THE SOCIAL ROUND

Sun (Christchurch), Volume III, Issue 698, 6 May 1916, Page 6

THE SOCIAL ROUND

Mr aml Mrs Meibomian have gone back (o I imam it't: i a Ih mg •■ isil to tliis city. Mrs Carton and Miss Ballistor caino lip to <'liristrlmr.il from Ouueditl last night, ami arc going north tliis evening, Mr ami Mrs M. Belhell returned to I'aliau Pastures today. Mr ami .Mrs Dumpier Atkinson ( Blenheim ) arc at Warner's. Mr ami Mrs.Klohr (Wellington >, who have boon touring in the south, arc at present in Christehurch, Oil their way home. Mr ami Mrs I'arlyle Whin-man and Miss .1. K. Carlyle Whitetnan loft for Australia liy the Rivorina this week. The Rev. and Mis G. N. Nolham-Wat-son (To Karaka, Poverty Bay) are visit in),' Christehuivh. Mr and Mrs W. A. Crawford (Dunedini, who have been staying at Sumner, have gone to the North Island for fi stay. ,Mr ami Mrs Scnndrett and Miss Scandrett (Inverc.argill) are visiting Christchurch. Lady Stout has returned to Welling ton from a trip to Bunedin. Miss Longhnan (Wellington) is the guest of Mrs Eric FTarper. Another literary woman who has taken up irtirsing, and now wears the \\r\\ Cross uniform, is Miss D. EardleyWilmot, daughter of Admiral EardloyWilmot. Ilei name is not as well known to the general public as it should be, considering that she wrote the words of that haunting song, "The Little Grey Home in the West," which, once heard, is always remembered. Three little bridesmaids who were much admired at a wedding i" Auckland the other day. wore read, white, and blue. Their frocks were white, their Hashes blue, and they had Red Riding Hood capes, with the hood part pulled over their heads. Each child carried on her left arm a wicker basket tilled with posies for the guests. A pretty wedding was solemnised at the Church of Christ recently, when Pastor R. A. Gebbie united in matrimony Miss Ada Ire and Mr Meredith Dorreen. The bride, who was given away by her father, looked charming in a white satin gown, draped with ninon and lace, and made with court train lined with heliotrope. Her wedding veil was of lloniton lace, worn with a coronet of orange blossoms, and she carried a shower bouquet of white flowers. The bridesmaid (Miss L. M. Pre) wore white silk, draped with pink ninon, picture hat of black and pale, pink, bouquet of pink and white (lowers. Master Stanley Roberts (nephew of the bride) acted' as page, and was dressed in a suit of white velvet. -Miss Lesley Margreavcs, dressed in white silk and carrying a basket of pink and heliotrope Mowers, accompanied him. Mr D'Arcy Htfrreen acted as best man. The bridegroom's gift to the bride was a. handsome pearl cluster ring. To the bridesmaid lie gave a ring, and to the. little flower girl a gold brooch. The bride : s gift to the bridegroom was a net of gold sleeve links. A wedding breakfast was served in the Henrietta Tea Rooms. The newly-wedded couple subsequently left for the North Island for the honeymoon trip, the bride travelling in a navy serge costume, black velvet, lined with champagne colour, and set of fox furs. A writer in an exchange remarks that big bags came into fashion when pockets disappeared from women's garments. Philosophic women regarded them as a pleasant compensation, but the woman with early Victorian ideals still longed for the pocket petticoat and the small purse dear to the grandmothers. Now the pocket has reappeared, but the. bag has proved too serviceable to be banished. The complex existence of the pre-sent-day woman calls for many receptacles wherein to cany her articles for work and pleasure. So she dings to her bag. Pushkin favours this whim, and when, owing to war conditions, leather became scarce, bags of silk, beads, and velvet arrived to substitute the more solid article. Such bags may not be Arable, but they are prettier, and present variety. Artists have set to work, and designed bags in two shades of beads, which are worked into quaint shapes, and often around such charming things as beautiful c eos. It is very interesting to copy the designs of good china in embroidery (says an exchange), whether in silk or wools, upon any suitable ground. A woman has justt embroidered the familiar blue Copenhagen china design on white for a table centre-piece to go on her own Delft china. The many-coloured little bunches of Mowers that are hand painted on Worcester and other old English chinas are just as fascinating when you see them worked on ipiilts, cushions, and the like.

WOMANHOOD AND WAR. •■What will happen to Europe's women after the war:'" asks Eugene Brieux, the famous French playwright, and feminist, in a recent American paper. 1 am afraid this is the most important question- we will have to face, once peace is declared. I am afraid we shall see a new sex. The war, with ils economic struggle betw.'on men and women, is taking on a violent character. Before the war my apprehensions in this respect were sufficiently acute, and were expressed in my play, "La Pemme Seule." The workshop, counter and office man has already found a female competitor facing him, and he has complained, sometimes without gallantry, generosity, or justice. But what will happen after the 'war? Once demobilised ami having rceived their well deserved homage, and hung ! their laurel wreaths on the family walls, land kissed their children, the 1. en will ; want to go back to the work they left 1 when they were railed to the colours. J But often they will find their jobs ocI copied by women who were called in a moment of necessity, and will not quit by persuasion. Women Won't Quit. The women wilj say: "I am used to earning my living; 1 have proved I can do work you thought 1 was incapable of doing. I am used to ! salaried independence; T am here to I stay —get out.'' The men will reply: ! "The war is over. 1 have suffered I for the defence of my fatherland, my J liberty, and my home. I return covered with glorv. (live me back my job." Both will be right, and when both i sides in a dispute are right, the struggle j is bound to become most bitter. I It would be wise to discuss this problem right now, so that the minds of the 1 people may be prepared to accept the I inevitable," and so that attempts may i be made to attenuate the evil. It is undeniable that woman's cause has made another giant stride in this war. Our French women have been admirable. Enemies of their cause will ! say that there are exceptions. An in i finitely small number of women, indeed, have ceased work owing to the war allowances distributed, sometimes with more generosity than discernment, and in the dramshop some few have learned to behave like men. But, apart from these very few exceptions, French women have behaved admirably in France's hour of need. In fact, women have done more than men ever could have expected of them. Have Won Rights. The French woman's devotion to the soil and to her children need ..ot surprise anyone. What does astonish us is that she has shown herself so practical, careful, well-informed, and wily in business, persevering without excitability, not as stubborn, but fully as prudent and courageous as the men. 1 Now that tin? women have proved i their ability to wisely conduct their husband's affairs in their absence, it ! will not do to scoff and jeer when they I demand that they be allowed to help ! administer the public affairs through j municipal elections. When told that only taxpayers can ; vote, the woman will reply that she has I paid her tax in money and nature, and that she has held the handles of the plough as well as the purse-strings. To prove that she also has protected the impost of blood she will point to the 'empty chair where her son—flesh of ; her Mesh —used to sit. The comic sketch-writers must not j joke of these things. Most of the arguments against woman's rights are bankrupt. Women have displayed their abilities, both in town and in the country. We see them as cafe-waiters and street-car conductors. We see tin in doing the work which we used to think was too heavy for their "weak organism.'' Bite Forbidden Fruit. This weak organism has resisted the strain of the ironworks. Those frail hands have polished steel helmets, loaded shells, and verified the keying-up of i the guns. T see now two laundresses trying to : move a heavy hand-cart loaded with I linen. One of them is pulling at the shafts, and the other is behind, pushing. I Both are scarlet with their exertion their disordered hair waxing in the j wind. I admire them as symbols of . feminine efficiency. Today, women have taken a bite of the fruit forbidden, not by God, but by man. The revelation of what they can do came to them because the men were j not there to prevent their trying, or I to say: "Leave it alone: it is too I much for you.'' Before the war only a small number 1 of women refused to believe that men j were necessary to their support. "Xow, : let us men admit that they have proved I that we need them more, than they need i us. What the women of Europe may now I say of themselves is: "We are not so weak, stupid, devoid of judgment, ami incapable as the men jsaid: we can run a farm or shop, give

change, serve a pay-counter, manipulate' tools, or bring up children.'* Maternity Question. "It was silly of our mothers to bring us up merely to please a future husband. I need no longer regard my liancec as a superior liberator when he is only a humbug. "I will not bring'ilp my children to make a conquest of this useless master." Doubters will raise the question of maternity, ami talk scornfully of childless women. , All that is true. But, at least, let us admit woman's right to choose the father of her children. My remedies for the whole of this problem are: 1. Man must give up his drunken habits, but he must be so uplifted as to have no excuse that the saloon is the poor man 's parlour. '2. Man must respect woman, and not treat her as a silly, shrinking, necessarily subjugated being. Early Marriages. ."'.. The abominable system of marriage dowries must end. Marriage must not. come as a relapse into respectability after misspent youth, but it must come during youth's best days, so that the couple may lead together a complete life with its early struggles, anxieties, and joyous successes. 4. Mothers must teach their sons to respect women. .">. N'o honourable woman must have a peaceful moment as long as she knows that some other woman is forced jto sell herself through physical or j moral poverty. BRIEUX VIEW SHARED BY G. BERNARD SHAW. Brieux's ideas are in accord with those of George Bernard Shaw, who, when asked: "Should the conscription of women's labour in field and factoryresult, do you think that there, is likelihood of a real sex war occurring after peace is proclaimed with Germany?" replied: "1 do not think there will be con- ' script-ion of women's labour. But, at. ; the end of the war hundreds of thousands of men will come back to England and find their work being done by women. Others may find their work being done by other men. "if they quarrel with their supplanters, as some of them very likely 'will, that will not be the sex war. They wiH'qunrrel just as hard with the men as with the women.''