Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-12-01
W0MAN'S IDEAL MAN.
Mary J. Holmes on the Qualities in
Men Most Priced by Women. I
LADIES' LIKES AND DTsLIKES'
Things Which Make Married Life a Fore
taste Of Paradise.
A YOUNG GIRLS OPINION OF THE MEN
WRITTEN For THE. .p1spAroH.l

to what qualities or actions of men are most
pleasing to women and most conducive to
their happiness. If there were but one
woman in the world, and 1 were that
woman, could answer the question easily,
for I know exactly what pleases me in a
man and could tell it in few words. But
the name of woman is legion, and every
woman has her own ideas, and these ideas
change as years go by, until, seen in the
full glare OF our summer life, or through
the spectacles which more sober autumn
puts on, the man who, In our spring time,
was our ideal of all man should be, falls
from his high pedestal, and the pieces of
our shattered idol are not worth the pick
| ing up.
When Mrs. Jones, in her early girlhood,
married Mr.. Jones, she thought him the one
man in all the world who could make her
happy, and his roughness and swagger and
coarse good-humor pleased and amused her,
for there was in her nature something which
responded to his. But, given the same ad-
vantages, women polish sooner than men,
and are quicker to adopt the little customs
of politeness and refinement, and although
Mrs. Jones is not yet SO refined that she can
not enjoy herself, she has learned to blush
at her husbands roughness, and shivers at
his coarse, loud talk.
Mrs. Brown likes to have her husband
smoke, and enjoys the smell of his cigar,
while Mrs. Smith detests tobacco, and the
smell of cigar makes her sick. Mrs.
Wilkes likes her husband to dine at his
club, because it gives her more liberty to
gossip and visit, while Mrs. Tubbs cries if
she is LETT to dine alone. And so one might
multiply the list of women whom the minor
actions and habits of their husbands make
happy or miserable.
THE MYSTERY OF LOVE.
But it is not altogether with the Mrs.
Smiths, and Browns, and Joneses that this
article has to do; nor yet with that class of
women who married the man they knew to
be drunkard, saying, as did young girl
of my acquaintance, that they would marry
him if they knew he would be brought home
every week in state of intoxlcation. That
suppose, is love; but of the kind of which
know nothing from personal experience. I
could not marry man who drank, or
gambled, or swore, or made vile remarks
about women, holding them all as low as
himself, or VINO had not as much or more
brain than myself. Still, there are plenty
of girls who can and do marry Just such
men and seem reasonably content.
And thus the puzzle grows as to the quail
ity in men most priced by the better class of
women, for do not call her of the better
class who willingly and knowingly promises
to love and honor fool, or roue, or a
swearer, or gambler, or a drunkard. She
may be and often is in the so-called higher
ranks, where money reigns supreme, for
money will buy nearly everything and
everybody, and I should sometimes be
tempted to think it the golden virtue which
my sex prizes the most in men, did 1 not
know many a noble-minded woman who
has chosen to be poor with the man she
loves rather than rich with the one she does |
not.
To judge others by ones self is said to be |
righteous judgment, but is not always safe |
rule to follow in drawing conclusions, and |
since thinking of this article have sounded |
several women with regard to their likes and |
dislikes in husbands, real or prospective. I |
asked a young girl with positive opinions
what trai: she would like best in her hus-
band, if she had one, and her answer was |
prompt and to the point: "I'd want him to
have mind of his own, and not be bossed
round by his wife!'
WHAT THE GIRLS WANT.
The reply was startling, but had in it a
ring of common sense and truth, for much
as a woman may like to boss her husband,
and pleasing as the recreation may be, she
would in her heart respect him more if he
sometimes took the reins in his own hands,
even if he upset the matrimonial car, or
drove it into domestic cyclone.
I asked another girl, with no positive
opinions, and her answer was characteristics:
"A man is a man any way. full of corners
and Quirks and cranks. But we all have to
have one, suppose, and so it does not mat
ter much, if he is only nice, and let us have
our own way"
Another, frivolous butterfly, would like
a handsome man, who stands six feet in
his boots, and can dance without stepping
on her train, and making guy of himself.
The girl has yet to learn that dancing
man and handsome man is not man to
be desired, and that the plainest features
and most awkward manners, if they 90
hand in hand with kindness of heart and
soul of honor and integrity, are worth far
more than a Turveydrop and handsome
face, which, in man, seldom fails to be in
,ipid.
Another would be satisfied with man of
high position, whom the world delighted to
honor, the reporters to interview, and the
people to stare at and point out, while she,
Is his wife, shone in his reflected light.
Does not that girl know that such men
-arely have time to give to their wives, and
10 not think of those little everyday at
,entlons which are to true, loyal woman
What the dew is to the flowers, and without
which love will wear itself out in hot re-
,ellion against the ambition and Us fruition
which have come between itself and hap
1iness?
Another wants learned man, who has
cad so much and knows so much that when
lie speaks words of wisdom drop from his
ips like raindrops in summer shower All
his sounds very fine, or would, if the man
# erudition ever talked to her or to anyone
Use; but bookworms, as rule, are reticent
md selEabsorbed, aud in their abstraction
md reticence are apt to become selfish and
xacting, as was Carlyle, growing over his
oast and tea in that not very happy home
It Craigenputtock. He was a man of learn
ng and fame, and his wife was proud and
ond of him, but, like. Dorothy in Middle
osrch,'' who, while honoring Casaubon,
till had hankering after his scapegraee
Iephew, with his magnetism and frank,
enial ways, she would have liked him
nore and been happier with him had he
ound time for those little attentions and