hought of that may possibly open a way for their
self-support."

"Well, let us look over the field," said my wife. "What is there for
woman?"

"In the first place," said I, "come the professions requiring natural
genius,--authorship, painting, sculpture, with the subordinate arts of
photographing, coloring, and finishing; but when all is told, these
furnish employment to a very limited number,--almost as nothing to the
whole. Then there is teaching, which is profitable in its higher
branches, and perhaps the very pleasantest of all the callings open to
woman; but teaching is at present an overcrowded profession, the
applicants everywhere outnumbering the places. Architecture and
landscape gardening are arts every way suited to the genius of woman,
and there are enough who have the requisite mechanical skill and
mathematical education; and, though never yet thought of for the sex,
that I know of, I do not despair of seeing those who shall find in
this field a profession at once useful and elegant. When women plan
dwelling-houses, the vast body of tenements to be let in our cities
will wear a more domestic and comfortable air, and will be built more
with reference to the real wants of their inmates."

"I have thought," said Bob, "that agencies of various sorts, as
canvassing the country for the sale of books, maps, and engravings,
might properly employ a great many women. There is a large class whose
health suffers from confinement and sedentary occupations, who might,
I think, be both usefully and agreeably employed in business of this
sort, and be recruiting their health at the same time."

"Then," said my wife, "there is the medical profession."

"Yes," said I. "The world is greatly obliged to Miss Blackwell and
other noble pioneers who faced and overcame the obstacles to the
attainment of a thorough medical education by females. Thanks to them,
a new and lucrative profession is now open to educated women in
relieving the distresses of their own sex; and we may hope that in
time, through their intervention, the care of the sick may also become
the vocation of cultivated, refined, intelligent women, instead of
being left, as heretofore, to the ignorant and vulgar. The experience
of our late war has shown us what women of a high class morally and
intellectually can do in this capacity. Why should not this experience
inaugurate a new and sacred calling for refined and educated women?
Why should not NURSING become a