Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1873-06-11
WOmen's Real Needs.
BY EMILY FAITHFUL.

In England there are now three million
women dependent on their own exertions.
To tell such as these that woman's proper
sphere is home, is mockery, for they are
forced from their homes to get bread.
Though many barrier to woman's earn
ing a livelihood has been broken down,
there are still terrible difficulties in find
ing employment for women. Specially
onerous is the effort in the case of those
Of fallen fortunes, members Of the genteel
classes. True it is that young men now
find it hard to get suitable work; they
often have to 90 West But there is no
analogy among them to the wholesale
yearly destruction of consciences, bodies
and souls, among wOmen-destructiO too
often brought about by destitution
How can tender-hearted people fold
their hands while so many of their sisters
are driven to the gates of perdition by
want of bread? Statements are published
that capable women, willing to work, can
get employment at good wages. Good,
steady, skilled labor is wanted in just
those departments where women have
gained position. The unremitting, earnest
application required to acquire skill in
these departments, is hard for women to
60 through. In them, love of work, for
its own sake, is no more inherent than in
men. Moreover, women are always look
ing for the appearance of the possible
emancipation. Men have nothing but their
work to look to for dependence. The
greatest evil Of all is the lack of the right
early training, and for this the family, the
parents, and society in general must be
impeached. Society casts stigma on
women who earn their own livelihood,
and parents pray that their daughters may
never be brought so low. AS to education,
a girls training tops just where the main
part of boys begins. Men are allowed
full opportunity to devote themselves to
their chosen work, and are not diverted by
social demands. Women are at the beck
and call of everybody, as it were, and
have so many society duties, so many dis
tracing little trifles to attend to, that the
wonder is not that there has not been a
female Shakespeare, Raphael, and Newton,
but that women have done so much
The problem, what shall we do with our
redundant women in England, is answered
by some philosophers by proposing emf
grafton and marriage. But emigration
has already been largely tried, and Scotch,
English, and Irish women have been sent
to Australia and America in great num-
UCIS WIbIoGt lliuCll UlInlulSu1uS UuC CRAWL
ty of the problem; while as for marriage,
there is yet to be found the woman to say
mo" when the right man appears. AS
long as the number of women in Great
Britain exceeds that of the men by six per
cent, marriage will not wholly do away
with the difficulty, unless Mormonism is
tried.
True marriage is the crown and glory
of woman's life; but i must be founded
on love, and not on the desire of home
or of support, while nothing can be
more deplorable, debasing, and corrupt
ing than the loveless marriages brought
about in our upper society BY a craven
ambition and longing for a good settle
ment. Loveless marriages, and different
standard OF morality for men and women,
are the curses Of modern society.
The dignity of labor is not yet properly
appreciated We agree that work is hon
orable in a man, but are not yet convinced
that idleness is dishonorable in a woman.