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Show i: Dorothy Dix Talks j W- j: Judge Women 'by the Majority and Not the Exception. : ft j By DOROTHY DIX, The World's Highest Paid Woman Writer !J DOROTHY DIX WOMAN'S PAGE. . . QR I A man writes me a letter in which i he tells a pathetic story of a friend of I ' his "Whose -wife deserted him because I t he lost his money. "This is the way I ' the selfish American -wife treats her husband in the day of adversity," says my correspondent. "The European t woman, devoted only to her husband and family, would not act so." Piffle. Also, nonBense. There are "ood wives and bad wives, faithful wives and unfaithful ones, the world ! over. Loyalty has no geographical limitations. One swallow does not make a spring, nor should one selfish American wife queer the whole race I ou Patient Grizeldas in this country. Judge women by the majority and not the exception. One American I .ii-- .-.01. lmvr. lrft hr.r hushanri whon I y,iu ""-' " -7-- 1 ho lost his property, but how many thousands of women have you seen roll up their sleeves nnd go to work to help their husbands under similar circumstances7 Don't you know doz-1 doz-1 ens of women who have converted ' (heir fine houses into boarding houses after their husbands' failures in business? busi-ness? f "Can't you recall plenty of women who have dismissed their servants and gone into their kitchens to do the ' work, who have made over their old 'f clothes, and trimmed their hats, and 1 pushed their own baby carriages when f iheir husbands came a cropper in I business, and who not only turned a I smiling face upon the world, but kept their husbands' courage so that the 1 men were able to make a fresh start I In the world? . For any one American wife who Is 1 a millstone about her husband's neck ' T-rtii .nn And a thousand who are the power behind the throne, who are ' making of their tender shoulders a k ladder on which their husbands are 1 climbing to success. 'i Some extravagant American wives f there are. but tho great majority are ! far more thrifty and economical than ! their husbands, which is abundantly I proven by the fact that not one man in ten ever saves any money until ho I! gets married. A great many salaried men turn over their entire pay en-:f en-:f velope to their wives, not because the ' wives demand it, but because experi-1 experi-1 f ence has shown tho husbands that U their wives can take bettter care of the money and get more out of it j than they can. As for the American wife not being r as good a wife as the foreign woman is, that's all tommyrot- At any rate, j sho suits the American man better ' than any other wife would, because she has been evolved according to his 1 tastes and needs. That she fills the bill to his satisfaction is amply shown , by the fact that while the American woman often marries a foreign man. K the American man very rarely marries a foreign woman. A certain clergyman criticises the ' American woman because he says she j .3 always gadding about Instead of ! spending her time in the kitchen as does the German hausfrau. Well, 1 what of it? If the American woman ! Is clever enough to plan her work bet-1 bet-1 ter, to have more kitchen conveni-j conveni-j ences, and to get through her domes-A domes-A tic labors so that she has time, for PI clubs and reading and outside inter- 1 ests, she should be praised for It rath-' rath-' f er tnan blamed. -4. I j Certainly nobody will claim that i ! American husbands and American ' children don't get plenty of good, well i prepared food. Their looks show that JjS they do, and statistics declare that W , only one family in ninety keep serv-H serv-H ants. So the wife must do the house-EjJ) house-EjJ) work. (2 r : Another thing the clergyman lam-$ lam-$ ' basts American women for Is for 2 dressing too well and not looking 1 - ' ' hi. 1 dowdy, as middle class foreign women do. Score again for tho American woman. She can take a cut paper 1 pattern, a few yards of cheap cloth and a sowing machine and evolve a creation that looks $49 instead of -19 cents. Moreover, a certain taste and style and way of wearing things are indigenous with tho females of this country that makes the poor woman look as well dressed as the well-tcdo woman does abroad. We have no peasant women in tho U. S. A., and none that look like peasants. No man need be afraid of marrying an Amorlcan girl. She'll do her part if he will do his. And there's no danger dan-ger of losing her in time of need. She'll stick through adversilv a? well as prosperity. If you will "go down uu imeuu a session 01 tne domestic relations court, you will observe that there are practically no husband deserters, de-serters, but the wife deserters keep the judge busy handing out warrants. It is the men who have quit on tho job when things got bad at home, not tho women. It ill becomes anyone In this country coun-try to speak disparagingly of American wives when practically all of us are the children and grandchimren of those heroic pioneer women who followed fol-lowed their men into the wilderness, and with their own hands helped blaze tho path of civilization from the Atlantic At-lantic to the Pacific and from the Gulf to tho St. Lawrence. All the hardships hard-ships that the men endured twofold. All the perils that the men dared tho women dared a thousandfold, because they braved the dangers of motherhood mother-hood with no science or skill of aphy-slcianito aphy-slcianito help them in i-ieir extremity. And these women, who had tho strength and courage to do and dare, left behind them worthy daughters, who are just as ready to stand back to back, fighting with their husbands, as their foremothers were. Read the stories of "the successful self-made men of today, and you will find just such a wife working, saving, sacrificing, sacrific-ing, pushing him on to the goal. There is nothing the matter with the American wife. She's all right. Three cheers for her. |