Devils Lake inter-ocean. (Devils Lake, Ramsey Co., Dakota [N.D.]) 1884-1905, 1903-02-06
TREASON.

DoyCotl Gne hdusdS S1ty JOurnal!
1t says: "In the olden time man
was the lord of creation. He fought,
hunted, fshed and ate and drank all
the good victuals and all the good
drinks on the primitive sideboard;
his wife did the hewing Of wood and
carrying Of water and if he let her
have enough to eat and allowed her
to keep her life and her bones intact
she thought him pretty good hus-
band. Mrs. Robert j. Burdette calls
our attention to the fact that these
relations are being reversed in civil
lized countries have been in fact,
almost entirely reversed in the Uni
ted States, whore woman occupies a
higher place than in any other coun-
try. She finds that here proud wo.
man has not only deposed her erst.
while lord, bat shs is rapidly making
him her footstool. Mrs. Burdette is
greivsd ct the wrJGgs poor man II
suffering. In her talk at the Athsn-
aeum rooms Thursday, she begged
the women to be not quite 80 hard on
him. She controverted the popular
opinion that men are to blame for
most domestic troubles. She charged
many American women with senseless
extravagance in their personal and
household expenditures, and asserted
that this, added to their incessant
attention to their so called "social
duties, y keeps the noses Of their hus-
bands constantly to the grindstone,
in many cases causes them to yield to
the temptation to get money by dis
honest means. and tends to break up
the American home. She pleaded
with American women to try to lead
''simpler lives.
No mere man-at least, no mere
American man-would have the
hardihood to say all this. But since
80 prominent society and club
woman as Mrs. Burdette has said
them. mere man may be at least pard-
oned for indorsing them. It seems
to be high time that sensible women
like Mrs. Burdette should begin a
crusade against some Of the follies of
her sex, and particularly against
those to which she alluded.
Every sensible man and every SEN
sible woman knows that what Mrs.
Burdette said is true. The world of
many American women is circum-
scribed BY that little word, society,""
and what narrow, trihing, cramped,
and despicable world it generally is.
The word society as now com
monty employed, does not imply the
association: of men and women Of true
culture with the object Of improving
their minds and their manners, and
getting from life all the true pleasure
that it contains. 1t implies world
in which all women. except the very
wealthy spend more money than they
can afford to spend, in vain and silly
efforts to outshins each other; in
which true mental and moral worth
and good breeding, as compared with
wealth and display, are at a discount; /;
and in which most women are miser-
able and most men are bored. This
kind Of life has often been criticised,
lampooned and denounced, with ap-
parently little effect. But it is hard
to believe that Mrs. Burdette and 9TH
or good women who think like her
cannot do some good by drawing con-
trasts between the homes this kind of
life creates and those other happy
American homes where simplicity is
the rule, where the head Of the fami-
1y is not constantly harrassed by bills
larger than he can pay, and in which
true culture and good breeding are
put above mere outward seeming and
ostentation.