ies terrified by the thought of their collapse. The orphan
forever dreams of the day when a home will be found for him. The child
whose parents seek freedom, leaving him to school or servants, never
fails to nourish a sense of injustice. Whatever one generation may
decide as to the futility or burdensomeness of the home, the oncoming
child will force its return.

To keep this permanent place abreast with growing truth, that is the
obligation of the woman. It is the failure to do this that produces
what we may call the homeless daughter; that girl who loved and often
served to the point of folly, finds herself in a group where none of
the imperative needs the day has awakened in her are met.

One of the first of these needs is for what we call "economic
independence." The spirit of our day and of our system of government
is personal, material independence for all. Under the old regime the
girl had her economic place. The family was a small community. It
provided for most of its own wants, hence the girl must be taught
household arts and science, all of the fine traditional knowledge and
skill which made, not drudges, but skilled managers, skilled cooks and
needlewomen, skilled hostesses and nurses. She had a _business_ to
learn under the old regime, and there was an authority, often severely
enforced no doubt, which made her learn it well. There was the same
appraising of the efficiency of the girl for her business there was
of the boy for his.

The girl of to-day rarely has any such systematic training for the
material side of her business, nor is a dignified place provided for
her in well-to-do families. Her place is parasitical and demoralizing.
Take the young girl who has been what we call "educated"; that is, one
who has gone through college and has not found a talent which she is
eager to develop. The spirit of the times makes her less keen for
marriage, puts no feeling of obligation of marriage upon her. She
finds herself in a home which is not regarded as a serious industrial
undertaking. Things go on more or less accidentally, according to
traditions or conventions. Her ideas of scientific management, if she
has any, are treated as revolutionary. Her help is not needed. There
is no place for her.

The daughters of the very poor often have better fortune than she in
this respect. They, from very early years, have known that they were
necessary to the family. Almost invariably they accept heavy and
sometimes