e of too much attention to our manners rather than to
be thought careless of our persons and our behavior.

Civilized peoples cannot help but be concerned with manners,
refinement, good breeding, and in a more minute sense, with the forms
of etiquette. It is these things that distinguish civilization from
savagery, and so unmistakably lift the cultured person above the one
who does not see fit to cultivate the grace of gentility.

It has been truly said that we judge our neighbors severely by the
breach of written or traditional laws, and choose our society, and
even our friends, by the touchstone of courtesy. It is not an uncommon
occurrence for a girl or a boy to win an advantageous position in
life, not by superior mental or physical endowments but by a
graciousness of manners that have smoothed for them the ways that lead
to success.

For some quite unwarranted reason society seems to have taken the
position that we have a right to expect more from our girls than from
our boys in the matter of good manners. This, however, is not the view
held by those who know the true meaning of good breeding. The demand
that every boy shall be a gentleman is as firm and binding as is that
which says that every girl must be a gentle woman and a thorough lady.

Every girl knows what is expected of her. Her parents, brothers,
sisters, teachers, society and the world intend that she shall be good
and gentle and gracious. They will be satisfied with nothing short of
all that and it will be well for every girl to learn early in life to
pursue only the paths that will lead into ways wherein these qualities
of person and character may be found. So here and now it is timely to
ask of the readers of these lines--

WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO?

What are you going to do, girls,
With the years that are hurrying on?
Do you mean to begin life's purpose to win
In the freshness and strength of the dawn?
The builders who build in the morning,
At even may joyfully rest,
Their victories won, as they watch the glad sun
Sink down in the beautiful west.

What are you going to do, girls,
With time as it ceaselessly flows?
Are you molding a heart that will pleasures impart
As perfume exhales from the rose?
Let all that is purest and grandest
In duty's fair wreath be entwined;
There is no other grace can illumine the face
Like the charm of a beautiful mind.