The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1914-04-18
From Other Pens
NO MORE Do11.sl

Mrs. Charlotte Perkins Gilman. one
OF the most original and refreshing
OF socioiogists and geneophilosophers.
now puts q taboo on two degrading
superstttions or survivals of the prim-
tive and savage nursery: Little girls
should not be allowed to play with
dolls and call them their babies.
Whether 1t Is done instinctively or in
should not play house and put their
children to bed, nor harbor any of
the emotions or duties of a mother.
1t Is not childish: it il abnormal. That
love OF the little girls to mother
things Is just another proof that with
woman her sex predominates. 1t
must be discouraging for modern
minded mothers to see their Young
daughters practicing in the twentieth
century that strange material SYM
oonsm or magic. that nurture if not
worship OF blocks of wood or stone
that was fmmemorially antique when
Moses was in the bulrushes- Surely
the world ought to gain as Il grows,
Shall the infants of this enlixhtened''
twentieth century dandle and dress
dolls. even as brown babies of the
eighteenth dynasty did? Shall little
American girls be on an intellectual
par with infant daughters of Ham in
darkest Africa, babies of the Arunta.
children of the Australian bush. Pc
ruvian pickaninnies of prehistoric
archaeology? Those memorials of
children of thousands of years ago
| may touch the idle sentimentalist in
museum. This water age scorns
such toys. What says the poet Of
play with his wife's dolls, IL the leg
end is true:
The never enough to- be slammed
Arabian prophet Mohammed,
Would oft Ayesha's dolly coddle-
The old mollycoddle.
Dps
knows more about children than all
the mothers in the world, ever use a
dolI! II dolls are not recommended
to boys. their employment by kris is
dishonoring badge OF inferiority, q
stigma of servitude. And IL ssmofher.
ing" dolls isg abnormal" motherhood
Wnicn 1t images. is also abnormal.
rms, we believe, il the conclusion to
whicn the most logical petticoat gem
eophfiosophy comes. playing house"
nae. IN iact. an intolerable domestic
connotation. Little girls should be
taught to play clubhouse."-New
York Sun.
PROTECTING HOTEL GUESTS.
The employment of Burns detective.
20 RIO hotel Hobbies of card sharps,
fake mine promoters, and Confidence
men generally. evidences q cofnmend-
able concern for their patrons by hotel
managers. Why should not a hotel
look aIter the welfare OF guests in
this respect a. much as in the matter
OF landlords to exercise a protective
surveillance of the kind will be an
plauded. But why stop half way?
why not protect guests as well from
the powers that prey" within-tho
Matchbox men. walters, bellboys. cab
starters. porters. maids and other ..fn-
side operators" who, from points of
vantage in the hotel. levy toll on ali
its frequenters? The victims OF the
card sharp and confidence man are.
after AL. not numerous. and they are
to an extent accomplices in their own
deception. But from the '.honest
graft Of the hotel employee there IL
no escape. 1t IL q good thing to get
rid OF the corridor confidence men.
but what great hotel will first install
a detective bureau for the exposure az
overcharge. extorti0n. bad service. ana
other imp0sitions to which guests AZ
subject within its walls?-NeW York
World.