The Business of Being a Woman

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untry in limited expresses; to-morrow we shall fly! Once twilight and darkness were without, shadows and dim recesses within; now, wherever men gather there is one continuous blazin

rm which changes, not the essence. The few great underlying elements from which character and happiness are evolved are permanent-their mutation

ling it in a fashion sufficiently acceptable to prevent family revolts mastered, and the woman usually is as fixed as a star in its orbit. She resents

is responsible, that place where her child is born and reared, where her mate retreats, to be reassured that the effort to which he has committed himself is worth wh

t the doors, creep in at the windows, win her husband and children from her very arms. The home on which she depended to keep them becomes impot

It is equally understandable that those who find themselves adrift should doubt the home as an institution. At the bottom of the revolt of thousands

im into panic. The sacrifices and pains very young children suffer uncomplainingly, particularly in great cities and factory towns, is a pathetic enough demonstration of what the word means to them. Mere children by the hundreds support families terrified by the thought of their collapse. The orphan fo

to do this that produces what we may call the homeless daughter; that girl who loved and often served to the p

mmunity. It provided for most of its own wants, hence the girl must be taught household arts and science, all of the fine traditional knowledge and skill which made, not drudges, but skilled managers, skilled cooks and needlewomen, skilled hostesses and

ated"; that is, one who has gone through college and has not found a talent which she is eager to develop. The spirit of the times makes her less keen for marriage, puts no feeling of obligation of marriage upon her. She finds herself in a home which is not

cing the laws which forbid children under fourteen working, is the child's desire to help. He may hate the hardship, but at least there is in his lot none of that hopeless sense of futility which comes over the girl of high spirit when she realizes she has no practical value in the group to which she belongs. "Not needed"-that is one of the tragic experiences of the you

hich would enable her to help make more of a limited income. Nothing is so rare to-day as the fine habit of making much of little. A dollar mixed with brains is worth five in every place where dollars are used. Particularly is this true in the household. The failure to teach how to mix brains and dollars, and to inspire respect for the undertaking, annually drives thousands of girls into our already overburdened industrial system who would

it can, if it will, exist practically for itself. That excessive individualism, which is responsible for so many evils in our country, has encouraged this isolation. The girl who finds herself without a productive place at home at the same time finds none of the fine inspiration which comes from fitting herself into a social scheme and helping to do its work. The spirit of the age is social.

ut by the persistence of that spirit of parental authority, which looks upon it as a duty to rule the life, particularly of the daughter, as long as she is at home. There is nothing clearer than that

t build it from the place where you stand and with the materials in your hands. Nobody else ever stood in your particular place or ever will stand in one identical; nobody ever has or can possess the same materials. You alone can fuse the elements. Hold your place; do not try to shift into the place that a

that to her daughter, to help her to see it, and to rise

rogressively on. She must seek work, less for the sake of work than for the sake of life. To remain where she is, unproductive in a group which does not recognize the calls of the present world

must go through to earn her bread in any trade or profession. She learns that work is work whether done in kitchen, sewing room, countinghouse, studio, or editor's sanctum, and all that keeps the operations which consume the bulk of the wor

nock for admission and declare her fealty to its ideals. She realizes sooner or later that she is an outsider and must delve her way

every chance for companionship or pleasure. Her keen need of it makes her overappreciative and undercritical. Moreover, she has the confidence of ignorance. Most American girls are brought up as if wrongdoing were impos

rom the old system of chaperonage and authority. The weak point is in the fact that the girl has not knowledge enough for her freedom. It is not a return of the old system of guarded girls which is needed. That is impossible under modern conditions, out of harmony with modern

hing. It is a positive, living reality. The home has a power of projecting itself into the lives of those who go out from it. It is where the girl does not carry away a sense of an uninterrupted relation-a certainty that

arried or at work, and they do not need me. I have nothing to do. My business is complete, I am retired, sidetracked. It is for this reason that I ask a part in politics." But her argument prov

or many years now, of work for women, that is, of work outside of the home, frequently leads the woman to take some particular virtue to herself for self-support. She feels that it entitles her to special consideration, releases her from obligations which she does not voluntarily assume. The attitude is enough to narrow and harden her life. The great preventive of thi

d a fine-intentioned woman say recently. "I insist that she take all the care of her room, save the weekly cleaning, and that she keep the living-room tidy." But what an occupation for a young woman with a college degree, who for four years has led a busy, well-organized life in which each task was d

Something doing" all the time seems to be the motto, and to take part in this headless procession of unrelated events becomes the first law of the household. The daughter has been living an organized life in college. She wants to study or write, or do regular work of some kind. But there is no order in the spirit of the place, no respect for order, no respect for a regular occupation. "I

upposed to be something which has to do with great cities and factory towns, not with the small community. Yet one reason that social problems are so acute in great groups of men and women is that they are so poorly met in small and scattered groups. There is the same need of industrial training, of efficient schools, of books, of neighborliness, of innocent amusements, of finding opportunities for the exceptional child, of looking after the adenoids and teeth, of

resent itself to her as a grave, dignified undertaking on which several persons dear to her have embarked, how can she be expected to tie to it? The old phrases which she may hear now and then-"the honor of the famil

aught but itself. It has all to learn, but it is youth, the most beautiful and hopeful thing in life. And it is the thing upon which the full development of life for a woman depends. She must have it always at h

the developing and ennobling association. Indeed, the childless woman of to-day, in addition to he