The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909 1910)

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Our engines drive fast in earth, water and air;
Our resistless, smooth-running machines still unroll,
With brain-work unceasing and handiwork fair,
New material forms for each step on the soul;
But that soul, for the contact without which it dies,
Comes closest of all through that animal's eyes.

WOMEN TEACHERS, MARRIED AND UNMARRIED

We have still active and conspicuous among us, saying and doing foolish
things about women, men, both eminent and ordinary, whose attitude in
this matter will make them a shame to their children, and a laughing
stock to their grandchildren. We are proud to exhibit name and portrait
of the great-grandfather who signed the Declaration of Independence, but
our descendants will forget as soon as possible those asinine ancestors
who are to-day so writing themselves down--in their attitude in regard
to women teachers, married and unmarried.

For long women were kept out of the schools altogether--education was
for boys. They were not allowed to teach, save in a small way, in
infant schools, or schools for girls; teaching was a masculine
profession. Now they have equal educational opportunities--in large
measure, and constitute the majority of pupils; and, what is more
alarming, the majority of teachers. The "male mind"--essentially and
hopelessly male--sees in this not the natural development of a long
suppressed human being, but the entrance of females upon a masculine
province.

In her relation of pupil, there is a large body of eminent educators
clamoring that girls should be taught female things; that, whether our
universities are turned into trade schools or not, the women's colleges
and "annexes" should teach girls "the duties of wife and mother." By
this, of course, they mean the duties of house-service, and, perhaps, of
nursing. Nothing would scandalize these Antique Worthies more than to
have girls taught the real duties of wife and mother!

Also, in the relation of pupils, a man of as high standing as Professor
Barrett Wendell of Harvard claims that teaching girls lowers the
mentality of men! In coeducational colleges the "male mind," seeing in
the violent games of young men a profound educational influence (and
large profits!), considers that the presence of the purely studious
element--the girls--is an injury to the college, and is even now
endeavoring to eliminate them.

But it is in treatment of women teachers that this sex attitude of mind
is most prominent to-day, most offensive, and most ridiculous.

The first effect is, of course, to give to the woman teacher the lowest
grades of work and the lowest pay. Even when she has forced her way
into high-grade work, and won a good position over all competitors, her
pay is still measured by her status as a female--not as a teacher. The
"male mind" can never for a moment forget or overlook the fact that
women are females; and is rigidly incapable of admitting that they are
also human beings as much as he.

In spite of this absurd limitation, women teachers have increased in
numbers and in power; and are pressing steadily up into the higher
positions reserved for men. An enormous majority of our teaching force
is now composed of women; and, in our public schools, they naturally
teach boys. Upon this point has arisen, and is still rising, an angry
protest among men. Women teachers are, they say, unmarried; to be
unmarried is an unnatural state, productive of various mental and
physical morbidities; and as such does not form a suitable atmosphere
for growing boys.

Recently President Hamilton of Tufts College goes even further than
this, and objects to the influence of unmarried teachers upon girls!

To the "male mind," viewing the woman as first, last and always a
female, and marriage and motherhood as her only normal relations, these
crowding thousands of calm, respectable, independent, unmarried women
are in a condition of unrest, of acrimonious rebellion against fate, of
a contemptuous dislike for their unattainable "sour grapes." They are
assumed to have been queer in the first place, or some gracious
protector would have married them; and to grow queerer as life drags
away, leaving them eternally unsatisfied, bitter and perverse. This
deadly influence is supposed to have some poisonous effect on the
pupils; just what is not defined. The unselfish, tireless service of
the "maiden aunt" in the home we all know; but set her to teaching
school, and some strange evil follows from the contact.

President Hamilton says college girls need to have their outlook on life
broadened, not narrowed; and thinks these limited ladies, the teachers,
are fitted only for work in the lower preparatory schools, or in "homes"
and "settlements."

Just how the average male teacher in a college is to broaden the outlook
of his pupils is not explained. It does not need explanation. It is
broader because he is a man!

Most of our men teachers are still young men, by the way, and unmarried.
Is the influence of the unmarried male on classes of girls an unmixed
good? Is a man by nature a better teacher? More subtly sympathetic,
more capable of understanding the difficulties of each pupil and meeting
them, more patient and tender?

No--but he is "more methodical," and "a better disciplinarian." In
other words, he is more male--and therefore a better teacher! All this
is absurd enough, and injurious enough; false, unjust, pitifully
ignorant.

But the crowning feat of the "logical male mind" is in its exclusion of
married women from schools. This is what the living children of living
men will laugh at and blush for--that their fathers should have made
themselves thus lamentably conspicuous in present-day history. Here in
this city of New York, where a system of competitive examination ensures
the required degree of learning and promotion follows on proved
efficiency (or is supposed to); some women teachers, following "that
inexorable law of nature" which so many others successfully evade, have
presumed to marry. Surely now the stock objection to women teachers is
removed.

All that "narrowness," that "bitterness," that "morbidity" is
transformed by this magic alchemy into breadth and sweetness and all
health. Now we have for our children the influence of "normal
womanhood"--of "the wife and mother."

No. Married women are not desired in our schools; not allowed; they are
specifically discriminated against.

Some years ago a woman teacher of New York married, and refused to give
up her position. There was no reason for discharging her--she fulfilled
every duty as competently as before. But these historic school
officials withheld her pay!

They had no right to; she had earned the money--it was hers. But they
had the power, and used it. After many months of this high-handed
withholding of her legitimate salary, this woman, and another similarly
placed, sued for their back pay, making a test case of it.

They won. It was a perfectly plain case in law and equity.

Then the Board, naturally displeased, passed a by-law prohibiting the
appointment, or reappointment, of married women. One woman, already in,
and married, a very efficient teacher, and candidate for promotion to
principalship, was not promoted, for this plain reason: they do not wish
married women to teach in our schools.

Now, why?

What injurious influence exudes from previously competent teachers
merely because they now know this personal, as well as their former
professional, happiness!

Then with bated breath the official male mind suggests that they might
become mothers.

Well? So they should. Is there anything about mothers which renders
them unfit persons to teach children?

"You do not understand!" says the official male mind, a little
nervously. "They would be--about to become mothers--and the children
might notice it!"

Here we have Justice Shallow, Mrs. Grundy and King Canute rolled into
one. What gross ignorance, what narrow conservatism, what petty and
futile resistance to progress, as well as a low coarseness, prompts this
objection! If our system of education allows children to grow up in
such neglect that they neither know nor reverence motherhood, it is high
time that the system was changed.

And it will be changed; by women--who are mothers.

Aside from this, and admitting that most married teachers who are in
this dreaded "condition" do rapidly remove themselves from school, and
do not come back for a year or more, the next objection is "the
continued absence" of the married woman teachers.

Since there is a long array of substitutes, excellent substitutes (often
married women, these!) who are paid less than the salary the absent one
does not draw, it is difficult to see the evil of this. Unless indeed
the merits of the married teacher are so supreme that even her temporary
absence is a real loss. If that be so, then she is worth keeping, it
would seem, at any cost.

In all this tissue of injustice and absurdity is there no thread of
explanation, no reason better than these for such arbitrary interference
with personal rights? There is a veritable cable; enough to hang the
whole case on. It is shown in this provision:

If the married woman teacher can bring a doctor's certificate showing
that her husband is sick--_then_ she can hold her place and draw her
pay, undisturbed!

The plain ordinary un-male mind will say, "What has that to do with it?"

It has nothing to do with it. The position in question is that of the
teacher; the relation one between the teacher and pupil on the one side,
and teacher and governing officers on the other side. Whether teacher,
pupil or official is married or unmarried had nothing to do with the
case, unless it can be shown to interfere with the legitimate work
involved. Are we to suppose that the unseen extraneous husband has,
when well, a malign influence on his wife's proficiency as a teacher,
and, when ill, a beneficent one? Not at all; there is no such subtlety
involved. It is not in the least a question of professional efficiency;
it is a question of money.

Money is for men--who should use some of it to take care of their women.
When a woman marries, she has a claim for support, and no further use
for money of her own, no right to it, in fact!

Now let us temporarily admit that this is so--what has it to do with the
action of school boards? Is our public school system an institution for
the regulation of married women's property rights? Does it make
inquiries as to the family relations of men teachers and pay them
according to the number of dependents they have to support? Among the
unmarried women, are those who are putting brothers through college, or
maintaining invalid sisters or aged parents, paid more than the young
lady living at home and not "having to work" at all? If there is no
discrimination made in this matter among men teachers, nor among
unmarried women teachers, why does it instantly enter into consideration
in the case of married teachers?

All "systems" grow stiff, case-hardened, difficult to change; but in
America we have the newest and most pliable, and we are bravely used to
altering things. It is high time we altered our system of education.
The very crown and flower of our best minds and noblest characters are
called for to bring up children:

"That our childhood may pass with the best you can give--
And our manhood so live!"

Men and women both are needed as teachers; education is a social
process--not one of sex. Yet the woman is, by virtue of her motherhood,
the original teacher; and is more frequently possessed of the teaching
instinct. All normal women would naturally marry, circumstances
permitting; should marry, and would be no poorer teachers for that new
relationship. All normal women should be mothers; and as such, would be
_better_ teachers--not worse!

As to payment, so long as we must measure off our services and pay for
them, no form of human work is worthy of higher reward than this. To
gather the fruit of all our progress, to prepare it for a child's mind,
and lead him to eat that fruit, freely, and so grow to his best and
highest--this is _the_ human work.

It should be so prized, so honored, and so paid. And the payment should
be for great work done--and bear no relation whatever to age or sex, or
sex-relation; much less to the pathological condition of irrelevant
husbands.

There is now formed in New York City, "The Married Women Teachers'
Association" (secretary, Miss Anna G. Walsh, 22 Harvard Street, Jamaica,
N. Y.), the purpose of which is to resist this unjust and illegitimate
discrimination.

It is unfortunate that more of the unmarried teachers do not cheerfully
assist in the work.

They do not yet seem to realize that all women should make common cause
against what is not only an injustice, but the most insolent and
presuming interference on the part of men, with the private and personal
affairs of women.

WHAT DIANTHA DID

CHAPTER XIII.

ALL THIS.

They laid before her conquering feet
The spoils of many lands;
Their crowns shone red upon her head
Their scepters in her hands.

She heard two murmuring at night,
Where rose-sweet shadows rest;
And coveted the blossom red
He laid upon her breast.

When Madam Weatherstone shook the plentiful dust of Orchardina from her
expensive shoes, and returned to adorn the more classic groves of
Philadelphia, Mrs. Thaddler assumed to hold undisputed sway as a social
leader.

The Social Leader she meant to be; and marshalled her forces to that
end. She Patronized here, and Donated there; revised her visiting list
with rigid exclusiveness; secured an Eminent Professor and a Noted
Writer as visitors, and gave entertainments of almost Roman
magnificence.

Her husband grew more and more restive under the rising tide of social
exactions in dress and deportment; and spent more and more time behind
his fast horses, or on the stock-ranch where he raised them. As a
neighbor and fellow ranchman, he scraped acquaintance with Ross Warden,
and was able to render him many small services in the process of
settling.

Mrs. Warden remembered his visit to Jopalez, and it took her some time
to rearrange him in her mind as a person of wealth and standing. Having
so rearranged him, on sufficient evidence, she and her daughters became
most friendly, and had hopes of establishing valuable acquaintance in
the town. "It's not for myself I care," she would explain to Ross,
every day in the week and more on Sundays, "but for the girls. In that
dreadful Jopalez there was absolutely _no_ opportunity for them; but
here, with horses, there is no reason we should not have friends. You
must consider your sisters, Ross! Do be more cordial to Mr. Thaddler."

But Ross could not at present be cordial to anybody. His unexpected
good fortune, the freedom from hated cares, and chance to work out his
mighty theories on the faithful guinea-pig, ought to have filled his
soul with joy; but Diantha's cruel obstinacy had embittered his cup of
joy. He could not break with her; she had not refused him, and it was
difficult in cold blood to refuse her.

He had stayed away for two whole weeks, in which time the guinea-pigs
nibbled at ease and Diantha's work would have suffered except for her
mother's extra efforts. Then he went to see her again, miserable but
stubborn, finding her also miserable and also stubborn. They argued
till there was grave danger of an absolute break between them; then
dropped the subject by mutual agreement, and spent evenings of
unsatisfying effort to talk about other things.

Diantha and her mother called on Mrs. Warden, of course, admiring the
glorious view, the sweet high air, and the embowered loveliness of the
two ranch houses. Ross drew Diantha aside and showed her "theirs"--a
lovely little wide-porched concrete cottage, with a red-tiled roof, and
heavy masses of Gold of Ophir and Banksia roses.

He held her hand and drew her close to him.

He kissed her when they were safe inside, and murmured: "Come,
darling--won't you come and be my wife?"

"I will, Ross--whenever you say--but--!" She would not agree to give up
her work, and he flung away from her in reckless despair. Mrs. Warden
and the girls returned the call as a matter of duty, but came no more;
the mother saying that she could not take her daughters to a Servant
Girls' Club.

And though the Servant Girls' Club was soon removed to its new quarters
and Union House became a quiet, well-conducted hotel, still the two
families saw but little of each other.

Mrs. Warden naturally took her son's side, and considered Diantha an
unnatural monster of hard-heartedness.

The matter sifted through to the ears of Mrs. Thaddler, who rejoiced in
it, and called upon Mrs. Warden in her largest automobile. As a mother
with four marriageable daughters, Mrs. Warden was delighted to accept
and improve the acquaintance, but her aristocratic Southern soul was
inwardly rebellious at the ancestorlessness and uncultured moneyed pride
of her new friend.

"If only Madam Weatherstone had stayed!" she would complain to her
daughters. "She had Family as well as Wealth."

"There's young Mrs. Weatherstone, mother--" suggested Dora.

"A nobody!" her mother replied. "She has the Weatherstone money, of
course, but no Position; and what little she has she is losing by her
low tastes. She goes about freely with Diantha Bell--her own
housekeeper!"

"She's not her housekeeper now, mother--"

"Well, it's all the same! She _was!_ And a mere general servant before
that! And now to think that when Ross is willing to overlook it all and
marry her, she won't give it up!"

They were all agreed on this point, unless perhaps that the youngest had
her inward reservations. Dora had always liked Diantha better than had
the others.

Young Mrs. Weatherstone stayed in her big empty house for a while, and
as Mrs. Warden said, went about frequently with Diantha Bell. She liked
Mrs. Bell, too--took her for long stimulating rides in her comfortable
car, and insisted that first one and then the other of them should have
a bit of vacation at her seashore home before the winter's work grew too
heavy.

With Mrs. Bell she talked much of how Diantha had helped the town.

"She has no idea of the psychic effects, Mrs. Bell," said she. "She
sees the business, and she has a great view of all it is going to do for
women to come; but I don't think she realizes how much she is doing
right now for women here--and men, too. There were my friends the
Pornes; they were 'drifting apart,' as the novels have it--and no
wonder. Isabel was absolutely no good as a housekeeper; he naturally
didn't like it--and the baby made it all the worse; she pined for her
work, you see, and couldn't get any time for it. Now they are as happy
as can be--and it's just Diantha Bell's doings. The housework is off
Isabel's shoulders.

"Then there are the Wagrams, and the Sheldons, and the Brinks--and ever
so many more--who have told me themselves that they are far happier than
they ever were before--and can live more cheaply. She ought to be the
happiest girl alive!"

Mrs. Bell would agree to this, and quite swelled with happiness and
pride; but Mrs. Weatherstone, watching narrowly, was not satisfied.

When she had Diantha with her she opened fire direct. "You ought to be
the happiest, proudest, most triumphant woman in the world!" she said.
"You're making oodles of money, your whole thing's going well, and look
at your mother--she's made over!"

Diantha smiled and said she was happy; but her eyes would stray off to
the very rim of the ocean; her mouth set in patient lines that were not
in the least triumphant.

"Tell me about it, my friend," said her hostess. "Is it that he won't
let you keep on with the business?"

Diantha nodded.

"And you won't give it up to marry him?"

"No," said Diantha. "No. Why should I? I'd marry him--to-morrow!"
She held one hand with the other, tight, but they both shook a little.
"I'd be glad to. But I will not give up my work!"

"You look thin," said Mrs. Weatherstone.

"Yes--"

"Do you sleep well?"

"No--not very."

"And I can see that you don't eat as you ought to. Hm! Are you going
to break down?"

"No," said Diantha, "I am not going to break down. I am doing what is
right, and I shall go on. It's a little hard at first--having him so
near. But I am young and strong and have a great deal to do--I shall do
it."

And then Mrs. Weatherstone would tell her all she knew of the intense
satisfaction of the people she served, and pleasant stories about the
girls. She bought her books to read and such gleanings as she found in
foreign magazines on the subject of organized house-service.

Not only so, but she supplied the Orchardina library with a special
bibliography on the subject, and induced the new Woman's Club to take up
a course of reading in it, so that there gradually filtered into the
Orchardina mind a faint perception that this was not the freak of an
eccentric individual, but part of an inevitable business development,
going on in various ways in many nations.

As the winter drew on, Mrs. Weatherstone whisked away again, but kept a
warm current of interest in Diantha's life by many letters.

Mr. Bell came down from Jopalez with outer reluctance but inner
satisfaction. He had rented his place, and Susie had three babies now.
Henderson, Jr., had no place for him, and to do housework for himself
was no part of Mr. Bell's plan.

In Diantha's hotel he had a comfortable room next his wife's, and a
capacious chair in the firelit hall in wet weather, or on the shaded
piazza in dry. The excellent library was a resource to him; he found
some congenial souls to talk with; and under the new stimulus succeeded
at last in patenting a small device that really worked. With this, and
his rent, he felt inclined to establish a "home of his own," and the
soul of Mrs. Bell sank within her. Without allowing it to come to an
issue between them, she kept the question open for endless discussion;
and Mr. Bell lived on in great contentment under the impression that he
was about to move at almost any time. To his friends and cronies he
dilated with pride on his daughter's wonderful achievements.

"She's as good as a boy!" he would declare. "Women nowadays seem to do
anything they want to!" And he rigidly paid his board bill with a
flourish.

Meanwhile the impressive gatherings at Mrs. Thaddler's, and the humbler
tea and card parties of Diantha's friends, had a new topic as a
shuttlecock.

A New York company had bought one of the largest and finest blocks in
town--the old Para place--and was developing it in a manner hitherto
unseen. The big, shabby, neglected estate began to turn into such a
fairyland as only southern lands can know. The old live-oaks were
untouched; the towering eucalyptus trees remained in ragged majesty; but
an army of workmen was busy under guidance of a master of beauty.

One large and lovely building rose, promptly dubbed a hotel by the
unwilling neighbors; others, smaller, showed here and there among the
trees; and then a rose-gray wall of concrete ran around the whole, high,
tantalizing, with green boughs and sweet odors coming over it. Those
who went in reported many buildings, and much activity. But, when the
wall was done, and each gate said "No admittance except on business,"
then the work of genii was imagined, and there was none to contradict.

It was a School of Theosophy; it was a Christian Science College; it was
a Free-Love Colony; it was a Secret Society; it was a thousand wonders.

"Lot of little houses and one big one," the employees said when
questioned.

"Hotel and cottages," the employers said when questioned.

They made no secret of it, they were too busy; but the town was
unsatisfied. Why a wall? What did any honest person want of a wall?
Yet the wall cast a pleasant shadow; there were seats here and there
between buttresses, and, as the swift California season advanced, roses
and oleanders nodded over the top, and gave hints of beauty and richness
more subtly stimulating than all the open glory of the low-hedged
gardens near.

Diantha's soul was stirred with secret envy. Some big concern was about
to carry out her dream, or part of it--perhaps to be a huge and
overflowing rival. Her own work grew meantime, and flourished as well
as she could wish.

The food-delivery service was running to its full capacity; the girls
got on very well under Mrs. Jessup, and were delighted to have a house
of their own with the parlors and piazzas all to themselves, and a
garden to sit in as well. If this depleted their ranks by marriage, it
did not matter now, for there was a waiting list in training all the
time.

Union House kept on evenly and profitably, and Diantha was beginning to
feel safe and successful; but the years looked long before her.

She was always cheered by Mrs. Weatherstone's letters; and Mrs. Porne
came to see her, and to compare notes over their friend's success. For
Mrs. Weatherstone had been presented at Court--at more than one court,
in fact; and Mrs. Weatherstone had been proposed to by a Duke--and had
refused him! Orchardina well-nigh swooned when this was known.