St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1890-02-04
WOMEN BEHIND THE DESK.
From Mans Point of View
How One Woman Treats An

AO" OhC W O1idn IIcatS All
other.
"Chatterer" in the Boston Courier:
Ii pains me to learn that woman in Of
ice is somewhat of failure; at least in
New York. 1t seems that she carries
into her official life certain traits that
are characteristic of her sex, but which
| are not in harmony with business
affairs. In the first place, the woman
Official is severely offensive to women,
from whom she exacts more than the
legal pound OF flesh, and for whom she
SHOWS a contempt and lofty liberation
that are outside the limits of law. The
cause of this attitude of woman against
woman has as yet eiuded the search of
science and confOunded the theories
OF philosophy: and, to conclude, even
have no solution to offer. And vet. if
we consider the matter closely, we shall
ind a reason, If not a cause. A man
appears before woman in Office
already crushed; it has absorbed
all his courage to face official
femininity, and if he does not receive all
the snubs and the contempt that he is
prepared for he is more disappointed
than surprised. The woman behind the
desk is an awe-inspiring object to the
DrayeSt man; she is her sex plus author
1ty, Charlotte Corday and Minerva COM
bined. She is not the more imposing by
reason Of her Office, hut the office is i'm
posing because she fills it. because the
office is herself. Such Womau NAV In
siSt on anything unhindered of man. He
Is even content, at her command,
to concede that the earth is fat for
the time being. He appears before
SO much majesty In q commanding atti-
tude; he waits her pleasure patiently
before receiving the postage stamp for
which he applies, cash in hand; he
STILES his haste to obtain his letters I'M
til she sees fit to give them to him. For
these reasons the official woman does
not go out of her way to annoy or to
torture man: she accepts him as worm,
and because he is weak she refrainS
flom treading on him, and goes no fur
Their than to turn deaf ear to his ap-
p'ication for letters or stamps, and to
gorgoniZe him with her Tennysonian
''Stony stare"
A woman approaches the official
Woman-guarded window in a different
attitude, in fact in belligerent attitude,
and the monarch of all she surveys re-
eelyes her in an equal beiligerent spirit.
Two hungry dogs approaching the
same bone will give fair idea of the
situation. The passive indifference
shown to that humble creature, man. no
longer exists; the adversaries both
have their lanceS in rest, and each
is looking for the weakest spot
in the armor of the other.
There is an ominouS silence, during
which the fashion of garments and
fashion of features are criticised: there
is an ominous sniff, swapping of eyes,
an elaborate exhibition of chip on the
shoulder for opponents to remove vio-
lently, lofty staring at tops of heads
instead of into eyes; an aggressigeness
of excessive overpolitenesS; the fine
malice of preventing to the utmost the
contamination of the object that
both have at heart; the overzeal-
GUS desire to make fault and
find it, to imagine an insult and re-
sent it, to compel insolence that breeds
the insult. Naturally, the women who
are not officials complain of the women
who are officials, and the woman be-
hind the window complains of the
woman in front of 1t. This is the serious
danger that cOnfronts the woman who
aSpireS for pablo office-the weight that
drags her down when in office. The
fault is hers individually, but it is the
failing of the sex generally-the lmpos-
sihillty oil a woman treating woman
All any OtHCL way tudu DIS
rival or an antagonist. The woman
in Office cannot escape from her
self. She refuses to see, or cannot see,
any difference between free, if tax
paying, public and her own family cir
Gle. She carries her home character
istics into public affairs, regarding men
as the possessors of obnoxious latch
keys, and women as the victims of them.
Her clients are punished for her tooth
aches and responsible for her dyspepsia.
That she is compelled to hold lowly
Office is the fault of the world, and the
world must suffer for it. She
knows that she is better than
other women, and demstrates her
superiority to anticipate their doubt,
or the doubt that she has invented for
them. This is not gallant, but. unfort-
unately, it is true. There can be no
question that, with time, the faults in
dictated will be remedied; but. until
they are, woman in office will be con-
slant eXasperation to woman out of
Office. 1t is true that woman out of
office is equally exasperatIng to woman
III office, and the proverbial mans in
humanity to man is thus furnished with
parallel in Woman's antagonism to
woman.