LONG ENGAGEMENTS WOMEN’S CLUBS AND THEIR LITTLE FAILURES

New Zealand Times, Volume LXXVI, Issue 5288, 28 May 1904, Page 13

LONG ENGAGEMENTS

WOMEN’S CLUBS AND THEIR LITTLE FAILURES

The question of a long engagement is one which is almost certain to arise in the life of every man and every girl, unless they happen to belong to the fortunate class to whom money is a matter of no concern. It is such an exceedingly easy thing to fail in love, or, at any rate, to fancy that this crisis has occurred. The inevitable sequel appears t« be an engagement, and to start with tho l also seems quite simple It costs so little to become engaged. A man needs a very small balance at his banker’s to enable him to buy an engagement ring. There is a strange kind of faith in fat© or Providence which is given to yonng people in this condition which makes them believe that some extraordinary miracle wiil take place that will enable them in a short time to marry. They may look round at thoir friend? and acquaintances, and see many of them wearing their lives out under the stress of x long engagement, hut the happy pair of lovers will in some way explain all this away, and assure themselves that for them there will be no long wait, and (hat even if they must wait, this will Joe better than senaration—a state of mind that may prove, however, a great mistake. No man has a right to ask a girl to marry him unless ho can see a good chance of offering her in a reasonable time a home equal to the one in which she has been brought up. And for this statement there are many reasons.

I It is an undoubted fact, bard though ; the statement may appear, that a girl who is engaged does not usually have such a good time as a girl who is quite free. It is true that in ordinary social i life a man does not desire to fall in love with or marry every girl he meets, but he certainly takes a greater interest in her if he realises that there is no impossible barrier to such an eventuality. The girl’s faith, too, in the man to whom she is engaged may be unbounded, but after a time she will be conscious of a feeling, which perhaps she will not admit even to herself, that the other men whom she knows have been able to marry the girls of their choice, while her fiance has railed to make a position in the world which would warrant him in giving her a home. Then the man, after the first flash of excitement is over, will begin to face the conditions of the nosition. Instead of feeling free to take any chance that offers in any part of the world, he will always have an added responsibility upon him that he must do nothing which will make the engagement longer. Before long he will begin that endless and tiring addition sum of how to make two and two equal five. The income which up to the time of his engagement was more or less sufficient for his own needs will appear startingly small when he considers the possibility of having to support someone else on it as well as himself. There-is nothing that lakes the joy of living out of a man’s heart so much as the fear of grinding poverty. And what does poverty mean? It implies going without certain things which are absolute necessities of existence, and to the engaged man marriage soon becomes one of the absolute necessities. In two or three years the hero of the story may find that marriage is as far off as ever, and the question may arise, however loyal and true to the heroine ho may be. "Have I not been unwise? Have I not made a mistake?” Once such a question as this comes into a man’s mind, he is on the high road to the termination of his love story.

It is because those wbo have passed a little further along the road of life have seen the tragedy that then results hannen again and aga'u that fathers and mothers usually,set their faces so sternly againft lone engagements. Vhat. then. is the practical outcome of all this? Surely it is that every man should come to the strong determination to make the homo first before he asks any girl to enter it. He ought not to reverse the process, and sav to the girl, "W’ll you share my home if ever T have one to offer von?” Neither this decision nor the strength to keep it w'll he obtained withont a struggle. Apart from an engagement, if a mnn is serienslv interested in some girl of his acquaintance, and is thinking of Proposing to her, although he is gloriouslv indefinite as to his chances or marrying her, tUera are two courses open to him. If he has himself well in hand, and he thinks that he has not gained the girl’s affections (though that is not the last thing in the* world about which any man can bo cer. tain), and if he thinks that he can go on meeting her without the friendsh'p getting tho better of him, he may make up his mind that friendship is the only possibility for him. and may strive to put love out of his head. But this is a dangerous course, and will almost cer-

taiuly load to complications. The other alternative and tho wiser ono is flight* 1 do not necessarily mean tho actual packing up of his goods ana rushing away to i-oiiio tit-.aUtni part of u*o world. Probably the circumstances of ms life and hi 3 business render such a course out of the quest on. Put ho may make up his mind steadfastly to adhere to the practice of never seeing or meeting tho girl except when absolutely necessary. Ho may strenuously endeavour to fill up his life to tho full with other interests. Xn that case, ho will probably find, after a short period of mental depression, chat there is more truth in the cyn cal statement of “Out of Sight, out of mind,” than he at present dreams. Though the influence which tho girl has exercised on his life may have a lasting effect, ho may eventually como to the broader wisdom that years bring, and be devoutly thanki that he did not mar a gaTs future, and perhaps that of his own, by unwise precipitancy.

Of course it depends on the point of view. Some of tho weak points here chronicled are apparently the chief articles of faith among feminine clubbites, seeing that they prevail in most. Anyway, whether strong or weak, the contrast between a man’s ideal of a club and that held by his wife and sister is interesting. Man is said to want but little here below. But one of those few wants is a quiet, peaceful club whose Nirvana stillness soothes his nerves ofter the burden and bustle of a busy day. At a woman’s club the main ideal to strive for Is a baud at luncheon, a baud at tea, and music throughout dinner. Success is reached when At Homes and big tea parties throng tho staircases so that you need a posse of police to clear a way to tho silent room on tho second storey. Somebody is eternally reading a paper. Debates aro held periodically, fencing foils clash in the recreation room. A state apartment is devoted to the storage of barking lituo toy dogs, and tho walls are not padded! In short, man uses his club as a sedative. Woman uses hors as a stimulant. Both are eminently in the right—from their own standpoint. In a man’s club the stan lard of domesticity is of the highest order. The supply of pins on the dressing tables never gives out. EvArywlieve from tho daintiest toilet appurtenances down to tho latest dish from Paris, man’s innate talent for domesticity proclaims itself. Some of this perfection is doubtless duo to a much larger club subscription than a woman would ever pay. But much of the explanation lies in the fact that many members of a feminine club committee are weary of domestic well-doing at homo, and regard their club as a very present refuge from housewifery and all its worrying works. Indeed, tho latest and smartest ideas among feminine clubbists is to make their club headquarters at an hotel, so that tho domestic machinery will be run by masculine and managerial hands. "Tho club’s spring cleaning, tne meals and the domesticity thereof is tho last straw added to the feminine back, which already bears the burden of these things in her own homo,” says the smart little chairman of a well-known ladies’ club, ’The house committee of a man’s club wh ch gravely settles all surts'and conditions of housewifely problems regards the task blithely and lightheartcdly. It is a novelty to them. To women who face these* things day in day out for alifetime, the task savors somewhat of monotony. Hence the tendency of the modern woman’s club to migrate to an hotel.

To a woman with few social and intellectual opportunities a club of many receptions, magic lantern displays, debates and lectures, is an oasis in her dull desert. A busy professional woman, on the other hand, whoso life is, filled with interests and duties, seeks a. club possessing the “doloe far niente” atmosphere of the man’s ideal club. The restless activities of tho average woman’s club, while a boon and a blessing to those at their wits’ end to kill time, block out tho reposeful element so necessary to the woman who works. Put in the rapid multiplication of feminine chibs the time is close at hand when each typo of woman will he able to choose whether sho shall join a clnh famous for tho number of parties and mnsioales it organises, or one-in which she may sit serenely in the chimney corner undisturbed by the strains of a fore'gn band, the gathering together of big bridge parlies, and the shrill noise of the lap dogs which delight to bark in the canine sanctum which woman’s ingenuity has added to the resources of a club.—“ Daily Chronicle."