I have said, perhaps at too great length, I come
back to my original thought of the grand art of education as of life. Do
not dwell upon petty details or exaggerate accidental peculiarities. Lay
your foundations broad and deep in the common ground of humanity. Base
your calculations on the sure ground of universal law. Then, gradually,
out of this common earth will grow up the special flower, true to its
own individual law, which is just as sacred and unalterable as the
general law. All the art of the gardener cannot transform the oak to a
willow, or produce the blue dahlia, though by its aid the sour crab has
become a mellow apple, and the astringent pear, the luscious Bartlett.
We need to study the great subject of education more, and to talk less
about the special peculiarities of woman's education, and we shall find
that the greater includes the less, and that the more thoroughly we
develop all the powers of mind, the more eminently will each woman be
fitted to perform her own peculiar work in life.

I did once see a man crippled of both legs, who claimed to be specially
able to manage a washing-machine because he stood lower than other men.
I honored his acceptance of his limitation, but still think the ordinary
complement of legs an advantage not to be despised.

The great duty of the educator is to place his wheel so that the stream
will fill its buckets evenly. Far more than you can do directly for your
daughter, will the great social forces, the influences of custom,
society, hereditary tendencies do for her; but you can hold the helm and
keep the rudder firmly fixed towards the pole-star of truth and right;
and so, from all these forces thus combined, and from the overflowing
fullness of a mother's love, always warming and kindling the spirit of
life, however much you may err in details, on the grand basis of
humanity, and in the consummate perfection of her own individuality you
may rear

"A woman nobly planned
To warn, to comfort, and command;
And yet a spirit still and bright,
With something of an angel's light."

EDNA D. CHENEY.

Jamaica Plain, Mass.

[NOTE.--I have said nothing of the father's influence upon the education
of girls, simply because I was not writing on that subject, but I do not
wish to be suspected of undervaluing it. By the beautiful law of
relation between the sexes, a father may often have a finer
understanding of his daughter on some points, than the