GIRLS' EMPLOYMENTS.
A Constant Reader (Teaching).—You are thinking of entering the Oxford Senior Local Examination. This undoubtedly would be a wise step. To pass this examination, however, even with the highest honours would not qualify you to take a very good position in the teaching profession, though it would help you towards such a position. A very good plan, if finances must be carefully considered, would be on passing the Oxford examination to proceed to some training college for elementary teachers. At Whitelands College, Chelsea, there is now a course of training that has been arranged specially for girls possessed of a superior general education. If you pass the Oxford examination, you would be eligible to avail yourself of this, and the expense is not very great. The Secretary of Whitelands College would doubtless send you a prospectus on application. Elementary teaching offers, on the whole, better opportunities than does the career of private governess. To become a fully-qualified High School teacher would probably entail too much expense, as you ought to obtain a University degree, if later you wish to secure a good salary and promotion. Your handwriting is neat, clear, and good for your age.
Erica.—Your position is indeed a hard one, and it is difficult to advise you satisfactorily. But the future must be considered as well as the present, and it seems to us that this future is decidedly cloudy unless you can be trained for some employment now. If friends could come forward with an offer to train you for any of the occupations mentioned here from time to time, we think your mother would see the propriety of your availing yourself of the chance, sad though it would be to part, and much though there is to say in favour of the immediate economy of living together. We would suggest that you should learn either dressmaking or drawing—the latter with a view to newspaper and magazine illustration or fashion drawing. It is evident you have some talent for art, or your pictures would not have been exhibited; but as money is so much needed, we advise you not to go in for painting. You write a good hand, and a letter which leads us to think you have more than average ability. At the same time your health is possibly not robust. Cannot a little council of relations and friends be held so as to decide what plan should be taken to enable you to earn a living?
Lady Udina S. (Working for Charity).—The circumstance that your presentation at Court has been postponed leaves you with more time free than you would have had if you had entered into the regular round of engagements during the London season. These engagements, however, do not occupy all a girl's time. We are glad to observe that girls and young married women, occupying the very highest positions in London society, set apart some portion of their time for work of public usefulness. Like yourself, they are not content to lay aside only one-tenth of money that has cost them no effort to obtain (though the subtraction of such an amount for God is obligatory), but they wish also to do work for others. It is not always easy to decide what a young and inexperienced girl can do. To help in a Working Girl's Club is suitable and often most interesting; or you might join the local committee of the Children's Country Holidays Fund. The Charity Organisation Society, and the Metropolitan Association for Befriending Young Servants, are both societies that can sometimes delegate practical duties to young assistants. In the meantime you should still pursue your general education notwithstanding the fact that your governess is no longer needed. It is education that will make you of service in the world. Read the standard works of the best writers, study the course of history in the newspapers and with the aid of a map. Try almost every day to give some time both to study and to practical duties. We commend the motive that prompts you to wish to earn money in order to have more to give away. But the earning of money is a serious matter. It can only be performed successfully by girls who have had some special training or who possess special gifts. You give us no information in regard to these points. On the whole it would be better that any work you now do should be voluntary. At the same time, circumstances may occur to almost anyone to render it most desirable that one should be able to earn money. Try, therefore, within the next few years so to educate and train yourself that, if need arose, you could turn your hand profitably to something. A knowledge of housewifery, for instance, is a splendid possession for any girl and can never prove useless.
Yvonne (Hospital Nursing or Teaching).—Since you feel drawn towards hospital nursing, you might do wisely to enter one of the largest London hospitals as a probationer, when you are twenty-three or twenty-four. Having only passed the Oxford Senior Local Examination, your prospects as a teacher cannot be very brilliant, and in the long run you might find yourself more favourably placed in life as a nurse. But in the meantime you had better continue to teach. It hardly seems to be advisable that you should give up your present situation when you appear to be kindly and fairly treated. People who hold the same opinions as ourselves even on the highest subjects are not always pleasant in their dealings. You can at all events strive to show the beauty of your creed in your life and conduct; for a noble example is often more persuasive than doctrine. In hospital wards, moreover, you will find quite as great a diversity of beliefs as you could possibly encounter on the Continent.