The Washburn leader. [volume] (Washburn, McLean County, N.D.) 1890-1986, 1899-04-22
SHE WAS A GERMAN.
AND COULD NOT TRAVEL BY
HERSELF. a
Envled tho American Women - Frau
verwittwete Had Always Wanted to
Roam the World but When Her
Chance Came Her Nationality Interfered

This particular Mrs. Widow, as the
Germans put it, was the relict of a
I.eipsic merchant, who had left her
we'll provided for, says the New York
Commercial Advertiser. She was a
short, stout, prosperous looking wom-
an of somewhere about 60, with beau
tiful white hair. She bought it at that
nice place in Munich, and with it
dressed her head in a more elaborate
and French way than is common
among German women of her years.
She also eschewed the caps with which
they commonly make themselves so
unnecessarily "old lady" In fact, so
far as looks went, the Frau Verwitt-
wete ran the American mamma in the
pension a close second. And they ad-
mired each other mutually-when they
were on speaking terms. The Frau
VerWittwete was on her travels, too.
To be sure she was not a dozen blocks
away from where she had always liv-
ed. having married and settled in Leip-
sic and stayed in it right along with
only an occasional break in the way
of a "cure' at some Bad. But all
through the years when she had had
to bide at home and keep her hus-
bands house, as German wives are x
pected to do, she had nourished a Sc
cret desire to see the world. a longing
to travel. And the death of her Herr
Gemahl, which is to say her lord and
master, together with his substantial
nachlass, had set her free at last to
indulge her lifelong wish. She ac-
cordingly sold her house and estab-
lished herself in that popular pension
through which a cosmopolitan stream
OF travel poured. 1t was a %vicarious
way of seeing the world, but German
women, even in their Cos, are shy
about setting off on their travels alone,
especially Frau Verwittwete. The hab-
it of being looked after and decided
for by a man keeps them down, even
after he is gone. The principle on
which all German life is based, that
the man is herr i'm hause as we'll as
in the shop, leaves it's mark. That
mark lay like a clog on that Frau Yer
wittwete, though she was clever
enough to realize it and to rebel
against it in a spirited but impotent
way, which expressed itself in the dec
laration flung many times and def
antly into the faces of the Germans
among her fellow-pensionaires: eff l
had my life to live over
again, my friends, I should go
to America and marry an Am
erican. They make the best hus-
bands" This opinion, the strongest
evidently and most important which
the Frau Verwittwete had arrived at
in her travels, was all the more fiatter-
ing to that famous benedict, the Amer
lean husband, in that it was based up
on the American wife, of whom the
usual constant current swept through
that pension. Their air of personal in
dependence and financial security in
spired the Frau Verwittwete alike with
admiration, envy and dislike. In fact,
to tell the whole truth, as she would
when her temper got the better of her,
the Frau Verwittwete and a higher
opinion of the American husband
whom she did not see than of the
American wife whom she did. Just as,
now and again, she would wax senti-
mental and spout Schiller's Jungfrau
like n Backfsch. so now and again