WOMAN'S WORLD.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LV, Issue 16761, 30 January 1918, Page 2

WOMAN'S WORLD.

I THE GENTLER SEX. Slvce the first year of the war we hats become Jess polite. Unhappily, most ofus are to blame. We need to "pull ourselves together." The women have doneso splendidly that it is difficult to writ® unkindly about them. But I fear they started the mischief, remarks a writer in an exchange. The strong wine of a new independence' got into their {leads; they began to jostle and crush; they lived hurried lives, they toiled at laborious tasks. Inevitably, they became irritable— rude. At the sales they have gone from bad to worse. Being old-fashioned and fogoyigh, I don't like to see women elbowing and thrusting. I still think of them as the gentler sex. And, perhaps, they have some justification for their impoliteness and hustling methods." And what of the men? Hie men have evolved a method of defence—reprisals, if you prefer it. They have developed the " nice conduct of a news-paper." And, like " the nice conduct of a cane," it is a fascinating exercise. You see it at work on all the crowded ' trains. Watch at focus-points of traffic, 1 whew: multitudes press into the trains. You find the male occupants of the car- ! riage reading their newspapers with fixed attention, as if their several lives depended on it. They read from left to right, from right to left; from the top of che column to the foot, from the foot, to the top. Advertisements appear to be welcomed like refreshing rain aft-er a drought. Yon can discover the habitual offender by his furtive glances over the top of his newspaper as the people crowd in. If he sees ladies surging into a crowded department, his eyes drop, and the already well-digested newspaper is ploughed through again. Thie kind of man never sees a lady standing. He positively can't see anybody standing, even a soldier, burdened with all the complicated burden the infantryman carries. I heard a soldier pass some pungent comments on the " newspaper nose-div-ers," as he called them, recently. He was swinging from the strap, and the ladies around him had also to standi One of the bolder spirits replied that women filled half the smoking-compart-ment at the terminus, instead .if * .■iking seats in the half-filled non-smokers. And that often takes place. I have read somewhere that the politest act'in history was that of the bulky ex-President Taft* who rose in a tramcar, and offered his seat to three ladies. There isn't much of this massive courtesy abroad to-day. Whosoever is at fault, we must resume our normal politeness. If the ladies jostle, men must be patient and kindly. THE LITTLE THINGS. " Nothing matters. It will be all the same a hundred years after this." Wh«t a silly'thing to say. Everything in life matters, down to the smallest detail. So small a thing as the proper shoe-lace for the shoe, or the correct lid for the saucepan, or, further, the just dealing J with our servants or our friends or our ' husbands and children matter as much i in the daily life, as the amount of money i we have to spend. I Our homes are like a puzzle, the house | may be a small one or one Wfiich is so I large and handsome that we are proud I to call it ours, but all the little bits must I fit one into the other we make a I perfect whole. Perfect— chat is perI haps a mistake. Perfection is seldom 1 reached, and when it appea-s we begin ' to suspect it. There are ji st as many ; little things that matter in 1 lie tiny oneroomed cottage as in the ten-roomed house. Method is a little thing that matters. It is easy to get at it if you will just I begin in the rieht way. Sometimes we are born with a methodical mind, and in many cases we get at method up-hill all the way. Now just try with the nearest duty at hand. Someone forgets to wind up the clock, because it is not one person's duty. Just do it yourself, and it is wonderful how soon the'clock with always the correct tims? will help everyone along. It prevents a train being lost. It causes the meals being on the table just at the right time, and amongst the hundred and one other little things it helps the temper of the whole household. DECORATING GLASS. The materials needed for decorating table glassware or toilet-bottles with initials, monograms, etc., are few and inex. pensive. A tin' funnel, holding three pints and three pounds of medium-grade emery-sand will be required. Let a tinsmith add about five feet to the length of the spout of the funnel, end reduce its outlet to about one quarter of an inch. To cut a monogram on a cologne bottle, first draw out the desirod combination of letters on paper with a pencil, and then cut out the monogram. It will now in skeleton form. Now gum the monogram with mucilage to the bottle and cut out a border in square, circle, or oval shape, with or without ornamental edges, and gum this to the bottle. Then the glass will be exposed between the monogram and the surrounding border, and in the interstices of the monogram, and the exposed surfaces are to be cut by allowing a stream of emery-sand to fall thereon, through the long spout of the funnel. , Lay the bottle on its side in a deep bos, with the monogram side upwards, and suspend the funnel so that its outlet will be directly in line with the exposed surfaces of the glass, ana about 3in above the glass. Put the 31b of emery in the funnel, and allow it. to run from the spout of the trough on to the exposed glass. The emery will not damage the paper, but it will" cut the glass very rapidly, although you may have to repeat the operation three or four times. After the glass is cut sufficiently deep, remote the paper, and the monogram will appear sharply outlined in smooth glass, frith the exposed parts of the glass nicely frosted. ON BEING RESERVED. Reserved people are like reserved carriages—only a few privileged persons are allowed to get inside. It's not that they re 1 any different from other railway carriages —they're equally dusty, equally ugly, equally uncomfortable, but they have a i red label on the window to kejjp ordinary travellers out. That's what the reserved girl does. There's not really more in her than in the " bo-friends-at-oncc-and-kiss-me" type of damsel, and she hasn't .nearly such a bracing, brightening effect on her fellow creatures, but because she smiles a little ■ distantly, goes her own way, and is generally ''close" about her personal affairs, those people who don't dislike her, dub her " reserved," imagine depths of feeling .behind the cold'manner, and usually make efforts to know herAnd I maintain it isn't fair. Deep things— thingsare not always the best. The cream's on the top of the milk, isn't it? The sugar icing is— or —always the best part of the cake. Reserved people can be such a nuisance ! , Don't you know the girl who comes home in the evening looking tired, sits down to supper in silence, murmurs " I don t want meat," and makes an unsatisfactory meal off vegetables; repels the dog s advances goes and sits by the window with her chin on her hands, and finally departs to bed early? Wouldn't it be infinitely* more satisfactory if she poured out a flood of grievance on the doormat? How can you be expected to know that she s just heard there's fierce fighting at the place where her Jim is stationed? But, all the same, she expects sympathy, and she usually gets it. Mothers listen to the communicative daughter but- they fuss over the silent one. " She feels it so, I know, they say, confident that the former has tallied the edge off her troubles. So she has probably. That's the great advantage of being able to communicate your woes. A reserved friend of mine once said: "If only I could tell you about it, it wouldn't hurt 60 much, tut I can t. She recognised that it was a disadvantage to be reserved, not something to be superior about., And that's ffMt I'm out to prove I