The herald., 1897-10-31
NEW WOMEN ARE
NOT So VERY NEW
At Least There Is Nothing New
in Woman's Sharing
Mans Work.
MRS. VANDERBILT.
How Her TOihng Hands Helped
Her Husband to Amass His
Immense Fortune


read and hear the eulogies constantly
lavished upon the "new woman" be-
cause she is earning her own living,
would inevitably suppose work by wo-
men to be a new thing on earth, and
that the mothers and grandmothers
and great-grandmothers of the present
generation were an idle and useless lot.
But the stranger would be wrong in his
conclusions; for the women-speaking
broadly-have always done as large a
share Of the worlds work as they do
now, and perhaps larger one. The
changes in women's work have been
chiefly of quality and variety, not OF
quantity.
This is especially true in America,
where, though a very large leisure class
now exists among the women, there is
almost no corresponding class of idlera
among the men. If you doubt this, re.
call the situation last summer, and
many previous summers, at nearly
every pleasure resort in the United
States, where there were rarely more
than half enough men ito so round"
While the women We're taking their
ease, the men We're earning the money
to pay for it. 1t is just the same in
| lle WluleT, LOO, dllllOSL everywhere
What is called society is carried on
except, perhaps, in the greater cities.
where there are numbers of men rich
| enough to be idle-almost exclusively
| by the women. The men give some at
| tention to it, to be sure, but the women
do the planning and the scheming-and
most of the enjoying, for that matter
| for the men haven't the time.
|
most of the women worked as steadily
as the men. 1t is true that they did
home work. mostly, but it was hard
work none the less, and it helped sup
port the families and earn the slowly
accommodating surplus.
| In those days the women did the
work that is now performed by half a
dozen different kinds of factories. They
| spun the yarn for the stockings that
were worn by every member of the
family, and knitted them, too; and they
did most of the weaving. Nowadays
even the knitting is done chiefly by ma
| chimes. Not only was the cloth for the
garments of every member of the fam
lily manufactured at home by the dill
gent housewife, but she and her deep
chested strong-armed daughters wove
| the carpets DeSluSS. AL tIlS factory
work" was done in addition to the
"house work." now so generally done by
servants; every bit of it was then held
to be distinctively "woman's work." and
had been so regarded since work first
began.
Although this labor was mostly done
| in doors, the woman never hesitated to
help in the harder. outdoor work Of
| 1aI hV al
accounts this was pretty often. Farm
ers' wives and daughters were fire.
quently seen in the fields. They plant
ed and husked the yellow corn they
made hay, they helped in the harvest,
and they drove teams.
Sor.e of the vast fortunes on which
the famous families" of today-whose
women marry dukes and princes, and
would be scandalized at the thought OF
any kind of work-are founded, were
built up by the help of woman's work.
1t is said that the wife of the first VAN
derbilt toled as hard as he did. When
he was a young man he was a ferry
man between New York and Elizabeth
port At first he used a schooner in
his business. He commanded the craft,
and his wife did the cooking. Some-
the passengers and crew; for, although
when the wind and the tide were right
the trip was easily and quickly made.
when they were adverse the passage
sometimes occupied days. Mrs. Van-
derbit was a good cook and a frugal
woman, and it was due quite as much
to her industry and thrift as her hus-
bands that he was able to discard his
| limo mhO1tS
in. But for years after that the pas
sengers were often fed on the boat, and
she remained the cook until the Van
derbilt surplus had attained to consid-
cradle proportions.
Among the middle and lower classes
Of the countries of the old world, the
women have always done a lot of the
work that is considered the work Of
men here. In England women work at
the forge, hammering out nails and
chains; in France and Belgium they
mine coal, and have done so for gen.
erations; in many German cities they
clean the streets; and all through Eu-
rope the small shopkeeper has always
been assisted by his wife both in maxi
ing sales and in keeping the books. In
short, the world over woman has done
quite as much in the past to earn
money as she is doing now,-and man
has very rarely interposed objections.
In the character of the work, how
ever, there has been vast change.
| There was a time when men practically
monopolized the arts and professions,
but that time has gone forever. Then
there were no women book-keepers. nor
painters, nor sculptors, nor Journalists.
| Now women have free field in all these
| lines of effort,-thanks quite as much
to the help of man in opening the doors
as to the energy of the eternal femi-
nine herself. And though there are
some sour grumblers among the men,
there is really no cause for masculine
discomfort on account of the women
workers. since the work given up ''in
the shuttle" by the women to the men,
in the way of tailoring, dressmaking,
cooking, and other lines, almost or
quite equals that seized by the So
Icalled "weaker SEX"
lCopyright, 1897, by Bachelor Syndicate.
Austria's Emperor at Play.
The Emperor of Austria takes his
lamusements publicly, much unlike
| l11;