The Birmingham age-herald., 1923-10-20

It is a curious thing that the vir- tues of the home and the virtues of the street are not always the same and that many a good man is a bad husband. There are plenty of. men so impeccable in their conduct in public that they are held up as examples for the youth of their community to initiate who commit crimes worse than murder against their wives and children.
 I have known men honest to the last farthing in all their dealings; men who would have scorned to have given a false weight or measure or misrepresented the goods they had to sell; men who would have died rath CT than betray trust or accept a their right hand rather than let any tainted money stick to 1t.
 Yet these men, who are so honest with other peoples money, are not fair enough to give their wives one single penny of the money they earn by working IA hours day for them and their children. I have seen the wives of these men humiliated into the dust because they did not have an extra nickel with which to pay a friends street car fare, or quarter with which to treat the women tc soda water who were always buying
 
 these women cringe with fear. like a beaten dog, when they had to present the monthly bills to their husbands I have seen these women insulted al most beyond human endurance when they went like mendicants to theiI husbands asking for the money they had earned ten times over.
 I have seen honest men such tight [. wads in their own families that they made their wives and children steal and lie to get the things they were entitled to have. and that their fath- CTS and husbands could afford to give them. and were too stingy to give them.
 have known men who were sober as the town pump. Men who proudly boasted that they had never touched liquor, or tobacco in any form. Men who had never played game of cards for money. or gone to horse race. Men who were pointed out to the young as models of temperance that they should follow.
 have seen these men give way in their own homes to bursts of temper that were temporary insanity. have heard them curse and swear like madmen over such trivial soup. I have seen their wives fawn and flatter trying to keep them in good humor, and using almost super human dexterity to keep any topic out of the conversation that would ruffle their husbands sensibilities.
 In such households I have seen the children hush their prattle the min ute their fathers key sounded in the latch. and seen them sneak away to where his eye would not fall upon them, in the hope that they might that way escape his wrath. 1 have seen them sit silent and hushed at the table, hoping against hope that he would not single them out for his tirades. and when they had to ask him if they might go somewhere, or do something that they desired to do, I have seen them shake as a crimi- nal might in the presence of hang ing judge.
 I have known moral men who were faithful to their marriage vows. Mer who never philandered with pretty woman, or took a second look at any petticoat except those hanging on their own wash line. Men who were vamp- proof.
 But I have seen these same men as cold and hard as a rock to their own wives. l have seen these met let their wives starve and die for a little appreciation, little tenderness, a little love. l have known many of