The Washington herald., 1918-04-10

A young man who is in love asks
me for a reliable recipe for winning
a maiden's heart.
This is a hard question to answer.
There are many women with many
minds and each woman has a hun
dred minds about what she likes in
a man. What pleases her one MINUTE
may bore her the next. What she
longs for most she may tire of as
soon as she gets II. so that any ad-
vice that one might give in the mat
ter is subject to endless change to
suit the time, the place. and the girl.
There are some roads, though, that
come SO nearly to always leading to
the feminine fancy that II seems
worth while to erect a few guide
posts along them for the benefit OF
anxious lovers.
Once, ] was sent by the newspaper
upon which I was employed to inter-
view a convicted bigamist who had
twenty-four loving wives in various
parts OF the country. He was a most
ordinary ana commonplace creature,
with neither good looks, education, a
prepossessing manner, nor money
with which to dazzle a woman's eyes
and capture her imagination. There
fore il was with unbounded curiosity
that I asked him to reveal to me
the secret by which he had won so
many female hearts.
oh he said contemptuously, ''it's
just dead easy to make a woman fall
In love with you. All you've got to
do Is just talk her blind about her
self"
1t was putting the matter brutally,
but It was the opinion of an expert,
and there is undoubtedly much truth
In the contention. Women do like TO
be talked to about themselves. 1t is
the one subject of which they never
weary, and no matter how stumbling
the tongue that whipsers paeans OF
admiration in their ears, TO them 1t is
tipped with the wisdom of a Solomon
and the eloquence of a Demosthenes.
When girls are very young they like
gross flattery about their eyes, their
hair. their lips. their looks generally.
and they adore being told they are
the living image of Mary PickfOrd or
Lillian Russell.
When they are older and their
| tastes are a little more subtle, they
prefer to be made to feel that a man
is analyzing their thoughts. their emo
| tions and their intuitions. 1t Is this
| time that a woman falls for the as
sertion that there is something mys-
| terious and inscrutable about her.
But, indeed, it is a safe play at any
stage of the game between the cradle
and the grave, to tell a woman that
she is not like other women and that
her being so-er-er-different somehow
was what first attracted the mans at
tention to her.
Bear this in mind. however-always
praise a homely woman for hes eyes
her teeth. her smile. or her figure. ant
not for her cleverness. and reverse
this rule and praise the pretty woman
for her wit. and her cleverness
Heaven knows why, but a woman i.
always more flattered to be thought
the things she isn't than the things
she is.
AS a matter of fact women are moi
half as keen on compliments to theiI
looks as men suppose. They have
worked hard to adorn themselves
They have got on their war paint anC
| they expect TO be praised for it, More
than that, they know that it is the
| conventional thing that every mar
says to every woman and that TO say
How radiantly beautiful you are to
night really means no more thar
saying. 80 charmed to see you," ant
So while they might possibly resen
the omission of a tribute to their ap
pearance. they take It lightly when 4
Is paid.
The compliment that really goes t.
a woman's head and fiatters Ter ou
of her senses, is for a man to max,
her feel that she has wonderful divi
nation, deep insight into things. an
a strange and occult intuition Of tn,