WOMEN'S REALM.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXV, Issue 94, 20 April 1904, Page 3

WOMEN'S REALM.

THE WIFE A WOEEINGMAN NEEDS. (By Dan. W. Richmond, President International Association of Railway Clerks.) " A workingman's wife should possess health, energy, frugality, amiability, adaptability, sympathy, and, last but not least, patience. Health, is an essential to all the other desirable qualities. It is essential to the future of her children. Everybody has ills, more or less, at various times, and these ills should be attended to, cured, and forgotten. No good can come of the constant recounting of the ills of the past. Each day has its own troubles. Why carry forward any "bad debts" from yesterday? ' Take each day as it comes and make the most of it and "don't worry." Energy is a product of health, and should be cultivated and directed in the proper channel, "systematic performance of her household duties." She should have a time and place for everything, and everything,.in. its time and place. "Time is the stuff life is made of," says Benjamin Franklin. "Every man has exactly the same amount of it in a year. One improves it and reaps great results. Another wastes it and reaps failure. The first class they call lucky; the second unfortunate.. The unfortunate form the mass of mankind, it should be noted. To use time aright, have a system. Shape everything to it. Divide the twenty-four hours between work, recreation, sleep, and mental culture, according to a scheme that suits -your judgment and circumstances, then make things go that way." She should possess frugality. By frugality, I do not mean it should be carried to penuriousness, nor should it be used as. a bulwark against the extravagances of the husband. It, and, in all these qualities, should be mutual. It should be governed by wisdom, taste and tact, those traits of the feminine mind and hand that can keep her from looking passe in any costume, that can elevate any meal, however poor, above the appellation of "grub."' Amiability is the true sunlight of a pure woman's soul. By it she sheds the reflected rays of her own optimism over all with whom she comes in contact, encouraging, elevating and ennobling them. "More power \t the amiable woman." , Sympathy is what even a workingman desires and needs from bis wife at times. A little "coddling," if you please, not enough to make a "nice old lady of him," but just enough and at the proper time to "switch" him from the track of despondency back on to the main line of hope with a "clear target" ahead. Many a good man has gond into the "scrap heap" for the want of a timely and judicious word* of sympathy. Adaptability: She should be able to adapt herself to circumstances, however unexpected, as she may find them. Whether it be good wages and "steady time" or reduced wages and "broken' time," lockouts or strikes for her husband, she is expected to be prepared for and meet them with a smile. In the words of Irving this is best explained. "There is in every true woman's heart a spark of heavenly fire, which lies dormant in the broad daylight of prosperity, but which kindles up, and beams, and blazes in the dark hour of adversity. No man knows what the .wife of his* bosom man knows what a ministering angel she is— Until he has gone with her through the fiery trials of this world." She should be able to make corn meal and potatoes '"loom up" like a table d'hote dinner. She should be able to repair her own clothes and those of her husband and children, and may, in a pinch, be called upon to repair the shoes of the children. In fact, adaptability is worked to the limit. If her amiability is on a par with her adaptability she is a wonder indeed. The patience she should possess'should have made Job round-shouldered carrying it around. Let us view these "should haves" fairly and see what Her reward is for the possession of these almost angelic qualities, especially ii : the "bug" of ambition has lodged in her husband's brain. Almost the. entire task of ''bringing up" the children devolves upon her. His evenings, that were formerly passed at home, are now devoted to agitating (he calls it speaking) in his chosen line, whatever it may be. She is expected to practice the maxim of "Charity begins at home," "He sings to the world, and she to her nest, In the name of sweet nature, which song is the best?" While be is out "whooping 'em up" for the balance of humanity, but somebody must do the agitating; somebody must exercise patience. If bis motives are right and his cause is just, better he than another. And what will be their reward? For him, if he "is on the square," a big funeral and possibly, some day,_a monument; for her, she has the option of making her own livelihood or marrying the second time, which, if she does, it is to be hoped that she marry a "common workingman," with no ambitions and consequently a contented and happy model husband.