lish, too
brutal, too conceited and too vile to find a wife. _Any_ man can find
_some_ woman to wed him. In this connection, one recalls the famous
cook, who, when condoled with on the defection of a lover, replied:
'It don't matter; thank God I can love any man!'

One cannot help being amused by the serious articles on this subject in
feminine journals. We are gravely told that women don't marry nowadays
because they price their liberty too high, because those who have money
prefer to be independent and enjoy life, and those who have none prefer
bravely wringing a living from the world to being a man's slave, a mere
drudge, entirely engrossed in housekeeping, etc., etc.; and so on--pages
of it! All this may possibly be true of a very small portion of the
community, but the uncontrovertible fact remains that the principal
reason for woman's spinsterhood is man's indifference.

I have every sympathy with the women who wish to postpone taking up the
heavy responsibilities of matrimony till they have had what in the
opposite sex is termed 'a fling,' that is until they have enjoyed a
period of freedom wherein to study, to travel, to enjoy their youth
fully, to meet many men, to look life in the eyes and learn something of
its meaning. But there comes a period in the life of almost every
woman--except the aforesaid degenerate--when she feels it is time to
'put away childish things,' and into her heart there steals a longing
for the real things of life--the things that matter, the things that
last--wedded love and little children, and that priceless possession,
a home of one's own.

It is the fashion nowadays to discredit the home, and it has been
jestingly alluded to by Mr Bernard Shaw as 'the girl's prison and the
woman's workhouse;' but what a wonderful sanctuary it really is!--and
exactly how much it means to a woman, only those who have felt the need
of it can tell. In our youth, home is the place where hampers come from,
where string and stamps and magazines grow on the premises, a place
generally where love is, but nevertheless essentially a place we take
for granted and for which we never dream of being grateful. Later on it
is sometimes associated with irksome duties; to some it even becomes a
place to get away from; but when we have lost it, how we long for it!
How reverently we think of each room and the things that happened there;
how we yearn in thought over the old garden and dream about the beloved
trees. No