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Title: The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910)

Editor: Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Release date: January 1, 2002 [eBook #3017]
Most recently updated: January 8, 2021

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3017

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE
FORERUNNER, VOLUME 1 (1909-1910) ***

THE FORERUNNER, A MONTHLY MAGAZINE

by

CHARLOTTE PERKINS GILMAN

VOLUME ONE, November 1909-December 1910 (14 issues)

CONTENTS

Volume 1 No. 1 November 1909
Then This (poem)
A Small God And a Large Goddess (essay)
Arrears (poem)
Three Thanksgivings (story)
How Doth The Hat (poem)
Introducing the World, the Flesh And the Devil (sketch)
What Diantha Did (serial fiction)
Where the Heart Is (sketch)
Thanksgiving (poem)
Our Androcentric Culture; or, The Man-Made World (serial non-fiction)
Comment And Review
Personal Problems
Thanksong (poem)

Advertisements: Lowney's, Fels-Naptha Soap, Holeproof Hoisery, Moore's
Fountain Pen, The Forerunner, A Toilet Preparation, Calendula

Volume 1 No. 2 December 1909

Love (poem)
According To Solomon (story)
An Obvious Blessing (essay)
Steps (poem)
Why We Honestly Fear Socialism (essay)
Child Labor (poem)
What Diantha Did (serial fiction)
The Poor Relation (sketch)
His Crutches (poem)
Our Androcentric Culture; or, The Man-Made World (serial non-fiction)
Comment And Review
Personal Problems
Get Your Work Done (poem)
Advertisements: Lowney's, Soapine, Woman's Era, The Forerunner,
Calendula

Volume 1 No. 3 January 1910

A Central Sun, a song (poem)
Reasonable Resolutions (essay)
Her Housekeeper (story)
Locked Inside (poem)

Private Morality And Pulic Immorality (essay)
"With God Above" (poem)
The Humanness Of Women (essay)
Here Is The Earth (poem)
What Diantha Did (serial fiction)
The "Anti" And The Fly (poem)
The Barrel (sketch)
Our Androcentric Culture; or, The Man-Made World (serial non-fiction)
Comment and Review
Personal Problems
Play-Time: The Melancholy Rabbit (poem)
Advertisements: The Forerunner, Confidential Remarks About Our
Advertising, Things we wish to Advertise, Calendula

Volume 1 No. 4 February 1910

Two Prayers (poem)
An Offender (story)
Before Warm February Winds (poem)
Kitchen-Mindedness (esssay)
Two Storks (sketch)
What Diantha Did (serial fiction)
Little Leafy Brothers (poem)
Our Androcentric Culture; or, The Man-Made World (serial non-fiction)
Comment and Review
Personal Problems
Play-Time: A Walk Walk Walk (poem)
Ode To a Fool (poem)

Volume 1 No. 5 March 1910

The Sands (poem)
A Middle-Sized Artist (story)
The Minor Birds (poem)
Parlor-Mindedness (essay)
Naughty (sketch)
What Diantha Did (serial fiction)
Erratum
Our Androcentric Culture; or, The Man-Made World (serial non-fiction)
Water-Lure (poem)
Comment and Review
Personal Problems
Play-Time: Aunt Eliza (poem)
The Cripple (poem)

Volume 1 No. 6 April 1910

When Thou Gainest Happiness (poem)
Martha's Mother (story)
For Fear (poem)
Nursery-Mindedness (essay)
A Village Of Fools (sketch)
What Diantha Did (serial fiction)
"I gave myself to God" (poem)
Our Androcentric Culture; or, The Man-Made World (serial non-fiction)
His Agony (poem)
Comment and Review

Personal Problems
Advertisements: The Forerunner, A Summer Cottage

Volume 1 No. 7 May 1910

Brain Service (poem)
When I Was A Witch (story)
Quotation: Eugene Wood
Believing And Knowing (essay)
The Kingdom (poem)
Heaven Forbid! (poem)
What Diantha Did (serial fiction)
The House of Apples (sketch)
Our Androcentric Culture; or, The Man-Made World (serial non-fiction)
Comment and Review
Personal Problems
Suffrage (editorial)
Advertisements: The Forerunner, A Summer Cottage

Volume 1 No. 8 June 1910

The Puritan (poem)
Making a Living (story)
Ten Suggestions (essay)
The Malingerer (poem)
Genius, Domestic and Maternal, part I (essay)
Prisoners (sketch)

May Leaves (poem)
What Diantha Did (serial fiction)
The Room At The Top (poem)
Our Androcentric Culture; or, The Man-Made World (serial non-fiction)
Comment and Review
Personal Problems
Advertisement: The Forerunner

Volume 1 No. 9 July 1910

The Bawling World (poem)
A Coincidence (story)
Shares (poem)
Genius, Domestic and Maternal, part II (essay)
Improved Methods of Habit Culture (essay)
O Faithful Clay! (poem)
What Diantha Did (serial fiction)
We Eat At Home (poem)
Our Androcentric Culture; or, The Man-Made World (serial non-fiction)
Only an Hour (sketch)
Comment and Review
Personal Problems
Advertisements: Books by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, The Forerunner

Volume 1 No. 10 August 1910

The Earth's Entail (poem)
The Cottagette (story)
Wholesale Hypnotism (essay)
"Sit up and think!" (poem)
The Kitchen Fly (essay)
Alas! (poem)
Her Pets (sketch)
What Diantha Did (serial fiction)
"The Outer Reef!" (poem)
Our Androcentric Culture; or, The Man-Made World (serial non-fiction)
Comment and Review
Personal Problems
The Editor's Problem (editorial)
Advertisements: Books by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, The Forerunner

Volume 1 No. 11 September 1910

To-morrow Night (poem)
Mr. Robert Grey Sr. (story)
What Virtues Are Made Of (essay)
Animals In Cities (essay)
What Diantha Did (serial fiction)
The Waiting-Room (poem)
While the King Slept (sketch)
The Housewife (poem)
Our Androcentric Culture; or, The Man-Made World (serial non-fiction)
The Beauty Women Have Lost (essay)
Comment and Review
Personal Problems

The Editor's Problem (editorial)
From Letters Of Subscribers
Advertisements: Some Of Our Exchanges, Books by Charlotte Perkins
Gilman, The Forerunner

Volume 1 No. 12 October 1910

Only Mine (poem)
The Boys and the Butter (story)
A Question (poem)
Is It Wrong To Take Life? (essay)
The World and the Three Artists (sketch)
In How Little Time (poem)
Woman and the State (essay)
What Diantha Did (serial fiction)
Our Androcentric Culture; or, The Man-Made World (serial non-fiction)
The Socialist and the Suffragist (poem)
Comment and Review
Personal Problems
Our Bound Volume As A Christmas Present (editorial)
To Those Specially Interested… (editorial)
If You Renew (editorial)
If You Discontinue (editorial)
Advertisements: The Woman's Journal, Some Of Our Exchanges, Books
by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, The Crux

Volume 1 No. 13 November 1910

Worship (poem)
My Astonishing Dodo (story)
Why Texts? (essay)
The Little White Animals (poem)
Women Teachers, Married and Unmarried (essay)
What Diantha Did (serial fiction)
The Good Man (sketch)
Our Androcentric Culture; or, The Man-Made World (serial non-fiction)
A Frequent Question (sketch)
Boys Will Be Boys (poem)
Many Windows (poem)
Comment and Review
From Letters Of Subscribers
A Friendly Response (editorial)
Our Bound Volume As A Christmas Present (editorial)
To Those Specially Interested… (editorial)
If You Renew (editorial)
If You Discontinue (editorial)
Advertisements: The Woman's Journal, Some Of Our Exchanges, Books by
Charlotte Perkins Gilman, The Crux

Volume 1 No. 14 December 1910

In As Much (poem)
A Word In Season (story)
Christmas Love (essay)
What Diantha Did (serial fiction)
Our Overworked Instincts (essay)
Love's Highest (poem)
The Permanent Child (sketch)

The New Motherhood (essay)
How We Waste Three-Fourths Of Our Money (essay)
Our Androcentric Culture; or, The Man-Made World (serial non-fiction)
The Nun In The Kitchen (essay)
Letters From Subscribers (editorial)
Comment and Review
Advertisements: Success Magazine, The Co-Operative Press, Woman
and Socialism, The Woman's Journal, Some Of Our Exchanges
From Letters of Forerunner Subscribers
Advertisements: Books by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, The Crux

INDEX

SERIALS AND COLUMNS

Our Androcentric Culture, or The Man-Made World, non-fiction (1:1 -
1:14)
What Diantha Did, novel (1:1 - 1:14)
Comment and Review (1:1 - 1:14)
Personal Problems (1:1 - 1:12)
Play-Time (1:3 - 1:5)

STORIES

According To Solomon (1:2)
The Boys and the Butter (1:12)
A Coincidence (1:9)
The Cottagette (1:10)
Her Housekeeper (1:3)
Making a Living (1:8)
Martha's Mother (1:6)
A Middle-Sized Artist (1:5)
Mr. Robert Grey Sr. (1:11)
My Astonishing Dodo (1:13)
An Offender (1:4)

Three Thanksgivings (1:1)
When I Was A Witch (1:7)
A Word In Season (1:14)

ESSAYS AND SKETCHES

Animals In Cities (1:11)
The Barrel (1:3)
The Beauty Women Have Lost (1:11)
Believing And Knowing (1:7)
Christmas Love (1:14)
A Frequent Question (1:13)
Genius, Domestic and Maternal (1:8, 1:9)
The Good Man (1:13)
Her Pets (1:10)
The House of Apples (1:7)
How We Waste Three-Fourths Of Our Money (1:14)
The Humanness Of Women (1:3)
Improved Methods of Habit Culture (1:9)
Introducing the World, the Flesh And the Devil (1:1)
Is It Wrong To Take Life? (1:12)
The Kitchen Fly (1:10)
Kitchen-Mindedness (1:4)
Naughty (1:5)
The New Motherhood (1:14)
The Nun In The Kitchen (1:14)
Nursery-Mindedness (1:6)
An Obvious Blessing (1:2)
Only an Hour (1:9)
Our Overworked Instincts (1:14)

Parlor-Mindedness (1:5)
The Permanent Child (1:14)
The Poor Relation (1:2)
Prisoners (1:8)
Private Morality And Pulic Immorality (1:3)
Reasonable Resolutions (1:3)
A Small God And a Large Goddess (1:1)
Ten Suggestions (1:8)
A Village Of Fools (1:6)
What Virtues Are Made Of (1:11)
Where the Heart Is (1:1)
Wholesale Hypnotism (1:10)
While the King Slept (1:11)
Why Texts? (1:13)
Why We Honestly Fear Socialism (1:2)
Woman and the State (1:12)
Women Teachers, Married and Unmarried (1:13)
The World and the Three Artists (1:12)

POEMS

Alas! (1:10)
The "Anti" And The Fly (1:3)
Arrears (1:1)
Aunt Eliza (1:5)
The Bawling World, a sestina (1:9)
Before Warm February Winds (1:4)
Boys Will Be Boys (1:13)
Brain Service (1:7)
A Central Sun, a song (1:3)
Child Labor (1:2)

The Cripple (1:5)
The Earth's Entail (1:10)
For Fear (1:6)
Get Your Work Done (1:2)
Heaven Forbid! (1:7)
His Agony (1:6)
His Crutches (1:2)
Here Is The Earth (1:3)
The Housewife (1:11)
How Doth The Hat (1:1)
"I gave myself to God" (1:6)
In As Much (1:14)
In How Little Time (1:12)
The Kingdom (1:7)
Little Leafy Brothers (1:4)
The Little White Animals (1:13)
Locked Inside (1:3)
Love (1:2)
Love's Highest (1:14)
The Malingerer (1:8)
Many Windows (1:13)
May Leaves (1:8)
The Melancholy Rabbit (1:3)
The Minor Birds (1:5)
O Faithful Clay! (1:9)
Ode To a Fool (1:4)
Only Mine (1:12)
"The Outer Reef!" (1:10)
Play-Time: Aunt Eliza (1:5)
Play-Time: The Melancholy Rabbit (1:3)

Play-Time: A Walk Walk Walk (1:4)
The Puritan (1:8)
A Question (1:12)
The Room At The Top (1:8)
The Sands (1:5)
Shares (1:9)
"Sit up and think!" (1:10)
The Socialist and the Suffragist (1:12)
Steps (1:2)
Thanksgiving (1:1)
Thanksong (1:1)
Then This (1:1)
To-morrow Night (1:11)
Two Prayers (1:4)
The Waiting-Room (1:11)
A Walk Walk Walk (1:5)
Water-Lure (1:5)
We Eat At Home (1:9)
When Thou Gainest Happiness (1:6)
"With God Above" (1:3)
Worship (1:13)

ADVERTISEMENTS AND MISC.

Editorial: The Editor's Problem (1:10, 1:11)
Editorial: A Friendly Response (1:13)
Editorial: If You Discontinue (1:12, 1:13)
Editorial: If You Renew (1:12, 1:13)
Editorial: Letters From Subscribers (1:14)
Editorial: Our Bound Volume As A Christmas Present (1:12, 1:13)
Editorial: Suffrage (1:7)

Editorial: To Those Specially Interested… (1:12, 1:13)
Erratum (1:5)
From Letters Of Subscribers (1:11, 1:13, 1:14)
Masthead tags (1:1, 1:3 - 1:7)
Quotation: Eugene Wood (1:7)
Advertisement: Books by Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1:9 - 1:14)
Advertisement: Calendula (1:1 - 1:3)
Advertisement: Confidential Remarks About Our Advertising (1:3)
Advertisement: The Co-Operative Press (1:14)
Advertisement: The Crux (1:12 - 1:14)
Advertisement: Fels-Naptha Soap (1:1)
Advertisement: The Forerunner (1:1 - 1:3, 1:6 - 1:11)
Advertisement: Holeproof Hoisery (1:1)
Advertisement: Lowney's (1:1: 1:2)
Advertisement: Moore's Fountain Pen (1:1)
Advertisement: Soapine (1:2)
Advertisement: Some Of Our Exchanges (1:11 - 1:14)
Advertisement: Success Magazine (1:14)
Advertisement: A Summer Cottage (1:6, 1:7)
Advertisement: Things we wish to Advertise (1:3)
Advertisement: A Toilet Preparation (1:1)
Advertisement: Woman's Era (1:2)
Advertisement: Woman and Socialism (1:14)
Advertisement: The Woman's Journal (1:12 - 1:14)

WORKS REVIEWED

"The American Magazine", illustrations (1:1)
Jessie H. Childs, "The Sea of Matrimony" (1:3)
Stanton Coit, "Woman in Church and State" (1:9)
"The Common Cause," magazine (1:11)

Lavinia L. Dock, "Hygiene and Morality" (1:13)
"The Englishwoman," magazine (1:10)
"The Ethical World", magazine (1:9)
Cicely Hamilton, "Marriage as a Trade" (1:13)
Alexander Irvine, "From The Bottom Up" (1:11)
Mary Jonston, "The Wise Housekeeper" (1:13)
Ellen Key, "The Century of the Child" (1:14)
Ingraham Lovell, "Margharita's Soul" (1:2)
"Philemon's Verses" (author unknown) (1:5)
Sarah Harvey Porter, "The Life and Times of Anne Royall" (1:2)
"The Progressive Woman," magazine (1:11)
Gerald Stanley Lee, "Inspired Millionaires" (1:7)
Prince Morrow, "Social Diseases and Marriage" (1:6)
Meredith Nicholson, "The Lords of High Decision" (1:5)
William Robinson, "Never Told Tales" (1:6)
Thomas W. Salmon, "Two Preventable Causes of Insanity" (1:10)
Nancy Musselman Schoonmaker, "The Eternal Fires" (1:9)
Molly Elliot Sewell, "The Ladies' Battle" (1:14)
Ida Tarbell, "The American Woman" (1:8)
"To-day's Problems," various authors (1:13)
"The Union Labor Advocate," magazine (1:11)
"Votes for Women," magazine (1:11)
Lester F. Ward, "Pure Sociology" (1:12)
H. G. Wells, "Ann Veronica" (1:3)
Harvey White, "A Ship Of Souls" (1:12)
"The Woman's Journal" (1:3, 1:10)

THE FORERUNNER, VOLUME
ONE

THE FORERUNNER
A MONTHLY MAGAZINE

BY

CHARLOTTE PERKINS GILMAN OWNER AND PUBLISHER

1.00 A YEAR .10 A COPY

Volume 1. No. 1 NOVEMBER, 1909 The Charlton Company, 67 Wall Street, New York
Copyright for 1909, C. P. Gilman

Said the New Minister: "I shall not give you a text this morning. If you
listen closely, you will discover what the sermon is about by what I say."

THEN THIS

The news-stands bloom with magazines,
They flame, they blaze indeed;
So bright the cover-colors glow,
So clear the startling stories show,
So vivid their pictorial scenes,
That he who runs may read.

Then This: It strives in prose and verse,
Thought, fancy, fact and fun,
To tell the things we ought to know,
To point the way we ought to go,
So audibly to bless and curse,
That he who reads may run.

A SMALL GOD AND A LARGE GODDESS

The ancient iconoclast pursued his idol-smashing with an ax. He did not
regard the feelings of the worshippers, and they, with similar indifference to
his, promptly destroyed him.

The modern iconoclast, wiser from long experience, practices the
kindergarten art of substitution; enters without noise, and dexterously
replaces the old image with a new one.

Often the worshippers do not notice the change. They never spend their
time in discriminating study of their idol, being exclusively occupied in
worshipping it.

The task herein undertaken is not so easy. We can hardly expect to
remove the particular pet deity of millions of people for thousands of years
—an especially conspicuous little image at that, differing from other gods
and goddesses; and substitute another figure, three times his size, of the
opposite sex, and thirty years older—without somebody's noticing it.

Yet this is precisely what is required of us, by the new knowledge of to-
day. We are called upon to dislodge what is easily the most popular god in
the calendar, albeit the littlest; that fat fluttering small boy, congenitally
blind, with his haphazard archery playthings; that undignified conception,
type of folly change and irresponsible mischief, which so amazingly usurps
the name and place of love. Never was there a more absurd
misrepresentation.

Suppose we worshipped Fire, the great sun for our over-lord, all lesser
lights in varying majesty, each hearth-fire as the genius and guardian of the
home. So worshipping, suppose we chose, as ever present image of the
great idea, to be pictured and sculptured far and wide, to fill all literature, to
be accepted even by science as type and symbol of the Fire Divine—a
match-box!

So slight, so transient, so comparatively negligible in importance, is the
flickering chance-sown spark typified in this pretty chimera of flying

immaturity, compared with the majestic quenchless flame of life and love
we ought to worship.

We have taken the assistant for the principal, a tributary for the main
stream; we have exalted Eros, the god of man's desire, and paid no heed to
that great goddess of mother love to whom young Eros is but a running
footman.

We are right to worship love, in all its wide, diverging branches; the love
that is gratitude, love that is sympathy. love that is admiration, love that is
gift and service; even the love that is but hunger—mere desire.

But when we talk of the Life Force, the strong stream of physical
immortality, which has replaced form with form and kept the stream
unbroken through the ages, we ought to understand whereof we speak.

That force is predominant. Under its ceaseless, upward pressure have all
creatures risen from the first beginning. Resistlessly it pushes through the
ages; stronger than pain or fear or anger, stronger than selfishness or pride,
stronger than death. It rises like a mighty tree, branching and spreading
through the changing seasons.

Death gnaws at it in vain. Death destroys the individual, not the race;
death plucks the leaves, the tree lives on. That tree is motherhood.

The life process replaces one generation with another, each equal to, yes,
if possible, superior to, the last. This mighty process has enlarged and
improved throughout the ages, until it has grown from a mere division of
the cell—its first step still—to the whole range of education by which the
generations are replenished socially as well as physically. From that vague
impulse which sets afloat a myriad oyster germs, to the long patience of a
brooding bird; from the sun-warmed eggs of a reptile to the nursed and

guarded young of the higher mammals; so runs the process and the power
through lengthening years of love and service, lives by service, grows with
service. The longer the period of infancy, the greater the improvement of
species.

The fish or insect, rapidly matured, reaches an early limit. He must be
competent to Iive as soon as he begins, and is no more competent at his
early ending. The higher life form, less perfect at beginning, spending more
time dependent on its mother, receives from her more power. First from her
body's shelter, the full, long upbuilding; safety while she is safe; the circling
guard of wise, mature, strong life, of conscious care, besides the
unconscious bulwark of self-interest. Contrast this with the floating chances
of the spawn!

Then the rich, sure food of mother-milk, the absolute adaptation, the
whole great living creature an alembic to gather from without, and distil to
sweet perfection, what the child needs. Contrast this with the chances of
new-born fish or fly, or even those of the bird baby, whose mother must
search wide for the food she brings. The mammal has it with her.

Then comes the highest stage of all, where the psychic gain of the race is
transmitted to the child as well as the physical. This last and noblest step in
the life process we call education. education is differentiated motherhood. It
is social motherhood. It is the application to the replenishment and
development of the race of the same great force of ever-growing life which
made the mother's milk.

Here are the three governing laws of life: To Be; To Re-Be; To Be Better.
The life force demands Existence. And we strain every nerve to keep
ourselves alive. The life force demands Reproduction. And our physical
machinery is shifted and rearranged repeatedly, with arrayed impulses to
suit—to keep the race alive. Then, most imperative of all, the life force

demands Improvement. And all creation groaneth and travaileth in this one
vast endeavor. Not merely this thing—permanently; not merely more of this
thing—continuously; but better things, ever better and better types, has
been the demand of life upon us, and we have fulfilled it.

Under this last and highest law, as the main factor in securing to the race
its due improvement, comes that supreme officer of the life process, the
Mother. Her functions are complex, subtle, powerful, of measureless value.

Her first duty is to grow nobly for her mighty purpose. Her next is to
select, with inexorable high standard, the fit assistant for her work. The
third—to fitly bear, bring forth, and nurse the child. Following these, last
and highest of all, comes our great race-process of social parentage, which
transmits to each new generation the gathered knowledge, the accumulated
advantages of the past.

When mother and father labor and save for years to give their children
the "advantages" of civilization; when a whole state taxes itself to teach its
children; that is the Life Force even more than the direct impulse of
personal passion. The pressure of progress, the resistless demand of better
conditions for our children, is life's largest imperative, the fullest expression
of motherhood.

But even if we confine ourselves for the time being to the plane of mere
replenishment, to that general law under which animals continue in
existence upon earth, even here the brief period of pre-paternal excitement
is but a passing hour compared to the weeks and months, yes, years, in the
higher species, of maternal service, love and care. The human father, too,
toils for his family; but the love, the power, the pride of fatherhood are not
symbolized by the mischievous butterfly baby we have elected to worship.

Cupid has nothing to do with either motherhood or fatherhood in the
large human sense. His range is far short of the mark, he suggests nothing
of the great work to which he is but the pleasing preliminary. Even for
marriage we must bring in another god little heard of—Master Hymen. This
personage has made but small impression upon literature and art; we have
concentrated our interest on the God of First Sensation, leaving none for
ultimate results.

It is as if we were impressed by the intricate and indispensible process of
nutrition (upon which, as anyone can see, all life continuously depends) and
then had fixed our attention upon the palate, as chief functionary. The palate
is useful, even necessary. Without that eager guide and servant we might be
indifferent to the duty of eating, or might eat what was useless or injurious,
or at best eat mechanically and without pleasure.

In the admirable economy of nature we are led to perform necessary acts
by the pleasure which accompanies them; so the "pleasures of the palate"
rightly precede the uses of the stomach; but we should not mistake them for
the chief end. In point of fact, this is precisely what we have done. It not an
analogy, it is a real truth. In nutrition as in reproduction we have been quite
taken up with accompaniments and assistants, and have ignored the real
business in hand. That is why the whole world is so unwisely fed. It
considers only the taste of things, the pleasure of eating them, and ignores
the real necessities of the process.

And why, if this standard of doorstep satisfaction does not really measure
values in food, should we continue to set the same standard for the mighty
work of love? Love is mighty, but little Master Cupid is not Love. The love
that warms and lights and builds the world is Motherlove. It is aided and
paralleled by Fatherlove (that new development distinctive of our race, that

ennobling of the father by his taking up so large a share of what was once
all motherwork).

But why, so recognizing and reverencing this august Power, why should
we any longer be content to accept as its symbol this godlet of transient
sensation? No man who has ever loved a woman fully, as only human
beings can love, through years of mutual care and labor, through sickness,
age, and death, can honestly accept, as type of that long, strong, enduring
Love, this small blind fly-by-night.

There is, unquestionably, a stage of feeling which he fitly represents.
There is an inflammable emotionality in youth and its dreary continuance
into middle life, when as the farcial old governor in the play exclaims,
"Every day is ladies' day to me." Such a state of mind—or body, rather—is
common enough, harmless enough, perhaps, for a few light, ineffectual
years; but it is a poor compliment to call it Love, to let this state of shuffling
indecision, this weather-cock period, this blindfold chance-shot game of hit
or miss, hold such high place in our hearts.

The explanation of it all is plain. In those slow, ignorant ages when the
spark of life was supposed to be transmitted by the male, he naturally was
taken to typify the life force. As this force was most imperious in youth, so
youth was taken to represent it. And as, even in the eyes of the supposed
chief actor, his feelings were changeable and fleeting and his behavior
erratic and foolish in the extreme—therefore Cupid!

Therefore, seeing the continuous unreason of the love-driven male, we
say, "Love is blind"; seeing his light-mindedness, we say, "Love has
wings"; seeing his evident lack of intelligence and purpose, we make him a
mere child; seeing the evil results of his wide license, we euphemistically
indicate some pain by that bunch of baby arrows.

It is easy to see the origin of this deification of the doorstep. It is not so
easy to justify its persistence now that long years of knowledge show us the
great Door.

The Door of Life is Motherhood. She is the gate of entrance. Her work is
the great work as moulder and builder. She carries in her the Life Power
which this absurd infant is supposed to typify; and her love is greater than
his, even as a wise, strong mother is greater than a little child.

Consider the imperative law that demands motherhood, that gives
motherhood, that holds motherhood to its great continuing task; where short
pleasure is followed by long discomfort crowned with pain; where even the
rich achievement of new-made life is but the beginning of years of labor
and care. Here is the life force. Here is power and passion. Not the irritable,
transient impulse, however mighty, but the staying power, the passion that
endures, the spirit which masters weakness, slays selfishness, holds its
ministrant to a lifelong task.

This is not appetite, hunger, desire. Desire may lead to it, and usefully.
Desire is the torchbearer, Motherhood is the Way.

Give Baby Love his due. He is not evil; he is good. He is a joy forever.
He is vitally necessary in the scheme of things. Happy are they who in the
real great work of life can carry with them this angel visitant, fluttering free
along their path, now close and sweet, now smiling mischievously at a
distance, yet returning ever.

But with all that can be said of him he is out of place as chief deity in this
high temple. Let a little shrine be made at the gate outside the door. Let him
smile there and take his tribute of red roses. But when we put the shoes
from off our feet and enter, we should see before us, tall and grave, glorious

in strong beauty, majestic in her amplitude of power, the Goddess
Motherhood.

Such love should shine from her deep eyes that children would crowd to
that temple and feel at home; learning to understand a little of what had
brought them there. Such beauty in this body of great womanhood that men
would worship as for long they have worshipped her of Melos. Such high
pride that girls, gazing, would feel strong to meet and bear their splendid
task. And such power—such living, overmastering power that man, woman
and child alike should bow in honor and rise in strength.

Then will Love be truly worshipped.

ARREARS

Our gratitude goes up in smoke,
In incense smoke of prayer;
We thank the Underlying Love,
The Overarching Care—
We do not thank the living men
Who make our lives so fair.

For long insolvent centuries
We have been clothed and fed,
By the spared captive, spared for once,
By inches slain instead;
He gave his service and is gone;
Unthanked, unpaid, and dead.

His labor built the world we love;
Our highest flights to-day
Rest on the service of the past,
Which we can never pay;
A long repudiated debt
Blackens our upward way.

Our fingers owed his fathers dead—
Disgrace beyond repair!
No late remorse, no new-found shame
Can save our honor there:
But we can now begin to pay
The starved and stunted heir!

We thank the Power above for all—
Gladly we do, and should.
But might we not save out a part
Of our large gratitude,
And give it to the power on earth—
Where it will do some good?

THREE THANKSGIVINGS

Andrew's letter and Jean's letter were in Mrs. Morrison's lap. She had read
them both, and sat looking at them with a varying sort of smile, now
motherly and now unmotherly.

"You belong with me," Andrew wrote. "It is not right that Jean's husband
should support my mother. I can do it easily now. You shall have a good

room and every comfort. The old house will let for enough to give you quite
a little income of your own, or it can be sold and I will invest the money
where you'll get a deal more out of it. It is not right that you should live
alone there. Sally is old and liable to accident. I am anxious about you.
Come on for Thanksgiving—and come to stay. Here is the money to come
with. You know I want you. Annie joins me in sending love. ANDREW."

Mrs. Morrison read it all through again, and laid it down with her quiet,
twinkling smile. Then she read Jean's.

"Now, mother, you've got to come to us for Thanksgiving this year. Just
think! You haven't seen baby since he was three months old! And have
never seen the twins. You won't know him—he's such a splendid big boy
now. Joe says for you to come, of course. And, mother, why won't you
come and live with us? Joe wants you, too. There's the little room upstairs;
it's not very big, but we can put in a Franklin stove for you and make you
pretty comfortable. Joe says he should think you ought to sell that white
elephant of a place. He says he could put the money into his store and pay
you good interest. I wish you would, mother. We'd just love to have you
here. You'd be such a comfort to me, and such a help with the babies. And
Joe just loves you. Do come now, and stay with us. Here is the money for
the trip.—Your affectionate daughter, JEANNIE."

Mrs. Morrison laid this beside the other, folded both, and placed them in
their respective envelopes, then in their several well-filled pigeon-holes in
her big, old-fashioned desk. She turned and paced slowly up and down the
long parlor, a tall woman, commanding of aspect, yet of a winningly
attractive manner, erect and light-footed, still imposingly handsome.

It was now November, the last lingering boarder was long since gone,
and a quiet winter lay before her. She was alone, but for Sally; and she
smiled at Andrew's cautious expression, "liable to accident." He could not

say "feeble" or "ailing," Sally being a colored lady of changeless aspect and
incessant activity.

Mrs. Morrison was alone, and while living in the Welcome House she
was never unhappy. Her father had built it, she was born there, she grew up
playing on the broad green lawns in front, and in the acre of garden behind.
It was the finest house in the village, and she then thought it the finest in the
world.

Even after living with her father at Washington and abroad, after visiting
hall, castle and palace, she still found the Welcome House beautiful and
impressive.

If she kept on taking boarders she could live the year through, and pay
interest, but not principal, on her little mortgage. This had been the one
possible and necessary thing while the children were there, though it was a
business she hated.

But her youthful experience in diplomatic circles, and the years of
practical management in church affairs, enabled her to bear it with patience
and success. The boarders often confided to one another, as they chatted
and tatted on the long piazza, that Mrs. Morrison was "certainly very
refined."

Now Sally whisked in cheerfully, announcing supper, and Mrs. Morrison
went out to her great silver tea-tray at the lit end of the long, dark
mahogany table, with as much dignity as if twenty titled guests were before
her.

Afterward Mr. Butts called. He came early in the evening, with his usual
air of determination and a somewhat unusual spruceness. Mr. Peter Butts
was a florid, blonde person, a little stout, a little pompous, sturdy and

immovable in the attitude of a self-made man. He had been a poor boy
when she was a rich girl; and it gratified him much to realize—and to call
upon her to realize—that their positions had changed. He meant no
unkindness, his pride was honest and unveiled. Tact he had none.

She had refused Mr. Butts, almost with laughter, when he proposed to her
in her gay girlhood. She had refused him, more gently, when he proposed to
her in her early widowhood. He had always been her friend, and her
husband's friend, a solid member of the church, and had taken the small
mortgage of the house. She refused to allow him at first, but he was
convincingly frank about it.

"This has nothing to do with my wanting you, Delia Morrison," he said.
"I've always wanted you—and I've always wanted this house, too. You
won't sell, but you've got to mortgage. By and by you can't pay up, and I'll
get it—see? Then maybe you'll take me—to keep the house. Don't be a fool,
Delia. It's a perfectly good investment."

She had taken the loan. She had paid the interest. She would pay the
interest if she had to take boarders all her life. And she would not, at any
price, marry Peter Butts.

He broached the subject again that evening, cheerful and undismayed.
"You might as well come to it, Delia," he said. "Then we could live right
here just the same. You aren't so young as you were, to be sure; I'm not,
either. But you are as good a housekeeper as ever—better—you've had
more experience."

"You are extremely kind, Mr. Butts," said the lady, "but I do not wish to
marry you."

"I know you don't," he said. "You've made that clear. You don't, but I do.
You've had your way and married the minister. He was a good man, but he's
dead. Now you might as well marry me."

"I do not wish to marry again, Mr. Butts; neither you nor anyone."

"Very proper, very proper, Delia," he replied. "It wouldn't look well if
you did—at any rate, if you showed it. But why shouldn't you? The children
are gone now—you can't hold them up against me any more."

"Yes, the children are both settled now, and doing nicely," she admitted.

"You don't want to go and live with them—either one of them—do you?"
he asked.

"I should prefer to stay here," she answered.

"Exactly! And you can't! You'd rather live here and be a grandee—but
you can't do it. Keepin' house for boarders isn't any better than keepin'
house for me, as I see. You'd much better marry me."

"I should prefer to keep the house without you, Mr. Butts."

"I know you would. But you can't, I tell you. I'd like to know what a
woman of your age can do with a house like this—and no money? You can't
live eternally on hens' eggs and garden truck. That won't pay the mortgage."

Mrs. Morrison looked at him with her cordial smile, calm and non-
committal. "Perhaps I can manage it," she said.

"That mortgage falls due two years from Thanksgiving, you know."

"Yes—I have not forgotten."

"Well, then, you might just as well marry me now, and save two years of
interest. It'll be my house, either way—but you'll be keepin' it just the
same."

"It is very kind of you, Mr. Butts. I must decline the offer none the less. I
can pay the interest, I am sure. And perhaps—in two years' time—I can pay
the principal. It's not a large sum."

"That depends on how you look at it," said he. "Two thousand dollars is
considerable money for a single woman to raise in two years—and
interest."

He went away, as cheerful and determined as ever; and Mrs. Morrison
saw him go with a keen, light in her fine eyes, a more definite line to that
steady, pleasant smile.

Then she went to spend Thanksgiving with Andrew. He was glad to see
her. Annie was glad to see her. They proudly installed her in "her room,"
and said she must call it "home" now.

This affectionately offered home was twelve by fifteen, and eight feet
high. It had two windows, one looking at some pale gray clapboards within
reach of a broom, the other giving a view of several small fenced yards
occupied by cats, clothes and children. There was an ailanthus tree under
the window, a lady ailanthus tree. Annie told her how profusely it bloomed.
Mrs. Morrison particularly disliked the smell of ailanthus flowers. "It
doesn't bloom in November," said she to herself. "I can be thankful for
that!"

Andrew's church was very like the church of his father, and Mrs. Andrew
was doing her best to fill the position of minister's wife—doing it well, too
—there was no vacancy for a minister's mother.

Besides, the work she had done so cheerfully to help her husband was not
what she most cared for, after all. She liked the people, she liked to manage,
but she was not strong on doctrine. Even her husband had never known how
far her views differed from his. Mrs. Morrison had never mentioned what
they were.

Andrew's people were very polite to her. She was invited out with them,
waited upon and watched over and set down among the old ladies and
gentlemen—she had never realized so keenly that she was no longer young.
Here nothing recalled her youth, every careful provision anticipated age.
Annie brought her a hot-water bag at night, tucking it in at the foot of the
bed with affectionate care. Mrs. Morrison thanked her, and subsequently
took it out—airing the bed a little before she got into it. The house seemed
very hot to her, after the big, windy halls at home.

The little dining-room, the little round table with the little round fern-dish
in the middle, the little turkey and the little carving-set—game-set she
would have called it—all made her feel as if she was looking through the
wrong end of an opera-glass.

In Annie's precise efficiency she saw no room for her assistance; no room
in the church, no room in the small, busy town, prosperous and progressive,
and no room in the house. "Not enough to turn round in!" she said to
herself. Annie, who had grown up in a city flat, thought their little
parsonage palatial. Mrs. Morrison grew up in the Welcome House.

She stayed a week, pleasant and polite, conversational, interested in all
that went on.

"I think your mother is just lovely," said Annie to Andrew.

"Charming woman, your mother," said the leading church member.

"What a delightful old lady your mother is!" said the pretty soprano.

And Andrew was deeply hurt and disappointed when she announced her
determination to stay on for the present in her old home. "Dear boy," she
said, "you mustn't take it to heart. I love to be with you, of course, but I love
my home, and want to keep it is long as I can. It is a great pleasure to see
you and Annie so well settled, and so happy together. I am most truly
thankful for you."

"My home is open to you whenever you wish to come, mother," said
Andrew.
But he was a little angry.

Mrs. Morrison came home as eager as a girl, and opened her own door
with her own key, in spite of Sally's haste.

Two years were before her in which she must find some way to keep
herself and Sally, and to pay two thousand dollars and the interest to Peter
Butts. She considered her assets. There was the house—the white elephant.
It was big—very big. It was profusely furnished. Her father had entertained
lavishly like the Southern-born, hospitable gentleman he was; and the
bedrooms ran in suites—somewhat deteriorated by the use of boarders, but
still numerous and habitable. Boarders—she abhorred them. They were
people from afar, strangers and interlopers. She went over the place from
garret to cellar, from front gate to backyard fence.

The garden had great possibilities. She was fond of gardening. and
understood it well. She measured and estimated.

"This garden," she finally decided, "with the hens, will feed us two
women and sell enough to pay Sally. If we make plenty of jelly, it may
cover the coal bill, too. As to clothes—I don't need any. They last

admirably. I can manage. I can live—but two thousand dollars—and
interest!"

In the great attic was more furniture, discarded sets put there when her
extravagant young mother had ordered new ones. And chairs—uncounted
chairs. Senator Welcome used to invite numbers to meet his political friends
—and they had delivered glowing orations in the wide, double parlors, the
impassioned speakers standing on a temporary dais, now in the cellar; and
the enthusiastic listeners disposed more or less comfortably on these serried
rows of "folding chairs," which folded sometimes, and let down the visitor
in scarlet confusion to the floor.

She sighed as she remembered those vivid days and glittering nights. She
used to steal downstairs in her little pink wrapper and listen to the
eloquence. It delighted her young soul to see her father rising on his toes,
coming down sharply on his heels, hammering one hand upon the other;
and then to hear the fusilade of applause.

Here were the chairs, often borrowed for weddings, funerals, and church
affairs, somewhat worn and depleted, but still numerous. She mused upon
them. Chairs—hundreds of chairs. They would sell for very little.

She went through her linen room. A splendid stock in the old days;
always carefully washed by Sally; surviving even the boarders. Plenty of
bedding, plenty of towels, plenty of napkins and tablecloths. "It would
make a good hotel—but I can't have it so—I can't! Besides, there's no need
of another hotel here. The poor little Haskins House is never full."

The stock in the china closet was more damaged than some other things,
naturally; but she inventoried it with care. The countless cups of crowded
church receptions were especially prominent. Later additions these, not very
costly cups, but numerous, appallingly.

When she had her long list of assets all in order, she sat and studied it
with a clear and daring mind. Hotel—boarding-house—she could think of
nothing else. School! A girls' school! A boarding school! There was money
to be made at that, and fine work done. It was a brilliant thought at first, and
she gave several hours, and much paper and ink, to its full consideration.
But she would need some capital for advertising; she must engage teachers
—adding to her definite obligation; and to establish it, well, it would
require time.

Mr. Butts, obstinate, pertinacious, oppressively affectionate, would give
her no time. He meant to force her to marry him for her own good—and his.
She shrugged her fine shoulders with a little shiver. Marry Peter Butts!
Never! Mrs. Morrison still loved her husband. Some day she meant to see
him again—God willing—and she did not wish to have to tell him that at
fifty she had been driven into marrying Peter Butts.

Better live with Andrew. Yet when she thought of living with Andrew,
she shivered again. Pushing back her sheets of figures and lists of personal
property, she rose to her full graceful height and began to walk the floor.
There was plenty of floor to walk. She considered, with a set deep
thoughtfulness, the town and the townspeople, the surrounding country, the
hundreds upon hundreds of women whom she knew—and liked, and who
liked her.

It used to be said of Senator Welcome that he had no enemies; and some
people, strangers, maliciously disposed, thought it no credit to his character.
His daughter had no enemies, but no one had ever blamed her for her
unlimited friendliness. In her father's wholesale entertainments the whole
town knew and admired his daughter; in her husband's popular church she
had come to know the women of the countryside about them. Her mind
strayed off to these women, farmers' wives, comfortably off in a plain way,

but starving for companionship, for occasional stimulus and pleasure. It was
one of her joys in her husband's time to bring together these women—to
teach and entertain them.

Suddenly she stopped short in the middle of the great high-ceiled room,
and drew her head up proudly like a victorious queen. One wide,
triumphant, sweeping glance she cast at the well-loved walls—and went
back to her desk, working swiftly, excitedly, well into the hours of the night.

*

Presently the little town began to buzz, and the murmur ran far out into
the surrounding country. Sunbonnets wagged over fences; butcher carts and
pedlar's wagon carried the news farther; and ladies visiting found one topic
in a thousand houses.

Mrs. Morrison was going to entertain. Mrs. Morrison had invited the
whole feminine population, it would appear, to meet Mrs. Isabelle Carter
Blake, of Chicago. Even Haddleton had heard of Mrs. Isabelle Carter
Blake. And even Haddleton had nothing but admiration for her.

She was known the world over for her splendid work for children—for
the school children and the working children of the country. Yet she was
known also to have lovingly and wisely reared six children of her own—
and made her husband happy in his home. On top of that she had lately
written a novel, a popular novel, of which everyone was talking; and on top
of that she was an intimate friend of a certain conspicuous Countess—an
Italian.

It was even rumored, by some who knew Mrs. Morrison better than
others—or thought they did—that the Countess was coming, too! No one

had known before that Delia Welcome was a school-mate of Isabel Carter,
and a lifelong friend; and that was ground for talk in itself.

The day arrived, and the guests arrived. They came in hundreds upon
hundreds, and found ample room in the great white house.

The highest dream of the guests was realized—the Countess had come,
too. With excited joy they met her, receiving impressions that would last
them for all their lives, for those large widening waves of reminiscence
which delight us the more as years pass. It was an incredible glory—Mrs.
Isabelle Carter Blake, and a Countess!

Some were moved to note that Mrs. Morrison looked the easy peer of
these eminent ladies, and treated the foreign nobility precisely as she did
her other friends.

She spoke, her clear quiet voice reaching across the murmuring din, and
silencing it.

"Shall we go into the east room? If you will all take chairs in the east
room, Mrs. Blake is going to be so kind as to address us. Also perhaps her
friend—"

They crowded in, sitting somewhat timorously on the unfolded chairs.

Then the great Mrs. Blake made them an address of memorable power
and beauty, which received vivid sanction from that imposing presence in
Parisian garments on the platform by her side. Mrs. Blake spoke to them of
the work she was interested in, and how it was aided everywhere by the
women's clubs. She gave them the number of these clubs, and described
with contagious enthusiasm the inspiration of their great meetings. She
spoke of the women's club houses, going up in city after city, where many

associations meet and help one another. She was winning and convincing
and most entertaining—an extremely attractive speaker.

Had they a women's club there? They had not.

Not yet, she suggested, adding that it took no time at all to make one.

They were delighted and impressed with Mrs. Blake's speech, but its
effect was greatly intensified by the address of the Countess.

"I, too, am American," she told them; "born here, reared in England,
married in Italy." And she stirred their hearts with a vivid account of the
women's clubs and associations all over Europe, and what they were
accomplishing. She was going back soon, she said, the wiser and happier
for this visit to her native land, and she should remember particularly this
beautiful, quiet town, trusting that if she came to it again it would have
joined the great sisterhood of women, "whose hands were touching around
the world for the common good."

It was a great occasion.

The Countess left next day, but Mrs. Blake remained, and spoke in some
of the church meetings, to an ever widening circle of admirers. Her
suggestions were practical.

"What you need here is a 'Rest and Improvement Club,'" she said. "Here
are all you women coming in from the country to do your shopping—and
no place to go to. No place to lie down if you're tired, to meet a friend, to
eat your lunch in peace, to do your hair. All you have to do is organize, pay
some small regular due, and provide yourselves with what you want."

There was a volume of questions and suggestions, a little opposition,
much random activity.

Who was to do it? Where was there a suitable place? They would have to
hire someone to take charge of it. It would only be used once a week. It
would cost too much.

Mrs. Blake, still practical, made another suggestion. Why not combine
business with pleasure, and make use of the best place in town, if you can
get it? I think Mrs. Morrison could be persuaded to let you use part of her
house; it's quite too big for one woman."

Then Mrs. Morrison, simple and cordial as ever, greeted with warm
enthusiasm by her wide circle of friends.

"I have been thinking this over," she said. "Mrs. Blake has been
discussing it with me. My house is certainly big enough for all of you, and
there am I, with nothing to do but entertain you. Suppose you formed such a
club as you speak of—for Rest and Improvement. My parlors are big
enough for all manner of meetings; there are bedrooms in plenty for resting.
If you form such a club I shall be glad to help with my great, cumbersome
house, shall be delighted to see so many friends there so often; and I think I
could furnish accommodations more cheaply than you could manage in any
other way.

Then Mrs. Blake gave them facts and figures, showing how much
clubhouses cost—and how little this arrangement would cost. "Most women
have very little money, I know," she said, "and they hate to spend it on
themselves when they have; but even a little money from each goes a long
way when it is put together. I fancy there are none of us so poor we could
not squeeze out, say ten cents a week. For a hundred women that would be
ten dollars. Could you feed a hundred tired women for ten dollars, Mrs.
Morrison?"

Mrs. Morrison smiled cordially. "Not on chicken pie," she said, "But I
could give them tea and coffee, crackers and cheese for that, I think. And a
quiet place to rest, and a reading room, and a place to hold meetings."

Then Mrs. Blake quite swept them off their feet by her wit and
eloquence. She gave them to understand that if a share in the palatial
accommodation of the Welcome House, and as good tea and coffee as old
Sally made, with a place to meet, a place to rest, a place to talk, a place to
lie down, could be had for ten cents a week each, she advised them to clinch
the arrangement at once before Mrs. Morrison's natural good sense had
overcome her enthusiasm.

Before Mrs. Isabelle Carter Blake had left, Haddleton had a large and
eager women's club, whose entire expenses, outside of stationary and
postage, consisted of ten cents a week per capita, paid to Mrs. Morrison.
Everybody belonged. It was open at once for charter members, and all
pressed forward to claim that privileged place.

They joined by hundreds, and from each member came this tiny sum to
Mrs. Morrison each week. It was very little money, taken separately. But it
added up with silent speed. Tea and coffee, purchased in bulk, crackers by
the barrel, and whole cheeses—these are not expensive luxuries. The town
was full of Mrs. Morrison's ex-Sunday-school boys, who furnished her with
the best they had—at cost. There was a good deal of work, a good deal of
care, and room for the whole supply of Mrs. Morrison's diplomatic talent
and experience. Saturdays found the Welcome House as full as it could
hold, and Sundays found Mrs. Morrison in bed. But she liked it.

A busy, hopeful year flew by, and then she went to Jean's for
Thanksgiving.

The room Jean gave her was about the same size as her haven in
Andrew's
home, but one flight higher up, and with a sloping ceiling. Mrs.
Morrison whitened her dark hair upon it, and rubbed her head confusedly.
Then she shook it with renewed determination.

The house was full of babies. There was little Joe, able to get about, and
into everything. There were the twins, and there was the new baby. There
was one servant, over-worked and cross. There was a small, cheap, totally
inadequate nursemaid. There was Jean, happy but tired, full of joy, anxiety
and affection, proud of her children, proud of her husband, and delighted to
unfold her heart to her mother.

By the hour she babbled of their cares and hopes, while Mrs. Morrison,
tall and elegant in her well-kept old black silk, sat holding the baby or
trying to hold the twins. The old silk was pretty well finished by the week's
end. Joseph talked to her also, telling her how well he was getting on, and
how much he needed capital, urging her to come and stay with them; it was
such a help to Jeannie; asking questions about the house.

There was no going visiting here. Jeannie could not leave the babies. And
few visitors; all the little suburb being full of similarly overburdened
mothers. Such as called found Mrs. Morrison charming. What she found
them, she did not say. She bade her daughter an affectionate good-bye when
the week was up, smiling at their mutual contentment.

"Good-bye, my dear children," she said. "I am so glad for all your
happiness. I am thankful for both of you."

But she was more thankful to get home.

Mr. Butts did not have to call for his interest this time, but he called none
the less.

"How on earth'd you get it, Delia?" he demanded. "Screwed it out o'
these club-women?"

"Your interest is so moderate, Mr. Butts, that it is easier to meet than you
imagine," was her answer. "Do you know the average interest they charge in
Colorado? The women vote there, you know."

He went away with no more personal information than that; and no
nearer approach to the twin goals of his desire than the passing of the year.

"One more year, Delia," he said; "then you'll have to give in."

"One more year!" she said to herself, and took up her chosen task with
renewed energy.

The financial basis of the undertaking was very simple, but it would
never have worked so well under less skilful management. Five dollars a
year these country women could not have faced, but ten cents a week was
possible to the poorest. There was no difficulty in collecting, for they
brought it themselves; no unpleasantness in receiving, for old Sally stood at
the receipt of custom and presented the covered cash box when they came
for their tea.

On the crowded Saturdays the great urns were set going, the mighty array
of cups arranged in easy reach, the ladies filed by, each taking her refection
and leaving her dime. Where the effort came was in enlarging the
membership and keeping up the attendance, and this effort was precisely in
the line of Mrs. Morrison's splendid talents.

Serene, cheerful, inconspicuously active, planning like the born
statesman she was, executing like a practical politician, Mrs. Morrison gave
her mind to the work, and thrived upon it. Circle within circle, and group
within group, she set small classes and departments at work, having a boys'
club by and by in the big room over the woodshed, girls' clubs, reading
clubs, study clubs, little meetings of every sort that were not held in
churches, and some that were—previously.

For each and all there was, if wanted, tea and coffee, crackers and cheese;
simple fare, of unvarying excellence, and from each and all, into the little
cashbox, ten cents for these refreshments. From the club members this came
weekly; and the club members, kept up by a constant variety of interests,
came every week. As to numbers, before the first six months was over The
Haddleton Rest and Improvement Club numbered five hundred women.

Now, five hundred times ten cents a week is twenty-six hundred dollars a
year. Twenty-six hundred dollars a year would not be very much to build or
rent a large house, to furnish five hundred people with chairs, lounges,
books, and magazines, dishes and service; and with food and drink even of
the simplest. But if you are miraculously supplied with a club-house,
furnished, with a manager and servant on the spot, then that amount of
money goes a long way.

On Saturdays Mrs. Morrison hired two helpers for half a day, for half a
dollar each. She stocked the library with many magazines for fifty dollars a
year. She covered fuel, light, and small miscellanies with another hundred.
And she fed her multitude with the plain viands agreed upon, at about four
cents apiece.

For her collateral entertainments, her many visits, the various new
expenses entailed, she paid as well; and yet at the end of the first year she
had not only her interest, but a solid thousand dollars of clear profit. With a

calm smile she surveyed it, heaped in neat stacks of bills in the small safe in
the wall behind her bed. Even Sally did not know it was there.

The second season was better than the first. There were difficulties,
excitements, even some opposition, but she rounded out the year
triumphantly. "After that," she said to herself, "they may have the deluge if
they like."

She made all expenses, made her interest, made a little extra cash, clearly
her own, all over and above the second thousand dollars.

Then did she write to son and daughter, inviting them and their families
to come home to Thanksgiving, and closing each letter with joyous pride:
"Here is the money to come with."

They all came, with all the children and two nurses. There was plenty of
room in the Welcome House, and plenty of food on the long mahogany
table. Sally was as brisk as a bee, brilliant in scarlet and purple; Mrs.
Morrison carved her big turkey with queenly grace.

"I don't see that you're over-run with club women, mother," said
Jeannie.

"It's Thanksgiving, you know; they're all at home. I hope they are all as
happy, as thankful for their homes as I am for mine," said Mrs. Morrison.

Afterward Mr. Butts called. With dignity and calm unruffled, Mrs.
Morrison handed him his interest—and principal.

Mr. Butts was almost loath to receive it, though his hand automatically
grasped the crisp blue check.

"I didn't know you had a bank account," he protested, somewhat
dubiously.

"Oh, yes; you'll find the check will be honored, Mr. Butts."

"I'd like to know how you got this money. You can't 'a' skinned it out o'
that club of yours."

"I appreciate your friendly interest, Mr. Butts; you have been most kind."

"I believe some of these great friends of yours have lent it to you.
You won't be any better off, I can tell you."

"Come, come, Mr. Butts! Don't quarrel with good money. Let us part
friends."

And they parted.

HOW DOTH THE HAT

How doth the hat loom large upon her head!
Furred like a busby; plumed as hearses are;
Armed with eye-spearing quills; bewebbed and hung
With lacy, silky, downy draperies;
With spread, wide-waggling feathers fronded high
In bosky thickets of Cimmerian gloom.

How doth the hat with colors dare the eye!
Arrest—attract—allure—affront—appall!
Vivid and varied as are paroquets;
Dove-dull; one mass of white; all solid red;

Black with the blackness of a mourning world—
Compounded type of "Chaos and Old Night"!

How doth the hat expand: wax wide, and swell!
Such is its size that none can predicate
Or hair, or head, or shoulders of the frame
Below thIs bulk, this beauty-burying bulk;
Trespassing rude on all who walk beside,
Brutally blinding all who sit behind.

How doth the hat's mere mass more monstrous grow
Into a riot of repugnant shapes!
Shapes ignominious, extreme, bizarre,
Bulbous, distorted, unsymmetrical—
Of no relation to the human head—
To beauty, comfort, dignity or grace.

Shape of a dishpan! Of a pail! A tub!
Of an inverted wastebasket wherein
The head finds lodgment most appropriate!
Shape of a wide-spread wilted griddlecake!
Shape of the body of an octopus
Set sideways on a fireman's misplaced brim!

How doth the hat show callous cruelty
In decoration costing countless deaths;
Carrying corpses for its ornaments;
Wreath of dead humming-birds, dismembered gulls,
The mother heron's breastknot, stiffened wings;
Torn fragments of a world of wasted life.

How doth the hat effect the minds of men?
Patient bill-payers, chivalrously dumb!
What does it indicate of woman's growth;
Her sense of beauty, her intelligence,
Her thought for others measured with herself,
Her place and grade in human life to-day?

INTRODUCING THE WORLD, THE FLESH, AND THE DEVIL

"O, no—Please don't—I'd rather not meet them!"

I'm sorry but you have to meet them, constantly.

"But I don't have to know them, surely!"

You will find it safer and easier if you do.

"But they are not proper persons to meet—I've heard awful things about
them."

Those stories come from people who never really knew them. They have
been much maligned I assure you. Let me tell you a little about them before
they come up.

The World yonder is really an excellent fellow, but sulky and erratic
because he's not well used. Think of a beautiful, fruitful, home garden used
for nothing but to play ball and fight in—and then blamed for its condition.
That's the way he feels.

Then there's the Flesh. Never was a good fellow more abused! He's been
brought up wrong, from babyhood—but he's all right inside.

As to the Devil—we really ought to be ashamed of treating him so. He'd
have died centuries ago, but we will keep him going—and then blame him
because his behavior's out of date!

Here they come. Allow me to present:

The World—Just Us; We and our Workshop.

The Flesh—Just Us; Our Natural Vehicle and Servant.

The Devil—Just Us; but an Anachronism—an artificially preserved
Extinct Ancestor!

WHAT DIANTHA DID

CHAPTER I.

HANDICAPPED

One may use the Old Man of the Sea,
For a partner or patron,
But helpless and hapless is he
Who is ridden, inextricably,
By a fond old mer-matron.

The Warden house was more impressive in appearance than its neighbors.
It had "grounds," instead of a yard or garden; it had wide pillared porches
and "galleries," showing southern antecedents; moreover, it had a cupola,

giving date to the building, and proof of the continuing ambitions of the
builders.

The stately mansion was covered with heavy flowering vines, also with
heavy mortgages. Mrs. Roscoe Warden and her four daughters reposed
peacefully under the vines, while Roscoe Warden, Jr., struggled desperately
under the mortgages.

A slender, languid lady was Mrs. Warden, wearing her thin but still
brown hair in "water-waves" over a pale high forehead. She was sitting on a
couch on the broad, rose-shaded porch, surrounded by billowing masses of
vari-colored worsted. It was her delight to purchase skein on skein of soft,
bright-hued wool, cut it all up into short lengths, tie them together again in
contrasting colors, and then crochet this hashed rainbow into afghans of
startling aspect. California does not call for afghans to any great extent, but
"they make such acceptable presents," Mrs. Warden declared, to those who
questioned the purpose of her work; and she continued to send them off, on
Christmases, birthdays, and minor weddings, in a stream of pillowy
bundles. As they were accepted, they must have been acceptable, and the
stream flowed on.

Around her, among the gay blossoms and gayer wools, sat her four
daughters, variously intent. The mother, a poetic soul, had named them
musically and with dulcet rhymes: Madeline and Adeline were the two
eldest, Coraline and Doraline the two youngest. It had not occurred to her
until too late that those melodious terminations made it impossible to call
one daughter without calling two, and that "Lina" called them all.

"Mis' Immerjin," said a soft voice in the doorway, "dere pos'tively ain't
no butter in de house fer supper."

"No butter?" said Mrs. Warden, incredulously. "Why, Sukey, I'm sure we
had a tub sent up last—last Tuesday!"

"A week ago Tuesday, more likely, mother," suggested Dora.

"Nonsense, Dora! It was this week, wasn't it, girls?" The mother appealed
to them quite earnestly, as if the date of that tub's delivery would furnish
forth the supper-table; but none of the young ladies save Dora had even a
contradiction to offer.

"You know I never notice things," said the artistic Cora; and "the de-
lines," as their younger sisters called them, said nothing.

"I might borrow some o' Mis' Bell?" suggested Sukey; "dat's nearer 'n' de
sto'."

"Yes, do, Sukey," her mistress agreed. "It is so hot. But what have you
done with that tubful?"

"Why, some I tuk back to Mis' Bell for what I borrered befo'—I'm always
most careful to make return for what I borrers—and yo' know, Mis' Warden,
dat waffles and sweet potaters and cohn bread dey do take butter; to say
nothin' o' them little cakes you all likes so well—an' de fried chicken,
an'—"

"Never mind, Sukey; you go and present my compliments to Mrs. Bell,
and ask her for some; and be sure you return it promptly. Now, girls, don't
let me forget to tell Ross to send up another tub."

"We can't seem to remember any better than you can, mother," said
Adeline, dreamily. "Those details are so utterly uninteresting."

"I should think it was Sukey's business to tell him," said Madeline with
decision; while the "a-lines" kept silence this time.

"There! Sukey's gone!" Mrs. Warden suddenly remarked, watching the
stout figure moving heavily away under the pepper trees. "And I meant to
have asked her to make me a glass of shrub! Dora, dear, you run and get it
for mother."

Dora laid down her work, not too regretfully, and started off.

"That child is the most practical of any of you," said her mother; which
statement was tacitly accepted. It was not extravagant praise.

Dora poked about in the refrigerator for a bit of ice. She ho no idea of the
high cost of ice in that region—it came from "the store," like all their
provisions. It did not occur to her that fish and milk and melons made a
poor combination in flavor; or that the clammy, sub-offensive smell was not
the natural and necessary odor of refrigerators. Neither did she think that a
sunny corner of the back porch near the chimney, though convenient, was
an ill-selected spot for a refrigerator. She couldn't find the ice-pick, so put a
big piece of ice in a towel and broke it on the edge of the sink; replaced the
largest fragment, used what she wanted, and left the rest to filter slowly
down through a mass of grease and tea-leaves; found the raspberry vinegar,
and made a very satisfactory beverage which her mother received with
grateful affection.

"Thank you, my darling," she said. "I wish you'd made a pitcherful."

"Why didn't you, Do?" her sisters demanded.

"You're too late," said Dora, hunting for her needle and then for her
thimble, and then for her twist; "but there's more in the kitchen."

"I'd rather go without than go into the kitchen," said Adeline; "I do
despise a kitchen." And this seemed to be the general sentiment; for no one
moved.

"My mother always liked raspberry shrub," said Mrs. Warden; "and your
Aunt Leicester, and your Raymond cousins."

Mrs. Warden had a wide family circle, many beloved relatives,
"connections" of whom she was duly proud and "kin" in such widening
ramifications that even her carefully reared daughters lost track of them.

"You young people don't seem to care about your cousins at all!" pursued
their mother, somewhat severely, setting her glass on the railing, from
whence it was presently knocked off and broken.

"That's the fifth!" remarked Dora, under breath.

"Why should we, Ma?" inquired Cora. "We've never seen one of them—
except Madam Weatherstone!"

"We'll never forget her!" said Madeline, with delicate decision, laying
down the silk necktie she was knitting for Roscoe. "What beautiful manners
she had!"

"How rich is she, mother? Do you know?" asked Dora.

"Rich enough to do something for Roscoe, I'm sure, if she had a proper
family spirit," replied Mrs. Warden. "Her mother was own cousin to my
grandmother—one of the Virginia Paddingtons. Or she might do something
for you girls."

"I wish she would!" Adeline murmured, softly, her large eyes turned to
the horizon, her hands in her lap over the handkerchief she was marking for

Roscoe.

"Don't be ungrateful, Adeline," said her mother, firmly. "You have a good
home and a good brother; no girl ever had a better."

"But there is never anything going on," broke in Coraline, in a tone of
complaint; "no parties, no going away for vacations, no anything."

"Now, Cora, don't be discontented! You must not add a straw to dear
Roscoe's burdens," said her mother.

"Of course not, mother; I wouldn't for the world. I never saw her but that
once; and she wasn't very cordial. But, as you say, she might do something.
She might invite us to visit her."

"If she ever comes back again, I'm going to recite for her," said, Dora,
firmly.

Her mother gazed fondly on her youngest. "I wish you could, dear," she
agreed. "I'm sure you have talent; and Madam Weatherstone would
recognize it. And Adeline's music too. And Cora's art. I am very proud of
my girls."

Cora sat where the light fell well upon her work. She was illuminating a
volume of poems, painting flowers on the margins, in appropriate places—
for Roscoe.

"I wonder if he'll care for it?" she said, laying down her brush and
holding the book at arm's length to get the effect.

"Of course he will!" answered her mother, warmly. "It is not only the
beauty of it, but the affection! How are you getting on, Dora?"

Dora was laboring at a task almost beyond her fourteen years, consisting
of a negligee shirt of outing flannel, upon the breast of which she was
embroidering a large, intricate design—for Roscoe. She was an ambitious
child, but apt to tire in the execution of her large projects.

"I guess it'll be done," she said, a little wearily. "What are you going to
give him, mother?"

"Another bath-robe; his old one is so worn. And nothing is too good for
my boy."

"He's coming," said Adeline, who was still looking down the road; and
they all concealed their birthday work in haste.

A tall, straight young fellow, with an air of suddenly-faced maturity upon
him, opened the gate under the pepper trees and came toward them.

He had the finely molded features we see in portraits of handsome
ancestors, seeming to call for curling hair a little longish, and a rich
profusion of ruffled shirt. But his hair was sternly short, his shirt severely
plain, his proudly carried head spoke of effort rather than of ease in its
attitude.

Dora skipped to meet him, Cora descended a decorous step or two.
Madeline and Adeline, arm in arm, met him at the piazza edge, his mother
lifted her face.

"Well, mother, dear!" Affectionately he stooped and kissed her, and she
held his hand and stroked it lovingly. The sisters gathered about with
teasing affection, Dora poking in his coat-pocket for the stick candy her
father always used to bring her, and her brother still remembered.

"Aren't you home early, dear?" asked Mrs. Warden.

"Yes; I had a little headache"—he passed his hand over his forehead
—"and Joe can run the store till after supper, anyhow." They flew to get him
camphor, cologne, a menthol-pencil. Dora dragged forth the wicker lounge.
He was laid out carefully and fanned and fussed over till his mother drove
them all away.

"Now, just rest," she said. "It's an hour to supper time yet!" And she
covered him with her latest completed afghan, gathering up and carrying
away the incomplete one and its tumultuous constituents.

He was glad of the quiet, the fresh, sweet air, the smell of flowers instead
of the smell of molasses and cheese, soap and sulphur matches. But the
headache did not stop, nor the worry that caused it. He loved his mother, he
loved his sisters, he loved their home, but he did not love the grocery
business which had fallen so unexpectedly upon him at his father's death,
nor the load of debt which fell with it.

That they need never have had so large a "place" to "keep up" did not
occur to him. He had lived there most of his life, and it was home. That the
expenses of running the household were three times what they needed to be,
he did not know. His father had not questioned their style of living, nor did
he. That a family of five women might, between them, do the work of the
house, he did not even consider.

Mrs. Warden's health was never good, and since her husband's death she
had made daily use of many afghans on the many lounges of the house.
Madeline was "delicate," and Adeline was "frail"; Cora was "nervous,"
Dora was "only a child." So black Sukey and her husband Jonah did the
work of the place, so far as it was done; and Mrs. Warden held it a miracle
of management that she could "do with one servant," and the height of
womanly devotion on her daughters' part that they dusted the parlor and
arranged the flowers.

Roscoe shut his eyes and tried to rest, but his problem beset him
ruthlessly. There was the store—their one and only source of income. There
was the house, a steady, large expense. There were five women to clothe
and keep contented, beside himself. There was the unappeasable demand of
the mortgage—and there was Diantha.

When Mr. Warden died, some four years previously, Roscoe was a lad of
about twenty, just home from college, full of dreams of great service to the
world in science, expecting to go back for his doctor's degree next year.
Instead of which the older man had suddenly dropped beneath the burden
he had carried with such visible happiness and pride, such unknown anxiety
and straining effort; and the younger one had to step into the harness on the
spot.

He was brave, capable, wholly loyal to his mother and sisters, reared in
the traditions of older days as to a man's duty toward women. In his first
grief for his father, and the ready pride with which he undertook to fill his
place, he had not in the least estimated the weight of care he was to carry,
nor the time that he must carry it. A year, a year or two, a few years, he told
himself, as they passed, and he would make more money; the girls, of
course, would marry; he could "retire" in time and take up his scientific
work again. Then—there was Diantha.

When he found he loved this young neighbor of theirs, and that she loved
him, the first flush of happiness made all life look easier. They had been
engaged six months—and it was beginning to dawn upon the young man
that it might be six years—or sixteen years—before he could marry.

He could not sell the business—and if he could, he knew of no better way
to take care of his family. The girls did not marry, and even when they did,
he had figured this out to a dreary certainty, he would still not be free. To
pay the mortgages off, and keep up the house, even without his sisters,

would require all the money the store would bring in for some six years
ahead. The young man set his teeth hard and turned his head sharply toward
the road.

And there was Diantha.

She stood at the gate and smiled at him. He sprang to his feet,
headacheless for the moment, and joined her. Mrs. Warden, from the lounge
by her bedroom window, saw them move off together, and sighed.

"Poor Roscoe!" she said to herself. "It is very hard for him. But he carries
his difficulties nobly. He is a son to be proud of." And she wept a little.

Diantha slipped her hand in his offered arm—he clasped it warmly with
his, and they walked along together.

"You won't come in and see mother and the girls?"

"No, thank you; not this time. I must get home and get supper.
Besides, I'd rather see just you."

He felt it a pity that there were so many houses along the road here, but
squeezed her hand, anyhow.

She looked at him keenly. "Headache?" she asked.

"Yes; it's nothing; it's gone already."

"Worry?" she asked.

"Yes, I suppose it is," he answered. "But I ought not to worry. I've got a
good home, a good mother, good sisters, and—you!" And he took
advantage of a high hedge and an empty lot on either side of them.

Diantha returned his kiss affectionately enough, but seemed preoccupied,
and walked in silence till he asked her what she was thinking about.

"About you, of course," she answered, brightly. "There are things I want
to say; and yet—I ought not to."

"You can say anything on earth to me," he answered.

"You are twenty-four," she began, musingly.

"Admitted at once."

"And I'm twenty-one and a half."

"That's no such awful revelation, surely!"

"And we've been engaged ever since my birthday," the girl pursued.

"All these are facts, dearest."

"Now, Ross, will you be perfectly frank with me? May I ask you an—an
impertinent question?"

"You may ask me any question you like; it couldn't be impertinent."

"You'll be scandalised, I know—but—well, here goes. What would you
think if Madeline—or any of the girls—should go away to work?"

He looked at her lovingly, but with a little smile on his firm mouth.

"I shouldn't allow it," he said.

"O—allow it? I asked you what you'd think."

"I should think it was a disgrace to the family, and a direct reproach to
me," be answered. "But it's no use talking about that. None of the girls have
any such foolish notion. And I wouldn't permit it if they had."

Diantha smiled. "I suppose you never would permit your wife to work?"

"My widow might have to—not my wife." He held his fine head a trifle
higher, and her hand ached for a moment.

"Wouldn't you let me work—to help you, Ross?"

"My dearest girl, you've got something far harder than that to do for me,
and that's wait."

His face darkened again, and he passed his hand over his forehead.
"Sometimes I feel as if I ought not to hold you at all!" he burst out, bitterly.
"You ought to be free to marry a better man."

"There aren't any!" said Diantha, shaking her head slowly from side to
side. "And if there were—millions—I wouldn't marry any of 'em. I love
you," she firmly concluded.

"Then we'll just wait," said he, setting his teeth on the word, as if he
would crush it. "It won't be hard with you to help. You're better worth it
than Rachael and Leah together." They walked a few steps silently.

"But how about science?" she asked him.

"I don't let myself think of it. I'll take that up later. We're young enough,
both of us, to wait for our happiness."

"And have you any idea—we might as well face the worst—how many
years do you think that will be, dearest?"

He was a little annoyed at her persistence. Also, though he would not
admit the thought, it did not seem quite the thing for her to ask. A woman
should not seek too definite a period of waiting. She ought to trust—to just
wait on general principles.

"I can face a thing better if I know just what I'm facing," said the girl,
quietly, "and I'd wait for you, if I had to, all my life. Will it be twenty years,
do you think?"

He looked relieved. "Why, no, indeed, darling. It oughtn't to be at the
outside more than five. Or six," he added, honest though reluctant.

"You see, father had no time to settle anything; there were outstanding
accounts, and the funeral expenses, and the mortgages. But the business is
good; and I can carry it; I can build it up." He shook his broad shoulders
determinedly. "I should think it might be within five, perhaps even less.
Good things happen sometimes—such as you, my heart's delight."

They were at her gate now, and she stood a little while to say good-night.
A step inside there was a seat, walled in by evergreen, roofed over by the
wide acacia boughs. Many a long good-night had they exchanged there,
under the large, brilliant California moon. They sat there, silent, now.

Diantha's heart was full of love for him, and pride and confidence in him;
but it was full of other feelings, too, which he could not fathom. His trouble
was clearer to her than to him; as heavy to bear. To her mind, trained in all
the minutiae of domestic economy, the Warden family lived in careless
wastefulness. That five women—for Dora was older than she had been
when she began to do housework—should require servants, seemed to this
New England-born girl mere laziness and pride. That two voting women
over twenty should prefer being supported by their brother to supporting
themselves, she condemned even more sharply. Moreover, she felt well

assured that with a different family to "support," Mr. Warden would never
have broken down so suddenly and irrecoverably. Even that funeral—her
face hardened as she thought of the conspicuous "lot," the continual
flowers, the monument (not wholly paid for yet, that monument, though this
she did not know)—all that expenditure to do honor to the man they had
worked to death (thus brutally Diantha put it) was probably enough to put
off their happiness for a whole year.

She rose at last, her hand still held in his. "I'm sorry, but I've got to get
supper, dear," she said, "and you must go. Good-night for the present; you'll
be round by and by?"

"Yes, for a little while, after we close up," said he, and took himself off,
not too suddenly, walking straight and proud while her eves were on him,
throwing her a kiss from the corner; but his step lagging and his headache
settling down upon him again as he neared the large house with the cupola.

Diantha watched him out of sight, turned and marched up the path to her
own door, her lips set tight, her well-shaped head as straightly held as his.
"It's a shame, a cruel, burning shame!" she told herself rebelliously. "A man
of his ability. Why, he could do anything, in his own work! And he loved it
so!

"To keep a grocery store—

""And nothing to show for all that splendid effort!

"They don't do a thing? They just live—and 'keep house!' All those
women!

"Six years? Likely to be sixty! But I'm not going to wait!"

WHERE THE HEART IS

I.

A small stone city, very old, built upon rock, rock-paved, rock-bound with
twenty centuries of walls.

A Ghetto, an age-old Ghetto, crowded into a stony corner of the crowded
stony city; its steep and narrow confines not more a boundary than the iron
prejudices that built them.

In the Ghetto—life, human life; close-pressed, kept to its elemental
forms, with a vitality purchased at nature's awful price—by surviving slow
extinction.

This life, denied all larger grouping, finds its sole joy in fierce deep love
of family and home. This home a room, a low and narrow room,
unwholesome, dark, incredibly filled up, yet overflowing most with love.

Here was peace. Here was Honor wherewith to face the outer Scorn.
Here was Safety—the only safety known. Here, most of all was Love,
Love, wound and interwound with the blood-tie, deepened by religion,
intensified by centuries of relentless pressure, strengthened a thousandfold
by the unbroken cruelty of the environment. Love, one with the family; the
family one with the home; the home, for generation after generation—one
room!

*

A miracle! Some daughter of this house, strayed as a child, found by
eccentric travellers, taken to England, reared with love and care to strange

exotic beauty, marrying a great landowner so lost in passionate devotion
that he gave her all he had, and, dying, left her heir to vast estates.

She following, her family inherit the estate, and come to take possession.

They enter the tall pillared gates; they wander up the shaded avenue, a
little group, huddled and silent, timid, ill at ease. They mount the wide,
white marble-terraced steps, the children crowding close, the mother
frightened, the father striving to hold up this new strange pride under his
time-swollen burden of humility and fear.

These towering halls, these broad-curved stairways, these lofty chambers,
even the great kitchens and their clustering offices, are to this timid group
as wide and desolate as deserts or the sea.

They seek a room, a room that shall be small enough and low enough and
dark enough; they reach at last one friendly sheltering little room—crowd
into it with tumultuous affection, and find a home!

*

It is home where the heart is!

II.

A new age where new power has conquered a new element, and sky-sailors
seek for large discoveries compared to which the old "new world" was but a
dooryard venture. Our little world now known from coast to coast and pole
to pole; its problems solved, its full powers mastered; its sweet
serviceableness and unfailing comfort the common joy of all.

Later science, piling wonder upon wonder, handling radiant energy,
packing compressed air for long excursions into outer space, sends out
some skyship on tremendous errands of interstellar search. Days, weeks,
they flit, with speed incredible, our earth a speck, our moon invisible, our
sun a star among the others now; then having done their work, turn the
sharp prow and study their vast charts for the return.

Out of that blackness, wider than our minds, back from the awful
strangeness of new stars, they turn and fly. All know their charts, all have
their telescopes, all see that old familiar system swinging nearer. They greet
the sun as we Fire Island—the moon like Sandy Hook.

But that small star, bigger and bigger now, its heavenly radiance fading
softly down to the warm glow of earthly beauty, coming out round and full
at last—ah! how they choke, how they cry out to see it!

Nearer—the blue skin of the all-enclosing sea, the green of interrupting
continents; now they can recognize the hemisphere—the tears come—this
is home!

*

It is home where the heart is.

THANKSGIVING

I never thought much of the folks who pray
The Lord to make them thankful for a meal
Expecting Him to furnish all the food

And then provide them with the gratitude
They haven't grace to feel.

I never thought much of this yearly thanks,
Either for what once happened long ago,
Or for "our constant mercies." To my mind
If we're to thank a Power that's daily kind,
Our annual's too slow.

Suppose we spread Thanksgiving—hand it round—
Give God an honest heartful every day;
And, while we're being thankful, why not give
Some gratitude to those by whom we live—
As well as stingy pay?

OUR ANDROCENTRIC CULTURE, or THE MAN-MADE WORLD

I.

AS TO HUMANNESS.

Let us begin, inoffensively, with sheep. The sheep is a beast with which
we are all familiar, being much used in religious imagery; the common
stock of painters; a staple article of diet; one of our main sources of
clothing; and an everyday symbol of bashfulness and stupidity.

In some grazing regions the sheep is an object of terror, destroying grass,
bush and forest by omnipresent nibbling; on the great plains, sheep-keeping
frequently results in insanity, owing to the loneliness of the shepherd, and
the monotonous appearance and behavior of the sheep.

By the poet, young sheep are preferred, the lamb gambolling gaily;
unless it be in hymns, where "all we like sheep" are repeatedly described,
and much stress is laid upon the straying propensities of the animal.

To the scientific mind there is special interest in the sequacity of sheep,
their habit of following one another with automatic imitation. This instinct,
we are told, has been developed by ages of wild crowded racing on narrow
ledges, along precipices, chasms, around sudden spurs and corners, only the
leader seeing when, where and how to jump. If those behind jumped exactly
as he did, they lived. If they stopped to exercise independent judgment, they
were pushed off and perished; they and their judgment with them.

All these things, and many that are similar, occur to us when we think of
sheep. They are also ewes and rams. Yes, truly; but what of it? All that has
been said was said of sheep, genus ovis, that bland beast, compound of
mutton, wool, and foolishness. so widely known. If we think of the sheep-
dog (and dog-ess), the shepherd (and shepherd-ess), of the ferocious sheep-
eating bird of New Zealand, the Kea (and Kea-ess), all these herd, guard, or
kill the sheep, both rams and ewes alike. In regard to mutton, to wool, to
general character, we think only of their sheepishness, not at all of their
ramishness or eweishness. That which is ovine or bovine, canine, feline or
equine, is easily recognized as distinguishing that particular species of
animal, and has no relation whatever to the sex thereof.

Returning to our muttons, let us consider the ram, and wherein his
character differs from the sheep. We find he has a more quarrelsome
disposition. He paws the earth and makes a noise. He has a tendency to butt.
So has a goat—Mr. Goat. So has Mr. Buffalo, and Mr. Moose, and Mr.
Antelope. This tendency to plunge head foremost at an adversary—and to
find any other gentleman an adversary on sight—evidently does not pertain
to sheep, to genus ovis; but to any male creature with horns.

As "function comes before organ," we may even give a reminiscent
glance down the long path of evolution, and see how the mere act of butting
—passionately and perpetually repeated—born of the beliggerent spirit of
the male—produced horns!

The ewe, on the other hand, exhibits love and care for her little ones,
gives them milk and tries to guard them. But so does a goat—Mrs. Goat. So
does Mrs. Buffalo and the rest. Evidently this mother instinct is no
peculiarity of genus ovis, but of any female creature.

Even the bird, though not a mammal, shows the same mother-love and
mother-care, while the father bird, though not a butter, fights with beak and
wing and spur. His competition is more effective through display. The wish
to please, the need to please, the overmastering necessity upon him that he
secure the favor of the female, has made the male bird blossom like a
butterfly. He blazes in gorgeous plumage, rears haughty crests and combs,
shows drooping wattles and dangling blobs such as the turkey-cock affords;
long splendid feathers for pure ornament appear upon him; what in her is a
mere tail-effect becomes in him a mass of glittering drapery.

Partridge-cock, farmyard-cock, peacock, from sparrow to ostrich,
observe his mien! To strut and languish; to exhibit every beauteous lure; to
sacrifice ease, comfort, speed, everything—to beauty—for her sake—this is
the nature of the he-bird of any species; the characteristic, not of the turkey,
but of the cock! With drumming of loud wings, with crow and quack and
bursts of glorious song, he woos his mate; displays his splendors before her;
fights fiercely with his rivals. To butt—to strut—to make a noise—all for
love's sake; these acts are common to the male.

We may now generalize and clearly state: That is masculine which
belongs to the male—to any or all males, irrespective of species. That is
feminine which belongs to the female, to any or all females, irrespective of

species. That is ovine, bovine, feline, canine, equine or asinine which
belongs to that species, irrespective of sex.

In our own species all this is changed. We have been so taken up with the
phenomena of masculinity and femininity, that our common humanity has
largely escaped notice. We know we are human, naturally, and are very
proud of it; but we do not consider in what our humanness consists; nor
how men and women may fall short of it, or overstep its bounds, in
continual insistence upon their special differences. It is "manly" to do this;
it is "womanly" to do that; but what a human being should do under the
circumstances is not thought of.

The only time when we do recognize what we call "common humanity"
is in extreme cases, matters of life and death; when either man or woman is
expected to behave as if they were also human creatures. Since the range of
feeling and action proper to humanity, as such, is far wider than that proper
to either sex, it seems at first somewhat remarkable that we have given it so
little recognition.

A little classification will help us here. We have certain qualities in
common with inanimate matter, such as weight, opacity, resilience. It is
clear that these are not human. We have other qualities in common with all
forms of life; cellular construction, for instance, the reproduction of cells
and the need of nutrition. These again are not human. We have others, many
others, common to the higher mammals; which are not exclusively ours—
are not distinctively "human." What then are true human characteristics? In
what way is the human species distinguished from all other species?

Our human-ness is seen most clearly in three main lines: it is mechanical,
psychical and social. Our power to make and use things is essentially
human; we alone have extra-physical tools. We have added to our teeth the
knife, sword, scissors, mowing machine; to our claws the spade, harrow,

plough, drill, dredge. We are a protean creature, using the larger brain
power through a wide variety of changing weapons. This is one of our main
and vital distinctions. Ancient animal races are traced and known by mere
bones and shells, ancient human races by their buildings, tools and utensils.

That degree of development which gives us the human mind is a clear
distinction of race. The savage who can count a hundred is more human
than the savage who can count ten.

More prominent than either of these is the social nature of humanity. We
are by no means the only group-animal; that ancient type of industry the
ant, and even the well-worn bee, are social creatures. But insects of their
kind are found living alone. Human beings never. Our human-ness begins
with some low form of social relation and increases as that relation
develops.

Human life of any sort is dependent upon what Kropotkin calls "mutual
aid," and human progress keeps step absolutely with that interchange of
specialized services which makes society organic. The nomad, living on
cattle as ants live on theirs, is less human than the farmer, raising food by
intelligently applied labor; and the extension of trade and commerce, from
mere village market-places to the world-exchanges of to-day, is extension
of human-ness as well.

Humanity, thus considered, is not a thing made at once and
unchangeable, but a stage of development; and is still, as Wells describes it,
"in the making." Our human-ness is seen to lie not so much in what we are
individually, as in our relations to one another; and even that individuality is
but the result of our relations to one another. It is in what we do and how we
do it, rather than in what we are. Some, philosophically inclined, exalt
"being" over "doing." To them this question may be put: "Can you mention
any form of life that merely 'is,' without doing anything?"

Taken separately and physically, we are animals, genus homo; taken
socially and psychically, we are, in varying degree, human; and our real
history lies in the development of this human-ness.

Our historic period is not very long. Real written history only goes back a
few thousand years, beginning with the stone records of ancient Egypt.
During this period we have had almost universally what is here called an
Androcentric Culture. The history, such as it was, was made and written by
men.

The mental, the mechanical, the social development, was almost wholly
theirs. We have, so far, lived and suffered and died in a man-made world.
So general, so unbroken, has been this condition, that to mention it arouses
no more remark than the statement of a natural law. We have taken it for
granted, since the dawn of civilization, that "mankind" meant men-kind,
and the world was theirs.

Women we have sharply delimited. Women were a sex, "the sex,"
according to chivalrous toasts; they were set apart for special services
peculiar to femininity. As one English scientist put it, in 1888, "Women are
not only not the race—they are not even half the race, but a subspecies told
off for reproduction only."

This mental attitude toward women is even more clearly expressed by
Mr. H. B. Marriot-Watson in his article on "The American Woman" in the
"Nineteenth Century" for June, 1904, where he says: "Her constitutional
restlessness has caused her to abdicate those functions which alone excuse
or explain her existence." This is a peculiarly happy and condensed
expression of the relative position of women during our androcentric
culture. The man was accepted as the race type without one dissentient
voice; and the woman—a strange, diverse creature, quite disharmonious in

the accepted scheme of things—was excused and explained only as a
female.

She has needed volumes of such excuse and explanation; also,
apparently, volumes of abuse and condemnation. In any library catalogue
we may find books upon books about women: physiological, sentimental,
didactic, religious—all manner of books about women, as such. Even to-
day in the works of Marholm—poor young Weininger, Moebius, and others,
we find the same perpetual discussion of women—as such.

This is a book about men—as such. It differentiates between the human
nature and the sex nature. It will not go so far as to allege man's masculine
traits to be all that excuse, or explain his existence: but it will point out
what are masculine traits as distinct from human ones, and what has been
the effect on our human life of the unbridled dominance of one sex.

We can see at once, glaringly, what would have been the result of giving
all human affairs into female hands. Such an extraordinary and deplorable
situation would have "feminized" the world. We should have all become
"effeminate."

See how in our use of language the case is clearly shown. The adjectives
and derivatives based on woman's distinctions are alien and derogatory
when applied to human affairs; "effeminate"—too female, connotes
contempt, but has no masculine analogue; whereas "emasculate"—not
enough male, is a term of reproach, and has no feminine analogue.
"Virile"—manly, we oppose to "puerile"—childish, and the very word
"virtue" is derived from "vir"—a man.

Even in the naming of other animals we have taken the male as the race
type, and put on a special termination to indicate "his female," as in lion,
lioness; leopard, leopardess; while all our human scheme of things rests on

the same tacit assumption; man being held the human type; woman a sort of
accompaniment aud subordinate assistant, merely essential to the making of
people.

She has held always the place of a preposition in relation to man. She has
been considered above him or below him, before him, behind him, beside
him, a wholly relative existence—"Sydney's sister," "Pembroke's mother"—
but never by any chance Sydney or Pembroke herself.

Acting on this assumption, all human standards have been based on male
characteristics, and when we wish to praise the work of a woman, we say
she has "a masculine mind."

It is no easy matter to deny or reverse a universal assumption. The human
mind has had a good many jolts since it began to think, but after each
upheaval it settles down as peacefully as the vine-growers on Vesuvius,
accepting the last lava crust as permanent ground.

What we see immediately around us, what we are born into and grow up
with, be it mental furniture or physical, we assume to be the order of nature.

If a given idea has been held in the human mind for many generations, as
almost all our common ideas have, it takes sincere and continued effort to
remove it; and if it is one of the oldest we have in stock, one of the big,
common, unquestioned world ideas, vast is the labor of those who seek to
change it.

Nevertheless, if the matter is one of importance, if the previous idea was
a palpable error, of large and evil effect, and if the new one is true and
widely important, the effort is worth making.

The task here undertaken is of this sort. It seeks to show that what we
have all this time called "human nature" and deprecated, was in great part
only male nature, and good enough in its place; that what we have called
"masculine" and admired as such, was in large part human, and should be
applied to both sexes: that what we have called "feminine" and condemned,
was also largely human and applicable to both. Our androcentric culture is
so shown to have been, and still to be, a masculine culture in excess, and
therefore undesirable.

In the preliminary work of approaching these facts it will be well to
explain how it can be that so wide and serious an error should have been
made by practically all men. The reason is simply that they were men. They
were males, avid saw women as females—and not otherwise.

So absolute is this conviction that the man who reads will say, "Of
course! How else are we to look at women except as females? They are
females, aren't they?" Yes, they are, as men are males unquestionably; but
there is possible the frame of mind of the old marquise who was asked by
an English friend how she could bear to have the footman serve her
breakfast in bed—to have a man in her bed-chamber—and replied sincerely,
"Call you that thing there a man?"

The world is full of men, but their principal occupation is human work of
some sort; and women see in them the human distinction preponderantly.
Occasionally some unhappy lady marries her coachman—long
contemplation of broad shoulders having an effect, apparently; but in
general women see the human creature most; the male creature only when
they love.

To the man, the whole world was his world; his because he was male;
and the whole world of woman was the home; because she was female. She
had her prescribed sphere, strictly limited to her feminine occupations and

interests; he had all the rest of life; and not only so, but, having it, insisted
on calling it male.

This accounts for the general attitude of men toward the now rapid
humanization of women. From her first faint struggles toward freedom and
justice, to her present valiant efforts toward full economic and political
equality, each step has been termed "unfeminine" and resented as an
intrusion upon man's place and power. Here shows the need of our new
classification, of the three distinct fields of life—masculine, feminine and
human.

As a matter of fact, there is a "woman's sphere," sharply defined and
quite different from his; there is also a "man's sphere," as sharply defined
and even more limited; but there remains a common sphere—that of
humanity, which belongs to both alike.

In the earlier part of what is known as "the woman's movement," it was
sharply opposed on the ground that women would become "unsexed." Let
us note in passing that they have become unsexed in one particular, most
glaringly so, and that no one has noticed or objected to it.

As part of our androcentric culture we may point to the peculiar reversal
of sex characteristics which make the human female carry the burden of
ornament. She alone, of all human creatures, has adopted the essentially
masculine attribute of special sex-decoration; she does not fight for her
mate as yet, but she blooms forth as the peacock and bird of paradise, in
poignant reversal of nature's laws, even wearing masculine feathers to
further her feminine ends.

Woman's natural work as a female is that of the mother; man's natural
work as a male is that of the father; their mutual relation to this end being a
source of joy and well-being when rightly held: but human work covers all

our life outside of these specialties. Every handicraft, every profession,
every science, every art, all normal amusements and recreations, all
government, education, religion; the whole living world of human
achievement: all this is human.

That one sex should have monopolized all human activities, called them
"man's work," and managed them as such, is what is meant by the phrase
"Androcentric Culture."

COMMENT AND REVIEW

Why criticize?

Why does anybody criticize anything? And why does THE
FORERUNNER criticize—the things herein treated?

On examination, we find several sources of criticism. The earliest and
commonest is the mere expression of personal opinion, as is heard where
young persons are becoming acquainted, the voluble "I like this!" and
"Don't you like that?" and "Isn't such a thing horrid?" For hours do the
impressionable young exchange their ardent sentiments; and the same may
be heard from older persons in everyday discussion.

This form of criticism has its value. It serves to show, even relentlessly to
expose, the qualities and deficiencies of the critic. What one "likes" merely
shows what one is like.

The vitality dies out of it, however, when one learns two things; first, that
likings change with growth of character and new experience, and, second,
that few people are interested in an inventory of limitations.

Following this comes another painfully common source of criticism—the
desire to exhibit superiority. The aged are prone to this fault in discussion of
the young and their achievements. The elect in general show it, seeking to
prove to common people that these are not as they are; the conservative
rests his objection to anything new and different on the same broad base;
and the critic, the real, professional critic, can hardly trust himself to
approve warmly of anything, lest it weaken his reputation. If he does, it
must be something which is caviar to the general.

Then comes that amiable desire to instruct and assist, born of parental
instinct, fostered by pedagogy, intrusted by St. Paul to the "husband at
home." Moved by this feeling, we point out the errors of our friends and
mark examination papers; and thus does the teacher of painting move
among his pupils and leave them in ranks of glimmering hope or dark
despair.

Another fruitful source of criticism is a natural wish to free one's mind;
as the hapless public sputters on the street, or in letters to the papers,
protesting against the stupidity and cruelty of its many aggressors. Under
this impulse bursts forth the chattering flood of discussion after play or
lecture, merely to relieve the pressure.

Then comes a very evil cause—the desire to give pain, to injure. Certain
persons, and publications, use their critical ability with great effect to this
end. In England it seems to be a sort of game, great literary personages rush
out into the open and belabor each other mercilessly; while the public
rejoices as at a prize-fight. We sometimes see a newspaper offering its
readers a form of entertainment which is not even a fight, nor yet a prompt
and needed execution, but a sort of torture-chamber exhibition, where the
dumb victim is vilified and ridiculed, grilled and "roasted," to make an
American holiday.

There is one more cause of criticism—the need of money. Some people
are hired to criticize others, the nature of their attentions wholly dictated by
the employer. A shadowy bridge is opened here, connecting criticism with
advertisement. Many cross it.

*

For any criticism to have value it must rest clearly and honestly upon a
definite point of view.

"The Toad beneath the harrow knows
Exactly where each tooth point goes.
The Butterfly upon the road
Preaches contentment to that Toad."

If one elects, for instance, to criticize an illustration in particular—or a
particular illustration—or the present status of popular illustration in
general—the position of the critic must be frankly chosen and firmly held.
If it is that of the technician, either the original artist or the reproducer or
even the publisher, then a given picture in a magazine may be discussed
merely as a picture, as a half-tone, or as a page effect, intelligently and
competently. If the purely aesthetic viewpoint is chosen, all the above
considerations may be waived and the given picture judged as frankly ugly,
or as beautiful, quite apart from its technique. If, again, the base of
judgment is that of the reader, in whose eyes an illustration should illustrate
—i.e., give light, make clear the meaning of the text—then we look at a
given picture to see if it carries out the ideas expressed in the tale or article,
and value it by that.

On this base also stands the author, only one person, to be sure, as
compared with the multitude of readers, but not a dog, for all that. The
author, foaming at the mouth, remote and helpless, here makes common
ground with the reader and expects an illustration to illustrate. Perhaps, we
should say, "the intelligent reader"—leaving out such as the young lady in
the tale, who said they might read her anything, "if it was illustrated by
Christie."*

[*—This does not by any means deny intelligence to all appreciators of
Mr. Christie's work, but merely to such as select literature for the pictures
attached.]

THE FORERUNNER believes that it may voice the feelings of many
writers and more readers; almost all readers, in fact, if it here and now
records a protest against an all too frequent illustrative sin: where the
gentleman, or lady, who is engaged and paid to illustrate a story, prefers to
insert pictures of varying attractiveness which bear no relation to the text.
This is not illustration. It is not even honest business. It does not deliver the
goods paid for. It takes advantage of author, publisher and public, and foists
upon them all an art exhibition which was not ordered.

To select a recent popular, easily obtainable, instance of vice and virtue
in illustration, let us take up the "American Magazine" for August.
Excellent work among the advertisements—there the artist is compelled to
"follow copy"; his employer will take no nonsense. That's one reason why
people like to look at them—the pictures are intelligible. Admirable pictures
by Worth Brehm to Stewart White's story—perfect. You see the people, Mr.
White's people, see them on the page as you saw them in your mind, and
better. Good drawing, and personal character—those special people and
not others. The insight and appreciation shown in the frontispiece alone
makes as fine an instance of what illustration ought to be as need be given.

Those light sketches to the airy G. G. Letters are good, too—anything
more definite would not belong to that couple.

But Mr. Cyrus Cuneo shows small grasp of what Mr. Locke was writing
about in his "Moonlight Effect." The tailpiece, by somebody else, is the best
picture of the lot.

Mr. Leone Brackner does better in Jack London's story, though falling far
short of the extreme loathsomeness Mr. London heaps so thickly. J. Scott
Williams follows "Margherita's Soul" with a running accompaniment and
variations, in pleasant accord with the spirit of that compelling tale. He
gives more than the scene represented, gives it differently, and yet gives it.

Mr. McCutcheon and George Fitch are also harmonious in clever fooling
of pen and pencil, and Thomas Fogarty, though by no means convincing,
goes well enough with Mr. O'Higgins' story, which is not convincing, either.
The hat and dress pictures are photographs, and do artificial justice to their
artificial subjects in Mrs. Woodrow's arraignment of the Fantastic Feminine.

But—. Go to your library after, or send your ten cents for, or look up on
your own shelves, that August number, and turn to Lincoln Colcord's story
of "Anjer," to see what an illustrator dare do. Here's a story, the merits of
which need not be discussed, but in which great stress is laid on a certain
Malay Princess, the free nobility of whose savage love healed the sick heart
of an exhausted man. "I saw how beautiful she was," says the narrator: "her
breast was bare in a long slit, and shadowed like the face of the pool." "The
most glorious native woman of the East I've ever seen." "She walked like a
tiger, with a crouching step of absolute grace." "Her eyes called as if they'd
spoken words of love: the beauty of her face was beyond speech—almost
beyond thought." Thus Mr. Colcord.

And how Mr. Townshend? It is on Page 334, Mr. Townshend's
"illustration." ("Whit way do we ca' it the Zoo?" "If it wasna' ca'd the Zoo,
what would we ca' it?") A bit of railing and a pillar is the only concession to
the scene described; that and the fact that there is a man and a woman there.
One more detail is granted—a forehead ornament, as alleged. For the rest?

Since the picture is so unjust to the words of the author, can the words of
the critic do any justice to the picture? The man will do, as well one man as
another, apparently. The big blob of an object that seems to have been
suggested by a Gargantuan ginger jar, and to be put in for tropical effect, as
also a set of wooden bananas, may be forgiven.

But the Princess—the tigress—the free, graceful, passionate woman—the
beauty beyond speech. Look at it.

A crooked, crouching, awkward negroid type, a dress of absurd volume
and impossible outlines, the upper part a swathed bath towel, one stiff, ugly
arm hung helpless, one lifted and ending in a hoof, a plain pig's hoof; the
head bent, chin sunk on chest like a hunchback's; and the face—! One could
forgive the gross, unusual ugliness; but why no hint of interest in her lover?
Why this expression as of a third generation London pauper in a hospital?
What explanation is there of this meagre, morbid, deformed female in the
midst of that story?

Frank incapacity on the part of an artist is possible. To try and try and try
again and utterly fail is possible. To write to the author and say, "I cannot
visualize your character, or express it, and must decline to undertake the
order," or to the editor and refuse the job, is possible. But to take the order,
to read the story (if he did read it), to send in and accept pay for a picture
like that—"Whit way would ye ca' it?"

PERSONAL PROBLEMS

A passionate interest is shown by many persons in consulting anonymous
advisers through the columns of various publications. Their inquiries are
mainly as to small matters of etiquette, and the care of the complexion.

In one of the current women's papers we find such questions as these:
"When one is introduced, how does one acknowledge the introduction?
Must it be by a mention of the weather? How should one receive a small
gift?" (x) All these by one breathless inquirer.

Another asks pathetically: "Will you tell me how soon after a husband's
death it is permitted to a widow to return formal calls? What is the present
form of visiting cards for a widow?" (y)

Another rudderless ship, in a somewhat less recent issue of a very
popular woman's paper, writes: "I am wearing mourning. In the hot weather
I find the veil very heavy and close, and wish to throw it back. What shall I
do?" (z)

These are apparently bona fide questions, but in most cases they are
answered in a style too palpably oracular. If the questioners are genuine and
want help they get precious little. If it is merely a game, it seems rather a
flat one. But the popularity of the pastime continues.

The Forerunner will give no answers to foolish questions; unless at peril
of the asker. But to sincere inquirers, who are interested in some moot point
of conduct, some balance of conflicting duties, honest attention will be
given, and their questions answered as sincerely.

The intention is to promote discussion of the real problems of life, and to
apply to them the new standards afforded by the larger knowledge and

deeper religious sense of to-day.

If any of the above questions were sent to this office they would be thus
dismissed:

(x) Read "How To Do It," by E. E. Hale. Learn to be sincere; have real
feelings and express them honestly.

(y) If you are truly prostrated by grief you cannot return calls. If you are
able—and like to do it—what are you afraid of? Whose "permission" are
you asking? See answer to x.

(z) Mourning is a relic of barbarism, kept up by women because of their
retarded social development. But if you must wear a heavy veil and wish to
throw it back—why don't you?

These persons would be displeased and not write again. Truly. Such
questions are not wanted by The Forerunner. They would discontinue their
subscription. Doubtless. But this is a waste of anxiety, for such would never
have subscribed for The Forerunner in the first place.

Suppose, however, that a question like this is sent in:

"I am a girl of twenty. My mother is an invalid. My father is in business
difficulties. They want me to marry an old friend of father's—a good man,
but forty years older then I am. Is it my duty to marry him—for their sake?"
(B)

Answer. (B) Marriage is not an institution for the support of parents, or
the settling of business difficulties. If you loved that old man you would not
be asking advice. To marry a man you do not love is immoral. Marriage is
to serve the best interests of children and to give happiness to the

contracting parties. If your parents need your financial aid go to work and
give them your earnings, but do not make a business of matrimony.

Or again: Query. "My mother is a widow living on a moderate income.
She has two married children, but does not like to live with them. I am a
college graduate and wish to work at a profession. She says it is not
necessary for me to work, and wants me to live with her—says she needs
me, claims my filial duty. Is this right?" (F)

Answer. (F) No, it is dead wrong. Parental duty is a natural obligation—
not a loan. Filial duty is the same from son and daughter. You owe your
mother care and service if needed, just as your brother would. She has no
more right to prevent your going to work than if you were a son. By all
means live with her if you both like it, but live your own life. You have a
duty of citizenship as well as of daughtership.

Or again: Query. "My wife is spending more of my income on dress than
I can afford. How can I stop her?" (G)

There is not room to answer this in this issue.

THANKSONG

Thankful are we for life
And the joy of living.
Baby-pleasure of taking;
Mother-glory of giving.

Thankful are we for light
And the joy of seeing.

Stir of emotion strong,
And the peace of being.

Thankful are we for power,
And the pride ensuing;
Baby-pleasure of having,
Father-glory of doing.

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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 fantasy, 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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C A L E N D U LA

CHILDREN CEASE TO CRY FOR IT.

This is a gratuitous advertisement, benefitting

a) The Child; whose pain stops;

b) The Mother; who doesn't have to hear him cry;

c) The Nearest Druggist—a little.

CALENDULA is a good standard old drug—made of marigolds—in the
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C A L E N D U L A TAKES THE PAIN FROM A R A W W O U N D

THE FORERUNNER
A MONTHLY MAGAZINE

BY

CHARLOTTE PERKINS GILMAN OWNER AND PUBLISHER

1.00 A YEAR .10 A COPY

Volume 1. No. 2 DECEMBER, 1909 The Charlton Company, 67 Wall Street, New York
Copyright for 1909, C. P. Gilman

LOVE

Not the child-god of our most childish past,
Nor sympathy, nor worship, passionless;
Nor gratitude, nor tenderest caress:
Nor the post-mortal glamor priests have cast
With "This to hope! Surrender what thou hast!"
These are but parts and can but partly bless;
We in our new-born common consciousness
Are learning Law and Life and Love at last.

The age-old secret of the sphinx's holding,
Incarnate triumph, infinitely strong;
The mother's majesty, grown wide and long,
In the full power and fire of life's unfolding;
The conscious splendor and ripe joy thereof—
Glad world-wide, life-long service—this is Love!

ACCORDING TO SOLOMON

"'He that rebuketh a man afterwards shall find more favor than he that
flattereth with his tongue,'" said Mr. Solomon Bankside to his wife Mary.

"Its the other way with a woman, I think;" she answered him, "you might
put that in."

"Tut, tut, Molly," said he; "'Add not unto his words,'—do not speak
lightly of the wisdom of the great king."

"I don't mean to, dear, but—when you hear it all the time"—

"'He that turneth away his ear from the law, even his prayer shall be an
abomination,'" answered Mr. Bankside.

"I believe you know every one of those old Proverbs by heart," said his
wife with some heat. "Now that's not disrespectful!—they are old!—and I
do wish you'd forget some of them!"

He smiled at her quizzically, tossing back his heavy silver-gray hair with
the gesture she had always loved. His eyes were deep blue and bright under
their bushy brows; and the mouth was kind—in its iron way. "I can think of
at least three to squelch you with, Molly," said he, "but I won't."

"O I know the one you want! 'A continual dropping in a very rainy day
and a contentions woman are alike!' I'm not contentious, Solomon!"

"No, you are not," he frankly admitted. "What I really had in mind was
this—'A prudent wife is from the Lord,' and 'He that findeth a wife findeth a
good thing; and obtaineth favor of the Lord.'"

She ran around the table in the impulsive way years did not alter, and
kissed him warmly.

"I'm not scolding you, my dear," he continued: "but if you had all the
money you'd like to give away—there wouldn't be much left!"

"But look at what you spend on me!" she urged.

"That's a wise investment—as well as a deserved reward," her husband
answered calmly. "'There is that scattereth and yet increaseth,' you know,
my dear; 'And there is that withholdeth more than is meet—and it tendeth to
poverty!' Take all you get my dear—its none too good for you."

He gave her his goodby kiss with special fondness, put on his heavy
satin-lined overcoat and went to the office.

Mr. Solomon Bankside was not a Jew; though his last name suggested
and his first seemed to prove it; also his proficiency in the Old Testament
gave color to the idea. No, he came from Vermont; of generations of
unbroken New England and old English Puritan ancestry, where the
Solomons and Isaacs and Zedekiahs were only mitigated by the Standfasts
and Praise-the-Lords. Pious, persistent pigheaded folk were they, down all
the line.

His wife had no such simple pedigree. A streak of Huguenot blood she
had (some of the best in France, though neither of them knew that), a
grandmother from Albany with a Van to her name; a great grandmother with
a Mac; and another with an O'; even a German cross came in somewhere.
Mr. Bankside was devoted to genealogy, and had been at some pains to dig
up these facts—the more he found the worse he felt, and the lower ran his
opinion of Mrs. Bankside's ancestry.

She had been a fascinating girl; pretty, with the dash and piquancy of an
oriole in a May apple-tree; clever and efficient in everything her swift hands
touched; quite a spectacular housekeeper; and the sober, long-faced young
downeasterner had married her with a sudden decision that he often
wondered about in later years. So did she.

What he had not sufficiently weighed at the time, was her spirit of
incorrigible independence, and a light-mindedness which, on maturer
judgment, he could almost term irreligious. His conduct was based on
principle, all of it; built firmly into habit and buttressed by scriptural
quotations. Hers seemed to him as inconsequent as the flight of a moth.
Studying it, in his solemn conscientious way, in the light of his genealogical
researches, he felt that all her uncertainties were accounted for, and that the
error was his—in having married too many kinds of people at once.

They had been, and were, very happy together none the less: though
sometimes their happiness was a little tottery. This was one of the times. It
was the day after Christmas, and Mrs. Bankside entered the big drawing
room, redolent of popcorn and evergreen, and walked slowly to the corner
where the fruits of yesterday were lovingly arranged; so few that she had
been able to give—so many that she had received.

There were the numerous pretty interchangeable things given her by her
many friends; "presents," suitable to any lady. There were the few perfectly
selected ones given by the few who knew her best. There was the rather
perplexing gift of Mrs. MacAvelly. There was her brother's stiff white
envelope enclosing a check. There were the loving gifts of children and
grand-children.

Finally there was Solomon's.

It was his custom to bestow upon her one solemn and expensive object, a
boon as it were, carefully selected, after much thought and balancing of
merits; but the consideration was spent on the nature of the gift—-not on
the desires of the recipient. There was the piano she could not play, the
statue she did not admire, the set of Dante she never read, the heavy gold
bracelet, the stiff diamond brooch—and all the others. This time it was a set
of sables, costing even more than she imagined.

Christmas after Christmas had these things come to her; and she stood
there now, thinking of that procession of unvalued valuables, with an
expression so mixed and changeful it resembled a kaleidoscope. Love for
Solomon, pride in Solomon, respect for Solomon's judgment and power to
pay, gratitude for his unfailing kindness and generosity, impatience with his
always giving her this one big valuable permanent thing, when he knew so
well that she much preferred small renewable cheap ones; her personal
dislike of furs, the painful conviction that brown was not becoming to her—
all these and more filled the little woman with what used to be called
"conflicting emotions."

She smoothed out her brother's check, wishing as she always did that it
had come before Christmas, so that she might buy more presents for her
beloved people. Solomon liked to spend money on her—in his own way;
but he did not like to have her spend money on him—or on anyone for that
matter. She had asked her brother once, if he would mind sending her his
Christmas present beforehand.

"Not on your life, Polly!" he said. "You'd never see a cent of it! You can't
buy 'em many things right on top of Christmas, and it'll be gone long before
the next one."

She put the check away and turned to examine her queerest gift. Upon
which scrutiny presently entered the donor.

"I'm ever so much obliged, Benigna," said Mrs. Bankside. "You know
how I love to do things. It's a loom, isn't it? Can you show me how it
works?"

"Of course I can, my dear; that's just what I ran in for—I was afraid you
wouldn't know. But you are so clever with your hands that I'm sure you'll
enjoy it. I do."

Whereat Mrs. MacAvelly taught Mrs. Bankside the time-honored art of
weaving. And Mrs. Bankside enjoyed it more than any previous handicraft
she had essayed.

She did it well, beginning with rather coarse and simple weaves; and
gradually learning the finer grades of work. Despising as she did the more
modern woolens, she bought real wool yarn of a lovely red—and made
some light warm flannelly stuff in which she proceeded to rapturously
enclose her little grandchildren.

Mr. Bankside warmly approved, murmuring affectionately, "'She seeketh
wool and flax—she worketh willingly with her hands.'"

He watched little Bob and Polly strenuously "helping" the furnace man to
clear the sidewalk, hopping about like red-birds in their new caps and coats;
and his face beamed with the appositeness of his quotation, as he remarked,
"She is not afraid of the snow for her household, for all her household are
clothed with scarlet!" and he proffered an extra, wholly spontaneous kiss,
which pleased her mightily.

"You dear man!" she said with a hug; "I believe you'd rather find a
proverb to fit than a gold mine!"

To which he triumphantly responded: "'Wisdom is better than rubies; and
all the things that may be desired are not to be compared to it.'"

She laughed sweetly at him. "And do you think wisdom stopped with that
string of proverbs?"

"You can't get much beyond it," he answered calmly. "If we lived up to
all there is in that list we shouldn't be far out, my dear!"

Whereat she laughed again smoothed his gray mane, and kissed him in
the back of his neck. "You dear thing!" said Mrs. Bankside.

She kept herself busy with the new plaything as he called it. Hands that
had been rather empty were now smoothly full. Her health was better, and
any hint of occasional querulousness disappeared entirely; so that her
husband was moved to fresh admiration of her sunny temper, and quoted
for the hundredth time, "'She openeth her mouth with wisdom, and in her
tongue is the law of kindness.'"

Mrs. MacAvelly taught her to make towels. But Mrs. Bankside's skill
outstripped hers; she showed inventive genius and designed patterns of her
own. The fineness and quality of the work increased; and she joyfully
replenished her linen chest with her own handiwork.

"I tell you, my dear," said Mrs. MacAvelly, "if you'd be willing to sell
them you could get almost any price for those towels. With the initials
woven in. I know I could get you orders—through the Woman's Exchange,
you know!"

Mrs. Bankside was delighted. "What fun!" she said. "And I needn't
appear at all?"

"No, you needn't appear at all—do let me try."

So Mrs. Bankside made towels of price, soft, fine, and splendid, till she
was weary of them; and in the opulence of constructive genius fell to
devising woven belts of elaborate design.

These were admired excessively. All her women friends wanted one, or
more; the Exchange got hold of it, there was a distinct demand; and finally

Mrs. MacAvelly came in one day with a very important air and a special
order.

"I don't know what you'll think, my dear," she said, "but I happen to
know the Percy's very well—the big store people, you know; and Mr. Percy
was talking about those belts of yours to me;—of course he didn't know
they are yours; but he said (the Exchange people told him I knew, you see)
he said, 'If you can place an order with that woman, I can take all she'll
make and pay her full price for them. Is she poor?' he asked. 'Is she
dependent on her work?' And I told him, 'Not altogether.' And I think he
thinks it an interesting case! Anyhow, there's the order. Will you do it?'

Mrs. Bankside was much excited. She wanted to very much, but dreaded
offending her husband. So far she had not told him of her quiet trade in
towels; but hid and saved this precious money—the first she had ever
earned.

The two friends discussed the pros and cons at considerable length; and
finally with some perturbation, she decided to accept the order.

"You'll never tell, Benigna!" she urged. "Solomon would never forgive
me, I'm afraid."

"Why of course I won't—you needn't have a moment's fear of it. You
give them to me—I'll stop with the carriage you see; and I take them to the
Exchange—and he gets them from there."

"It seems like smuggling!" said Mrs. Bankside delightedly. "I always did
love to smuggle!"

"They say women have no conscience about laws, don't they?" Mrs.
MacAvelly suggested.

"Why should we?" answered her friend. "We don't make 'em—nor God—
nor nature. Why on earth should we respect a set of silly rules made by
some men one day and changed by some more the next?"

"Bless us, Polly! Do you talk to Mr. Bankside like that?"

"Indeed I don't!" answered her hostess, holding out a particularly
beautiful star-patterned belt to show to advantage. "There are lots of things I
don't say to Mr. Bankside—'A man of understanding holdeth his peace' you
know—or a woman."

She was a pretty creature, her hair like that of a powdered marchioness,
her rosy checks and firm slight figure suggesting a charmer in Dresden
china.

Mrs. MacAvelly regarded her admiringly. "'Where there is no wood the
fire goeth out; so where there is no tale bearer the strife ceaseth,'" she
proudly offered, "I can quote that much myself."

But Mrs. Bankside had many misgivings as she pursued her audacious
way; the busy hours flying away from her, and the always astonishing
checks flying toward her in gratifying accumulation. She came down to her
well-planned dinners gracious and sweet; always effectively dressed; spent
the cosy quiet evenings with her husband, or went out with him, with a
manner of such increased tenderness and charm that his heart warmed anew
to the wife of his youth; and he even relented a little toward her
miscellaneous ancestors.

As the days shortened and darkened she sparkled more and more; with
little snatches of song now and then; gay ineffectual strumming on the big
piano; sudden affectionate darts at him, with quaintly distributed caresses.

"Molly!" said he, "I don't believe you're a day over twenty! What makes
you act so?"

"Don't you like it, So?" she asked him. That was the nearest she ever
would approximate to his name.

He did like it, naturally, and even gave her an extra ten dollars to buy
Christmas presents with; while he meditated giving her an electric
runabout;—to her!—who was afraid of a wheelbarrow!

When the day arrived and the family were gathered together, Mrs.
Bankside, wearing the diamond brooch, the gold bracelet, the point lace
handkerchief—everything she could carry of his accumulated generosity—
and such an air of triumphant mystery that the tree itself was dim beside
her; handed out to her astonished relatives such an assortment of desirable
articles that they found no words to express their gratitude.

"Why, Mother!" said Jessie, whose husband was a minister and salaried
as such, "Why, Mother—how did you know we wanted just that kind of a
rug!—and a sewing-machine too! And this lovely suit—and—and—why
Mother!"

But her son-in-law took her aside and kissed her solemnly. He had
wanted that particular set of sociological books for years—and never hoped
to get them; or that bunch of magazines either.

Nellie had "married rich;" she was less ostentatiously favored; but she
had shown her thankfulness a week ago—when her mother had handed her
a check.

"Sh, sh! my dear!" her mother had said, "Not one word. I know! What
pleasant weather we're having."

This son-in-law was agreeably surprised, too; and the other relatives,
married and single; while the children rioted among their tools and toys,
taking this Christmas like any other, as a season of unmitigated joy.

Mr. Solomon Bankside looked on with growing amazement, making
computations in his practiced mind; saying nothing whatever. Should he
criticize his wife before others?

But when his turn came—when gifts upon gifts were offered to him—
sets of silken handkerchiefs (he couldn't bear the touch of a silk
handkerchief!), a cabinet of cards and chips and counters of all sorts (he
never played cards), an inlaid chess-table and ivory men (the game was
unknown to him), a gorgeous scarf-pin (he abominated jewelery), a five
pound box of candy (he never ate it), his feelings so mounted within him,
that since he would not express, and could not repress them, he summarily
went up stairs to his room.

She found him there later, coming in blushing, smiling, crying a little too
—like a naughty but charming child.

He swallowed hard as he looked at her; and his voice was a little strained.

"I can take a joke as well as any man, Molly. I guess we're square on that.
But—my dear!—where did you get it?"

"Earned it," said she, looking down, and fingering her lace handkerchief.

"Earned it! My wife, earning money! How—if I may ask?"

"By my weaving, dear—the towels and the belts—I sold 'em. Don't be
angry—nobody knows—my name didn't appear at all! Please don't be
angry!—It isn't wicked, and it was such fun!"

"No—it's not wicked, I suppose," said he rather grimly. "But it is
certainly a most mortifying and painful thing to me—most unprecedented."

"Not so unprecedented, Dear," she urged, "Even the woman you think
most of did it! Don't you remember 'She maketh fine linen and selleth it—
and delivereth girdles unto the merchants!'"

Mr. Bankside came down handsomely.

He got used to it after a while, and then he became proud of it. If a friend
ventured to suggest a criticism, or to sympathize, he would calmly respond,
"'The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her, so that he shall have no
need of spoil. Give her of the fruit of her hands, and let her own works
praise her in the gates.'"

AN OBVIOUS BLESSING

We are told, on the authority of the Greatest Sociologist, that it is more
blessed to give than to receive.

So patent and commonplace a fact as this ought to meet with general
acceptance. Anyone can see that it is so, by a little study or by less practice.
To give implies having. You must be in possession before you can give. To
receive implies wanting, at its best—to receive what you do not want is
distinctly unpleasant. To have is more blessed than to want. Of course it is.

To give gratifies several natural feelings; the mother-instinct of supplying
needs, the pride of superior power and the generosity; and, if you are a
sordid soul, the desire to "lay up treasure in heaven" or, as the Buddhists
frankly put it—to "acquire merit."

None of these pleasures pertain to receiving. There is a certain
humiliation about it always, a childish sense of dependence and inferiority.
Only children can continuously receive without degradation; and as soon as
they begin to realize life at all they delight to give as we all do. "Let me
help!" says the child, and plans birthday presents for mama as eagerly as he
hopes for them himself.

The instinct of giving is the pressure of the surplus; the natural outgo of
humanity, its fruit. We are not mere receptacles, we are productive engines,
of immense capacity; and, having produced, we must distribute the product.
To give, naturally, is to shed, to bear fruit; a healthy and pleasurable
process.

What has confused us so long on this subject? Why have we been so
blind to this glaring truth that we have stultified our giving instinct and
made of it an abnormal process called "Charity," or a much restricted
pleasure only used in families or at Christmas time?

Two things have combined to prevent our easy acceptance of this visible
truth; one the time-honored custom of "sacrifice," and the other our
ignorance of social economics.

Sacrificing is not giving. That black remnant of lowest savagery dates
back to the time when a pursuing beast was placated by the surrender of
something, or somebody; and a conqueror bought off by tribute. The
medicine man made play with this race habit, and gross idols were soothed
and placated by sacrifices—on which the medicine man lived. Always the
best and finest were taken naturally by the hungry beast; as naturally by the
greedy conqueror; and not unnaturally by the dependent priesthood.
Sacrificing is a forced surrender with personal hope as the reason. It is not
giving.

Our economic ignorance and confusion is partly based on this same old
period of cruelty and darkness. Labor was extorted as the price of life; and
the fruits of labor taken by force through warring centuries. A guarded and
grudging system of exchange gradually developed; the robbing instinct
slowly simmering down to legally limited extortion; but each party
surrendering his goods reluctantly, and only with the purpose of gaining
more than he lost. Here also is the basic spirit of sacrifice—to get
something now or in the far future—always the trading spirit at the bottom.
Selling is not giving.

The real basis of giving is motherhood; and that is merely the orderly
expression of life's progressive force. Living forms must increase—spread
—grow—improve. The biological channel for this force is through mother-
love; and, later, father-love. The sociological channel is in the pouring flood
of productive activity, which fills the world with human fruit—the million
things we make and do.

This ceaseless output is not dragged out of us as a sacrifice, it is not
produced by want and hunger and the grasping spirit of exchange. It is the
natural expression of social energy; blossoming in every form of art, stirring
the brain to ceaseless action, filling the world with the rich fruit of human
handiwork.

Having produced, we must distribute—we must discharge, we must give.

To be human is to be a producer, to make, to do, to have some output
either in goods or services whereby the sum of welfare is increased. To have
this productive energy and to use it normally, is to give. Not to have it, not
to use it, is not to be human—to be a minus quantity; to live parasitically on
the labor of others—to receive.

It is more blessed to give than to receive.

STEPS

I was a slave, because I could not see
That work for one another is our law;
I hated law. I work? I would be free!
Therefore the heavy law laid hands on me
And I was forced to work in slavery—
Until I saw.

I was a hireling, for I could not see
That work was natural as the breath I drew,
Natural? I would not work without the fee!
So nature laid her heavy hands on me
And I was forced by fear of poverty—
Until I knew.

Now I am free. Life is new-seen, recast
To work is to enjoy, to love, to live!
The shame and pain of slavery are past,
Dishonor and extortion follow fast,
I am not owned, nor hired, full-born at last,
My power I give.

WHY WE HONESTLY FEAR SOCIALISM

A peaceable elderly Englishman of a bald and scholarly aspect, inquired,
following a lecture on Socialism, "Will the speaker state in one sentence
what Socialism is?" He wore an air of mild gentlemanly triumph;
apparently imagining that he had demanded the impossible.

But the speaker, seeming unconscious of any difficulty replied,
"Certainly; Socialism is the public ownership of all natural monopolies and
the means of production."

This simple definition is advanced to start with, that we may know what
we are talking about. This is the essence of Socialism—public ownership of
public things; the real point at issue being "What things are public?"

The vast majority of us do not yet understand this easy and clear
definition; and no wonder; for the Socialists themselves are for the most
part so lost in grief over the sufferings of the poor and in rage over the
misbehavior of the rich, that they find it hard to speak gently. Most of us,
having but vague ideas of Socialism, fear it on several grounds, some of
them easily removable as mere mistakes; others requiring careful treatment.

The mistakes are these:

ERROR I. "Socialism will abolish private property."

ANSWER. Quite wrong. It will do no such thing. You are thinking of
Communism. The early Communists, like the early Christians, held all
things in common, but Socialism urges no such doctrine. It does, however,
restrict our definition of what is private property; just as was done when
human slavery was abolished.

Slavery was once universal, and still exists In many countries. It was held
legal and honest to personally own human beings—they were property. In
our great civil contest of half a century since, the north—from a southern
point of view—confiscated property when the slaves were freed. But from
the northern point of view the slave was not property at all. This is a very
vivid instance of change of opinion on property rights. Such "rights" are
wholly of our own making; and change from age to age.

Parents once held property rights in children and men "owned" their
wives; they could be punished, imprisoned, sold—even killed, at will of the
owner. The larger public sense has long since said, "Women and children
are not private property."

Laws about property are not God's laws; not Nature's laws; they are just
rules and regulations people make from time to time according to their
standards of justice. There is nothing novel in proposing to change them—
they have often been changed. There is nothing immoral or dangerous in
changing them; it is constantly done in all legislatures, in varying degree, as
when private estates are "condemned" for public use.

Socialism advances the idea that private property rights do not
legitimately apply to public necessities like coal, water, oil and land. As a
matter of fact we do not really "own" land now—we only rent it of the
government, calling our rent "taxes." If we do not pay our rent the
government gets it again, like any other owner.

The utmost restriction of private property under Socialism leaves us still
every article of personal use and pleasure. One may still "own" land by
paying the government for it as now; with such taxation, however, as would
make it very expensive to own too much! One may own one's house and all
that is in it; one's clothes and tools and decorations; one's horses, carriages
and automobiles; one's flying machines—presently. All "personal property"
remains in our personal hands.

But no man or group of men could own the country's coal and decide
how much the public can have, and what we must pay for it. Private holding
of public property would be abolished.

ERROR 2. Socialism would reduce us all to a dead level.

ANSWER. Quite wrong. Eating at the same table in the same family
does not reduce brothers and sisters to the same level; some remain far
smarter and stronger than others. By a wiser system of education we may
greatly increase the difference in people—Socialism would not hinder it. A
higher average level of income—which is what Socialism ensures, will give
people a chance to differ more than they do now. Our machine-like
educational system, long hours of labor, specialized monotony of mill work,
and "the iron law of wages" do tend to reduce us to a dead level. Socialism
does not.

ERROR 3. Socialists are atheists.

ANSWER. How anyone can say this when they know of the immense
organization of Christian Socialists is amazing; but then it is always
amazing to see how queerly people think. Some Socialists are atheists. So
are some monarchists and some republicans. A Socialist may be an atheist,
or a homeopathist, or a Holy Roller—it has nothing to do with Socialism.

ERROR 4. Socialists are immoral.

ANSWER. Again—some are; but so are some other people. The
immorality of which we hear most in the papers is by no means that of
Socialists; but of most prominent capitalists.

ERROR 5. Socialism is unnatural—you must "alter human nature" before
it would be possible.

ANSWER. This is a very common position, based like most of the
foregoing, on lack of understanding. It assumes that Socialism requires a
state of sublime unselfishness and mutual deference, in which all men are
willing to work for nothing. But why assume this? It is no product of
Socialism. Our socialistic public parks and libraries do not presuppose that

people shall be angels. They may tend to make them such, but the progress
is not rapid enough to alarm us. In regard to this particular error we should
learn that Socialism is not a totally new and different scheme of things; but
a gradual and legitimate extension of previous tendencies. Human nature is
socialistic—and is progressively extending socialism.

ERROR 5. Socialism will pay every one alike and so destroy the
incentive of personal ambition.

ANSWER. This idea of equal payment is not Socialism. Some socialists
hold it—more do not. The essential idea of public ownership and
management of public property does not include this notion of equal
payment.

ERROR 7. Socialism will destroy competition. Competition, most of us
believe, "is the life of trade;" in other words we are supposed to work, not
merely to get something for ourselves, but to get ahead of other people.

ANSWER. Admitting that we do; admitting that such an incentive is
useful; the simple answer is that Socialism would not destroy competition.

Even in financial reward some would still be paid more than others; and
far beyond this lies the larger competition for fame and glory and public
esteem, which has always moved men more strongly than the love of
money. This remains always open.

MAIN ERROR. Passing over all these minor objections, due to mere
ignorance and easily understood, we come to the one major objection,
honestly held by intelligent people; that under Socialism people would not
work. This is why so many good and intelligent persons do honestly distrust
and fear it. Their position is this:

PREMISE A. Work must be done to keep civilization going. Work is
done by individuals in order to get something they want. Work would not be
done by anyone without the immediate stimulus of personal desire.

PREMISE B. Socialism, in some mysterious way will supply the needs
of the people gratuitously.

CONCLUSION. The people being so provided for would not work. Then
follows the downfall of civilization.

This is the honest opinion of the individualist, the older economist, and is
entitled to respect and fair answer.

If the premises were correct the terrible conclusion would be correct, and
the Socialist position visionary and dangerous. Of course people are afraid
of anything that controverts the laws of economics and human nature—they
ought to be. But are those premises correct?

To remove the easiest one first let us observe the absurdity of the idea,
that Socialism will provide for people without their working. Provide them
with what, pray? All wealth is produced by human labor—there is no
socialist patent for drawing bread and circuses from the sky. People must
always and forever work for what they have, and have in proportion to the
quantity and quality of their work.

So thoroughly is this true that the socialist grieves to see so many people
living to-day without working; receiving wealth out of all proportion to
their usefulness. If this was common to all of us it would mean the downfall
of civilization. As we live now a great many people work too hard, too long,
under unsanitary conditions, a sort of living sacrifice to the rest of the
world; and a few people do visibly and ostentatiously consume and waste
the very things the workers so painfully lack.

Socialism claims to ensure decent payment for all labor, and see that we
all receive it—all of us; not the same for everyone; but enough for
everyone. Further, Socialism claims that by such procedure the quantity and
quality of human work would be improved; that more wealth would be
produced—far more.

By thus removing Premise B, Premise A becomes a non sequitur. We
will, however, remove this also, to make a clean sweep.

It is not true that work is only done in order to get something. Some work
is done that way by some people. But it is not the only kind of work—and
they are not the only kind of people. Even the savage, having exerted
himself to get his dinner, and having had his dinner, and being, in a small
way, human, begins to exert himself further to decorate his tools and
weapons, his canoes and totem poles—because he likes to. Nobody pays
him for it. He enjoys the act of doing it, and the results.

The reason any ordinary man prefers any one kind of work to another is
that he experiences a certain pleasure in the performance of certain actions
—more than others. He is beginning to specialize.

The reason the highly specialized social servant, artist, teacher, preacher,
scientific student, true physician, inventor, chooses his work, follows it
often under disadvantages; and in the case of the enthusiast, even under
conditions of danger, pain and death—is that he likes that kind of work,
enjoys doing it, indeed has to do it—is uncomfortable if prevented.

This is a social instinct which our earlier economists have not
recognized. It is proven an instinct by the fact that children have it—all
normal children. They like any kind of ordinary work, want to learn how,
want to help, long before they attach any idea of gain to the labor.

The little girl in the kitchen wants to make cookies—as well as eat them;
longs to print little figures around the pies, and then hold the plate on poised
spread fingers and trim off that long broken ribbon of superfluous pastry—
wants to do things, as well as to have things. The one instinct is as natural
as the other.

The reasons so many of us to-day hate and despise work, avoid it, give it
up as soon as possible, are simple and clear. First because of the cruel
difficulties with which we have loaded what should be a pleasure—the
monotony, the long hours, the disagreeable surroundings, the danger and
early death, and the grossly insufficient pay. Any normal boy enjoys
working with carpenter's tools, or blacksmith's tools; enjoys running a
machine; but when such work is saddled with the above conditions, he does
not like it. Of course. It is not the work we are averse to, it is what goes
with it;—difficulties of our own making.

Further; besides the physical disadvantages, we have loaded this great
natural process of human labor with a mass of superstitions and degrading
lies. The lazy old orientals called it a curse! Work, a curse! Work; which is
the essential process of human life; man's natural function and means of
growth!

We have despised it because women did it. Glory to the women—without
them we should have had no industry. We have despised it because slaves
did it. Glory to the slaves! They built the pyramids—not Cheops. They built
every one of the marvelous relics and ruins of the past—the slaves built
Athens!

We despise it now because the low and ignorant do it. If there was ever
an instance of consummate folly, of churlish ingratitude, it is our general
attitude toward work and the workers. Here are three millions of laboring
benefactors; feeding us; clothing us; building our houses; spinning and

weaving and sewing for us;—hewing wood and drawing water;—keeping
the world alive and moving; and we look down on the work and the
workers. As we are not really brutes and fools, how is this absurd position
to be accounted for?

By that old fallacy of Premise A. "They are only doing it for themselves,"
we say. "They are paid for what they do. They wouldn't do it if they weren't
paid for it!" That is the vital core of the real opposition to Socialism, this
erroneous economic idea about work.

If that can ever be changed, if we can look at work with new eyes, then
we can look at Socialism with new eyes too; and not be afraid. Then
cautiously and rationally, we shall say:

"So this new system of yours proposes to increase human wealth, does it?
To promote and develop all kinds of legitimate work and to distribute the
product so as to improve the people? That sounds pretty good to me. But
how do you know you can do it? I'm from Missouri myself—you'll have to
show me."

And then perhaps our wiser Socialists will appeal to the people as a
whole, of every grade and class; and teach the natural orderly development
of this simple and practical system of economics; teach its splendid benefits
to all classes; and the methods of its legitimate and gradual introduction; by
careful massing of the facts; by visible proof of things already
accomplished. They must show us that we are not facing a great leap in the
dark, but clear straight steps in the light, in the orderly progress of social
evolution.

CHILD LABOR

The children in the Poor House
May die of many an ill,
But the Poor House does not profit
By their labor in the mill!

The children in the Orphanage
Wear raiment far from fine,
But no Orphanage is financed
By child labor in a mine.

The Cruel Law may send them
To Reform School's iron sway,
But it does not set small children
To hard labor by the day.

Only the Loving Family,
Which we so much admire,
Is willing to support itself
On little children's hire.

Only the Human Father,
A man, with power to think,
Will take from little children
The price of food and drink.

Only the Human Mother—
Degraded, helpless thing!
Will make her little children work
And live on what they bring!

No fledgling feeds the father-bird!
No chicken feeds the hen!

No kitten mouses for the cat—
This glory is for men.

We are the Wisest, Strongest Race—
Loud my our praise be sung!—
The only animal alive
That lives upon its young!

We make the poverty that takes
The lives of babies so.
We can awake! rebuild! remake!—
And let our children grow!

WHAT DIANTHA DID

CHAPTER II.

AN UNNATURAL DAUGHTER

The brooding bird fulfills her task,
Or she-bear lean and brown;
All parent beasts see duty true,
All parent beasts their duty do,
We are the only kind that asks
For duty upside down.

The stiff-rayed windmill stood like a tall mechanical flower, turning
slowly in the light afternoon wind; its faint regular metallic squeak pricked
the dry silence wearingly. Rampant fuchsias, red-jewelled, heavy, ran up its

framework, with crowding heliotrope and nasturtiums. Thick straggling
roses hung over the kitchen windows, and a row of dusty eucalyptus trees
rustled their stiff leaves, and gave an ineffectual shade to the house.

It was one of those small frame houses common to the northeastern
states, which must be dear to the hearts of their dwellers. For no other
reason, surely, would the cold grey steep-roofed little boxes be repeated so
faithfully in the broad glow of a semi-tropical landscape. There was an
attempt at a "lawn," the pet ambition of the transplanted easterner; and a
further attempt at "flower-beds," which merely served as a sort of
springboard to their far-reaching products.

The parlor, behind the closed blinds, was as New England parlors are;
minus the hint of cosiness given by even a fireless stove; the little bedrooms
baked under the roof; only the kitchen spoke of human living, and the living
it portrayed was not, to say the least, joyous. It was clean, clean with a
cleanness that spoke of conscientious labor and unremitting care. The zinc
mat under the big cook-stove was scoured to a dull glimmer, while that
swart altar itself shone darkly from its daily rubbing.

There was no dust nor smell of dust; no grease spots, no litter anywhere.
But the place bore no atmosphere of contented pride, as does a Dutch,
German or French kitchen, it spoke of Labor, Economy and Duty—under
restriction.

In the dead quiet of the afternoon Diantha and her mother sat there
sewing. The sun poured down through the dangling eucalyptus leaves. The
dry air, rich with flower odors, flowed softly in, pushing the white sash
curtains a steady inch or two. Ee-errr!—Ee-errr!—came the faint whine of
the windmill.

To the older woman rocking in her small splint chair by the rose-draped
window, her thoughts dwelling on long dark green grass, the shade of elms,
and cows knee-deep in river-shallows; this was California—hot, arid,
tedious in endless sunlight—a place of exile.

To the younger, the long seam of the turned sheet pinned tightly to her
knee, her needle flying firmly and steadily, and her thoughts full of pouring
moonlight through acacia boughs and Ross's murmured words, it was
California—rich, warm, full of sweet bloom and fruit, of boundless vitality,
promise, and power—home!

Mrs. Bell drew a long weary sigh, and laid down her work for a moment.

"Why don't you stop it Mother dear? There's surely no hurry about these
things."

"No—not particularly," her mother answered, "but there's plenty else to
do." And she went on with the long neat hemming. Diantha did the "over
and over seam" up the middle.

"What do you do it for anyway, Mother—I always hated this job—and
you don't seem to like it."

"They wear almost twice as long, child, you know. The middle gets worn
and the edges don't. Now they're reversed. As to liking it—" She gave a
little smile, a smile that was too tired to be sarcastic, but which certainly did
not indicate pleasure.

"What kind of work do you like best—really?" her daughter inquired
suddenly, after a silent moment or two.

"Why—I don't know," said her mother. "I never thought of it. I never
tried any but teaching. I didn't like that. Neither did your Aunt Esther, but

she's still teaching."

"Didn't you like any of it?" pursued Diantha.

"I liked arithmetic best. I always loved arithmetic, when I went to school
—used to stand highest in that."

"And what part of housework do you like best?" the girl persisted.

Mrs. Bell smiled again, wanly. "Seems to me sometimes as if I couldn't
tell sometimes what part I like least!" she answered. Then with sudden heat
—"O my Child! Don't you marry till Ross can afford at least one girl for
you!"

Diantha put her small, strong hands behind her head and leaned back in
her chair. "We'll have to wait some time for that I fancy," she said. "But,
Mother, there is one part you like—keeping accounts! I never saw anything
like the way you manage the money, and I believe you've got every bill
since yon were married."

"Yes—I do love accounts," Mrs. Bell admitted. "And I can keep run of
things. I've often thought your Father'd have done better if he'd let me run
that end of his business."

Diantha gave a fierce little laugh. She admired her father in some ways,
enjoyed him in some ways, loved him as a child does if not ill-treated; but
she loved her mother with a sort of passionate pity mixed with pride;
feeling always nobler power in her than had ever had a fair chance to grow.
It seemed to her an interminable dull tragedy; this graceful, eager, black-
eyed woman, spending what to the girl was literally a lifetime, in the
conscientious performance of duties she did not love.

She knew her mother's idea of duty, knew the clear head, the steady will,
the active intelligence holding her relentlessly to the task; the chafe and fret
of seeing her husband constantly attempting against her judgment, and
failing for lack of the help he scorned. Young as she was, she realized that
the nervous breakdown of these later years was wholly due to that common
misery of "the square man in the round hole."

She folded her finished sheet in accurate lines and laid it away—taking
her mother's also. "Now you sit still for once, Mother dear, read or lie
down. Don't you stir till supper's ready."

And from pantry to table she stepped, swiftly and lightly, setting out what
was needed, greased her pans and set them before her, and proceeded to
make biscuit.

Her mother watched her admiringly. "How easy you do it!" she said. "I
never could make bread without getting flour all over me. You don't spill a
speck!"

Diantha smiled. "I ought to do it easily by this time. Father's got to have
hot bread for supper—or thinks he has!—and I've made 'em—every night
when I was at home for this ten years back!"

"I guess you have," said Mrs. Bell proudly. "You were only eleven when
you made your first batch. I can remember just as well! I had one of my bad
headaches that night—and it did seem as if I couldn't sit up! But your
Father's got to have his biscuit whether or no. And you said, 'Now Mother
you lie right still on that sofa and let me do it! I can!' And you could!—you
did! They were bettern' mine that first time—and your Father praised 'em—
and you've been at it ever since."

"Yes," said Diantha, with a deeper note of feeling than her mother caught,
"I've been at it ever since!"

"Except when you were teaching school," pursued her mother.

"Except when I taught school at Medville," Diantha corrected. "When I
taught here I made 'em just the same."

"So you did," agreed her mother. "So you did! No matter how tired you
were—you wouldn't admit it. You always were the best child!"

"If I was tired it was not of making biscuits anyhow. I was tired enough
of teaching school though. I've got something to tell you, presently,
Mother."

She covered the biscuits with a light cloth and set them on the shelf over
the stove; then poked among the greasewood roots to find what she wanted
and started a fire. "Why don't you get an oil stove? Or a gasoline? It would
be a lot easier."

"Yes," her mother agreed. "I've wanted one for twenty years; but you
know your Father won't have one in the house. He says they're dangerous.
What are you going to tell me, dear? I do hope you and Ross haven't
quarrelled."

"No indeed we haven't, Mother. Ross is splendid. Only—"

"Only what, Dinah?"

"Only he's so tied up!" said the girl, brushing every chip from the hearth.
"He's perfectly helpless there, with that mother of his—and those four
sisters."

"Ross is a good son," said Mrs. Bell, "and a good brother. I never saw a
better. He's certainly doing his duty. Now if his father'd lived you two could
have got married by this time maybe, though you're too young yet."

Diantha washed and put away the dishes she had used, saw that the
pantry was in its usual delicate order, and proceeded to set the table, with
light steps and no clatter of dishes.

"I'm twenty-one," she said.

"Yes, you're twenty-one," her mother allowed. "It don't seem possible,
but you are. My first baby!" she looked at her proudly

"If Ross has to wait for all those girls to marry—and to pay his father's
debts—I'll be old enough," said Diantha grimly.

Her mother watched her quick assured movements with admiration, and
listened with keen sympathy. "I know it's hard, dear child. You've only been
engaged six months—and it looks as if it might be some years before
Ross'll be able to marry. He's got an awful load for a boy to carry alone."

"I should say he had!" Diantha burst forth. "Five helpless women!—or
three women, and two girls. Though Cora's as old as I was when I began to
teach. And not one of 'em will lift a finger to earn her own living."

"They weren't brought up that way," said Mrs. Bell. "Their mother don't
approve of it. She thinks the home is the place for a woman—and so does
Ross—and so do I," she added rather faintly.

Diantha put her pan of white puff-balls into the oven, sliced a quantity of
smoked beef in thin shavings, and made white sauce for it, talking the while
as if these acts were automatic. "I don't agree with Mrs. Warden on that

point, nor with Ross, nor with you, Mother," she said, "What I've got to tell
you is this—I'm going away from home. To work."

Mrs. Bell stopped rocking, stopped fanning, and regarded her daughter
with wide frightened eyes.

"Why Diantha!" she said. "Why Diantha! You wouldn't go and leave your
Mother!"

Diantha drew a deep breath and stood for a moment looking at the feeble
little woman in the chair. Then she went to her, knelt down and hugged her
close—close.

"It's not because I don't love you, Mother. It's because I do. And it's not
because I don't love Ross either:—it's because I do. I want to take care of
you, Mother, and make life easier for you as long as you live. I want to help
him—to help carry that awful load—and I'm going—to—do—it!"

She stood up hastily, for a step sounded on the back porch. It was only
her sister, who hurried in, put a dish on the table, kissed her mother and
took another rocking-chair.

"I just ran in," said she, "to bring those berries. Aren't they beauties? The
baby's asleep. Gerald hasn't got in yet. Supper's all ready, and I can see him
coming time enough to run back. Why, Mother! What's the matter? You're
crying!"

"Am I?" asked Mrs. Bell weakly; wiping her eyes in a dazed way.

"What are you doing to Mother, Diantha?" demanded young Mrs. Peters.
"Bless me! I thought you and she never had any differences! I was always
the black sheep, when I was at home. Maybe that's why I left so early!"

She looked very pretty and complacent, this young matron and mother of
nineteen; and patted the older woman's hand affectionately, demanding,
"Come—what's the trouble?"

"You might as well know now as later," said her sister. "I have decided to
leave home, that's all."

"To leave home!" Mrs. Peters sat up straight and stared at her. "To leave
home!—And Mother!"

"Well?" said Diantha, while the tears rose and ran over from her mother's
eyes. "Well, why not? You left home—and Mother—before you were
eighteen."

"That's different!" said her sister sharply. "I left to be married,—to have a
home of my own. And besides I haven't gone far! I can see Mother every
day."

"That's one reason I can go now better than later on," Diantha said.
"You are close by in case of any trouble."

"What on earth are you going for? Ross isn't ready to marry yet, is he?"

"No—nor likely to be for years. That's another reason I'm going."

"But what for, for goodness sake."

"To earn money—for one thing."

"Can't you earn money enough by teaching?" the Mother broke in
eagerly. "I know you haven't got the same place this fall—but you can get
another easy enough."

Diantha shook her head. "No, Mother, I've had enough of that. I've taught
for four years. I don't like it, I don't do well, and it exhausts me horribly.
And I should never get beyond a thousand or fifteen hundred dollars a year
if I taught for a lifetime."

"Well, I declare!" said her sister. "What do you expect to get? I should
think fifteen hundred dollars a year was enough for any woman!"

Diantha peered into the oven and turned her biscuit pan around.

"And you're meaning to leave home just to make money, are you?"

"Why not?" said Diantha firmly. "Henderson did—when he was eighteen.
None of you blamed him."

"I don't see what that's got to do with it," her mother ventured.
"Henderson's a boy, and boys have to go, of course. A mother expects that.
But a girl—Why, Diantha! How can I get along without you! With my
health!"

"I should think you'd be ashamed of yourself to think of such a thing!"
said young Mrs. Peters.

A slow step sounded outside, and an elderly man, tall, slouching,
carelessly dressed, entered, stumbling a little over the rag-mat at the door.

"Father hasn't got used to that rug in fourteen years!" said his youngest
daughter laughingly. "And Mother will straighten it out after him! I'm
bringing Gerald up on better principles. You should just see him wait on
me!"

"A man should be master in his own household," Mr. Bell proclaimed,
raising a dripping face from the basin and looking around for the towel—

which his wife handed him.

"You won't have much household to be master of presently," said Mrs.
Peters provokingly. "Half of it's going to leave."

Mr. Bell came out of his towel and looked from one to the other for some
explanation of this attempted joke, "What nonsense are you talking?" he
demanded.

"I think it's nonsense myself," said the pretty young woman—her hand
on the doorknob. "But you'd better enjoy those biscuits of Di's while you
can—you won't get many more! There's Gerald—good night!" And off she
ran.

Diantha set the plateful on the table, puffy, brown, and crisply crusted.
"Supper's ready," she said. "Do sit down, Mother," and she held the chair
for her. "Minnie's quite right, Father, though I meant not to tell you till
you'd had supper. I am going away to work."

Mr. Bell regarded his daughter with a stern, slow stare; not so much
surprised as annoyed by an untimely jesting. He ate a hot biscuit in two un-
Fletcherized mouthfuls, and put more sugar in his large cup of tea. "You've
got your Mother all worked up with your nonsense," said he. "What are you
talking about anyway?"

Diantha met his eyes unflinchingly. He was a tall old man, still handsome
and impressive in appearance, had been the head of his own household
beyond question, ever since he was left the only son of an idolizing mother.
But he had never succeeded in being the head of anything else. Repeated
failures in the old New England home had resulted in his ruthlessly selling
all the property there; and bringing his delicate wife and three young
children to California. Vain were her protests and objections. It would do

her good—best place in the world for children—good for nervous
complaints too. A wife's duty was to follow her husband, of course. She had
followed, willy nilly; and it was good for the children—there was no doubt
of that.

Mr. Bell had profited little by his venture. They had the ranch, the
flowers and fruit and ample living of that rich soil; but he had failed in
oranges, failed in raisins, failed in prunes, and was now failing in wealth-
promising hens.

But Mrs. Bell, though an ineffectual housekeeper, did not fail in the
children. They had grown up big and vigorous, sturdy, handsome creatures,
especially the two younger ones. Diantha was good-looking enough.
Roscoe Warden thought her divinely beautiful. But her young strength had
been heavily taxed from childhood in that complex process known as
"helping mother." As a little child she had been of constant service in caring
for the babies; and early developed such competence in the various arts of
house work as filled her mother with fond pride, and even wrung from her
father some grudging recognition. That he did not value it more was
because he expected such competence in women, all women; it was their
natural field of ability, their duty as wives and mothers. Also as daughters.
If they failed in it that was by illness or perversity. If they succeeded—that
was a matter of course.

He ate another of Diantha's excellent biscuits, his greyish-red whiskers
slowly wagging; and continued to eye her disapprovingly. She said nothing,
but tried to eat; and tried still harder to make her heart go quietly, her
cheeks keep cool, and her eyes dry. Mrs. Bell also strove to keep a cheerful
countenance; urged food upon her family; even tried to open some topic of
conversation; but her gentle words trailed off into unnoticed silence.

Mr. Bell ate until he was satisfied and betook himself to a comfortable
chair by the lamp, where he unfolded the smart local paper and lit his pipe.
"When you've got through with the dishes, Diantha," he said coldly, "I'll
hear about this proposition of yours."

Diantha cleared the table, lowered the leaves, set it back against the wall,
spreading the turkey-red cloth upon it. She washed the dishes,—her kettle
long since boiling, scalded them, wiped them, set them in their places;
washed out the towels, wiped the pan and hung it up, swiftly, accurately,
and with a quietness that would have seemed incredible to any mistress of
heavy-footed servants. Then with heightened color and firm-set mouth, she
took her place by the lamplit table and sat still.

Her mother was patiently darning large socks with many holes—a kind
of work she specially disliked. "You'll have to get some new socks, Father,"
she ventured, "these are pretty well gone."

"O they'll do a good while yet," he replied, not looking at them. "I like
your embroidery, my dear."

That pleased her. She did not like to embroider, but she did like to be
praised.

Diantha took some socks and set to work, red-checked and excited, but
silent yet. Her mother's needle trembled irregularly under and over, and a
tear or two slid down her cheeks.

Finally Mr. Bell laid down his finished paper and his emptied pipe and
said, "Now then. Out with it."

This was not a felicitious opening. It is really astonishing how little
diplomacy parents exhibit, how difficult they make it for the young to

introduce a proposition. There was nothing for it but a bald statement, so
Diantha made it baldly.

"I have decided to leave home and go to work," she said.

"Don't you have work enough to do at home?" he inquired, with the same
air of quizzical superiority which had always annoyed her so intensely, even
as a little child.

She would cut short this form of discussion: "I am going away to earn my
living. I have given up school-teaching—I don't like it, and, there isn't
money enough in it. I have plans—which will speak for themselves later."

"So," said Mr. Bell, "Plans all made, eh? I suppose you've considered
your Mother in these plans?"

"I have," said his daughter. "It is largely on her account that I'm going."

"You think it'll be good for your Mother's health to lose your assistance,
do you?"

"I know she'll miss me; but I haven't left the work on her shoulders. I am
going to pay for a girl—to do the work I've done. It won't cost you any
more, Father; and you'll save some—for she'll do the washing too. You
didn't object to Henderson's going—at eighteen. You didn't object to
Minnie's going—at seventeen. Why should you object to my going—at
twenty-one."

"I haven't objected—so far," replied her father. "Have your plans also
allowed for the affection and duty you owe your parents?"

"I have done my duty—as well as I know how," she answered. "Now I
am twenty-one, and self-supporting—and have a right to go."

"O yes. You have a right—a legal right—if that's what you base your idea
of a child's duty on! And while you're talking of rights—how about a
parent's rights? How about common gratitude! How about what you owe to
me—for all the care and pains and cost it's been to bring you up. A child's a
rather expensive investment these days."

Diantha flushed. she had expected this, and yet it struck her like a blow.
It was not the first time she had heard it—this claim of filial obligation.

"I have considered that position, Father. I know you feel that way—
you've often made me feel it. So I've been at some pains to work it out—on
a money basis. Here is an account—as full as I could make it." She handed
him a paper covered with neat figures. The totals read as follows:

Miss Diantha Bell,
To Mr. Henderson R. Bell, Dr.

To medical and dental expenses . . . $110.00
To school expenses . . . $76.00
To clothing, in full . . . $1,130.00
To board and lodging at $3.00 a week . . . $2,184.00
To incidentals . . . $100.00
————
$3.600.00

He studied the various items carefully, stroking his beard, half in anger,
half in unavoidable amusement. Perhaps there was a tender feeling too, as
he remembered that doctor's bill—the first he ever paid, with the other,
when she had scarlet fever; and saw the exact price of the high chair which
had served all three of the children, but of which she magnanimously
shouldered the whole expense.

The clothing total was so large that it made him whistle—he knew he had
never spent $1,130.00 on one girl's clothes. But the items explained it.

Materials, three years at an average of $10 a year . . . $30.00
Five years averaging $20 each year . . . $100.00
Five years averaging $30 each year . . . $50.00
Five years averaging $50 each year . . . $250.00
———-
$530.00

The rest was "Mother's labor, averaging twenty full days a year at $2 a
day, $40 a year. For fifteen years, $600.00. Mother's labor—on one child's,
clothes—footing up to $600.00. It looked strange to see cash value attached
to that unfailing source of family comfort and advantage.

The school expenses puzzled him a bit, for she had only gone to public
schools; but she was counting books and slates and even pencils—it
brought up evenings long passed by, the sewing wife, the studying children,
the "Say, Father, I've got to have a new slate—mine's broke!"

"Broken, Dina," her Mother would gently correct, while he demanded,
"How did you break it?" and scolded her for her careless tomboy ways.
Slates—three, $1.50—they were all down. And slates didn't cost so much
come to think of it, even the red-edged ones, wound with black, that she
always wanted.

Board and lodging was put low, at $3.00 per week, but the items had a
footnote as to house-rent in the country, and food raised on the farm. Yes,
he guessed that was a full rate for the plain food and bare little bedroom
they always had.

"It's what Aunt Esther paid the winter she was here," said Diantha.

Circuses—three . . . $1.50
Share in melodeon . . . $50.00

Yes, she was one of five to use and enjoy it.

Music lessons . . . $30.00

And quite a large margin left here, called miscellaneous, which he smiled
to observe made just an even figure, and suspected she had put in for that
purpose as well as from generosity.

"This board account looks kind of funny," he said—"only fourteen years
of it!"

"I didn't take table-board—nor a room—the first year—nor much the
second. I've allowed $1.00 a week for that, and $2.00 for the third—that
takes out two, you see. Then it's $156 a year till I was fourteen and earned
board and wages, two more years at $156—and I've paid since I was
seventeen, you know."

"Well—I guess you did—I guess you did." He grinned genially. "Yes," he
continued slowly, "I guess that's a fair enough account. 'Cording to this, you
owe me $3,600.00, young woman! I didn't think it cost that much to raise a
girl."

"I know it," said she. "But here's the other side."

It was the other side. He had never once thought of such a side to the
case. This account was as clear and honest as the first and full of
exasperating detail. She laid before him the second sheet of figures and
watched while he read, explaining hurriedly:

"It was a clear expense for ten years—not counting help with the babies.
Then I began to do housework regularly—when I was ten or eleven, two
hours a day; three when I was twelve and thirteen—real work you'd have
had to pay for, and I've only put it at ten cents an hour. When Mother was
sick the year I was fourteen, and I did it all but the washing—all a servant
would have done for $3.00 a week. Ever since then I have done three hours
a day outside of school, full grown work now, at twenty cents an hour.
That's what we have to pay here, you know."

Thus it mounted up:

Mr. Henderson R. Bell,
To Miss Diantha Bell, Dr.

For labor and services—

Two years, two hours a day at 10c. an hour . . . $146.00
Two years, three hours a day at 10c. an hour . . . $219.00
One year, full wages at $5.00 a week . . . $260.00
Six years and a half, three hours a day at 20c . . . $1423.50
————
$2048.50

Mr. Bell meditated carefully on these figures. To think of that child's
labor footing up to two thousand dollars and over! It was lucky a man had a
wife and daughters to do this work, or he could never support a family.

Then came her school-teaching years. She had always been a fine scholar
and he had felt very proud of his girl when she got a good school position in
her eighteenth year.

California salaries were higher than eastern ones, and times had changed
too; the year he taught school he remembered the salary was only $300.00
—and he was a man. This girl got $600, next year $700, $800, $900; why it
made $3,000 she had earned in four years. Astonishing. Out of this she had
a balance in the bank of $550.00. He was pleased to see that she had been
so saving. And her clothing account—little enough he admitted for four
years and six months, $300.00. All incidentals for the whole time, $50.00—
this with her balance made just $900. That left $2,100.00.

"Twenty-one hundred dollars unaccounted for, young lady!—besides this
nest egg in the bank—I'd no idea you were so wealthy. What have you done
with all that?"

"Given it to you, Father," said she quietly, and handed him the third sheet
of figures.

Board and lodging at $4.00 a week for 4 1/2 years made $936.00, that he
could realize; but "cash advance" $1,164 more—he could not believe it.
That time her mother was so sick and Diantha had paid both the doctor and
the nurse—yes—he had been much cramped that year—and nurses come
high. For Henderson, Jr.'s, expenses to San Francisco, and again for
Henderson when he was out of a job—Mr. Bell remembered the boy's
writing for the money, and his not having it, and Mrs. Bell saying she could
arrange with Diantha.

Arrange! And that girl had kept this niggardly account of it! For Minnie's
trip to the Yosemite—and what was this?—for his raisin experiment—for
the new horse they simply had to have for the drying apparatus that year he
lost so much money in apricots—and for the spraying materials—yes, he
could not deny the items, and they covered that $1,164.00 exactly.

Then came the deadly balance, of the account between them:

Her labor . . . $2,047.00
Her board . . . $936.00
Her "cash advanced" . . . $1,164.00
————-
$4,147.00
His expense for her . . . $3,600
————-
Due her from him . . . $547.00

Diantha revolved her pencil between firm palms, and looked at him
rather quizzically; while her mother rocked and darned and wiped away an
occasional tear. She almost wished she had not kept accounts so well.

Mr. Bell pushed the papers away and started to his feet.

"This is the most shameful piece of calculation I ever saw in my life,"
said he. "I never heard of such a thing! You go and count up in cold dollars
the work that every decent girl does for her family and is glad to! I wonder
you haven't charged your mother for nursing her?"

"You notice I haven't," said Diantha coldly.

"And to think," said he, gripping the back of a chair and looking down at
her fiercely, "to think that a girl who can earn nine hundred dollars a year
teaching school, and stay at home and do her duty by her family besides,
should plan to desert her mother outright—now she's old and sick! Of
course I can't stop you! You're of age, and children nowadays have no sense
of natural obligation after they're grown up. You can go, of course, and
disgrace the family as you propose—but you needn't expect to have me
consent to it or approve of it—or of you. It's a shameful thing—and you are
an unnatural daughter—that's all I've got to say!"

Mr. Bell took his hat and went out—a conclusive form of punctuation
much used by men in discussions of this sort.

THE POOR RELATION

A certain man had a Poor Relation, who was only kept in the family as a
Servant, who was certainly open to criticism, and who got it.

"He is so dirty!" said the Head of the Family, "That is why we make him
sleep over the stable."

"He is careless and clumsy—he soils, breaks and loses things—that is
why his furniture and clothing are so poor."

"He is a stupid fellow—not to be trusted with any important business—
that is why he does the scullery work!"

"He is a sickly wretch too—it costs us a deal of money to have him cared
for in the hospital and his defects attended to."

"Worst of all he has criminal tendencies—he is a disgrace and an expense
to the Family on this account alone."

"Why do you keep him at all?" I asked.

"We have to—he is after all a relation. Besides—someone must do the
scullery work."

"What do you pay him?" I asked.

"We don't really pay him anything; we just keep him alive—and clothed
—so that he can do his work."

"Was he born defective?" I asked.

"No—I've heard my mother say he was as good a baby as I."

"And what relation did you say he was?"

"I rather hate to own it—but he's my brother!"

HIS CRUTCHES

Why should the Stronger Sex require,
To hold him to his tasks,
Two medicines of varied fire?
The Weaker Vessel asks.

Hobbling between the rosy cup
And dry narcotic brown,—
One daily drug to stir him up
And one to soothe him down.

OUR ANDROCENTRIC CULTURE; or, THE MAN-MADE WORLD

II.

THE MAN-MADE FAMILY.

The family is older than humanity, and therefore cannot be called a
human institution. A post office, now, is wholly human; no other creature
has a post office, but there are families in plenty among birds and beasts; all
kinds permanent and transient; monogamous, polygamous and polyandrous.

We are now to consider the growth of the family in humanity; what is its
rational development in humanness; in mechanical, mental and social lines;
in the extension of love and service; and the effect upon it of this strange
new arrangement—a masculine proprietor.

Like all natural institutions the family has a purpose; and is to be
measured primarily as it serves that purpose; which is, the care and nurture
of the young. To protect the helpless little ones, to feed and shelter them, to
ensure them the benefits of an ever longer period of immaturity, and so to
improve the race—this is the original purpose of the family.

When a natural institution becomes human it enters the plane of
consciousness. We think about it; and, in our strange new power of
voluntary action do things to it. We have done strange things to the family;
or, more specifically, men have.

Balsac, at his bitterest, observed, "Women's virtue is man's best
invention." Balsac was wrong. Virtue—the unswerving devotion to one
mate—is common among birds and some of the higher mammals. If Balsac
meant celibacy when he said virtue, why that is one of man's inventions—
though hardly his best.

What man has done to the family, speaking broadly, is to change it from
an institution for the best service of the child to one modified to his own
service, the vehicle of his comfort, power and pride.

Among the heavy millions of the stirred East, a child—necessarily a male
child—is desired for the credit and glory of the father, and his fathers; in
place of seeing that all a parent is for is the best service of the child.
Ancestor worship, that gross reversal of all natural law, is of wholly
androcentric origin. It is strongest among old patriarchal races; lingers on in
feudal Europe; is to be traced even in America today in a few sporadic
efforts to magnify the deeds of our ancestors.

The best thing any of us can do for our ancestors is to be better than they
were; and we ought to give our minds to it. When we use our past merely as
a guide-book, and concentrate our noble emotions on the present and future,
we shall improve more rapidly.

The peculiar changes brought about in family life by the predominance of
the male are easily traced. In these studies we must keep clearly in mind the
basic masculine characteristics: desire, combat, self-expression—all
legitimate and right in proper use; only mischievous when excessive or out
of place. Through them the male is led to strenuous competition for the
favor of the female; in the overflowing ardours of song, as in nightingale
and tomcat; in wasteful splendor of personal decoration, from the pheasant's
breast to an embroidered waistcoat; and in direct struggle for the prize, from
the stag's locked horns to the clashing spears of the tournament.

It is earnestly hoped that no reader will take offence at the necessarily
frequent, reference to these essential features of maleness. In the many
books about women it is, naturally, their femaleness that has been studied
and enlarged upon. And though women, after thousands of years of such
discussion, have become a little restive under the constant use of the word
female: men, as rational beings, should not object to an analogous study—at
least not for some time—a few centuries or so.

How, then, do we find these masculine tendencies, desire, combat and
self-expression, affect the home and family when given too much power?

First comes the effect in the preliminary work of selection. One of the
most uplifting forces of nature is that of sex selection. The males,
numerous, varied, pouring a flood of energy into wide modifications,
compete for the female, and she selects the victor, this securing to the race
the new improvements.

In forming the proprietary family there is no such competition, no such
selection. The man, by violence or by purchase, does the choosing—he
selects the kind of woman that pleases him. Nature did not intend him to
select; he is not good at it. Neither was the female intended to compete—
she is not good at it.

If there is a race between males for a mate—the swiftest gets her first;
but if one male is chasing a number of females he gets the slowest first. The
one method improves our speed: the other does not. If males struggle and
fight with one another for a mate, the strongest secures her; if the male
struggles and fights with the female—(a peculiar and unnatural horror,
known only among human beings) he most readily secures the weakest. The
one method improves our strength—the other does not.

When women became the property of men; sold and bartered; "given
away" by their paternal owner to their marital owner; they lost this
prerogative of the female, this primal duty of selection. The males were no
longer improved by their natural competition for the female; and the
females were not improved; because the male did not select for points of
racial superiority, but for such qualities as pleased him.

There is a locality in northern Africa, where young girls are deliberately
fed with a certain oily seed, to make them fat,—that they may be the more

readily married,—as the men like fat wives. Among certain more savage
African tribes the chief's wives are prepared for him by being kept in small
dark huts and fed on "mealies' and molasses; precisely as a Strasbourg
goose is fattened for the gourmand. Now fatness is not a desirable race
characteristic; it does not add to the woman's happiness or efficiency; or to
the child's; it is merely an accessory pleasant to the master; his attitude
being much as the amorous monad ecstatically puts it, in Sill's quaint poem,
"Five Lives,"

"O the little female monad's lips!
O the little female monad's eyes!
O the little, little, female, female monad!"

This ultra littleness and ultra femaleness has been demanded and
produced by our Androcentric Culture.

Following this, and part of it, comes the effect on motherhood. This
function was the original and legitimate base of family life; and its ample
sustaining power throughout the long early period of "the mother-right;" or
as we call it, the matriarchate; the father being her assistant in the great
work. The patriarchate, with its proprietary family, changed this altogether;
the woman, as the property of the man was considered first and foremost as
a means of pleasure to him; and while she was still valued as a mother, it
was in a tributary capacity. Her children were now his; his property, as she
was; the whole enginery of the family was turned from its true use to this
new one, hitherto unknown, the service of the adult male.

To this day we are living under the influence of the proprietary family.
The duty of the wife is held to involve man-service as well as child-service,

and indeed far more; as the duty of the wife to the husband quite transcends
the duty of the mother to the child.

See for instance the English wife staying with her husband in India and
sending the children home to be brought up; because India is bad for
children. See our common law that the man decides the place of residence;
if the wife refuses to go with him to howsoever unfit a place for her and for
the little ones, such refusal on her part constitutes "desertion" and is ground
for divorce.

See again the idea that the wife must remain with the husband though a
drunkard, or diseased; regardless of the sin against the child involved in
such a relation. Public feeling on these matters is indeed changing; but as a
whole the ideals of the man-made family still obtain.

The effect of this on the woman has been inevitably to weaken and
overshadow her sense of the real purpose of the family; of the relentless
responsibilities of her duty as a mother. She is first taught duty to her
parents, with heavy religious sanction; and then duty to her husband,
similarly buttressed; but her duty to her children has been left to instinct.
She is not taught in girlhood as to her preeminent power and duty as a
mother; her young ideals are all of devotion to the lover and husband: with
only the vaguest sense of results.

The young girl is reared in what we call "innocence;" poetically
described as "bloom;" and this condition is held one of her chief "charms."
The requisite is wholly androcentric. This "innocence" does not enable her
to choose a husband wisely; she does not even know the dangers that
possibly confront her. We vaguely imagine that her father or brother, who
do know, will protect her. Unfortunately the father and brother, under our
current "double standard" of morality do not judge the applicants as she
would if she knew the nature of their offenses.

Furthermore, if her heart is set on one of them, no amount of general
advice and opposition serves to prevent her marrying him. "I love him!" she
says, sublimely. "I do not care what he has done. I will forgive him. I will
save him!"

This state of mind serves to forward the interests of the lover, but is of no
advantage to the children. We have magnified the duties of the wife, and
minified the duties of the mother; and this is inevitable in a family relation
every law and custom of which is arranged from the masculine viewpoint.

From this same viewpoint, equally essential to the proprietary family,
comes the requirement that the woman shall serve the man. Her service is
not that of the associate and equal, as when she joins him in his business. It
is not that of a beneficial combination, as when she practices another
business and they share the profits; it is not even that of the specialist, as the
service of a tailor or barber; it is personal service—the work of a servant.

In large generalization, the women of the world cook and wash, sweep
and dust, sew and mend, for the men.

We are so accustomed to this relation; have held it for so long to be the
"natural" relation, that it is difficult indeed to show that it is distinctly
unnatural and injurious. The father expects to be served by the daughter, a
service quite different from what he expects of the son. This shows at once
that such service is no integral part of motherhood, or even of marriage; but
is supposed to be the proper industrial position of women, as such.

Why is this so? Why, on the face of it, given a daughter and a son, should
a form of service be expected of the one, which would be considered
ignominious by the other?

The underlying reason is this. Industry, at its base, is a feminine function.
The surplus energy of the mother does not manifest itself in noise, or
combat, or display, but in productive industry. Because of her mother-power
she became the first inventor and laborer; being in truth the mother of all
industry as well as all people.

Man's entrance upon industry is late and reluctant; as will be shown later
in treating his effect on economics. In this field of family life, his effect was
as follows:

Establishing the proprietary family at an age when the industry was
primitive and domestic; and thereafter confining the woman solely to the
domestic area, he thereby confined her to primitive industry. The domestic
industries, in the hands of women, constitute a survival of our remotest past.
Such work was "woman's work" as was all the work then known; such work
is still considered woman's work because they have been prevented from
doing any other.

The term "domestic industry" does not define a certain kind of labor, but
a certain grade of labor. Architecture was a domestic industry once—when
every savage mother set up her own tepee. To be confined to domestic
industry is no proper distinction of womanhood; it is an historic distinction,
an economic distinction, it sets a date and limit to woman's industrial
progress.

In this respect the man-made family has resulted in arresting the
development of half the field. We have a world wherein men, industrially,
live in the twentieth century; and women, industrially, live in the first—and
back of it.

To the same source we trace the social and educational limitations set
about women. The dominant male, holding his women as property, and

fiercely jealous of them, considering them always as his, not belonging to
themselves, their children, or the world; has hedged them in with
restrictions of a thousand sorts; physical, as in the crippled Chinese lady or
the imprisoned odalisque; moral, as in the oppressive doctrines of
submission taught by all our androcentric religions; mental, as in the
enforced ignorance from which women are now so swiftly emerging.

This abnormal restriction of women has necessarily injured motherhood.
The man, free, growing in the world's growth, has mounted with the
centuries, filling an ever wider range of world activities. The woman,
bound, has not so grown; and the child is born to a progressive fatherhood
and a stationary motherhood. Thus the man-made family reacts unfavorably
upon the child. We rob our children of half their social heredity by keeping
the mother in an inferior position; however legalized, hallowed, or ossified
by time, the position of a domestic servant is inferior.

It is for this reason that child culture is at so low a level, and for the most
part utterly unknown. Today, when the forces of education are steadily
working nearer to the cradle, a new sense is wakening of the importance of
the period of infancy, and its wiser treatment; yet those who know of such a
movement are few, and of them some are content to earn easy praise—and
pay—by belittling right progress to gratify the prejudices of the ignorant.

The whole position is simple and clear; and easily traceable to its root.
Given a proprietary family, where the man holds the woman primarily for
his satisfaction and service—then necessarily he shuts her up and keeps her
for these purposes. Being so kept, she cannot develop humanly, as he has,
through social contact, social service, true social life. (We may note in
passing, her passionate fondness for the child-game called "society" she has
been allowed to entertain herself withal; that poor simiacrum of real social
life, in which people decorate themselves and madly crowd together,

chattering, for what is called "entertainment.") Thus checked in social
development, we have but a low grade motherhood to offer our children;
and the children, reared in the primitive conditions thus artificially
maintained, enter life with a false perspective, not only toward men and
women, but toward life as a whole.

The child should receive in the family, full preparation for his relation to
the world at large. His whole life must be spent in the world, serving it well
or ill; and youth is the time to learn how. But the androcentric home cannot
teach him. We live to-day in a democracy-the man-made family is a
despotism. It may be a weak one; the despot may be dethroned and
overmastered by his little harem of one; but in that case she becomes the
despot—that is all. The male is esteemed "the head of the family;" it
belongs to him; he maintains it; and the rest of the world is a wide hunting
ground and battlefield wherein he competes with other males as of old.

The girl-child, peering out, sees this forbidden field as belonging wholly
to men-kind; and her relation to it is to secure one for herself—not only that
she may love, but that she may live. He will feed, clothe and adorn her—
she will serve him; from the subjection of the daughter to that of the wife
she steps; from one home to the other, and never enters the world at all—
man's world.

The boy, on the other hand, considers the home as a place of women, an
inferior place, and longs to grow up and leave it—for the real world. He is
quite right. The error is that this great social instinct, calling for full social
exercise, exchange, service, is considered masculine, whereas it is human,
and belongs to boy and girl alike.

The child is affected first through the retarded development of his
mother, then through the arrested condition of home industry; and further
through the wrong ideals which have arisen from these conditions. A

normal home, where there was human equality between mother and father,
would have a better influence.

We must not overlook the effect of the proprietary family on the
proprietor himself. He, too, has been held back somewhat by this
reactionary force. In the process of becoming human we must learn to
recognize justice, freedom, human rights; we must learn self-control and to
think of others; have minds that grow and broaden rationally; we must learn
the broad mutual interservice and unbounded joy of social intercourse and
service. The petty despot of the man-made home is hindered in his
humanness by too much manness.

For each man to have one whole woman to cook for and wait upon him is
a poor education for democracy. The boy with a servile mother, the man
with a servile wife, cannot reach the sense of equal rights we need to-day.
Too constant consideration of the master's tastes makes the master selfish;
and the assault upon his heart direct, or through that proverbial side-avenue,
the stomach, which the dependent woman needs must make when she wants
anything, is bad for the man, as well as for her.

We are slowly forming a nobler type of family; the union of two, based
on love and recognized by law, maintained because of its happiness and
use. We are even now approaching a tenderness and permanence of love,
high pure enduring love; combined with the broad deep-rooted friendliness
and comradeship of equals; which promises us more happiness in marriage
than we have yet known. It will be good for all the parties concerned—man,
woman and child: and promote our general social progress admirably.

If it needs "a head" it will elect a chairman pro tem. Friendship does not
need "a head." Love does dot need "a head." Why should a family?

COMMENT AND REVIEW

I watched and waited for Margharita's Soul through eleven glittering
chapters of fair words; and when it appeared at last, in the twelfth chapter, it
was the funniest little by-product, born of imminent peril and ice-water.

A beautiful great body had Margharita and a beautiful great voice; but her
long-delayed soul was the size of a small island and one family. Funny
notion of a soul! A hen might have it. No, not a hen—she is a light-minded
promiscuous creature; but a stork, let us say; she is monogamous and quite
bound up in her family. No—not a stork either—storks migrate; no island
would satisfy her. Apparently it takes a human creature to be proud of a soul
that size.

It is a very pretty story.

Thesis: the only thing a woman is for is matrimony and much
childbearing! If she don't like it—no soul.

To develop thesis: Some unusual conditions; and a weird feminine
product, of such sort that her lover's sudden surrender and frantic marriage
is as it were involuntary. It is of the kind that requires no soul in the beloved
object, a soul might have been a little in the way in that violent attack.

Then—to sharply accent and enforce the thesis, our soulless charmer—
(her overwhelming allure for the men about her, during this period, casts a
sharp sidelight on the value of Soul as an Attraction!) is given a Golden
Voice.

This Voice is evidently one to give measureless pleasure to thousands;
not only so, but is shown to have such power as to touch hard hearts and
lead them heavenward; she with no soul assisting the souls of others; long

careful chapters are given to this voice; evidently as one decks out a
sacrifice; for the world comforting voice is only given her that she may give
it up—for Roger!

It seems a pity—with all this arranged, to ruin that voice by the shock
and exposure which aroused her Soul, She herself regretted it—having so
much less to give up—for Roger. She meant to give it up anyway, she said.
Perhaps the author didn't trust that new Soul completely—knowing her
previous character. Anyway there she is, plus a soul and minus a voice;
living on the island and populating it as rapidly as possible, perfectly happy,
and a lesson for us all.

But is there not also Madam Schumann-Heinck? A great sweet voice and
a great sweet mother too? Has she not a Soul?

*

This Duty of Childbearing is evidently weighing on the minds of men, in
these days. The thing must be done—they cant do it themselves, and they
are mightily afraid we won't, if we have half a chance to do anything else. If
a woman was by way of being a Dante or a Darwin, she had better give it
up—for Roger—and take to replenishing the earth. She can't do both—that
is the main assumption; and if she chooses to serve the world outside of the
home that is sheer loss.

Says this wise Searcher of Feminine Souls: "For if all the wisdom and
experience and training that the wonderful sex is to gain by its exodus from
the home does not get back into it ultimately, I can't (in my masculine
stupidity) quite see how it's going to get back into the race at all! And then
what good has it done?"

The gentleman does not see any way of advancing the human race except
by physical heredity—or by domestic influence.

What Shakespeare wrought into the constitution and character of his
daughter Judy is all that matters of his life and work. Keats, having no
children, contributed nothing to the world. George Washington, childless,
was of no social service. Lincoln is to be measured by the number and
quality of his offspring. Florence Nightingale, in lifting the grade of nursing
for the world, accomplished nothing. Uncle Tom's Cabin was of no service
except as it might in some mysterious way "get back into the home." What
mortal perversity is it that cannot see Humanity in women as well as Sex;
see that Social Service is something in itself, quite over and above all the
domestic and personal relations.

This getting back into the race means only the boys. It would do no good
for generations of Margaritas to inherit that Golden Voice—each and all
must give it up—for Roger. The race gets no music till the bass, barytone or
tenor appear.

Books like this are pathetic in their little efforts to check social progress.

We suspect the author's name to be Mr. Partington.

*

(The Life and Times of Anne Royall. By Sarah Harvey Porter, M.A.
12mo.
Cloth, 209 pp. $1.50 net; postage 12 cents.)

Biography has never been a favorite study with me; but I was interested
in this book because the woman whose life it described seemed worth
while. Reading it, I found not only the life of Anne Royall, but the life of

America in the early part of the nineteenth century, in our young, crude,
dangerous days of national formation. A novel has been defined as "a corner
of life seen through a temperament." If that is a true definition, then this is a
novel, for Anne Royall had "temperament" if ever anyone had, and she saw
a large corner of life through it.

Who was Anne Royall? An American woman, pioneer born and bred,
familiar with the life-and-death struggle of the frontier, and full of the spirit
of '76. She was born in 1769, and lived through the War of the Revolution,
the War of 1812, the Mexican War, and almost up to the Civil War, dying in
1854. In 1797 she was married to Captain William Royall, an exceptional
man, a Virginian, cultivated, liberal, singularly broad-minded and public-
spirited, and life with him added years of genuine culture to the energy of a
naturally bright mind. Left a widow at the age of forty-four, and, after ten
years of travel and experience, defrauded of the property left to her by her
husband, she began to live a brave self-supporting independent life at an
age when most of the women of her years were white-capped
grandmothers.

Instead of sinking into the position of a dependent female relative, she
insisted on earning her own living. This she did as so many women do to-
day, by the use of her pen, a rarer profession in those times. The more
remarkable thing is that in the face of overwhelming odds she stood for a
religion, at a period when old-fashioned Calvinism was still a dominant
power. The most remarkable, is her absolute devotion to the public interests,
to social service as she saw it.

There were a good many women writers even at that time, some of high
merit, but there were few publicists among them. Some espoused this or
that "Cause" and gave to it the passionate devotion so natural to a woman's
heart. But Anne Royall, while she also was passionately devoted to several

well-defined "Causes," was unique in that she kept in view the general
situation of her country, political, economic, geographic, and educational,
and wrote steadily for thirty-one years on matters of national importance.

It is not a question of whether she was right or wrong—though she was
mostly right, as history has proved; but the impressive thing is that this old
woman, with "troubles of her own," was overwhelmingly interested in her
country and its service. There are not so many, either men or women, of this
mind, that we can afford to overlook this sturdy pioneer "new woman." She
had virtues, too, good solid Christian virtues of the rarer sort; she visited the
sick and afflicted, gave to him that asked, and from him that would borrow
turned not away. Even to her own weaker sisters she was a strength and
comfort, greatly injuring her own position by this unusual charity. Also she
was brave, honest, truthful, persevering, industrious—"manly" virtues
these.

But—and here we have the reason why Anne Royall made no greater
mark, why she was "unsuccessful," why most of us never heard of her—she
attacked great powers, and she fought unwisely. Her abusive writing sounds
abominably to-day, but must be judged, of course, by the standard of her
time. The worst things she said were not as bad as things Shelley said—as
the bitter invective and scurrilous attacks common to pamphleteers of the
time. If our newspapers are yellow, theirs were orange in the matter of
personalities.

But even then this woman had a keen-cutting weapon, and used it
unsparingly. Being alone, with no male relative to defend her; being poor,
and so further defenceless; being old, thus lacking weak woman's usual
protection of beauty, she had absolutely nothing to fall back on when her
enemies retaliated.

This picture of one lone woman defying and blackguarding what was
almost an established church, is much like Jack the Giantkiller—with a
different result. It was deemed necessary to crush this wasp that stung so
sharply; and in 1829, in the capitol city of the United States of America, a
court of men tried—and convicted—this solitary woman of sixty as a
Common Scold. They raked up obsolete laws, studied and strove to wrest
their meanings to apply to this case, got together some justification, or what
seemed to them justification for their deeds, and succeeded in irretrievably
damaging her reputation.

She was not to be extinguished, however. In 1831 she started a
newspaper, with the ill-chosen name of PAUL PRY. In 1836 another took its
place, called THE HUNTRESS. And on the sale of these newspapers and
her books, the indomitable old lady lived to fight and fought to live till she
was eighty-five.

She is well worth reading about. The history of her times rises and lives
around her. In her vivid description we see the new rugged country, over
which she travelled from end to end; in her accounts of current literature we
pick up stray bits of information as to new authors and new words.
"Playfulness," for instance, is one which she stigmatizes as "silly in sound
and significance," and declares that she does not read the new novels "with
the exception of Walter Scott's." More interesting still to most of us is to
study over the long lists of her pen-portraits and see our ancestors as the
others saw them. Few Americans of three generations but can find some
grandfather or great uncle halo-ed or pilloried by this clear-eyed observer.

Miss Porter has done her work well. It is clear, strong and entertaining—
this biography. If the writer seems more enthusiastic about Anne Royall
than the reader becomes, that is clearly due to an unusual perception of life-

values; a recognition of the noble devotion and high courage of her subject,
and an intense sympathy with such characteristics.

*

The discussion as to whether we should or should not teach children the
Santa Claus myth pops up anew with Christmas time; and puzzles anew
anyone who regards this festival from a religious viewpoint.

If it was a choice between Santa Claus and nothing, we might prefer
Santa Claus; but here we have before us three things: first, the basis of fact,
the world old festival of the turn of the year, the coming of the sun; second,
a history of rejoicing peoples throughout all the ages, keeping up the
celebration under changing gods and dogmas; and third, the story of beauty
and wonder about the birth of Jesus.

Any child could be taught the meaning of the Coming of the Sun. The
growing light, the longer days, the beautiful future of flowers and birds and
playing in the grass; the joy of the young year. If we want legends and
stories, every religion behind us is full of them; stories of sun-gods and
their splendid triumph; stories of the great earth mother and her bounty;
stories of elves and gnomes and druids and all manner of fairy tales.

But why avoid our own religion—the first which has emphatically taught
Love as the Law of Life—peace on earth and good-will to men. Are we
ashamed of our religion or don't we believe it any more? If we do accept it
in all the long-told tales of miracle and wonder, then we have stories
enough to tell our children; stories of simple human beauty, stories of
heavenly glory, stories of mystery and magic and delight.

If we do not wish to tell them these things as literally true; or even as
beautiful legends, there remains enough historic foundation to begin with;

and enough of the enduring glory of human love to last us a lifetime.

"What is Christmas, Mama?"

"Christmas is a festival as old as the world, dear child—as old as our
human world; historic people have feasted and danced and sung for
thousands upon thousands of years, at this time of the year; and offered
gifts."

"Why do they give things at Christmas, Mama?"

"Because they are happy, dear; because they feel rich and glad and loving
now that the sun is coming back. As if Mama had been away—and you
could just see her—a long, long way off. You had seen her go—and go—
and go—farther and farther; and then she stopped a while—with her back to
you—and then all of a sudden she turned round and came toward you!
Wouldn't you be glad?"

Then if the child wants to know about the tree and the candles and all the
details of ceremony, there are facts and fancies to account for them all.

But if he says, "Why do they call it Christmas, Mama?"—then you must
tell him the secret of Christianity—which is love.

Now, can anyone explain—or defend, in face of all this, our preference
for a shallow local myth about St. Nicholas, and the corruption of that into a
mere comic supplement character; a bulbous benevolent goblin, red-nosed
and gross, doing impossible tricks with reindeers and chimneys, and half
the time degraded to a mere adjunct of nursery government? Why do we
think it beautiful? Or interesting? Or beneficial? The children like it, we
say.

Children like what they are used to, generally. Also, like older people,
they are prone to like what isn't good for them. They like brandy-drops
among sweetmeats, but that is no reason we should supply them.

*

This brings us to a strange characteristic of most of us; we seem to prefer
small cheap shallow outside things to the deep glowing beauty of life. We
seem afraid to take life at its splendid best; choosing rather to live in a litter
of petty ideas and feelings, and save the big ones for Sundays—or annual
holidays.

*

Yet in our hearts we all love great sweeps of emotion; and children
especially. Prof. Thomas, of Chicago, has given us a sidelight on this in his
clever book about women, "Sex and Society." He shows how in our long
pre-social period we were accustomed to strong excitement, long hours of
quivering suspense, mad rushes of blind fear, and orgies of wild triumph.
Our nerve channels were like the beds of mountain streams, in dry warm
lands; lying shallow or even empty at times; and again roaring torrents. So
that nowadays, on the paved levels of our civilized life, the well-graduated
dribble of small steady feelings, the organism itself cries out for a change in
the pressure.

Children and young people feel this more than older ones; the very old,
indeed, resent an unusual emotion. Yet when the young grow restless and
fretfully "wish something would happen!" we rebuke them; from the
heights of our enforced contentment; and call this natural and healthy
feeling a mere "thirst for excitement."

*

We need excitement. We have a vast capacity for it. It is a most useful
thing—this excitement; and we ought to have more of it, much more. These
young people are perfectly right in their uneasy feeling that it would be nice
to have something happen!

With all this to bank on, why so overlook the splendid possibilities of
Christmas? Why continue to make our helpless children's minds the
submissive channels for poor worn-out thin old stories? Are there no
gorgeous glowing truths in life—real life—now?

Then we tired aged people—born and reared in this atmosphere of cold
weariness; shake our heads and say—

"No. Life is hard. Life is dreary. Life is one long grind!"

That is where we are wrong, and the children are right. They come in
new every time. The earth is as young to them as it was to Adam.

If we would but once face the dignity and beauty of childhood instead of
looking down on it as we do—then we could take advantage of that
constant influx of force, instead of doing our best to crush it down.

This brings us sharply back to our Christmas—the festival of the Child.

It is. If celebrates the real new year; the new-born year, the opening of
another season of Life.

Dimly, very dimly, we have glimpsed this now and then, in the old triune
godhead of Isis, Osiris and Horus; and in our modern worship of the
Madonna and Child.

The time is coming very near when we shall see the meaning of The
Child more fully; and make our worship wiser.

What we see in all our thousand homes is "my child." What the doll-
taught mother sees is a sweet pretty dressable object; far more time and
effort being given—even before its birth—to the making of clothing, than to
the making of its constitution or character.

Then we see children as "a care," and a care they are to our worldwide
incompetence. How pathetic is the inadequacy of the young mother! She
would never dare to undertake to run a racing stable with no more
knowledge and experience than she brings to run a family.

She loves them—?

Yes, she loves them. And Mother love is so mighty a power that we all
love and honor Motherhood—in spite of its obvious deficiencies. But none
of these feelings; not even the deepest mother-love, is all that we should
give the child.

He needs Understanding—and Honor.

He needs to be recognized as the forefront of the world—the world of to-
morrow—the world we are making.

As we bear and rear him—and her!—as we guide and teach them both,
so stand the Men and Women who follow us.

*

Of course we do the best we can for our own little ones. That goes
without saying.

So does a monkey.

It is far more than that the child needs.

This Young Life, celebrated in our Christian Festival; this New Life,
Better Life, Life to Come, deserves more respect.

And the first meed of honor which we owe to our Successor, is to tell him
the truth!

*

That ought to put an end to our paltry old story of the Benign Chimney
Climber.

What we are here for, all of us, is to make the world better and the people
better. It is an easy and a pleasant game, if we would but give our minds to
it. The whole swiftly spreading enchantment of our varied arts and
industries is making a garden out of a wilderness; and even the limited and
defective education we now offer to our children, makes better people than
we used to have.

But what we have done for them is nothing to what we may do! The best
brains in the world should proudly serve the child. We should consider him
as a nation does its crown Prince—not a mere pet and darling—but a
coming Ruler.

*

Christmas will have a rejuvenation when it is recognized in this sense as
the Child's Festival. Every beautiful myth of the past remains to decorate it;
every beautiful truth to vivify it. It should be a domestic, religious, civic,
national and international festival.

It should mean Joy—and Hope—and Love; and teach them.

*

And Gifts?

Yes, gifts. There could be no more appropriate testimony to Joy and
Hope and Love than these visible fruits. Gifts to the happy child to make
him happier. Gifts from the happy child—and the new joy of giving. Gifts
everywhere—from each to each—as showing the rich overflow of Love and
joy.

And more than that—Gifts from Each to All! There is a custom worth
initiating! Not charity nor anything of that sort. Not the mere visiting of the
sick and the prisoner. But a yearly practice of giving something to the
Community—to show you love it!

*

And suppose you don't?

If you had been properly taught as a child you would. If you teach our
children properly they will. Should we not gratefully recognize the care and
service that gives as everything we have? It is the most glaring lesson in life
—this universal help of each to all.

Every day of our lives we are served and guarded and generally blessed
by—the Community.

*

It is perfectly easy to teach this to a child. Everything that he sees about
him—that is not "a natural object," some of us dead or alive have made.
The accumulated services of all the people gone have given us the world as
it is; those now here keep it up for us; and we—and our children may build
it better.

Not love the people who have given you the world? How ungrateful!

*

At which you will remark disgustedly, "Given! Not much? They were
paid for it."

That is our mistake.

In the first place they never were paid for it—and are not now—not by a
long way. And further—if we had outgrown this temporary custom of
paying for this—we should still have to serve each other—to live.

If we were all multi-millionaires—and so perfectly "independent"—why
we'd have to have some millionaire sailors and house-builders and
blacksmiths—that's all. Their money would build no houses and sail no
ships.

Service is what counts—giving—the outpouring of strength and good-
will.

That is what Christmas means. It is the Festival of Life. Love and
Service—Loving and Giving—for the Coming Race.

PERSONAL PROBLEMS

We have one, a mere sample, left over from last time.

Query: "My wife is spending more of my income on dress than I can
afford. How can I stop her? G.

Answer: G. "By letting her earn her own income and spend it as she
pleases."

G. would never be content with that. G. would get back at us and say—

Query: "How can a woman do her duty as a mother and earn her own
living?"

Answer: "If your wife was doing her duty as a mother she wouldn't be
spending so much money on dress!"

Answer further: Motherhood is "piecework"—it is not done by the hour.
The value of a mother to her children is not to be measured by quantity, but
by quality. If a mother understood any business thoroughly, she would
begin to understand her mother-work better than she does now.

Query: "But how can a mother leave her children and go to work?"

Answer: "She does not have to. She could be a milliner or dressmaker at
home just as well as a cook."

But these problems are general rather than personal. Here is a personal
one.

Query: "I am about thirty—a woman. I wish very much to be married.
All the nice men in our town have left it—or are married. There are thirty or
forty more unmarried women than men. What shall I do? X."

Answer: "Leave that town and go to some place where there are more
men. Go as a matter of business, earning your own living. Keep well, be as
good as you know how, and trust in Providence."

GET YOUR WORK DONE

Get your work DONE, to remember,—
Nothing can take it away,
Then shall the sun of December
Shine brighter than goldenest May.

What is the Spring-time of flowers for?
Why does the sunshine come down?
What are the harvest-day hours for
But fruit? In the fruit is the crown.

Why should we grieve over losses?
Why should we fret over sin?
Death is the smallest of crosses
To the worker whose harvest is in.

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LOWNEY'S

I speak as one who has cared little for candy of any kind and less for
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I don't like chocolate cake, nor chocolate blanc mange, nor chocolate
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and strained carefully.

Nevertheless I fell in with friends, who feasted upon Lowney's; they
beguiled me into feasting upon Lowney's, and since then my attitude has
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I had a box of Lowney's, a particularly well-made, attractive box, that is
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Always before, I had looked on with the unselfishness of a pelican, to see
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C. P. G.

Walter M. Lowney Co.

BOSTON, MASS.

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WOMAN'S ERA

THE NEW MAGAZINE OF INSPIRATION FOR WOMEN OF AMERICA

IN A CLASS OF ITS OWN!

A monthly world-wide review of women's activities, achievements and
aims in all the broader fields of work; reviews and original, authoritative
articles on

Economics, Ethics, Civics, Arts and Crafts, Music, Literature, Club and
College Work, etc.

Among its contributors are:

Ella Wheeler Wilcox
Charlotte Perkins Gilman
Maude Ballington Booth
Florence Kelley
Mme. Sara Anderson
Prof. Margaret Cross
Miss Emma Church
Alice Hubbard
Kate Barnard
Mrs. Eva Perry Moore
Rev. Anna Shaw

And a host of other equally noted authorities in the world of women.

Initial Number out January 15, 1910

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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 fantasy, 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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C A L E N D U LA

CHILDREN CEASE TO CRY FOR IT.

This is a gratuitous advertisement, benefitting

a) The Child; whose pain stops;

b) The Mother; who doesn't have to hear him cry;

c) The Nearest Druggist—a little.

CALENDULA is a good standard old drug—made of marigolds—in the
materia medica. You buy a little bottle of tincture of calendula, and keep it
on the shelf. Nobody will drink it by mistake—it doesn't taste good.

Presently Johnny falls down hard—he was running—he fell on a gritty
place—his poor little knee is scraped raw. And he howls, how he howls!
square-mouthed and inconsolable.

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it, and put in a few drops of calendula. Wet a soft clean rag in it, bind it
softly on the wound, keep it wet—and the pain stops.

Many many times has this quieted my infant anguish; also have I used it
as a grown up. The effect is the same.

C A L E N D U L A TAKES THE PAIN FROM A R A W W O U N D

THE FORERUNNER
A MONTHLY MAGAZINE

BY

CHARLOTTE PERKINS GILMAN
AUTHOR, OWNER & PUBLISHER

1.00 A YEAR .10 A COPY

Volume 1. No. 3 JANUARY, 1910 Copyright for 1910 C. P. Gilman

Forgive the Past—and forget it!—don't carry a grudge against
graveyards.
Accept the Present—you have to—here it is.
Concentrate on the Future—still yours to make—and get busy!

A CENTRAL SUN

A Song

Given a central sun—and a rolling world;
Into the light we whirl—and call it day;
Into the dark we turn—and call it night;
Glow of the dawn—glory of midday light—
Shadow of eve—rest of the fragrant night
And the dawn again!

Given a constant Power—and a passing frame;
Into the light we grow—and call it life;
Into the dark we go—and call It death;
Glory of youth—beauty and pride and power—
Shadow of age—rest of the final hour—
And are born again!

REASONABLE RESOLUTIONS

The trouble with our "New Year Resolutions" is that they are too personal.
We are always fussing about our little individual tempers and weaknesses

and bad habits.

While we, Socially, behave as badly as we do, we individually can
accomplish little.

Says the wiseacre—"Ah! but if each of us was individually perfect
Society would be perfect!"

Not at all! You can amass any number of perfect parts of a mechanism—
or organism—but if they do not work together right the thing is no good.

And you can't learn to work together by trying to be perfect separately.
Can you?

We need collective aims, collective efforts, collective attainments.

Let us collectively resolve:

That we will stop wasting our soil and our forests and our labor!

*

That we will stop poisoning and clogging our rivers and harbors.

*

That we will stop building combustible houses.

*

That we will now—this year—begin in good earnest to prevent all
preventable diseases.

*

That we will do our duty by our children and young people, as a wise
Society should, and cut off the crop of criminals by not making them.

*

That—; no; here are quite enough resolutions for one year.

HER HOUSEKEEPER

On the top floor of a New York boarding-house lived a particularly
attractive woman who was an actress. She was also a widow, not divorcee,
but just plain widow; and she persisted in acting under her real name, which
was Mrs. Leland. The manager objected, but her reputation was good
enough to carry the point.

"It will cost you a great deal of money, Mrs. Leland," said the manager.

"I make money enough," she answered.

"You will not attract so many—admirers," said the manager.

"I have admirers enough," she answered; which was visibly true.

She was well under thirty, even by daylight—and about eighteen on the
stage; and as for admirers—they apparently thought Mrs. Leland was a
carefully selected stage name.

Besides being a widow, she was a mother, having a small boy of about
five years; and this small boy did not look in the least like a "stage child,"
but was a brown-skinned, healthy little rascal of the ordinary sort.

With this boy, an excellent nursery governess, and a maid, Mrs. Leland
occupied the top floor above mentioned, and enjoyed it. She had a big room
in front, to receive in; and a small room with a skylight, to sleep in. The
boy's room and the governess' rooms were at the back, with sunny south
windows, and the maid slept on a couch in the parlor. She was a colored
lady, named Alice, and did not seem to care where she slept, or if she slept
at all.

"I never was so comfortable in my life," said Mrs. Leland to her friends.
"I've been here three years and mean to stay. It is not like any boarding-
house I ever saw, and it is not like any home I ever had. I have the privacy,
the detachment, the carelessness of a boarding-house, and 'all the comforts
of a home.' Up I go to my little top flat as private as you like. My Alice
takes care of it—the housemaids only come in when I'm out. I can eat with
the others downstairs if I please; but mostly I don't please; and up come my
little meals on the dumbwaiter—hot and good."

"But—having to flock with a lot of promiscuous boarders!" said her
friends.

"I don't flock, you see; that's just it. And besides, they are not
promiscuous—there isn't a person in the house now who isn't some sort of a
friend of mine. As fast as a room was vacated I'd suggest somebody—and
here we all are. It's great."

"But do you like a skylight room?" Mrs. Leland's friends further inquired
of her?"

"By no means!" she promptly replied. "I hate it. I feel like a mouse in a
pitcher!"

"Then why in the name of reason—?"

"Because I can sleep there! Sleep!—It's the only way to be quiet in New
York, and I have to sleep late if I sleep at all. I've fixed the skylight so that
I'm drenched with air—and not drenched with rain!—and there I am.
Johnny is gagged and muffled as it were, and carried downstairs as early as
possible. He gets his breakfast, and the unfortunate Miss Merton has to go
out and play with him—in all weathers—except kindergarten time. Then
Alice sits on the stairs and keeps everybody away till I ring."

Possibly it was owing to the stillness and the air and the sleep till near
lunchtime that Mrs. Leland kept her engaging youth, her vivid uncertain
beauty. At times you said of her, "She has a keen intelligent face, but she's
not pretty." Which was true. She was not pretty. But at times again she
overcame you with her sudden loveliness.

All of which was observed by her friend from the second floor who
wanted to marry her. In this he was not alone; either as a friend, of whom
she had many, or as a lover, of whom she had more. His distinction lay first
in his opportunities, as a co-resident, for which he was heartily hated by all
the more and some of the many; and second in that he remained a friend in
spite of being a lover, and remained a lover in spite of being flatly refused.

His name in the telephone book was given "Arthur Olmstead, real
estate;" office this and residence that—she looked him up therein after their
first meeting. He was rather a short man, heavily built, with a quiet kind
face, and a somewhat quizzical smile. He seemed to make all the money he
needed, occupied the two rooms and plentiful closet space of his floor in
great contentment, and manifested most improper domesticity of taste by
inviting friends to tea. "Just like a woman!" Mrs. Leland told him.

"And why not? Women have so many attractive ways—why not imitate
them?" he asked her.

"A man doesn't want to be feminine, I'm sure," struck in a pallid,
overdressed youth, with openwork socks on his slim feet, and perfumed
handkerchief.

Mr. Olmstead smiled a broad friendly smile. He was standing near the
young man, a little behind him, and at this point he put his hands just
beneath the youth's arms, lifted and set him aside as if he were an umbrella-
stand. "Excuse me, Mr. Masters," he said gravely, but you were standing on
Mrs. Leland's gown."

Mr. Masters was too much absorbed in apologizing to the lady to take
umbrage at the method of his removal; but she was not so oblivious. She
tried doing it to her little boy afterwards, and found him very heavy.

When she came home from her walk or drive in the early winter dusk,
this large quietly furnished room, the glowing fire, the excellent tea and
delicate thin bread and butter were most restful. "It is two more stories up
before I can get my own;" she would say—"I must stop a minute."

When he began to propose to her the first time she tried to stop him. "O
please don't!" she cried. "Please don't! There are no end of reasons why I
will not marry anybody again. Why can't some of you men be nice to me
and not—that! Now I can't come in to tea any more!"

"I'd like to know why not," said he calmly. "You don't have to marry me
if you don't want to; but that's no reason for cutting my acquaintance, is it?"

She gazed at him in amazement.

"I'm not threatening to kill myself, am I? I don't intend going to the devil.
I'd like to be your husband, but if I can't—mayn't I be a brother to you?"

She was inclined to think he was making fun of her, but no—his proposal
had had the real ring in it. "And you're not—you're not going to—?" it
seemed the baldest assumption to think that he was going to, he looked so
strong and calm and friendly.

"Not going to annoy you? Not going to force an undesired affection on
you and rob myself of a most agreeable friendship? Of course not. Your tea
is cold, Mrs. Leland—let me give you another cup. And do you think Miss
Rose is going to do well as 'Angelina?'"

So presently Mrs. Leland was quite relieved in her mind, and free to
enjoy the exceeding comfortableness of this relation. Little Johnny was
extremely fond of Mr Olmstead; who always treated him with respect, and
who could listen to his tales of strife and glory more intelligently than either
mother or governess. Mr. Olmstead kept on hand a changing supply of
interesting things; not toys—never, but real things not intended for little
boys to play with. No little boy would want to play with dolls for instance;
but what little boy would not be fascinated by a small wooden lay figure,
capable of unheard-of contortions. Tin soldiers were common, but the flags
of all nations—real flags, and true stories about them, were interesting.
Noah's arks were cheap and unreliable scientifically; but Barye lions, ivory
elephants, and Japanese monkeys in didactic groups of three, had unfailing
attraction. And the books this man had—great solid books that could be
opened wide on the floor, and a little boy lie down to in peace and comfort!

Mrs. Leland stirred her tea and watched them until Johnny was taken
upstairs.

"Why don't you smoke?" she asked suddenly. "Doctor's orders?"

"No—mine," he answered. "I never consulted a doctor in my life."

"Nor a dentist, I judge," said she.

"Nor a dentist."

"You'd better knock on wood!" she told him.

"And cry 'Uncle Reuben?' he asked smilingly.

"You haven't told me why you don't smoke!" said she suddenly.

"Haven't I?" he said. "That was very rude of me. But look here. There's a
thing I wanted to ask you. Now I'm not pressing any sort of inquiry as to
myself; but as a brother, would you mind telling me some of those
numerous reasons why you will not marry anybody?"

She eyed him suspiciously, but he was as solid and calm as usual,
regarding her pleasantly and with no hint of ulterior purpose. "Why—I don't
mind," she began slowly. "First—I have been married—and was very
unhappy. That's reason enough."

He did not contradict her; but merely said, "That's one," and set it down
in his notebook.

"Dear me, Mr. Olmstead! You're not a reporter, are you!"

"O no—but I wanted to have them clear and think about them," he
explained. "Do you mind?" And he made as if to shut his little book again.

"I don't know as I mind," she said slowly. "But it looks so—
businesslike."

"This is a very serious business, Mrs. Leland, as you must know. Quite
aside from any personal desire of my own, I am truly 'your sincere friend

and well-wisher,' as the Complete Letter Writer has it, and there are so
many men wanting to marry you."

This she knew full well, and gazed pensively at the toe of her small
flexible slipper, poised on a stool before the fire.

Mr. Olmstead also gazed at the slipper toe with appreciation.

"What's the next one?" he said cheerfully.

"Do you know you are a real comfort," she told him suddenly. "I never
knew a man before who could—well leave off being a man for a moment
and just be a human creature."

"Thank you, Mrs. Leland," he said in tones of pleasant sincerity. "I want
to be a comfort to you if I can. Incidentally wouldn't you be more
comfortable on this side of the fire—the light falls better—don't move."
And before she realized what he was doing he picked her up, chair and all,
and put her down softly on the other side, setting the footstool as before,
and even daring to place her little feet upon it—but with so businesslike an
air that she saw no opening for rebuke. It is a difficult matter to object to a
man's doing things like that when he doesn't look as if he was doing them.

"That's better," said he cheerfully, taking the place where she had been.
"Now, what's the next one?"

"The next one is my boy."

"Second—Boy," he said, putting it down. "But I should think he'd be a
reason the other way. Excuse me—I wasn't going to criticize—yet! And the
third?"

"Why should you criticize at all, Mr. Olmstead?"

"I shouldn't—on my own account. But there may come a man you love."
He had a fine baritone voice. When she heard him sing Mrs. Leland always
wished he were taller, handsomer, more distinguished looking; his voice
sounded as if he were. And I should hate to see these reasons standing in the
way of your happiness," he continued.

"Perhaps they wouldn't," said she in a revery.

"Perhaps they wouldn't—and in that case it is no possible harm that you
tell me the rest of them. I won't cast it up at you. Third?"

"Third, I won't give up my profession for any man alive."

"Any man alive would be a fool to want you to," said he setting down,
"Third—Profession."

"Fourth—I like Freedom!" she said with sudden intensity. "You don't
know!—they kept me so tight!—so tight—when I was a girl! Then—I was
left alone, with a very little money, and I began to study for the stage—that
was like heaven! And then—O what idiots women are!" She said the word
not tragically, but with such hard-pointed intensity that it sounded like a
gimlet. "Then I married, you see—I gave up all my new-won freedom to
marry!—and he kept me tighter than ever." She shut her expressive mouth
in level lines—stood up suddenly and stretched her arms wide and high.
"I'm free again, free—I can do exactly as I please!" The words were
individually relished. "I have the work I love. I can earn all I need—am
saving something for the boy. I'm perfectly independent!"

"And perfectly happy!" he cordially endorsed her. "I don't blame you for
not wanting to give it up."

"O well—happy!" she hesitated. "There are times, of course, when one
isn't happy. But then—the other way I was unhappy all the time."

"He's dead—unfortunately," mused Mr. Olmstead.

"Unfortunately?—Why?"

He looked at her with his straightforward, pleasant smile. "I'd have liked
the pleasure of killing him," he said regretfully.

She was startled, and watched him with dawning alarm. But he was quite
quiet—even cheerful. "Fourth—Freedom," he wrote. "Is that all?"

"No—there are two more. Neither of them will please you. You won't
think so much of me any more. The worst one is this. I like—lovers! I'm
very much ashamed of it, but I do! I try not to be unfair to them—some I
really try to keep away from me—but honestly I like admiration and lots of
it."

"What's the harm of that?" he asked easily, setting down,
"Fifth—Lovers."

"No harm, so long as I'm my own mistress," said she defiantly. "I take
care of my boy, I take care of myself—let them take care of themselves!
Don't blame me too much!"

"You're not a very good psychologist, I'm afraid," said he.

"What do you mean?" she asked rather nervously.

"You surely don't expect a man to blame you for being a woman, do
you?"

"All women are not like that," she hastily asserted. "They are too
conscientious. Lots of my friends blame me severely."

"Women friends," he ventured.

"Men, too. Some men have said very hard things of me."

"Because you turned 'em down. That's natural."

"You don't!"

"No, I don't. I'm different.".

"How different?" she asked.

He looked at her steadily. His eyes were hazel, flecked with changing bits
of color, deep, steady, with a sort of inner light that grew as she watched till
presently she thought it well to consider her slipper again; and continued,
"The sixth is as bad as the other almost. I hate—I'd like to write a dozen
tragic plays to show how much I hate—Housekeeping! There! That's all!"

"Sixth—Housekeeping," he wrote down, quite unmoved. "But why
should anyone blame you for that—it's not your business."

"No—thank goodness, it's not! And never will be! I'm free, I tell you and
I stay free!—But look at the clock!" And she whisked away to dress for
dinner.

He was not at table that night—not at home that night—not at home for
some days—the landlady said he had gone out of town; and Mrs. Leland
missed her afternoon tea.

She had it upstairs, of course, and people came in—both friends and
lovers; but she missed the quiet and cosiness of the green and brown room

downstairs.

Johnny missed his big friend still more. "Mama, where's Mr. Olmstead?
Mama, why don't Mr. Olmstead come back? Mama! When is Mr. Olmstead
coming back? Mama! Why don't you write to Mr. Olmstead and tell him to
come back? Mama!—can't we go in there and play with his things?"

As if in answer to this last wish she got a little note from him saying
simply, "Don't let Johnny miss the lions and monkeys—he and Miss Merton
and you, of course, are quite welcome to the whole floor. Go in at any
time."

Just to keep the child quiet she took advantage of this offer, and Johnnie
introduced her to all the ins and outs of the place. In a corner of the
bedroom was a zinc-lined tray with clay in it, where Johnnie played
rapturously at making "making country." While he played his mother noted
the quiet good taste and individuality of the place.

"It smells so clean!" she said to herself. "There! he hasn't told me yet
why he doesn't smoke. I never told him I didn't like it."

Johnnie tugged at a bureau drawer. "He keeps the water in here!" he said,
and before she could stop him he had out a little box with bits of looking-
glass in it, which soon became lakes and rivers in his clay continent.

Mrs. Leland put them back afterward, admiring the fine quality and
goodly number of garments in that drawer, and their perfect order. Her
husband had been a man who made a chowder of his bureau drawers, and
who expected her to find all his studs and put them in for him.

"A man like this would be no trouble at all," she thought for a moment—
but then she remembered other things and set her mouth hard. "Not for

mine!" she said determinedly.

By and by he came back, serene as ever, friendly and unpresuming.

"Aren't you going to tell me why you don't smoke?" she suddenly
demanded of him on another quiet dusky afternoon when tea was before
them.

He seemed so impersonal, almost remote, though nicer than ever to
Johnny; and Mrs. Leland rather preferred the personal note in conservation.

"Why of course I am," he replied cordially. "That's easy," and he fumbled
in his inner pocket.

"Is that where you keep your reasons?" she mischievously inquired.

"It's where I keep yours," he promptly answered, producing the little
notebook. "Now look here—I've got these all answered—you won't be able
to hold to one of 'em after this. May I sit by you and explain?"

She made room for him on the sofa amiably enough, but defied him to
convince her. "Go ahead," she said cheerfully.

"First," he read off, "Previous Marriage. This is not a sufficient objection.
Because you have been married you now know what to choose and what to
avoid. A girl is comparatively helpless in this matter; you are armed. That
your first marriage was unhappy is a reason for trying it again. It is not only
that you are better able to choose, but that by the law of chances you stand
to win next time. Do you admit the justice of this reasoning?"

"I don't admit anything," she said. "I'm waiting to ask you a question."

"Ask it now."

"No—I'll wait till you are all through. Do go on."

"'Second—The Boy,'" he continued. "Now Mrs. Leland, solely on the
boy's account I should advise you to marry again. While he is a baby a
mother is enough, but the older he grows the more he will need a father. Of
course you should select a man the child could love—a man who could love
the child."

"I begin to suspect you of deep double-dyed surreptitious designs, Mr.
Olmstead. You know Johnnie loves you dearly. And you know I won't
marry you," she hastily added.

"I'm not asking you to—now, Mrs. Leland. I did, in good faith, and I
would again if I thought I had the shadow of a chance—but I'm not at
present. Still, I'm quite willing to stand as an instance. Now, we might
resume, on that basis. Objection one does not really hold against me—now
does it?"

He looked at her cheerily, warmly, openly; and in his clean, solid strength
and tactful kindness he was so unspeakably different from the dark,
fascinating slender man who had become a nightmare to her youth, that she
felt in her heart he was right—so far. "I won't admit a thing," she said
sweetly. "But, pray go on."

He went on, unabashed. "'Second—Boy,' Now if you married me I should
consider the boy as an added attraction. Indeed—if you do marry again—
someone who doesn't want the boy—I wish you'd give him to me. I mean it.
I think he loves me, and I think I could be of real service to the child."

He seemed almost to have forgotten her, and she watched him curiously.

"Now, to go on," he continued. "'Third-Profession.' As to your
profession," said he slowly, clasping his hands over one knee and gazing at
the dark soft-colored rug, "if you married me, and gave up your profession I
should find it a distinct loss, I should lose my favorite actress."

She gave a little start of surprise.

"Didn't you know how much I admire your work?" he said. "I don't hang
around the stage entrance—there are plenty of chappies to do that; and I
don't always occupy a box and throw bouquets—I don't like a box anyhow.
But I haven't missed seeing you in any part you've played yet—some of 'em
I've seen a dozen times. And you're growing—you'll do better work still. It
is sometimes a little weak in the love parts—seems as if you couldn't quite
take it seriously—couldn't let yourself go—but you'll grow. You'll do better
—I really think—after you're married "

She was rather impressed by this, but found it rather difficult to say
anything; for he was not looking at her at all. He took up his notebook again
with a smile.

"So—if you married me, you would be more than welcome to go on with
your profession. I wouldn't stand in your way any more than I do now.
'Fourth—Freedom,'" he read slowly. "That is easy in one way—hard in
another. If you married me,"—She stirred resentfully at this constant
reference to their marriage; but he seemed purely hypothetical in tone; "I
wouldn't interfere with your freedom any. Not of my own will. But if you
ever grew to love me—or if there were children—it would make some
difference. Not much. There mightn't be any children, and it isn't likely
you'd ever love me enough to have that stand in your way. Otherwise than
that you'd have freedom—as much as now. A little more; because if you
wanted to make a foreign tour, or anything like that, I'd take care of
Johnnie. 'Fifth—Lovers.'" Here he paused leaning forward with his chin in

his hands, his eyes bent down. She could see the broad heavy shoulders, the
smooth fit of the well-made, coat, the spotless collar, and the fine, strong,
clean-cut neck. As it happened she particularly disliked the neck of the
average man—either the cordy, the beefy or the adipose, and particularly
liked this kind, firm and round like a Roman's, with the hair coming to a
clean-cut edge and stopping there.

"As to lovers," he went on—"I hesitate a little as to what to say about
that. I'm afraid I shall shock you. Perhaps I'd better leave out that one."

"As insuperable?" she mischievously asked.

"No, as too easy," he answered.

"You'd better explain," she said.

"Well then—it's simply this: as a man—I myself admire you more
because so many other men admire you. I don't sympathize with them, any!
—Not for a minute. Of course, if you loved any one of them you wouldn't
be my wife. But if you were my wife—"

"Well?" said she, a little breathlessly. "You're very irritating! What would
you do? Kill 'em all? Come—If I were your wife?—"

"If you were my wife—" he turned and faced her squarely, his deep eyes
blazing steadily into hers, "In the first place the more lovers you had that
you didn't love the better I'd be pleased."

"And if I did?" she dared him.

"If you were my wife," he purused with perfect quietness, "you would
never love anyone else."

There was a throbbing silence.

"'Sixth—Housekeeping,'" he read.

At this she rose to her feet as if released. "Sixth and last and all-
sufficient!" she burst out, giving herself a little shake as if to waken. "Final
and conclusive and admitting no reply!"—I will not keep house for any
man. Never! Never!! Never!!!"

"Why should you?" he said, as he had said it before; "Why not board?"

"I wouldn't board on any account!"

"But you are boarding now. Aren't you comfortable here?"

"O yes, perfectly comfortable. But this is the only boarding-house I ever
saw that was comfortable."

"Why not go on as we are—if you married me?"

She laughed shrilly. "With the other boarders round them and a whole
floor laid between," she parodied gaily. "No, sir! If I ever married again—
and I wont—I'd want a home of my own—a whole house—and have it run
as smoothly and perfectly as this does. With no more care than I have now!"

"If I could give you a whole house, like this, and run it for you as
smoothly and perfectly as this one—then would you marry me?" he asked.

"O, I dare say I would," she said mockingly.

"My dear," said he, "I have kept this house—for you—for three years."

"What do you mean?" she demanded, flushingly.

"I mean that it is my business," he answered serenely. "Some men run
hotels and some restaurants: I keep a number of boarding houses and make
a handsome income from them. All the people are comfortable—I see to
that. I planned to have you use these rooms, had the dumbwaiter run to the
top so you could have meals comfortably there. You didn't much like the
first housekeeper. I got one you liked better; cooks to please you, maids to
please you. I have most seriously tried to make you comfortable. When you
didn't like a boarder I got rid of him—or her—they are mostly all your
friends now. Of course if we were married, we'd fire 'em all." His tone was
perfectly calm and business like. "You should keep your special apartments
on top; you should also have the floor above this, a larger bedroom,
drawing-room, and bath and private parlor for you;—I'd stay right here as I
am now—and when you wanted me—I'd be here."

She stiffened a little at this rather tame ending. She was stirred, uneasy,
dissatisfied. She felt as if something had been offered and withdrawn;
something was lacking.

"It seems such a funny business—for a man," she said.

"Any funnier than Delmonico's?" he asked. "It's a business that takes
some ability—witness the many failures. It is certainly useful. And it pays
—amazingly."

"I thought it was real estate," she insisted.

"It is. I'm in a real estate office. I buy and sell houses—that's how
I came to take this up!"

He rose up, calmly and methodically, walked over to the fire, and laid his
notebook on it. "There wasn't any strength in any of those objections, my

dear," said he. "Especially the first one. Previous marriage, indeed! You
have never been married before. You are going to be—now."

It was some weeks after that marriage that she suddenly turned upon him
—as suddenly as one can turn upon a person whose arms are about one—
demanding.

"And why don't you smoke?—You never told me!"

"I shouldn't like to kiss you so well if you smoked!"—said he.

"I never had any idea," she ventured after a while, "that it could be—like
this."

LOCKED INSIDE

She beats upon her bolted door,
With faint weak hands;
Drearily walks the narrow floor;
Sullenly sits, blank walls before;
Despairing stands.

Life calls her, Duty, Pleasure, Gain—
Her dreams respond;
But the blank daylights wax and wane,
Dull peace, sharp agony, slow pain—
No hope beyond.

Till she comes a thought! She lifts her head,
The world grows wide!
A voice—as if clear words were said—
"Your door, o long imprisoned,
Is locked inside!"

PRIVATE MORALITY AND PUBLIC IMMORALITY

There is more sense in that convenient trick of blaming "the old Adam" for
our misbehavior than some of us have thought. That most culpable sinner
we no longer see as a white-souled adult baby, living on uncooked food in a
newmade garden, but as a husky, hairy, highly carnivorous and bloodthirsty
biped, just learning his giant strength, and exercising it like a giant.

Growing self-conscious and intelligent, he developed an ethical sense,
and built up system after system of morals, all closely calculated to advance
his interests in this world or the next. The morals of the early Hebrews, for
instance, with which we are most familiar, were strictly adjusted to their
personal profit; their conception of Diety definitely engaging to furnish
protection and reward in return for specified virtuous conduct.

This is all reasonable and right in its way. If good conduct were not
ultimately advantageous it would not be good. The difficulty with the
ancient scheme of morality lies in its narrow range. "The soul that sinneth it
shall die," is the definite statement; the individual is the one taken to task,
threatened, promised, exhorted and punished. Our whole race-habit of
thought on questions of morality is personal. When goodness is considered
it is "my" goodness or "your" goodness—not ours; and sins are supposed to
be promptly traceable to sinners; visible, catchable, hangable sinners in the

flesh. We have no mental machinery capable of grasping the commonest
instances of collective sin; large, public continuing sin, to which thousands
contribute, for generations upon generations; and under the consequences of
which more thousands suffer for succeeding centuries. Yet public evils are
what society suffer from most to-day, and must suffer from most in
increasing ratio, as years pass.

In concrete instance, we are most definitely clear as to the verb "to steal."
This is wrong. It says so in the Bible. It if a very simple commandment. If a
man steals he is a thief. And our law following slowly along after our moral
sense, punishes stealing. But it is one man stealing from one other man who
is a thief. It is the personal attack upon personal property, done all at once,
which we can see, feel, and understand. Let a number of men in
combination gradually alienate the property of a number of other men—a
very large number of other men, and our moral sense makes no remark.
This is not intended in any ironic sense—it is a plain fact, a physiological,
or psychological fact.

The racial mind, long accustomed to attach moral values to personal acts
only, cannot, without definite effort, learn to attach them to collective acts.
We can do it, in crude instances, when mere numbers are in question and
the offence is a plain one. If a number of men in a visible moving group
commit murder or arson before our eyes, we had as lief hang a dozen as
one: but when it comes to tracing complicity and responsibility in the
deaths of a few screaming tenants of firetrap tenements, a death
unnecessary perhaps, but for the bursting of the fire hose—then we are at
fault. The cringing wretch who lit the oilsoaked rags in the cellar we seize
in triumph. He did it. Him we can hang. "The soul that sinneth it shall die."
But if the fire is "an accident," owing to "a defective flue," if the fire-escape
breaks, the stairs give away under a little extra weight, or ill-built walls

crumble prematurely—who can we lay hands on? Where is the soul that
sinneth?

Our brains are not trained to follow a complex moral relation; we travel
in the deep ruts of mental habit as old as Adam aforesaid. Our sense of duty,
of obligation, of blame or praise is all hopelessly egotistic. "Who is to
blame?" we continue to say; when we should say, "Who are to blame?" One
heavy dose of poison resulting in one corpse shows us murder. A thousand
tiny doses of poison, concealed in parcels of food, resulting in the lowered
vitality, increased illness and decreased efficiency of thousands of persons,
shows us nothing. There is need to-day for very honest mental effort in
readjusting our moral sense so that we may recognize social evils, social
offenders and social responsibility.

Here we are all together, rising and falling in masses under the influence
of other person's conduct, with no possibility of tracing the death of this
particular baby to the dirty hands of that particular milker of far-off cows. It
wasn't murder—he never saw the baby. You can't hang a man for not
washing his hands. We see babies die, look in vain for the soul that sinneth,
and do nothing.

We should have a poor opinion of any state where there was no moral
sense ai all, no weight of public opinion to uphold standards, no measures
to protect innocence and punish crime. This we should call barbarism or
savagery, and feel proud of our Christian civilization, where we legislate so
profusely and punish so severely—when we can lay hands on individual
offenders, whose crimes, though small, are at least whole ones. But we are
in precisely that state of barbarism in regard to the fractional crimes of our
complex social life.

If seven doctors in succession refuse to answer a poor man's call and he
dies for lack of medical aid—who has killed him? Has he seven murderers

—or is each doctor one-seventh of a murderer? Or is it not murder at all just
to let a man die?

If again, the doctor does his duty and the man dies because the medicine
given him was different from what the doctor ordered—a cheaper, weaker
drug, an adulteration or substitute—then who killed him? The druggist who
sold—the clerk who put up the prescription—the advertiser of the stuff—
the manufacturer of it—or those who live on money invested in the
manufacturing company? "The clerk!" we cry, delightedly. "He put up the
poison! He knew it was not what was ordered! He did it with his hands!"
"The soul that sinneth it shall die." And perhaps it does—or at least the
body of it. Yet the same drug goes on poisoning.

We might perhaps pass on from that shaggy Adam of our remote past and
his necessary limitations, and begin to study the real relation of human
beings in modern life, learning at last that human conduct changes as
society develops, that morality is no longer a mere matter of "thou shalt"
and "thou shalt not," but a vast complex of mutually interactive conduct in
which personal responsibility has small place.

Take an evil like our railroad management with its yearly tale of
bloodshed and dismemberment, its hundreds and thousands of killed and
wounded. We cannot pick out and hang a director or president when the
dead brakeman is dragged out from between the cars that did not have
automatic couplers. The man is dead, is killed, is murdered—but we cannot
fix responsibility. Can we arrest for murder the poor mother who is caring
for her boy sick with typhoid fever; just because she empties slops on a
watershed that feeds a little brook, that feeds a river, that feeds a city—and
thousands die of that widespread disease? She is not personally guilty of
murder. There are others in plenty between her and the victim and many
back of her to blame for her ignorance. Who can untangle the responsibility

for the ruin of a girl who was utterly untaught, underpaid, improperly
dressed, ill-fed, influenced by every gorgeously dressed idle woman who
stood before her counter, and tempted by many men in turn? There is the
one "sin"—but is she the only "sinner"?

Consider the two awful instances of recent date—the Iroquois Theatre
fire in Chicago, the Slocum disaster in New York. Even if it were possible
to "fix responsibility," to find the one person, or more than one whom we
could prove to blame for these holocausts, what could we do to these
persons as fit punishment for such an injury to society? If we could devise
tortures prolonged and painful enough to make such criminals feel as felt
their dying victims, what good would that do? It would raise no dead,
restore no health, prevent no repetition of similar horrors. That much has
been established by the history of our primitive systems—punishment does
not prevent.

What does?

Here is the real question for society to ask—Adam did not know enough.
The age of personal morals is the age of personal punishment. The age of
recognized public evils is the age of prevention. This we are beginning to
see, beginning to do. After the Iroquois fire we were more stringent in
guarding our theatres. After the Slocum disaster the inspection of
steamships was more thorough. After the slaughter of the innocents in the
burning schoolhouse, many other school buildings were condemned and
more were safeguarded.

But this is only a beginning—a feeble, temporary, ineffectual effort.
Social morality does not consist in spasmodic attempts to be good,
following upon some terrible catastrophe. A mother's duty to a child is not
mere passionate protection after it has fallen through the ice; the soldier's
duty is not confined to wild efforts to recover the flag after it has been lost.

We have a constant definite active duty to society, each one of us; there lies
our responsibility and failing therein is our fault.

When men or women fail in full honest efficient performance of their
social service, which means their special kind of work, they sin—if we
must call it sin—against society. Better drop the very name and thought of
"sin" and say merely, "Why are we to-day so inefficient and unreliable in
our social duty?" For reason good. We are not taught social duty. For further
reason that we are taught much that militates against it. Our social instinct
is not yet strong enough to push and pull us into perfect relation with one
another without conscious effort. We need to be taught from infancy, which
way our duty lies—the most imperative duty of a human creature—to give
his life's best service to humanity.

This would call for new standards in the nursery, the school and the shop,
as well as the platform, press and pulpit. That is our crying need; a truer
standard of duty, and the proper development of it. The School City is a step
this way, a long one; as is the George Junior Republic and other specific
instances of effort to bring out the social sense.

But it is in our work that we need it most. From babyhood we should be
taught that we are here dependent on one another, beautifully specialized
that we may serve one another; owing to the State, our great centralized
body, the whole service of our lives. What every common soldier knows
and most of them practice is surely not too difficult for a common business
man. Our public duty is most simple and clear—to do our best work for the
service of the world. And our personal sin—the one sin against humanity—
is to let that miserable puny outgrown Ego—our exaggerated sense of
personality—divert us from that service.

[Untitled]

With God Above—Beneath—Beside—
Without—Within—and Everywhere;
Rising with the resistless tide
Of life, and Sure of Getting There.

Patient with Nature's long delay,
Proud of our conscious upward swing;
Not sorry for a single day,
And Not Afraid of Anything!

With Motherhood at last awake—
With Power to Do and Light to See—
Women may now begin to Make
The People we are Meant to Be!

THE HUMANNESS OF WOMEN

A woman by the river's brim,
A wife and servant is to him—
And she is nothing more.

We have made mistakes, as old as humanity, about the world, and about
women.

First, as to the world:

This we have assumed to be a general battlefield for men to struggle in; a
place for free competition; full of innumerable persons whose natural mode
of life was to struggle, for existence, with one another.

This is the individualist view, and is distinctly masculine.

Males are essentially individualistic—born to vary and compete; and an
exclusively masculine world must be individualistic and competitive.

We have been wrong. The new Social Philosophy recognizes Society as
an orderly life-form, having its own laws of growth; and that we, as
individuals, live only as active parts of Society. Instead of accepting this
world of warfare, disease, and crime, of shameful, unnecessary poverty and
pain, as natural and right, we now see that all these evils may be removed,
and we propose to remove them. Humanity is waking up, is beginning to
understand its own nature, is beginning to face a new and a possible
problem, instead of the dark enigma of the past.

Second, as to the woman:

Our mistake about her was a very strange one. No one knows yet how or
why it was made; yet there it stands; one of the most colossal blunders ever
made by mankind. In the face of all creation, where the female is sometimes
found quite self-sufficient, often superior, and always equal to the male, our
human race set up the "andro-centric theory," holding that man alone is the
race type; and that woman was "his female." In what "Mr. Venus" described
as "the vicious pride of his youth," our budding humanity distinguished
itself by discrediting its mother. "You are a female," said Ancient Man, "and
that's all. We are the People!"

This is the alpha and omega of the old idea about woman. It saw in her
only sex—not Humanity.

The New Woman is Human first, last and always. Incidentally she is
female; as man is male. As a male he has done his small share in the old
physical process of reproduction; but as a Human Creature he has done
practically all in the new Social processes which make civilization.

He has been Male—and Human:—She has been Female—and nothing
else;—that is, in our old idea.

Holding this idea; absurd, erroneous, and mischievous to a terrible
degree; we strove to carry it out in our behavior; and human history so far is
the history of a wholly masculine world, competing and fighting as males
must, forever seeking and serving the female as males must, yet building
this our world as best they could alone.

Theirs is the credit—and the shame—of the world behind us, the world
around us; but the world before us has a new element—the Humanness of
Woman.

For a little over a century we have become increasingly conscious of a
stir, an uprising, and protest among women. The long-suppressed "better
half" of humanity has begun to move and push and lift herself. This
Woman's movement is as natural, as beneficial, as irresistible as the coming
of spring; but it has been misunderstood and opposed from the first by the
glacial moraine of old ideas, the inert force of sheer blank ignorance, and
prejudice as old as Adam.

At first the women strove for a little liberty, for education; then for some
equality before the law, for common justice; then, with larger insight, for
full equal rights with men in every human field; and as essential base of
these, for the right of suffrage.

Woman suffrage is but one feature of the movement, but it is a most
important one. The opposition to it is wholly one of sex-prejudice, of
feeling, not of reason; the opposition of a masculine world; and of an
individualism also masculine. The male is physiologically an individualist.
It is his place in nature to vary, to introduce new characteristics, and to
strive mightily with his rivals for the favor of the females. A world of males
must fight.

With the whole of history of this combative sort; with masculinity and
humanity identical, in the average mind; there is something alien, unnatural,
even revolting, in the claim of woman to her share in the work and
management of the world. Against it he brings up one constant cry—that
woman's progress will injure womanhood. All that he sees in woman is her
sex; and he opposes her advance on the ground that "as a woman" she is
unfit to take part in "a man's world"—and that if she did, it would
mysteriously but inevitably injure her "as a woman."

Suggest that she might be able to take part in "a woman's world,"—and
has as much right to a world made her way as he has to his man-made
world! Suggest that without any such extreme reversal, she has a right to
half the world; half the work, half the pay, half the care, half the glory!

To all this replies the Male-individualist:

"The World has to be as it is. It is a place to fight in; fight for life, fight
for money. Work is for slaves and poor people generally. Nobody would
work unless they had to. You are females and no part of the world at all.
Your place is at home: to bear and rear children—and to cook."

Now what is the position toward women of this new philosophy that sees
Society as one thing, and the main thing to be considered; that sees the
world as a place open to ceaseless change and improvement; that sees the

way so to change and improve it that the major part of our poor silly sins
and sorrows will disappear utterly for lack of cause?

From this viewpoint male and female fall into two lower positions, both
right and proper; useful, beautiful, essential for the replenishment of the
race on earth. From this viewpoint men and women rise, together, from that
lower relation, to the far higher one of Humanness, that common
Humanness which is hers as much as his. Seeing Society as the real life-
form; and our individual lives as growing in glory and power as we serve
and develop Society; the movement of women becomes of majestic
importance. It is the advance of an entire half the race, from a position of
arrested development, into full humanness.

The world is no longer seen as a battlefield, where it is true, women do
not belong; but as a garden—a school—a church—a home, where they
visibly do belong. In the great task of cultivating the earth they have an
equal interest and an equal power. Equality is not identity. There is work of
all kinds and sizes—and half of it is woman's.

In that vast labor of educating humanity, till all of us understand one
another; till the thoughts and feelings necessary to our progress can flow
smooth and clear through the world-mind, women have preeminent part.
They are the born teachers, by virtue of their motherhood, as well as in the
human joy of it.

In the power of organization which is essential to our progress we have
special need of women, and their rapid and universal movement in this
direction is one of the most satisfactory proofs of our advance. In every art,
craft and profession they have the same interests, the same power. We rob
the world of half its service when we deny women their share in it.

In direct political action there is every reason for women's voting that
there is for men's; and every reason for a spreading universal suffrage that
there is for democracy. As far as any special power in government is called
for, the mother is the natural ruler, the natural administrator and executive.
The functions of democratic government may be wisely and safely shared
between men and women.

Here we have our great position fairly before us:—the improvement of
the world is ours to make; women are coming forward to help make it;
women are human with every human power; democracy is the highest form
of government—so far; and the use of the ballot is essential to democracy;
therefore women should vote!

Against this rises the tottering fortress of the ultra-masculine, abetted by
a petty handful of witless traitors—those petticoated creatures who also see
in women nothing but their sex. They may be, in some cases, honest in their
belief; but their honesty does no credit to their intelligence. They are
obsessed by this dominant idea of sex; due clearly enough to the long
period of male dominance—to our androcentric culture. The male naturally
sees in the female, sex; first, last and always. For all these centuries she has
been restricted to the exercise of feminine duties only, with the one addition
of house-service.

The wife-and-mother sex, the servant sex, she is to him; and nothing
more. The woman does not look at men in this light. She has to consider
them as human creatures, because they monopolize the human functions.
She does not consider the motorman and conductor as males, but as
promotors of travel; she does not chuck the bellboy under the chin and kiss
the waiter!

Inextricably mingled with the masculine view is the individualist view,
seeing the world forever and ever as a place of struggle.

Then comes this great change of our time, the dawning of the Social
consciousness. Here is a world of combination, of ordered grouping and
inter-service. Here is a world now wasting its wealth like water—all this
waste may be saved. Here is a world of worse than unnecessary war. We
will stop this warfare. Here is a world of hideous diseases. We will
exterminate them. Here is a world of what we call "Sin"—almost all of
which is due to Ignorance, Ill-health, Unhappiness, Injustice.

When the world learns how to take care of itself decently; when there are
no dirty evil places upon it, with innocent children born daily and hourly
into conditions which inevitably produce a certain percentage of
criminality; when the intelligence and good breeding which now distinguish
some of us are common to all of us—we shan't hear so much about sin!

A socially conscious world, intelligent, courageous, earnest to improve
itself, seeking to establish a custom of peaceful helpful interservice—such a
world has no fear of woman, and no feeling that she is unfit to participate in
its happy labors. The new social philosophy welcomes woman suffrage.

*

But suppose you are not in any sense Socialistically inclined. Suppose
you are still an Individualist, albeit a believer in votes for women. Even so,
merely from the woman's point of view, enough can be said to justify the
promise of a New World.

What makes the peace and beauty of the Home—its order—comfort—
happiness?—the Woman.

Her service is given, not hired. Her attitude is of one seeking to
administer a common fund for the common good. She does not set her
children to compete for their dinner—does not give most to the strongest

and leave the weakest to go to the wall. It is only in her lowest helplessness;
under the degrading influence of utter poverty, that she is willing to exploit
her children and let them work before their time.

If she, merely as Woman, merely as wife and mother, comes forward to
give the world the same service she has given the home, it will be wholly to
its advantage.

Go and look at the legislation initiated or supported by women in every
country where women vote—and you will see one unbroken line of social
service. Not self-interest—not mercenary profit—not competition; but one
steady upward pressure; the visible purpose to uplift and help the world.

This world is ours as much as man's. We have not only a right to half its
management but a duty to half its service. It is our duty as human beings to
help make the world better—quickly! It is our duty as Women to bring our
Motherhood to comfort and help humanity—our children every one!

HERE IS THE EARTH

Here is the earth: As big, as fresh, as clean,
As when it first grew green;
Our little spots of dirt walled in,
As easy to outgrow as sin,
In the swift, sweet, triumphal hour
Of nature's power.

We have not hurt the world: Still safe we rest
On that great loving breast.
Proud, patient mother! Strong and still!

Our little years of doing ill
Lost in her smooth, unmeasured time
Of life sublime.

We need not grieve, nor kneel our faults to own;
She has not even known
That we offended! Our misdeeds
She covers with one summer's weeds:
Her love we thought so long away—
Is ours to-day.

And here are we. Our bodies are as new
As ever Adam grew:
Replenished still with daily touch,
By the fair mother, loving much.
Glad living things! Still conscious part
Of earth's rich heart!

And for the soul which these fair bodies give
Increasing room to live—?
It is the same soul that was born
In the dim, lovely, unknown morn
Of Nature's waking—the same soul—
Still here, and whole!

Strong? `Tis the force that governs ring on ring
Where quiet planets swing.
Glad? `Tis the joy of riotous flowers
And meadow-larks in May, now ours,
Ours endlessly—to have—to give—
To all who live!

No grief behind have we, no fear before
But only more and more
The splendid passion of the soul
In new creation to unroll:
All life, poured new in all the lands,
Through our glad hands!

WHAT DIANTHA DID

CHAPTER III.

BREAKERS

Duck! Dive! Here comes another one!
Wait till the crest-ruffles show!
Beyond is smooth water in beauty and wonder—
Shut your mouth! Hold your breath! Dip your head under!
Dive through the weight and the wash, and the thunder—
Look out for the undertow!

If Diantha imagined that her arithmetical victory over a too-sordid
presentation of the parental claim was a final one, she soon found herself
mistaken.

It is easy to say—putting an epic in an epigram—"She seen her duty and
she done it!" but the space and time covered are generally as far beyond our
plans as the estimates of an amateur mountain climber exceed his
achievements.

Her determination was not concealed by her outraged family. Possibly
they thought that if the matter was well aired, and generally discussed, the
daring offender might reconsider. Well-aired it certainly was, and widely
discussed by the parents of the little town before young people who sat in
dumbness, or made faint defense. It was also discussed by the young
people, but not before their parents.

She had told Ross, first of all, meaning to have a quiet talk with him to
clear the ground before arousing her own family; but he was suddenly away
just as she opened the subject, by a man on a wheel—some wretched
business about the store of course—and sent word that night that he could
not come up again. Couldn't come up the next night either. Two long days—
two long evenings without seeing him. Well—if she went away she'd have
to get used to that.

But she had so many things to explain, so much to say to make it right
with him; she knew well what a blow it was. Now it was all over town—
and she had had no chance to defend her position.

The neighbors called. Tall bony Mrs. Delafield who lived nearest to them
and had known Diantha for some years, felt it her duty to make a special
appeal—or attack rather; and brought with her stout Mrs. Schlosster, whose
ancestors and traditions were evidently of German extraction.

Diantha retired to her room when she saw these two bearing down upon
the house; but her mother called her to make a pitcher of lemonade for them
—and having entered there was no escape. They harried her with questions,
were increasingly offended by her reticence, and expressed disapproval
with a fullness that overmastered the girl's self-control.

"I have as much right to go into business as any other citizen, Mrs.
Delafield," she said with repressed intensity. "I am of age and live in a free

country. What you say of children no longer applies to me."

"And what is this mysterious business you're goin' into—if one may
inquire? Nothin you're ashamed to mention, I hope?" asked Mrs. Delafield.

"If a woman refuses to mention her age is it because she's ashamed of
it?" the girl retorted, and Mrs. Delafield flushed darkly.

"Never have I heard such talk from a maiden to her elders," said Mrs.
Schlosster. "In my country the young have more respect, as is right."

Mrs. Bell objected inwardly to any reprimand of her child by others; but
she agreed to the principle advanced and made no comment.

Diantha listened to quite a volume of detailed criticism, inquiry and
condemnation, and finally rose to her feet with the stiff courtesy of the
young.

"You must excuse me now," she said with set lips. "I have some
necessary work to do."

She marched upstairs, shut her bedroom door and locked it, raging
inwardly. "Its none of their business! Not a shadow! Why should Mother sit
there and let them talk to me like that! One would think childhood had no
limit—unless it's matrimony!"

This reminded her of her younger sister's airs of superior wisdom, and
did not conduce to a pleasanter frame of mind. "With all their miserable
little conventions and idiocies! And what 'they'll say,' and 'they'll think'! As
if I cared! Minnie'll be just such another!"

She heard the ladies going out, still talking continuously, a faint response
from her mother now and then, a growing quiet as their steps receded

toward the gate; and then another deeper voice took up the theme and
heavily approached.

It was the minister! Diantha dropped into her rocker and held the arms
tight. "Now I'll have to take it again I suppose. But he ought to know me
well enough to understand."

"Diantha!" called her mother, "Here's Dr. Major;" and the girl washed her
face and came down again.

Dr. Major was a heavy elderly man with a strong mouth and a warm hand
clasp. "What's all this I hear about you, young lady?" he demanded, holding
her hand and looking her straight in the eye. "Is this a new kind of Prodigal
Daughter we're encountering?"

He did not look nor sound condemnatory, and as she faced him she
caught a twinkle in the wise old eyes.

"You can call it that if you want to," she said, "Only I thought the
Prodigal Son just spent his money—I'm going to earn some."

"I want you to talk to Diantha, Doctor Major," Mrs. Bell struck in. "I'm
going to ask you to excuse me, and go and lie down for a little. I do believe
she'll listen to you more than to anybody."

The mother retired, feeling sure that the good man who had known her
daughter for over fifteen years would have a restraining influence now; and
Diantha braced herself for the attack.

It came, heavy and solid, based on reason, religion, tradition, the custom
of ages, the pastoral habit of control and protection, the father's instinct, the
man's objection to a girl's adventure. But it was courteous, kind, and

rationally put, and she met it point by point with the whole-souled
arguments of a new position, the passionate enthusiasm of her years.

They called a truce.

"I can see that you think its your duty, young, woman—that's the main
thing. I think you're wrong. But what you believe to be right you have to do.
That's the way we learn my dear, that's the way we learn! Well—you've
been a good child ever since I've known you. A remarkably good child. If
you have to sow this kind of wild oats—" they both smiled at this, "I guess
we can't stop you. I'll keep your secret—"

"Its not a secret really," the girl explained, "I'll tell them as soon as I'm
settled. Then they can tell—if they want to." And they both smiled again.

"Well—I won't tell till I hear of it then. And—yes, I guess I can furnish
that document with a clean conscience."

She gave him paper and pen and he wrote, with a grin, handing her the
result.

She read it, a girlish giggle lightening the atmosphere. "Thank you!" she
said earnestly. "Thank you ever so much. I knew you would help me."

"If you get stuck anywhere just let me know," he said rising. "This
Proddy Gal may want a return ticket yet!"

"I'll walk first!" said Diantha.

"O Dr. Major," cried her mother from the window, "Don't go! We want
you to stay to supper of course!"

But he had other calls to make, he said, and went away, his big hands
clasped behind him; his head bent, smiling one minute and shaking his head
the next.

Diantha leaned against a pearly eucalyptus trunk and watched him. She
would miss Dr. Major. But who was this approaching? Her heart sank
miserably. Mrs. Warden—and all the girls.

She went to meet them—perforce. Mrs. Warden had always been kind
and courteous to her; the girls she had not seen very much of, but they had
the sweet Southern manner, were always polite. Ross's mother she must
love. Ross's sisters too—if she could. Why did the bottom drop out of her
courage at sight of them?

"You dear child!" said Mrs. Warden, kissing her. "I know just how you
feel! You want to help my boy! That's your secret! But this won't do it, my
dear!"

"You've no idea how badly Ross feels!" said Madeline. "Mrs. Delafield
dropped in just now and told us. You ought to have seen him!"

"He didn't believe it of course," Adeline put in. "And he wouldn't say a
thing—not a thing to blame you."

"We said we'd come over right off—and tried to bring him—but he said
he'd got to go back to the store," Coraline explained.

"He was mad though!" said Dora—"I know."

Diantha looked from one to the other helplessly.

"Come in! Come in!" said Mrs. Bell hospitably. "Have this rocker, Mrs.
Warden—wouldn't you like some cool drink? Diantha?"

"No indeed!" Mrs. Warden protested. "Don't get a thing. We're going
right back, it's near supper time. No, we can't think of staying, of course
not, no indeed!—But we had to come over and hear about this dear child's
idea!—Now tell us all about it, Diantha!"

There they sat—five pairs of curious eyes—and her mother's sad ones—
all kind—all utterly incapable of understanding.

She moistened her lips and plunged desperately. "It is nothing dreadful,
Mrs. Warden. Plenty of girls go away to earn their livings nowadays. That is
all I'm doing."

"But why go away?"

"I thought you were earning your living before!"

"Isn't teaching earning your living?"

"What are you going to do?" the girls protested variously, and Mrs.
Warden, with a motherly smile, suggested—

"That doesn't explain your wanting to leave Ross, my dear—and your
mother!"

"I don't want to leave them," protested Diantha, trying to keep her voice
steady. "It is simply that I have made up my mind I can do better
elsewhere."

"Do what better?" asked Mrs. Warden with sweet patience, which
reduced
Diantha to the bald statement, "Earn more money in less time."

"And is that better than staying with your mother and your lover?"
pursued the gentle inquisitor; while the girls tried, "What do you want to
earn more money for?" and "I thought you earned a lot before."

Now Diantha did not wish to state in so many words that she wanted
more money in order to marry sooner—she had hardly put it to herself that
way. She could not make them see in a few moments that her plan was to do
far more for her mother than she would otherwise ever be able to. And as to
making them understand the larger principles at stake—the range and depth
of her full purpose—that would be physically impossible.

"I am sorry!" she said with trembling lips. "I am extremely sorry.
But—I cannot explain!"

Mrs. Warden drew herself up a little. "Cannot explain to me?—Your
mother, of course, knows?"

"Diantha is naturally more frank with me than with—anyone," said Mrs.
Bell proudly, "But she does not wish her—business—plans—made public
at present!"

Her daughter looked at her with vivid gratitude, but the words "made
public" were a little unfortunate perhaps.

"Of course," Mrs. Warden agreed, with her charming smile, "that we can
quite understand. I'm sure I should always wish my girls to feel so.
Madeline—just show Mrs. Bell that necktie you're making—she was asking
about the stitch, you remember."

The necktie was produced and admired, while the other girls asked
Diantha if she had her fall dressmaking done yet—and whether she found

wash ribbon satisfactory. And presently the whole graceful family
withdrew, only Dora holding her head with visible stiffness.

Diantha sat on the floor by her mother, put her head in her lap and cried.
"How splendid of you, Mother!" she sobbed. "How simply splendid! I will
tell you now—if—if—you won't tell even Father—yet."

"Dear child" said her Mother, "I'd rather not know in that case. It is—
easier."

"That's what I kept still for!" said the girl. "It's hard enough, goodness
knows—as it is! Its nothing wicked, or even risky, Mother dear—and as far
as I can see it is right!"

Her mother smiled through her tears. "If you say that, my dear child, I
know there's no stopping you. And I hate to argue with you—even for your
own sake, because it is so much to my advantage to have you here. I—shall
miss you—Diantha!"

"Don't, Mother!" sobbed the girl.

"Its natural for the young to go. We expect it—in time. But you are so
young yet—and—well, I had hoped the teaching would satisfy you till Ross
was ready."

Diantha sat up straight.

"Mother! can't you see Ross'll never be ready! Look at that family! And
the way they live! And those mortgages! I could wait and teach and save a
little even with Father always losing money; but I can't see Ross wearing
himself out for years and years—I just can't bear it!"

Her mother stroked her fair hair softly, not surprised that her own plea
was so lost in thought of the brave young lover.

"And besides," the girl went on "If I waited—and saved—and married
Ross—what becomes of you, I'd like to know? What I can't stand is to have
you grow older and sicker—and never have any good time in all your life!"

Mrs. Bell smiled tenderly. "You dear child!" she said; as if an affectionate
five-year old had offered to get her a rainbow, "I know you mean it all for
the best. But, O my dearest! I'd rather have you—here—at home with me
—-than any other 'good time' you can imagine!"

She could not see the suffering in her daughter's face; but she felt she had
made an impression, and followed it up with heart-breaking sincerity. She
caught the girl to her breast and held her like a little child. "O my baby! my
baby! Don't leave your mother. I can't bear it!"

A familiar step outside, heavy, yet uncertain, and they both looked at
each other with frightened eyes.

They had forgotten the biscuit.

"Supper ready?" asked Mr. Bell, with grim humor.

"It will be in a moment, Father," cried Diantha springing to her feet.
"At least—in a few moments."

"Don't fret the child, Father," said Mrs. Henderson softly. "She's feeling
bad enough."

"Sh'd think she would," replied her husband. "Moreover—to my mind—
she ought to."

He got out the small damp local paper and his pipe, and composed
himself in obvious patience: yet somehow this patience seemed to fill the
kitchen, and to act like a ball and chain to Diantha's feet.

She got supper ready, at last, making griddle-cakes instead of biscuit, and
no comment was made of the change: but the tension in the atmosphere was
sharply felt by the two women; and possibly by the tall old man, who ate
less than usual, and said absolutely nothing.

"I'm going over to see Edwards about that new incubator," he said when
the meal was over, and departed; and Mrs. Bell, after trying in vain to do
her mending, wiped her clouded glasses and went to bed.

Diantha made all neat and tidy; washed her own wet eyes again, and
went out under the moon. In that broad tender mellow light she drew a deep
breath and stretched her strong young arms toward the sky in dumb appeal.

"I knew it would be hard," she murmured to herself, "That is I knew the
facts—but I didn't know the feeling!"

She stood at the gate between the cypresses, sat waiting under the acacia
boughs, walked restlessly up and down the path outside, the dry pepper
berries crush softly under foot; bracing herself for one more struggle—and
the hardest of all.

"He will understand!" he told herself, over and over, but at the bottom of
her heart she knew he wouldn't.

He came at last; a slower, wearier step than usual; came and took both
her hands in his and stood holding them, looking at her questioningly. Then
he held her face between his palms and made her look at him. Her eyes
were brave and steady, but the mouth trembled in spite of her.

He stilled it with a kiss, and drew her to a seat on the bench beside him.
"My poor Little Girl! You haven't had a chance yet to really tell me about
this thing, and I want you to right now. Then I'm going to kill about forty
people in this town! Somebody has been mighty foolish."

She squeezed his hand, but found it very difficult to speak. His love, his
sympathy, his tenderness, were so delicious after this day's trials—and
before those further ones she could so well anticipate. She didn't wish to cry
any more, that would by no means strengthen her position, and she found
she couldn't seem to speak without crying.

"One would think to hear the good people of this town that you were
about to leave home and mother for—well, for a trip to the moon!" he
added. "There isn't any agreement as to what you're going to do, but they're
unanimous as to its being entirely wrong. Now suppose you tell me about
it."

"I will," said Diantha. "I began to the other night, you know, you first of
course—it was too bad! your having to go off at that exact moment. Then I
had to tell mother—because—well you'll see presently. Now dear—just let
me say it all—before you—do anything."

"Say away, my darling. I trust you perfectly."

She flashed a grateful look at him. "It is this way, my dear. I have two,
three, yes four, things to consider:—My own personal problem—my
family's—yours—and a social one."

"My family's?" he asked, with a faint shade of offence in his tone.

"No no dear—your own," she explained.

"Better cut mine out, Little Girl," he said. "I'll consider that myself."

"Well—I won't talk about it if you don't want me to. There are the other
three."

"I won't question your second, nor your imposing third, but isn't the first
one—your own personal problem—a good deal answered?" he suggested,
holding her close for a moment.

"Don't!" she said. "I can't talk straight when you put it that way."

She rose hurriedly and took a step or two up and down. "I don't suppose
—in spite of your loving me, that I can make you see it as I do. But I'll be
just as clear as I can. There are some years before us before we can be
together. In that time I intend to go away and undertake a business I am
interested in. My purpose is to—develop the work, to earn money, to help
my family, and to—well, not to hinder you."

"I don't understand, I confess," he said. "Don't you propose to tell me
what this 'work' is?"

"Yes—I will—certainly. But not yet dear! Let me try to show you how
I feel about it."

"Wait," said he. "One thing I want to be sure of. Are you doing this with
any quixotic notion of helping me—in my business? Helping me to take
care of my family? Helping me to—" he stood up now, looking very tall and
rather forbidding, "No, I won't say that to you."

"Would there be anything wrong in my meaning exactly that?" she asked,
holding her own head a little higher; "both what you said and what you
didn't?"

"It would be absolutely wrong, all of it," he answered. "I cannot believe
that the woman I love would—could take such a position."

"Look here, Ross!" said the girl earnestly. "Suppose you knew where
there was a gold mine—knew it—and by going away for a few years you
could get a real fortune—wouldn't you do it?"

"Naturally I should," he agreed.

"Well, suppose it wasn't a gold mine, but a business, a new system like
those cigar stores—or—some patent amusement specialty—or anything—
that you knew was better than what you're doing—wouldn't you have a
right to try it?"

"Of course I should—but what has that to do with this case?"

"Why it's the same thing! Don't you see? I have plans that will be of real
benefit to all of us, something worth while to do—and not only for us but
for everybody—a real piece of progress—and I'm going to leave my people
—and even you!—for a little while—to make us all happier later on."

He smiled lovingly at her but shook his head slowly. "You dear, brave,
foolish child!" he said. "I don't for one moment doubt your noble purposes.
But you don't get the man's point of view—naturally. What's more you don't
seem to get the woman's."

"Can you see no other point of view than those?" she asked.

"There are no others," he answered. "Come! come! my darling, don't add
this new difficulty to what we've got to carry! I know you have a hard time
of it at home. Some day, please God, you shall have an easier one! And I'm
having a hard time too—I don't deny it. But you are the greatest joy and
comfort I have, dear—you know that. If you go away—it will be harder and
slower and longer—that's all. I shall have you to worry about too. Let

somebody else do the gold-mine, dear—you stay here and comfort your
Mother as long as you can—and me. How can I get along without you?"

He tried to put his arm around her again, but she drew back. "Dear," she
said. "If I deliberately do what I think is right—against your wishes—what
will you do?"

"Do?" The laughed bitterly. "What can I do? I'm tied by the leg here—l
can't go after you. I've nothing to pull you out of a scrape with if you get in
one. I couldn't do anything but—stand it."

"And if I go ahead, and do what you don't like—and make you—suffer—
would you—would you rather be free?" Her voice was very low and
shaken, but he heard her well enough.

"Free of you? Free of you?" He caught her and held her and kissed her
over and over.

"You are mine!" he said. "You have given yourself to me! You cannot
leave me. Neither of us is free—ever again." But she struggled away from
him.

"Both of us are free—to do what we think right, always Ross! I
wouldn't try to stop you if you thought it was your duty to go to the
North Pole!" She held him a little way off. "Let me tell you, dear.
Sit down—let me tell you all about it." But he wouldn't sit down.

"I don't think I want to know the details," he said. "It doesn't much matter
what you're going to do—if you really go away. I can't stop you—I see that.
If you think this thing is your 'duty' you'll do it if it kills us all—and you
too! If you have to go—I shall do nothing—can do nothing—but wait till

you come back to me! Whatever happens, darling—no matter how you fail
—don't ever be afraid to come back to me."

He folded his arms now—did not attempt to hold her—gave her the
freedom she asked and promised her the love she had almost feared to lose
—and her whole carefully constructed plan seemed like a child's sand castle
for a moment; her heroic decision the wildest folly.

He was not even looking at her; she saw his strong, clean-cut profile dark
against the moonlit house, a settled patience in its lines. Duty! Here was
duty, surely, with tenderest happiness. She was leaning toward him—her
hand was seeking his, when she heard through the fragrant silence a sound
from her mother's room—the faint creak of her light rocking chair. She
could not sleep—she was sitting up with her trouble, bearing it quietly as
she had so many others.

The quiet everyday tragedy of that distasteful life—the slow withering
away of youth and hope and ambition into a gray waste of ineffectual
submissive labor—not only of her life, but of thousands upon thousands
like her—it all rose up like a flood in the girl's hot young heart.

Ross had turned to her—was holding out his arms to her. "You won't go,
my darling!" he said.

"I am going Wednesday on the 7.10," said Diantha.

THE "ANTI" AND THE FLY

The fly upon the Cartwheel
Thought he made all the Sound;

He thought he made the Cart go on—
And made the wheels go round.

The Fly upon the Cartwheel
Has won undying fame
For Conceit that was colossal,
And Ignorance the same.

But to-day he has a Rival
As we roll down History's Track—
For the "Anti" on the Cartwheel
Thinks she makes the Wheels go back!

THE BARREL

I was walking, peacefully enough, along a plain ordinary road, when I lifted
my head and observed an impressive gateway. The pillars were of stone,
high, carven, massive; mighty gates of wrought iron hung between them,
the gray wall stretched away on either side.

As the gates were open and there was no prohibitory sign, I entered, and
for easy miles walked on; under the springing arches of tall elms, flat roofs
of beech, and level fans of fir and pine; through woodland, park and
meadow, with glimpses of starred lily-ponds, blue lakelets, and bright
brooks; seeing the dappled deer, the swans and pheasants—a glorious place
indeed.

Then a smooth turn, and across velvet lawns and statued gardens I saw a
towering palace, so nobly beautiful, so majestic, I took off my hat
involuntarily. Approaching it I was met by courteous servingmen; told that

it was open to visitors; and shown from hall to hall, from floor to floor;
where every object was a work of art; where line, color and proportion,
perfect architecture and fitting decoration made an overwhelming beauty.

"Whose it is?" I inquired. "Some Duke?—King?—Emperor? Who owns
this palace?—this glorious estate?"

They bowed and offered to lead me to him.

Downward and toward the back; through servants' apartments; through
workroom, scullery and stable; out to the last and least and meanest little
yard; narrow and dark, stone-paved, stone-walled, shadowed by caves of
barns; there, huddled in a barrel, they pointed out a man.

They bowed to him, they called him master. They told me he was the
owner of this vast estate.

I could not believe it—but they stood bowing—and he ordered them
away.

"What!" I cried. "You!—you are the owner—the master of all this wealth
of beauty—this beauty of wealth! You own these miles of breezy upland
and rich valley—still forests and bright lakes! You own these noble trees—
those overflowing flowers—those glades of browsing deer! You own this
palace—a joy to the eye and uplift to the soul! This majesty and splendor—
this comfort, beauty, form, you own all this—and are living—here."

He regarded me superciliously, with a weary expression.

"Young man," he said, "you are a dreamer—a visionary—a Utopian!—an
idealist! You should consider Facts, my young sir; fix your mind on Facts!
The Fact is that I live in this Barrel."

It was a fact;—he did visibly live in the Barrel.

It was also a fact that he owned that vast estate.

And there was no lid on the Barrel.

OUR ANDROCENTRIC CULTURE; or, THE MAN-MADE WORLD

III.

HEALTH AND BEAUTY.

NOTE—The word "Androcentric" we owe to Prof. Lester F. Ward. In his
book, "Pure Sociology," Chap. 14, he describes the Androcentric Theory of
life, hitherto universally accepted; and introduces his own "Gyneacocentric
Theory." All who are interested in the deeper scientific aspects of this
question are urged to read that chapter. Prof. Ward's theory is to my mind
the most important that has been offered the world since the Theory of
Evolution; and without exception the most important that has ever been put
forward concerning women.

Among the many paradoxes which we find in human life is our low
average standard of health and beauty, compared with our power and
knowledge. All creatures suffer from conflict with the elements; from
enemies without and within—the prowling devourers of the forest, and "the
terror that walketh in darkness" and attacks the body from inside, in hidden
millions.

Among wild animals generally, there is a certain standard of excellence;
if you shoot a bear or a bird, it is a fair sample of the species; you do not
say, "O what an ugly one!" or "This must have been an invalid!"

Where we have domesticated any animal, and interfered with its natural
habits, illness has followed; the dog is said to have the most diseases second
to man; the horse comes next; but the wild ones put us to shame by their
superior health and the beauty that belongs to right development.

In our long ages of blind infancy we assume that sickness was a visitation
frown the gods; some still believe this, holding it to be a special prerogative
of divinity to afflict us in this way. We speak of "the ills that flesh is heir to"
as if the inheritance was entailed and inalienable. Only of late years, after
much study and long struggle with this old belief which made us submit to
sickness as a blow from the hand of God, we are beginning to learn
something of the many causes of our many diseases, and how to remove
some of them.

It is still true, however, that almost every one of us is to some degree
abnormal; the features asymmetrical, the vision defective, the digestion
unreliable, the nervous system erratic—we are but a job lot even in what we
call "good health"; and are subject to a burden of pain and premature death
that would make life hideous if it were not so ridiculously unnecessary.

As to beauty—we do not think of expecting it save in the rarely
exceptional case. Look at the faces—the figures—in any crowd you meet;
compare the average man or the average woman with the normal type of
human beauty as given us in picture and statue; and consider if there is not
some general cause for so general a condition of ugliness.

Moreover, leaving our defective bodies concealed by garments; what are
those garments, as conducive to health and beauty? Is the practical ugliness

of our men's attire, and the impractical absurdity of our women's, any
contribution to human beauty? Look at our houses—are they beautiful?
Even the houses of the rich?

We do not even know that we ought to live in a world of overflowing
loveliness; and that our contribution to it should be the loveliest of all. We
are so sodden in the dull ugliness of our interiors, so used to calling a tame
weary low-toned color scheme "good taste," that only children dare frankly
yearn for Beauty—and they are speedily educated out of it.

The reasons specially given for our low standards of health and beauty
are ignorance, poverty, and the evil effects of special trades. The Man with
the Hoe becomes brother to the ox because of over-much hoeing; the
housepainter is lead-poisoned because of his painting; books have been
written to show the injurious influence of nearly all our industries upon
workers.

These causes are sound as far as they go; but do not cover the whole
ground.

The farmer may be muscle-bound and stooping from his labor; but that
does not account for his dyspepsia or his rheumatism.

Then we allege poverty as covering all. Poverty does cover a good deal.
But when we find even a half-fed savage better developed than a well paid
cashier; and a poor peasant woman a more vigorous mother than the idle
wife of a rich man, poverty is not enough.

Then we say ignorance explains it. But there are most learned professors
who are ugly and asthmathic; there are even doctors who can boast no
beauty and but moderate health; there are some of the petted children of the

wealthy, upon whom every care is lavished from birth, and who still are ill
to look at and worse to marry.

All these special causes are admitted, given their due share in lowering
our standards, but there is another far more universal in its application and
its effects. Let us look back on our little ancestors the beasts, and see what
keeps them so true to type.

The type itself set by that balance of conditions and forces we call
"natural selection." As the environment changes they must be adapted to it,
if they cannot so adapt themselves they die. Those who live are, by living,
proven capable of maintaining themselves. Every creature which has
remained on earth, while so many less effective kinds died out, remains as a
conqueror. The speed of the deer—the constant use of speed—is what keeps
it alive and makes it healthy and beautiful. The varied activities of the life
of a leopard are what have developed the sinuous gracile strength we so
admire. It is what the creature does for its living, its daily life-long exercise
which makes it what it is.

But there is another great natural force which works steadily to keep all
animals up to the race standard; that is sexual selection. Throughout nature
the male is the variant, as we have already noted. His energy finds vent not
only in that profuse output of decorative appendages Ward defines as
"masculine efflorescence" but in variations not decorative, not useful or
desirable at all.

The female, on the other hand, varies much less, remaining nearer the
race type; and her function is to select among these varying males the
specimens most valuable to the race. In the intense masculine competition
the victor must necessarily be stronger than his fellows; he is first proven
equal to his environment by having lived to grow up, then more than equal
to his fellows by overcoming them. This higher grade of selection also

develops not only the characteristics necessary to make a living; but
secondary ones, often of a purely aesthetic nature, which make much of
what we call beauty. Between the two, all who live must be up to a certain
grade, and those who become parents must be above it; a masterly
arrangement surely!

Here is where, during the period of our human history, we in our
newborn consciousness and imperfect knowledge, have grieviously
interfered with the laws of nature. The ancient proprietary family, treating
the woman as a slave, keeping her a prisoner and subject to the will of her
master, cut her off at once from the exercise of those activities which alone
develop and maintain the race type.

Take the one simple quality of speed. We are a creature built for speed, a
free swift graceful animal; and among savages this is still seen—the
capacity for running, mile after mile, hour after hour. Running is as natural
a gait for genus homo as for genus cervus. Now suppose among deer, the
doe was prohibited from running; the stag continuing free on the mountain;
the doe living in caves and pens, unequal to any exercise. The effect on the
species would be, inevitably, to reduce its speed.

In this way, by keeping women to one small range of duties, and in most
cases housebound, we have interfered with natural selection and its
resultant health and beauty. It can easily be seen what the effect on the race
would have been if all men had been veiled and swathed, hidden in harems,
kept to the tent or house, and confined to the activities of a house-servant.
Our stalwart laborers, our proud soldiers, our athletes, would never have
appeared under such circumstances. The confinement to the house alone,
cutting women off from sunshine and air, is by itself an injury; and the
range of occupation allowed them is not such as to develop a high standard
of either health or beauty. Thus we have cut off half the race from the

strengthening influence of natural selection, and so lowered our race-
standards in large degree.

This alone, however, would not have hid such mischievous effects but for
our further blunder in completely reversing nature's order of sexual
selection. It is quite possible that even under confinement and restriction
women could have kept up the race level, passably, through this great
function of selection; but here is the great fundamental error of the
Androcentric Culture. Assuming to be the possessor of women, their owner
and master, able at will to give, buy and sell, or do with as he pleases, man
became the selector.

It seems a simple change; and in those early days, wholly ignorant of
natural laws, there was no suspicion that any mischief would result. In the
light of modern knowledge, however, the case is clear. The woman was
deprived of the beneficent action of natural selection, and the man was then,
by his own act, freed from the stern but elevating effect of sexual selection.
Nothing was required of the woman by natural selection save such capacity
as should please her master; nothing was required of the man by sexual
selection save power to take by force, or buy, a woman.

It does not take a very high standard of feminine intelligence, strength,
skill, health, or beauty to be a houseservant, or even a housekeeper; witness
the average.

It does not take a very high standard of masculine, intelligence, strength,
skill, health or beauty to maintain a woman in that capacity—witness
average.

Here at the very root of our physiological process, at the beginning of
life, we have perverted the order of nature, and are suffering the
consequences.

It has been held by some that man as the selector has developed beauty,
more beauty than we had before; and we point to the charms of our women
as compared with those of the squaw. The answer to this is that the squaw
belongs to a decadent race; that she too is subject to the man, that the
comparison to have weight should be made between our women and the
women of the matriarchate—an obvious impossibility. We have not on earth
women in a state of normal freedom and full development; but we have
enough difference in their placing to learn that human strength and beauty
grows with woman's freedom and activity.

The second answer is that much of what man calls beauty in woman is
not human beauty at all, but gross overdevelopment of certain points which
appeal to him as a male. The excessive fatness, previously referred to, is a
case in point; that being considered beauty in a woman which is in reality
an element of weakness, inefficiency and ill-health. The relatively small
size of women, deliberately preferred, steadfastly chosen, and so built into
the race, is a blow at real human progress in every particular. In our upward
journey we should and do grow larger, leaving far behind us our dwarfish
progenitors. Yet the male, in his unnatural position as selector, preferring
for reasons both practical and sentimental, to have "his woman" smaller
than himself, has deliberately striven to lower the standard of size in the
race. We used to read in the novels of the last generation, "He was a
magnificent specimen of manhood"—"Her golden head reached scarcely to
his shoulder"—"She was a fairy creature—the tiniest of her sex." Thus we
have mated, and yet expected that by some hocus pocus the boys would all
"take after their father," and the girls, their mother. In his efforts to improve
the breed of other animals, man has never tried to deliberately cross the
large and small and expect to keep up the standard of size.

As a male he is appealed to by the ultra-feminine, and has given small
thought to effects on the race. He was not designed to do the selecting.

Under his fostering care we have bred a race of women who are physically
weak enough to be handed about like invalids; or mentally weak enough to
pretend they are—and to like it. We have made women who respond so
perfectly to the force which made them, that they attach all their idea of
beauty to those characteristics which attract men; sometimes humanly ugly
without even knowing it.

For instance, our long restriction to house-limits, the heavy limitations of
our clothing, and the heavier ones of traditional decorum, have made
women disproportionately short-legged. This is a particularly undignified
and injurious characteristic, bred in women and inherited by men, most seen
among those races which keep their women most closely. Yet when one
woman escapes the tendency and appears with a normal length of femur
and tibia, a normal height of hip and shoulder, she is criticized and called
awkward by her squatty sisters!

The most convenient proof of the inferiority of women in human beauty
is shown by those composite statues prepared by Mr. Sargent for the
World's Fair of '93. These were made from gymnasium measurements of
thousands of young collegians of both sexes all over America. The statue of
the girl has a pretty face, small hands and feet, rather nice arms, though
weak; but the legs are too thick and short; the chest and shoulders poor; and
the trunk is quite pitiful in its weakness. The figure of the man is much
better proportioned.

Thus the effect on human beauty of masculine selection.

Beyond this positive deteriorative effect on women through man's
arbitrary choice comes the negative effect of woman's lack of choice.
Bought or stolen or given by her father, she was deprived of the innately
feminine right and duty of choosing. "Who giveth this woman?" we still

inquire in our archaic marriage service, and one man steps forward and
gives her to another man.

Free, the female chose the victor, and the vanquished went unmated—
and without progeny. Dependent, having to be fed and cared for by some
man, the victors take their pick perhaps, but the vanquished take what is
left; and the poor women, "marrying for a home," take anything. As a
consequence the inferior male is as free to transmit his inferiority as the
superior to give better qualities, and does so—beyond computation. In
modern days, women are freer, in some countries freer than in others; here
in modern America freest of all; and the result is seen in our improving
standards of health and beauty.

Still there remains the field of inter-masculine competition, does there
not? Do not the males still struggle together? Is not that as of old, a source
of race advantage?

To some degree it is. When life was simple and our activities consisted
mainly in fighting and hard work; the male who could vanquish the others
was bigger and stronger. But inter-masculine competition ceases to be of
such advantage when we enter the field of social service. What is required
in organized society is the specialization of the individual, the development
of special talents, not always of immediate benefit to the man himself, but
of ultimate benefit to society. The best social servant, progressive, meeting
future needs, is almost always at a disadvantage besides the well-
established lower types. We need, for social service, qualities quite different
from the simple masculine characteristics—desire, combat, self-expression.

By keeping what we call "the outside world" so wholly male, we keep up
masculine standards at the expense of human ones. This may be broadly
seen in the slow and painful development of industry and science as

compared to the easy dominance of warfare throughout all history until our
own times.

The effect of all this ultra masculine competition upon health and beauty
is but too plainly to be seen. Among men the male idea of what is good
looking is accentuated beyond reason. Read about any "hero" you please; or
study the products of the illustrator and note the broad shoulders, the rugged
features, the strong, square, determined jaw. That jaw is in evidence if
everything else fails. He may be cross-eyed, wide-eared, thick-necked,
bandy-legged—what you please; but he must have a more or less
prognathous jaw.

Meanwhile any anthropologist will show you that the line of human
development is away from that feature of the bulldog and the alligator, and
toward the measured dignity of the Greek type. The possessor of that kind
of jaw may enable male to conquer male, but does not make him of any
more service to society; of any better health or higher beauty.

Further, in the external decoration of our bodies, what is the influence
here of masculine dominance.

We have before spoken of the peculiar position of our race in that the
woman is the only female creature who carries the burden of sex ornament.
This amazing reversal of the order of nature results at its mildest in a
perversion of the natural feminine instincts of love and service, and an
appearance of the masculine instincts of self-expression and display. Alone
among all female things do women decorate and preen themselves and
exhibit their borrowed plumage (literally!) to attract the favor of the male.
This ignominy is forced upon them by their position of economic
dependence; and their general helplessness. As all broader life is made to
depend, for them, on whom they marry, indeed as even the necessities of

life so often depend on their marrying someone, they have been driven into
this form of competition, so alien to the true female attitude.

The result is enough to make angels weep—and laugh. Perhaps no step in
the evolution of beauty went farther than our human power of making a
continuous fabric; soft and mobile, showing any color and texture desired.
The beauty of the human body is supreme, and when we add to it the flow
of color, the ripple of fluent motion, that comes of a soft, light garment over
free limbs—it is a new field of loveliness and delight. Naturally this should
have filled the whole world with a new pleasure. Our garments, first under
right natural selection developing perfect use, under right sex selection
developing beauty; and further, as our human aesthetic sense progresses,
showing a noble symbolism, would have been an added strength and glory,
a ceaseless joy.

What is the case?

Men, under a too strictly inter-masculine environment, have evolved the
mainly useful but beautiless costume common to-day; and women—?

Women wear beautiful garments when they happen to be the fashion; and
ugly garments when they are the fashion, and show no signs of knowing the
difference. They show no added pride in the beautiful, no hint of
mortification in the hideous, and are not even sensitive under criticism, or
open to any persuasion or argument. Why should they be?

Their condition, physical and mental, is largely abnormal, their whole
passionate absorption in dress and decoration is abnormal, and they have
never looked, from a frankly human standpoint, at their position and its
peculiarities, until the present age.

In the effect of our wrong relation on the world's health, we have spoken
of the check to vigor and growth due to the housebound state of women and
their burdensome clothes. There follow other influences, similar in origin,
even more evil in result. To roughly and briefly classify we may distinguish
the diseases due to bad air, to bad food, and that field of cruel mischief we
are only now beginning to discuss—the diseases directly due to the
erroneous relation between men and women.

We are the only race where the female depends on the male for a
livelihood. We are the only race that practices prostitution. From the first
harmless-looking but abnormal general relation follows the well recognized
evil of the second, so long called "a social necessity," and from it, in deadly
sequence, comes the "wages of sin;" death not only of the guilty, but of the
innocent. It is no light part of our criticism of the Androcentric Culture that
a society based on masculine desires alone, has willingly sacrificed such an
army of women; and has repaid the sacrifice by the heaviest punishments.

That the unfortunate woman should sicken and die was held to be her just
punishment; that man too should bear part penalty was found unavoidable,
though much legislation and medical effort has been spent to shield him;
but to the further consequences society is but now waking up.

COMMENT AND REVIEW

Mr. H. G. Wells is an author whose work I have followed with delight,
interest and respect for years—since first I read that sinister vision of dead
worlds, "The Time Machine." He is a successful craftsman, an artist of
power; and has that requisite so often missing in our literary craftsmen and
artists—something to say. In his mighty work of electrifying the world's

slow mind to the splendid possibilities of life as it might be, may be, will
be, as soon as we wake up, he has my admiring sympathy.

But alas! and alas! Like many another great man, Mr. Wells loses his
perspective and clear vision when he considers women. He sees women as
females—and does not see that they are human; the universal mistake of the
world behind us; but one unworthy of a mind that sees the world before us
so vividly.

He has knowledge, the scientific habit of mind, an enormous imagination
and the courage to use it; he is not, usually, afraid of facts, even when an
admission carries reproach. But in this field he shows simply the old race-
mind, that attitude which considers women as mothers, potential, active,
and in retrospect; and as nothing else. He likes them as mothers. He honors
them as mothers. He wants to have them salaried, as mothers. But he thinks
it quite beyond reason that they should appear as regular members of the
working world; their motherhood, to his mind, would prevent it.

In this attitude he has produced a vivid novel called Ann Veronica; a
book of keen analysis and delicate observation, full of amusing darts and
flashes; seeing and showing much that is absurd in our modern uneasiness
and wavering discussion; and thus explained by himself in The Spectator
(which had denounced the work as "poisonous").

"My book was written primarily to express the resentment and distress
which many women feel nowadays at their unavoidable practical
dependence upon some individual man not of their deliberate choice"; and
he further says he sympathizes with the woman who lives with a man she
does not love; and respects her natural desire to prefer some one man as her
husband and father of her children—a harmless position surely.

To carry out these feelings he has described a girl, vigorous and
handsome, a nice, normal girl, who is crushed and stultified in her home life
and wants to get out of it; as is the case with so many girls today. She wants
freedom—room to grow—more knowledge and power—again as is so
common nowadays. We read with sympathy, admiring his keen sure touch,
hoping much for this brave woman in her dash for freedom.

Then he makes this girl, so strong and intelligent, deliberately refuse
various kinds of work she might have done because they did not please her;
and borrow money from a man in preference to earning her living. She
exposes herself to insult and even danger with an idiocy that even a novel-
reared child of sixteen would have scorned. She falls in love, healthfully
enough, with a fine strong man; and sees no reason for avoiding him when
she learns he is married. She cheerfully elopes with him—quite forgetting
the money she had borrowed, and when she remembers about that abhorrent
debt, expects her companion to pay it, without a qualm apparently.

The ex-wife must have conveniently died after a while; and the man
develops a sudden new talent as a playwright; for they wind up very
respectably in a nice flat, having Ann Veronica's father and aunt to dinner,
and regarding them as a pair of walking mummies. Nothing more is said of
any desire on the part of the heroine for freedom, knowledge,
independence; having attained her man she has attained all; indeed Mr.
Wells goes to the pains to fully express his idea of the case, by describing
her early struggle and outburst as like "the nuptial flight of an ant."

It is hard to see why Mr. Wells, in seeking "to express the resentment and
distress which many women feel nowadays" at their dependence; and in
showing sympathy with their natural right of choice, should have burdened
himself with all this unnecessary complication of special foolishness on the
part of his heroine which alienates our sympathy; and special illegality on

the man's position. Perhaps this is to add heroism to her effort to secure the
right mate, to indicate how small are any other considerations in
comparison to this primary demand of life.

Waiving all objections to this framework of the story, there remains the
painful exhibition of Mr. Wells's misapprehension of the larger causes of the
present unrest among women. What later historians will point out as the
most distinguishing feature of our time, its importance shared only by the
movement towards economic democracy, is the sudden and irresistible
outburst of human powers, human feeling, human activities, and in that half
the world hitherto denied such experiences.

Ann Veronica, as at first portrayed, shared in this world impulse. She
wanted to be human, and tried to be. Her masculine interpreter, seeing no
possible interests in the woman's life except those of sex, dismisses all that
passionate outgoing as comparable to the mating impulse of insects. He
overestimates the weight of this department of life, a mistake common to
most men and some women.

When opposed, the protagonists of this position cry that their opponent
wishes to unsex women; to repudiate motherhood; and see in all the natural
development of the modern woman only a threat of decreased population.

Cannot Mr. Wells, as one acquainted with zoology, see that both male and
female of a species are alike in the special qualities of that species, although
differing in sex? Can he not see that the area of human life, the social
development of humanity, is one quite common to both men and women;
and that a woman, however amply occupied in wife and mother-hood,
suffers from lack of human relation, if denied it, even as a man would,
whose activities were absolutely limited to husband- and father-hood?

*