St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1885-08-06
WOMAN THE NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS.
Mans Utter HeIpIessneSs without
WOman,S Aid.
gginson In Hnrner's Weaklv

L W. Htgg1nsOn in Harper'S Weekly.
A single man may have an estate,
principality; he can own great hotel and
fill it with guests; but he can not create
home without a woman TO help him, and
that, too. a woman whose service is not
for money. When it comes to a home,
there is not solitary dreSSmaker In the
land, enScOneed in her little room with her
geranium, her canary and her sewing
machine, who can not completely eclipse
him, this being heresult, not of his sins,
but of his sex.
Undoubtedly each reader will think, or
try TO think. of some exception to all this
some single man who is happy, some
Jolly bachelor" some cheerful wild
over" No doubt there are those who can
be happy, especially during the first half
of life, without the sense of home. A,
with his wealth and his paintings. and his
yachts and his delightful monologue; b,
with his perpetual jOurneyings; C, with
his six dogs, and our late Cambridge pro-
feSsOr, with that family of hens which he
tended, like herdsman, with long staff,
and which he trained 10 take food from
stakes stuck in the ground instead of
scratching in the flower beds-all these
may doubtless have found a bachelor life
not inconsistent with happiness; but where,
after all, is the home? Neither yachts,
nOrpictureS. nor steamer tickets, nor dogs,
nor hens, can supply that. Home" says
the prOverb, lis where the heart isl but if
so no man seems to have heart enough to
fit out home without woman to help
him. A woman can do it for herself;
there lies her advantage,
1t may be harder for a woman to make
money; undoubtedly it is harder. She
makes dollar, perhaps, where a man makes
twenty; but when it comes to purchasing
power her dollar goes the fartheSt toward
the maintenance of a home. So long as she
retains it she she Is strong and self-respect-
ing, and if she parts with it, SO strong is
the instinct of home that she can some
times reconstruct it for herself even in a
boarding house. If the home is combined
with little freedom in the use of money,
it gives more comfort and more local pres
tige than lone man can win by fortune.
What would be the social condition of any
country village i'm our Atlantic states
without tirst-clasS maiden lady? She is
the daughter of ''Old squire" somebody, or
of ''parsOn" somebody else; she lives in the
great square house with its elms and its
white lilacs and its breezy hall; she has
maid or two who have lived with her so
long that they seem like half sisters; she
has in daily use the precious china and the
old chairs that her enviOus city niece vainly
tried to rival at auction rooms. She man
ages the book club and the church sOciable:
she is the cOnfidante of all the love affairs:
she calls upon the new corners, if worthy
indeed the new corners, If worthy, bring
letters to her. To the older inhabitants OF
the town she always seems young and even
elegant; she has prolonged tradition OF
precedence that OutlastS youth and beauty;
if she has a sister they are spoken of to the
end of their days as the Parker girls"
All this is the joint result of wOmanhOOd
and home. or OF that wOmanhood which
created home. 1t is not only potent for
itself. but it extends its potency over all
other homes. What. compared to this. is
the social position given by wealth to the
lonely old bachelor of the country village?
Though he be a millionaire, he is simply
''the old bach.'
The truth is that as people grow older it
is the man who becomes dependent. and
the woman the central and essential figure
of the household. since she can do without
him and he cannot do without her.
The proof of this lies in the fact that
we see all around us self-sufiicing and con-
tented households of women. while house
that contains men only is a baTack. not a
home. In youth it is easy to ignore, to
say with Shakespeare in Henry V:
'Tis ever common
That men are merriest wlen away from home,
but the merriment is shallow, the laugh is
forced, and years and illness and sorrow
soon bring him back repentant prOdigal,
to his home and to woman, the only home
maker.