Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1883-10-01
A Home of My Own.

Not very long ago, two attractive young
women sat together on the deck of Hud
son River Steamboat. The scene was
perhaps suggestive ofmore poetic thoughts
than were expressed. rs 1t was Just about
| twilight. The smooth expanse OF water
heaved under the beating of the paddle.
wheel, and over the dark hills Venus cast
long, wavy line of light upon the stream
One of them remarked to the other abrupt.
lY; "what would like is home of my
own" Substitute home for house." re.
sponded the other. land will venture to
| assert, that you will express the chief
earthly desire of every true woman who
is more than twenty-five years old. The
last speaker was nearly right.
In the first dawn of romance and hero
worship some girls build lazy castles in
Spain. and the central figure of these day
dreams is the coming man; while with
others Of these young visioDaries, they
themselves and their own wonderful deeds
are the foundation and cornerstone OF
many fanciful structure.
With older women this is not so. They
have lived to learn that il takes very ex-
ceptional characters or circumstances
and very strong enthusiasms to make ever
so slight an impression on the worlds
history. They have generally learned
that their own abilities are of very ordi-
nary nature, and that the circle of their
lives will only include homely duties. and
such joys and sorrows as fall to the lot of
every day humanity.
Then it is that they begin to long for a
home OF their own, where such talents as
they have will find free scope. and where
they can feel that they are OF real
use. Besides it is an instructive longing,
implanted by God in their hearts tor the
preservation of society. II Is the balance
wheel of the nations, and in part what
makes woman the conservative element
in the life of the world
Men seem rarely to have it in great
degree, and indeed. il abnormally devel-
oped in them. it might prove a serious
disadvantage to the state.
II the poets are to be trusted it is long
ing by which even the brute creation is
ennobled, for one of them says
ale sings to the wide world,
And she TO her nest:
In the sweet ear of nature
hch song Is the best?"
In their families and i'm the world at
large unmarried women are the ones who
have to bear the most unrecompensing
burdens, and that often without receiving
considerations from others. Their wishes
are set aside and ove.borne. they are
treated like children and sometimes capri
ciOusly thwarted even after they have ar
rived at the years of discretion. In fact
they are made to feel their dependence in
thousand little ways that man neither
could nor would bear.
The fully developed woman longs for
her own home, and her own children
There she at least will have but one mas.
ter, and she will have some one beneath
her over whom she has power. And. let
me whisper it in your ear, my sister
women love power.
She will have her own children to re.
produce her traits, and to restore to her
her youth. They will be her present jvy
and her future happiness. for in them she
lives her life over again, and through them
she hOpOs to touch the worlds destinies
Thus many women marry men whom
they like only; not so much for the sake
OF the husbands, but of the homes. and
the power and assured position that the
having husband gives them.
The unmarried woman needs to be the
very salt Of the earth to keep from being
soured. For her lot will probably be al
ways to consult others wishes rather than
her own, to live in other peoples homes.
do other peoples work. rejoice in stran-
gers happiness and bear their burdens
and sorrows as well as her own. She
must not expect full appreciation or graf
itude, but be contented with the most un.
selfish joys.
This sounds rather forlorn, but life SO
unselfishly spent is of the noblest type
We have known such women, true sisters
of mercy, so full of deeds and tender SYM
pathy that every where glad welcomes