Vermont farmer. [volume] (Newport, Orleans County, Vt.) 1870-1877, 1875-02-05

men possessing eXhaustless wealth. Judged
by its fruits, it evidently assumes that n
woman's work mainly consists in discussing
literature, smatterng French, executing OPP
erettas andIattemptingt to copy paintings with
out knowledge of drawing. II assumes
that the girls will not marry; or. If she does,
that the strain of maternity will not test her
constitution; that her children will never be
sick; that her family will be oblivious to
bnd bread, worse coffee, and household con-
fusion; that her nowerless garden will ill
her husband with bliss, and n buttonless
shirt with ecstacy; and, above all, that she
will never, through any adversilies, or under
any conceivable circumstances, be required
10 perform any possible kind Of work! The
world Tor which it prepares her is Dream
land, where tho poetic Charles Augustus
awaits her arrival that they may snll IN
fairy ship over placid ocean to his castle IN
Spain. and spend perpetual youth IN deli
cious wooipg while the ceaseless moonlight
Sits through ovorhanging leaves and extoic
flowers perfume the air. Charles Augustus
is fraud Ills true name is John Smith.
He lives in Kansas and earns every cent by
hard labor. He tears his clothes, snores,
and cats unlimited quantities of pork and
cabbage, which Mrs. John Smith may have
to cook, and. at the same time, preserve or
der among an assorted lot of little Smiths,
energetic with mischief and having capa-
cious lungs and elastic stomachs. 1t is not
strange that the seminaries provide tho usual
course of study, for, like other merchants,
ln i,,ln oil ht In
market. But it is strange that mother
who was herself so educated, and who, rs II
wife and housekeeper, has keenly felt her
own ignorance of subjects that should have
been taught, and her want of skill that might
have been acquired, can be content to give
her daughter the same unreal preparation
for that which she knows to be very real
life And it Is exceedingly strange that fa-
theirs, long familiar with the distress sudden
ly wrought by financial changes, should re-
ligiously exclude from the daughters edua-
ton all knowledge Of business, and every
possibility of oarning woman's living cX.
cept by the wash tub, needle or piano.
1t is impossible to determine just what
WORK given woman will likely be required
to 10, and, therefore, impossible to decide
just what knowledge and skill the girl should
most seek. Ordinarily she will marry; yet
so various are tho duties imposed by matr-
mony that this fact does not settle the quos-
ton. Some wives are lifted by the husbands
wealth above all household care, except that
of general superintendent. Others, nobly
impelled by love. are from the outset elf
cient co-laborers in acquiring the common
property, his occupation deciding the kind Of
work performed by her, whether in the
kitchen, dairy. office or store. Still others,
whose husbands become helpless through
sickness, dissipation or chronic worthless
ness, are gradually forced to support the
family by their own labor. While every
person is acquainted with one whose girl.
hood was spent in luxury, whose education
was exquisitcly L" finished" whose married
life WIS free from NJ. business knowledge or
perplexity, suddenly hurled by the husbands
death, with bankrupt estate and group OF
nesting children, TO battle against the train
ed cunning and steeled avarce of soulless
men for the mere crumb that prevents actu
al starvation. Without raising the vexed
question Of woman's rights-whether the
family is her proper sphere, or whether it be
rs broad as her success in professional and
political life can make it-she undoubtedly
has u right to be educated rs woman. She
is not man any more than lawyer is II
physician, and il as fairly entitled TO special
instruction us are they. The girl has right
to nm education as precisely adapted TO a
woman's work ms is the boys preparatory to
mans work.
She has right to study her own organism
and functions, TO understand the conditions
of health, and to be forewarned against the
memorable penalties of ignorance, folly or
over-taxatiOn. She has right to instruc-
ton respecting the proper care of the sick,
for mothers watchfulness and wife's ter
derness, when inteligcntly directed, are
more potent than drugs in the struggle with
death Not that she is to receive the physi-
clans education for we are not speaking of
the physicians work; but woman's educa-
ton for that divine work which woman has
always performed in every race, and will
perform so long rs there are moaning chill
dren to soothe and ievered brows to cool.
She has right to instruction and practice in
the art of cutting and making her own cloth
ing tsstefully; in tho art of cookery; in that
of setting table, Frightening n room, beau
tilying garden; in short, TO all the knowl-
edge which related sciences can contribute
to her intelligence, deitness and efficiency in
that greatest and purest of womanly arts.
the art of making home brighter 10 the little
ones than streets. more attractive to its ad-
ults than saloons--a quiet nook whence the
pilgrim of three score and ten boards the
ship that sails out into eternlty's ocean.
These are things which men cannot perform.
Since the world began. and because of the
division of labor ordained before it began,
they have distinctvey belonged to woman
rs woman. Her patent to them is freshly
written, generation by generation, in the full
promptings Of her own nature. Her COM
mission to do them issues from higher au-
thority than that of fashion. ambitious fancy,
or the Ignorance induced by u Traditional
education which has created greater dis
taste for home duties than any other one
element.
1t is difficult to indicate precisely and fully
the various kinds of work which naturally
fall in this group; difficult to mark the
boundaries which should separate it from
Fthose groups which are generally recognized
MS woman's rightful work; and equally
difficult to find for 1t distinctive name.
This difficulty may either arise from the fact
that the proposed classification is false, or
from the. iact that the intended distinction
has not been practically made, and tho APP
propriate name not really needed. If the
whole subject be stripped of tho preconcep-
II, Mt tho same time, the warp and wool of
the average woman's daily life DO fairly ex-
amined, any one can see that there is such u
group. For the want Of better name, it
may be termed the organic or primitive
group of woman's work; and may be defined