IDLE LADY'S COMPLAINT.

Waikato Times, Volume I, Issue 228, 25 October 1873, Page 2

IDLE LADY'S COMPLAINT.

Ik n paper recently read at tbe iSociili Science Booms, th© author — a medical man' of eminence— stated that he was acquainted with a disease which ae»med to attack women exactly in proportion to" the number of their tervauti. So far as his experience extended, no woman who did her own housework was ever attacked by this fearful malady, which, to avoid disagreeable details, we shall call the "Idle Lady's Complaint." Persons who kept ono maid-of-all-work were occasionally known to undergo it, and women with twp orj;hree rather more frequently. But the ravages of the disease were among. the ladies who possesied regularly mounted establishment* of three ra»le and female domestics. For them the danger was portentous ! We cannot but suspect that Dr Alfred; Carpenter carried out his theory a little " beyond tho boot" . . . . But the fact that women who are compelled to stir their blood by sharing in domestic labours, turning, beds, sweeping floors, or only dusting their " parlours," art less, liable to illness than those who ore relieved from fch« necessity of such avocations, and have found nothing better- to do, is ft matter which we can all readily credit, even without the doctor's- amusing statistics. . . An aimless life, or a life whose only aim is to pass away the hours pleasantly, isaot tbo less an unwholesome existence because it is a delicate and high-bred woman who leads it, and idleness is " tbe root of all evil," for the fine lady quite as truly as for the ploughboy who is taught to believe i-. so in the Tillage school. The question recurs continually, What are men and women of fortune to do, when nobody in particular wants them, and they,are possessed of no particular abilities to do anything ? . . The problem is one which has made a thousand hearts ache in vain efforts of solution, and it would be an idlenes» more impertinent than nil the othrr idlenesses to pretend it can thus be readily- answered, or even, that much help can be given to its solution by any [general observations. After some remarks on the question- aa it affects men^ the writer concludes as follows : — For the women- threatened with tho "Idle Lady's Complaint" the case is far more difficult. When we read such a book as Mrs Qrote's memoir of her husband, we behold the natural and fitting union of pursuits, the interchange of high thought as well as tender feeling, wherein the noblest kind of marriages is found,, and doubtless also the most perfect happiness. But when x mau regularly leaves his political, or literary, or commercial interests, as a Turk leaves his slippers, outside tbedoor of his wife's apartments, and — as often happens — compels her to- lead all her days » life of intellectual divorce, what can happen, if she have nob her haiids full of children* but that sne must either create some separate interest for herself, or dwindle and wither in idleness inanition ? Thje same thing, of course, applies to grown up daughters. There are many who. are not clever enough, or have not energy enough, to undertake any original pursuit in life, but there are very few indeed — and certainly no man of sense ought to marry one of. them- — who are incapable of giving some interested attention to<the pursuits of the men nearest to them, and being their aids, companions, counsellors, aud friends. Wtiero is. tfie man who would not rejoice to have such comradeship as. Madame BoUnd or Mrs Browning gave the husbands., in their political and literary lives*? Such cases, of course, are and must be rare ; and yet how few systematically attempt to draw the mind of tbe young wife into sympathy. Thestimulus of a deep affection is often needed to take womenout of the narrow round of a school-girl's interest into the world of wider cares of the man of business or literature. But loving encouragement would often accomplish the purposes even wH-fi those who are seemingly frivolous to the backbone, and for others the opening of » new sphere of interest would ennoble the whole character, and make the heart mere capacious even for love itself. We will not say with the much-quoted bard of the nursery about Satan, idle hands, kc. ; but we may safely affirm that men have' only themselves to blame whenwomen fall into habits of indolence and indifference, frivolity or extravagance, or come to perish at last of the mysterious disease,. the " Idle Lady's Complaint."