St. Landry democrat., 1885-05-02
WOMEN IN BUSINESS.

Their NIaIo Friends Largely Responsible
for Their Lack of Aptitude for Affairs.
One of the strongest arguments in
the minds of many against woman
rights is the want of aptitude shown by
women, as whole, for business. Now
and then woman, strong and mighty.
will make her appearance and seem to
be a proof OF the hidden talent pos
sessed by her sex. But the vast
number of women prove conclusively
that if they possess the business talent
tbs most securely hidden, and nothing
but practical education in the laws gov
erning. the transactions of the business
world will reveal it. Fathers and
brothers are largely to blame for this
ignorance, rs the majority of them are
educated to believe that business af
fairs are none of Woman's business,
but that it is field to be occupied en-
tirely by themselves.
A weLl-knoWn writer ON the SUBJECT,
abiding to the fact that some business
men and some corporation refuse to do
business with women, says:
Business men or corporations have,
of course, the right to put upon their
business transactions such limits as
they think fit, but men will certainly
adopt and maintain only such laws
and limitations as are profitable. 1t is
well to know what disadvantages
women rest under in business; but all
of them can be traced to one disad-
vantage of not being trained into care
full business habits. Every girl should
be taught how to keep her accounts in
an orderly and business-like manner;
she should be trusted with IN allow
ance, be held responsible for its man.
agement, and made to abide the con-
sequences of its mismanagement; and
every girl should be taught arithmetic
in such practical way that she can
compute interest, buy and sell, and de-
pend with perfect confidence on her
own figures.
1.-The injustice that parents-rich and
poor-do their daughters by bringing
them up in a state of infantile ignorance
of affairs, and by keeping them in a
condition of pecuniary dependence even
after they have reached womanhood, is
not to be computed. 1t can, indeed, be
measured only by the modification, the
inconvenience and suffering in which
such raising involves its victims.
"'Have | not walked openly, says
Mrs. Helen Campbell, into q choice
selection of the pitfalls which yawn be-
fore my sisters, and all because certain
business knowledge, which man seems
to get through his fingers ends, fails to
become q part of ordinary women.
With the man there is an inherited apti-
tude, AID observation and constant OPP
portunity to confirm the habit. With
the woman there is equally an inher-
tied inaptitude, and not only this, but
an indifference and placidly accepted
ignorance that, to one who has learned
what shocking wrong may be the result
of this state, is simply appalling.
I" Property slips away suddenly,
rights are invaded or set aside, children
suffer, lives are spoiled, through failure
to find out precisely what certain forms
mean, or what the bearing of an action
may be. Every week brings to us the
story of some woman's suffering through
blind confidence that things were safe
and right; while thousands, through
sharp experience, have learned their
lesson, other thousands are ruined be-
yond hope or redress. The bearings OF
common law should be as much part
of girls education as arithmetic or
any other essential. - Christian
Union.