The Republican journal., 1904-06-02

the newest UdDy. sue pFOUdUlS taxes
at least one women's paper and reads
it diligently and perhaps sends an occa-
sional contribution to the housekeep-
ers' column. AS her children grow a
little older and begin going to school
she reads up on new educational meth
DDS and is proud and happy that her
advantage.
When the children grow older and
the girl goes away to school or comes
home afterwards, and when the boy
goes into college or into business, she
them,-their dress, their pursuits and
their friends
Up to this stage she is certainly not a
back number. We have seen her
before and after she crossed the dead
line," and even if we do not under
stand why the change comes we are
quick to recognize its effects
In the first place the woman grows
careless about her dress, so long as it
is clean and whole. She doesn't care
about questions of public interest.
She doesn't read the papers, She
knows nothing of what is going on in
the great world. She is inclined to be
a little peevish or querulous, possibly.
She feels that she is not, much use.
Although most women'do not recog-
niZe the fact, the time when they be-
gin to be back numbers is long before
they get there. The disease is one of
slow growth. 1t shows itself first when
the mother ceases to throw herself into
the pursuits of her children, and takes
it for granted that since they have their
friends she is not needed. When she
leaves the room in the evening because
Bessie or Mary is expecting callers,
when she does not share in her daugh-
ter's interest in their new frocks or
new companions, when she fails to join
in her sons enthusiasm over base bali
or foot ball and to listen with keen in
terest to what this fellow" said or
that fellow" did, when she comes to
the point that she can no longer be a girl
with her girls or boy with her boys,
she is well on the way to confirmed
case of back numberitis." Her condi-
ton demands heroic treatment and her
children rarely dare apply it,-or per-
haps it does not occur to them. 1t is
an exceptionally clear-sighted son or
daughter who does not accept the
mother as she is without making an
effort to change her
Even when the effort does come from
the daughter the mother does not
always respond kindly to it. For one
of the symptoms of back numberltis is
resentment OF criticism.
And it must be owned that the ex-
perlence is not one of unmiXed gratlti-
cation. We all of us like to be we'll
thought Of And for mother who
has thought pretty we'll of herself for
years,-even if she has not owned it,
to be called to order by her young
daughter for fault in pronunciation
or in grammar, or for the cut of her
skirt or the sort of stock she wears, or
the old-fashioned way in which she
does her hair, is not the pleasantest ex-
perience one could select if one were
searching for pleasant experiences.
Yet such medicine is good for the
soul. 1t is part of the heroic treatment
that is to save one from becoming
back number. As soon as one reaches
the point where criticism is resented
and ignored, growth and improvement
are practically at an end.
The other day saw one woman who
declines such physic. She is perhaps
sixty years old and she has in her the
possibility of being an attractive wo-
man. Her figure is somewhat inclined
to redundancy, but this same tleshi-
ness does away with wrinkles and her
face is as smooth and rosy as that of a
child. Her hair, which is still plenti-
full, she wears in flowing curls, because
she wore them like that when she first
met her husband, some forty odd years
ago. This gives her rather singular
in this day of more conven-
tional coiffures, and her dress does not
make her look less odd.
For one thing, she INDUCES in shirt
waists, and this is an article of attire
that the middle aged woman should
deny herself, if she is stout. Her cor
set was decidedly not of the straight
front variety. She also wore short
skirt, another garment that is never
becoming to large woman. In imita-
ton of the young girls whom she had
seen wear fourth hand ties, this wo-
man had put on turn down collar and
a made up four-in-hand. Apparently
sell, but it would have been an ex-
ceptionally dutiful son or daughter
who would with pride have introduced
her to strangers. Yet had her dress
been criticised, no matter how kindly,
her feelings would have been hurt deep
ly. And for that reason her family en-
dures the modification of her eccentric
aspect, loving her too dearly to wound
her by word of disparagement, or
even of advise.
The mother need not of necessity be
obliged to entertain in an elaborate
fashion, any more than she must dress
in gorgeous attire. But she should
make her children's friends welcome to
the family table, she should know what
are their interests and ambitions, she
should pay enough attention to her
own dress to be sure that she will APP
pear well in the eyes of her family and
of others. She should share the pur-
suits of her sons and daughters so far
as she can. The lectures and concerts
and clubs that interest them should
claim her interest. She should join in
their outdoor occupations. She should
fish with them, row with them, walk
with them, wheel with them.
All this is not merely to be COM
panion to the juniors and so to do them
good and help them on in life. The as
ISOLATION does that, but it does more
besides. 1t keeps the mother young.
1t brings her in touch with what is 60
ing on in the world about her and
makes her feel a part of the great
scheme Of things instead of a self-cen
tered atom off by herself. There is no
danger If getting into a hack oddv and