of these remarks, to use an expression which requires some explanation. I have said, that a young woman may with propriety learn even the dead languages, provided she has nothing better to do; by which, I would be understood to mean, provided she does not consequently leave undone what would render her more useful or amiable as a woman. The settlement of this question must depend entirely upon the degree of her talent, and the nature of her position in life. If she has no other talent likely to make her so useful as that which is employed in learning Greek, Latin, and Hebrew, this settles the point at once, or if she has no duties so important to her as to ascertain the derivation of words, or to study the peculiarities of heathen writers, then by all means let her be a learned lady, for every study, every occupation of mind, provided it does not include what is evil, must be preferable to absolute idleness.

But may we not turn to the consideration of science as opening a wide field of interesting study, which does more to enlarge the mind, and give right views of common things, than the mere acquisition of language?

"Science!—what have we to do with science?" exclaim half a dozen soft voices at once. Certainly not to give public lectures, nor always to attend them, unless you go with your understanding prepared by some previous reading, or acquaintance with the subjects, which in the lecture-room are necessarily rather illustrated, than fully explained. Neither is it necessary that you should sacrifice any portion of your feminine delicacy by diving too deep, or approaching too near the professor's chair. A slight knowledge of science in general is all which is here recommended, so far as it may serve to obviate some of those groundless and irrational fears, which arise out of mistaken apprehensions of the phenomena of nature and art; but, above all, to enlarge our views of the great and glorious attributes of the Creator, as exhibited in the most sublime, as well as the most insignificant, works of his creation.

Perhaps one of the lowest advantages, and I am far from thinking it a low one either,

which is derived by women from a general knowledge of science, is, that it renders them more companionable to men. If they are solicitous to charm the nobler sex by their appearance, dress, and manners, surely it is of more importance to interest them by their conversation. By the former they may please; by the latter they may influence, and that to the end of their lives. Yet, how is it possible to interest by their conversation, without some understanding of the subjects which chiefly occupy the minds of men? Most kindly, however, has it been accorded by man to his feeble sister, that it should not be necessary for her to talk much, even on his favorite topics, in order to obtain his favor. An attentive listener is generally all that he requires; but in order to listen attentively, and with real interest, it is highly important that we should have considerable understanding of the subject discussed; for the interruption of a single foolish or irrelevant question, the evidence of a wandering thought, the constrained attitude of attention, or the rapid response which conveys no proof of having received an idea, are each sufficient to break the charm, and destroy the satisfaction which most men feel in conversing with really intelligent women.

It is also worth some attention to this subject, if we can thereby dispel many of the idle fears which occupy and perplex the female mind. I have known women who were quite as much afraid of a gun when it was not loaded, as when it was; others who thought a steam-engine as likely to explode when it was not working, as when it was; and others still, who avowedly considered thunder more dangerous than lightning. Now, to say nothing of the irritation which fears like these are apt to occasion in minds of a more masculine order, it is surely no insignificant attainment to acquire a habit of feeling at ease, when there is really nothing to be afraid of.

But, far beyond this, the use of science is to teach us not to

"Wrong thee, mighty Nature! With whom adversity is but transition<"

and higher still, to teach us how the wisdom and goodness of God pervade all creation. Women are too much accustomed to look at the animal, vegetable, and mineral kingdoms with eyes that may almost literally be said not to see. An insect is to them a little troublesome thing, which flies or creeps; a flower is a petty ornament, with a sweet perfume; and a mine of coal or copper, something which they read about in their geography, as belonging to Newcastle or Wales. I do not say that their actual knowledge is thus limited; but that they are too much in the habit of regarding these portions of the creation as such, and no more.

Chemistry, too, is apt to be considered by young women as far too elaborate and masculine a study to engage their attention; and thus they are satisfied, not only to go on through life unacquainted with those wonderful combinations and properties, which in some of the most familiar things would throw light upon their real nature, and proper use; but also to remain unenlightened in that noblest school of knowledge, which teaches the sublime truth, that the wonder-working power of God has been employed upon all the familiar, as well as the astonishing objects we perceive; and that the same power continues to be exemplified in their perpetual creation, their order, adaptation, and use.

Chiefly, however, would I recommend to the attention of youth, an intimate acquaintance with the nature and habits of the animal world. Here we may find a source of rational and delightful interest, which can never fail us, so long as a bird is heard to sing upon the trees, or a butterfly is seen to sport among the flowers.

I will not go the length of recommending to my young country women to become collectors, either of animals or of insects; because, as in the case of translations from the best of ancient writers, this has already been done for them, better than they are likely to do it for themselves; and because I am not quite sure, that simply for our own amusement, and without any reference to serving the purpose of science, we have a right to

make even a beetle struggle to death upon the point of a pin, or to crowd together boxes full of living creatures, who, in the agony of their pent-up sufferings, devour and destroy one another.

Happily for us, there are ably written books on these subjects, from which we can learn more than from our own observation; and museums accessible to all, where different specimens of insects, and other animals, are so arranged as materially to assist in understanding their nature and classification; and far more congenial it surely must be to the heart and mind of woman, to read all which able and enlightened men have told us of this world of wonder, and then to go forth into the fields, and see the busy and beautiful creatures by which it is inhabited, sporting in the joyous freedom of nature, unharmed, and unsuspicious of harm. Yes, there is an acquaintance with the animal creation, which might be cultivated, so as to do good to the heart, both of the child and the philosopher-an acquaintance which seems to absolve these helpless creatures from the curse of estrangement from their sovereign man-an acquaintance which brings them near to us in all their natural peculiarities, their amazing instincts, and in the voiceless, and otherwise unintelligible secrets of their mysterious existence.

And it is good to be thus acquainted with that portion of creation which acknowledges, in common with ourselves, the great principle of animal life, to know that enjoyment is enjoyment, and that pain is pain, to myriads and myriads of beings, in some respects more beautiful, in others more curious, and in all more innocent, than ourselves. It is good to know, so far as men can know, for what purpose Almighty power has created them. It is good to behold their beauty, to understand their wonderful formation, and to examine the fairy fancy-work of some of their sacred little homes. It is good to be acquainted with the strength of the mother's love, when she stoops her wing to the spoiler, and offers her own life to save her tender brood. It is good to know that the laws of nature, in

their filial and parental influences, cannot be violated without sorrow as intense, though not as lasting, as that which tortures the human heart on the separation of parent and child. It is good to know how these creatures, placed by Divine wisdom under the power and dominion of man, are made to suffer or to die when he neglects or abuses them.

The earth and the air, the woods and the streams, the gardens and the fields, tell us of all this. When we sit under the shade of a lofty tree, in the stillness of summer's balmy noon, the note of the wood pigeon salutes us from above. We look up, and the happy couple are nestling on a bough, as closely, side by side, as if the whole world to them was nothing, so long as their faithful love was left. On a lower branch of the same tree, or on a broken rail close by, the little robin sits and sings, looking occasionally askance into the face of that lordly creature whom instinct teaches him to shun. Yet is it less a reproachful, than an inquiring glance, as if he would ask, whether you could really wish to frighten him with all the terrors which agitate his little breast on your approach. And then he sings to you again, a low soft warble; though his voice is never quite so sweet as in the autumn, when other birds are silent, and he still sings on amidst the falling leaves and faded flowers. Next, the butterfly comes wavering into sight, yet hastening on to turn its golden wings once more up to the sunshine. The bee then hur ries past, intent upon its labors, and attracted only for a moment by the nosegay in your hand; while the grasshopper, that master of ventriloquism, invites your curiosity-now here, now there, but never to the spot where his real presence is to be found. And all this while, the faithful dog is at your feet. If you rise, at the same moment he rises too; and if you sit down, he also composes himself to rest. Ever ready to go, or stay, he watches your slightest movement; and so closely and mysteriously is his being absorbed in yours, that, although a ramble in the fields affords him a perfect ecstasy of delight,

he never allows himself this indulgence, without your countenance and companionship. But it is impossible so much as to name one in a thousand of the sweet and cheering influences of animal life upon the youthful heart. The very atmosphere we live in teems with it; the woods are vocal-the groves are filled with it; while around our doors, within our homes, and even at our social hearth, the unfailing welcome, the transient glimpses of intelligence, the instinct, the love of these creatures, are interwoven with the vast chain of sympathy, which, through the whole of what may be a wandering and uncertain life, binds us to that spot of earth where we first awoke to a feeling of companionship with this portion of the creatures of our heavenly Father's care.

Nor must we forget the wonderful and mysterious affection which some animals are capable of feeling for man. Often as we may have failed to inspire the love we have sought for among our fellow-creatures, we are all capable of inspiring attachment here; nor does the fact of our being unattractive, or comparatively worthless among mankind, operate in the slightest degree to our disadvantage with this class of beings. Witness the outcast from society-the wanderer on the public roads the poor and houseless mendicant; he still has his dog—yes, and he bears the cold repulse he meets with when he asks for bread, better than he could bear the desertion of that faithful animal: but he fears it not. The proud may pass him by unheeded, the rich may spurn him from their doors, the vulgar and the unfeeling may make a mockery of his rags and wretchedness; but when the stormy night comes on, and he seeks the almost roofless shed to rest his weary limbs, he is followed even there by one friend, who creeps beside him with a love as watchful and as true as if he shared the silken couch of luxury and ease.

There are little motherless children, too, and others not unacquainted with a feeling of almost orphan solitude, who have felt, at times, how the affection of a dumb animal could supply the disappointed yearnings of a

young warm heart. In after life, we may learn to look upon these creatures with respect, because our heavenly Father has thought them worthy of his care; but youth is the season when we love them for their own sakes; and because we then discover that they can be made, by kindness, to love us. In youth alone can we feel to unite them with ourselves in that bond of sympathy, which will never afterwards allow us to treat their sufferings with indifference, or to regard their happiness as beyond the sphere of our duty to promote.

Here, then, the law of love is made to operate through innumerable channels of sweet and natural feeling, extending over a wide field of creation, and reaping its reward of satisfaction wherever a poor animal is rescued from oppression, hunger, or pain.

The study of natural history is, perhaps, the most congenial pursuit to which the mind of youth can be introduced; and it never can begin with this too soon. The history and nature of plants is the next most pleasing study-though far inferior to the first, for this important reason: our acquaintance with animals involves a moral feeling, and not one feeling only, but a vast chain of sympathies and affections, which, if not touched in early life, are seldom afterwards called forth with any degree of earnestness or warmth; and for a woman to be insensible or indifferent to the happiness of the brute creation, is an idea too repulsive to be dwelt upon for a moment.

There is, however, a sickly sensibility indulged in by some young ladies, which I should be the last to recommend. Many, for instance, will nurse and fondle animals, without ever taking the trouble to feed them. Others shrink away with loathing at the sight of pain, which, if they would but exert themselves to remove, might easily be remedied. I remember a young girl with whom I was well acquainted, having watched a cat torment a mouse until she could bear it no longer, when at last, with a feeling of the utmost repugnance to the act, she snatched up the poor lacerated mouse, and killed it in a

moment. On seeing her do this, two very delicate and estimable young ladies gave themselves up to shrieks and hysterics, although they had known for the previous half hour that the little helpless animal had been enduring the most cruel torture in the claws of the cat, and they had borne this knowledge with the greatest composure.

It is not, then, a delicate shrinking from the mere sight of pain, which constitutes that kindly feeling towards the animal creation, that forms so estimable a part of the female character; but that expansive sentiment of benevolence towards all the creatures of God's formation, which is founded on the principle of love, and which operates as a principle in prompting us to promote the good of all creatures that have life, and to promote it on the widest possible scale.

But to return to the subject of botany. A woman who does not love flowers, suffers a great want in her supplies of healthy and natural enjoyment. How could the poet Milton, when he pictured woman in her highest state of excellence, have employed our mother Eve, had he made her indifferent to the beauty of the plants of paradise, or negligent of the flowers which bloomed around her? Still, I must acknowledge that there is, to many minds, something the reverse of attractive in the first aspect of the study of botany, as it is generally presented to our attention. In this I am supported by one of the most gifted of modern authors, when he speaks of the "ponderous nomenclature" of botany having frightened many a youthful student back from the portals of this study. There are many persons now advanced in life, who deeply regret their want of what is called a taste for botany, when the fault has not been in their natural taste, so much as in the form under which this study was introduced to their notice in youth; and thus they have been shut out through the whole of life, from the pleasure of expatiating in a field, as boundless in its extent as inexhaustible in its attractions.

These difficulties, however, are not insurmountable to all; and youth is unquestiona

bly the season for forming an intimate acquaintance with this, the loveliest aspect of nature; so that in after life, when duties are more imperative, and occupations more serious, and there is consequently less time for minute investigation, every flower and every plant may be met as a member of a wellknown family, and, as such, bear somewhat of the character of a familiar friend.

It is the same with every part of the creation, whether natural history, or botany, or geology, have occupied our attention, or chemistry, or electricity, that great mystery of the visible world, whose all-powerful agency, the most sublime as well as the most insignificant phenomena of nature are daily and hourly tending to develop, an early and intimate acquaintance with each and all of these, must so far enlighten and enlarge the mind, as to lead our thoughts beyond the narrow limits of material existence, up to that higher region of wonder and of love, where to behold is to admire-to feel is to adore.

From the consideration of the different advantages arising from such studies as it is important should be pursued at an early period of life, we are necessarily led to ask, "What is the use of KNOWLEDGE in general?"

Nothing can well be more vague than the notions popularly entertained of the meaning of knowledge. Dr. Johnson has called it "general illumination of mind." But, if I might be allowed to do so, I should prefer restricting my use of the word knowledge, to that acquaintance with facts, which, in connection with the proper exercise of a healthy mind, will necessarily lead to general illumination. A knowledge of the world, therefore, as I propose to use the expression, must consequently mean, a knowledge of such facts as the general habits of society develop.

This is universally allowed to be a dangerous knowledge, beause it cannot be acquired without the risk of being frequently deceived by the false aspect which society assumes, and the still greater risk of having our moral being too deeply absorbed in the

interest and excitement which the study itself affords. No one can obtain a knowledge of the world, by being a mere spectator. It is, therefore, safer and happier to leave this study until the judgment is more matured, and the habits and principles more formed; or rather I should say, to leave it as a study altogether. a study altogether. Time and experience teach us all it is necessary to know on this subject; and even duty urges us forward on the theatre of life, when little enough prepared for the temptations and the conflicts we must there encounter. By absolute necessity, then, we acquire as much knowledge of the world as any rational being needs desire, and that is just sufficient to enable us to judge of the consequences of certain principles, or modes of action, as they operate upon the well-being of individuals, and of society at large. Destitute of this degree of worldly knowledge, we must ever be liable to make the most serious mistakes in applying the principle of benevolence, in forming our estimate of the moral condition of mankind, as well as in regulating our scale of social and relative duty.

A general knowledge of the political and social state of the country in which we live, and indeed of all countries, is of great importance, not only to men, but to women. Nor let my fair readers be startled when I speak of the political state of countries. You have been accustomed to make history your study. An acquaintance with the most important eras in history is considered an essential part of a female education. And can it be less essential to know what events are taking place in your own times, than what transpired in past ages? Do not, however, misunderstand me on this important subject. Do not suppose it would add any embellishment to your conversation, for you to discuss what are called politics, simply as such, especially when, as in nine cases out of ten, you do not really understand what you are talking about. Do not take up any question as belonging to your side, or your party, while ignorant what the principles of that party are. Above all, do not allow yourself