earning, inside one's own door, and snugly locked up by one's own key, teaching the widow's son to read, and the motherless bairn to sew, or holding comfortable converse with Dickens and Thackeray, Tennyson and Mrs. Browning, or some of those elder spirits among "the just made perfect" who have left us records of earnest lives and holy deaths, as a compensation for living people whom we have not met because they would not meet us,-because we kept a shop!

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Into the general stream of business, then, whose tributary rivulets are of different complexion in different localities, we desire to turn the intelligent female labour of the Anglo-Saxon race. The second question we proposed was,-how are we to effect the change? It can only be effected on the required scale by every young woman who must "go out" from the domestic hearth asking herself, “ Is there nothing else which I can, for better pay than that of a governess, undertake at the cost of a little courage? Can I not enter somebody else's shop, or set up one of my own with some friend? Or is there not some situation as clerk or accountant, or superintendent, for which I can fit myself if I look out sharply?" Such an one, casting her gentility on the waters, would assuredly find it return to her again after not many days. And with married women in their own comfortable and well-considered homes lies the great onus in this matter, of sheltering with their motherly and sisterly sympathies the more exposed career of those who must at all events for some years seek their own bread. Let it once be clearly recognised that the young business-woman is shielded by the social intercourse of those who are technically called "ladies,” and many of those graver objections which deter parents and guardians from allowing their charges to meet the world in shops and warehouses would be obviated. It is because these scattered young women are not so shielded, because when they disappear there is no large and reputable circle to hound the destroyer with indignation, that mischief sometimes occurs.

Before concluding we would fain make some allusion to a long and careful paper in Blackwood' for the current month (February). It is, we think, written by a man of strongly conservative tendency, but with much sense and kindliness. The writer believes that the cry about unemployed women nowadays is marked by much morbid exaggeration, and that young men struggle with equal difficulties as tutors, as clerks, as emigrants; and that it would be an excellent thing if all single women would get married as fast as they can, and the rest hold their tongues in a dignified manner. And he thinks that the numbers of solitary women are greatly exaggerated in the popular mind just at the present time. He instances the Bronté family as a case where the tutor brother failed, and the governess sisters succeeded, in working out a great career. All this is said with a certain pleasant paternal kindness, much as Sir Peter Laurie might

have put down suicide, and the only objection we have to make is that the article ignores facts. The exact number of women who are unmarried or widowed, and such proportion of them as have to work for their bread, are to be found stated in the census. Female pauperism (in the workhouses) can be estimated, and female emigration told, to a head: nobody need dispute about "exaggeration " till they have checked it by figures. But, supposing women to have as good chances of escaping destitution as men (which they have not), still everybody knows that destitution is for them a more awful thing; that there are depths of horror, of degradation, into which men cannot fall; and that, without any ugly reflections as to the comparative chances of the university tutor or the governess, there is cogent reason why prosperous Englishwomen, and those many good men who are willing to help them, should try with might and main to help their own sex to further industrial gains, and every reason why the young working women of the day should cast about for what their hand findeth to do, remembering that, after all, it is themselves who must clear the path to new occupations.

"Who would be free, herself must strike the blow."

II. A HOUSE OF MERCY.

A FEW days ago I visited the London Diocesan Penitentiary, situated at Highgate; a penitentiary for the most unfortunate of women. This institution is principally supported by voluntary contributions, and is calculated to receive about eighty penitents. An ornamental cross over the entrance gate has, I believe, unfortunately created a prejudice in some minds against this Penitentiary as being Roman Catholic, whereas it is Protestant, a clergymen of the Church of England, who resides with his wife and family near to the institution, being at its head as Warden.

The impression left upon my mind by my visit is so agreeable, that I would willingly make others acquainted with this benevolent asylum for the despised and unhappy.

The place itself is a large mansion, standing in its own grounds, surrounded by high walls; a very healthy, airy, spacious abode.

The Warden, deeply interested in this and other social reforms, and who has long devoted himself to similar labours, has been now at the head of this establishment somewhat less than two years. He received us in his room, wearing his collegiate dress. The room is furnished simply, with oak chairs and an oak library table. A poor's-box hangs upon the wall; mottoes are painted above the

doors and mantel-piece; and upon the mantel-piece stands a small wooden cross.

We were first taken into the laundry, which now occupies what was formerly stables. The institution is in part supported by laundry-work, and during the London season a great deal of linen is sent from the West End to be got up by the girls. They were, however, busy washing and ironing their own clothes only, when we visited the laundry. No washing is received in the l'enitentiary from the immediate neighbourhood.

Many scientific appliances have been introduced into the establishment for lessening the labour of washing and wringing the clothes. I observed to the Warden that I could not avoid questioning whether this were an advisable arrangement as regarded the education of the girls, for in an ordinary way household and domestic labour has none of these aids. Two instances had come under our own observation, of girls educated in public institutions where labour had in a similar manner been lightened, refusing when in service to perform common and necessary domestic work because it had never been required of them" in their school."

The Warden replied that in the case of this particular class of girls these scientific appliances were a great boon. The girls are generally placed in the laundry as soon as they have passed out of the noviciate class, the labour being simple and easy, thus lightened by these mechanical aids, and no longer too heavy for their generally feeble frames. The whole course of their previous lives having rendered the penitents weak, and utterly incapable of exertion requiring a considerable amount of muscular power, it is only by judicious arrangements that they can be gradually and without danger to health initiated into domestic work.

There were about ten girls occupied in the laundry when we entered.

All were perfectly silent, this being one of their silent hours. Some were dressed in pale grey, and others in pale blue gingham dresses; checked handkerchiefs, and small white caps. Beyond the laundry was the drying-ground, in which we noticed the scientific arrangement of the lines for drying the linen, all the lines radiating from a pole in the centre. It is a pity that this plan is not generally adopted, as thus the wind is caught from whatever point it blows.

There is accommodation in this establishment, as I have already said, for eighty girls, and there are constant applications for admission into it from refuges in London and other places; but although the funds would allow of more girls than forty, the number now within its walls, the Warden is deterred from receiving fresh penitents on account of the small number of "Sisters" in the establishment. All the instruction in domestic matters, and the oversight of the girls day and night, is confided to "Sisters of Mercy" who reside in the Home. At the present time there are but three

Sisters. I had some conversation with two of these ladies-Sister A. and Sister B. I will call them. Sister A. might be about thirty; the other was considerably older. Their countenances had that calmness so peculiarly belonging to their Sisterhood, and which so harmoniously blends with the sentiment of their caps of soft pure muslin, their black dresses, and the string of black beads and cross hanging round their necks. Both spoke with touching devotion of their mission, and of the deep interest they felt in the progress towards reformation in their charges, and of the heavenly peacefulness of their own lives. Sister B., the elder one, said, "I am advanced in life, and have seen much of the world; but never did I experience such true heart felt joy, such peace and happiness, as I have felt within these walls. To feel that a power is given one of leading these poor stray sinners to our dear Lord; to know one's duty, and to be able cheerfully daily to perform it-and such a holy duty too! how great is our privilege! I only wish that we could persuade more ladies to join us in our labours. They do not know how much their aid is wanted; how holy is the life, or what an internal joy would animate their souls. And many ladies need sacrifice no really sacred worldly tie by joining us, for we can return to the world whenever we cease to feel that our duty is here. At any time of sickness or sorrow in our own families we can return to our homes, for we are bound by no vow."

I asked, did they not suffer physically from so much exertion, especially under circumstances such as theirs at present, where the small number of Sisters precluded all possibility of relaxation ? But both Sister A. and Sister, B. replied that certainly their bodies felt wearied by the time night arrived, and that it would be a great comfort occasionally to feel that half an hour could be called their own; but that their health was very good, better than before they had entered upon their vocation. And truly their countenances spoke of health and peace.

Sister A. conducted us over the dormitories. Each Sister has charge of her particular set or class of girls, and each class sleeps in a separate dormitory, receives instruction in a separate class-room, and takes exercise together in the grounds under the Sister's superintendence. At the various services in the chapel, and at mealtimes in the dining-room, they all meet. Sister A.'s bed-room and class-room were a specimen of the others—a bright, cheerful little chamber, containing a French bed with white dimity hangings, a couple of chairs, a dressing-table and looking-glass, with a few small prints, and photographs from sacred pictures of the French and German schools, together with a small cross on the wall. Some sentences from the Scriptures were illuminated, and fastened as loving monitors on the wall opposite the bed, and above the little fireplace. Here too I observed sentences from the Gospels formed of dried box or ilex leaves sown upon paper with considerable

elegance. Sister A. said this was the work of the girls in spare moments, and upon Saints'-days and holidays, and was their only "fancy-work," and also a great delight; some of them executing this leaf-embroidery with much expertness and taste. A square aperture in the Sister's room opened into the dormitory, thus conveying all sounds to her attentive ear, even when the walls separated her otherwise from her charges.

The dormitory was a large chamber subdivided into about a dozen cubicles or small sleeping apartments by wooden partitions and doors which rose within a few feet of the ceiling, thus producing privacy to each occupant of the cubicle, and not preventing a free circulation of air. All here was scrupulously clean; each little iron bedstead stood covered with its mattress and blue and white checked coverlet; apparatus for washing standing by each bed. I noticed above several of the beds those little religious prints called in France “images," and which, though occasionally sentimental, frequently also have a peculiar sacred grace about them. These I observed had been well selected; they had been given to the girls by the Sisters and visitors. One particularly struck me. It was not bad in an artistic point of view, and the sentiment was affecting when you knew that it had been placed by the hands of the poor penitent above her pillow. A very narrow bridge spanned a deep chasm. A tall, commanding figure of Christ approached from the farther side towards a girl who, with outstretched arms and face of anguish, pleaded for aid, ready to fall as she stepped along the narrow, dizzy plank. Beneath it, if I rightly remember, were the words, "Aid me, O Lord, or I perish." There were also holy words and sentences embroidered in box and ilex leaves over many of the beds. The girls become greatly attached to their " cubicles," and regard the privacy and sense of possession there enjoyed as one of their greatest privileges. They are found greatly to develop a sense of self-respect in the girls.

I inquired from Sister A. whether there were any particular rules regarding cleanliness and bathing, as I should imagine that the free and ample use of cold water would be an important means towards reformation. She said that each week they took a bath, and that personal cleanliness was especially enjoined; but that it was difficult, whilst so many duties devolved upon one Sister, to be sure that their ablutions were as thorough as might be desirable. I have learned subsequently that the Warden is very desirous of fitting up a room in the house as a bath-room, but is as yet restrained from doing so until the requisite funds are obtained. The weekly bath takes place in the laundry at present, where the accommodation is by no means such as the Sisters consider desirable, and where the stone floor is prejudicial to health.

Silence was, Sister A. informed me, enjoined upon the girls in their bed-rooms, and the rule was rarely broken. At 10 o'clock the