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Emily might have been a lawyer, Mary an architect. should have turned your hands to something.'

'O aunt Dunk, impossible!

All of you

I am sure Anne never could go

about feeling people's pulses and looking at their tongues.' 'Why not, eh? Is Anne a fool? Every woman should make the most of her talent; and now I think of it, you are not too old to begin. Time has been lost, for of course you know nothing, and can do nothing; but much may be done yet. I should like to make a lawyer of you, and maybe, by the time you have studied a bit, the profession would be open to you; but if you have a fancy to be a doctor, that could be done at once.'

Frightened and weary, I could only sit and tremble, as I saw myself in imagination the cynosure of all eyes, standing up to undergo an examination in the schools, preparing to brow-beat a witness, or sharpening my knife to cut off a fellow-creature's leg. Could aunt Dunk really mean it? There was such a terrible energy and earnestness about her, that if she had announced her intention of drowning herself in the tea-kettle, one would have expected her to do it at once. I am ashamed to say that I cried myself to sleep that night over the prospect of walking the hospitals.

CHAPTER II.

AUNT DUNK ON WOMAN'S RIGHTS.

DAYLIGHT enabled me to ridicule my fears; but they returned with full force when I went down-stairs, for aunt Dunk was holding forth to Charles Treyhen, and her subject was the necessity of educating me to a profession. She only nodded to me as I came in, and continued talking vehemently, only stopping to say 'Pshaw!' when he got up to greet me. It was certainly embarrassing for a young woman to eat her breakfast before two people who were discussing the question whether she would excel most as doctor, lawyer, or architect. Aunt Dunk was very eager, Charles Treyhen considerably amused.

'I tell you the girl has no fortune. She must do something. Marry, you say. That's all nonsense, and you know it, Charles. The day for that is past. Girls don't marry nowadays—at least, these ugly ones don't. They've a better destiny.'

Really, aunt Dunk, it can hardly be pleasant to Miss Pellam to listen to this discussion.'

'Stuff and nonsense! She don't care a pin, and if she does she must get over it, for she'll, for she'll have to hear enough about it before I've done with her.'

'I believe you,' sotto voce; and aloud, 'I will be no party to such rudeness.'

'Where's the rudeness? It's common sense. The girl can't starve.'

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Give her some of your superfluity.'

'Mr. Treyhen! as if I should take it!' It escaped me involuntarily, and I coloured crimson to find that I had spoken.

Hoity-toity, my young lady! As if you would take it, forsooth! I can tell you, you shall take it, if I choose; and maybe you'll have to take it. Am I not to give my own money to my own brother's daughter, if I please?'

'I beg your pardon, aunt Dunk.'

And you will promise to be good, and to ask for money whenever you want it,' added Mr. Treyhen, in comical imitation of my frightened manner.

'She will do no such thing. Ask me for money indeed! I should like to hear it. She shall keep herself, and from this moment I devote myself, first to the choice of a profession for her, and secondly to fitting her for that profession when chosen.'

'In other words, you will cease to worry your friends about women in general, and will content yourself with worrying woman in particular.'

'I shall not, Charles; and you are abominably rude.'

'Miss Pellam, what profession shall you choose, supposing any liberty of choice is left you ?-which it will not be.'

'Now, Charles, why say that, when you know perfectly well she will be free as air, provided only she chooses in accordance with my wishes? I imagine some consideration is owing to me.'

'Very well; I must frame my question differently. Miss Pellam, what profession do you hope aunt Dunk will choose for you? Will you build my house, cut off my arm, or ruin me at law by your eloquence ?'

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All appear to me equally terrible and impossible.'

Impossible they are not, Jane, and of that I will soon convince

'Not now, aunt Dunk; please wait till I am gone. I am bent on finding out whether Miss Pellam would rather be soldier, sailor, tinker, or tailor, that I may give her the advantage of my influence with you.'

'Influence you have none, either with me or anybody else. I regret that as yet the noble professions of soldiers and sailors are closed to us. But that will all come in time.'

'And you will immediately join a marching regiment, aunt Dunk, and oblige poor Miss Pellam to serve her time as middy.'

It would do her all the good in the world, and had I been born in these days of emancipation, I should undoubtedly have entered the army.'

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'As soldier, sailor, or lawyer you would have excelled, aunt Dunk.' That I should not, Charles; but I humbly hope I should have done my duty, as I mean to do now.'

'If you mean to perform that disagreeable operation now, aunt Dunk, I, knowing what it is, shall take my leave. Good-morning, Miss Pellam. I wish I could hope that, when next I see you, you may still be allowed to knit, net, and crochet work, which to my mind are the chief duties of woman.'

Charles, you are a fool-' began aunt Dunk; but the appearance of Crampton and the letter-bag arrested her speech, and for some time she was fully occupied, while Charles still lingered, talking to me.

'Well,' said aunt Dunk at length, laying down a letter which she had been attentively perusing, if I could only have foreseen the glorious destiny of woman in the nineteenth century, I for one would never have married; your uncle Dunk might have whistled But in my day a woman had no profession but marriage. An unmarried woman was nothing but an old maid; now she is something more than man, better than wife or widow. What a fool I was, to be sure!'

'But what is this glorious destiny of which everybody writes and talks? Do tell me, aunt Dunk,' said Charles.

'What is it! Why, emancipation from the social slavery of centuries; franchise, professions, the prizes of life open to us-in a word, equality with man.'

'I am glad you think so highly of man; I rather fancied you despised him.'

'I don't think at all highly of man. He is a mean despicable creature, and he has kept everything to himself as long as he could. But every dog has its day, and, thank goodness, his day's past and gone at last. It is our turn now. Man grows more abominable every day. In my young days, though they did keep us out of our rights, they had the grace to be ready enough to marry and keep us. They don't even do that much now. I made a fuss to have the ugliest of the Pellam girls; but upon my word, now I think of it, any one of 'em would have done nowadays.'

'Aunt Dunk, light dawns. I begin dimly to comprehend all this agitation about woman's rights. You open my eyes; you enlarge my mind. You were all happy enough as long as you all had a fair chance of being married; but now that the increase of luxuries and expensive tastes has rendered marriage an event of rare occurrence, you demand, forsooth, to enter the arena as man's equal. He will none of your help and sympathy; he shall meet you as a rival on his own grounds.'

'That's not true; all claptrap, every word. There are some fools who hold that woman's highest place is as wife and mother. They pretend that the rights we are claiming should only be given to those who are waiting to be made wives-slaves, I should sayor to those who miss that slavery altogether. But bless you, boy,

that's all bosh, and it's dying out, Charles. It did well enough to break the ice; it was but the thin end of the wedge. I hope to live to see the time when girls will look upon married life as a last resource when health and powers are failing, the battle of life fought, and the prize won-just as men do now, you know.'

'Aunt Dunk, aunt Dunk, defend me from a wife covered with Victoria Crosses and Waterloo medals!'

'Defend yourself from any wife at all. No, no; the day for that is past; I look forward to a glorious consummation of the present dispensation in a perfect equality of man and woman.'

I looked up in astonishment, which was lessened in the course of the day, when I accidentally lighted upon this very sentence in a book.

'Bravo, aunt Dunk; encore! exclaimed Charles. 'That was worthy of a platform. Why do you not give the public the benefit of those mysterious expressions? Make Miss Pellam an orator; a female orator must have 66 glorious mission."

Upon my word, the boy has hit it!' exclaimed aunt Dunk, starting up. 'Dear me! That he should have had the wit to think of it! Well, men are not all fools, that's one comfort. It's the very thing. I'll train you up for public speaking, Jane; so that's settled and done.'

As usual, aunt Dunk spoke with such energy that we both felt that she meant it. I grew white as a sheet as I saw my own conviction reflected in Mr. Treyhen's face; I saw too that he felt for me. His whole manner altered, and he was startled into expostulating. He could not have done worse. Every word he uttered only confirmed her resolution, and I was surprised at his eager pertinacity, so different from the cool sarcasm with which he had hitherto treated her. At length he took his leave, with a mortification so evident that aunt Dunk was in the seventh heaven.

The day wore on wearily. Prompt in action as in speech, aunt Dunk ransacked the library for works on eloquence, oratory, and the management of the voice. She wrote to London for the latest publications on the same subjects, and was only prevented from writing to Mr. Gladstone for advice by my immediate acquiescence in the proposal.

'I would just ask how a young man should be trained to speak in public. I shouldn't say it's for a woman, of course. It's all the same.'

A very good idea, aunt Dunk,' said I, in obedience to violent winks from Crampton, for the conversation took place at dinner. No doubt Mr. Gladstone will be charmed; especially now, in the recess, when he can have nothing to do.'

'Nothing to do, child! Why, the man's worked to death. I should not wonder if he had all his letters burnt unread, now Parlia

I

ment is up. Now I think of it, I'll write to Mr. Mill instead. shall tell him the whole truth, and send you up to see him if he wishes it. Crampton and Crow could take you up-couldn't you, Crampton ?'

'With pleasure, ma'am. We should like to see the nobility and gentry once more, ma'am.'

'Why, you stupid old man, do you call Mr. Mill the nobility and gentry? You'd like to see Madame Tussaud's waxworks, I expect. That's more in your line, to say nothing of the shop-windows.'

'Precisely, ma'am; I was on the point of mentioning the shops, ma'am. We would be proud to take charge of Miss Jane, ma'am.' 'I'm not sure I won't go myself and state my views to Mr. Mill. He's the man for us, Jane.'

I sought safety in silence.

After luncheon, aunt Dunk announced her intention of driving into Crippleton alone. She had business, and I was to stay at home and write to Anne, and tell her I was perfectly comfortable and quite as ugly as aunt Dunk expected.

As soon as she was gone, Crampton entered the room with a huge pile of books which he placed before me.

'My mistress begs you will look these through, ma'am, if you please, and tell her what's inside of them when she comes back; and if you please, ma'am, if you've no objection, I think of taking out my gun for a 'are, ma'am. My mistress expects of me to keep the house supplied, though she makes a rule of objecting if she catches me doing of it, so I am obliged to do it on the sly. There is no fear of nobody calling, ma'am.'

I signified my consent, and he went on

'If I might make so bold, ma'am, Mr. Treyhen and Mr. Charles sometimes looks in, and my mistress wished them to be told that she is gone into Crippleton to consult Mr. Williamson about the matter in hand.'

I promised to deliver the message, and he left me. I turned wearily to the books-Cicero, Burke, Whately; I gazed upon them with terror, and letting my head fall on the table, I burst into tears.

A woman who cries in the drawing-room should always do it judiciously; that is to say, with her hair (if real) down, and taking care to leave off before her eyes and nose are red; for she can never foresee who may surprise her. I fulfilled both these conditions, and the Mr. Treyhens came just in time to see me at my best.

There was a momentary confusion on both sides, and then Charles Treyhen advanced with eager solicitude. He was so sorry, so very sorry-of course it was aunt Dunk; but could he do nothing? His sympathy made my tears flow faster; but collecting myself, I pointed to the books.

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