Women In France

Wonien are the stronger as well as the betterhalf of Franca They do everythingbutbuildhouses. The best inspector in the French custom house is a woman. She is in the Havre office, and she has a nose that can detect dutiable goods without opening a lock. She is naturally amiable and slow to anger, but woe to the foreigner or countryman who provokes her ire. There is no sadder spectacle in the republic of France than the women shoe polishers, who doze under the sheds of the markets and quay, one eye shut and t'other fixed on the bootbox over the way, patiently waiting for trade. They ask 5 cents and accept 2 cents for their nnwomanly work. At Thiers, the blackest town in France, the women sit outside of the grimy little machine shops mating scisBor blades and polishing knife and scissor handles. The stream that turns the 10,000 little mili wheels is blacker than thé Chicago river, and as the f urnaces never burn without belching the toilers and their devoted ■ lifelong apprentices are sometimos Malay and sonietimes Mongolian, but seldom Cancasian in color. Not long ago a college woman went down to Thiers to teach school for the winter. The promise of 80 pupils was a temptation, but on reaching the colony of soot begrimed and smoke stained emithies she found that the position paid $5 a month, and the teacher was expected to furnish the fuel for the