The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1902-10-03

/
with the very young men and the
| girls just from college. The older
and wiser man grows, I notice, the
less he has to say about constancy,
and the women
swell, it is hard to tell exactly
what a.woman really thinks. She'll
assert thing which she doesn't be-
| lieve one bit; and she will talk flip
PANTY of what is the one thought
and absorption of her heart and soul,
| just to make her listeners believe it
is matter of very small conse-
quence to her.
| ''Oh, yes, I've found that out long
| ago. It's hard to tell what woman
means, and still harder to guess
what she intends doing. Some of 'em
play fast and loose, and I've no
ticed they often spite themselves out
of strange sort of perversity and
give an entirely wrong impression of
themselves, their character and their
sentiments.
'Men are more straightforward
and consequently more comprehen-
sible. There must be reason why
women act so strangely, but I. don't
know it.
''I've often laughed to split my
sides to see how the girls who come
out here on these sands manage to
puzzle the men and get the situation
mixed up, when, in reality, both the
men and the girls are pining for an
| identical termination to their little
summer game.
'But they are all at cross pur-
poses, and come back to this island
for sea bathing mismatched and I'M
| happy, cynical and morose.
"I've hesrd so many silly things
said by people sitting on this bench,
and I've crept out on the sand and
observed and listened for so many
years, that I could be very enter
tanning if I choose to give the result
| of my discoveries to the public.
"Why, only last week, when those
| two 1 am interested in were out here
chatting, it struck me how grateful
Dick Thornton would be if I could
| have made him see that Maude Cam
eron's light badinage was all put on
like her clever, careless society man.
ner, just to hide her real feelings
and because she was so deeply hurt,
| that he had let week pass without
running over to see her, and had
| not even written.
$50 Dick grew formal, and also
society in his manner, and men,
| toned pleasant call he had made on
Dorathea Spencer. Dorathea is the
| tall, handsome girl who was over
| here a month ago, and looked so
stunning in her striped black and
yellow bathing suit. I danced over
| the sand in the moonlight, and shout
| ed with delight at the absurdity of
their misunderstanding each other,
and their mutual indignation over
what never existed.
"Of course Dick Thornton never
explained to her what I heard him
discussing later on with friend,
while walking up and down on the
hotel piazza and smoking; that their
firm has been unusually busy with
some cotton shipments, and that the
senior partner is away.
81 travel around good deal these
bright moonlight nights, specially
when the tide is low, and in that way
get to see and know everything
that is going on.
81 run across the sand hills to the
old bench on the beach, then to the
breakwater rocks--and on such a
night as this there are good many
couples sitting on the rocks-then I
go around by the hotel, where the
band is playing, and big white and
pink oleandef bushes grow along the
front of the piazza, in spite of the
drifting sand. I am spare and agile
of limb, and have no fear of my enc
mics, the dogs, when night comes,
and I love to roam around and learn
the ways of the world.
"Last evening when 1 came out she
was sitting there gazing out at the
sea and absurdly unhappy. She is
much too handsome to sit alone, and
| far too spirited to NOPE, so as soon
as a fellow in white fannels came
along Maude frightened and dropped
! into her usual brilliant spirits, al
though she was thinking of some
| one else half the time.
"They all act that way.
"Now, the man in white flannel is,
I know, engaged to a girl-a shrewd,
clever girl-who lives mostly abroad,
I heard them say. She came to this
island accidentally on account of
some ones illness. She dresses bet
ter than all the other women, and
all the men run after her. She, too,
has sat on this bench frequently.
She criticises the island and laughs
at the sand and is very apish. She
laughs at everything. I don't like
| her.
Neither does the man in white
fannels, overmuch, for all he is en-
gagged to her. They are to be mar
ried in New York this fall. Mean
while 1 heard him flirting outrage
ously with handsome Maude out
here in the moonlight while the tide
was rolling slowly up, and Maude
she was encouraging him, and all
the time wishing he was somebody
| else It's too funny