Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1942-12-28

A man may be the noblest of h
the Ten Commandments. He may be
faithful. He may toll like a galley sla
able, yet make their marriage hell {
grouchiness that keep her walking OF
way.
A woman may be a model of all
the virtues. She may be pretty and
intelligent, devoted wife and moth
er, an inspired cook, and champion
penny pincher, and yet keep her
husband cursing the day he married
her by her nagging and her inability
to say a thing once and let it rest
there
When We hear of married couple
getting a divorce, we assume that
one or the other has committed some
deadly and unforgivable wrong
against the other, and the scandal
mongers sharpen their tongues and
begin to wonder if Mr.. Jones, who
looks like such a gentleman, has
been beating his poor little wife, or
if he has fallen in love with his
blond secretary; or if Mrs. Jones,
whom everybody has thought to be
such a noble, Christian woman has
found her soul mate in that good
looking young chan who is always at
their house; or if -1r. Jones is send
ing her to Reno to keep her from
bankrupting him with her eXtrav-
aganceS.
But the chances are a hundred to
one that none Of these surmiseS is
correct, or if they are true in the
end, they were not in the begin
ming Mr.. and Mrs. Jones are both
worthy people, incapable of being
deliberately cruel to each other. or
of planning a cold blOoded divorce.
They didn't stab their love to the
heart with any one deed. They just
let it bleed to death through
thousand pinpricks.
Once I asked a woman who was
getting a divorce from her husband
to whom she had been married for
Is years, why she was doing it.
After you have been married so
long" murmured namely, land you
both stand so high in the commit
nifty" L know how it will seem to
Others she replied, but I have
stood Charles disposition for 25
| years and I have reached the limit
Of my endurance. l want to have a
few years of peace in which / will
not be criticized for everything I do
and say, badgered about everything
l spend and forced to listen to
man tell me how great and wonder
full he is.
of course. Charles has never
struck me with his hands. but he
has beaten my pride and self-respect
black and blue by the insulting
things he has said to me. I have had
| the best of food, but l have starved
| for love and appreciation. and even
/ common kindness. And that's why l
| am getting a divorce"
And some such tale as that is be-
| hind the separation of nearly all
married couples. Not many men
| lose their taste for their wives until
| their wives diSlllusion them. Not
many wives fall out of love with
| their husbands until their husbands
| get on their nerves by the way they
| treat them. And neither husbands
or wives have brought about the
catastrophe by committing any great
sin against the other.
1t is just the little irritating things
they have done. Curl papers and
cold cream and sOiled housecoatS at
breakfast, leaving wet towels on the
bathroom floor, senseleSs arguments
about nothing, leaving the cap off
the toothpaste tube, infinitesimal
| fool things like these have alienated
more affection than all the sirens
and Don Juans who ever lived.
And the reverse of this is equally
true. 1t is the little things that make
marriage a grand and glorious sue
cess, not the big ones. It is the
| graces we weave about marriage that
make it lovely and beautiful not do
| ing ones duty. No man feels eS-
| pecially grateful to his wife for being
a good houSekeeper and making him
| comfortable and darning his socks
J Az tiiAiiFNs' IN 10 AuNhS W Ii1Nb sbtlCll
a good cook instead of one who would
poison him with food that would
make an ostrich call for the bicar-
Donate. But, after all, that is her
duty. That is her part in the mar
rlage contract and doesn't call for
any beating of the cymbals.
1t is her playing up to him, her
always treating him with tender
ness, with appreciation. with under
standing, and making him feel that
he is the center Of her world and
that she thinks him the most Won
derful creature in it; it is her keep
ing herself always looking attrac-
tive and being sweet to live with,
that makes him thank God on his
knees for her.
And even more so with women.
1t is not the fine houses and limou-
sineS that man gives his wife for
which she is grateful. 1t is his graft
tude towards her. AS long as he
feeds her on soft talk she will starve
for him without whimper. AS long
as her husband takes an interest in
holding her hand she will work it to
the bone to support him, and think
it a privilege to do it.
1t is the little things that count
| In MARRIAGE