Page:Side talks with girls (1895).djvu/72

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.

QUIET WALKS FOR GIRLS

SOMEONE asked, not very long ago, why women went out into the world to work; whether it was for love of money or for love of work; whether it was to get away from home, or whether it was with the desire to become famous. I think oftenest—and I am forced to think this from innumerable letters I receive from my girls—that the girl who goes out into the workaday world to earn her own bread and butter does it because of the necessity. But when the question of making one's own living stares one in the face, and what one must do to gain this livelihood has to be decided upon, nothing is more common than to see the quickness with which girls choose the paths in life which are already overcrowded.

They think they would like to make their living by writing. They have read about some woman who has made money and fame by her pen. They hear of her to-day; what about the ten long years