CHAPTER VI.

THE CYNOSURE.

It's a singular thing that the commonest place

Is the hardest to properly fill;

That the labor imposed on a full half the race

Is so seldom performed with good will--

To say nothing of knowledge or skill!

What we ask of all women, we stare at in one,

And tribute of wonderment bring;

If this task of the million is once fitly done

We all hold our hands up and sing!

It's really a singular thing!

Isabel Porne was a cautious woman, and made no acclaim over her new

acquisition until its value was proven. Her husband also bided his

time; and when congratulated on his improved appearance and air of

contentment, merely vouchsafed that his wife had a new girl who could

cook.

To himself he boasted that he had a new wife who could love--so cheerful

and gay grew Mrs. Porne in the changed atmosphere of her home.

"It is remarkable, Edgar," she said, dilating repeatedly on the peculiar

quality of their good fortune. "It's not only good cooking, and good

waiting, and a clean house--cleaner than I ever saw one before; and it's

not only the quietness, and regularity and economy--why the bills have

gone down more than a third!"

"Yes--even I noticed that," he agreed.

"But what I enjoy the most is the _atmosphere,_" she continued. "When I

have to do the work, the house is a perfect nightmare to me!" She

leaned forward from her low stool, her elbows on her knees, her chin in

her hands, and regarded him intently.

"Edgar! You know I love you. And I love my baby--I'm no unfeeling

monster! But I can tell you frankly that if I'd had any idea of what

housework was like I'd never have given up architecture to try it."

"Lucky for me you hadn't!" said he fondly. "I know it's been hard for

you, little girl. I never meant that you should give up

architecture--that's a business a woman could carry on at home I

thought, the designing part anyway. There's your 'drawing-room' and all

your things--"

"Yes," she said, with reminiscent bitterness, "there they are--and there

they might have stayed, untouched--if Miss Bell hadn't come!"

"Makes you call her "Miss Bell" all the time, does she?"

Mrs. Porne laughed. "Yes. I hated it at first, but she asked if I

could give her any real reason why the cook should be called by her

first name more than the seamstress or governess. I tried to say that

it was shorter, but she smiled and said that in this case it was

longer!--Her name is Diantha--I've seen it on letters. And it is one

syllable longer. Anyhow I've got used to Miss Bell now."

"She gets letters often?"

"Yes--very often--from Topolaya where she came from. I'm afraid she's

engaged." Mrs. Porne sighed ruefully.

"I don't doubt it!" said Mr. Porne. "That would account for her six

months' arrangement! Well, my dear--make hay while the sun shines!"

"I do!" she boasted. "Whole stacks! I've had a seamstress in, and got

all my clothes in order and the baby's. We've had lot of dinner-parties

and teas as you know--all my "social obligations" are cleared off!

We've had your mother for a visit, and mine's coming now--and I wasn't

afraid to have either of them! There's no fault to be found with my

housekeeping now! And there are two things better than that--yes,

three."

"The best thing is to see you look so young and handsome and happy

again," said her husband, with a kiss.

"Yes--that's one. Another is that now I feel so easy and lighthearted I

can love you and baby--as--as I _do!_ Only when I'm tired and

discouraged I can't put my hand on it somehow.

He nodded sympathetically. "I know, dear," he said. "I feel that way

myself--sometimes. What's the other?"

"Why that's best of aIl!" she cried triumphantly. "I can Work again!

When Baby's asleep I get hours at a time; and even when he's awake I've

fixed a place where he can play--and I can draw and plan--just as I used

to--_better_ than I used to!"

"And that is even more to you than loving?" he asked in a quiet

inquiring voice.

"It's more because it means _both!_" She leaned to him, glowing, "Don't

you see? First I had the work and loved it. Then you came--and I loved

you--better! Then Baby came and I loved him--best? I don't know--you

and baby are all one somehow."

There was a brief interim and then she drew back, blushing richly. "Now

stop--I want to explain. When the housework got to be such a

nightmare--and I looked forward to a whole lifetime of it and _no_

improvement; then I just _ached_ for my work--and couldn't do it! And

then--why sometimes dear, I just wanted to run away! Actually! From

_both_ of you!--you see, I spent five years studying--I was a _real_

architect--and it did hurt to see it go. And now--O now I've got It and

You too, darling! _And_ the Baby!--O I'm so happy!"

"Thanks to the Providential Miss Bell," said he. "If she'll stay I'll

pay her anything!"

The months went by.

Peace, order, comfort, cleanliness and economy reigned in the Porne

household, and the lady of the house blossomed into richer beauty and

happiness; her contentment marred only by a sense of flying time.

Miss Bell fulfilled her carefully specified engagement to the letter;

rested her peaceful hour in the morning; walked and rode in the

afternoon; familiarized herself with the length and breadth of the town;

and visited continuously among the servants of the neighborhood,

establishing a large and friendly acquaintance. If she wore rubber

gloves about the rough work, she paid for them herself; and she washed

and ironed her simple and pretty costumes herself--with the result that

they stayed pretty for surprising periods.

She wrote letters long and loving, to Ross daily; to her mother twice a

week; and by the help of her sister's authority succeeded in maintaining

a fairly competent servant in her deserted place.

"Father was bound he wouldn't," her sister wrote her; "but I stood right

up to him, I can now I'm married!--and Gerald too--that he'd no right to

take it out of mother even if he was mad with you. He made a fuss about

your paying for the girl--but that was only showing off--_he_ couldn't

pay for her just now--that's certain. And she does very well--a good

strong girl, and quite devoted to mother." And then she scolded

furiously about her sister's "working out."

Diantha knew just how hard it was for her mother. She had faced all

sides of the question before deciding.

"Your mother misses you badly, of course," Ross wrote her. "I go in as

often as I can and cheer her up a bit. It's not just the work--she

misses you. By the way--so do I." He expressed his views on her new

employment.

Diantha used to cry over her letters quite often. But she would put

them away, dry her eyes, and work on at the plans she was maturing, with

grim courage. "It's hard on them now," she would say to herself. "Its

hard on me--some. But we'll all be better off because of it, and not

only us--but everybody!"

Meanwhile the happy and unhappy households of the fair town buzzed in

comment and grew green with envy.

In social circles and church circles and club circles, as also in

domestic circles, it was noised abroad that Mrs. Edgar Porne had "solved

the servant question." News of this marvel of efficiency and propriety

was discussed in every household, and not only so but in barber-shops

and other downtown meeting places mentioned. Servants gathered it at

dinner-tables; and Diantha, much amused, regathered it from her new

friends among the servants.

Does she keep on just the same?" asked little Mrs. Ree of Mrs. Porne in

an awed whisper.

"Just the same if not better. I don't even order the meals now, unless

I want something especial. She keeps a calendar of what we've had to

eat, and what belongs to the time of year, prices and things. When I

used to ask her to suggest (one does, you know: it is so hard to think

up a variety!), she'd always be ready with an idea, or remind me that we

had had so and so two days before, till I asked her if she'd like to

order, and she said she'd be willing to try, and now I just sit down to

the table without knowing what's going to be there."

"But I should think that would interfere with your sense of freedom,"

said Mrs. Ellen A Dankshire, "A woman should be mistress of her own

household."

"Why I am! I order whenever I specially want anything. But she really

does it more--more scientifically. She has made a study of it. And the

bills are very much lower."

"Well, I think you are the luckiest woman alive!" sighed Mrs. Ree. "I

wish I had her!"

Many a woman wished she had her, and some, calling when they knew Mrs.

Porne was out, or descending into their own kitchens of an evening when

the strange Miss Bell was visiting "the help," made flattering

propositions to her to come to them. She was perfectly polite and

agreeable in manner, but refused all blandishments.

"What are you getting at your present place--if I may ask?" loftily

inquired the great Mrs. Thaddler, ponderous and beaded.

"There is surely no objection to your asking, madam," she replied

politely. "Mrs. Porne will not mind telling you, I am sure."

"Hm!" said the patronizing visitor, regarding her through her lorgnette.

"Very good. Whatever it is I'll double it. When can you come?"

"My engagement with Mrs. Porne is for six months," Diantha answered,

"and I do not wish to close with anyone else until that time is up.

Thank you for your offer just the same."

"Peculiarly offensive young person!" said Mrs. Thaddler to her husband.

"Looks to me like one of these literary imposters. Mrs. Porne will

probably appear in the magazines before long."

Mr. Thaddler instantly conceived a liking for the young person, "sight

unseen."

Diantha acquired quite a list of offers; places open to her as soon as

she was free; at prices from her present seven dollars up to the

proposed doubling.

"Fourteen dollars a week and found!--that's not so bad," she meditated.

"That would mean over $650 clear in a year! It's a wonder to me girls

don't try it long enough to get a start at something else. With even

two or three hundred ahead--and an outfit--it would be easier to make

good in a store or any other way. Well--I have other fish to fry!"

So she pursued her way; and, with Mrs. Porne's permission--held a sort

of girl's club in her spotless kitchen one evening a week during the

last three months of her engagement. It was a "Study and Amusement

Club." She gave them short and interesting lessons in arithmetic, in

simple dressmaking, in easy and thorough methods of housework. She gave

them lists of books, referred them to articles in magazines, insidiously

taught them to use the Public Library.

They played pleasant games in the second hour, and grew well acquainted.

To the eye or ear of any casual visitor it was the simplest and most

natural affair, calculated to "elevate labor" and to make home happy.

Diantha studied and observed. They brought her their poor confidences,

painfully similar. Always poverty--or they would not be there. Always

ignorance, or they would not stay there. Then either incompetence in

the work, or inability to hold their little earnings--or both; and

further the Tale of the Other Side--the exactions and restrictions of

the untrained mistresses they served; cases of withheld wages; cases of

endless requirements; cases of most arbitrary interference with their

receiving friends and "followers," or going out; and cases, common

enough to be horrible, of insult they could only escape by leaving.

"It's no wages, of course--and no recommendation, when you leave like

that--but what else can a girl do, if she's honest?"

So Diantha learned, made friends and laid broad foundations.

The excellence of her cocking was known to many, thanks to the weekly

"entertainments." No one refused. No one regretted acceptance. Never

had Mrs. Porne enjoyed such a sense of social importance.

All the people she ever knew called on her afresh, and people she never

knew called on her even more freshly. Not that she was directly

responsible for it. She had not triumphed cruelly over her less happy

friends; nor had she cried aloud on the street corners concerning her

good fortune. It was not her fault, nor, in truth anyone's. But in a

community where the "servant question" is even more vexed than in the

country at large, where the local product is quite unequal to the

demand, and where distance makes importation an expensive matter, the

fact of one woman's having, as it appeared, settled this vexed question,

was enough to give her prominence.

Mrs. Ellen A. Dankshire, President of the Orchardina Home and Culture

Club, took up the matter seriously.

"Now Mrs. Porne," said she, settling herself vigorously into a

comfortable chair, "I just want to talk the matter over with you, with a

view to the club. We do not know how long this will last--"

"Don't speak of it!" said Mrs. Porne.

"--and it behooves us to study the facts while we have them."

"So much is involved!" said little Mrs. Ree, the Corresponding

Secretary, lifting her pale earnest face with the perplexed fine lines

in it. "We are all so truly convinced of the sacredness of the home

duties!"

"Well, what do you want me to do?" asked their hostess.

"We must have that remarkable young woman address our club!" Mrs.

Dankshire announced. "It is one case in a thousand, and must be

studied!"

"So noble of her!" said Mrs. Ree. "You say she was really a

school-teacher? Mrs. Thaddler has put it about that she is one of these

dreadful writing persons--in disguise!"

"O no," said Mrs. Porne. "She is perfectly straightforward about it,

and had the best of recommendations. She was a teacher, but it didn't

agree with her health, I believe."

"Perhaps there is a story to it!" Mrs. Ree advanced; but Mrs. Dankshire

disagreed with her flatly.

"The young woman has a theory, I believe, and she is working it out. I

respect her for it. Now what we want to ask you, Mrs. Porne, is this:

do you think it would make any trouble for you--in the household

relations, you know--if we ask her to read a paper to the Club? Of

course we do not wish to interfere, but it is a remarkable

opportunity--very. You know the fine work Miss Lucy Salmon has done on

this subject; and Miss Frances Kellor. You know how little data we

have, and how great, how serious, a question it is daily becoming! Now

here is a young woman of brains and culture who has apparently grappled

with the question; her example and influence must not be lost! We must

hear from her. The public must know of this."

"Such an ennobling example!" murmured Mrs. Ree. "It might lead numbers

of other school-teachers to see the higher side of the home duties!"

"Furthermore," pursued Mrs. Dankshire, "this has occured to me. Would

it not be well to have our ladies bring with them to the meeting the

more intelligent of their servants; that they might hear and see

the--the dignity of household labor--so ably set forth?

"Isn't it--wouldn't that be a--an almost dangerous experiment?" urged

Mrs. Ree; her high narrow forehead fairly creped with little wrinkles:

"She might--say something, you know, that they might--take advantage

of!"

"Nonsense, my dear!" replied Mrs. Dankshire. She was very fond of Mrs.

Ree, but had small respect for her judgment. "What could she say? Look

at what she does! And how beautifully--how perfectly--she does it! I

would wager now--_may_ I try an experiment Mrs. Porne?" and she stood

up, taking out her handkerchief.

"Certainly," said Mrs. Porne, "with pleasure! You won't find any!"

Mrs. Dankshire climbed heavily upon a carefully selected chair and

passed her large clean plain-hemmed handkerchief across the top of a

picture.

"I knew it!" she proclaimed proudly from her eminence, and showed the

cloth still white. "That," she continued in ponderous descent, "that is

Knowledge, Ability and Conscience!"

"I don't see how she gets the time!" breathed Mrs. Ree, shaking her head

in awed amazement, and reflecting that she would not dare trust Mrs.

Dankshire's handkerchief on her picture tops.

"We must have her address the Club," the president repeated. "It will

do worlds of good. Let me see--a paper on--we might say 'On the True

Nature of Domestic Industry.' How does that strike you, Mrs. Ree?"

"Admirable!" said Mrs. Ree. "So strong! so succinct."

"That certainly covers the subject," said Mrs. Porne. "Why don't you

ask her?"

"We will. We have come for that purpose. But we felt it right to ask

you about it first," said Mrs. Dankshire.

"Why I have no control over Miss Bell's movements, outside of working

hours," answered Mrs. Porne. "And I don't see that it would make any

difference to our relations. She is a very self-poised young woman, but

extremely easy to get along with. And I'm sure she could write a

splendid paper. You'd better ask her, I think."

"Would you call her in?" asked Mrs. Dankshire, "or shall we go out to

the kitchen?"

"Come right out; I'd like you to see how beautifully she keeps

everything."

The kitchen was as clean as the parlor; and as prettily arranged. Miss

Bell was making her preparation for lunch, and stopped to receive the

visitors with a serenely civil air--as of a country store-keeper.

"I am very glad to meet you, Miss Bell, very glad indeed," said Mrs.

Dankshire, shaking hands with her warmly. "We have at heard so much of

your beautiful work here, and we admire your attitude! Now would you be

willing to give a paper--or a talk--to our club, the Home and Culture

Club, some Wednesday, on The True Nature of Domestic Industry?"

Mrs. Ree took Miss Bell's hand with something of the air of a Boston

maiden accosting a saint from Hindoostan. "If you only would!" she

said. "I am sure it would shed light on this great subject!"

Miss Bell smiled at them both and looked at Mrs. Porne inquiringly.

"I should be delighted to have you do it," said her employer. "I know

it would be very useful."

"Is there any date set?" asked Miss Bell.

"Any Wednesday after February," said Mrs. Dankshire.

"Well--I will come on the first Wednesday in April. If anything should

happen to prevent I will let you know in good season, and if you should

wish to postpone or alter the program--should think better of the

idea--just send me word. I shall not mind in the least."

They went away quite jubilant, Miss Bell's acceptance was announced

officially at the next club-meeting, and the Home and Culture Club felt

that it was fulfilling its mission.

[Untitled]

I gave myself to God.--

With humility and contrition,

In sacrifice and submission.

"Take me! Do not refuse me!

Order me--govern me--use me!

Nothing I ask for my own--

I pray to be thine alone!--"

And God smiled.

I gave myself to mankind.--

With sorrow and sympathy deep,

With pity that would not sleep.

"To serve you and save you, brothers!

To give my life for the others!

I ask no price--no place--

I seek but to help the race!--"

And God smiled.

I gave myself to Myself.--

In the knowledge that opens power;

In the truth's unfolding hour;

In the glory of service free;

The joy that such life can be:--

My life--that is never done!

For my neighbor and I are One!--

And God smiled.

OUR ANDROCENTRIC CULTURE; or, THE MAN-MADE WORLD

VI.

GAMES AND SPORTS

One of the sharpest distinctions both between the essential characters

and the artificial positions of men and women, is in the matter of games

and sports. By far the greater proportion of them are essentially

masculine, and as such alien to women; while from those which are

humanly interesting, women have been largely debarred by their arbitrary

restrictions.

The play instinct is common to girls and boys alike; and endures in some

measure throughout life. As other young animals express their abounding

energies in capricious activities similar to those followed in the

business of living, so small children gambol, physically, like lambs and

kids; and as the young of higher kinds of animals imitate in their play

the more complex activities of their elders, so do children imitate

whatever activities they see about them. In this field of playing there

is no sex.

Similarly in adult life healthy and happy persons, men and women,

naturally express surplus energy in various forms of sport. We have

here one of the most distinctively human manifestations. The great

accumulation of social energy, and the necessary limitations of one kind

of work, leave a human being tired of one form of action, yet still

uneasy for lack of full expression; and this social need has been met by

our great safety valve of games and sports.

In a society of either sex, or in a society without sex, there would

still be both pleasure and use in games; they are vitally essential to

human life. In a society of two sexes, wherein one has dictated all the

terms of life, and the other has been confined to an extremely limited

fraction of human living, we may look to see this great field of

enjoyment as disproportionately divided.

It is not only that we have reduced the play impulse in women by

restricting them to one set of occupations, and overtaxing their

energies with mother-work and housework combined; and not only that by

our androcentric conventions we further restrict their amusements; but

we begin in infancy, and forcibly differentiate their methods of play

long before any natural distinction would appear.

Take that universal joy the doll, or puppet, as an instance. A small

imitation of a large known object carries delight to the heart of a

child of either sex. The worsted cat, the wooden horse, the little

wagon, the tin soldier, the wax doll, the toy village, the "Noah's Ark,"

the omnipresent "Teddy Bear," any and every small model of a real thing

is a delight to the young human being. Of all things the puppet is the

most intimate, the little image of another human being to play with.

The fancy of the child, making endless combinations with these visible

types, plays as freely as a kitten in the leaves; or gravely carries out

some observed forms of life, as the kitten imitates its mother's

hunting.

So far all is natural and human.

Now see our attitude toward child's play--under a masculine culture.

Regarding women only as a sex, and that sex as manifest from infancy, we

make and buy for our little girls toys suitable to this view. Being

females--which means mothers, we must needs provide them with babies

before they cease to be babies themselves; and we expect their play to

consist in an imitation of maternal cares. The doll, the puppet, which

interests all children, we have rendered as an eternal baby; and we

foist them upon our girl children by ceaseless millions.

The doll, as such, is dear to the little boy as well as the girl, but

not as a baby. He likes his jumping-jack, his worsted Sambo, often a

genuine rag-doll; but he is discouraged and ridiculed in this. We do

not expect the little boy to manifest a father's love and care for an

imitation child--but we do expect the little girl to show maternal

feelings for her imitation baby. It has not yet occurred to us that

this is monstrous.

Little children should not be expected to show, in painful precocity,

feelings which ought never to be experienced till they come at the

proper age. Our kittens play at cat-sports, little Tom and Tabby

together; but little Tabby does not play she is a mother!

Beyond the continuous dolls and their continuous dressing, we provide

for our little girls tea sets and kitchen sets, doll's houses, little

work-boxes--the imitation tools of their narrow trades. For the boy

there is a larger choice. We make for them not only the essentially

masculine toys of combat--all the enginery of mimic war; but also the

models of human things, like boats, railroads, wagons. For them, too,

are the comprehensive toys of the centuries, the kite, the top, the

ball. As the boy gets old enough to play the games that require skill,

he enters the world-lists, and the little sister, left inside, with her

everlasting dolls, learns that she is "only a girl," and "mustn't play

with boys--boys are so rough!" She has her doll and her tea set. She

"plays house." If very active she may jump rope, in solitary

enthusiasm, or in combination of from two to four. Her brother is

playing games. From this time on he plays the games of the world. The

"sporting page" should be called "the Man's Page" as that array of

recipes, fashions and cheap advice is called "the Woman's Page."

One of the immediate educational advantages of the boy's position is

that he learns "team work." This is not a masculine characteristic, it

is a human one; a social power. Women are equally capable of it by

nature; but not by education. Tending one's imitation baby is not

team-work; nor is playing house. The little girl is kept forever within

the limitations of her mother's "sphere" of action; while the boy learns

life, and fancies that his new growth is due to his superior sex.

Now there are certain essential distinctions in the sexes, which would

manifest themselves to some degree even in normally reared children; as

for instance the little male would be more given to fighting and

destroying; the little female more to caring for and constructing

things.

"Boys are so destructive!" we say with modest pride--as if it was in

some way a credit to them. But early youth is not the time to display

sex distinction; and they should be discouraged rather than approved.

The games of the world, now the games of men, easily fall into two broad

classes--games of skill and games of chance.

The interest and pleasure in the latter is purely human, and as such is

shared by the two sexes even now. Women, in the innocent beginnings or

the vicious extremes of this line of amusement, make as wild gamblers as

men. At the races, at the roulette wheel, at the bridge table, this is

clearly seen.

In games of skill we have a different showing. Most of these are

developed by and for men; but when they are allowed, women take part in

them with interest and success. In card games, in chess, checkers, and

the like, in croquet and tennis, they play, and play well if

well-trained. Where they fall short in so many games, and are so wholly

excluded in others, is not for lack of human capacity, but for lack of

masculinity. Most games are male. In their element of desire to win,

to get the prize, they are male; and in their universal attitude of

competition they are male, the basic spirit of desire and of combat

working out through subtle modern forms.

There is something inherently masculine also in the universal dominance

of the projectile in their games. The ball is the one unescapable

instrument of sport. From the snapped marble of infancy to the flying

missile of the bat, this form endures. To send something forth with

violence; to throw it, bat it, kick it, shoot it; this impulse seems to

date back to one of the twin forces of the universe--the centrifugal and

centripetal energies between which swing the planets.

The basic feminine impulse is to gather, to put together, to construct;

the basic masculine impulse to scatter, to disseminate, to destroy. It

seems to give pleasure to a man to bang something and drive it from him;

the harder he hits it and the farther it goes the better pleased he is.

Games of this sort will never appeal to women. They are not wrong; not

necessarily evil in their place; our mistake is in considering them as

human, whereas they are only masculine.

Play, in the childish sense is an expression of previous habit; and to

be studied in that light. Play in the educational sense should be

encouraged or discouraged to develop desired characteristics. This we

know, and practice; only we do it under androcentric canons; confining

the girl to the narrow range we consider proper for women, and assisting

the boy to cover life with the expression of masculinity, when we should

be helping both to a more human development.

Our settled conviction that men are people--the people, and that

masculine qualities are the main desideratam in life, is what keeps up

this false estimate of the value of our present games. Advocates of

football, for instance, proudly claim that it fits a man for life.

Life--from the wholly male point of view--is a battle, with a prize. To

want something beyond measure, and to fight to get--that is the simple

proposition. This view of life finds its most naive expression in

predatory warfare; and still tends to make predatory warfare of the

later and more human processes of industry. Because they see life in

this way they imagine that skill and practice in the art of fighting,

especially in collective fighting, is so valuable in our modern life.

This is an archaism which would be laughable if it were not so dangerous

in its effects.

The valuable processes to-day are those of invention, discovery, all

grades of industry, and, most especially needed, the capacity for honest

service and administration of our immense advantages. These are not

learned on the football field. This spirit of desire and combat may be

seen further in all parts of this great subject. It has developed into

a cult of sportsmanship; so universally accepted among men as of

superlative merit as to quite blind them to other standards of judgment.

In the Cook-Peary controversy of 1909, this canon was made manifest.

Here, one man had spent a lifetime in trying to accomplish something;

and at the eleventh hour succeeded. Then, coming out in the rich

triumph long deferred, he finds another man, of character well known to

him, impudently and falsely claiming that he had done it first. Mr.

Peary expressed himself, quite restrainedly and correctly, in regard to

the effrontery and falsity of this claim--and all the country rose up

and denounced him as "unsportsmanlike!"

Sport and the canons of sport are so dominant in the masculine mind that

what they considered a deviation from these standards was of far more

importance than the question of fact involved; to say nothing of the

moral obliquity of one lying to the whole world, for money; and that at

the cost of another's hard-won triumph.

If women had condemned the conduct of one or the other as "not good

house-wifery," this would have been considered a most puerile comment.

But to be "unsportsmanlike" is the unpardonable sin.

Owing to our warped standards we glaringly misjudge the attitude of the

two sexes in regard to their amusements. Of late years more women than

ever before have taken to playing cards; and some, unfortunately, play

for money. A steady stream of comment and blame follows upon this. The

amount of card playing among men--and the amount of money lost and won,

does not produce an equivalent comment.

Quite aside from this one field of dissipation, look at the share of

life, of time, of strength, of money, given by men to their wide range

of recreation. The primitive satisfaction of hunting and fishing they

maintain at enormous expense. This is the indulgence of a most

rudimentary impulse; pre-social and largely pre-human, of no service

save as it affects bodily health, and of a most deterring influence on

real human development. Where hunting and fishing is of real human

service, done as a means of livelihood, it is looked down upon like any

other industry; it is no longer "sport."

The human being kills to eat, or to sell and eat from the returns; he

kills for the creature's hide or tusks, for use of some sort; or to

protect his crops from vermin, his flocks from depredation; but the

sportsman kills for the gratification of a primeval instinct, and under

rules of an arbitrary cult. "Game" creatures are his prey; bird, beast

or fish that is hard to catch, that requires some skill to slay; that

will give him not mere meat and bones, but "the pleasure of the chase."

The pleasure of the chase is a very real one. It is exemplified, in its

broad sense in children's play. The running and catching games, the

hiding and finding games, are always attractive to our infancy, as they

are to that of cubs and kittens. But the long continuance of this

indulgence among mature civilized beings is due to their masculinity.

That group of associated sex instincts, which in the woman prompts to

the patient service and fierce defence of the little child, in the man

has its deepest root in seeking, pursuing and catching. To hunt is more

than a means of obtaining food, in his long ancestry; it is to follow at

any cost, to seek through all difficulties, to struggle for and secure

the central prize of his being--a mate.

His "protective instincts" are far later and more superficial. To

support and care for his wife, his children, is a recent habit, in plain

sight historically; but "the pleasure of the chase" is older than that.

We should remember that associate habits and impulses last for ages upon

ages in living forms; as in the tree climbing instincts of our earliest

years, of Simian origin; and the love of water, which dates back through

unmeasured time. Where for millions of years the strongest pleasure a

given organism is fitted for, is obtained by a certain group of

activities, those activities will continue to give pleasure long after

their earlier use is gone.

This is why men enjoy "the ardor of pursuit" far more than women. It is

an essentially masculine ardor. To come easily by what he wants does

not satisfy him. He wants to want it. He wants to hunt it, seek it,

chase it, catch it. He wants it to be "game." He is by virtue of his

sex a sportsman.

There is no reason why these special instincts should not be gratified

so long as it does no harm to the more important social processes; but

it is distinctly desirable that we should understand their nature. The

reason why we have the present overwhelming mass of "sporting events,"

from the ball game to the prize fight, is because our civilization is so

overwhelmingly masculine. We shall criticize them more justly when we

see that all this mass of indulgence is in the first place a form of

sex-expression, and in the second place a survival of instincts older

than the oldest savagery.

Besides our games and sports we have a large field of "amusements" also

worth examining. We not only enjoy doing things, but we enjoy seeing

them done by others. In these highly specialized days most of our

amusement consists in paying two dollars to sit three hours and see

other people do things.

This in its largest sense is wholly human. We, as social creatures, can

enjoy a thousand forms of expression quite beyond the personal. The

birds must each sing his own song; the crickets chirp in millionfold

performance; but human being feels the deep thrill of joy in their

special singers, actors, dancers, as well as in their own personal

attempts. That we should find pleasure in watching one another is

humanly natural, but what it is we watch, the kind of pleasure and the

kind of performance, opens a wide field of choice.

We know, for instance, something of the crude excesses of aboriginal

Australian dances; we know more of the gross license of old Rome; we

know the breadth of the jokes in medieval times, and the childish

brutality of the bull-ring and the cockpit. We know, in a word, that

amusements vary; that they form a ready gauge of character and culture;

that they have a strong educational influence for good or bad. What we

have not hitherto observed is the predominant masculine influence on our

amusements. If we recall once more the statement with regard to

entertaining anecdotes, "There are thirty good stories in the world, and

twenty-nine of them cannot be told to women," we get a glaring sidelight

on the masculine specialization in jokes.

"Women have no sense of humor" has been frequently said, when "Women

have not a masculine sense of humor" would be truer. If women had

thirty "good stories" twenty-nine of which could not be told to men, it

is possible that men, if they heard some of the twenty-nine, would not

find them funny. The overweight of one sex has told in our amusements

as everywhere else.

Because men are further developed in humanity than women are as yet,

they have built and organized great places of amusement; because they

carried into their humanity their unchecked masculinity, they have made

these amusements to correspond. Dramatic expression, is in its true

sense, not only a human distinction, but one of our noblest arts. It is

allied with the highest emotions; is religious, educational, patriotic,

covering the whole range of human feeling. Through it we should be able

continually to express, in audible, visible forms, alive and moving,

whatever phase of life we most enjoyed or wished to see. There was a

time when the drama led life; lifted, taught, inspired, enlightened.

Now its main function is to amuse. Under the demand for amusement, it

has cheapened and coarsened, and now the thousand vaudevilles and

picture shows give us the broken fragments of a degraded art of which

our one main demand is that it shall make us laugh.

There are many causes at work here; and while this study seeks to show

in various fields one cause, it does not claim that cause is the only

one. Our economic conditions have enormous weight upon our amusements,

as on all other human phenomena; but even under economic pressure the

reactions of men and women are often dissimilar. Tired men and women

both need amusement, the relaxation and restful change of irresponsible

gayety. The great majority of women, who work longer hours than any

other class, need it desperately and never get it. Amusement,

entertainment, recreation, should be open to us all, enjoyed by all.

This is a human need, and not a distinction of either sex. Like most

human things it is not only largely monopolized by men, but masculized

throughout. Many forms of amusement are for men only; more for men

mostly; all are for men if they choose to go.

The entrance of women upon the stage, and their increased attendance at

theatres has somewhat modified the nature of the performance; even the

"refined vaudeville" now begins to show the influence of women. It

would be no great advantage to have this department of human life

feminized; the improvement desired is to have it less masculized; to

reduce the excessive influence of one, and to bring out those broad

human interests and pleasures which men and women can equally

participate in and enjoy.

HIS AGONY

A Human Being goes past my house

Day after day, hour after hour,

Screaming in agony.

It is dreadful to hear him.

He beats the air with his hands, blindly, despairingly.

He shrieks with pain.

The passers-by do not notice him.

The woman who is with him does not notice him.

The policeman does not notice him.

No ambulance comes ringing.

No doctor rushes out of a house--no crowd collects.

He screams and screams.

No one notices him.

I bear him coming again.

It is terrible--one day after another.

I look out of my window.

Yes--the same Human Being--the same agony.

I cannot bear it. I rush down--out into the street.

I say to the woman who is with him--

"Why do you not do something?"

She says there is nothing to be done. She resents my interference.

She is a hired person, hired by the owner of the Human Being.

That is why no one does anything--

We dare not interfere with the Owner.

He is a very young Human Being,

That is why no one notices--

We are used to the sound of agony and the indifference of hired persons.

COMMENT AND REVIEW

The spread of social ethics among the medical profession is cause for

great rejoicing. Long and justly celebrated as benefactors of humanity,

and upholding with devotion the high ideals of their profession, they

have now begun to widen their usefulness and extend their ideals under

the general social awakening of our time.

Social sanitation is a rapidly extending process; as fast as our

discoveries reveal the nature of disease or new remedies therefor, our

governments, local and national, are beginning to safeguard the

community.

In the general movement to lengthen and strengthen human life, doctors

are necessarily most prominent because of their special knowledge. They

have long been necessary. they have become more and more valuable, but

their usefulness is still checked (as is true of all of us) by the

persistence of conservatism and old ideas.

Very recently the advance of bacteriological science has thrown new

light on a group of especially dangerous diseases; and still more

recently the doctors themselves, with a splendid exertion of social

conscience against tradition and habit, have begun to disseminate this

new light to the general public.

Those special payments of the "wages of sin," spoken of in varying

euphemisms, most commonly as "social diseases" are now better understood

by physicians; and they are making noble efforts to spread this

understanding among the people. Their efforts are gravely hindered by

two obstacles; one the professional tradition known as "the medical

secret," the other the universal prevalence of that primordial

superstition--the sex tabu.

This last belongs to the very deepest sedimentary deposit in the human

mind. The first rules the lowest savage peoples began to make were the

sex tabus and food tabus. Secrecy, mystery, all manner of childish

hocus pocus, were used to establish these primitive ideas; and the

weight of that black past is upon its yet.

The less developed a race, the less educated a class, the more solemn

and earnest they are in preserving the sex tabus; whereas with wide

scientific knowledge this field of facts is seen to be like others;

important and worth understanding; but not as special arcana to be

concealed and avoided.

If the doctors come forward to tell us how the typhoid bacillus is

disseminated, how dangerous it is, and how it is to be avoided, we are

interested, grateful, and more or less willing to profit by the

instruction. But when they try to tell us how the gonococcus attacks

humanity, how dangerous it, and how it is to be avoided, we say, "Sh!

That is something you mustn't talk about!"

To the credit of the profession they have kept on talking, many of them.

To the credit of some of our bravest and wisest editors the talk has

been widely published. And right here I wish to pay a well deserved

tribute to the "Ladies' Home Journal," which ought to have a Nobel prize

for great public service.

That paper--long scorned by me as the arch-type of all small

ultra-feminine backwardness, did the bravest thing a paper can do,

risked its whole position by flying in the face of the public and

printing the clearest, fullest, most enlightening accounts of the

present status of these "social diseases," their terrible effects, and

our duty toward them. It lost subscribers by the thousand and hundred

thousand, but it did the work; and did it better than any other

publication could; not only on account of its enormous circulation, but

because it went into the homes of pious and unenlightened persons who

would never have seen the information in more progressive magazines.

The negative inertia and positive resistance of the popular mind cannot

forever resist the constantly increasing pressure of knowledge now

poured forth on this subject.

But there is that other obstacle--the tradition of secrecy in the

medical profession.

Doctors take the Hipprocratic oath. They solemnly swear not to reveal

the confidences of their patients; or, more properly their innocent

confidences. They are not bound like priests in the confessional; if a

patient tells the doctor he has poisoned his mother or is about to

poison his father, the doctor is not bound to conceal the facts.

Nevertheless, if a patient afflicted with one of these highly contagious

diseases tells his doctor that he has poisoned his wife, or is to poison

his child--the doctor feels professionally bound to keep silence.

What puzzles an outsider is to see why the medical mind discriminates so

sharply here between the conduct required in cases of small pox or

scarlet fever, and in this case. If you tell the doctor you have

leprosy--there's nothing sacred about that. Off with you to the pest

house, at any cost of pain and shame to you or your family. Is the

whole community to be exposed to infection just to save your feelings?

So even with measles, with diphtheria, with yellow fever. The privacy

of the home is invaded, families are ruthlessly separated, the strong

arm of the law is reached out to protect the public against this danger;

and the doctor, so far from conniving with the patient, is legally

required to record all cases of this sort.

Now where is the difference?

These special diseases are more dangerous--and far more common, than

most of these mentioned above; and their effects, hereditary as well as

contagious, of measureless evil.

We are told that the difference is one of moral obliquity.

But surely there is no veil of secrecy about moral obliquity! If a man

is a thief or a murderer we do not respect his confidence and conceal

his offence. The papers justify their fierce blazonry of crimes and

sins by saying that it strengthens public opinion--protects the people.

No, it is not because of moral obliquity.

It is for precisely the same reason that you must not make inquiries of

a Chinaman as to his wife's health, or see a Turkish lady without her

veil--it is "improper!"

The doctors and the boards of health together can soon change this silly

convention, and the physician be required to register every case of this

sort as he does in other contagious diseases.

All this is called up at this time by a little book named "Never Told

Tales," sent me by the author, Dr. William Robinson of New York City.

It is a brave little book. Dr. Robinson is not a novelist by

profession, but his heart is so wrung and his brain so roused by the

hidden tragedy he sees all about him that he has reached out into

literature for aid. Everywhere this mischief creeps about, centering

rankly in every large city; carried everywhere by those infected;

bringing death, deformity, and hideous diseases into thousands of

innocent families; spreading, growing, and nobody saying anything about

it!

Dr. Robinson has said something. He has thrown out the little book of

stories, hoping that in the vivid narrative form it may reach and appeal

to those who would not read "medical literature"; or even the new and

impressive books now to be had on this subject.

For solid information of a clear and serious sort, readable and clean,

Dr. Prince Morrow's book, "Social Diseases and Marriage" is the best I

know. Dr. Morrow is the founder of the American Society of Sanitary and

Moral Prophylaxis in New York City; a splendid effort on the part of the

medical profession to spread even to unwilling ears this necessary

knowledge.

The New York Federation of Women's Clubs has lately taken action on the

subject; passing resolutions urging in this state an amendment to the

Domestic Relations law requiring every marriage certificate to be

accompanied by a medical certificate also, certifying the applicant to

be free from contagious disease. This is already required in several

western states. It seems a simple and righteous proposition. If a man

wishes to join the army or navy, or to have his life insured, he has to

pass a physical examination, and is refused if he is unfit. Is not

marriage and parenthood as important as carrying life insurance?

There is a large and growing interest in these matters among intelligent

women; and it is a natural and proper one. If a woman is to unite her

life with a man, she surely has a right to know whether her own life is

to be risked by the union. If she looks forward to motherhood as every

normal woman should, she should be safeguarded from this terrible

possibility.

It is time there was wide, full public knowledge on this subject.

PERSONAL PROBLEMS

This from a recent newspaper: "When a reporter called at the address,

Miss Doe or Mrs. Roe appeared in a highly nervous state as a result of

her struggles during the day to keep out of the way of reporters. It

took half an hour's argument to induce her to acknowledge the marriage."

As the whole story treats of this lady's marriage, the calling her

"Miss" appears to be a needlessly elaborate insult; but what seems most

prominent here is the naive brutality of the inquisitor.

Here is a runaway match; the groom being a student and the son of a

somewhat prominent man; it is a bit of gossip, of no general importance

whatever, the publication of which is sure to cause intense distress to

the bride, the groom, the father, and the heads of the institution where

the young man was being educated.

In pursuit of this utterly unnecessary "news" the young bride is hounded

into a "highly nervous condition" by the person hired to meddle in

private affairs for trade purposes. The effect of her previous

"struggle to keep out of the way" is calmly noted by the successful

intruder; he forces himself in where he was not wanted; he remains

admittedly against the will of the occupier; he talks like a book-agent

and wears out the already nervous woman till he makes her "acknowledge

the marriage."

As a personal problem, why should any citizen submit to be exploited in

this manner for trade purposes?

As a public problem, why should any tradesman be allowed to practice

this sort of psychic assault and battery?

The position was well expressed by a wise man as follows: "If the

newspaper is a public business for public service, by what right do

personal owners make fortunes out of it? If it is a personal business

for personal profit, by what right does it meddle with my private

affairs?"

This might be made an extremely debatable question: What right has

anyone to keep to himself some process, drug, or special knowledge of

real value to humanity? Patents or royalties may be allowed, with full

freedom to use, but has he the right to conceal and withhold his

benefaction? Or suppose again, that one has some distinction of no use

to humanity, yet of sufficient interest to the gaping crowd to command a

price for exhibition; if one is a Bearded Lady, say, or a Living

Skeleton, or a Fat Boy, and if one makes a living by exhibiting these

peculiarities and selling one's photograph--then would it be just to

allow any and every photographer to forcibly take one's picture and sell

it?

Further, suppose one has a private history rich in biographical

revelations, and intended to publish the same, after the manner of those

major and minor ego-maniacs of the astounding "confessions"; then is it

right that the public scandal pedlars be allowed to chase their prey

into his or her private house, and by a sort of "third degree" process

wring from the exhausted and irritated victim these biographical

tidbits, that they may go and sell them to their own profit?

"The public is interested in these things," we are gravely told by these

who thus make a living.

The Public might, conceivably, be interested in the table manners of

certain noted persons, or their expressions while shaving, or "doing

their hair."

Is it therefore permissible that dealers in picture post-cards, or

makers of moving picture. shows, come in with cameras at mealtimes or

toilette hours, and photograph the lifted soupspoon, the purchased hair,

or cheek stretched under the razor?

The right of society to the best service of all, we must accept as

paramount; but what right has a private individual to exploit the

secrets of other private individuals merely for his own financial

profit? And how can he claim "social service" as his excuse, when what

he does is no benefit but an injury to society?

Do we not need a wide and thorough revision of our ideas as to social

and personal rights?

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THE FORERUNNER

CHARLOTTE PERKINS GILMAN'S MAGAZINE

CHARLTON CO., 67 WALL ST., NEW YORK

AS TO PURPOSE:

_What is The Forerunner?_ It is a monthly magazine, publishing stories

short and serial, article and essay; drama, verse, satire and sermon;

dialogue, fable and fantasty, comment and review. It is written

entirely by Charlotte Perkins Gilman.

_What is it For?_ It is to stimulate thought: to arouse hope, courage

and impatience; to offer practical suggestions and solutions, to voice

the strong assurance of better living, here, now, in our own hands to

make.

_What is it about?_ It is about people, principles, and the questions

of every-day life; the personal and public problems of to-day. It gives

a clear, consistent view of human life and how to live it.

_Is it a Woman's magazine?_ It will treat all three phases of our

existence--male, female and human. It will discuss Man, in his true

place in life; Woman, the Unknown Power; the Child, the most important

citizen.

_Is it a Socialist Magazine?_ It is a magazine for humanity, and

humanity is social. It holds that Socialism, the economic theory, is

part of our gradual Socialization, and that the duty of conscious

humanity is to promote Socialization.

_Why is it published?_ It is published to express ideas which need a

special medium; and in the belief that there are enough persons

interested in those ideas to justify the undertaking.

AS TO ADVERTISING:

We have long heard that "A pleased customer is the best advertiser."

The Forerunner offers to its advertisers and readers the benefit of this

authority. In its advertising department, under the above heading, will

be described articles personally known and used. So far as individual

experience and approval carry weight, and clear truthful description

command attention, the advertising pages of The Forerunner will be

useful to both dealer and buyer. If advertisers prefer to use their own

statements The Forerunner will publish them if it believes them to be

true.

AS TO CONTENTS:

The main feature of the first year is a new book on a new subject with a

new name:--

_"Our Androcentric Culture."_ this is a study of the historic effect on

normal human development of a too exclusively masculine civilization.

It shows what man, the male, has done to the world: and what woman, the

more human, may do to change it.

_"What Diantha Did."_ This is a serial novel. It shows the course of

true love running very crookedly--as it so often does--among the

obstructions and difficulties of the housekeeping problem--and solves

that problem. (NOT by co-operation.)

Among the short articles will appear:

"Private Morality and Public Immorality."

"The Beauty Women Have Lost"

"Our Overworked Instincts."

"The Nun in the Kitchen."

"Genius: Domestic and Maternal."

"A Small God and a Large Goddess."

"Animals in Cities."

"How We Waste Three-Fourths Of Our Money."

"Prize Children"

"Kitchen-Mindedness"

"Parlor-Mindedness"

"Nursery-Mindedness"

There will be short stories and other entertaining matter in each issue.

The department of "Personal Problems" does not discuss etiquette,

fashions or the removal of freckles. Foolish questions will not be

answered, unless at peril of the asker.

AS TO VALUE:

If you take this magazine one year you will have:

One complete novel . . . By C. P. Gilman

One new book . . . By C. P. Gilman

Twelve short stories . . . By C. P. Gilman

Twelve-and-more short articles . . . By C. P. Gilman

Twelve-and-more new poems . . . By C. P. Gilman

Twelve Short Sermons . . . By C. P. Gilman

Besides "Comment and Review" . . . By C. P. Gilman

"Personal Problems" . . . By C. P. Gilman

And many other things . . . By C. P. Gilman

DON'T YOU THINK IT'S WORTH A DOLLAR?

THE FORERUNNER

CHARLOTTE PERKINS GILMAN'S MAGAZINE

CHARLTON CO., 67 WALL ST., NEW YORK

_____ 19__

Please find enclosed $_____ as subscription to "The Forerunner" from

_____ 19___ to _____ 19___

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TO RENT

A Summer Cottage

on Lake Champlain

Near the Adirondacks

This is a six-room two-story cottage, natural wood finish, unplastered,

on two and a half acres of land, 600 feet on the lake, with an old apple

orchard and many other trees. It has on two sides covered piazzas,

outside blinds, open fireplaces in two rooms; and new white enameled

open plumbing, with hot and cold water. It is about a mile and a half

from Essex Village, and about one-quarter of a mile from the post

office, at the Crater Club, an exclusive summer colony. Access by boat

and train.

I have not seen this cottage, but I've seen plans, elevations and

photographs of it, and of views from it. It stands on a bluff, close to

the lake, the Green Mountains far in the east, and the Adirondacks some

twelve miles to the west. The people who own it will answer further

questions and state facts fully on request, both advantages and

disadvantages.

The list of furnishings is accurate and circumstantial, as follows:

INVENTORY OF CONTENTS OF COTTAGE

LIVING ROOM

Mahogany sofa, small mahogany table

Marble-topped table and "Crowning of Esther"

4 rosewood chairs, steamer chair

Whatnot, wall-bracket, books, basket

Mahogany table, small round 3-legged

Long mantel mirror, gilt frame

3 oil paintings, 3 engravings

Rustic seat (filled with wood)

Old-fashioned heating stove, crated

Candle-lantern, 2 Japanese trays

Door-scraper, woodbasket

Tongs-holder, hearth brush

Child's garden tools

2 sofa cushions

Various small ornaments

KITCHEN

Ironing Table, stand, wax, bosom board

Tin pail, dipper, basin

1 new broom, 1 old broom

Tool box, tools, nails, saw, hatchet

Hammock, barrel hammock, tie ropes

Soap rack, dustpan, scrap basket

Folding hat rack, ladder

Carving set, 6 knives (very old)

Coffee pot, toaster, egg whip, egg beater

5 large white china plates

5 medium and 6 small ditto

6 demi tasse and saucers, same

2 tea cups, 6 saucers, same

2 egg stands, green; 2 sugar bowls

1 butterfly cup and saucer

6 glasses, 1 lemon squeezer

1 mechanical red-glass lamp

2 reading lamps, 3 small hand lamps

3 small bracket lamps, 1 shade

White shades at all windows

GREEN BEDROOM

Green bedstead (three-quarter)

2 mattresses, 2 pillows, madras cover

Green bureau; green washstand

Green table; green rocking chair

Oak chair; 2 pictures; 1 chamber

LARGE EAST BEDROOM

Oak bedstead (double)

Oak bureau, oak washstand

2 mattresses, 2 feather beds, 1 bolster

2 pillows, madras spread

1 box cot, 1 mattress, straw pillow

2 chairs, 2 towel racks

Bureau cover, pen cushion, etc.

3 pictures

SOUTHWEST BEDROOM

Black walnut single bedstead

1 hair mattress and bolster

1 pillow, 1 feather bed, 1 madras spread

Bureau (mirror broken), 2 towel racks

Mahogany washstand, mirror

Small 3-legged table

3 rosewood chairs

Bureau cover, pin cushion, etc.

Shoebag on wall

Oil painting, on copper

Brass stair rods, in closet

NORTHWEST BEDROOM

2 mahogany bureaus, empty trunk

Portable bath-tub, clothes basket

On shelves: 7 sheets, 7 pillow cases

3 table cloths, 10 doilies

4 towels, dish cloths and towels

Bureau and tray cloths

Curtains, enough for doors

Curtains for some windows

Apply to "Summer Cottage," care of The Forerunner or to John B. Burnham,

Agent, Essex, N.Y.

THE FORERUNNER

A MONTHLY MAGAZINE

BY

CHARLOTTE PERKINS GILMAN

AUTHOR, OWNER & PUBLISHER

1.00 A YEAR

.10 A COPY

Volume 1. No. 7

MAY, 1910

Copyright for 1910

C. P. Gilman

Having made pockets, we need not carry so many things in our hands.

Having made books, we need not carry so many things in our heads.

BRAIN SERVICE

We offer our hearts to God, contrite and broken;

Why not offer our brains, whole and alive?

Why follow the grovelling words wailing old races have spoken?

Bow and submit, when we ought to resist and strive!

What is this "heart" that you offer? A circulator,

An organ that quivers and starts at the fears of the hour.

Why not offer your head? And hold it straighter?

Bring to the service of God your noblest power?

When we learn to credit Him with our great ideals, and greater--

When we all stand up at last, stop kissing the rod--

When we bring the brains of to-day to seek and serve the Creator--

God will look better to us, and we shall look better to God.

WHEN I WAS A WITCH

If I had understood the terms of that one-sided contract with Satan, the

Time of Witching would have lasted longer--you may be sure of that. But

how was I to tell? It just happened, and has never happened again,

though I've tried the same preliminaries as far as I could control them.

The thing began all of a sudden, one October midnight--the 30th, to be

exact. It had been hot, really hot, all day, and was sultry and

thunderous in the evening; no air stirring, and the whole house stewing

with that ill-advised activity which always seems to move the steam

radiator when it isn't wanted.

I was in a state of simmering rage--hot enough, even without the weather

and the furnace--and I went up on the roof to cool off. A top-floor

apartment has that advantage, among others--you can take a walk without

the mediation of an elevator boy!

There are things enough in New York to lose one's temper over at the

best of times, and on this particular day they seemed to all happen at

once, and some fresh ones. The night before, cats and dogs had broken

my rest, of course. My morning paper was more than usually mendacious;

and my neighbor's morning paper--more visible than my own as I went down

town--was more than usually salacious. My cream wasn't cream--my egg

was a relic of the past. My "new" napkins were giving out.

Being a woman, I'm supposed not to swear; but when the motorman

disregarded my plain signal, and grinned as he rushed by; when the

subway guard waited till I was just about to step on board and then

slammed the door in my face--standing behind it calmly for some minutes

before the bell rang to warrant his closing--I desired to swear like a

mule-driver.

At night it was worse. The way people paw one's back in the crowd! The

cow-puncher who packs the people in or jerks them out--the men who smoke

and spit, law or no law--the women whose saw-edged cart-wheel hats,

swashing feathers and deadly pins, add so to one's comfort inside.

Well, as I said, I was in a particularly bad temper, and went up on the

roof to cool off. Heavy black clouds hung low overhead, and lightning

flickered threateningly here and there.

A starved, black cat stole from behind a chimney and mewed dolefully.

Poor thing! She had been scalded.

The street was quiet for New York. I leaned over a little and looked up

and down the long parallels of twinkling lights. A belated cab drew

near, the horse so tired he could hardly hold his head up.

Then the driver, with a skill born of plenteous practice, flung out his

long-lashed whip and curled it under the poor beast's belly with a

stinging cut that made me shudder. The horse shuddered too, poor

wretch, and jingled his harness with an effort at a trot.

I leaned over the parapet and watched that man with a spirit of

unmitigated ill-will.

"I wish," said I, slowly--and I did wish it with all my heart--"that

every person who strikes or otherwise hurts a horse unnecessarily, shall

feel the pain intended--and the horse not feel it!"

It did me good to say it, anyhow, but I never expected any result. I

saw the man swing his great whip again, and--lay on heartily. I saw him

throw up his hands--heard him scream--but I never thought what the

matter was, even then.

The lean, black cat, timid but trustful, rubbed against my skirt and

mewed.

"Poor Kitty" I said; "poor Kitty! It is a shame!" And I thought

tenderly of all the thousands of hungry, hunted cats who stink and

suffer its a great city.

Later, when I tried to sleep, and up across the stillness rose the

raucous shrieks of some of these same sufferers, my pity turned cold.

"Any fool that will try to keep a cat in a city!" I muttered, angrily.

Another yell--a pause--an ear-torturing, continuous cry. "I wish," I

burst forth, "that every cat in the city was comfortably dead!"

A sudden silence fell, and in course of time I got to sleep.

Things went fairly well next morning, till I tried another egg. They

were expensive eggs, too.

"I can't help it!" said my sister, who keeps house.

"I know you can't," I admitted. "But somebody could help it. I wish

the people who are responsible had to eat their old eggs, and never get

a good one till they sold good ones!"

"They'd stop eating eggs, that's all," said my sister, "and eat meat."

"Let 'em eat meat!" I said, recklessly. "The meat is as bad as the

eggs! It's so long since we've had a clean, fresh chicken that I've

forgotten how they taste!"

"It's cold storage," said my sister. She is a peaceable sort; I'm not.

"Yes, cold storage!" I snapped. "It ought to be a blessing--to tide

over shortages, equalize supplies, and lower prices. What does it do?

Corner the market, raise prices the year round, and make all the food

bad!"

My anger rose. "If there was any way of getting at them!" I cried.

"The law don't touch 'em. They need to be cursed somehow! I'd like to

do it! I wish the whole crowd that profit by this vicious business

might taste their bad meat, their old fish, their stale milk--whatever

they ate. Yes, and feel the prices as we do!"

"They couldn't you know; they're rich," said my sister.

"I know that," I admitted, sulkily. "There's no way of getting at 'em.

But I wish they could. And I wish they knew how people hated 'em, and

felt that, too--till they mended their ways!"

When I left for my office I saw a funny thing. A man who drove a

garbage cart took his horse by the bits and jerked and wrenched

brutally. I was amazed to see him clap his hands to his own jaws with a

moan, while the horse philosophically licked his chops and looked at

him.

The man seemed to resent his expression, and struck him on the head,

only to rub his own poll and swear amazedly, looking around to see who

had hit him. the horse advanced a step, stretching a hungry nose toward

a garbage pail crowned with cabbage leaves, and the man, recovering his

sense of proprietorship, swore at him and kicked him in the ribs. That

time he had to sit down, turning pale and weak. I watched with growing

wonder and delight.

A market wagon came clattering down the street; the hard-faced young

ruffian fresh for his morning task. He gathered the ends of the reins

and brought them down on the horse's back with a resounding thwack. The

horse did not notice this at all, but the boy did. He yelled!

I came to a place where many teamsters were at work hauling dirt and

crushed stone. A strange silence and peace hung over the scene where

usually the sound of the lash and sight of brutal blows made me hurry

by. The men were talking together a little, and seemed to be exchanging

notes. It was too good to be true. I gazed and marvelled, waiting for

my car.

It came, merrily running along. It was not full. There was one not far

ahead, which I had missed in watching the horses; there was no other

near it in the rear.

Yet the coarse-faced person in authority who ran it, went gaily by

without stopping, though I stood on the track almost, and waved my

umbrella.

A hot flush of rage surged to my face. "I wish you felt the blow you

deserve," said I, viciously, looking after the car. "I wish you'd have

to stop, and back to here, and open the door and apologize. I wish that

would happen to all of you, every time you play that trick."

To my infinite amazement, that car stopped and backed till the front

door was before me. The motorman opened it. holding his hand to his

cheek. "Beg your pardon, madam!" he said.

I passed in, dazed, overwhelmed. Could it be? Could it possibly be

that--that what I wished came true. The idea sobered me, but I

dismissed it with a scornful smile. "No such luck!" said I.

Opposite me sat a person in petticoats. She was of a sort I

particularly detest. No real body of bones and muscles, but the

contours of grouped sausages. Complacent, gaudily dressed, heavily

wigged and ratted, with powder and perfume and flowers and jewels--and a

dog.

A poor, wretched, little, artificial dog--alive, but only so by virtue

of man's insolence; not a real creature that God made. And the dog had

clothes on--and a bracelet! His fitted jacket had a pocket--and a

pocket-handkerchief! He looked sick and unhappy.

I meditated on his pitiful position, and that of all the other poor

chained prisoners, leading unnatural lives of enforced celibacy, cut off

from sunlight, fresh air, the use of their limbs; led forth at stated

intervals by unwilling servants, to defile our streets; over-fed,

under-exercised, nervous and unhealthy.

"And we say we love them!" said I, bitterly to myself. "No wonder they

bark and howl and go mad. No wonder they have almost as many diseases

as we do! I wish--" Here the thought I had dismissed struck me agin.

"I wish that all the unhappy dogs in cities would die at once!"

I watched the sad-eyed little invalid across the car. He dropped his

head and died. She never noticed it till she got off; then she made

fuss enough.

The evening papers were full of it. Some sudden pestilence had struck

both dogs and cats, it would appear. Red headlines struck the eye, big

letters, and columns were filled out of the complaints of those who had

lost their "pets," of the sudden labors of the board of health, and

interviews with doctors.

All day, as I went through the office routine, the strange sense of this

new power struggled with reason and common knowledge. I even tried a

few furtive test "wishes"--wished that the waste basket would fall over,

that the inkstand would fill itself; but they didn't.

I dismissed the idea as pure foolishness, till I saw those newspapers,

and heard people telling worse stories.

One thing I decided at once--not to tell a soul. "Nobody'd believe me

if I did," said I to myself. "And I won't give 'em the chance. I've

scored on cats and dogs, anyhow--and horses."

As I watched the horses at work that afternoon, and thought of all their

unknown sufferings from crowded city stables, bad air and insufficient

food, and from the wearing strain of asphalt pavements in wet and icy

weather, I decided to have another try on horses.

"I wish," said I, slowly and carefully, but with a fixed intensity of

purposes, "that every horse owner, keeper, hirer and driver or rider,

might feel what the horse feels, when he suffers at our hands. Feel it

keenly and constantly till the case is mended."

I wasn't able to verify this attempt for some time; but the effect was

so general that it got widely talked about soon; and this "new wave of

humane feeling" soon raised the status of horses in our city. Also it

diminished their numbers. People began to prefer motor drays--which was

a mighty good thing.

Now I felt pretty well assured in my own mind, and kept my assurance to

my

self. Also I began to make a list of my cherished grudges, with a fine

sense of power and pleasure.

"I must be careful," I said to myself; "very careful; and, above all

things, make the punishment fit the crime."

The subway crowding came to my mind next; both the people who crowd

because they have to, and the people who make them. "I mustn't punish

anybody, for what they can't help," I mused. "But when it's pure

meanness!" Then I bethought me of the remote stockholders, of the more

immediate directors, of the painfully prominent officials and insolent

employees--and got to work.

"I might as well make a good job of it while this lasts," said I to

myself. "It's quite a responsibility, but lots of fun." And I wished

that every person responsible for the condition of our subways might be

mysteriously compelled to ride up and down in them continuously during

rush hours.

This experiment I watched with keen interest, but for the life of me I

could see little difference. There were a few more well-dressed persons

in the crowds, that was all. So I came to the conclusion that the

general public was mostly to blame, and carried their daily punishment

without knowing it.

For the insolent guards and cheating ticket-sellers who give you short

change, very slowly, when you are dancing on one foot and your train is

there, I merely wished that they might feel the pain their victims would

like to give them, short of real injury. They did, I guess.

Then I wished similar things for all manner of corporations and

officials. It worked. It worked amazingly. There was a sudden

conscientious revival all over the country. The dry bones rattled and

sat up. Boards of directors, having troubles enough of their own, were

aggravated by innumerable communications from suddenly sensitive

stockholders.

In mills and mints and railroads, things began to mend. The country

buzzed. The papers fattened. The churches sat up and took credit to

themselves. I was incensed at this; and, after brief consideration,

wished that every minister would preach to his congregation exactly what

he believed and what he thought of them.

I went to six services the next Sunday--about ten minutes each, for two

sessions. It was most amusing. A thousand pulpits were emptied

forthwith, refilled, re-emptied, and so on, from week to week. People

began to go to church; men largely--women didn't like it as well. They

had always supposed the ministers thought more highly of them than now

appeared to be the case.

One of my oldest grudges was against the sleeping-car people; and now I

began to consider them. How often I had grinned and borne it--with

other thousands--submitting helplessly.

Here is a railroad--a common carrier--and you have to use it. You pay

for your transportation, a good round sum.

Then if you wish to stay in the sleeping car during the day, they charge

you another two dollars and a half for the privilege of sitting there,

whereas you have paid for a seat when you bought your ticket. That seat

is now sold to another person--twice sold! Five dollars for twenty-four

hours in a space six feet by three by three at night, and one seat by

day; twenty-four of these privileges to a car--$120 a day for the rent

of the car--and the passengers to pay the porter besides. That makes

$44,800 a year.

Sleeping cars are expensive to build, they say. So are hotels; but they

do not charge at such a rate. Now, what could I do to get even?

Nothing could ever put back the dollars into the millions of pockets;

but it might be stopped now, this beautiful process.

So I wished that all persons who profited by this performance might feel

a shame so keen that they would make public avowal and apology, and, as

partial restitution, offer their wealth to promote the cause of free

railroads!

Then I remembered parrots. This was lucky, for my wrath flamed again.

It was really cooling, as I tried to work out responsibility and adjust

penalties. But parrots! Any person who wants to keep a parrot should

go and live on an island alone with their preferred conversationalist!

There was a huge, squawky parrot right across the street from me, adding

its senseless, rasping cries to the more necessary evils of other

noises.

I had also an aunt with a parrot. She was a wealthy, ostentatious

person, who had been an only child and inherited her money.

Uncle Joseph hated the yelling bird, but that didn't make any difference

to Aunt Mathilda.

I didn't like this aunt, and wouldn't visit her, lest she think I was

truckling for the sake of her money; but after I had wished this time, I

called at the time set for my curse to work; and it did work with a

vengeance. There sat poor Uncle Joe, looking thinner and meeker than

ever; and my aunt, like an overripe plum, complacent enough.

"Let me out!" said Polly, suddenly. "Let me out to take a walk!"

"The clever thing!" said Aunt Mathilda. "He never said that before."

She let him out. Then he flapped up on the chandelier and sat among the

prisms, quite safe.

"What an old pig you are, Mathilda!" said the parrot.

She started to her feet--naturally.

"Born a Pig--trained a Pig--a Pig by nature and education!" said the

parrot. "Nobody'd put up with you, except for your money; unless it's

this long-suffering husband of yours. He wouldn't, if he hadn't the

patience of Job!"

"Hold your tongue!" screamed Aunt Mathilda. "Come down from there!

Come here!"

Polly cocked his head and jingled the prisms. "Sit down, Mathilda!" he

said, cheerfully. "You've got to listen. You are fat and homely and

selfish. You are a nuisance to everybody about you. You have got to

feed me and take care of me better than ever--and you've got to listen

to me when I talk. Pig!"

I visited another person with a parrot the next day. She put a cloth

over his cage when I came in.

"Take it off!" said Polly. She took it off.

"Won't you come into the other room?" she asked me, nervously.

"Better stay here!" said her pet. "Sit still--sit still!"

She sat still.

"Your hair is mostly false," said pretty Poll. "And your teeth--and

your outlines. You eat too much. You are lazy. You ought to exercise,

and don't know enough. Better apologize to this lady for backbiting!

You've got to listen."

The trade in parrots fell off from that day; they say there is no call

for them. But the people who kept parrots, keep them yet--parrots live

a long time.

Bores were a class of offenders against whom I had long borne undying

enmity. Now I rubbed my hands and began on them, with this simple wish:

That every person whom they bored should tell them the plain truth.

There is one man whom I have specially in mind. He was blackballed at a

pleasant club, but continues to go there. He isn't a member--he just

goes; and no one does anything to him.

It was very funny after this. He appeared that very night at a meeting,

and almost every person present asked him how he came there. "You're

not a member, you know," they said. "Why do you butt in? Nobody likes

you."

Some were more lenient with him. "Why don't you learn to be more

considerate of others, and make some real friends?" they said. "To have

a few friends who do enjoy your visits ought to be pleasanter than being

a public nuisance."

He disappeared from that club, anyway.

I began to feel very cocky indeed.

In the food business there was already a marked improvement; and in

transportation. The hubbub of reformation waxed louder daily, urged on

by the unknown sufferings of all the profiters by iniquity.

The papers thrived on all this; and as I watched the loud-voiced

protestations of my pet abomination in journalism, I had a brilliant

idea, literally.

Next morning I was down town early, watching the men open their papers.

My abomination was shamefully popular, and never more so than this

morning. Across the top was printing in gold letters:

All intentional lies, in adv., editorial, news, or any other column. .

.Scarlet

All malicious matter. . .Crimson

All careless or ignorant mistakes. . .Pink

All for direct self-interest of owner. . .Dark green

All mere bait--to sell the paper. . .Bright green

All advertising, primary or secondary. . .Brown

All sensational and salacious matter. . .Yellow

All hired hypocrisy. . .Purple

Good fun, instruction and entertainment. . .Blue

True and necessary news and honest editorials. . .Ordinary print

You never saw such a crazy quilt of a paper. They were bought like hot

cakes for some days; but the real business fell off very soon. They'd

have stopped it all if they could; but the papers looked all right when

they came off the press. The color scheme flamed out only to the

bona-fide reader.

I let this work for about a week, to the immense joy of all the other

papers; and then turned it on to them, all at once. Newspaper reading

became very exciting for a little, but the trade fell off. Even

newspaper editors could not keep on feeding a market like that. The

blue printed and ordinary printed matter grew from column to column and

page to page. Some papers--small, to be sure, but refreshing--began to

appear in blue and black alone.

This kept me interested and happy for quite a while; so much so that I

quite forgot to be angry at other things. There was _such_ a change in

all kinds of business, following the mere printing of truth in the

newspapers. It began to appear as if we had lived in a sort of

delirium--not really knowing the facts about anything. As soon as we

really knew the facts, we began to behave very differently, of course.

What really brought all my enjoyment to an end was women. Being a

woman, I was naturally interested in them, and could see some things

more clearly than men could. I saw their real power, their real

dignity, their real responsibility in the world; and then the way they

dress and behave used to make me fairly frantic. 'Twas like seeing

archangels playing jackstraws--or real horses only used as

rocking-horses. So I determined to get after them.

How to manage it! What to hit first! Their hats, their ugly, inane,

outrageous hats--that is what one thinks of first. Their silly,

expensive clothes--their diddling beads and jewelry--their greedy

childishness--mostly of the women provided for by rich men.

Then I thought of all the other women, the real ones, the vast majority,

patiently doing the work of servants without even a servant's pay--and

neglecting the noblest duties of motherhood in favor of house-service;

the greatest power on earth, blind, chained, untaught, in a treadmill.

I thought of what they might do, compared to what they did do, and my

heart swelled with something that was far from anger.

Then I wished--with all my strength--that women, all women, might

realize Womanhood at last; its power and pride and place in life; that

they might see their duty as mothers of the world--to love and care for

everyone alive; that they might see their dirty to men--to choose only

the best, and then to bear and rear better ones; that they might see

their duty as human beings, and come right out into full life and work

and happiness!

I stopped, breathless, with shining eyes. I waited, trembling, for

things to happen.

Nothing happened.

You see, this magic which had fallen on me was black magic--and I had

wished white.

It didn't work at all, and, what was worse, it stopped all the other

things that were working so nicely.

Oh, if I had only thought to wish permanence for those lovely

punishments! If only I had done more while I could do it, had half

appreciated my privileges when I was a Witch!

[Untitled]

"I can understand," says Eugene Wood, "how some women want to vote. And

I can understand how some women do not want to vote."

"But I can't understand how some women do not want other women to vote."

BELIEVING AND KNOWING

What is Believing--psychologically? What does the brain do when it

"believes" that is different from what it does when it "knows"?

There is a difference. When you know a thing you don't have to believe

it. There is no effort, and no credit attached, in knowing; but this

act of "believing" has long been held as both difficult and worthy.

There seems to be not only a clearly marked distinction between knowing

and believing, but a direct incompatibility. It may be said roughly

that the less we know the more we believe, and the more we know the less

we believe. The credulity of the child, the savage, and the less

educated classes in society, is in sharp contrast with the relative

incredulity of the adult civilized human, and the more highly educated.

There is a difference also shown in our mental sensations as to a thing

believed and a thing known. If a man tells you that grass is red and

the sky yellow, you merely think him color blind--It does not anger you

nor alter your opinion. If he tells you that two and two make ten, you

think him ignorant, weak-minded, but your view is not changed, nor are

you enraged by him. But if he contradicts you on some religious dogma

you are hurt and angry. Why? As a matter of direct

physicho-psychological action, why?

To make a physical comparison, it is like the difference between being

pushed against when you stand square on your feet, and pushed when you

stand on one leg.

Or again, the thing you know is like something nailed down, or planted

and growing; the thing you believe like something held up by main force,

and quite likely to be joggled or blown away. "Do not try to shake my

faith!" protests the believer. He does not object to your trying to

shake his knowledge.

If the new knowledge you bring him is evidently a matter of fact, if his

brain rationally perceives that he was wrong about this thing, and you

are right, he removes his incorrect idea and establishes the correct

one, with no more disagreeable sensation than a little sense of

shame:--not that, if he was wise enough to admit ignorance gracefully.

But the new faith you bring him is quite another matter. He hangs on to

his old faith as if there was a virtue in the mental attitude of

belief--aha! now we are on the track! He has been taught that there is!

We receive knowledge and faith in quite different ways, with quite

different emphasis. The child learns--and learns--and learns--every day

of his life; learns year after year, as long as his brain is able to

receive impressions. This vast mass of knowledge is for the most part

received indiscriminately and assorted by the brain after its own

fashion.

There are but few departments of knowledge to which we have attached

arbitrary ideas of superiority; and those fortunately, are all old ones.

Knowledge of "the classics" was once kept in the same box with social

standing, if not with orthodoxy; and to this day an error in spelling or

grammar will condemn a person far more than entire ignorance of

physiology or mechanics. Knowledge is a vast range, an unlimited range,

visibly subject to extension; each new peak surmounted showing us many

more. We learn, unlearn, and relearn, without much opposition or

criticism, so long as our little bunch of specialties is assured--the

spelling, for instance.

But when it comes to believing, disbelieving, and rebelieving--that is a

different matter. Certain things were given us to believe--in our

racial infancy--before we knew much of anything, and were therefore far

more capable of believing. These articles of belief were sincerely held

to be the most important matters; and they were too; because, if any

stronger minded race infant refused to believe them, he was

ostracised--or executed. What a man believed, or disbelieved, was the

keynote of life--in that interesting race infancy of ours. All the

other mental processes were as nothing compared to this. Knowledge?

There was none to speak of. Doubt was a crime. Inquiry was the

beginning of doubt.

The dogmas inserted did change, though slowly; but their importance in

the scheme of life did not change. Whatever else the man might or might

not be the first question was, "Art thou a Believer?" And he was. What

he believed might be the One Absolute Truth; or one of many contemptible

heresies; but he was always a believer.

They began with the helpless little children, and told them as the most

important basic truths, whatsoever religious doctrines were current at

the time; and renewed this process with every generation until this very

day--and are still at it. Many of the most pronounced free-thinkers not

only prefer to have their women still "devout," but insist on putting

their children through the old course of instruction.

So, in the course of these unbroken ages; under a combined treatment of

rigid "natural selection"--the elimination of the unfit, who were burned

or beheaded--and of the heaviest social pressure, in both education and

imitation; we have developed in the race mind a special area for

"believing" as distinct front knowing. This area is abnormally

sensitive because in those long ages behind us, it was the very vital

base of life itself. If your Belief was steady and intact, you were

permitted to live. If it was in the least degree wavering you were in

danger. Is it any wonder we object so automatically to anyone's trying

to "shake our faith?"

The change of the last century in this regard has been not only in the

sudden opening up of new fields of knowledge; not only in the adoption

of entire new methods in the acquisition of knowledge; not only in the

rapid popularization of knowledge; but most of all in a new relation of

ideas. We are beginning dimly to grasp something of the real scheme of

life; to get our sense of the basic verities from observation of facts.

That underlying scheme of life which the brain as an organ hungers for,

is now opening to us in the field of ascertained fact.

A broad deep satisfying conception of life may now be gathered from the

open book of natural law, both the perception of and the inspiration to

right living are to be found there; all matters of calm clear easily

held knowledge. When one knows enough to build a working religion on

established facts, one does not have so much need of that extra capacity

of believing.

You may also believe what you know--but it isn't necessary.

It will be a wonderful thing for the world when in every mind the

beautiful truths of life shall be common knowledge. You may believe in

an alleged father you have never seen; but when you live with your

father you know him.

THE KINGDOM

"Where is Heaven?" asked the Person.

"I want Heaven--to enjoy it;

I want Heaven, recompensing

For the evils I have suffered--

All the terrible injustice,

All the foolish waste and hunger--

Where is Heaven? Can I get there?"

Then the Priest expounded Heaven:

"Heaven is a place for dead men;

After you are dead you'll find it,

_If_"--and here the Priest was earnest--

"_If_ you do the things I tell you--

Do exactly what is ordered!

It will cost you quite a little--

You must pay a price for Heaven--

You must pay before you enter."

"Am I sure of what I'm getting?"

Asked the mean, suspicious Person.

"What you urge is disagreeable;

What you ask is quite expensive;

Am I sure of getting Heaven?"

Then the Priest prepared a potion,

Made of Concentrated Ages,

Made of Many Mingled Feelings--

Highest Hope and Deepest Terror--

Mixed our best and worst together,

Reverence and Love and Service,

Coward Fear and rank Self-Interest--

Gave him this when he was little,

Pumped it in before the Person

Could examine his prescription.

So the Person, thus instructed,

Now believed the things he told him;

Paid the price as he was able,

Died--the Priest said, went to Heaven--

None came back to contradict him!

*

"We want Heaven," said the People;

We believe in God and Heaven;

Where God is, there must be Heaven;

God is Here--and this is Heaven."

Then they saw the earth was lovely;

Life was sweet, and love eternal;

Then they learned the joy of living,

Caught a glimpse of what Life might be,

What it could be--should be--would be--

When the People chose to have it!

Then they bought no further tickets

Of the sidewalk speculators;

They no longer gave their children

The "spring medicine" of Grandma.

They said, "We will take no chances

Of what happens after dying;

We perceive that Human Beings,

Wise, and sweet, and brave, and tender,

Strong, and beautiful, and noble,

Living peaceably together,

In a universal garden,

With the Sciences for Soldiers,

With the Allied Arts for Angels,

With the Crafts and Trades for Servants,

With all Nature for the Teacher,

And all People for the Students,

Make a very pleasant Heaven.

We can see and understand it,

We believe we'd really like some;

Now we'll set to work and make it!

So they set to work, together,

In the Faith that rests on Knowledge,

In the Hope that's born of Wisdom.

In the Love that grows with Practise

And proceeded to make Heaven.

*

And God smiled. He had been tired

Of the everlasting dead men,

Of the hungry, grasping dead men;

He had always wanted live ones--

Wanted them to build the Kingdom!

PRIZE CHILDREN

A prosperous farmer, driving a valuable horse, will exhibit with pride

the "points" of his swift roadster--the fine action, the speed and

endurance. He himself sits stoop-shouldered and muscle-bound; strong,

it may be, but slow and awkward, with bad teeth and poor digestion; by

no means a model human being either in "points" or "action."

He never thinks of these things.

A virtuous housewife, running a comfortable house, has a justifiable

pride in the cleanliness, comfort and convenience of the place, in its

beautiful appointments and conveniences, and in her own. fine clothes!

She herself is stout, short-legged, incapable of any swift agility of

action; a brief run leaves her panting; she would be grotesque as a

statue; and her internal housekeeping is by no means as efficient as a

doctor would approve.

She never thinks of these things.

The same farmer will show you his stock--sheep, swine, fowls, cattle;

point out their superiority and talk learnedly of the best methods of

improvement. The same housewife will show you her fine needlework, her

fine cooking, and discuss patterns and recipes with gusto. Both the

farmer and his wife took prizes at the county fair--he for pigs and

poultry, she for pies.

Now look at their children.

She gathers little Johnny into her motherly arms. "Johnny was always

delicate!" she says tenderly. "He's a little backward because he's

delicate. Mother's boy!" And she kisses his smooth head as he nestles

up to her. "Adelaide had better go and lie down. Adelaide's not

strong. They work her too hard in school."

Jim looks sturdy enough, and makes noise enough, but the expert

perceives that Jimmy has adenoids, breathes through his mouth, is really

undersized.

Here is the oldest boy, a tall, heavy fellow; but what a complexion!

"Quite natural for boys of that age; yes, he's real sensitive about it."

*

Well? They are "good children." When properly dressed, they compare

favorably with other people's children.

None of them would take any prizes in an exhibition of Human Stock.

There are no such prizes. As to the exhibition--that is continuous. We

are so used to the exhibition, and to its pitiful average, that we have

no ideals left.

Neither the farmer nor his wife ever thought of a Human Standard;

whether they came up to it, or if their children did, or of how they

might improve the breed.

We take humanity as we find it. We admire "beauty," or what we call

beauty; but we don't care enough for it to try to increase it. We are

concerned about our health after we lose it, but give small thought to

lifting the average. Young men vie with one another in athletic sports,

and have certain ideals, perhaps, of "military bearing," and the kind of

chest and chin a man should have; but all their ideals put together do

not make us as beautiful and strong as we have a right to be.

Then arise those who come to us talking largely of eugenics; wanting us

to breed super-men and super-women; talk[ing of improving] the race by

right selection. There is a lot of sense in this; we could do wonders

that way; of course, if we would. Certain obstacles arise, however.

Men and women seem to love each other on other grounds than physical

superiority. Those physically superior do not always have the most

superior children. Then, again, the physically superior children do not

always hold out through life, somehow.

This method of breeding and selection is nature's way. It works

well--give it a chance; but it has to be accompanied by a ruthless

slaughter of the unfit, and takes thousands upon thousands of years. We

have a method worth two of that.

We can improve the species after it is born.

That's the great human power, the conscious ability to improve ourselves

and our children. We have the power. We have the knowledge, too--some

of us have it, and all of us can get it.

The trouble is, speaking generally, that we haven't the standards.

Here is where our mothers need new ideals, and new information. A

person who is going to raise cattle ought to know something about

cattle; know what to expect of cattle, and how to produce it. Suppose

we had a course in Humaniculture to study. We have Agricultural

colleges; we study Horticulture, and Floriculture, and Apiculture and

Arboriculture. Why not have a Humanicultural College, and learn

something about how to raise people?

Such a course of study would begin with the theory, illustrating by

picture and model; and later should have practical illustration from the

living model, in nursery and school. The graduate from such a course

would have quite a different idea of human standards.

She would know the true proportions of the human body, and not call a

No. 2 foot "beautiful" on a No. 10 body. She would know what the real

shape of the human body is, and that to alter it arbitrarily is a habit

of the lowest savagery. The shape of the body is the result of its

natural activities, and cannot be altered without injury to them. She

would learn that to interfere with the human shape, moulding it to lines

that have nothing to do with the living structure and its complex

functions, is as offensive and ridiculous as it would be to alter the

shape of a horse.

Should we not laugh to see a horse in corsets? The time is coming when

we shall so laugh to see a woman.

She would learn to measure beauty, human beauty, by full health and

vigor first of all, right proportion, full possession of all natural

power, and that the human animal is by nature swift, agile, active to a

high degree, and should remain so throughout life. So trained, she

would regard being "put on a car" by the elbow as an insult, not a

compliment.

Then at last we should begin to have some notion of what to expect in

children, and how to get it. The girl would look forward not merely to

some vague little ones to love and care for, but to having finer

children than anyone else--if she could! And she would naturally have a

new standard of fatherhood, and sternly refuse to accept disease and the

vice which makes disease.

Then, when the children came, she would know the size and weight that

was normal, the way to feed and clothe the little body so as to promote

the best growth; the kind of exercise and training essential to develop

that legitimate human beauty and power which ought to belong to all of

us.

We have our vulgar "Baby Shows," where fat-cheeked, over-fed younglings

are proudly exhibited. A time is coming when, without public

exhibitions, without prize-money or clamorous vote, we shall raise a new

standard in child culture--and live up to it.

HEAVEN FORBID!

When I was seventeen, you'd find

No youth so brash as I;

Things must be settled to my mind,

Or I'd know why!

I knew it all, and somewhat more,

What I believed was true;

The future held no task in store

I could not do!

If I had died in my youthful pride--

And no man can say when--

Should I have been immortal

As I was then? (Heaven forbid!)

When I was forty-two I stood

Successful, proud and strong;

Little I cared for bad or good--

My purse was long.

My breakfast, newspaper and train,--

My office,--the Exchange--

My work, my pleasure, and my gain--

A narrow range.

If I had died in my business pride--

And no man can say when--

Should I have been immortal

As I was then? (Heaven forbid!)

Now I am old, and yet I keep

Intelligent content;

I wake and sleep in the quiet deep

Of disillusionment.

I don't believe, nor disbelieve--

I simply do not know.

I fear no grave--no heaven crave--

Am quite prepared to go.

But when I die--and I would not stay,

Though a friend should show me how,

Shall I become immortal,

As I am now? (Heaven forbid!)

WHAT DIANTHA DID