Barton County democrat. [volume] (Great Bend, Kan.) 1885-1915, 1889-05-23

A swset-Brler Rose Among the Dull
Weeds of Commercial Life
She is everywhere just now. and
she seems to like it just as well as we
do ourselves. She beams at you with
business-like eyes from behind the
plate-glass partitions of Palatial of
fees. She taps the keys with dainty
knowingness in all the large establish
ments of the metropolis. and paralyzes
ancient clerks and decrepit retainers
by the fluent ease with which she mas
tiers details of trade.
She comes on you unexpectedly
when you drop in down town to see
how the market is holding together. or
if that ..sure thing came in first at
Sheepshead. You hear a few con-
vulsive clicks; you look up. and there
she is-the inevitable typewriter! She
has penetrated to the Utmost sanctum
of the editor; she has wrung herself
insiduously into the halls OF the states
man, and in the offices of the broker
she reigns supreme. As Mark Twain
said of the Cross of the Legion of
Honor, '.few have escapedr' she is
everywhere. recognized and admired
fact, and has taken her place among
the institutions of the land with the
same unconscious grace and mag
nificent calmness with which she
draws her salary.
The stockholders Office is her favor
tie lair. She glows out OF its luxurious
settings like Klunder rose in a Wor-
fol at
her back. and her tipped boots crossed
effectively below her dainty skirt. She
smilingly looks up from under we'll
kept bang, and the modern man feels
that he has not lived in vain.
The pretty typewriter came like
shaft of light to the darkened intellects
of the weary photographers and the
funny men of the daily papers. The
small boy was a moth-eaten monstrosi-
ty. The mother-in-law q decayed and
undesirable nonentity. The almanac
files were sere and yellow. Then IT
was that the public arose and
kicked in its might. and demanded
something fresh to laugh at. The
willy joker was aghast, and cried out
to the gods for a new idea AS if in
answer to the long reiterated prayer.
a silvery chime struck upon the blur
red surface of his brain. There was a
whirr, a whizz, a click. and the type
writer stepped over the mOss-covered
threshold of his vision in all the fetch
ing attractiveness of a gentlemanly
collar and coquetish apron.
No man is a hero to his typewriter.
She knows too well the variable moods
that mark him as her own. The
mornings business-like severity. the
afternoon relaxation, and the genial
and inviting hilarity that grows
with the day. She has heard
so often the smothered ''some-
thing" which he says when the
ticker marks another drop in wheat.
She has seen the expression that fits
across his face when a message comes
over the phone to ''be home early to-
night. as Aunt Penelope is coming on
the 2:1O train" She sees and knows
it. She says nothing, but she thinks a
great deal. though she seems uncon-
scious, and there is a look in her eye
sometimes that is an eloquent sermon
in itself.
She is not spending her young life
in an Office for the fun of the thing.
She is working for what she shall eat
and drink and wherewithal she shall
be clothed. She has interests in life
outside of her rate of speed" and is
very frequently engaged" to some
other struggling young person with
magnificent ideas and inadequate
salary.
She often loves him, too, in an i'm
petuous, stenOgraphic way, and shares
his bright dreams of a little home
somewhere in the dim and misty not
far-off, that picture itself before her.
as she clicks the keys until they sound
like melody of angels voices.
She is sweet-brier rose that has
bloOmed among the dull weeds of COM
mercial life, and she thrives upon her
own fragrance. May the soft rays of
prosperity's sun shine upon her head,
and the breezes watt peace and plenty
to the busy hands of the pretty type
writer.-Once Week.