WORK FOR WOMEN.
Now, it seems to me that every mother who is blessed with a daughter should begin with the first dawn of reason to instil into that daughter's mind the consciousness that she has something to do—that there is work awaiting every step of her advancing progress from childhood to youth, from youth to womanhood, and from womanhood to old age.
The patronage of boarding-houses, which are entirely antagonistic to the first idea of a home, should be discarded. The daughter should be required to participate daily with her mother in household cares and duties, even while pursuing her studies.
Herein lies the difference between "modern ideas" and the antique régime. Here is the fault of the "century," so deplorable in its results, so widely lamented; and here—by the most culpable neglect to rear our daughters in a manner to fit them for the high responsibilities and duties of home—has the equilibrium between the "producer and consumer," so much talked of, been lost.
Education, like charity, should begin, be carried on, and be perfected at home, or it can be nothing elsewhere. The duties of women as "producers," in modern times, are identical with those of their grandmothers; and it is only in the family, within the dear and sheltered nook of home, that they can find profitable and legitimate exercise.
Under the ancient system—and it certainly could show as noble results as the modern mode has been able to achieve—the wife was the queen of a little kingdom, and her highest ambition was to rule within its sacred precincts wisely and well. If the resources and revenues were scanty, her study was so to manage the expenditures as to leave a margin on the credit side for future emergencies, or for increase of capital. If God gave her children, she accepted the inestimable boon with heartfelt thanksgivings, took up the holy office with all its tender cares and duties, as the crown of her glory, and presided with matronly dignity over the best and highest interests of the young immortals committed to her keeping, training her little ones diligently "in the way in which they should walk." She welcomed gracefully whatever adjuncts were furnished by schools and books, but never dreamed of abating her maternal vigilance, or trusting to these as substitutes for home culture. Her children were daily questioned, their proficiencies praised, their deficiencies or indolence in their studies reproved. Consequently she did not fall into that other dream, too common in these days, of going out from home to find something to do, because schools and systems had taken her children off her hands, and removed them beyond the scope of her jurisdiction.
Schools did not release her from the duty of watching over the development of their intellects. Sewing-machines did not stitch their garments; trained servants in every department were not at hand to perform the housework indifferently well. Verily, between one interest and another, our grandmothers had work enough to do!