WOMAN'S WORLD

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 74, 14 August 1912, Page 6

WOMAN'S WORLD

| (Conducted by "Eileen.") WIT AND WISDOM OF'AN ACTRESS. At the Savage Club's ladies' dinner in London Alias Gertrude Kingston responded to the toast of the evening—that of "The Ladies." She apologised for rising in a state of unashamed preparedness. But there was one consolation, she said, she was always much more amusing when she she had not prepared a speech and immensely more interesting when she was indiscreet. The indiscretions of an actress had always been pleasing to the British public. (Laughter). There was, however, this disadvantage—when she spoke at random and "shot an arrow into tlie air" without taking aim, aftef the manner of her sex, she usually hit somebody. (Laughter). She pointed out that while there were popular ways of doing popular tli' there were also unpopular ways of d ■ .y popular things, as, for instance, the Insurance Act, which everybody received with enthusiasm at the beginning, and ' with invective now that it was coming into practice. The i'ress frequently took up some things and made them popular, while about other things there was a conspiracy of silence. Mann and Malecka were popular subjects just now, while Pankhurst and Pethick Lawrence were condemned to utter silence.

PRINCESS AND HER THIRD HUSBAND. Another chapter in the carrT of Countess Montignoso, the Princess Louisa of Saxony, closed at Florence, where her definite separation from Signor Toselli, j the pianist, took place before the legal tribunal. The settlement of the case has beeii several times postponed because the Princess had in the meantime written a most affectionate letter to her former husband from her new home in Brussels expressing a wish for a reconciliation. The final separation took place under circumstances of a most cordial nature. The two met in a corridor of the law courts at 7 o'clock in the morning, and chatted affably together. It was decided that their son "Bobby" should remain in the care of Toselli's parents at the father's expense, and that the mother should retain the right of free access to 1 the child at all times. It was further agreed that there should be no money allowance on either side. The Princess' leave-taking of her third ex-consort, before motoring to the railway station, was as hearty as her greeting hail been earlier in the day.

But for Jur escapades, the Countess Montignoso would now be the Queen of Saxony, but life at Court with her husband, the Crown Prince, had no charm for her, and in 1902 Europe was scandalised by the news that she had run away with M. Giron, her children's Belgian tutor. In February, 1903, she was divorced by the Prince. Finally, in September, 1007, she married Signor Toselli at the Strand Registry Office in London.

j THE NEW JAPANESE GIRL IThe eternal feminine continues to occupy a great deal of space in the columns of the Tokio Press; in fact, an amount iof space quite out of proportion to the regard in which she is generally held in ) Japan, where the principle seems to be that women shpuld be seen and not heard. The Ivokumin Shimbun, an im- , portant daily paper, complains that the girlhood of the present day is not satisfied with the homely habits of its grandmothers, but is rushing after excitement, culture and fashion—and, incidentally, <; husbands. The journal points out that I cattle-breeding, apiculture, poultry farm- | ing, sericulture, truck and flower gardening are all most suitable occupations for young ladies of the yeoman class. "But, alas!" it is added, "there is a noticeable and deplorable tendency on the part of modern young ladies to 'positively hate' such occupations, and they hasten on every occasion to alienate themselves from the enchanting and healthful atmosphere of agriculture." It is a regrettable sign of the times (says the journal) when young ladies consider it beneath their dignity to follow the pursuit of their parents, and strive to compete in the bustle of the town life. And this has another disastrous effect, for the young men follow suit, yearn for the city life, and marriage with the city girls. This deplorable tendency lias been observable in other countries, but in Belgium, the United States and France it

has been combatted by the authorities, and it is high time, in the opinion of the Knkumin, that the Japanese educational authorities (lid something to save the country lass and the country bumpkin from themselves, and keep them where they belong —on the land.

GREAT ADVANCE OF THE GERMAN WOMAN The common notion of our German sister has too often been demarcated by the Kaiser's famous "three K's"—Tvuche Kinder, Kirche. She has been regarded as essentially the Ilausffrau. This, however, is shown by l'luga Munstcrberg, in the Atlantic Monthly, to be an impression wholly out of date. lie tells how only last year, in a meeting of leading professors, a young woman stood up and opposed the prevailing sentiment, and quietly but firmly turned the meeting to her side. "It was distinctly the influence of woman's oratory over a large group of important men. Twenty years ago that would have been entirely impossible in Germany." Shortly afterwards he was present at a great banquet to a leading jurist. The bestknown professors of law made speeches, and the guest of honor told how he had devoted his life to the idea that one nation ought to have one law. Then a young woman arose, with a champagne glass in her hand. She brilliantly interpreted the speaker to mean that there should be one law only, the same law for men and women, and that the women must therefore have the same rights as the men in public life. "In all my life in the Fatherland I had never before heard a woman making a toast at a public dinner." The girls' school of Germany until recently stood immeasurably below the boys' school. Now the girls' chances are not inferior to those of boys. Tn everv family it seems beyond discussion that the daughter shall prepare for a definite line of activity. About 10 million women are breadwinners in Germany, 3% million women in industrial work and business, and "738.000 women are independent owners and heads of establishments." The number of women students at the universities this year is about 2400.