WOMAN’S WORLD

Taranaki Daily News, 12 February 1921, Page 10

WOMAN’S WORLD

A WOMAN’S PROBLEM. WIVES WITH NOTHING TO LOOK FORWARD TO. (By 8.D., in the Daily Times.) “I’m glad I’m not married,” someone remarked at the club. “Nearly all the wives I know seem vaguely discontented. They look so fretful and they’re always talking about the past.” “They have nothing to look forward to,” another woman put in. “That’s why they’re unhappy. You find fay more happy men than women because the ordinary man is always looking forward and the ordinary woman looks backward.”

I believe this is the explanation. No one who watches the married, careers of his, or her, friends can doubt that it is usually the wife, not the husband, who first begins to wear the disappointed look.

For the first few years marriage is a great adventure for a -woman. But when the keen edge of romance goes, when the children have ceased to be a novelty, when home-making has become a habit, a woman begins to wonder what on earth she has to look forward to. The ambitious man can always find interest, if not an acute happiness, in his work. It promises changes and development. He can—indeed he must look forward. The unhappy wife who feels that she has come to the end of everything has fealiy many little dodges for conquering the depression of disillusionment. Psychologically, she needs a new form of activity. She makes a bad blunder if she throws herself into feverish amusements. For to watch other people doing new things is no cure for an ennui which comes from doing nothing new oneself. An unhappy friend o-f mine found salvation at the age of 36 in music. She began to learn to play the piano for the first time and finds an enormous pleasure in looking forward to the day when she will he able to play a Beethoven sonata sufficiently well to please ft critical husband. She has discovered the joy of ambition. If these disappointed' wives would forget their age and throw themselves back in imagination ten or fifteen years they would see all kind?'of possibilities. There remain almost all those things to be done of which they dreamed as girls, and whether they take up sport or social work, or some form of artistic expression, given the need for honest, hard study such women need never feel that they have come to the end of everything. They still have something to look forward to.

THE “FORLORN HOPE.” SHOULD WOMEN PROPOSE? As a forlorn hope there is a proposal afoot among a certain class of business girl* ; n Scotland that proposal- in the future should be made on more business lines, as it is felt that the conditions of life have changed so much, and the expenses entailed by marriage aie now so great, that bachelors are hanging back because they are afraid to “take the leap” for reasons of expense. A member of the Women’s League, in an interview, gave some of the reasons why our young men are hanging back from matrimony. “Bachelors, and even young men one would have thought would have liked homes for themselves, are hanging back because they will not risk the expense of keeping a home going. They will not even come out to dances, because they are afraid that they may be inveigled into marriage. “I do not mean that at the more public dances there are not many young men, but at private dances, where one gets more chummy and friendly, the men worth while will not face up. BRIDES WHO WILL WORK. “It may seem to those who refuse to march with the times that the idea of a young woman working after her marriage is one that ought not to be put forward. But consider the times we are living in. One must look the facts in the face. Take the price of furniture at the present time and the rents of houses. Then there are the rates and thg food prices, to say nothing about clothes and the many other things. “Well, is there anything unmaidenly for girls to be able to say to the young man of their choice that they will be willing to give a 1. dping hand before marriage in getting the future and other things, and will not scruple to work for a time after marriage in order to lighten the load at first?

“One has got to consider what the war has cost our men. Those who went out at the first call, and were not demobbed until late, found themselves in Queer Street in too many instances. Four or five years out of the life of a young man changes his position verymuch. “Unless in the case of the few whose employers recognised the sacrifice they were ipaking, they fell back, and can never really-regain what they lost. This fact has made many of them fight shy of girls. They cannot see their way to take up life. Many of them are despondent, and the dreams they wove of coming back and marrying the girl of their choice have all been shattered. WITH PARENTS. “It is true that a very considerable number of young couples took the plunge, got married, and as there was no house to be got, stayed with their parents and relatives. I know enough of this class to be able to say that in a great many cases, after the glamor of marriage was over, the life in a home that was one in name only was really a respectable kind of hell. “Men have had, up till now, the prerogative of proposing to the lady of their choice. But I do not think it is anything to be termed immodest for a young woman who has a very shrewd idea that a certain young man is only fighting shy of her because he has not the wherewithal, to make a nest for her to approach him and give him a word of heartening and let him know that he will not be left to fight the battle alone. MANY LONELY MEN. “There are many lonely men who have come back from the war and have been enibittered by the gross ingratitude meted out to them and the utter selfishness of those who have made good while they were’ out yonder fighting. Their outlook is a very grey one. If left to brood on their wrongs they will become worse. ! “Sex matters arc now discussed quite I openly in any respectable newspaper, and 1 : right of

they see what is wrong, to try and put | matters right. I notice that there is much being said of the need for limiting the population. That is a matter which ' do hot intend to discuss, but I think ■ he day has come when women |should r aim their right to choose their companion for life in the same way as the other sex has done from time immemorial. The surplus of marriageable girls of Scotland is becoming a matter that must be tackled, and when one way of solving the question is thus presented I do not see that there should be any squirmi^ - over it. “In society the settlements are a matter which invariably counts, and if it is good for one class that the bride should have a good tocher, then surely at such a time'as this, when our men have had years torn out of their Jives, and, as a consequence, have not the money which they might otherwise have had to start a house, there is no harm in a girl being willing to help to set the home on a good basis.” THE KITCHEN. ’ HASTY PUDDING. Boil 2 cups of milk, and when quit, boiling add enough flour, stirring it in quickly, to make a fairly stiff, linn; paste. Have ready a pie-dish lined with jam,-put in the mixture, sprinkle the top with sugar, add a few lumps, of butter, then brown in’a quick oven. CURRANT DUMPLING. Mix Goz. of dripping into 11b. of flour, then add 2 cups of well-cleaned currants, 4 tablespoonfuls of sugar, and a little ■ grated cinnamon. Mix to a good stiff paste with cold water. Roll the mixture into balls, tie in floured cloths, and cook in boiling water for hours, BREAKFAST WHEAT. Take some fine-skinned wheat, wash and soak it over night. Next day boil it for a few minutes in salted water, put in a cooker, and leave it 4 hours at least (all day will not hurt). When : wanted, serve with cream and - golden syrup, honey, jam, or sugar. If you have ! not a cooker, keep on the back of stove.

RONA BISCUITS. Take 1 cup of sugar, } cup of milk, and 1 of soda. Put in a saucepan and just bring to boil. - Set aside to cool. Put in a basin lib. of flour into which rub of butter. Mix all together, roll put thin; cut in shapes, and bake a light brown. These are inexpensive and delicious. This recipe brought many shillings in for the Red Cross shop in Geraldine. We made them in bird shapes, and they did take well. RABBIT ON TOAST. Take any left-over pieces of rabbit, extract the bones, place in a pan with enough milk to keep it from burning, a sliced onion, and a few pieces of parsley. Beat up an egg, and add this just before pouring on the toast. FROSTED APPLES. Peel some good apples and stew them in a thin syrup till tender; the syrup may be prepared by boiling four or five ounces of sugar in half a pint of water for 10 minutes (the quantity of sugar varying with the acidity of the fruit.) When tender dip the apples in white of egg whipped until it is all froth, sift powdered sugar over them thickly, and bake in a very slow oven, when the sugar should sparkle like frost. When cold, pile them high in a glass dish. MEAT AND POTATO ROLY-POLY. Make some suet crust, and roll it out thinly. Cover this first with a layer of chopped raw potato, then some finger lengths of fresh meat. Sprinkle a little chopped parsley and onion over, and season with pepper and salt. Wet the edges, roll up, and tie in a floured cloth. Boil for 2 hours and serve with gravy. This is a help when meat is dear or not too plentiful. BRAN COFFEE. We always make our breakfast coffee this way. We take 5 breakfastcupfuls of clean bran and half a cup of treacle. Mix this well with the hands, then place in a large baking-dish, and bake till a dark brown color, stirring every few moments to prevent burning. To make the coffee take I tablespoonful to a cup of boiling water, or 6 tablespoonfuls to 8 cups of boiling water. Put this on the stove, and bring to the boil. Then strain through a coffee strainer. This may be used with or without milk and sugar just like the ordinary coffee. WORTHSLEY PUDDING. Take 2oz of butter, 2oz sugar, 2 eggs, 2oz. of flour, and i pint of milk. Melt the butter and beat it with the sugar, add the eggs and any flavoring. Stir in the flour, then the milk. Bake twenty minutes in a buttered pie-dish. BANBURY CAKES. Make slb. of good short crust. Take 2 tablespoonsful each of currants, chopped dates, and brown sugar. Mix all together with any stewed fruit. Cut the short paste into thick rounds, place some of the fruit mixture on each, fold over, press the edges together, roll out thin, brush over with sugar and water, and bake quickly. TO MAKE POULTRY TENDER. When steaming an old fowl, add a pinch of baking-soda or a desertspoonful of vinegar to the water. Once this is tried you will never miss doing it. TO KEEP MEAT. To keep meat in very hot weather, that bought on Saturday for Sunday’s dinner should be taken in hand as soon as it is delivered. Wash it well over with vinegar and water, then spread it over with slices of raw onion. This done, it will keep perfectly fresh in the hottest weather. Before cooking, remove onion; and rinse the meat thoroughly in clean water, so that no taste of onion may remain. WATER BISCUITS Take 6 small cups of flour, U teaspoonfuls of cream of tartar, 1 cup of dripping, and 1 cup of water. Put the water and sugar on the fire till all the sugar is dissolved. Sift the flour, carbonate of soda., and cream of tartar together, then rub in the dripping till it is crumbly. Mix with the water and sugar, roll out thin, cut out, and bake well.