4 io MORE POT-POURRI 



as to the facts of life. There are hundreds of ways of 

 expanding and enlarging a girl's mind so as to increase 

 rather than diminish the modesty which is her greatest 

 safeguard, and certainly not the least of her attractions. 

 Indeed, it is a favourite theory of mine that the instincts 

 of life are apt to grow before their protector modesty 

 which is more the result of cultivation and civilisation 

 than particularly pertaining to what is natural. All 

 prohibitions wound liberty and increase desire. We 

 none of us can defend ourselves from a danger as 

 to the very existence of which we are ignorant. If a 

 girl is trained to understand that we are part of that great 

 whole which is called Nature, and that in fact our common 

 development is shared by every flower that blooms, she 

 is neither surprised nor shocked when further knowledge 

 gathers round her as life expands. This, I believe, 

 will serve as a very wholesome check against an over- 

 preponderance being given to the romantic attitude so much 

 advocated by Miss Marie Corelli. She describes marriage 

 as the ' exalted passion which fills the souls ' of a man and 

 woman, ' and moves them to become one in flesh as well 

 as one in spirit.' Mrs. Steel says, and I must say I agree 

 with her, that this so-called ' exalted passion ' is quite as 

 often likely to lead to evil as to good. 



Whether girls realise it or not, certainly an immense 

 number of them associate marriage with the very healthy 

 desire of having children of their own. With a little 

 further cultivation they will come to think of the man 

 they wish to marry as the father of these unborn children ; 

 and most women even girls can early discriminate 

 between the man they enjoy dancing with and the man 

 they would like to be some day head of their house and 

 father of their children. This develops what I hold to 

 be of such great importance : that the girl herself should 

 feel respect, or at any rate approval, of the man she thinks 



