The Savannah morning news., 1904-09-25
WORLD

the man who wants her, instead of the
man she wants. She must take her
opportunity in place of her preference.
Undoubtedly, in many marriages the
bridegroom is the one man in the
world that the bride would have chos-
en- for her spouse, even as she is the
one woman that he has picked out for
his wife, but l believe in the great ma
jority of cases the woman does not en-
ter into matrimony as free willed, and
with as romantic an affection as the
man does.
But marriage changes all this. Mat
rimony is a strange crucible in which
a mans love cools off, and a woman's
love heats up as a general thing.
Probably no man who married a wom-
an for whom he had a lukewarm af-
lection ever fell in love with her after
he was married. no matter what her
virtues as a wife, but any woman will
fall in love with a man after she is
married to him if he is good, kind, ana
considerate to her. for a mans love
lives on illusions, and matrimony even
with a good woman has enough reve-
lations to disillusion anyone, but
woman's love grows strong on deeds.
To my thinking, the fact that a man
loves the more when he is married
than the woman does, Is a wise provi-
sion of nature, and the only way by
which the sentimental accounts be-
tween a husband and wife could ever
be balanced. Taking it big and large
ii may be said that the average man
starts out in married life with the big
gest supply of romance and love and
sentiment generally he is going to
have. All of the ordinary affairs of
life tend TO deplete this capital. His
wife loses the beauty that captured his
young fancy. The intimacy of welded
life reveals the thousand faults he
never suspected that she has conceal
ed about her angelic disposition.
The affairs of the stock market be-
come more important than affairs of
the heart, and the very stress of bust
ness and the necessity of making a
living take him away from her. He
has a thousand interests in which she
cannot enter, and which if they do not
actually mAke him forget her keep him
from thinking about her. She is no
longer the whole of life to him. She
becomes merely side issue. Love isn't
dead. but it III drugged and in a trance.
On the other hand, the circumstances
of woman's life draw her to her hus-
band Her world is bounded by her
home, and the sun, and moon, and
stars revolve around the man whose
coming home at night is the event of
the day, whose appreciation is the re-
ward of her labors. and whose pleasure
and welfare is her continual study.
This keeps the woman's love alive and
burning, and If the husband will only
throw few Goals on the fire in the
shape of compliments, and endear-
lnents, he may be always sure of hav-
ing a fire upon the hearthstone by
hitch to warm himself as long as he
lives.
That woman's love outlasts mans we
see funnily illustrated In the large num-
bers of middle-aged wives that are SOL
EMMY hopping around on one foot in,
physical culture classes, and banting
and massaging in order to regain the
waist measure of their youth, and re-
main as attractive in their husbands
eyes as when they married, but no
body ever saw bald-headed old man,
with fat figure. making any efforts
TO make himself beautiful to his elderly
wife
That woman's love is more enduring
than mans admits of no argument.
Every day In the police courts we see
trembling wretches, with bruised bod
les, lying to shield the hand of the
brute that struck them; we see wives
toiling to support the drunkard that
comes home to abuse them; we see
women outraged, betrayed, degraded.
forgving the man that has dishonored
them. Shame, nor disgrace, nor i'll
treatment, nor neglect, have power to
XIX woman's love. II will not even
drown in her tears, but a man only
loves a woman while she is on her
good behavior.
In this way does mans love differ
from womans, and so If one might
sum the problem of whether man or
woman loved most. up in prize fighter
language, one might say that while
mans love is the strongest to start
with, woman's love has the greatest
staying powers and the most ability to
take punishment, and thus is woman
entitled to the championship in low
ing. Dorothy Dix.