Personality of the Month — With Mrs. Shafiqa Abd al-Rahim Diab

Fragrant blossoms whose perfume fills the air of a flourishing garden... limpid waters on which the pool bestows a color of heaven's own blue... poised statues of art, pulsing with life and splendor... all these welcome you as you pass the outer gate of the home of Mrs. Shafiqa Abd al-Rahim Diab... You ring the bell, and a servant hastens to receive you, trim in dress and cheerful of face, who leads you to the reception hall... and it is not long before you are seized by the splendor of what you behold — rich, costly furnishings and elegant, magnificent appointments... Your eyes are at a loss where to settle: the oil paintings draw your gaze from one side, the gilded settees in the style of Louis XV claim your attention from another, and the lifelike statuary hung from ceiling and walls strives to monopolize your interest — this besides the drapes and curtains and the precious, rarely-seen treasures scattered through corners and nooks... And from the place of honor in the study adjoining the door, Mr. Abd al-Rahim Diab receives you, in a costly gilded frame, welcoming you with a handsome smile imprinted upon his lips; and you answer him with a bitter sigh that rises burning from your depths for his fresh youth, withered in life's springtime and the pride of its bloom... You continue your progress to the reception hall that is your destination, and find it most elegant in a captivating simplicity, at its head a lovely picture of a small child in whom I recognized Salim, Mrs. Shafiqa's young son, the only boy among his five sisters.

And Mrs. Shafiqa comes toward us, slow of step, calm of feature, her face — bare of any trace of paint or adornment — clothed in a cast of silent melancholy. And like every daughter of my sex who cares about elegance and dress, I stole a glance at what Mrs. Shafiqa was wearing, and found it very simple — that captivating simplicity which in this age of ours is elegance itself. She was clad in a trim black tailleur, and her neck and wrist were bare of any ornament... Perhaps she still grieves for her husband, whom death folded away three years ago, leaving behind him extensive commercial enterprises and projects drawn up and awaiting execution. And so Mrs. Shafiqa descended into the arena of men to fill her late husband's place, becoming thereby one of the few ladies in our country who conduct vast commercial dealings and practice the thorny, intricate language of figures; and in this she strives, with all the resolve and strength given her, to preserve that name which her husband left behind in the world of trade and finance...

We settled ourselves and plunged into talk... I congratulated her on the victory she had won in her election as a member of the board of directors of Intra Bank; and with abounding modesty she went on to tell me of the board's insistence upon electing her, and of her own reluctance — for no reason but her exhaustion by her commercial affairs on the one hand, and her absorption in her social activity on the other; for she is a member of the Lebanese Women's League, an administrative member of the Lebanese Red Cross society — to which she was lately re-elected — besides being honorary president of most of the Lebanese charitable associations, such as the Children's Hospital Society and the Child Care Society...

I asked her about the dispensary standing beside her house, whose fame has gone abroad through most of the poor and needy quarters. She told me that years ago, when she felt the number of the sick swelling year upon year, and their pressing need for free care, she undertook this project of hers, meeting in it every requirement of health, and gave it the name of her late husband, to keep his memory alive and as a charity for his soul... The dispensary receives the sick, grown and small alike, supplies them with the medicines they need, and is overseen by a picked company of the best physicians... And speaking of her departed husband, Mrs. Shafiqa told me that she has endowed in his name three thousand liras as an annual scholarship for the Islamic Makassed College, to be awarded to the most distinguished among its girl students... Mrs. Shafiqa fell silent... and I went on in my turn, reviewing those financial contributions and charitable donations which Mrs. Shafiqa makes with open hand whenever need and occasion call, moved to it by a lofty generosity of spirit and a noble human feeling... I tried to draw her into disclosing something of those lofty humane contributions, but she lowered her eyes and signed to me that the best charity is that which one wraps in a veil of concealment...

And however far a woman may range outside her home — pioneering, inquiring, exploring — she must return at last to her quiet nest, where her children, the pieces of her heart, await her... So it is with Mrs. Shafiqa... Scarcely had I asked her about her little ones when her face shone with the light of motherhood, and a wave of gladness and tenderness swept over it, and she fell to telling me of Salma and Salwa and Salim — already my pupils at the French Evangelical College for Girls... In the thick of her occupations she finds, every day, a space of time to spend with them, listening to the complaint of this one, the confidences of that one, the recitations of the third... Salma, the eldest of her daughters, has reached the intermediate-certificate class this year; she is a tender, blossoming girl, opening day by day — sweet, radiant, well-mannered — and eyes and glances have already begun to press, with insistence and obstinacy, to snatch her away... and the mother is at a loss, for Salma is young, no doubt, but "the destined match is a wondrous thing," as Mrs. Shafiqa says... Salwa is diligent, beloved of her teachers and companions for her good heart and her eager, willing application to work... As for little Salim, he receives the lion's share of his mother's care, for she is training him from this day forward to storm

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the hard practical life, so that he may fill his father's place, and then his mother's, in the field of affairs, and keep for the family its name and standing in the world of trade and finance... We had come this far in our talk when the servant stood forth in the middle of the hall, announcing the arrival of Miss Ibtihaj Kaddoura, president of the General Arab Women's Union.

Miss Kaddoura came toward us beaming, radiant, aglow — delighted, no doubt, at the victory Mrs. Diab had won... and she went on to congratulate her with warmth and sincerity, saying: "It is we ladies who should congratulate ourselves on you, for you have lifted our heads high and proved to man that woman is worthy of mounting to social, administrative, and commercial positions..." And I sat between the two of them, proud and elated... for on one side of me sat the Municipal Council, and on the other the board of directors of Intra Bank...

And I drift away into another world, all striving and struggle and battle even unto martyrdom for the cause of woman... the days when woman pleaded desperately for her natural, lawful rights, while man laughed at her with all his jaws, decrying her weakness and her incapacity for any work outside her home... I review in my imagination the armies of women's demonstrations — clamorous and wrathful at one moment, calm and measured at another, menacing and threatening at yet another... and how Mrs. Shafiqa was in the vanguard, urging her colleagues on, spurring them to press forward in the struggle, in striving and battle, to the very end... until success was written for her in her mission and she attained what she longed for... And I found myself suddenly asking: has woman truly attained what she longs for??? It seems my question was spoken aloud, for Miss Kaddoura and Mrs. Diab at once sprang to answer, saying: "We are assuredly still at the very beginning of the road. We have thrown the door wide open for the coming generation; they have only to enter, and then to walk the road we spent long years in paving... We hope that this generation will come equipped with sound learning and true knowledge, lest it wreck what we have built and spoil what we have set right..."

I asked leave to withdraw... and Mrs. Shafiqa went before me to the outer door in farewell, repeating her kind praise of the pains "The Woman's Voice" takes to furnish the reader with every pleasure and profit, and to guide the steps of the rising generation up the paths of true knowledge and sound learning...