If Fate had Made them Women.

Auckland Star, Volume XXI, Issue 32, 8 February 1890, Page 4 (Supplement)

If Fate had Made them Women.

An American syndicate has been gleaning from somo well-known men what bhey would do if they were women.

Robert J. Burdette writes :—

What would I do if I wore a woman ?

I wouldn't try to bo a man. Cut that out and patrtoib on your looking-glass, daughter, and it will bo an ornament of grace v .to thy head and chains about thy neck many times a day. I wouldn't shudder and groan every time Ihe namo of the Monster was mentioned, bub I would studiously avoid acquiring the lightest of his many accompli, hments and the best of his manifold ways.

I would never learn to lay a fire, in range or fireplace. Every time I touched a fire, summer or winter, I would pub it dead out; then I'd never be expected to make ono. Tho firsb loaf of bread 1 baked I would let drop on the dog and kill him. Then I'd never be asked to bake bread again, and I'd get a new dog. When I descended into the laundry, I would manage to bring out all tho fancy Qannels, white as ghosts, and all the white Blurts as blue as the skies of June. Then I'd never be asked to assist ab tho wash bub

again. If I had to sit on the front scats when asked to drive, I would carry a large sun umbrella, and gougfl the driver's eyes out, and run tho team into a fence corner the firsb mile oub. Then I'd <jet the backseat on the shady side every time ever after-

ward

I would always sit sideways in a tramcar Then I would have plenty of room.

In church I would never rise during singing, and never kneel during prayer. Then people would notice me, and say, ' Who is that pretty girl, with t-uch lovely eyos ?' At the theatre I would wear tho biggest hat obtainable.

At cricket and lawn-tennis matches I would sit in the front row and raise my

parasol. I would cultivate such charming helplessless, such hopeless innocence, such pretty ignorance, such fascinating dependence, such dainty baby ways, that people would say, ' Oh, we must take care of her : she doesn't understand these things.' Then all my life long I would be petted, and coddled, and fondled, and cared for in a thousand ways, whero more independent women would have to ' hustle for them-

selves.'

Max O'Rell writes thab if he were a woman, ho should consider fow mon, if any, worthy of him. Ho goes on : "If I were a woman, I should expect a triumphal arch erected over each door through which I was about to pass, and each iioor strewn with flowors upon which I was about to tread. This is what I would do. And if the men were to expece me to return any gratitude to-them for it—why, that's just what I would nob do.'

If Doctor Talmage were a woman he would stay a woman. He says :-*-* If there i> anything despicable to my mind, it is an effeminate man or a masculine womanJust in proportion as a woman does her work in the sphere bhab God has appointed for her she will be happy and attractive. There is a great multitude of men now who, by their manners, assume a sorb of womanhood. They want to be soft ; they go simpering through the world, and they are far fiom being of interest to anybody.. A man should bo a man : a woman a woman, and nothing else. There _is no reason why there should be any distinction as to where the line should be thab divides man's appropriate field and woman's particular sphere. Every man knows when he is engaged in his right occupation, and so does every woman, and when they attempt otherwise they become offensive to all sensible men and all sensible women.'