The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1895-09-30
TACT IN JOURNALISM.
How the Society Reporter Got Ahead CT
the Other Fellow.

the Other Fellow.
She was what is called quite bright
woman In the New York vernacular
this term applies to any woman of sense
below the age of 30 after which they are
called 'tbrainy'' and don't seem to like it.
Her appearance was such that even So
c3ety reporters merely described her as
possessing 'an attractive personality.
This is-4s sis .lifieisBU fact. The society re-
porter is never rude. If you are million
aires daughter and of average looks, ho
will describe you as beautiful and pos
sessed of indescribable chic.
If you have few thousands and dress
well-even though you have no eyelashes
and a slab sided fgure-the society re-
porter will still be kind and allude to you
as "a young woman of considerable per-
sonal attractions. y
1t is only whom he describes you as Gin
teresting rather than strictly beautiful
that you may realize that probably your
nose is all out of drawing, your eyes wa
terry, and that what there is of your hair
is the wrong color In short this last ex-
preston is the worst that the society re-
porter can do to you-if you are in society.
And if you are not in society-weH,
then, he wouldn't know even who you
are, don't you know.
The society reporter had not yet applied
this final daInning descriptive term to her
of whom l write, because she had not yet
become "brainy," and-more important
still-she was not poor.
She smiled upon young man, and al
though her smile was about two inches
too long and too toothy to be pretty, he
decided to WOO her. He had been told that
she was bright So he decided to WOO
her as bright woman should be wooed in
his opinion.
II will not insult your preternatural
intelligence, he began, ''by telling you
that you are beautiful. You are too clever
to swallow that sort of hunbug. Besides
beauty is not what I am after. 1t is tran
sient and unsatisfying. But you have
mind. One cannot expect to find mind
and beauty eonlbined''-
But at this point the young lady said,
tTake me back to my chape-on. And
tho local temperature went down to freez-
ing point.
Now this happened at q function.
function is a meeting of people
held in large houses for the promotion of
employment among dresslnakers. florists
and society reporters. At this particular
function the society reporter, having been
at several other functions and having
slipped claret punch and champagne frappe
ct each, had accumulated what in lower
circles is known as "a pretty considerable
jag Therefore in reporting this function
he got his terms mixed.
The next morning on reading the morn
ing paper Mrs. Golde-D Dollar, the million
aire's wife, found herself described as ''in-
teresting rather than strictly beautiful, "
while she of whom 1 write rcad for the
first time that she was beautiful and pos
sessed of indescribable chic
The society reporter was donied entrance
at Mrs. Golde-D Dollars next function. And
when the young man-who thought that
bright woIn5n should be wooed differently
from other Woncn-saw the marriage of
the bright woman and the society reporter
in the paper he wondered how on earth
the other fellow had got ahead of him.
Jessie NJ Wood in Life.