The Ocala evening star. [volume] (Ocala, Fla.) 1895-1943, 1917-10-06

| the victim of the parasite or semi
parasitic wife. The business woman
has offers of. marriage from a few
rich old men she meets in business
men too old to attract the society
girl even tho they have wealth to Of
| fer. The business woman considers.
Yet while she prays and with a groan
against fate which would compel
her to sacrifice soul for the main
tenance of body, she rejects marriage
at the hands of these polluted off
casts and sets her mind more deter
minedly to business.
! What are this woman's evening di-
versions? Think seriously and answer
if you can, business men, social lead
er, sheltered wife.
What do you find at your fireside
and about your table three hundred
and sixty-five evenings in the year? /
/ shall not answer because all the
world knows what you find. Writers
of all ages have told in song and
story of the holy atmosphere of love
and cheer which cling about you and
envelope you at twilight, but now the
working woman comes home. No, in
all the world there is no home for
| her. Like the Savior of the world she
repeats as she seeks shelter for the
night: "The foxes have holes, the
birds have nests, but / have nowhere
| to lay my head!" But she finds the
place where she sleeps which is often
several blocks from where she eats.
1t is often cold in winter, unheated,
often improperly ventilated, jammed
against another building, dark even
in the daytime. Gods sunshine is
shut out of her abode as out of her
heart. If the season be summer, the
room is hot for the same reasons that
help to make it cold in winter, poor
ventilation, and fresh air shut off by
other buildings. The walls are often
bare, sometimes they are hung with
faces of men and women now promi-
nent in the social world, where fifteen
| years ago this woman's sweetness and
cleverness and her bright and grac-
ious manner made her conspicuous,
but now-the present-her evenings
| are empty, and she spends them alone
or with some other middle-aged or
older woman at movie show. Re-
gardless of the degree of this won-
ans skill and usefulness, nobody loves
her, she is homelessI Would it be so
with a man? No, somebody would
make a home for him. Twice it was
rumored that this woman was to mar
ry men now prominent in business
and politics, but as the years passed
on these men had married women far
beneath her on the scale by which we
4 measure womanhood, but those wom-
en- had the yellow metal the love of
which has been declared to be the root
Of all evil. They got the man, and
with his own shrewdness and their
money, he bought whatsoever he de-
sired, either worldly power, or human
/ flesh, for there are those woman who
would SELL
Often, too often, the man who In
youth would have loved her had for
tune favored her as had nature, now
tries to buy her. Maybe this heart
less Cd business woman stood in
some sheltered spot and listened to
the~tale of love from this same man
; who has fallen so low with the pass
ing years that his ideals have perish
ed, the words of love still issue from
his mouth, but their origin is not of
the soul, but of lust He really never
: loved his wife. He, too, has paid the
price. His life has been empty, or
partially so. This woman who has
worked by his side through the years
knows life as he knows it. Nothing
has been kept from her all-seeing
eyes. No shield of wealth, power, po-
sition, love. has held veil before her
vision. The man takes from his finger
costly jewel extended in his out
stretched hand fThis for kiss" he
says; "just one" She looks at it, she
looks at him. She hardly blames him
for the depravity of his soul Condi-
tions have played their part in this
mans life. Ambition has cost him a
dear price as it has always cost those
who put it before love and honor
J Gradually look of scorn on the WON
ans face is replaced by one of sym
pathy and understanding from
! this woman who has spent her life in
toll and service that she might cher
! ish an ideal.