ing fudge he objected
violently. The itching pride of the American male deprives him of many
comforts and sometimes of honor and freedom, because he will not let
his wife use her abilities and her spare time. He will steal or
embezzle rather than have the world look on while "his" wife ekes out
the family income. The determined Frenchwomen have had their men in
training for generations, and the wife is the business partner
straight up to the haute bourgeoisie; but the American woman, for all
her boasted tyranny over the busy male of her land, is either an
expensive toy or a mere household drudge, until years and experience
give her freedom of spirit. This war will do more to liberate her than
that mild social earthquake called the suffrage movement. The rich
women are working so hard that not only do they dress and entertain
far less than formerly but their husbands are growing quite accustomed
to their separate prominence and publicly admitted usefulness. The
same may be said of groups of women in less conspicuous classes, and
when the war is over it is safe to say these women will continue to do
as they please. There is something insidiously fascinating in work to
women that never have worked, not so much in the publicity it may give
but in the sense of mental expansion; and, in the instance of war, the
passion of usefulness, the sense of dedication to a high cause, the
necessary frequent suppression of self, stamp the soul with an impress
that never can be obliterated. That these women engaged in good works
often quarrel like angry cats, or fight for their relief organization
as a lioness would fight for her hungry cub, is beside the point. That
is merely another way of admitting they are human beings; not
necessarily women, but just human beings. As it was in the beginning,
is now, etc. Far better let loose their angry passions in behalf of
the men who are fighting to save the world from a reversion to
barbarism, than rowing their dressmakers, glaring across the bridge
table, and having their blood poisoned by eternal jealousy over some
man.

And if it will hasten the emancipation of the American man from the
thralldom of snobbery still another barrier will go down in the path
of the average woman. Just consider for a moment how many men are
failures. They struggle along until forty or forty-five "on their
own," although fitted by nature to be clerks and no more, striving
desperately to keep up appearances--for the