effort he might make, and he let it go at that.

What he saw in the position was not the need to know women; he could
employ women for that purpose. He perceived clearly that the editor of
a magazine was largely an executive: his was principally the work of
direction; of studying currents and movements, watching their
formation, their tendency, their efficacy if advocated or translated
into actuality, and then selecting from the horizon those that were for
the best interests of the home. For a home was something which Edward
Bok did understand. He had always lived in one; had struggled to keep
it together, and he knew every inch of the hard road that makes for
domestic permanence amid adverse financial conditions. And at the home
he aimed rather than at the woman in it.

And with his own limited knowledge of the sex, he needed, and none knew
it better than did he, the ablest women he could obtain to help him
realize his ideals. Their personal opinions of him did not matter so
long as he could command their best work. Sooner or later, when his
purposes were better understood, they might alter those opinions. For
that he could afford to wait. But he could not wait to get their work.

By this time the editor had come to see that the power of a magazine
might lie more securely behind the printed page than in it. He had
begun to accustom his readers to writing to his editors upon all
conceivable problems.

This he decided to encourage. He employed an expert in each line of
feminine endeavor, upon the distinct understanding that the most
scrupulous attention should be given to her correspondence: that every
letter, no matter how inconsequential, should be answered quickly,
fully, and courteously, with the questioner always encouraged to come
again if any problem of whatever nature came to her. He told his
editors that ignorance on any question was a misfortune, not a crime;
and he wished their correspondence treated in the most courteous and
helpful spirit.

Step by step, the editor built up this service behind the magazine
until he had a staff of thirty-five editors on the monthly pay-roll; in
each issue, he proclaimed the willingness of these editors to answer
immediately any questions by mail, he encouraged and cajoled his
readers to form the habit of looking upon his magazine as a great
clearing-house of information. Before long, the letters streamed in by
the tens of thousands during a year. The editor