Newspaper Page Text
Volume xv i l nr m ber g.
w
NEW YORK.—"Weeping," says
Dr. Sarah J. McNutt, tor twen
ty years teacher and profes
sor in two medical institutions
and a woman who knows
what her sisters are doing, "may al
most be considered as in the past
tense. 1 venture to say that where
there used to be hundreds of women
lying face down In the pillows blub
bering and having terrible times over
just nothing at all there are not ten
now. Why, it used to be just as much
a custom with some women to devote
half an hour a day, usually In the
afternoon, to half-forced crying as it
was for them to get up in the morn
ing.
"With some there was what may be
called a morbidly joyous search for
that which would give them an occa
sion for grabbing the handkerchief
and entering upon r sobful session.
With others they simply hurried other
duties along so as to be sure that
nothing would interfere with the
d^ly cry. Still another sort of woman
just trusted to luck that the day
would not be made wholly unbearable
by the absence of some trivial inci
dent suggestive of woe.
"Tears in those days were quite as
contagious as the measles. The period
of incubation was very brief. Neigh
bors hung out clothes in the back
yards and then leaning over the fence
would recall some doleful incident of
twenty years back, in which neither
had any direct interest, and there
upon the pickets they would mingle
their tears; iQitll household duties
called th^fl /way.
Some Cause for Their Grief.
"Now, it may be that there was
some excuse in a small percentage of
these cases, but only in a few. It
should have been quite as easy for a
woman to look at the world sensibly
then as it is now. But they^didn’t
seem to know how. Women used to
keep more to themselves than they do
now. They used to sit and think
about themselves and magnify small
things into large ones and try to carry
all the world’s woe on their shoulders,
and then, knowing full well that they
were in for it, they would seek relief
in the easy way.
"When woman began to get a grasp
of herself and to find that she was in
the world to do something besides
mope and moan and sob and sigh the
situation began to change. The status
of woman in the household had much
to do with making her a weeper, just
as her new status has made her the
happy, smiling woman we see around
us now.
"Man used to be the unit in the
household and the wife obviously be
came the cipher. The unit would take
his place at the head of the table
and between mouthfuls deliver mon
ologues on the state of the nation and
society, to which the cipher would be
a patient, although generally not an
interested listener.
Man the Supreme Monarch.
“He expressed all the opinions for
the domestic establishment, made its
laws, interpreted them like a high
court and administered them. Being
the silent member the wife found no
other way to relieve herself than to
get away in some dark corner with
a camphor bottle and boo-hoo until
she had a pain in the stomach and
her eyes frightfully red. Then she
would '‘draw one final sigh, broken up
into half a dozen sections, and hurry
to the kitchen to resume her inter
rupted duties.
“She sniveled through the long win
ters, sobbed when the birds were
singing in the spring, wept from
planting time until after harvest In
the fall, and were it not for her gen
erally good constitution she would
have been under the weeping willows
before she was thirty.
“When woman of that period went
out to do a little shopping it was cus
tomary for the husband to go along
and of course carry the wallet. She
would timidly buy 16 cents’ worth of
needles and thread, and he, with a
flourish, would slowly unwind the
strap from the pocketbook and count
out the change, take the package and
hand it to her, and she in turn would
sigh her thanks for this evidence of
generosity and love.
"It is a true picture that I have un
dertaken to draw —true every word of
it. No wonder that women went
around with granulated eyelids and
fluttered a sigh with every tenth
breath.
Old Order of Things Changed.
"Os course. It was inevitable that
women would get away from this con
dition of oftentimes self-imposed de
pression. They just had to wake up.
The old order of things had to pass.
The great sisterhood of American
women has stepped out of the
shadows into the sunlight and it is
getting something real and good out
of life now.
“It jwould be Inaccurate to say that
women have given up crying alto-
bulletin.
gether, but they have progressed to a
point where they no longer have
nerves forever on edge and tears for
ever on tap.
"Now I will tell you how I think it
came about. Mental stimulus has
done it. Just so soon as a woman
ceases to Imagine that she is the most
utterly forlorn and unhappy person
in the world she is bound to get a
new angle on herself. Women today
have minds for other things than
themselves. They are not worrying
over what they used to call their sad
fate. They are thinking about others,
about matters of some moment, about
books and plays and gardens and
happiness, and when they give to
these things all the time they deserve
there are no spare moments for lone
ly moaning, accompanied by sniffs.
Exit the Day of the Tear.
“There are in round numbers 60,000
clubwomen in New York. Do you
suppose any of them will spot a lace
handkerchief with a tear today? Not
one. How many of the bright-eyed
young business women —stenograph-
ers, typewriters, clerks,, office assist
ants and all the others —do you im
agine will go to business this morn
ing wondering whether they will find
time for a good cry during the day?
Not one, unless she Is ill. How many
of the shopgirls on the east side and
in Brooklyn do you suppose will go
sniffling to their work today? Not
one. They are too busy.”
Dr. McNutt took a number of books
from the top of her desk and dropped
one upon another with a slam.
“There,” she said, “are seven anti
dotes for tears. If you want others,
there are the newspapers. I’m a
great believer in novels. I read a lot
of them. They give me just the kind
of mental thrill that is good for me.
A good, clean story without a prob
lem is a tonic.
“If I could put a chauffeur novel in
the hands of some of our women who
still think there is something to weep
over in everyday life I believe I could
shut off the flow of pails of tears. All
of our young women read nowadays.
Take the girl just out of the office.
She jumps into the novel yacht or
the novel automobile or climbs onto
the novel load of hay and away she
goes. If she is in the novel yacht
she goes dancing over the waves of
the Sound and feels the cool spray in
her face. When night comes the
yacht puts in at Stamford or New
Haven and she goes to sleep and Is
lulled to pleasant dreams by the swish
of the water. She slips on her gog
gles and goes spinning over the road
in the machine, her hair flying and
sights changing all along the way.
Reading That Has Helped.
“One thing about stories is that you
do not have to do any talking your
self. Writers have away of making
people say just the thing that the
reader would like to say were she in
the book. That helps a lot. It doesn’t
tire one. Unconsciously the reader
enters into the enjoyment of the spirit
of wholesome adventure that runs
through the pages and it seems to be
real. Yoh see it helps a woman to
get into a new atmosphere, and in
that lies the secret of cheeriness.
"The really busy woman has no
time to snivel. She knows that it is
time wasted. She knows that it means
nothing in comfort and that it is
bound to make her nervous and take
the snap out of her eyes.
“Yes, yes; crying is rapidly becom
ing a lost art. The bottle of smelling
salts still dangles at the end of the
chatelaine chain, but its use is purely
decorative. The sniff and sob are no
longer modern.”
“Women,” said Dr. Mary MacMil
lan, “have become more philosophical
IRWINTON, WILKINSON COUNTY, GEORGIA, FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 1911.
in recent years. They have found that
tears are unproductive of substantial
results and therefore not to be sum
moned at frequent periods. A woman
friend of mine had a daughter among
the passengers on the Olympic when
that vessel met with an accident on
the other side. The girl very thought
fully sent a cablegram to her mother
telling of her saiety. It was received
on this side with smiles instead of
tears.
"I imagine it would have been dif
ferent a generation or two back. One
might picture a mother then wring
ing her hands and sobbing quite as if
she had met with a great misfortune.
Days of Mingled Tears.
“It was customary, I have been
told, for news of joyful character con
cerning an incident of some serious
ness to be received with great out
pourings, which were not confined to
the person most interested, but par
ticipated in by others in the imme
diate circle of relatives and friends.
The person whose tears fell first
would naturally send for the next
nearest relative, who would hear the
news and then mingle her tears with
the other’s. Then others would come
in and take out their handkerchiefs
and form part of the circle. About
dusk the manifestations of lachrymal
disturbance would reach its height,
for the shadow period Is supposed to
be appropriate for it, after which it
would subside and by and by there
would be a general brightening up. I
have heard it said that much satis
faction was had on occasions of the
sort, but we now know that it was a
mistake.
“There are legitimate occasions for
tears without creating them, but there
are few trials which may not be faced
by women without tears. Women no
longer live in an atmosphere of what
may be called the woebegone. They
do not look at life from the vale of
tears viewpoint, and it is well that
they do not. With smiles taking the
place of tears there will be buoyancy
instead of depression, cheeriness in
stead of moroseness. Healthy, nor
mal women ought not to weep and
few of them do.” —New York World.
Says Missionaries Lack Tact.
Professor Frederick W. Williams of
Yale, who is an expert on China, be
lieves too many missionaries to the
Chinese are tactless, according to the
New York Sun. To their tactlessness
he imputes the small number of Chi
nese ’converts.
Professor Williams, at a luncheon
at Princeton said last month:
“1 have known missionaries as Ig
norant of tact as Jim Driscoll was ig
norant of foot rules.
“Jim Driscoll, a farm boy. got a
job in a steel mill, and his boss gave
him a foot rule one day, and said:
“ ‘Measure me that plate out there
in the yard.’
“Jim at the end of a half hour,
returned and said:
“ ‘The plate is the length of the rule
and three fingers over, with this piece
of cobblestone, and the stem of my
pipe and my foot from here to here,
bar the toecap.’ ”
Sanitarium Fame.
First Invalid —You must think you
are somebody, judging from the way
you talk.
Second Ditto —1 want you to real
ize, sir, that I’ve been fought over tn
some of the best hospitals in the land.
—Puck.
Explained.
Jack —Why did you give up your
bachelor quarters? Tom— Because
I’m goln,. to marry dollars. —Birming-
ham News.
HIE 810 STORE TREATS
YOE RIGHT
Bill Siggins Says:
“The only thing I ever see any one get for nothin’ was a
zero with the rim knocked off.”
We want to commend Mr. Siggins’ saying as wise and
true. In these days you see so much of the something for
nothin’ that you don’t know where to land. Our idea has
been, is, and always will be===a good, square deal to
all. We only handle goods of known values; goods that
their trade mark is “HALLMARK” of quality. We believe
in the advertised lines===as we know a brand of merchan
dise that has stood the test of the ad man’s work for years
must be right. Each week we are going to tell you
of one line well known that we sell, and we want you to
watch for same.
We want you to come to Milledge=
J
ville; come to the big store
and let us show you.
W. S. MYRICK & CO.
Milledgeville’s Only Department Store
81.00 A YBAR.
