1937-10-30 — Page 8

THE CHINA MAIL 00

TAI CAN'T WORK C

evented

type or twi Someone else thought thing out a popular system of short- Shand

Then the war came and dragged gine. the clerks and accountants from their offices and counting houses.

And immediately a flood or eager females stormed the office gates

ige:

they

They banged down letters for away. signature and swaggered Their typing deteriora.ed.

found

A man would are worked so efficiently that he would have me into possibly, an shamed spology, a handshake and a drink after office hours

Seized by

They became wrapped up in little games was typical of the mo nearly kicked that obstinate en- their work that they couldn't hear dern business girl

a question until it had been re- The second time was when, for peated twice a brief period, I reheved a mas who was supposed to be in charge of a dozen office-girls shorthand The office-girl had come to stay, typists, a telephone operator and a and I who had nothing to do with girl-messenger shorthand, the typewriter or the He had let those girls run wild. war, am suffering from her to-day Morning coffee snatched fifteen that sooner or later there would ing bu

The blunt truth is that very few men can work with women.

EDGAR DENT

But

having annoyed count- less women by his shrewd remarks on love and marriage, has a few pungent things t say about the business girl.

Now, had they been men they They slacked deliberately. They would have been honest enough to worked twice as hard trying to find show their resentment so clearly ways of dodging work while seem-

WITH WOMEN!

on the table

When my time as rebel man minutes from 10

to 1115 have been a

up I left that department happily. Afternoon tea had a habit of ex conference. tending from 4 pm to twenty But they amoyed me oh, so I returned to work among men.

cleverly in a way that couldn't I'm not pretending that all the past

possibly call for definite action. men were red-blooded, true-blue, My first mild remonstrances Direct complaints were met paragons of perfectio

But at least we didn't fix our brought into play the wiles tha with, "Oh, well, Mr.always ask- are exasperating sensible employed us to do it that way" and I was minds on imagined slights, petty ers and deceiving the weaker ones caught in the substitute's dilemma, complaints, all over this country.

First, I was vamped.

though I knew that Mr.

surreptitious

weak tions and washroom scandal. as he might be, never tolerated downright sloppiness.

most men have been first deafened, then stunned, into acceptance.

It's too late, know, to bring And in the hope of a promising A female who had tried to copy side-long glance in the corridor or the make-up of Dolores del Rio, The flirtatious glances were suc- back the grand old days when an even more promising hand and who wore the outrageously ceeded by an icy calm. Inside the these wretched girls were kept in squeeze under cover of a filing unsuitable clothes of her familiar office a most formal silence ruled. their proper places and business cabinet, they treat these women type, rolled her pop-eyes in my with the saccharme charm that is direction so noticeably absent when they go home to their wives.

She kept running to me with all sorts of queries, designed to flat- ter me into feeling I knew every thing.

had a little dignity and order.

But every time I think of that at- But once, after a slit argument, mosphere of cheap perfume, I happened to be passing their clothes that suggested a garden- washroom on my way through the party rather than a business of- corridors to lunch.

fice, silly chatter, handbags bulg From inside that closed door ing with ancient love letters to Tactics were abruptly changed came a babble of voices. It sound be read and passed around wi when I told her that if she didn't ed like a female non-intervention furtive gigglers and petty

I feel a little sick. Know her job well enough to stop committee in full session.

Now, I am writing of something I know.

There have been only two times In my life when I fell into helpless silent, simmering rage, ye

It didn't work.

The first was when, a newcomer hanging over my desk asking all Now, I am not setting up these And I give thanks that I at any to motoring, I stood on a lonely manner of stupid questions she girls as horrible exceptions. They rate, was able to get away. moor and contemplated my cheap had better leave.

car that had broken down. I had The rext move was 2-mass dis- tinkered with the engine, tapped play of that dumb insolence, which

THE

WHAT

WORLD GOES BY

By “ULYSSES"

THAT do you do when you meet "If you lose your head and strug-

a python?

gle he will quickly whip his coils Nothing, I imagine. You proba-round von If you keep calm and bly let this everyday problem defest still he go on swallowing. you, when instead, there is an easy "Wait pasiently till he has swal way out. This is the invention of lowed up to about your knee. Then, one Canon Sehoba, whose religious carefully, take out your knife and duties apparently instructed him in insert it into the distended side of wiles of pythons and other his mouth Then with a quick rip

snakes in the grass.

"Remember not to run away,” says

the Canon. "The python can move $200 A Syllable

faster"

Canon Sehoza proceeds:

There is a good story concerning "The thing to do is to lie flat on Mr. Max Steuer, the famous Ameri- the ground on your back with your can criminal lawyer, who boasts feet together, arms to your sides, that he never lost a client to the head well down.

gallows or "the chair" "The python will then try to push A New York business man, feel- its head under you, experimenting ing the need of expert advice on a at every possible point.

decision he was about to take called

Keep calm, one wriggle and he upon Mr. Steuer. will get under you, wrap his colls The problem, though complicat- round you, crush you to death. If ed, only called for a simple

you remain plastered to the ground, or "No" from Mr. Steuer. has no power in his head alone vice was acted upon, and to raise you.

After a time the python

cide to

this and will probably

you wh

to be sound Shortly the cher

bill fo ££200

Stever

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