associates. The mother has it in her power to make such books the companions and friends of her children as her good judgment may select, and to impress upon them their truths, by conversing with them about the moral lessons or the intellectual instructions they contain. A taste may be easily cultivated for books on natural science and for history, as well as for those that teach important and wholesome lessons for the young, such as are contained in the works of Mrs. Edgeworth, Mrs Child, Mrs. Yonge, and many other books written for the young.

CHAPTER XXI.

Woman's Higher Education.

T has been seen that in the rearing and training of her children, woman has a great work to perform; that in this work she exerts an incalculable influence upon untold numbers, and that she molds the minds and characters

of her sons and daughters. How important, then, that she should cultivate her mental faculties to the highest extent, if for no other reason than to fit herself the better for the performance of this great duty of educating her children. How important it is, also, that she should look to

the higher education of her daughters, who, in turn, will become mothers of future generations, or may, perhaps, by some vicissitude of fortune, become dependent upon their own resources for support. With the highest culture of the mental faculties, woman will be best enabled to faithfully perform whatever she may undertake.

TRAIN YOUNG WOMEN TO SOME OCCUPATION.

Owing to the changes in social and industrial life which have crowded many women from their homes into business and public life, women must train for their branch of labor as men train for their work, if they wish to attain any degree of success. Even where women have independent fortunes, their lives will be all the happier if they have been trained to some occupation, that, in case of reverses, may be made a self-sustaining one.. A young woman who is able to support herself, increases her chances for a happy marriage, for, not being obliged to rely upon a husband for support or for a home, she is able to judge calmly of an offer when it comes, and is free to accept or decline, because of her independence. Women are capable of and adapted to a large number of employments, which have hitherto been kept from them, and some of these they are slowly wrenching from the hands of the sterner sex. In order that women may enter the ranks of labor which she is forcing open to herself, she needs a special education and training to fit her for such employment.

EDUCATION OF GIRLS TOO SUPERFICIAL.

The school instruction of our girls is too superficial. There is a smattering of too many branches, where two or three systematically studied and thoroughly mastered, would accomplish much more for them in the of a way sound mental training, which is the real object of education. The present method of educating young girls is

to give them from five to ten studies, in which they prepare lessons, and this, too, at an age when their physical development suffers and is checked by excess of mental labor. Such a course of instruction, bestowing only a smattering of many branches, wastes the powers of the mind, and deters, rather than aids, self-improvement. It is only a concentration of the mind upon the thorough acquisition of all it undertakes that strengthens the reflective, and forms the reasoning, faculties, and thus helps to lay a solid foundation for future usefulness. The word education means to educe, to draw out the powers of the mind; not the cramming into it of facts, dates and whole pages to be repeated verbatim.

AN EDUCATION APPROPRIATE TO EACH SEX.

The fact is becoming more palpable every year that there is an education appropriate to each sex; that identical education for the two sexes is so unnatural, that physiology protests against it and experience weeps over it. The physiological motto in education is, "Educate a man for manhood, a woman for womanhood, and both for humanity." Herbert Spencer, in speaking of the want of a proper course of education for girls, says: "It is an astonishing fact that, though on the treatment of offspring depend their lives or deaths, and their moral welfare or ruin, yet not one word of instruction on treatment of offspring is ever given to those who will, by and by, be parents." It will thus be seen, that as women have the care, the training and the education of children, they need an education in a special direc

tion, and should have a very thorough one, to prepare them for the task.

WOMEN SHOULD HAVE A KNOWLEDGE OF THE LAWS OF

HEALTH.

Physiology is one of the branches of that higher education, which should be thoroughly pursued by women to enable them to fulfill the various duties of their allotted stations. Yet it is also desirable that they should have a thorough knowledge of all branches that they undertake, and a mastery of the studies pursued by them; for the want of thoroughness in woman's education is an obstacle to success in all branches of labor. But woman should especially have a thorough knowledge of the laws of physiology and hygiene. If she becomes a mother, such knowledge will enable her to guard better the lives and health of her children. She will understand that when she sends out her child insufficiently clad, and he comes home chilled through, that his vitality, his power of resisting disease, is wasted. She will know that by taking the necessary precautions, she may save the child's life; that she must not take him thus chilled, to the fire or into a room highly heated, but that by gentle exercise or friction, she must restore the circulation of the blood, and in using such precautions, she may ward off the attacks of disease that would surely follow if they were neglected. This is but a single case, for there are instances of almost daily occurrence when a proper knowledge of the laws of health will ward off disease, in her own case, as well as in those of various