Alaska sentinel., 1909-01-07
A WORD FROM THE LANDLApY.
Bs Careful, Girls, She Says, We Can
 Tell More than seeress.


 "No." said the landlady. you can't tell anything from a boarder's trunk. The time has been when a yellow leather trunk with a Planters house label pasted on 1t could get my front single parlor and no questions asked. but not of late years. The stung land lady dreads the hotel label. Some of the swellest-loOklng trunks that ever went up my front stairs turned out to be made of paper with the brass hinges only painted on," runs story In the Kansas City Times.
 "Landladies are only human, and am free to confess that have been de ceiyed by these appearances in the past, but If had to size up boarder to-day by this means, other things being equal, I would pin my faith to the little bat tered tin trunk with barn-door pad lock and an odor of mothballs.
 "The truth Is landladies are often to blame for their own misfortunes, and their vanity has put many a good-pay- Ing boarding house on the rocks. When the new boarder comes to the door In a cab with his trunk strapped on behind and his hat box on the seat beside the driver 1t Is a strong minded landlady who can keep the fact clearly before her that she runs boarding house, and not an apartment hotel.
 "I don't know why 1t Is that land lady should allow herself to be taken in by such shallow artifices when she knows better all the time, but 1t Is true nevertheless that she is too often a willing victim. Her experience has taught her well enough that the boarder who puts on the most style. who makes the biggest kick about the odor of cab bage In the front hall, and who calls you down before the whole table be- cause you left the wrong laundry bun dle at his door, Is sure to be the man who Is shy on his board bill Saturday night. Yet such a boarder Is almost attention than the man who pays In advance. never kicks at anything, and always turns the gas low when he goes out.
 Short of marrying a man, I believe there is no experience to be gained In any business equal to that of landlady- ing him. No man can long conceal his true character from his landlady. He may shoot off lot of fireworks to fool the rest of the world, but his landlady generally knows what they are worth. I have often thought that If girls who are thinking of marrying would come to us first we could exert tremendous influence for good in behalf of soci- ety. Better come to us than go to fortune teller.
 Tt Is a grave question in my mind whether any girl should marry man until she has been around when he Is shaving The tone of voice in which I have been asked by boarder with murderous razor in his hand if called the water In the boiler hot would, am sure, make any girl who heard 1t think twice. Young men who are known to them as creatures of the greatest good nature and affabillty would bear different regulations If the landlady chose to tell what she knew.
 What q shock 1t would be to some confding girl If she could see her hero standing in his door shaking his shirt In my face and demanding to know what the laundry had done to the neck band. These are some of the things we could tell If we were asked. We could also show that some of the money spent for theater tickets and bonbons should have gone to pay for the roast consumed the previous Sunday. Have you ever noticed that a young man at the theater with his girl always avoids the eye of his landlady If she happens to be in the house? She knows, and he knows she knows.
 My hope is that some day the world will realize what it owes to the land lady. Perhaps the time will come when a grateful boarder will erect a monI- ment to her, but In the meantime will be satisfied If can collect what Is due me on Saturday night"