The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1900-03-11
w oman and AND! Society
LENT.


LENT.
We Fair Ethel holds her prayerbook,
Eis Her pensive face is bent.
Her hair has flched halo
shaft of sunlight sent,
Last week we golfed together; ]
E Now it's the sober Lent.
RS Her lips, Ger the responses,
LII Move sweetly all in tune,
Her long-lashed eyelids, dropping,
81 Will close in prayer soon,
But yesterday whist held us;
Now tits the Lenten noon.
She lnees, in plant posture,
With lowly, humble knee,
All, if her still petition
Clasped but a thought OF me!
Last night we danced measure.
How long the days will be! 49,,
A sacrifice of SELF she says,
We all should make in Lent,
With violets her breast adjoining,
She goes to service evry morning,
On selfdenial bent.
rs She talks about the lives Of saints
III And martyrs, telling how
They deemed no sacrifice too great,
No trial too hard for conscience, sake,
"a She feels she's like them now.
NJ For she has made great sacrifice,
She told me yesterday; 80
M And naught shall shake her purpose high
For forty days she vows to buy
Not one marion glace.
4-----
We all know, says Dorothy Dix in the New
Orleans Picaylne, that servants are one of the
illscrtitable instruments of providence for con.
tinually reminding that all happiness IS trans
itory. and that any morning we may nave 10
get Up and get the breakfast. We can't under
stand for the life of us why COOK should nave
as many caprices and as unsettled temper as
pTima donna, or why she always has fatai
perversity about letting the roast burn when
there's company, and, above all, it is an I'M
fashionable mystery how housemaid can make
up beds for twenty years and never learn now 10
tuck a sheet in so that it will stay at the bot
tom But before we blame the ladies below
stairs too much, let us look at the one above.
DO you see the image OF one who understands
her own business so well she knows how to
instruct another in it? Do you see one whose
temper is SO fully under control it fits her to gov
ern her subordnates9 Or do you see woman
who calls her irrtibility nerve, and who is SO 1g,
norant she is at the mercy OF every hlrel1ng!
After ALL If your servants lack judgment, sys-
expect TO hire for SIS a month. II your ser
wants had as much knowledge and ability as you
ought to have, and as you expect them to nave,
they wouldn't be in ,anybody's kitchen at that
price The trouble is that we expect Gordon
bleu at scullery maids wages, and we grumple
because don't get 1t. Don't you really tnlnk,
the maid is at the bottom OF the servant ques-
ton, and that if you were thoroughly
capable Of m3nagng yo END htc 81 tine e
Then there's gossip Isn't it the funniest thing
on earth how we disapprove of it in theory and
practice it in pryateS so shocking KIN ov we s9 Sy
people talk about their neighbors. Really IL
gotten so that a reputation that can stand d
season OF pink teas ana GhuIen aS mas now w be
henest-is there single mothers daughter ol
us who can look her mirror squarely IN the
face and not stand before 1t sefconyictea!
Not Of gossipping, that's SO vulgar, don't you
know, but of telling things" Sometimes l
think that we, who make such pretentlons OF not
H. and MI
3anrero,ls of the lot recognized scandal
nonger is like thief who has served term
in the penitentiary. Every one locks up thelr
nne whom YOU never expected--the trusted servant
or friend-who robs you. Those who really 90
the harm, who blast regulations, and break up
gether and say, "Now, mind, don't vouch for
word of this, and for heavens sakes DON'T say
1 told you, but and then we launch OUT
on the full tide of SANDER.
Another thing that should appeal to our sense
of humor, if not our conscience, is the hlgnly
moral attitude we take towards other people
follies. when we are guilty of just the same
things When we hear that the Newr1ches nave
moved uptown and given ball at winch they GU
every single one of their old friends, VINO knew
them in the days when old Newrich kept cor
ner grocery and Mrs. Newrich used to tend TN
counter in his absence, who SO virtuous as we
What scathing commentaries we can make ao0u
people toadying and hunkeying to the richl Blu
is it quite by chance that Mrs. Buttons caro- L
always conspicuously on the top OF our owl
invitations to Mrs. Socety's swell reception Will
her coat of arms topmost where 1t Will De seel
by every caller? Could anything, short OF tota
paralysis of the tongue, prevent us from drag
ring the name of our distinguished relative. Maj
Cen Fighten--though he is a forty seventh cou
sin-into the conversation at every turn, though
we never mention little Sally Salesglrl, VINO II
our dead sisters only girl? All, madame, II We
shot at no other ones folly until we had mrs.
brought down our own, the arrows % or saLnt
would molder in their culver.
Sometimes we let ourselves grow sour anC
discontinued and disgruntled. We fcel unit
preciated We have no friends People may d.
civil enough, but we are outside OF their anec
ton and no heart bids us come In and warn
ourselves at its fire. We say bitter tMng
about the selfishnesS of the world. We mocf
at friendship and deride the hickleness OF love
Suppose you look at yourself 10 see WA
YOU have done to deserve love before you com
plain of not having it,. Ii you see there wo
man whose tongue is like two-edged sword II
the hands of a ruthless savage, who cuts ant
sashes needless of whom she may wound
YOU see a woman to whom witticism Is deare
than friend-what right have you to expect U
be liked? If you see woman who mas put III
Vulnerable petty tyrannies on her husband, Wh'
has scolded and complained, and who has neye
done anything to make herself attractive OF
agreeable, don't you think she is pretty merry.
to pose as a martyr because he seeks elsewher
the pleasure he doesn't find at home? Ii you
shut yourself up in your own interests, VIVA
earthly reason have you to complain because
people let you alonef Nobody goes about
prying open clam shells unless there is at leas
a hint of something worth having inside.
mn n