Part 5 (1/2)
After one has listened to all these arguments and has contracted clergyman's sore throat talking back, it is real relief to meet the people who say flatly and without reason: ”You can't have it--no--I won't argue--but inasmuch as I can prevent it--you will never vote! So there!” The men who meet the question like this are so easy to cla.s.sify.
I remember when I was a little girl back on the farm in the Souris Valley, I used to water the cattle on Sat.u.r.day mornings, drawing the water in an icy bucket with a windla.s.s from a fairly deep well. We had one old white ox, called Mike, a patriarchal-looking old sinner, who never had enough, and who always had to be watered first. Usually I gave him what I thought he should have and then took him back to the stable and watered the others. But one day I was feeling real strong, and I resolved to give Mike all he could drink, even if it took every drop of water in the well. I must admit that I cherished a secret hope that he would kill himself drinking. I will not set down here in cold figures how many pails of water Mike drank--but I remember. At last he could not drink another drop, and stood s.h.i.+vering beside the trough, blowing the last mouthful out of his mouth like a bad child. I waited to see if he would die, or at least turn away and give the others a chance. The thirsty cattle came crowding around him, but old Mike, so full I am sure he felt he would never drink another drop of water again as long as he lived, deliberately and with difficulty put his two front feet over the trough and kept all the other cattle away.... Years afterwards I had the pleasure of being present when a delegation waited upon the Government of one of the provinces of Canada, and presented many reasons for extending the franchise to women. One member of the Government arose and spoke for all his colleagues. He said in substance: ”You can't have it--so long as I have anything to do with the affairs of this province--you shall not have it!”...
Did your brain ever give a queer little twist, and suddenly you were conscious that the present mental process had taken place before. If you have ever had it, you will know what I mean, and if you haven't I cannot make you understand. I had that feeling then.... I said to myself: ”Where have I seen that face before?” ... Then, suddenly, I remembered, and in my heart I cried out: ”Mike!--old friend, Mike!
Dead these many years! Your bones lie buried under the fertile soil of the Souris Valley, but your soul goes marching on! Mike, old friend, I see you again--both feet in the trough!”
CHAPTER VII
GENTLE LADY
The soul that idleth will surely die.
I am sorry to have to say so, but there are some women who love to be miserable, who have a perfect genius for martyrdom, who take a delight in seeing how badly they can be treated, who seek out hard ways for their feet, who court tears rather than laughter. Such a one is hard to live with, for they glory in their cross, and simply revel in their burdens, and they so contrive that all who come in contact with them become a party to their martyrdom, and thus even innocent people, who never intended to oppress the weak or hara.s.s the innocent, are led into these heinous sins.
Mrs. M. was one of these. She prided herself on never telling anyone to do what she could do herself. Her own poetic words were: ”I'd crawl on my hands and knees before I would ask anyone to do things for me.
If they can't see what's to be done, I'll not tell them.” This was her declaration of independence. Needless to say, Mrs. M. had a large domestic help problem. Her domestic helpers were continually going and coming. The inefficient ones she would not keep, and the efficient ones would not stay with her. So the burden of the home fell heavily on her, and, pulling her martyr's crown close down on her head, she worked feverishly. When she was not working she was bemoaning her sad lot, and indulging in large drafts of self-pity. The holidays she spent were in sanatoriums and hospitals, but she gloried in her illnesses.
She would make the journey upstairs for the scissors rather than ask anyone to bring them down for her, and then cherish a hurt feeling for the next hour because n.o.body noticed that she was needing scissors.
She expected all her family, and the maids especially, to be mind readers, and because they were not she was bitterly grieved. There is not much hope for people when they make a virtue of their sins.
She often told the story of what happened when her Tommy was two days old. She told it to ill.u.s.trate her independence of character, but most people thought it showed something quite different. Mr. M. was displeased with his dinner on this particular day, and, in his blundering man's way, complained to his wife about the cooking and left the house without finis.h.i.+ng his meal. Mrs. M. forthwith decided that she would wear the martyr's crown, again and some more! She got up and cooked the next meal, in spite of the wild protests of the frightened maid and nurse, who foresaw disaster. Mrs. M. took violently ill as a result of her exertions just as she hoped she would, and now, after a lapse of twenty years, proudly tells that her subsequent illness lasted six weeks and cost six hundred dollars, and she is proud of it!
A wiser woman would have handled the situation with tact. When Mr. M.
came storming upstairs, waving his table-napkin and feeling much abused, she would have calmed him down by telling him not to wake the baby, thereby directing his attention to the small pink traveler who had so recently joined the company. She would have explained to him that even if his dinner had not been quite satisfactory, he was lucky to get anything in troublous times like these; she would have told him that if, having to eat poor meals was all the discomfiture that came his way, he was getting off light and easy. She might even go so far as to remind him that the one who asks the guests must always pay the piper.
There need not have been any heartburnings or regrets or perturbation of spirit. Mr. M. would have felt ashamed of his outbreak and apologized to her and to the untroubled Tommy, and gone downstairs, and eaten his stewed prunes with an humble and thankful heart.
This love of martyrdom is deeply ingrained in the heart of womankind, and comes from long bitter years of repression and tyranny. An old handbook on etiquette earnestly enjoins all young ladies who desire to be pleasing in the eyes of men to ”avoid a light rollicking manner, and to cultivate a sweet plaintiveness, as of hidden sorrow bravely borne.”
It also declares that if any young lady has a robust frame, she must be careful to dissemble it, for it is in her frailty that woman can make her greatest appeal to man. No man wishes to marry an Amazon. It also earnestly commends a piece of sewing to be ever in the hand of the young lady who would attract the opposite s.e.x! The use of large words or any show of learning or of unseemly intelligence is to be carefully avoided.
People have all down the centuries blocked out for women a weeping part. ”Man must work and women must weep.” So the habit of martyrdom has sort of settled down on us.
I will admit there has been some reason for it. Women do suffer more than men. They are physically smaller and weaker, more highly sensitive and therefore have a greater capacity for suffering. They have all the ordinary ills of humanity, and then some! They have above all been the victims of wrong thinking--they have been steeped in tears and false sentiments. People still speak of womanhood as if it were a disease.
Society has had its lash raised for women everywhere, and some have taken advantage of this to serve their own ends. An orphan girl, ignorant of the world's ways and terribly frightened of them, was told by her mistress that if she were to leave the roof which sheltered her she would get ”talked about,” and lose her good name. So she was able to keep the orphan working for five dollars a month. She used the lash to her own advantage.
Fear of ”talk” has kept many a woman quiet. Woman's virtue has been heavy responsibility not to be forgotten for an instant.
”Remember, Judge,” cried out a woman about to be sentenced for stealing, ”that I am an honest woman.”
”I believe you are,” replied the judge, ”and I will be lenient with you.”
The word ”honest” as applied to women means ”virtuous.” It has overshadowed all other virtues, and in a way appeared to make them of no account.
The physical disabilities of women which have been augmented and exaggerated by our insane way of dressing has had much to do with shaping women's thought. The absurdly tight skirts which prevented the wearer from walking like a human being, made a pitiful cry to the world. They were no doubt worn as a protest against the new movement among women, which has for its object the larger liberty, the larger humanity of women. The hideous mincing gait of the tightly-skirted women seems to speak. It said: ”I am not a useful human being--see! I cannot walk--I dare not run, but I am a woman--I still have my s.e.x to commend me. I am not of use, I am made to be supported. My s.e.x is my only appeal.”
Rather an indelicate and unpleasant thought, too, for an ”honest” woman to advertise so brazenly. The tight skirts and diaphanous garments were plainly a return to ”s.e.x.” The ultra feminine felt they were going to lose something in this agitation for equality. They do not want rights--they want privileges--like the servants who prefer tips to wages. This is not surprising. Keepers of wild animals tell us that when an animal has been a long time in captivity it prefers captivity to freedom, and even when the door of the cage is opened it will not come out--but that is no argument against freedom.