The Savannah morning news., 1901-03-10
WOMAN'S
WORLD.

The bill which has been introduced into
the Minnesota Legislature to prohibit the
marriage of women after thay are forty
five years old is the most insidious attack
ever made upon the liberty of the sex.
A woman's chances of matrimony, says
Dorothy Dix in the New York Journal,
are slim enough, heaven knows, in these
days of over-production of women and
interpretation of men, without putting
any time limit on them, and It is her
inalienable privilege to marry whenever
and wherever and as often as she gets
a suitable opportunity.
1t isn't as if getting married were the
mere matter of choice with woman
that is with a man. If a man isn't mar
ried by the time he is forty-fve it is his
own fault. and because he didn't want
to. A woman may have Done her best
TO get married and still be sitting on the
anxious bench when the fatal hour strikes.
Custom debars her from openly chasing
down and capturing a good husband, no
matter how much she may want one, The
most she can do is to put herself in the
our old-fashioned Methodist friends used
TO say. Inasmuch as it is her misfortune
and not her fault that she is still single,
it is cruelty unjust to call time on her
and declare the fight off just because she
hasn't been able to win out in forty-hve
brief rounds. Many a woman at that age
is merely getting her second wind and is
in t.
rimonial prize.
To bar the woman of forty-fve out of
the matrimonial race would be to put
a heavy handicap on society. because so
cial intercourse between men and women,
with the possiblitie and probabilities OF
marriage eliminated, is like chasing an
anise seed bag instead of a live fox. 1t
is imitation sport, where you have to
imagine the thrills and excitement.
Neither do all men care for the society
of the very young There is only snort
time in life when we crave green apples
and taffy candy. AS our palates grow
more sophisticated we want something
riper. mellower, with a more subtle flavor.
College kids and dotards banker after
debutantes Most men, in the full pos
session of their faculties, prefer the wo-
man who has arrived, so to speak; who
can make the conversational running in
stead of expecting them to do II; who
can entertain instead of demanding to be
entertained.
The greatest sufferers by such law
would be widows. Forty-five is the
magic age at which the widow crop of
the world is gathered in by men who are
clever enough to know good thing when
they see 1t.
Experience counts in every trade, and 1t
IS not too much to say that the nrst
husband is offered up as an unintentlonal
sacrifice for the benefit of the second
husband II takes one course of matri-
mony to teach a woman how TO manage
a man without his knowing 1t, and the
second husband profits thereby.
There's nothing nicer than snug little
widow. with a snug little sum of insurance
money and the knowledge of how to ham
die a man with kid gloves, and it is I'M
nossibIe 10 believe man will ever cut
himself off from enjoying such bless
ing.
looking at the matter from senti-
mental standpoint the idea that the wo-
man of forty-five does not fall in love IS
monstrous folly. Nothing in fiction is so
untrue to life as making the herolhes
capable of the grande passion when they
are mere d-and-butter school misses.
A voune girls heart is a hotel, kept on
the European plan, where anybody Is
welcome who can pay his score In nat
serv. or amusement, or presents. He pas
SEES on and she turns the leaf ana Is
ready for fresh arrivals. ANY anectloh
she can feel is not to he compared TO that
of the older woman, who knows the needs
last. ALI that she has hoped and dreamed
Sc her own heart and soul and finds, at
last. all that she has hoped and dreamed
and prayed FOR in the love of some man.
II 10 urged, of course, that the Mime
sota bill is framed in the interests OF
rnosterity. but it doesn't seem worth WhlIe
10 sacrifice the present to the promenade
GOOD OF the future. Besides, there are
MANY men who are just as anxious Tor
good wife for themselves as they are Tor
q good mother for their children.
Not a little of the domestic infelicity OF
the times is because the average woman
is ali mother and no wife. Up to the first
habv is born she and her husband are
chums. After that she is nothing but
nurse. Her conversation reeks with par
egoric and sterilized foods. She quits
d~essins up because baby pulls her frills.
She interrupts his best story just at the
critical point to wonder If baby is covered
nm. and when he tries to tell her the
news of the day she responds dreamily
that you can almost see the hair on
baby's head If you get her in the right
Hight.
There's no doubt that a baby in the
house is a well-spring of joy, but it is
frequently such a gusher 1t washes the
neglected husband and father out or his
own house and into other womens in
search of entertainment.
Iniquitous, however. as is the PROPOSE
ton to limit the marrying age with wo-
men. there is one bright feature about it.
There are no unmarried women forty-five
years old. They are all younger-much
younger.
The Garden Nun
O slender lily, white and tall.
clustered within my garden wall,