What Men Know About Women.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XLII, Issue 3, 20 January 1909, Page 60

What Men Know About Women.

A large number of books about women has been written by men, scientific, sentimental, and suggestive. But up to the present time, very little is really known about this interesting and expensive creature. Woman in large masses, and regarded abstractedly from a distance, is highly objectionable. Because of her habit of having children—criticised by many- as an unfortunate .trait in itself—we could not very- well get along without her. And yet she is plainly, according to the best “authorities,” physically- inferior. She consumes food, uses up our natural resources, wears hideous clothes, and pays nothing for her immense privileges. ■She is a dead loss, regarded from arr economic standpoint. She is mean, has an undeveloped sense of honour, very little character, and is a consummate liar. All this she seems to be, in the aggregate. But—and this is highly important —• the moment we apply- this rule about Woman in the aggragate to woman in particular, we find it doesn't work. Miss A. is a charming, fresh, piquant, beautiful young girl, as delightful as a flower. We would jump off a reasonably steep cliff with previous warning to rescue her from a watery grave. We would neglect our business any day in the week and willingly- stay away from —or attend, as the case may be—church, if we thought there was even the remotest prospect of eventually holding her in our arms, or stealing a kiss from her ruby- lips. ■Mrs. B. runs her household like clockwork. She has business and executive ability combined with all of the excellent qualities of nrmal mother, Miss C. is a wit, whose delicate appreciation of shades of humour throws us into despair over our own erudeness in that respect. Then there is the nurse we once had —the perfection of self-abnegation, of sublime disinterestedness, the very- apotheosis of all virtue. All logic, all systems, fall before her quiet ways. And so our large, general conclusions have been shattered, ami, to descend abruptly to the slang of the day-, we discover that when it comes to a true estimate of ■woman, “all bets are off.” The real difficulty- is, that in judging woman, man has no standards to go by his own. These standards he has raised up for his own particular purpose, from purely utilitarian motives. They are all right for him. but why should he apply them to beings who have no use for them?

On the stock Exchange, for example, one man nods his bead, ami a thousand shares of stock, representing hundreds of thousands of dollars, are sold. No man there would go back on his nod, because in the long run to do so would involve individuals as well as the community in disaster. But imagine a lot of women suddenly brought together under similar circumstances, how many- of their nods would have any ultimate cash value? Women are not required to “make good” in this way. Hence, they- should be judged only by- their own standards; and as no man has ever discovered what those standards are, there is no solution to the problem. But man. on the other hand, can judge himself by his own stanadrds. And in this respect he fails so often and so lamentably, that perhaps it is just as well for him to go slow in trying to get a straight line on Woman.