ory of so-called Free
Love. They are professors in colleges, practicing physicians; not
yet, I believe, ordained clergywomen (the Quakers admit the female
right to preach without the ceremony of laying on of hands), or
admitted members of the bar; but it is difficult to imagine society
existing at all under more absolute conditions of freedom for its
female members than the women of the United States now enjoy. It is
a pity that the use sometimes made of so many privileges forms a
powerful argument to reasonable people in other countries against
their possession.[3]]

[3] I have learned since writing the above that in some of the
Western States and cities--among others, I believe,
Chicago--women are now practicing lawyers. A "legal lady" made
at one time, I know not how successfully, an attempt to become a
received member of the profession in Washington. In this, as in
all other matters, the several States exercise uncontrolled
jurisdiction within their own borders, and the Western States
are naturally inclined to favor by legislation all attempts of
this description; they are essentially the "New World." In the
Eastern States European traditions still influence opinion, and
women are not yet admitted members of the New York bar.

BRANCHTOWN, 1835.
DEAR MRS. JAMESON,

It is so very long since I have written to you, that I almost fear my
handwriting and signature may be strange to your eyes and memory alike.
As, however, silence can hardly be more than a _passive_ sin--a sin of
omission, not commission--I hope they will not be unwelcome to you. I am
desirous you should still preserve towards me some of your old
kindliness of feeling, for I wish to borrow some of it for the person
who will carry this letter over the Atlantic--a very interesting young
friend of mine, who begged of me, as a great favor, a letter of
introduction to you.... I think you will find that had she fallen in
your way _unintroduced_, she would have recommended herself to your
liking. [The lady in question was Miss Appleton, of Boston, afterwards
Mrs. Robert Mackintosh, whose charming sister, cut off by too sad and
premature a doom, was the wife of the poet Longfellow.]

And now, what shall I tell you? After so long a silence, I suppose you
think I ought to have plenty