The Bolivar bulletin. [volume] (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.) 1865-1888, 1886-02-12
MODERN SIRENS.
Female Canvassers and the Bright
Weapons Of Their Success.


on a place in mythology by being born
so recently. Had she been around
when the willy Ulysses was going about
with those impressionable Greeks on
yacht cruises, she would have COM
manded a good salary in any chorus of
sirens. Coming into existence in the
Ammo Domini period, she is perforce
compelled to change her tactics. She
does not try to catch tar, although a
Tartar every now and then falls in her
way, but sets about Turing the business
man into financial ruin. The female
canvasser is one of the few things of
contemporaneOus interest that were
not created to fill a long-felt want. No
one has ever been known to yearn for
her coming or to feel that her absence
manufactured a vacuum in his exist
ence. Phe result is that she has be-
come an interesting waif hunting for
an opening who diffuses herself over
the fair face of nature wherever the
shekels are Tipest.
The female canvasser is generally in
the book or advertising line. She
somehow contrives to find something
in both with which she can make appeal
TO the sluggish charitable instincts of
humanity. She never seems to be
working for business, but only for the
love of the cause in which she is en-
listed. and there is always some ulte-
riOr person OF purpose to be benefited
by a sale or subscription. Upon the
deserving character of this person or
purpose she always brings her efO-
quence to bear. 1t is not the mere
H. al
appears to be only the stimulation of
interest in the scheme she represents.
When she does take the money or its
eGuivalent-and that happens pretty
Often-shc does it as though she were
only performing a subordinate part of
the donors duty for which he ought to
be grateful to her.
The man who contributes to a char
ity or buys q bill of goods from a
drummer has a vague notion that he
has done a service for the solicitor.
But the female canvasser never permits
him to harbor any such idea about her.
He is given to understand that he has
done only what he should have done
long ago, and it was highly improper
for him TO wait till she reminded him
of it. That is the reason every one
feels himself humble and abashed
when a female canvaSser looms up in
the horizon, and feels humber and
more abashed when she leaves.
There are two kinds of female can
vassers-the old and the young varie-
ties. Their methods are dramatically
opposite. The one says everything she
can; the other as little as she can. The
former is a born exhorter She can
get in more vocal work in given
space than any male agitator Of the
,F hn
riety of canvasser does not run the
campaign that way. Her strong
points are her eyes. Once her tongue
has set forth her business it suspends
and her eyes begin to issue dividends.
Thereafter all operations are carried on
from that quarter
She finds this the most effective way.
A whole park of artillery would not
hold its own as an instrument of de-
struction against the eyes of a we'll
organized canvasSer. If she is coldly
received she throws a little warmth and
feeling into her chances. If she is re-
buffed the eyes fill. If she is turned
away she sutluses them with look of
pleading that would reduce adamant at
q hundred PAGES. She begs with them.
prays with them, urges with them and
eXhorts with them, and as there is no
force known to science that will over
come this mute insistence, humanity
has to yield and the reluctant purse
strings have to loosen.
Cunning business people know this.
They know that a female canvasser is
more fatal than any other engine of
war that can be brought to bear upon
the works with which mankind has
trenched itself against booksellers and
advertisers. So nowadays they reserve
hnr for fha fDr.IOru homo Nvnrlr and
launch her against the stOutest pointed
resistance, confident of the result
A reporter yesterday Rad a talk with
one of these long headed people. He
found her in an Office which eXhaled
more aroma than Sixth avenue phar-
macy, and contained more feet of femi-
nine artfulness than any known insti-
tuition outside of a charity fair. The
ladies in it were all canvaSsers. One
,,uld tell in twinkling from the flu
ency Of the utterances of the more ell
derby and the limpid catch-on-fulness
of the eyes of the younger ones. After
they had each poured few gallons of
melody into the boss's ears and varied it
every now and then with little mirth-
full refrains descriptive of how certain
positions were carried and the "loot'
taken, they all got up and went out
The reporter quailed as they filed
past him, He. thought of Amazons
going to war and trembled for the
store-keepers and Office clerks upon
whom all those resources of rhetoric
and optics would soon be brought to
bear. Then he accosted the gentleman
who owned and operated the line of
female Canvassers and asked where he
got most of his recruits.
From the very best kind of people, -
said the manager of this AGGREGATION
of tongues and eyes. mo one else
would do. You Will find that all those
ladies are people of culture. Many of
them are highly educated. Some have
been brought up in affjuence. How do
they come to canvass, you ask? That
is easily told, There is no country in
the world that witnesses so many vicis-
STUDIES of fortune as this, and none
where a woman has so many ways of
earning an Independence. Your woman
of spirit does not sit down and SWIVEL
when she finds herself without means,
or look TO her relatives for a precariOus
living, which is often yielded pretty re-
luctantly. She buckles on the armor
and starts out to fight her own battles.
Thank goodness, our American women
are not hedged in by the restraints that
are somewhere imposed on the sex.
They can do business with business
people without detriment TO their wOm-
auhOOd.
tThey can 90 about with nearly all