Clarksville weekly chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1873-1890, 1886-08-28
WHO DOES IT THE REsr2
The Difference Between Men and Women
as They Perform Common Duties.
A Matter Of Fact View by Nashville
Philosopher as to Sweeping,
Scrubbing, Etc,


"There are many points OF differ
ence in the style and manner in which
ladies' do things which gentlemen dc
which may well excite remark, said q
Nashville philosopher yesterday as he
leaned back in his chair and looked out
on the world from the bay window OF 9
comfortable residence.
Now, I'm not going to tell you," he
said, addressing the handsomest OF the
Union reporters, that lady can't
throw a stone straight, or that she
drives with both hands and nearly
saws the horses head off with the
reins, or any of those old, fossilized,
moss back chestnuts; nor am l going to
guy the gentler sex or say they can't dc
most things better than a man do the
same, because | think that, all things
being equal, they can. But / do say,
and will stick to it, that while a wo-
man can sweep floor or scrub a floor
or polish stove as good as a man can
do it, she can not do these things with
out kicking up fuss and making
everybody in the house uncomfortable.
That's the issue. Now then:
"When a man wants to sweep a
floor, he just sweeps it. He begins up
at one end and sweeps along, and when
he comes to a chair or a table, he
sweeps under and around it, and il any
thing is sitting in the chair, he or she
can stay right there. Don't make any
difference; it's all right.
But, when woman wants to sweep.
she just raises merry Hades. She be-
gins by saying: If you don't want to
get al covered with dust, you'd better
go into the next ROOM Then she
covers her head with a sweeping cap or
binds up her aching brow with an
alleged all-linen, ten cent towel, and
gets all OF the tables and chairs into the
middle OF. the room, and she starts for
the floor with rush like the cranky
cooper who recently breasted the
rapids of the raging Niagara. II there
is delinquent taxpayer upon the roof
OF that house, and the lady is sweeping
the basement floor, the derelict patriot
on the roof will know what she is doing
in the cellar. For if he will only pay
attention he will not only hear the
broom swish, but he will feel the
dust tingling in his nostrils. And
downstairs, where the angel of the
household is sweeping, the air will be
as thick with limestone dust as the
so-called boulevarde along Broadway
from the proposed sight OF the union
depot to the triangular junction OF
Broadway, West End and Belmont
avenues"
"Then again, suppose a woman
wants to scrub floor. First, she will
put on a pair OF llar-oyer-shoes, and
then she will turn up her skirts and pin
them so as to form festoons from her
waist midway between her shapely
ankles and her knees. Then she will
get a couple Of buckets of water, one
hot and the other cold, scrubbing
brush and big piece of soap. which
smells nasty as the "spicy breezes"
that blow along the unwashed and un-
terrified cutters of South Cherry street.
Then she'll get down upon her
hands and knees and work and scrub
and splash water, and scold everybody
who looks at the floor until the afore-
said floor is clean and dry. Her poor
back is almost broken. She has con-
tracted rheumatism in her joints, and
her finger-nails full OF mud.
GA man would simply get bucket
of water, possibly some soap, and then
with long-handled mop in his hands
would walk around and clean that floor
in few minutes, very likely smoking
cigar or agreeing as to the propriety
of Bob Taylor meeting ALT. in joint
debate, and willing to bet that the
Watauga Boy can down the Fellow
from Chucky, and with 10000 votes
to spare. If anybody walks across the
floor the man will swipe the mop across
the footprints and remove the tracks.
Moreover, continued the philoso-
pher, with evident intention to silence
the reporters battery, moreover, a
woman in shining stove will look as
thongh she had been in a fight when
she has finished. Her hair will be fly
ing in all directions, her bangs will be
straightened as by thunderstorm, and
she will have great patches of stove
polish all over her face, hands and
arms.
While she is at it she will make
noise enough to wake a dead man.
Her brush will rattle the stove-lids
and bang around the oven doors in a
way to make all the neighbors sick.
Men.who clean stoves are usually SO
dark complexioned (not complected,
as the American reporter has it) that
the backing will not show upon them
if they get it upon them, and they don't
make any noise about it anyway. So
you see, very plainly, after all, that all
Of this school sophistry about the
equality of the sexes will not bear the
test of domestic appliance.
THE new silver certificates authorized
at the last session OF Congress will not