The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1902-12-20
FOR The WOMEN.
Remarks About War and the
Girl Proposition.
Mr. DoOIey and What He Has
Taught.
RIDDLE OF THE SPHINX
Men and Women Are Puzzles Be.
cause They Are Not Frank.
Gossip About Things and
WOmen's Fashions.


ing up from the brilliant wool which her
long wooden needles were rapidly fash
Joining into the form of a sweater, that
Mr.. Dooley has abandoned the subject
of peace and war, foreign and domestic
politics and the topics of the day long
enough to consider what his contem-
porary humorist, George AIDE, calls the
Girl Proposition. Have you seen his re-
cent guess on women
The red-haired girl was too absorbed
in her embroidery and the Young Ma
iron in her basket weaving to reply, but
the Debutante nodded her head slowly is
she counted six stitches in her lace
work And I must say she observed,
finally that as a gueSser Mr.. DOOley Is
lust about the limit. Isn't mans ig-
norance of women something pitiable?'
It's entirely unnecessary said the
Oracle, with her habitual decision Mr..
DoOley SAYS, you know, that he can
Judge a. man pretty accurately at a
glance by the cut of his coat or beard.
by the expression OF his eye, or his
laugh, or by his manner at the bar. And
all his observation Of men has tended to
make him hold more and more strongly
to the opinion that one mans a good
deal like another. Savage or cultured.
rich or poor, honored or in disgrace, he
believes that every mans a Martin Doc
ley. or just what Martin Dooley would
have been with a different start. Now
if that philosophy's good in regard to
men, why isn't it good in regard to Wo-
men? He might go a step farther and
say that every woman, great or humble.
good or bad, clever or stupid, is a Martin
DOOley but for the accidents of sex,
birth, education and environment. /
agree with Mr.. DOoley and with that old
woman in Daniel Deronda' who said,
o men is men; gentle or simple, they're
much of a muchneSSi' but l think tho
same thing may be said of women. l.
you know one woman you know them
all, and it is my theory that if you know
one woman you know not only all other
women but all men. and conversely, that
one mans nature is the key to the ma
ture of all other men and of all women.
L refer now to the essential qualities
not the superficialities. OF course men
and women differ in habits tastes, opin-
ions and everything which environment
can affect, but under like circumstances
their impulses and actions are a good
deal the same.
1.-THE reason women are a puzzle to
men, and men are puzzle to women,
is because there is no frankneSs nor
sincerity between them, result of con
ventiOnal prejudices of conventional
education and training. Little girls and
little boys understand one another and
play and quarrel together on perfectly
equal terms, without a shadow of the
affectation equivocation, unnaturalness
and suspicion that mar the relations of
older girls and boys and men and wo-
men, Two men or two women like or
hate one another with frank and open
cordiality, usually, or if there is any
concealment it is with some especial
purpose easily understood and easily ex-
planned. But you can never tell what a
man and woman of the same class
think of one another to see them meet
in the ordinary relations of life. And
neither can the man or woman tell
what the other thinks, but such is the
habit of diStruSt between the sexes
that each is reasonably certain that It
is anything except what he or she pre-
tends. There is no such unfounded sus-
plcion between men or between women.
And the more intense the feeling. whether
like or dislike, the more unnatural is
their attitude to one another. In the
and woman who like each other are
sometimes. but rarely, frank and
simple and direct.
But let their casual interest deepen
and that spirit of open friendliness is
utterly lost The man and woman who
are on the verge of the condition which
we describe as in love are really deadly
enemies Ii you doubt it watch them
VIXEN the feeling has passed. No hate
equals the hate of former lovers. Dis
trust. suspicion, the desire to play
even.' Jealous guarding OF ones own in
don't these describe the attitude of the
average lovers in the most interesting
stages of a love affair?''
But that ends with the fuller under
standing and confidence of maria ge, -
put in the Young Matron with an air of
corieious superiority.
Yes" said the Oracle, 'or in the di-
vorce courts. But I don't think the
cynics are altogether unjustified in the
suspicion that indifference frequently
explains the easier terms on which