The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1904-10-30
WOMANS WORLD

~asn-~->~---~-~---~-s---s--~-
evolution to meet the requirements of
! masculine taste.
Men like femininity in woman, and
the woman who affects the mannish in
dress, or manners, or conversation does
| IL at her peril. Indeed, so great Is
! mans admiration for wonfAnliness that
he will forgive her all other defects IL
! she only possesses this one quality
This is the reason that the silly iit-
tie ingenue can marry six times to her
| strong minded sisters once, and why
we see women who are dull and stupid
| and unattractive who are still adored
by their husbands. A man man love
/ a women in spite of her being witty,
/ and Intelligent, and able to take care
/ of herself, but he never loves her be-
| cause Of these virtues.
| Women are never more largely and
| gorgeously mistaken than when they
think that they make a winning with
men by trying to make imitation men
OF themselves. The fallacy that men
| pine for women to be little brothers to
them has gained ground of late and
| found many adherents among women
who affect masculine sports, discuss
risque subjects, and endeavor to wipe
out the sex line. Never was greater
folly. 1t is womans unikeness to
man, the very difference of her point
of view, that makes all of her charms
and lends piquancy to her society. If
man wanted the ideas of another
man on subject he would seek one
who had been born to the masculine
estate, not one who had merely I'M
derstudied the role.
Men like what we call the old fash
Toned virtues in women. 1t is the
fashion now for women to be blase, and
cynical but there is no man SO hard
ened that he does not shudder away
from hard woman. He may never
put his foot inside OF a church. but he
wants a woman to be pious. He may
disbelieve in everything in Heaven or
earth, but he wants a woman to have
a ohildlike faith in everything, and no
matter how much he laughs at her for
her credulity, he loves her the bet
ter for 1t. He may judge the world
mercilessly, but he wants a woman
to be full Of tender and unreasoning
sympathy and pity. No man ever low
ed woman who did not cry, or who
was not tender to little children, or
who would not give to a beggar, and
investigate his needs afterwards. The
girl who thinks 1t smart to sneer at
domesticity, and declares that she will
never debase her talents by learning to
cook or sew, who hates children, and
n1ocks at religion, no matter how bril-
liant or beautiful she is, does not at
tract men.
Men like cheerfulness in a woman,
but they hate forced gayety. Prob
ably there is no other woman in the
world that makes men so tired as
the perpetual giggler and gusher-the
woman whose conversation is a series
OF EXPLANATIONS, who chatters like q
maybe, and who laughs at everything
that is said, whether it is funny or
not. These women labor under the hall
lucination that the way to be vivacious
is never to be still. Now in this coun-
try, where society is carried on after
ONCE hours, men seek the companion
ship of women for rest and relaxa-
ton. They want quiet. They want
to be soothed, and sympathized with.
and not to be irritated by the antics
of a perpetual motion machine COM
bined with the noise of a phonograph
that never runs down.
The woman who wants to attract
men must know how to listen as well
as talk. She must suggest an atmos-
phere OF quiet peace. not vaudeville
show where there is always something
doing. She must be deeply, softly COM
prehensive. 1t Is on the bosom of the
ocean that one dreams of resting, not
on the babbling brook. 1t is the sense
of restfulness, of quiet peace they give
that forms the attraction of the large
placid, bovine women who are generally
as stupid as they look, but who al
most invariably get the pick of the
matrimonial market.
Above all, men like naturainess in
women. Affectation and artif1eiality
are the bette noir or the masculine sex.
1t is undeniable that women roll their
eyes at men, and men succumb; that
men are taken in by the simple little
debutante who is younger and more in
nocent, and ignorant, than anyone
ever was by nature, and that not every
woman's hair, and complexion is hers
except by right of purchase, but these
women who affect to be what they are
not and still please men, are artists.
Their imitation of perfect lady is so
good that II looks like the real thing.
What disgusts men is the elephantine
lady who Affects to be kittenish the
stringy spinster of uncertain age who
hsps baby talk; the big, strong, cap
able looking women who think IL cute
to shrek every time they see a mouse,
and the vast sisterhood of feminine
posers who go into Mysteries of delight
over Browning and Wagner when their
real tastes in literature and music are
the Duchess" and 'Bedelia."
Women haven't found 1t out yet, but
the qualities that men like best in
them are tenderness, sympathy, affec-
tion, and goodness, and a man never
admires a woman so much as when she
Is just--a woman.
Dorothy Dix.