Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1895-02-23

passes you on, with wholesale INTRODUCE
tions, right and left, a word here, SEN
tence there, to tell to others who you are
and before the last syllable has left her
lips she is fixing her face in welcoming
smile for the next guest. The nervous
force expended in greeting several hundred
guests in this manner Is enough to appali
the stoutest heart. But the age demands
Intensity, and society woman would
rather die than fail to honor the draft.
The intense woman is always more or
less self conscious. Her nerves are rasped
to a thin edge by her restless zeal ana
her impressive fervor and having lost her
equipoise she unconsciously increases her
burden of restlessneSS by infinitesimal Wor-
ries. She imagines that her couture Is not
quite correct, and hurriedly slips her mana
over it. She touches a hafrpin and shoVes
it in She readjusts her jeweled comb,
pushes a refractory lock back or pulls one
forward. A dozen times during an even
irg she will do that. Her gloves are al
ways needing attention. They are snootn,
ed on and pulled at the fingers, buttoned
and unbuttoned, and adjusted at the wrist,
till the poor. strained kid fairly shrieks at
it's mistreatment. Her hat Is always a
source of annoyance, and with veil Is
safe for adjustment every five minutes.
Her card case comes in for large amount
of caressing, and lorgnette is perfect
boon. Her poor handkerchief is soon re-
duced to a shapeleSs rag, used as II Is LOT
face mop, or wadded into ball In her
hand. The arms akimbo fad has added
still another worry. 1t raises the Shout
derS and that pulls the short-waisted thing
free of the skirt. Tons of strength are
wasted every day in adjusting the refrac-
tory bodice.
On n High Pressure.
The intense woman talks like house
afire. The words tumble over each other
in their scramble to be uttered. She has
read every thing, or the review of it. from
Genesis to the Congressional Record, and
feels perfectly competent to discuss all
does discuss 1t. She will talk against a
brass band or the clatter of a cable car.
She boosts her voice up to the high Z
pitch. and shrills along at fearful pace,
shedding tons of strength all along the
line She talks with her eyes and mouth
and shoulders and hands. She sways and
bends she laughs and poses 1t all takes
energy. Lots of it. 1t takes nervous force
1t exhausts vitality. And none of 1T Is
necessary. 1t is the spirit of unrest, like
microbe, injecting the air. 1t Is con-
gressional unquiet invading the drawing
room to the undoing of our daughters
While 1t Is true that social and political
conditions are nearly allied, the unrest of
the political arena has not invaded the
home to a very great extent until recently,
and il is much to be regretted that the dis
that the poison of unrest has entered the
blood.
The intense woman Is always in a hurry
She finds it. necessary, in her effort to
keep up with the procession, to belong to
clubs These clubs embrace in their OBJ
jects all the ethics of life. moral and po-
litical They dabble in science and social
ism, study the stars, and analyze the earth.
They evolve solutions of the tariff prob
lens, based on the importation of ball
gowns and Partisan bonnets, and daily with
the silver question over the tea cups.
There are clubs for the amelioration Of the
woes of working women, and clubs for the
PRONUNCIATION of all the new fads. Cooking
clubs and sewing clubs-in fact, the clubs
that women may belong to far outnumber
those for men.
string at least one club for each day in the
week. She is secretary of one, president of
another, treasurer Of third. vice president
of the fourth, and prime mover of the 9TH
ers. She has her church duties, her liter
airy ambitions, her artistic aspirations, her
social obligations, and she is devoted to her
home, and desires to be considered a
worthy exponent Of all the multitudinous
woman who could endure such a strain
and live to happy old age has not yet been
born, and the woman who elects to go the
pace is simply committing suicide by
inches and benefiting nobody.
Lack of Repose.
From the time she lifts her throbbing
head off her pillow in the gray morning
till she drops 1t in sheer WEAKNESS again
at midnight she is on the go. Her home
duties distract her sufficiently, but she
must go from them to the disturbed con-
ditions of the club rooms, to smooth and
amalgamate factions, adjust differences
and combine discordant elements. She
must possess the qualities of a Richelieu,
a Napoleon, Il Chesterfield, Webster and
a ward politician. She must be able to rule
like a cZar and execute like field mar
shall. With 1t all she must retain her wo-
her sweetness of character, her
charm of manner and her faith in her
kind. If task like that isn't enough to
wear a woman to rags l don't know what
is. 1t does wear her out, too. Body and
soul are worn to a wire edge by the frlc-
ton, and the leased nerves revolt at last,
leaving their owner a physical wreck,
who's epitaph ought to be: Gone to pieces
on the rock of unrest"
Dick inveighs quite bitterly sometimes
against the lack of repose displayed by
and the other girls of his ac-
quaintance. Copy grandmother's style
he said to Dorothy one day. "She was the
best exemplar of repoSe and restfulness of
that 1 ever saw
Dick might have added, too, that grand
mother was never In hurry. Il have all
the time in the world at my disposal" she
used to say, in her soft, low voice. Even
never sets, can claim second more time
in the twenty-four hours than I. 1t does
not pay to hurry. All the riches and fame
of the world are not worth single heart
beat, if life is unnecessarily shortened
thereby" And the uninterrupted calm of
her long and busy life sufficiently demon
strated the truth of her theory.
"A woman in hurry has not time to be
graceful grandmother said once "And
a woman's first duty in life is to make her
self pleasing to her friends. If she per-
mits herself to be pushed for time she
leaves bad impression on the minds of all
A woman in hurry has over
crowded her time with duties, or she has
permitted persons to absorb more Of 1t
than rightfully belonged to them.
The friends who may have thus en-
feel guilty that they have robbed
her of her repose of manner, and her
nerves are stretched to a tighter tension
than is absolutely healthful, in the mighty
endeavor to accomplish neglected tasks.
One infringement brings on another, and
soon she finds that she is always behind,
and her peace of mind is gone to keep her
worries company. a flustered woman is
not an agreeable companion. She lacks the
air OF repose that marks the caste of We're