Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1917-03-23
BY DOROTHY DIX.

~ GENTLY a distinguished Eng
tx lsh woman novelist, giving her
- views on various matters. said
that one of the greatest shocks a wom-
an ever got was when she discovered
that she could not tell the truth to her
husband He simply would not stand
for it, He demanded that she lie to
lam.
This statement is astounding simply
because it is the plain, unvarnished
truth 1t is one Of the few occasions
upon which a woman has permitted her
self the luxury OF handing a man a
large hunk of strict veracity instead of
the nice f1ub-dub tarra-diddle that he
is accustomed to receive from her.
1t is a fact that all women are liars,
and that men make them so.
A girls education in duplicity be-
gins in ner cradle. A boy is permitted
to be the elemental savage that nature
made him. He is allowed to act out
himself, and to comport himself to-
wards tho feminine sex, in especial, just
in accordance with his true sentiments
If he doesn't like a girl, he lets her
alone If he doesn't want to make him.
self agreeable to an old lady, he simply
vanishes from the scene, or else is
gruff or silent, or freezes her off in
some other way.
On the other hand the little girl is
taught that no matter how i'll temper
ed and selfish and catfish she may be,
she must act like little angel and be
all sweetness and amiability and un-
selfishneSs, because, If she doesn't, peo-
pie won't like her and they won't give
her things and ask her to their par
ties.
She has 1t also grounded into her
Juvenile consciousness that woman
mission in life is to always rub the
masculine fur the right way. No mat
ter how much a stupid boy bores her,
she must sit up with a rapt express
sion as if she were having the time of
her life. No matter how much the
love making and compliments of some
doddering old beau may disgust her
she must smirk and smile and affect to
be tickled to death; no matter what a
fool she thinks some egotistical brag-
CART is, she has got to patiently work
the bellows.
She can't cut herself away from the
men who weary her beyond endurance,
or whose presence make her very flesh
crawl with loathfng, because If she did
she would get the reputation of being
peculiar and difficult and hard to please
and Ihen would avoid her as they would
the plague. So, in order that she may
have the pleasure of the society of a
few mon she likes, she is bound to be
hypocrite towards the many that she
doesn't like.
Every girl looks forward to being
married AS to time when she can drop
the double life and be sincere and frank
with the one man that she loves Alas,
it is a vain hope, and the few brides
who attempt the truthful Jane theory
soon find themselves in the divorce
courts.
The first minute the wife attempts
to insert a few planks of veracity into
the domestic platform she finds that
for some unaccountable reason she is
about to upset the whole structure Of
her domestic happiness, and so, If she
is wise woman, she abandons the task
and falls back once more upon the sooth-
ing and salving white lie.
It Is a cold, hard fact, that every
married woman knows, that a wife can
not deal with absolute frankness, as she
would like to, with a husband without
him thinking that she is a human icicle,
and a brute, into the bargain. For a
man doesn't want the truth from any
woman, still less from his wife, and if
she hands it out to him at home, it
doesn't take him long to scamper away
full lisr.
Every man wants his wife to f1atter
him and tell him continually that ne
is the wisest and greatest of his sex
and a perfect oracle, and the women
who hold their husbands and keep their
husbands in love with them are the
mendacious ladies who keep up this po-
lite fiction.
In his secret soul the man is bound
to know that his wife is lying to him.
because ne knows that she is a crea-
ture possessed Of ordinary intelligence,
aud that she is bound to perceive his
limitations and weaknesses, and how ig-
norant and narrow and prejudiced he is.
All the same, he wouldn't stand for a
minute for her telling him that she
knew Just what sort of a man he was,
but that she loved him in spite of his
weaknesses.
Nor, no matter how intelligent, nor
what good judgment wife has. is she
permitted to abandon the pose of a fool
She has TO always pretend to sit at her
husbands feet and ask his opinion, and
defer to hts great wisdom, although both
of them may know that she's got more
sense in a minute than he'll have in a
life time. and that he leans upon her
and not she upon him. But, myl what
a rumpus there would be in the family
If she didn't do her little kowtowtng be-
fore she went ahead and did as she
had intended doing from the first.
And take the ever acute money trou-
BILE. Suppose a woman should say to
her husband
Now, see here, John, want $50 for
new dress. I've earned the money
doing the homework, and sewing. and
patching. and mending, and baby tend
ing, and 1 expect you to hand it over
without a word of protest because its
my due as my part f the proceeds OF
our joint partnership as husband and
wife"
Wouldn't John go up in the ali?
wouldn't he consider any wife who
would speak like that as lacking in all
natural feeling? And wouldn't he hang
on to the coin until she came to her
senses? And don't all women know
that? And doesn't the woman who
wants a new hat find the easiest way
to get 1t is to cajole IT out of her hus-
band by telling him how good and dear
and sweet and generous he is. and what
a lucky woman she is to have great.
big, strong. noble husband who gives
his wife her clothes?
Thus are the amenities of omestic life
sustained, and the more gifted a fabri-
Gator the wife, the better beloved she
is by her husband. No doubt Ananias
regarded Saphtra a model wife, and,
as VIA LDou SCharereZada uas the only