St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1891-10-04
DRAWN BY A DAMSEL.
Some Practical Sketches of
the Everyday Life Of st.
Paul.
& Risque Story Going the
Rounds Of Summit Ave-
nue. Teas.
Why Do Girls Prefer the Name
Of Salary to Much Better
Wages ?
Cheap Perfumes Which Dis
guise Worse Odors Only
Very Thinly.

very 1nlnIy.
Somebody's masculine somebody
Ssked me the other day what.under the
aun women talk about at lunches and
afternoon teas and other functions of
the feminine gender. OF course it would
be the rankest kind of treason to my sex
to tell exactly what they do talk about,
though stories told under the rose of a
ladies' lunch do sometimes leak out.
A very funny but decidedly risque story
was told by society woman at Summit
avenue lunch little while ago, and now
everybody knows it. and the woman
who told it would give all her diamonds
TO have it unsaid. But just at present
the all-absorbing topic among women
all over town is the servant girl queS-
ton. There has never been time III
st. PauPs history when the question
was quite so serious as Just now. ltlaSt
Sundays GLOBE more than hundred
frantic housekeepers advertised for
servants. Girls are simply not to be
had. Some of the last years supply
have gone to the country. but the real
trouble is that most of them want to
work for what they may call salary in
stead of wages.
Now, there is really nothing a girl of
little education can do that pays so well
as homework. An ordinary general
servant is paid from s. to s. a week, and
that, when one considers that a servant
does not pay for board or washing, is a
great deal more than the majority of
working women make. \ competent
cook is always sure of work, while q
competent clerk or factory girl may find
ii impossible to get employment. Still,
girls won't apply for places, and when
woman has secured a servant she had
rather surrender her few remaining
rights than see her treasure disappear.
The condition of things is frightful, and
unless servants can be secured society
must live in family hotels.
AprOpos, it is astounding the number
OF apartment houses that are being built.
Even so far out as GrottO street, in the
midst of vacant lots galore, flats are be-
ing built. Fully dozen large apart
ment houses have been opened during
the last twelve months, and all of them
are reasonably well filled. The modern
house that is builed by crafty real estate
men for the occupancy of the unfortun-
ateS who remit such a whited sepuIcher
that the four strong and thick walls of an
apartment house seem especially inviting
Inc modern house Is so much a thing of
Queen Anne windows, tiled CRATES, poor
plumbing and paSteboard walls that the
including heat and coSiness of a fiat is
Irresistible. The only fault | have to
find with the builders of flats is that
they will insist on leaving the walls in
the most hideous state of glaring white
ness. A rough finish in soft gray, or a
tinted coat of ecru, would be cheaper;
but the builder is bound to have ceme-
terry white, even if it costs more.
The sense of color is very rare among
mankind in general, anyway. The
bright strawberry blonde woman will
make herself frightful to behold in
blues, and the dreadfully sallow woman
wear tan cOlored. 1t isn't quite so rep
rehensible in women, but when public
officials deliberately make public build
ings nightmares III color, somebody
ought to be impeached. | don't know
who is TO blame for the cobalt blue
shades of the court house, but whoever
is ought TO be boiled in oil. The build
ing In itself is not entirely thing of
beauty, and those shades are simply
odiouS. Grey, or brown or tan shades
won dn,t have cost any more. Even if
they AID the men in charge might better
urns out on the grass plot and used the
money in buying less gaudily hideous
shades.
There is not much beauty in public
buildings anyway, unless it is in the
form of an occasional pretty Stenogra-
pher. L. think everybody in town will
have three or four SighS of relief when
the lettering walls OF police headquar-
klo.
walk put around the block that won't
make everybody who passes think pro-
fame thoughts. The inside of the build
ing is entirely in keeping with the ex-
terror, and if l were called upon to
spend night in what is technically
termed the cooler, should certainly
want a very large piece OF something
nice to smell while l was in there A
prisoner there repOseS on WhiteWaShed
cot OF one mellow pine board, and
hasn't any drapery of his couch to
wrap around him when he lies down to
any kind of dreams he can get; and all
the perfumes of Arabia wouldn't sweet
ell the atmosphere. The county Jail
lsu't so bad, though a little incense
burned now and then in the corridors
would be grateful to the nostrils. The
women's ward is really very comfort
able, and by some wise dispensation,
the boy prisoners are kept entirely
apart from the men.
Speaking of odors, recalls to me the
fact that cheap perfumery is being used
10 an alarming extent this season. The
Strangest part of it is that when first
put on it really smells very pleasant
but III an hour or two it shows itself i'm
its true colors -or rather odors-and
smells like cheap vanilla with other
things mixed in. That was the kind of
perfume woman who sat in front of
me at Locke Richardson's Tuesday
evening reading had on. She held her
head on one side, too, and it was al
ways the side L wanted to hold mine on
| stood it just as long as l could. but
finally grew tired of absorbing Mac
beth and cheap vanilla at the same
time and roamed back to the neighbor-
hood OF picturesque Captain Jack. the
poet scout, on the back seat. Captain
Jack was looking very well. His
''biled' shirt was adorned with a Lord
Byron tie and his white vest had brass
buttons, His hair was just as long and
his hand clasp as hearty as ever.
Il ought to have been an actor said
the Poet Scout, when Mr. Richardson
had gone Off to rest a few minutes 81
nave been on the stage, and liked if
Immensely. played Brabantio in In
dianapolis to John McCuIlough's
Othello for two nights once. The first
night l stuck on my speech. and Nc
Cullough gave me the word inhibit.'
said it very loud, and-well. after the
play the tragedian called for me and
growled. We'll, young man. you're the
only amateur i ever knew to stick in
mat speech and get out of it without
prea;iklng down Pm going to have a