344 POT-POURRI FROM A SURREY GARDEN 



that goes on, more or less, in many women's lives. Of 

 course the same thing occurs, to a great degree, with 

 busy men, whose brains are often as much occupied, to the 

 exclusion of other things, in the work that interests them. 

 But since, as a rule, they have more power of arrang- 

 ing their lives to suit their tastes, their absorption affects 

 less the happiness or convenience of others, and they 

 often have a practical wife who helps them out of their 

 difficulties. No doubt there are instances of both men 

 and women who have the power of combining, in the 

 highest sense, both work and play. A pathetic little 

 touch in a woman's biography is of how Mrs. Browning 

 wrote ' Aurora Leigh ' as an invalid in Paris. She was con- 

 stantly interrupted by friends and visitors, and used quietly 

 to tuck the little bits of paper under the pillow of her 

 sofa, to resume her imaginative work when again alone. 

 The complications of life were lessened for her by the fact 

 that she [inhabited a sick-room. I think the women who 

 will do most for the cause of their sex in the future are 

 those who cease to fight for an equality with men, which 

 is practically an impossibility, and will strive, from their 

 youth up, to keep a just balance between duty, pleasure, 

 and intellectual pursuits ; sometimes asking the help of 

 others to decide when the two last must give way to the 

 first. I am terribly tempted to scratch out this last 

 sentence it sounds so odiously priggish ; and yet, of 

 course, we all know there is a good deal of truth in it. 



If a woman has been ever so successful in a profession, 

 it is my experience that she gives it up after marriage. 

 Every man always says, at the time of engagement, that 

 he would not for the world interfere with her work ; but 

 it always ends in the work being given up, if the house is 

 to be properly kept. Imagine, if there were sickness or 

 any other kind of domestic disaster in the house, the 

 man would never dream of giving up his work, whatever 



