In humbler ways, too, much might be done to stem the morbid activity of the collective female conscience. Big sins lie at the doors of the hosts of good men and women who turn out year by year tons of “books for the young” to serve as nutriment for the hungry nestlings of culpable, thoughtless parents. It is hard to overstate the pernicious effect of this class of motif literature. Féerie in old or new dress is the only nourishing food for the happy child who is to remain happy. The little girl, aged seven, who lately wrote in her diary before going to bed, “Of what real use am I in the world?” had, it is certain, been denied her Andersen, her Grimm, her Carroll, even her Blue fairy book. Turned in to browse on “Ministering Children,” “Agatha’s First Prayer,” and the fatal “Eric”--into how many editions has this last well-meaning but poisonous romance not passed--the little victim of parental stupidity is thus left with an organ damaged for life by over-much stimulation at the start. This new massacre of the innocents is of purely nineteenth-century growth. It dates from the era of the awakened conscience, and is coincident with the formation of all the societies for the regeneration of the human race.

Per contra, the wife-woman, though but seldom to be met with in the multitudinous pages written by women, is the well-beloved, the chosen of the male artist. Week-days and Sundays he paints her portrait. Shakespeare returns to her again and again, as though it were hard to part from her. Wicked Trix stands out as bold leader of one bad band. Tess belongs to the family, though she is of another branch; so does Cathy of Wuthering Heights, and Lyndall of the African Farm; whilst latest and slightest scamp of the lot comes dancing Dodo of Lambeth. Save in a strictly specialised sense, none of this class can be said to contrive the greatest good of the greatest number. These are the women to whom the nursery is at best but an interlude, and at worst a real interruption of their life’s strongest interests. They are not skilled in dealing with early teething troubles, nor in the rival merits of Welsh and Saxony flannel stuffs. Their crass ignorance of all this deep lore may, it is true, go far to kill off superfluous offspring, but, unjust as it would appear, these are the mothers who each succeeding year become more and more adored of their sons. Fribblers though they be, they sweeten the world’s corners with the perfume of their charm. And the bit of world’s work in which they excel is the keeping alive the tradition of woman’s witchery. Who, then, can deny them their plain uses? When Fate is kind and bestows the fitting partner, the fires of their love never die down. They remain lovers to the end. Their husbands need fear no rival, not even in the person of their own superior son. When Fate is unkind and things go crookedly, these are the women whose wreckage strews life’s high road, and from whom their wiser sisters turn reprovingly away. For the good woman who has to “work for her living,” and who pretends to enjoy the healthful after-pains in her moral system, is rarely tolerant of the existence of the leichtsinnïge sister for whom, as to Elijah at the brook, dainty morsels without labour are cheerfully provided by that inconsequent raven, man. This lady goes gaily, wearing what she has not spun, reaping where she has not sown. Sad reflections these for the high-souled woman whose enlightened demand for justice turns in its present day impotency to wrath and bitterness.

Wisdom and foresight are never the attributes of the wife-woman. Charm, beguilement, fascination of sorts, form her poor equipment for life’s selective struggle. These gifts cannot be said to promise, save when the stars are in happiest conjunction, long life and useful days for her intimates. Variations of the two types of Primitive Woman may abound, but the broad distinction between them is clearly cut and readily to be made out by the dullest groper after truth. We can imagine a modern Daniel addressing (quite uselessly) a modern disciple thus:

“Look to it now, O young man! that your feet go straight, and slip not in search for the pearl that may be hid away for you. For she who loveth you best may work you all evil, and she who loveth her own soul’s travail best will hardly fail you in the days and the years. But Love remaineth, and the way of return is not.”

“Tell me not Now”

By William Watson

Tell me not now, if love for love Thou canst return,-- Now while around us and above Day’s flambeaux burn. Not in clear noon, with speech as clear, Thy heart avow, For every gossip wind to hear; Tell me not now!

Tell me not now the tidings sweet, The news divine; A little longer at thy feet Leave me to pine. I would not have the gadding bird Hear from his bough; Nay, though I famish for a word, Tell me not now!

But when deep trances of delight All Nature seal; When round the world the arms of Night Caressing steal; When rose to dreaming rose says, “_Dear, Dearest_;” and when Heaven sighs her secret in Earth’s ear,-- Ah, tell me then!

From a Lithograph

By George Thomson

The Headswoman

By Kenneth Grahame

I

IT was a bland sunny morning of a mediæval May--an old-style May of the most typical quality; and the Council of the little town of St. Radegonde were assembled, as was their wont at that hour, in the picturesque upper chamber of the Hotel de Ville, for the dispatch of the usual municipal business. Though the date was early sixteenth century, the members of this particular town-council possessed some resemblance to those of similar assemblies in the seventeenth, eighteenth, and even the nineteenth centuries, in a general absence of any characteristic at all--unless a pervading hopeless insignificance can be considered as such. All the character, indeed, in the room seemed to be concentrated in the girl who stood before the table, erect, yet at her ease, facing the members in general and Mr. Mayor in particular; a delicate-handed, handsome girl of some eighteen summers, whose tall, supple figure was well set off by the quiet, though tasteful mourning in which she was clad.

“Well, gentlemen,” the Mayor was saying; “this little business appears to be--er--quite in order, and it only remains for me to--er--review the facts. You are aware that the town has lately had the misfortune to lose its executioner--a gentleman who, I may say, performed the duties of his office with neatness and dispatch, and gave the fullest satisfaction to all with whom he--er--came in contact. But the Council has already, in a vote of condolence, expressed its sense of the--er--striking qualities of the deceased. You are doubtless also aware that the office is hereditary, being secured to a particular family in this town, so long as any one of its members is ready and willing to take it up. The deed lies before me, and appears to be--er--quite in order. It is true that on this occasion the Council might have been called upon to consider and examine the title of the claimant, the late lamented official having only left a daughter--she who now stands before you; but I am happy to say that Jeanne--the young lady in question--with what I am bound to call great good-feeling on her part, has saved us all trouble in that respect, by formally applying for the family post, with all its--er--duties, privileges, and emoluments; and her application appears to be--er--quite in order. There is therefore, under the circumstances, nothing left for us to do but to declare the said applicant duly elected. I would wish, however, before I--er--sit down, to make it quite clear to the--er--fair petitioner, that if a laudable desire to save the Council trouble in the matter has led her to a--er--hasty conclusion, it is quite open to her to reconsider her position. Should she determine not to press her claim, the succession to the post would then apparently devolve upon her cousin Enguerrand, well known to you all as a practising advocate in the courts of this town. Though the youth has not, I admit, up to now proved a conspicuous success in the profession he has chosen, still there is no reason why a bad lawyer should not make an excellent executioner; and in view of the close friendship--may I even say attachment?--existing between the cousins, it is possible that this young lady may, in due course, practically enjoy the solid emoluments of the position without the necessity of discharging its (to some girls) uncongenial duties. And so, though not the rose herself, she would still be--er--near the rose!” And the Mayor resumed his seat, chuckling over his little pleasantry, which the keener wits of the Council proceeded to explain at length to the more obtuse.

“Permit me, Mr. Mayor,” said the girl, quietly, “first to thank you for what was evidently the outcome of a kindly though misdirected feeling on your part; and then to set you right as to the grounds of my application for the post to which you admit my hereditary claim. As to my cousin, your conjecture as to the feeling between us is greatly exaggerated; and I may further say at once, from my knowledge of his character, that he is little qualified either to adorn or to dignify an important position such as this. A man who has achieved such indifferent success in a minor and less exacting walk of life, is hardly likely to shine in an occupation demanding punctuality, concentration, judgment--all the qualities, in fine, that go to make a good business man. But this is beside the question. My motives, gentlemen, in demanding what is my due, are simple and (I trust) honest, and I desire that you should know them. It is my wish to be dependent on no one. I am both willing and able to work, and I only ask for what is the common right of humanity--admission to the labour market. How many poor toiling women would simply jump at a chance like this which fortune lays open to me! And shall I, from any false deference to that conventional voice which proclaims this thing as “nice,” and that thing as “not nice,” reject a handicraft which promises me both artistic satisfaction and a competence? No, gentlemen; my claim is a small one--only a fair day’s wage for a fair day’s work. But I can accept nothing less, nor consent to forgo my rights, even for any contingent remainder of possible cousinly favour!”