The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1896-02-20
A WORD WITH WOMEN.

fine homes and with much idle time
upon their hands. Still there is an
other class OF women, who having
found avenues for self-support along
lines heretofore closed to them, have
little use for home or its supposed joys.
Who is TO blame, if either, for this
spirit OF discomfort with old time con-
ditions which is rising up so promi-
nently. Or which Of the two, man or
woman is TO blame for the principal
part Of all the trouble which has
married the home life of humanity for
six thousand years, or ever since the
family relation was established?
Mrs Amelia E. Barr, bright writer,
in the North American Review declares
that the woman is to blame. Every
human being has a complaining side"
she says, "but discomfort is bound up
in the heart of woman; it is her original
sin" Mrs. Barr argues that if the
first woman had been satisfied with
her conditions. if she had not aspired
to be sas gods" and hankered after I'M
lawful knowledge, Satan would have
hardly thought it worth his while to
discuss her rights and wrongs with
her; that with or without reason, wO-
man has been perpetually subject TO
discomfort, with her conditions, and,
according to her nature, has been
moved by its influence. Some women
] - ho 10 -iCh nj
some ambitious, some reckless, while
noble majority have found in its very
control that serene cOmposure and
cheerfulnesS which is granted to those
women who conquer rather than to
those who inherit. But Mrs. Barr is
right when she assumes or states as
! her belief that never in the history of.
the race, Notwithstanding all the varied
influences, activities and opportunities,
has female discomfort demanded so
much as of the present A fever of
unrest possesses a large proportion of
the sex. The woman of today is just
4 as impatient of home, just as anxious
TO get rid of their Eden, as the woman
Eve, the mother of all, six thousand
years ago.
Mrs. Barr does not deny, but admits
| that there is a noble discomfort, which
urges to greater things. a discomfort
springing from regret and desire, be-
tween which two signs all horizons
lift; divine discomfort which inspires
a passion of longing which often leads
to better and higher ideals, but this is
the exception.
But, after ALL the reader of her con-
| tributiOn will be led 10 the conviction
that in the van of these discontinued
/ women are the indictments who are
| dissatisfied with and are fighting home
duties. Housekeeping has fallen into
| diSrepute and women in common cir
| cumstances are chasing after fin de
| steele literature and art, abandoning
her first and natural duty, for a life Of
appry and mere skimming of ideality.
! This class of women fill our towns and
cities and are worthless to husbands
and children. They dabble at clubs
with sciences, of which they absolutely
| know nothing, fundamentally forget
| ting or overlooking the fact that cook
I ing is a liberal science, that there is
most intimate connection between
| food and virtue, and food and health,
and food and thought These women
seem to dread being taken by their
neighbOrs as CinderelIas in ashes. or q
NauSicaa washing linen, or a Penelope
forever at her needle
Mrs. Barr holds that this revolt of
| woman against housekeeping Is not a
! revolt against her husband; it is simply
4 revolt against duty, against house
work which they hold to be monoton-
GUS and inferior, forgetting that the
work of husband and son is just as
! monotonOus. No, they would prefer
| to dabble in art. or embroider pillow
shaIhs, make red lamp shades, sell
goods, or do anything TO make money
to pay servants TO cook their husbands
| dinner and to nurse their babies for
them. They, with a cynical franknesS.
/
a superior mind That which they
hold as a credit ought 10 cover them
with shame. For service TO her hus-
band she hires a stranger, generally I'M
educated, young and inexperienced, a
hired peasant girl, or sloppy, untidy
ignorant colored girl. substituting her
| miserable ambition for love and heart
and hand service and acknowledging
that such hired service is better than
anything she is capable.
Mrs. Barr is right in laying it down
that housekeeping is no more hard or
monOtonouS than mems work in either
shop or office. The first lesson that a
man has to learn is 10 do pleasantly
and contentedly what he Does not like
10 do That housekeeping is degrad-
ing is 10 the average man monstrous.
or at best the smallest OF nonsense.
There is another phase of the new
woman taken up by this writer, and
that is the discontinued wife; the wife
| who is stunned and miserable because
she discovers that marriage is not an
everlasting picnic; who cannot realize
that her husband must be different
from the lover, and 50 spend her days
in whining. There are two things
dreaded by the average man.-he verify
hates the thought-one of them is a
fault-iinding or an everlaStingly sniff
Hing woman. and the other is the de-