now, when we have all begun to
feel that the resources of the angel's face and demon's soul have been
more heavily drawn on than is quite fair, and that, given "heavy braids
of golden hair," "bewildering blue eyes," "a small lithe frame," "a
special delicacy of feet and hands," and we are booked for the
companionship, through three volumes, of a young person to whom
Messalina or Lucretia Borgia would be a mere novice.

And yet there is a physiological truth in this association of energy
with smallness; perhaps, also, with a certain tint of yellow hair,
which, with a dash of red through it, is decidedly suggestive of nervous
force. Suggestiveness, indeed, does not go very far in an argument; but
the frequent connection of energy and smallness in women is a thing
which all may verify in their own circles. In daily life, who is the
really formidable woman to encounter?--the black-browed,
broad-shouldered giantess, with arms almost as big in the girth as a
man's? or the pert, smart, trim little female, with no more biceps than
a ladybird, and of just about equal strength with a sparrow? Nine times
out of ten, the giantess with the heavy shoulders and broad black
eyebrows is a timid, feeble-minded, good tempered person, incapable of
anything harsher than a mild remonstrance with her maid, or a gentle
chastisement of her children. Nine times out of ten her husband has her
in hand in the most perfect working order, so that she would swear the
moon shone at midday if it were his pleasure that she should make a fool
of herself in that direction. One of the most obedient and indolent of
earth's daughters, she gives no trouble to any one, save the trouble of
rousing, exciting, and setting her agoing; while, as for the conception
or execution of any naughty piece of self-assertion, she is as utterly
incapable as if she were a child unborn, and demands nothing better than
to feel the pressure of the leading-strings, and to know exactly by
their strain where she is desired to go and what to do.

But the little woman is irrepressible. Too fragile to come into the
fighting section of humanity, a puny creature whom one blow from a man's
huge fist could annihilate, absolutely fearless, and insolent with the
insolence which only those dare show who know that retribution cannot
follow--what can be done with her? She is afraid of nothing, and to be
controlled by no one. Sheltered behind her weakness as behind a triple
shield of brass, the