The daily morning Astorian. [volume] (Astoria, Oregon) 1883-1899, 1889-03-03
A wOMAN's OPINION.
Sensitiveness But Another Name For
Selfshness.

Who of us does not possess a SEN
sitive relative or friend? A creature
whose entire being is so delicately at
tuned that the merest breath, the
slightest joke or faintest allusion will
sweep the strings Of the sensitive in
strument until it walls in discord?
Parents stand guard over such
daughters and foster their sensitive
natures with feeling half awe, half
pride. 1t is with half reproachful
and half exultant smile that a mother
clasps shrinking, kicking specimen
Of babylon, while she explains to the
innocent offender how sensitive the
child is. The sensitive girl is an in-
tense one. She is both watchful and
suspicious. At school she loves her
dearest chum with an absorbing affec-
ton, and makes their companionship
a stormy one. The intimate-and
she will generally be some frank,
generous ereature-will afterward re-
member this friendship as one un-
broken martyrdom. 4.
AS a sweetheart the sensitive girl
is honey and gall. She loves with an
intensity and recklessness that is di-
vine. She exacts the meaning OF
every trifling word, look and act of
her lover with a persistency that is
fendish. She turns pale and bushes
at nothing and weeps at thin air.
What time her lover does not spend
in exalting her sweetness, he is kept
busy explaining something that has
hurt her.
It is, however, when this girl be-
comes wife that the extreme posi-
bilities Of a sensitive nature may
freely play. The broad sea Of matri-
monial life presents a magnificent
surface for the breezes of a sensitive
soul in all the variations of its ever
changing waves, in its swift counter
currents and deep ground swell.
Over its jagged. rocky shores, and
among its thousands OF islets and
bays, there is such glorious oppor-
tunity for the sensitive to sigh and
moan.
1t is this kind Of wife who is panied
when her husband goes fishing with
out her approval; who is hurt how
ever kindly he may seek to point out
come little failing of her own. Her
eyes will be full OF tears if he is de-
layed at dinner time, and she is
crushed to the earth when he denies
some trit1ing request.
She is the sort of q woman whose
devotion is intoxication, but whose
sufferings are an everlasting pin
prick. The sensitive sweetheart and
the sensitive bride are novelties. The
radiance of fresh romance, the de-
liciousness of tender Cancellation
after the agony OF ghastly misunder-
standings compensate to the lover or
newly made husband.
The sensitive, tear-stained, accus-
ing, reproachful- eyed woman, howev-
er, as a steady companion is like the
dropping of water on the
rocks. 1t means out of patience, love
and respect.
A woman of this kind is sort of
chameleon. She feeds on air and her
color burns or fades with the passing
hue Of other peoples thoughtlessness.
She becomes, unknown to herself, the
center of new creation. About her
is evolved an atmosphere of caution
and restraint. Husband, children
and friends cross this impalpable but
powerful barrier with guiltily con-
cealed wishes or cunningly sugared
They approach a per-
sonal desire or q consideration of their
rights with cold chills of apprehen-
sion and tremors of anticipation.
This woman is not sensitive at all
She is just sensitively and diplomat
ically ill-natured. She is tyraut
and she lsshes her slaves with her
tears and eXacts their servitude by
courtesy and not bills of sale. She is
to practice her wicked pro-
fession because it has been miscalled
from babyhood. She has been assis-
ted in its cultivation by weak parents
an indulgent husband and dutiful
children. She learned the power of
her weakness in babyhood, which is
but guileless mole eyed
condition. Her yonth is spent in ex-
perimenting on the unfortunate allied
to her by blood.
She learned that sob was worth
more in solid confectionery than a
scratch or bite. AS a sweetheart she
knew that tear was equivalent to
the humble confession woman loves
to hear. As wife she learned that
under the garb of sensitiveness wom-
an may tyrannize indefinitely over a
generous, chivalric, peace-loving man.
A domestic martyr is only a shade
better than a domestic scol1, and the
same selfish disregard of other peJ-
ple's happiness is the foundation rock
in the soul of the woman who weeps
as well as the woman who scolds.
FLORENCE HUNTLEY.