MARRIAGE AND AFTER.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 11763, 29 July 1916, Page 2

MARRIAGE AND AFTER.

THE WOifEN WORKERS' FUTURE. (London "Daily Mail.") "Silly old thingj" exclaimed Phyllis, half crying; "of course it won't." I looked across, at that emphatic and illogical utterance, to where she sat at her desk devouring a letter excitedly torn from one of those pale green envelopes that the love-ships bring from France. " Just listen to what Dick writes," sho cried: "'I say, old girl, are you really getting threo pounds a week?'" she read. " ' Why, the office only pay me ten shillings more. You'll be earning more than I ever earned by the time I come back. Somehow, I don't like to think of you being so cleverno, that sounds mean—but you will understand how I'm feeling. Is it going to make any difference r l ' " How like a man I pApd how like a wonxan ho was to fhc whole crux of the matter into the last tencel "Is it going to make any difference?" This is a sentence.. running m many of the love-letters nowadays that bravo the submarines from France. Girls who earned an average wage ill peace times are in so many cases in really responsible posts -to-day, drawing really responsible salaries, and the men at the front to \\honi thev are engaged are astomsheu—and", ves, just a little piqued! at tae state 'of affairs, and they are wonderin" what the outcome of these new possessions and this new knowledge 0 capability will produce.

Is it going to make any difference? Of course it is—in some ways. A girl who has formerly earned thirty shillings a week, and who has now doubled her salary, 2s not exactly going to look with the same eyes on marriago with a man earning less than eho does herself. She may fully intend to marry lum just the &ame, bii she views the situation from a different standpoint. _ And the wages earned by business girls nowadays are far greater than many of the public imagine. . .. . +v> „ sTransxely enough, however, it is tno men " doing their bit" who have been the first to ponder how marriage wiU bo ■affected by tins altered condition. Perhaps " out there" they have more time to think about these things, although it seem. 1 ; straugo that while they are deciding the great- or hie and death they should be the first to gra-.jp pi obtains that arc unfolding themse.ves at home. _ . 'l'be women urc t-oo husj lCtirnn-g their new work, writing then- letters, and sending their parcels, to reflect much on the subtle situation that their war time salaries will create, and it is on!v this insistent note in the lettcis from the front that id beginning to make.them stop and dunk more cleany. To-day the business girl has learned her market value. _ In spite of it being war time, and labour at a premium, she knous that her inflated wage would not be paid her is she were not worth the.money. She finds out, also, that many of the man-held posts she formerly contemplated with eves of awe hold no great, strain 011 the intelligence. "I used to think this was the most difficult work in tho office," _ confided 0110 business girl to another, giving ner views on her promotion. "Ah, 'out there's the responsibility, argued the other. ■' i\'gw don't drum that old buglxar into me," retorted her friend; "'Responsibility ' is a word that wo women have all been too frightened of —1 find after six months in this work that it's only a word after all, and that Hopkins got eight pounds a week for trading on ft, while I get only four!" Thus have the little tin gods fallen, and, now that wo have more than a oeep behind the scenes, our generation wijl never install them again. All t'lls is going to affect the marriage standpoint of tbo woman worker. At the t'-ud of the war she will bo fair enough to hand beck, with a grateful smi : i.\ her position .to the man who termer :y owned it and who has risked life itself-that-.c-he and other-women might remain in our own. land in-, safety '■ and comfort. But she - is shrewd e-nquga to know that mae.y women will be retained in 'well-paid pavt-s. permanently hold hi a tho positions of those returned warriors who will be caught in the flood of emigration and adventure that will prevail alter the war. and taking tho places' of that brave band who- alas!— will urvol' return. This- is the point whore-she will come to the crossroads, if. she is one of those who have sufficient grit and good'fortune to retain their posts. The man to whom she is engaged is o-eneraHy a man in tho .same circle of fife as herself, very often in the same wav of business. In the ordinary course of "events his salary doubled hers, and the home and prospects ho could oiler her. while nothing great, would have given her the little comforts and privileges to v/hic-h sho had been accustomed.

She was quite prepared to work very carefully 10 mane both end's meet that would bo uotning now ; she always had' to "go caj exu.iy " to maK.e Her salary provide her needs. Since the war, however, things have altored. A new hat or a new blouse doos not mark an enuch now. A now frock is not the subject .of care and worry thai it used to bt—with a strange recklessness that gives her a peculiar joy, slie feels the intoxication of possessing a salary beyond her nvv-cs. Before the w;.r, sli- viewed her iuncce's proapec'to contentedly; will tnoy look just tho same now i-hat «ho can equal—and often to; eel —Iks wage/' This question has to be solved definitely when tho war is over and she stands at the cross-roads. Thero will be two paths from which she may choose. Otic signpost will point to business success—a road that is now more alluring and promising to woman than ever, and that oJft-rs her tho independence our eex have been crying for. Tho other signpost will point to the oppaito pathway that the feet of women havo always chosen to tread; the path that leads to love, homo and children, but which requires so much patience, so much Kelf-sacrifico, end so much lovo to illumine it. Which will she chooseP Why, the love pathway every time—that is, if she is as wise as we think she is. Maybe there will be a half-regret-ful glance tho other way, but her feet will be planted confidently and firmly on tho road with her partner, for tho call of lovo, and all that it stands for, will always be stronger in women than the call of the office, shop or school. But there will be a new tone in these marriages after the war. No girl who is capable of earning a wago similar to her husband js going to settledown into a tame housekeeper—there will be more of the "partnership spirit" in tho after-the-war unions. She will_ discuss his business with him; ho will listen to her, for sho has proved her capabilities ; and she—a woman who has como out of tho great fire of war with enlarged vision—will see that her children are given fighting chances of progress, and that she herself is not relegated to a back seat. There, will be a pang or two, perhaps, when she looks back after marriage to the halcyon days when she did not hare to conjure with shillings, but she knows that tho love road is the happiest road —if a hard one—for women. The woman in her own home, with her man and her babies to care for, would not change places with the most "successful" business woman. Success _is not sufficient for a woman to live sweetly upon, and success when it is accompanied by loneliness has a hitter taste —to our sex at any rate.