The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1908-11-21
UNDERsrASDINe WOMEN.

There probably never lived man
who didn't fatter himself that he un-
derstood women.
They're a puzzle, of course, to
most men, but I think l know a little
about them" one hears him say in a
lordly, superior sort of way. There
is only one answer to be made to the
satisfied gentleman. The man who
thinks he knows most about women
really knows least.
In point of fact, it is impossible for
any man, however clever and expert
enced, fully to understand woman.
One woman he may learn a little of
very little-and then he is continu-
ally taken aback by new developments
in her on which he has not calculated !;
but let him only begin to apply the
knowledge so learned to his treatment
of another of the same sex, and he
will be bewildered and COMPOUNDED to
discover that the same rules will not
apply to them both.
Shakespeare, who had subtler in
sight into human nature than any
writer who ever lived, was right when
he said of woman, Cline cannot stale
her infinite variety" And it is this
very complexity of character, this
feeting change of mood and DISPOSE
ton, which makes her so desperately
perplexing to slower witted man.
To the ordinary man she is per-
fectly sealed book.
81 can't make her out at all. )"
"She is a mass of contradictions. )"
"She never does or says what you
expect" These are a few of the
plants made by men about the girls
in whom they begin to take special
interest. If she were constructed on
the simple lines of man in mind and
heart, her lover would better know
how to win her; but, in that case, it
is to be doubted whether he would
care to take the trouble. 1t is her
bewildering and puzzliDg nature that
makes her chief charm in his eyes.
"Do you understand women?"
asked a timid youth of a man who
had seen the world.
oh, yes. Understand that there S
no understanding them, and that is as
far as man can ever get" was the
crushing answer.
Women understand each other with
such ease they read each others mo-
tives and interpret Alright their looks
and tones and unspoken speech-it is
all such plain sailing to them that they
look with a kind of compassion on a
mans laundering ignorance of the
sex. That is why woman who is
popular among men is so very often
quite the other thing with women.
The poor, deluded men who take her
at precisely the valuation she intends
them to cannot comprehend why her
own sex don't see her many lovely
qualities, and, in their blindness, they
complacently set down the reason to
jealousy. The real fact is that the
woman can't deceive women, try as
she may. They read her through
and through, and estimate her accor-
dinghy.
That men never have fully under
stood women is plain to any one who
has made study of the male novel;
list S works. Even the foremost names
in the profession have this one point
of weakness. Their women are ad-
mirably painted from the outside.
They are charming very often, and
attractive, and full of grace. They
move and walk about the stage and
conduct themselves in 1ifelike man.
ner enough, but any woman can see
that after all they are only pasteboard
dummies they lack the touch of
promethean fire that would make them
flesh and blood Man in Boston
Globe.