oing to the movies. Don't you know there is a
ward caucus to-night?"

There is a curious situation in the economic world, too. Business has
been the man's field ever since Cain and Abel went into the stock and
farming combine, with one of them raising grain for the other's cows,
and taking beef in exchange. And the novelty is gone. But there's a
truism here: Men play harder than they work; women work harder than they
play.

Women in business bring to it the freshness of novelty, and work at
their maximum as a sex. Men, being always boys, work _under_ their
maximum. (Loud screams here. But think it over! How about shaking dice
at the club after lunch, and wandering back to the office at three P.M.
to sign the mail? How about golf? I'll wager I work more hours a day
than you, Irvin!)

The plain truth is that if more men put their whole hearts into business
during business hours, there would be no question of competition. As I
have said, they think straighter than women, although more slowly. They
have more physical strength. They don't have sick headaches--unless they
deserve them. But they are vaguely resentful when some little woman, who
has washed the children and sent them off to school and straightened her
house and set out a cold lunch, comes into the office at nine o'clock
and works in circles all around them.

But there is another angle to this "woman in the business world" idea
that puzzles women. Not long ago a clever woman whose husband does not
resent her working, since his home and children are well looked after,
said to me:

"I've always been interested in what he had to say of his day at the
office, but he doesn't seem to care at all about _my_ day. He seems so
awfully self-engrossed."

The truth probably is that they are both self-engrossed, but women can
dissemble and men cannot. It is another proof of their invincible
boyishness, this total inability to pretend interest. Even the averagest
man is no hypocrite. He tries it sometimes, and fails pitifully. The
successful male dissembler is generally a crook. But the most honest
woman in the world is often driven to pretense, although she may call it
_savoir faire_. She pretends, because pretense is the oil that
lubricates society. Have you ever seen a man when some neighbors who are
unpopular drop in for an evening call? After they are gone, his wife
says:

"I do wish you wouldn't bite the Andersons when they come in, Joe!"

"Bite them! I was civ