Page:Wit, humor, and Shakspeare. Twelve essays (IA cu31924013161223).pdf/227

 *ness balks the attempt to seize and unsnarl the vital points of the morning sheet. The marriages and deaths, being in large type and a conventional place, compete with the advertisements of low-priced cottons and flannels, and are only forgotten when the column that flatters with the latest fashions storms the well-dressed heart. Perhaps the same sheet announces the last pathetic moment of the Crimean campaign, which men follow with the eager interest of participants, as they are pledged to the cause of either party because they estimate the weal or woe of human races. Perhaps the Franco-Prussian war is creating an historic epoch in the politics and religion of Europe, involving new adjustments of the social and democratic life, making Luther's half battles whole ones, and leading all the bitter experiences of France into the solution of a republic. It is safe to say that the majority of women are indifferent to the closely printed columns which men follow with almost the literal precision of the compositors who set them up. Perhaps the statement may be hazarded that the emancipation of woman depends considerably upon her rivalry with man at the newsstands, and her patient sifting of the contents of her purchase. The proposition is not so fantastic as it may appear. I have been astonished at the repugnance of sprightly and intelligent women for the labor that the genuine news of the day from every nation requires, as it deserves, to be extracted from papers of value and dignity; for each throb of honest news carries forward the second-hand that marks the hours of mankind.