The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1904-02-12

modern surgery reaches the point where
it is possible to insert new backs,
woman may accomplish all she wishes
she could do and all a mere man thinks
she might do. Until then she must be
contented to be as the Creator made her.
There is choice in what may be
crowded out. l have spoken of the ad-
vantage of diversity of occupation. A
woman must not be all housekeeper lest
she neglect the weightier matters, mat
tiers of the law. She must not be all
wife, for fear her children should suffer,
nor should she be all mother, under pen
atty of causing her husband to feel like
an imposed upon boarder in his own
home. Still less should she, in her de-
sire to keep step with the march of
events outside, devote herself so unre-
servedly to Women's Clubs, Mothers
Meetings and Cooking Glasses that her
children bring themselves up by hand
and her husband finds his only satisfac
tory gastronomic greeting at the club or
the restaurant. In the ghoulish phrase
of a sprightly young man, she does not
wish either to keep in front with the
hearse OF come trailing along at the
back with the buggies.
1t is no small thing to be a wife and
mother and the fools who yearly rush
into relation where angels might well
fear to tread open terrifying pros
pect for the future of the race. Still,
the fools are not in the majority, and
the greater part of women who make
mistakes do it through ignorance and
false sense of proportion. When we start
classes in girls schools for the study of
perspective that is not that of drawing
and d proportion that is not to be
found in the arithmetics we may hope
better things for the future of the
nation.
In the meantime, don't throw things
at the performers,-th are doing their
best" There very best, poor things! 1t
is not the fault of the young girl that
she has mot been trained for the great
career of wifehood and motherhood that,
if God is good to her, lies ahead of her.
As it is, she can only do her possible.
1t is big thing when woman has
l.
though married, how to bring up children
so that they will be as much comfort as
possible to their families and as little
nuisance as feasible to the neighbours,
to keep house so that no one but the
house would suspect it did not keep
itself, to manage servant so that she
will not look upon the mistress as her
natural enemy, to be ready in hospitality
without being a burden, to be on good
terms with the neighbours, near or far,
without condescending to pettiness, to be
a member of a Woman's Club without
leaving the stockings undarned, to attend
church without losing her temper on
Sunday morning, to post herself upon
current events without taking the pa
per from her husband at the breakfast
table. to read a new book occasionally, to
practice outdoor exercise enough to keep
herself in good bodily trim, to dress
herself tastefully without forming colos-
sal bills, to bestow sufficient attention
upon her good looks, and having done all
this, to save herself from nervous pros
tration by the system and moderation
she brings to them all
And yet there are women who main
tain that the domestic career does not
give full scope to their powers! In the
name of the GODDESS Common Sense, what
more do they want?