IN our crowded population, girt in by island boundaries, and containing at the present time so great a disproportion of women, we must expect to find some poverty which no prudence or principle on the part of parents could arrest. That this amount might be greatly lessened is indisputable; nevertheless, we must prepare to deal with what is likely to exist for a long time to come, even if it does not seem (as I confess it does not to my mind) a desirable state of things for great numbers of educated women to be seeking a livelihood out of domestic life.

To what ends, therefore, can we hope to see average women devote themselves, since they cannot sit and starve, and since their natural protectors are gone by thousands across the sea to the antipodes? As a rule, those who can neither write nor paint, and are not sufficiently educated to teach, do sink into the grade of mechanical workers, in which ten shillings a-week is a high average of wages. But it is very hard that the middle-class woman, possessing often a fair share of common knowledge and plenty of sense, should be driven downwards to such a lot. Could she not in many more instances join the ranks of tradeswomen, making a tolerable profit, and keeping that which is so dear to a woman's heart, a comfortable and respectable roof over her head?