Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 255, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 October 1915 — FOIK We Touch. in Passig [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

FOIK We Touch. in Passig

By Julia Chandler MANG

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THE MAN AND HIS CHATTEL Because The Man measured everything in this world by the rule of dollars and cents it never occurred to him that anything that might add to the sum total of human happiness could be procured in any other way. He had always known what he wanted and straightway had bought it. Left a very large fortune when he was beginning his business career he took pride in his social and financial prestige. His friends called him a “lucky dog,” and matchmakers set their nets to catch him for eligible daughters, which was a waste of energy, for The Man had already made up his mind as to the sort of girl he would marry when the right time came. Above all else she must be qualified to fill the position in life he would be able to offer her. She must be cultured, brilliant, able to shine socially, be an adornment to his home; a satisfaction to his pride, and an honor to his standing in the community. He was not particular about her financial position so long as she had been well trained in the niceties of life, in fact, he thought he should rather prefer that she had not been accustomed to a great deal of money. She would be the better able to appreciate his; more grateful to him for the things he could do for her, more subservient to his will. Naturally he met many women, and

always he appraised them mentally as he would appraise some pedigreed addition he contemplated making to his far-famed stables, or as he would look into the possibilities of a financial venture. While no one knew the principle upon which his mind worked in his pursuit of a wife, everybody realized that he was hypercritical, and so it came about, when it was announced that The Man was engaged that everybody flocked to The Girl’s house to offer their congratulations and compliments. Secretly they were greatly astonished at The Man’s choice, for, while The Girl was an acknowledged beauty, her family represented one of those old broken-down houses of aristocracy with more traditions than money. The Man had a wonderful house built for his bride. It reflected his money and his good taste, but when The Girl went to live in it she felt like an alien in a strange land. It had never occurred to The Man to consult her about the building of the house in which she was to live, and so it was that she wandered from one sumptuous room to another in an agony of unrest, even while everybody was praising The Man for the palace he had builded, and telling each other what a wonderful blessing it was for The Girl to have made such a brilliant match. The Girl told herself that she would become accustomed to the place and be happier there when she had succeeded in stamping it with enough of her own individuality to make her feel at home, but she reckoned without The Man, who declared his house a

unit of perfection as it was, and that he did not want its harmony of color disturbed. He said it was his home; that he had bought and paid for it with his money, and that it was to express his ideas and his taste, and when later he found The Girl sobbing into her pillow he chided her for such thoughtless wreckage of her beauty which he told her meant so much to him. And to prove to her that he had just as much pride in her as he had in his house he instructed her to replace her “shabby trousseau” with costly and elaborate gowns which became her position, sparing no money in making herself the most beautiful ornament in his beautiful house. He told her that her loveliness was a part of herself and belonged to him; that he intended it to be exhibited in suitable trappings. He said it should make her very happy that he had such pride in her, and when he was all through he gave her a check so large that she sat staring at it for an hour after he had left her. The Girl got out every piece of her trousseau The Man had called “shabby”—the wedding clothes which she and her mother had made with the assistance of a visiting seamstress —dainty frocks and dainty lingerie expressive of her own refinement and good taste. With every stitch she had woven into the garments her lofty

thought of wifehood and motherhood and home —beautiful, sacred dreams of the highest fulfillment of love and life. Mingled with them had been plans fo* the accomplishment of much beyond her own happiness, for she had not been unmindful of The Man's great wealth. What splendid work she would accomplish with his money! What sorrow she would be able to soften; what comfort she would bring to the comfortless; what suffering she would assuage, and oh, the blessed little children of the poor to whom she would give a chance of life and happiness. As memory marshaled these plans in which she had expected The Man's help across The Girl’s mind scalding team filled her eyes and dropped one by one on the garments she neld. “But I am only a part‘of his chat* tels,” she sobbed into the soft folds of her wedding gown as she folded it neatly and -aid it on top of others in her trunk, which, when the evening shadows were gathering, went with The Girl very quietly out of the beautiful house which reflected The Man’s wealth and satisfied nis pride, but was in no sense a nome. And when later The Man searched the place for her he found the very large check he had given her earlier in the day tom straight across and lying in a conspicuous place on the perfectly-ordered table in the center of the apartment

"But I Am Only a Part of His Chattels."