Smyrna times., 1867-03-13
The Commonplace Woman.
The following is going the rounds of t

The following is going the rounds of the
newspapers. The author is unknown:
Woman is an institution common to all civ
ilized countries, in one Of which we are proud
to have our birth-right and local habtation =
As an institution she has been praised to the
topmOst pinnacle Of lofty reputation, and she
has been cursed in a Delilah, Borgia, a Mrs.
Cunningham, and few others of an infamous
sort of character. Writers who have mention
ed woman at all, have made it their special du-
ty to praise or blame her. They fancy that
the dilemma has but two horses, and that they
are obliged to lay hold on one or the other Of
them.
But there is an interesting betweenity which
is emphaticaly worthy of honorable mention
and which has been allowed to suffer from neg
lect We alude to the commonplace woman,
who is not ilustriOusly good nor VIGOROUSLY
wicked, but one who gets up fellow linen i'll
an impeachable STYLE and fries dOughnuts ac-
cording to Mrs. Hall. These are home wo-
men, and their sphere of action is limited by
the fence around their yard, but their infu-
ence extends much further
| Our recolections Of this class of our subject
commences very early. 1t was one of them
who first introduced us to huckaback soften
ed with SOAP" that polished the surface Ofour
face for Sabbath school, and spanked us for
interfering with the setting hen or trying the
bounding qualities Of our ball upon the surface
of the parlor mirror. 1t was one Ofthese COM
monplace women that slipped us into the mys-
teries of Comly's spelling, and gave force to the
catechism by a vigorous application of corset
board, y Spare the rod and spoil the child, y
was not illustrated in our juvenile manage
ment. Hence we are justified III advocating
this special class of wOmanhood.
1t is by no means an insignificant class; but
when kept out of books and blue-stOckings,
they are the most influential of their race. Il
is to them that the sex who has the bills tC
pay looks for the genuine of his household. =
No man wants a Joan of Arc to sew on hi
buttons or dish tea. A Jenny Lind woull cu
a poor figure in the commissary department O
a well-regulated household. A Browning o.
a Hemans would be sadly away from HelicO
in attempting the regulation of 'well-sprn
! of pleasure" No, the high-pressure wOme
are not sought after to fill these inches in life
They are comets in the home galaxy, and thei
tales are not a good lullaby for the baby, no
do they answer we'll for the larder
But our betweenitles just fill the bill. The
! are mistresses of the art of housekeeping.
: They are the genii Of order. Chaos cannC
p exist where their fingers are free Put one OF
4 them in a bachelors apartment for half a
; hour and the poor brute who owns the apart
) ment would think he was an intruder,on some
; a glorious set of creatures. They spank Il
! and kiss us, and scrub us while young, cajo
/ us when we become to be boys, jilt and fiji
. with and tantalize and finally marry us as lo'
ers, then make themselves slaves to our war;
- robes and spend our loose change Gd ti6itn
Is 1t is this class of women that buffers OF
G. toast, darns our socks, restores our button
lee brushes our castOrs scolds us for staying o.
Id late at night, lectures on each of the artlcl
lg in the code of proprety, tweak ks our noses +
We smiling too fOndly on Susan Jane Highfye
lg in short, they are our guardian angels, Il
so moulders of our morals and manners, thespe
IT. ders of our money, the everything that e.
Yates the nature of man and makes him te
that he is not altogether lord of all he surve
'lr especially inside his own dOmicil.
Ell The public may go mad over RlstOrl or
IT Ingeow, or a Sigourney, or BraddOn; b
lie for all practical uses and wholesome infuenc
ke give us a Mrs. Jones, or a Mrs. Smith or
he Mrs. Jenkins-especially the one who fries c
MS pancakes and scolds us for not coming home
L time to eat them hot We would rather ha
ast our hair pulled and our socks darned by 0
= ofthem, than to be possessor OF a piece OF
ere manity who could write sonnet, butcould
co. manage a son or sew on button.