CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE
I. [The Back Way]9
II. [Bainville Effects]31
III. [The Outbreak]60
IV. [Transplanted]81
V. [Contrasts]101
VI. [New Friends and Old]126
VII. [Side Lights]149
VIII. [A Mixture]174
IX. [Consequences]204
X. [Determination]229
XI. [Thereafter]256
XII. [Achievements]283

Who should know but the woman?—The young wife-to-be?
Whose whole life hangs on the choice;
To her the ruin, the misery;
To her, the deciding voice.

Who should know but the woman?—The mother-to-be?
Guardian, Giver, and Guide;
If she may not foreknow, forejudge and foresee,
What safety has childhood beside?

Who should know but the woman?—The girl in her youth?
The hour of the warning is then,
That, strong in her knowledge and free in her truth,
She may build a new race of new men.


CHAPTER I

THE BACK WAY

Along the same old garden path,
Sweet with the same old flowers;
Under the lilacs, darkly dense,
The easy gate in the backyard fence—
Those unforgotten hours!