n ancient _Stift_ formed by the
_Ritterschaft_ of the Duchy and it is so well off that it can afford
to pension every widow and fatherless child, and buy an outfit for
every bride whose name either by marriage or descent entitles her to
its protection. The example set by the noble families of the Middle
Ages was followed in time by other classes, and _Stifte_ were
established all over Germany for the daughters of the bourgeoisie.
They grew in number and variety; some had a school attached to their
endowment and some an orphanage. In some the rule was elastic, in
others binding. There are _Stifte_ from which a woman may absent
herself for the greater part of the year, and yet draw an income from
its funds and have a room or rooms appointed to her use; there are
others where residence is compulsory. Some are only open to
descendants of the founders; some sell vacancies. A woman may have to
wait year after year for a chance of getting in; or she may belong to
one that will admit her at a certain age. In many there is a presiding
lady, the Domina or Abbess; and when the present Emperor visited a
well-known _Stift_ lately he gave the Abbess a shepherd's crook with
which to rule her flock. Some are just sets of rooms with certain
privileges of light and firing attached. Their constitution varies
greatly, according to the class provided for and the means available.
But you cannot be much amongst Germans without meeting women who have
been educated, endowed, helped in sickness, or supported in old age by
one of these organisations. You come across girls of gentle birth but
with no means who have been brought up in a _Stift_, or you hear of
well-to-do girls whose parents have paid high for their schooling in
one. You know the elderly unmarried daughter of an official living on
his pension, and you find that though she has never been taught to
earn her bread she looks forward to old age with serenity, because
when she was a child her relations bought her into a _Stift_ that will
give her at the age of fifty free quarters, fire, light, and an income
on which, with her habits of thrift, she can live comfortably. Another
woman engaged in private teaching and a good deal battered by the
struggle for life, comes to you some day more radiant than you have
ever seen her, and you find that influential friends have put her case
before a _Stift_, and that it has granted her two charming rooms with
free fire and light. I heard of a cook the