“What is a man (a gentleman I mean) good for that is taught no more?” What has the woman done to forfeit the privilege of being taught?  Shall we upbraid women with folly when it is only the error of this inhuman custom that hindered them being made wiser?’ Defoe then proceeds to elaborate his scheme for the foundation of women’s colleges, and enters into minute details about the architecture, the general curriculum, and the discipline.  His suggestion that the penalty of death should be inflicted on any man who ventured to make a proposal of marriage to any of the girl students during term time possibly suggested the plot of Lord Tennyson’s Princess, so its harshness may be excused, and in all other respects his ideas are admirable.  I am glad to see that this curious little volume forms one of the National Library series.  In its anticipations of many of our most modern inventions it shows how thoroughly practical all dreamers are.

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I am sorry to see that Mrs. Fawcett deprecates the engagement of ladies of education as dressmakers and milliners, and speaks of it as being detrimental to those who have fewer educational advantages.  I myself would like to see dressmaking regarded not merely as a learned profession, but as a fine art.  To construct a costume that will be at once rational and beautiful requires an accurate knowledge of the principles of proportion, a thorough acquaintance with the laws of health, a subtle sense of colour, and a quick appreciation of the proper use of materials, and the proper qualities of pattern and design.  The health of a nation depends very largely on its mode of dress; the artistic feeling of a nation should find expression in its costume quite as much as in its architecture; and just as the upholstering tradesman has had to give place to the decorative artist, so the ordinary milliner, with her lack of taste and lack of knowledge, her foolish fashions and her feeble inventions, will have to make way for the scientific and artistic dress designer.  Indeed, so far from it being wise to discourage women of education from taking up the profession of dressmakers, it is exactly women of education who are needed, and I am glad to see in the new technical college for women at Bedford, millinery and dressmaking are to be taught as part of the ordinary curriculum.  There has also been started in London a Society of Lady Dressmakers for the purpose of teaching educated girls and women, and the Scientific Dress Association is, I hear, doing very good work in the same direction.

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I have received some very beautiful specimens of Christmas books from Messrs. Griffith and Farran.  Treasures of Art and Song, edited by Robert Ellice Mack, is a real edition de luxe of pretty poems and pretty pictures; and Through the Year is a wonderfully artistic calendar.

Messrs. Hildesheimer and Faulkner have also sent me Rhymes and Roses, illustrated by Ernest Wilson and St. Clair Simmons; Cape Town Dicky, a child’s book, with some very lovely pictures by Miss Alice Havers; a wonderful edition of The Deserted Village, illustrated by Mr. Charles Gregory and Mr. Hines; and some really charming Christmas cards, those by Miss Alice Havers, Miss Edwards, and Miss Dealy being especially good.