Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1893-04-18
Woman in Washington.

Cleveland Motfatt in the Illustrated American.
Washington is a very mecca for Ameri-
can women. Each brings something there which
she leaves behind, and each takes away with
her something she did not bring. The woman
is better for her stay in the city, the city is
better also. The woman loses her provincial
ism; the city becomes more cosmopolitan.
Thus, while the men of Washington are making
our national laws, the women are molding our
national character. The men who come to
Washington are busy. perhaps less so than they
seem. toIing for the country. They have
neither the time nor the inclination for those
pursuits which work such changes in their
wives and daughters. The women gather up
the seed and scatter 1t far and wide. 1t is not
effort wasted then, to study the seed and see if
it be good or bad.
will not say that the women of Washington
are the superiors OF the men, but any one who
takes the trouble to look into the matter will
hesitate to deny that such is the case. They
are certainly clever, well informed. earnest.
OF course. they have their dances. receptions,
lunches dinners and card parties, as women
do everywhere. They eat and drink marry
and are given in marriage. They have the
usual life of the world. but they have in adj
ditloE what many women in other cities lack. a
constant stimulus TO intellectual activity 1t
is the air. it Is all around them it is the
resultant force and favor left behind by
generations of cultured women who have set the
current flowing in the line of self improvement.
1t is much easier to move with the current than
to breast it.
Listlessness is not the fashion!
The first thing which str;Les ,or,,, fror,
New York Or Chicago settling in Washing
ton is the fuency with which every one she
meets speaks French. In half the drawing
rooms she enters she might as we'll be in Paris
She goes into book shop and half the things
she sees are in French. It.is really embarrass.
ing. She feels at once the need of brushing M
her vocab llary and terrifying her store of If
regular verbs. Washington women speak
French as matter of course. and very good
French. too. A woman without the same ac-
complshment feels almost as ill at ease as if her
many gaps which her money Will not FILL and
III sneer desperation the mortified stranger
Calls III teacher.
hhowiedge Is the fashion.
small matter that. you may say, but sig
ninant OF other things. The butterfly woman
from New 1orK. whose society stock in trade
cohslsts OF sAinminS iIom the latest novels and
plays. gowns from the Rue de la Paix and a
reservoir OF superficial gush. Is amazed to hear
Washington women talking about prison re-
form, our public school system or the BehrnC
sea Controversy. And they not only talk or
such subjects naturally and without any
suspicion OF posing, but they know what tEev
are talking about: 1t is no longer sufficient 10
throw out smilingly earnest remark about
some book OF lbsens and trust to ia se that tie
woman you are talking to is as ignorant of it as
YOU are. On no; the odds are agains. you III
Washington!
Sincerity Is the fashion!
Washington women are not only bright and
we'll informed bnt ,bev arc Mi. Mo al o..
dial in a h. gh degree. People who know anvtbin~