OUT-DOOR WORK FOR WOMEN. 157 



It is when thus working together, that their happiness wins 

 the admiration of the angels of heaven, and draws them down 

 to converse with Man. When Satan seeks to work mischief, 

 his first step is to divide them. 



I ask you to proffer this same invitation to the women of Mas- 

 sachusetts, to the thousands of women who need this occupation 

 for the benefit of their health, for the increase of their means 

 of support and usefulness, and for its educational value, in 

 developing their mental and moral powers. 



Do not say the career is open and they need no invitation : 

 " God helps those who help themselves." We cannot live thus 

 hardly with each other ; we need mutual help, support and 

 encouragement. True, God does not help those who do not 

 help themselves, but he is continually inviting, encouraging and 

 stimulating us to exertion ; and we must all do the same good 

 service to those whose energies are paralyzed by prejudice, 

 custom and self-indulgence. 



We ask for women only a fair field and no favor at the 

 last ; but those who hold the field must open the gates for them ; 

 not always oblige them to climb over the high walls, guarded 

 with many a pointed spike of sarcasm and contempt. The few 

 with great gifts and heroic energy of character will always 

 make their way through all obstacles, but it is necessary to 

 make a highway for the multitude to walk in. 



Even now women share largely in the out-door and farming 

 work of the world, but it is usually only as driven by excess 

 of poverty, and in a low and degrading manner, which drives 

 those of any higher culture or refinement as far from it as 

 possible. 



The slave-driver found nothing in woman's constitution which 

 kept her from the cotton-field, where, bending hour after hour 

 over her task, the lash came down upon her if she rose to 

 straighten her weary back. No wonder that the emancipated 

 colored women shrank at once from even the lightest out-door 

 labors of gardening, as the men for some time preferred raising 

 any other crop to cultivating cotton. 



We find that in England, in 1861, there were among women 

 fifty-six thousand three hundred and fifty-eight out-door laborers. 

 Bat their work was not only of the poorest kind and very ill 

 paid, but generally lasting only for a small portion of the year. 



