perhaps it is only natural for a
mother to feel that no girl who is good enough for her son ever has
been born. All the small deceits, the little schemes and frailties,
are as an open book in the eyes of other women.

"If you were a man," said one girl to another, "and knew women as well
as you do now, whom would you marry?"

The other girl thought for a moment, and then answered unhesitatingly:
"I'd stay single."

Women are always suspicious of each other, and the one who can deceive
another woman is entitled to her laurels for cleverness. With the keen
insight and quick intuition of the woman on either side of him, when
these women are violently opposed to each other, no man need look for
peace.

In spite of their discernment, women are sadly deficient in analysis
when it comes to a question of self. Neither wife nor mother can
clearly see her relation to the man they both love. Blinded by
passionate devotion and eager for power, both women lose sight of the
truth, and torment themselves and each other with unfounded jealousy
and distrust.

In no sense are wife and mother rivals, nor can they ever be so.
Neither could take the place of the other for a single instant, and
the wife foolishly guards the point where there is no danger, for, of
all the women in the world, his mother and sisters are the only ones
who could never by any possibility usurp her place.

A woman need only ask herself if she would like to be the mother
of her husband--to exchange the love which she now has for filial
affection--for a temporary clearness of her troubled skies. The mother
need only ask herself if she would surrender her position for the
privilege of being her son's wife, if she seeks for light on her dark
path.

Yet, in spite of this, the two are often open and acknowledged rivals.
A woman recently wrote to the "etiquette department" of a daily paper
to know whether she or her son's fiancee should make the first call.
In answering the question, the head of the department, who, by the
way, has something of a reputation for good sense, wrote as follows:
"It is your place to make the first call, and you have my sympathy in
your difficult task. You must be brave, for you are going to look into
the eyes of a woman whom your son loves better than he does you!"
"Better than he does you!" That is where all the trouble lies, for
each wishes to be first in a relation where no comparison is possible.

When an American yacht first w