The Saint Paul globe., 1904-01-23
zUOHAT qualities do women admire

ZUlHAT qualities do women admire
VIZ most in men?
A love-lorn youth writes me a pa
thetic letter saying in effect that he is
persona non grata with the fair sex
and asking what he must do to make
himself popular with women.
This is a hard question to answer.
There are many women of many minds,
and each has. different mind about
man. The style of masculine beauty
that appeals to one woman doesn't
please another The charms that set
one maiden's pulse a-fiutter leave an
other with the marble heart. The noble
and serious qualities that fascinate
plain Maria may repulse frivolous Ma
rie, and so it goes, and instead of there
being a frantic struggle for one par
ticular man, every man has his innings,
and every girl has the secret sat1sfac-
ton of plying every other girl because
she wasn't lucky enough to catch her
particular Jack. The most jealous wife
/ ever knew was a woman who had
married man so homely and so cranky
that no other woman would have had
him if he had been gold plated and set
with diamonds, yet the poor wife spent
her life in the narrowing belief that ev-
cry female she met-young or old, mar
ried or single-was trying to snatch her
| treasure from her
There is no disputing about tastes,
especially women's tastes in men.
But this is generalizing, and my
! correspondent comes right down to
| facts and asks: How can l become a
winner with the girls?'
Perhaps the secret of popularity with
| our fellow creatures must always re-
main the one unfathomable mystery OF
| life. In the old days-before she lost
| her French accent-Anna Held used to
sing little song in which she account
ed for her fascinat ton for the opposite
sex by saying: For 1 have sooch a
way wis me-" That, I take it, is about
as clear an alaysis of the reason we like
one person and don't like another as
has ever been given. A man may be
possibly able to tell why he loves a
woman, but as far as women are con-
cerned we never have the ghost of an
idea why we love a man. He may not
be clever, he may be as homely as sin,
and as poor as church mouse, but he
has sooch a way wis him" and we
get up and leave our comfortable
homes and follow him to the ends of
the earth.
And, heaven help us, we don't know
why we are doing it, any more than
sheep know why they follow their
leader over wall. 1t is simply blind
instinct.
l imagine, however, that 1t is pre-
cisely these winning ways that my COR
respondent desires to cultivate, and
that he wants to know, from woman,
what qualities in a man are most at
tractive to women. He says that girls
do not care for his society. They cast
no goo-goo eyes in his direction. His
mail is not loaded down with violet
scented missives, and when he tries to
curry favor with girls the ungrateful
minxes turn their backs upon him and
talk to another while they eat his
candy. It is a sad predicament. Let us
see If We can turn any light upon this
dark problem.
In the first place, it should be a
consolation to a man to know that his
looks have nothing to do with his pop
ularity with women. Few women care
for beauty in man. 1t is a poaching
upon their preserves that they resent
Besides the vanity of a handsome man
compared to the vanity of the vainest
woman that ever lived, is~as moonlight
to sunlight, or as water under wine,
or as any other imitation to the real
thing. 1t is never ending, all perva-
sive, utterly unsatisfiable, and leaves
him no room to notice the appearance
of any other human being. 1t is worth
bearing in mind that, almost without
exception, the great heart smashers of
history have been men who were not
only plain of face but often hideously
ugly. Titania. falling In love with a
creature with the head of a beast, was
not such q midsummer madness as the
poet represents il. He was not such
an ass as he looked for when they sat
upon a flowery bank he spent the time
telling her how beautiful she was, in
stead of expecting her to wear herself
out pitching bouquets at him as he
would have demanded had he been an
Apollo.
But While mere regularity of fea-
lures in a man counts but little in at
tracing a woman's fancy, a man
should always be well groomed and
we'll dressed. Nothing on earth but
the grace of God keeps a woman in
love with a man with a two days stub
bic of beard on his face. Married
women stand this because lack of
shaving is not yet recognized as a
cause for divorce, but no girl wants
a slovenly, untidy man, who looks like
he needed to be run through the laun-
dry, hanging around her. All the
from masculine lips. No woman joins
feels that the man who comes into
her presence ill-clothed, dirty and
neglected looking not only shows dis
respect for her. but indicates that he
lacks judgment, industry and pro-
p-reSSiVeneSS AS matter Of fact that