The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1896-01-11

looked OF him from every side through
their gold trimmed glasses, and the bold
est of them came and felt of him.
swell, we'll declare" said the crowd
finally, and crowded back into the hall
and left the farmer on the outside alone.
He went away, aud the state agricul-
tural association resumed its session
with the new found thrill of having seen
a real live farmer.
But the audacity of the fellow was con-
sidered stupendous.
This is the history of a case that oc-
ours in every city police court at least
once a week and sometimes a great deal
oftener.
This woman married this man years
ago when they were both young and
foolish, and she knew so little about men
that she expect ed he would furnish a
good home for her and she would be
happy all her days. e,
She married him for siove. That was
all he had to be married for and he has
lost that since. She never has and she
never will. 1t is once love, always love
with her.
Since he has found out that she can sup
port the family and provide him with a
little to eat and a place to sleep he is
willing to hustle out occasionally and
earn enough money to get chewing to-
bacco and bad whisky with.
OF course there are children, plenty of
them. There always are in such cases.
Very often he comes home drunk aud
very often he beats her. The first time
she is SO shocked that she says nothing
of it. After while he beats her SO often
that her anger overcomes her misguided
affection for him and one day she has him
arrested. She rspents of it Immediately
however, and at her request the case is
withdrawn.
AS soon as he is released he beats her
again for the indignity and the incon-
venience she has caused him.
She is repentant now and it goes I'M
needed.
After a while he beats her again, and
again she has him arrested.
This time she 0ogg eddy appears against
him with tears in her eyes. Her testi-
mony is weak for the old love surges up
again as she faces him in the court aud
sees his repentant gaze assumed, more
than likely, for the occasion.
He is fined $40 for assault. He has ne
money to pay the fine with and goes to
Jail.
She cannot sleep that night for think
ing of him in the prison walls and before
daylight she gets up to count over saw
ings of two or three dollars that she has
been putting away to get some clothing
for the children with.
Perhaps he puts in four or five days on
the rock pile before she has been able
with hard work and tears aud starvation
to save enough to pay him out.
Aud when he is out he shows his ap-
probation for her work and pains by
beating her again for having got him in.
Year after year she leads this life
standing his abuse until she can stand it
no longer and having him locked up
only to go through the same pain and
privation to ray him out again.
Somebody tells her she ought to get
divorce from him, and she is Mortified at
the thought. She could never leave him
she says.
1t isn't this woman that you hear talk
of freedom of sex. She never thinks of
means to right her wrongs. She is too
busy to contemplate them, and anyway
it would be difficult to get der to admit
she has any. He was her idol once and
he will always be her idol. He isn't
worth it, but she could not be made to
believe that.
And SO she goes on through life of
misery, every bright dream her girlhood
gave her destroyed by the cruelty of the
man she dreamed of.
And the worst of all this, is that this
story la not overdrawu. It is true of
dozens of women right here in Topeka.