Lyon County times. [volume] (Silver City, Nev.) 1874-1907, 1886-10-02
A WOMAN ON WOMAN.
q. Ouida" Plucks a Plume from Her
Hat and oft Makes a Pleasing Pen.

sOuida- PIucks Plume from Her
Hat and oft Makes Pleasing Pen.
The woman is the enemy of freedom. Give
her power and she is at once despotic,
whether she be called Elizabeth Tudor or
Therogne de Mirecourt, whether she be be.
nehcent or malcvolent ruler, whether she
be sovereign or a revolutionist. The en-
ormous pretentions to the monopoly Of mans
life which women put forward in marriage
are born Of the desire to tyrannze. The rage
and amazement displayed by a woman when
man, whether her lover or her husband, is
inconstant to her, comes from that tenacity
over the man as property which wholly blinds
her to keep her own faults or lack of charm
and power to keep him. A very clever We
man never blames man for Inconsistency to
her; she may, perhaps, blame herself. Wo-
man as q rule attach far too great value to
themselves; the woman imagines herself
necessary to the man because the man is
necessary to her. Hence the eternal antag
onism of the woman against the man, which
is one of the saddest things in human nature
Every writer like Dumas, who does his best
to increase this antagonism, commits great
crime The happiness of the human race
lies in the good will existing between men
and women. This good will cannot exist so
long as women have the inflated idea of their
own value, which they now possess largely
in Europe and still more largely in America.
A virtuous woman is above rubIes, has said
Solomon, but this depends very much on the
quality Of the virtue, and the idea prevail
ing among woman that they are valuable,
admirable and almos divine, merely because
they are woman, is one of the most mis-.
chievous fallacies born of human vanity and
accepted without analysis.
1t cannot be denied that the quality which
in women bestows most happiness on those
around them is that which is called in French
and has no descriptive word in English,
gafett de eaxr. Not frivolous unusefulness,
or passion for diversion and excitement, but
sweet and happy spirit, finding pleasure in
small things and great, and shedding light
like that OF Moore's wild freshness Of morn.
ing On the beaten tracks of life. Where will
this pleasant gaiety and smiling radience 60
when, harassed, heated and blown by the
bitter winds of strife, the woman seeks to
outshriek the man on political platforms, or
when with blood stained hands she bends
the torture trough of the physiological lab
oratory The humanties do not harden
women; erudition may leave her lovlness
and grace of form and mind; though as pro-
hcient Greek and Latin scholar as any of
the learned countrywomen Of the renaissance,
yet she may be the Joy of her home and the
angel of the poor. A love of learning,
Of art, of nature, keeps long young the
heart in which it has place. But the noisy
conflicts Of the polling booths and the pit
less cruelties of the laboratories will not do
so. There is in every woman, even IN the
best women, a sleeping potentality for
crime, a curious possibility of hendish evil.
Even her mat ernal love is dangerously near
an insane ferocity, which at times breaks
out in infantcide or child murder. Every
thing which tends to efface in her, her
Gentler and softer instincts tends to make OF
her worse curse to the world than any man
has ever been. If, indeed, in centuries to
come she should develope into the foe of
man, which Dumas ifs wishes her to be.
come, it is by no means improbable that men
in sheer self-defence, will be compelled to
turn on her and chain her down into the i'm
potency of servitude once more.-NOrH
ALnkricnn R..-,is-n