THE MISSION OF EDUCATED WOMEN. 601 



THE MISSION OF EDUCATED WOMEN. 



By Mrs. M. F. AKMSTKONG. 



" Love seldom haunts the breast 

 Where learning lies." Pope. 



" 'Tis Reason's part, 

 To govern and to guard the heart." Cotton. 



" I loved her well ; I would have loved her better 

 Had love been met with love ; 

 As 'tis, I leave her 

 To brighter destinies, if so she deems them." Byron. 



AN article entitled " Plain Words on the Woman Question," 

 - reprinted from the " Fortnightly Review " in this magazine, 

 is so far in the nature of an attack upon the women whom the 

 writer calls into court as to make reply, from one or another 

 quarter, legitimate, and indeed, I think, obligatory. As a woman, 

 who is bound by the conditions of wife and motherhood, for 

 which Mr. Allen makes so able a plea, I can not individually 

 appear on either side. It is not the women whom I represent who 

 are under discussion, but none the less are the principles involved 

 of the deepest and most pressing interest to thoughtful women 

 everywhere, whether they have elected the single-handed fight, 

 or the less evident but none the less serious test which comes with 

 motherhood and the endeavor to make a home. 



My excuse, therefore, for offering myself, in a sense, as a mouth- 

 piece for the women whom Mr. Allen classifies as " deplorable 

 accidents " is, first, that the points raised are in reality of as much 

 importance to married women as to their unmarried sisters ; and, 

 second, that my position gives me, I think, unusual advantages 

 for getting at certain underlying facts. 



I have been for years connected with a large educational insti- 

 tution, where young men and women are working, side by side, 

 under identically similar influences. The officials and teachers 

 in this school are largely women, and women who, to quote Mr. 

 Allen, have become " traitors to their sex," in that they have 

 taken upon their shoulders the burden of their own support. 

 They are, with few exceptions, highly educated, many of them 

 college-bred, three among them being regular physicians, while 

 all of them, if I may be permitted to judge, are of at least average 

 attractiveness. As to health, social position, and previous con- 

 dition, they offer also, I believe, a fair average, while their intel- 

 lectual standards mark them high in the scale of feminine de- 

 velopment. 



For years they have puzzled me, for they are, without doubt, 

 representative of a social phase, and the reasons for their exist- 



