e.
I don't want you to be one of them, though. You ought to be as much
cleverer than yourself as you are now than Nelly Fader, in order to
carry it through; and even then it might be the carrying of a cross
through life,--a grievous, in the view of most men perhaps an
ignominious cross, to the pioneers. Especially it will be so, if other
good but uninformed and thoughtless women are going to cry out upon it,
as you and Julia did the other day. Whether the experiment is to succeed
or not depends, under Providence, very much on you and such as you. But
if that sort of outcry is to be raised, it will probably have the effect
of keeping out of the profession such women as, from their integrity,
ability, culture, and breeding, could be ornaments to it, and leave us
shallow and low-minded smatterers, that I wouldn't trust with the life
of a canary-bird,--who will ask which is likely to be the most lucrative
calling, medicine or millinery, and take their choice accordingly,--and,
for want of better, poor dupes will employ them. If you can't bear
female practitioners, you'll have to bear female _quack_titioners." He
paused and looked at me.

I knew how jealous he always was for the honor of his craft. He did not
often come so near giving me a scolding; and I began to be afraid I
might deserve one, though I could not see how. "I am sorry," said I; "I
did not mean--I did not think--I did not know--"

"Precisely, kitten on the hearth," returned he, good-humoredly; "and as
you _are_ sorry, and as you are besides usually rather less unmeaning
and unthinking and unknowing than most other chits of your age, I
forgive you. Learn to think and know before you hiss or purr, and you
will be wiser than most chits of any age or sex. But now, consider: you,
such as you are, yourself little more than a child, have, in two or
three short visits, roused, interested, and done that other poor child
more good, and, I strongly suspect, inspired her with more confidence,
than I--I trust as upright a person and as sincere a well-wisher--have
been able to do in a score. And this you have been able to do, in great
part, simply by virtue of your womanhood. It _comes more natural_ to
her, no doubt, to talk with you. Nelly's is a case in point, though by
no manner of means so strong a case as others that I have in my mind.
Now imagine another woman with your good-will and natural tact,
vivacity, and sympathy; multiply these by double your age and intellec