are generally as carefully dressed as older women and often in better taste.  Contrary to the usual opinion, the real cause of the abuse of the toilet is not vanity but lack of occupation.  The woman who devotes six hours to her toilet is well aware that she is no better dressed than the woman who took half an hour, but she has got rid of so many of the tedious hours and it is better to amuse oneself with one’s clothes than to be sick of everything.  Without the toilet how would she spend the time between dinner and supper.  With a crowd of women about her, she can at least cause them annoyance, which is amusement of a kind; better still she avoids a tete-a-tete with the husband whom she never sees at any other time; then there are the tradespeople, the dealers in bric-a-brac, the fine gentlemen, the minor poets with their songs, their verses, and their pamphlets; how could you get them together but for the toilet.  Its only real advantage is the chance of a little more display than is permitted by full dress, and perhaps this is less than it seems and a woman gains less than she thinks.  Do not be afraid to educate your women as women; teach them a woman’s business, that they be modest, that they may know how to manage their house and look after their family; the grand toilet will soon disappear, and they will be more tastefully dressed.

Growing girls perceive at once that all this outside adornment is not enough unless they have charms of their own.  They cannot make themselves beautiful, they are too young for coquetry, but they are not too young to acquire graceful gestures, a pleasing voice, a self-possessed manner, a light step, a graceful bearing, to choose whatever advantages are within their reach.  The voice extends its range, it grows stronger and more resonant, the arms become plumper, the bearing more assured, and they perceive that it is easy to attract attention however dressed.  Needlework and industry suffice no longer, fresh gifts are developing and their usefulness is already recognised.

I know that stern teachers would have us refuse to teach little girls to sing or dance, or to acquire any of the pleasing arts.  This strikes me as absurd.  Who should learn these arts—­our boys?  Are these to be the favourite accomplishments of men or women?  Of neither, say they; profane songs are simply so many crimes, dancing is an invention of the Evil One; her tasks and her prayers we all the amusement a young girl should have.  What strange amusements for a child of ten!  I fear that these little saints who have been forced to spend their childhood in prayers to God will pass their youth in another fashion; when they are married they will try to make up for lost time.  I think we must consider age as well as sex; a young girl should not live like her grandmother; she should be lively, merry, and eager; she should sing and dance to her heart’s content, and enjoy all the innocent pleasures of youth; the time will come, all too soon, when she must settle down and adopt a more serious tone.