Atlanta Georgian. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1912-1939, 1913-03-22
What Was Poor, Beautiful Jobyna
Rowland to Think When Husband
Arthur Stringer Told Her That He
Adored Her, and Then Wrote That
Women Weren't Necessary to Poets
COULD Any Wife Stand For It?

in that gorgeous gown" But that did not pre-
vent her finding among the notes. when she
placed his desk in order that afternoon, the note
Enthusiastically in his handwriting:
woman finding herself with no resource
except to appeal to her possessor's magma
tion, was coerced into display of those at.
tributes which would most effectively and
permanently placate somewhat capricious
master. She acquired the dazzle habit. And
mating became more competitive she real
lied the advantage of ornamentation, of add
ing fictitious value to her person by the
things with which she adorned it. Out of this
was born the parade instinct in woman"
She gasped when she discovered the title under
which he gathered this and other selfiluminat-
ing remarks. 1t was "The Woman Barbarous"
What could a woman believe? He said thfs,
he wrote that, and he refused to explain the
incongruity Broodng, she decided that he could
not. The differences were irreconcilable. She
had married a monster, a monster of inconsist-
ency! Verify, the inconsistencies of men great
and many, while those of women are small and
fewl
'The greatest thing in the world is a woman
and you the greatest of all women her noeC
spouse might rhapsodize, but of what avail was
that when there struck her as a blow from a
page surmounted by his name:
"'The unequivocally great women of re-
corded time could be inscribed on a sheet of
paper bigger than this printed page"
And there appeared neither her name nor any
hint of her in the list that followed.
Man the irresponsible Every woman loves
to hear the man of her heart say: Angel of
goodness, l worship you" But why should Mr..
Stringer waste valuable breath in such assertions
when in his Irish poems he finishes his verses on
"Wimmin Folk" with this:
For when gerrls love We WELL my lad,
They're thrue to nayther law letter.
'Fis when they're most disheartenin bad
Ye'l learn to love such angels betther."
Mr. Strnger grew quite accustomed to hearing
half-sobbng exclamation "Oh, Arthur" after
his wife had cut the leaves of his latest book
or had dipped into his latest magazine article
And having nothing to say, he said it. But next
day he wrote: "Who can restrain a poet? Him
self least of ALL"
1T is because Jobyna persists in staying IN
the stage" was the conjecture of few friends,
when they heard of the packing of many deter
mined trunks in the Stringer household. But long
ago the poet withdrew his objection to his beau
tiful wife's gracing the boards. True he pre-
ferred his quiet pipe by the fire, six months a
year on the home farm at Cedar Springs, Canada
a permanent roof, growing family, but this is
age of indvidualism, and he recognized his
wife's righI to develop her individuality.
It was that pen of his. that runaway pen, hat
always outstripped his tongue that made his
life and works trial balance sheet, crisscrossed
with errors, they agree caused the parting Of
the ways.
She heard him vow love undying eternal and
watched him write rollicking inspired by
the cartoon of a standing beside a tomb
stone of his wife, watch in impatient hand.
He lauded her beauty. He told her it was a
gift of the gods He said he was proud to be
the husband of one of the most beautiful women
in America. But he wrote this:
"The beautiful woman begins life wrong
If she has intellect it atrophies through mac
ton, for to succeed she has only to smile,
for time, very little time, as compared
with the long stretch of a woman's life"
Who can blame Mrs. Strnger if she muttered
wretch" through her ct teeth as vciously as
did the villain in the theatre where she was
playing
He might eternal fidelity, but Of what
avail when he wrote for this newspaper:
The beautiful woman wins husband. The
ugly woman keeps him"
Mrs. Stringer had a healthy ambition for con-
tined success on the stage.