whose sterling good
sense is equal to her emergencies; the one who is self-reliant without
being bold, firm without being overbearing, brainy without being
masculine, strong of nerve--"but yet a woman." Let her be equipped for
the battle of life, which in our state of society so many girls are
fighting single-handed. Instruct her in business principles; teach her
to use the discretion needed to move safely along the crowded
thoroughfare and to follow the routine of the office or the studio,
trusting that with busy head and busy hands she may be safe wherever
duty leads her tireless feet. But in her hours of social recreation,
when she will meet and solve the vital problems of her own personal
life, she needs a subtle _something more_; the mother's wisdom to
supply the deficiencies of her inexperience, the mother's love to
enfold her in unspoken sympathy, the mother's approbation to rest upon
her dutiful conduct like a benediction.

Let no young girl regard this watch-care as a trammel placed on her
coveted liberty. On the contrary, she will find that she has far more
social freedom with the countenance of her mother's presence than she
could have without it. And in after years, when her life has developed
safely and happily under this discreet leadership, she will look back
to her _debut_, and her first seasons in society, with profound
gladness that--thanks to somebody wiser than herself--she has escaped
the follies that have in more or less measure injured the prospects of
her young friends who were too "independent" to submit to the
restraints of chaperonage, and who, for lack of it, to-day find
themselves to a relative extent depreciated in social estimation.

GREETINGS. RECOGNITIONS. INTRODUCTIONS.

The proverb, "The beginning is half the battle," applies in a multitude
of ways. In the first instant of a greeting between two people, the
ground upon which they meet should be indicated. Cordiality, reserve,
distrust, confidence, caution, condescension, deference--whatever the
real or the assumed attitude may be, should be shown unmistakably when
eyes meet and heads bend in the ceremony of greeting.

To put into this initial manner the essence of the manner which one
chooses to maintain throughout is one of the fine touches of diplomacy.
People fail to do this when their effusively gracious condescension
subsequently develops into snobbishness, or when an austere stiffness
of demeanor belies the fri