short of
meticulous. I asked my informant if Frenchwomen would ever again
submit to a man's making such an infernal nuisance of himself, and,
sad as she still was at her own great loss, she replied positively
that they would not. They had tasted independence and liked it too
well ever to drop back into insignificance.

"Nor," she added, "will we be content with merely social and domestic
life in the future. We will love our home life none the less, but we
must always work at something now; only those who have lost their
health, or are natural parasites will ever again be content to live
without some vital personal interest outside the family."

Words of tremendous import to France, those.

VII

I caught a glimpse more than once of the complete submergence of
certain Frenchwomen by husbands too old for war, but important in
matters of State. They bored me so that I only escaped betraying acute
misery by summoning all my powers of resistance and talking against
time until I could make a graceful exit. They were, these women (who
looked quite happy), mere echoes of the men to whom their eyes
wandered in admiration and awe. The last thing I had imagined,
however, was that the men would concern themselves about details that,
in Anglo-Saxon countries at least, have for centuries been firmly
relegated to the partner of the second part. How many American women
drive their husbands to the club by their incessant drone about the
iniquities of servants and the idiosyncrasies of offspring?

And much as the women of our race may resent that their role in
matrimony is the one of petty detail while the man enjoys the "broader
interests," I think few of us would exchange our lot for one of
constant niggling interference. It induces a certain pleasure to
reflect that so many Frenchwomen have reformed. Frenchmen, with all
their conservatism, are the quickest of wit, the most supple of
intellect in the world. No doubt after a few birth-pains they will
conform, and enjoy life more than ever. Perhaps, also, they will cease
to prowl abroad for secret entertainment.

VIII

Nothing, it is safe to say, since the war broke out, has so astonished
Frenchwomen--those that loved their husbands and those that loved
their lovers--as the discovery that they find life quite full and
interesting without men. At the beginning all their faculties were put
to so severe a strain that they had no time to miss them; as France
settled down to