work. Of course men can be useful
in many little ways; such as giving money and getting other people
to give it, in influencing legislation, interviewing school boards,
securing buildings, presiding over meetings, and giving a general air
of strength and solidity to the undertaking. But the chief plotting
and planning and working out of details must be done by women. The
male genius of humanity begets the ideas of which each century has
need (at least it is so said, and I have never had the courage to deny
it or the time to look it up); but the female genius, I am sure, has
to work them out, and "to help is to do the work of the world."

If one can give money, if only a single subscription, let her give
it; if she can give time, let her give that; if she has no time for
absolute work, perhaps she has time for the right word spoken in due
season; failing all else, there is no woman alive, worthy the name,
who cannot give a generous heartthrob, a warm hand-clasp, a sunny,
helpful smile, a ready tear, to a cause that concerns itself with
childhood, as a thank-offering for her own children, a pledge for
those the hidden future may bring her, or a consolation for empty
arms.

There is always time to do the thing that _ought_ to be, that _must_
be done, and for that matter who shall fix the limit to our powers of
helpfulness? It is the unused pump that wheezes. If our bounty be dry,
cross, and reluctant, it is because we do not continually summon and
draw it out. But if, like the patriarch Jacob's, our well is deep, it
cannot be exhausted. While we draw upon it, it draws upon the unspent
springs, the hill-sides, the clouds, the air, and the sea; and the
great source of power must itself suspend and be bankrupt before ours
can fail.

The kindergarten is not for the poor child alone, a charity; neither
is it for the rich child alone, a luxury, corrective, or antidote;
but the ideas of which it tries to be the expression are the proper
atmosphere for every child.

It is a promise of health, happiness, and usefulness to many an
unfortunate little waif, whose earthly inheritance is utter blackness,
and whose moral blight can be outgrown and succeeded by a development
of intelligence and love of virtue.

The child of poverty and vice has still within him, however overlaid
by the sins of ancestry, a germ of good that is capable of growth, if
reached in time. Let us stretch out a tender strong hand, and touching
that poor ger