Books: Female Weakness

MA JEETER’S GIRLS—Dorothy Thomas —Knopf ($1.75).

“Some families has one weakness and some has another.” The Jeeter weakness, sufficiently pronounced to be recognized by everybody as a family trait, was the girls’ tendency to have babies before they were married. Ma Jeeter admitted the tendency frankly, philosophically, but she never made the mistake of regarding it as more than a minor failing.

Of the six girls only Lena was really unlucky. It was the hired man. “He said sure he’d marry her but he never. Just skipped out.” Bell’s man stood by her. “He was here and they was married a good half-hour before the baby come.” Ma had to get the sheriff after Ella’s Oscar, but then everything was all right. Laura’s baby “come so little ahead of time it wasn’t hardly noticeable,” but poor Laura married the wrong man. When Lizzie and Carl had a lover’s quarrel, Ma straightened it out herself with a shotgun. Evie had a real wedding with all the fixings; but her sisters were horrified when she told them why she had no cause to hurry.