The Hope pioneer. [volume] (Hope, N.D.) 1882-1964, 1910-12-29
SOLVE BIG MYSTERY
Women's Souls Are EIated by
Gorgeous Clothes.
London Times Thinks It Has Found
Out Why Dress Is Made Such a
Serious Matter-Takes No In
terest in Any Sport.

London.-It has remained for the
London Times to solve one of the
great social mysteries. Amazement is
mild term to apply to the feelings of
Englishmen when they found in the
editorial columns of the Thunderer a
leading article entitled The Problem
of the Big Hat"
A joke in the columns of England's
most dignified journal would scarcely
have made a greater sensation. Fr1v-
olity, lightness, the human touch, are
things taboo in Printinghouse square.
And yet suddenly, without warning,
comes this startling sign of juvenation
not rejuvenation, for the Times new
er was young.
There is only one thing to account
for it. That awful burden, the prepa-
ration of new edition of the British
Encyclopaedia, has recently been trans
ferred from the Times to the Cam
bridge University Press. The relief
from responsibility has brought too
great reaction. 1t has gone to the
editors head. 1t has led him to tackle
recklessly and lightheartedly prob
lem which has baffled the masculine
half Of humanity since beyond the
memory of man. Without further de-
lay, here is his solution:
1T is commonly said that women
are more unselfsh than men. And so
they certainly are in the home. They
will sacrifice themselves utterly for
particular men and particular chill
dren. Yet they will not sacrifice an
inch of hat brim or feather for the
common convenience, and they will
not tell us the reason of this seem
ing inconsistency.
Men demonstrate, and they smile
and continue to wear the hats and the
feathers Therefore it remains for us
to guess at the reason of this behavior
guess that it is the result of sense
| of the relative Importance of things
| different from our own.
when man goes to lawn tennis
| tournament he goes to see the play
| and he assumes that women go for
| but they are not representative OF
their sex. They are women who have
adopted the mans point of view, who
are overpowered by the influence of
their fathers or husbands or brothers.
The woman whose natural instincts
have free play does not consider that
any game is important.
"She is not, as man is, game play
ing animal. But since man always will
be playing games she has arrived at a
| kind of compromise with him. She
will go to watch his games and profess
an interest in them on condition that
she may attend to her own, business
all the while, and her business is to
wear large hat or whatever else it
pleases her to wear.
1T may seem frivolous business
to the earnest lawn tennis player, but
then his lawn tennis seems frivolous
to her. 1t is Just popularity of his
sex to make fuss about it; she ac-
cepts his peculiarities without fretting
about them, and expects him to accept
hers.
"And after all dress to women is
something more than game. It is
one of their means of expressing them
selves. Fine clothes make them feel
happy and as if they were in a glori-
fed state of existence, freed from the
wear and tear of it's life; in fact as If
they were true birds of Paradise, with
all the splendor Of Paradise in their
plumage."
There you have 1t. There is more of
it, wherein the editor admits that only
Tolstoi and himself have sufficiently
true insight into woman's nature to be
able to solve the riddle.
But the women have yet to be heard
from in their opinion of the Times
resolution. We may be sure they will
speak up promptly. 1t is safe to say
the times mail bag is already swell.
ing with feminine remarks on its
judgment of feminine character-pos.
sibly not all of them in contradiction
| of it's view.