nights, and even the moments of repose which
the omnibus offers between the lessons she
gives at opposite ends of the town.

The temptation is natural for a young, proud,
and pure mind, courageously struggling to
improve her lot, to free herself from dependence on
individuals, to address herself to all, to take one
sole patron, the public, and believe that it will
be possible to live on the fruits of her thought.
What revelations women could make on this
subject! One only has ventured to do so in a
very powerful novel, whose only fault is its
brevity, so that the situations are not worked out
to their full effect. This book, Une Fausse
Position, came out fifteen years ago, and immediately
disappeared. It is the exact itinerary, the
road-book of a poor literary lady, the summary of the
tolls, and duties, and taxes exacted from her to
allow her to set a few steps within the barrier;
the bitterness, the irritation which her resistance
created all around her, so that she was entirely
surrounded by obstacles—nay, deadly obstacles.
Did you ever see the children in Provence persecute
an insect which they believed to be
venomous? They surround it with bits of stick
and straw, to which they set fire. Whichever
way the poor creature rushes, it is stopped by
flame. It cannot pass the circle of fire. Camille,
the woman of letters, surrounded by fire, and
finding no issue, longs for death.

With these sympathetic feelings towards the
female sex, M. Michelet administers to his
bachelor friends the following good trimming,
italicising himself the sharpest strokes of his rod:
"My dear sirs, after what I have told you, the
reason why you ought all to get married, the
strongest argument which your hearts can urge
is that Woman does not live without Man.
And can man live without woman? You
yourselves confess that your life is sombre and
bitter. In the midst of amusements and vain
shadows, you possess no wife, neither
happiness nor repose. You have not the steady
position, the harmonious equilibrium, which is of
such service in the production of important
works. Nature has drawn life tight together
into a triple and absolute knot; man, woman,
and the child. Apart, they are sure to perish;
their only safety lies in union and fellowship.
All the disputes between the two sexes, and their
respective pride, go for nothing. We must have
done with everything of the kind. In the only
book of this century in which there is a grand
poetical conception (the poem of the Last Man—
Le Dernier Homme), the author believes the world
exhausted, and the earth on the point of coming
to an end. But there is a sublime obstacle:
the earth cannot come to an end, so long as one
single man still loves. Take pity on the worn-out
earth, which, without love, would have no
further right to exist. Love, for the salvation
of the world!

"Your grand objection in respect to the
opposition of your creeds and the difficulty of bringing
woman to adopt yours, does not seem to me
very valid for any one who will look that difficulty
in the face coolly and practically. The
fusion of creeds will not be completely effected
till after two marriages, in two successive
generations. The woman whom you ought to
espouse, is the one whom I have pictured in my
book on L' Amour; the one who, simple in mind
and affectionate in disposition, having not yet
received any definite imprint, will be less
inclined to repulse modern ideas; the one who
does not come to you the prepossessed enemy of
science and of truth. I prefer that she should,
be poor, isolated, with but few and slight family
connexions. Her rank and education are of very
secondary importance. Every Frenchwoman is
born a queen, or ready to become one. Give me,
as a spouse, the simple woman, whom I can
elevate to a certain degree; and give me, as a
daughter, the confiding and believing woman,
whom I can raise to the highest stage of female
nature. Thus will be broken up the miserable
circle in which we go round and round, wherein
woman prevents our making woman what she
might and ought to be.

"With this good spouse, who shares, at
least in heart, her husband's faith, he, following
the very easy path of nature, will exercise
over his child an incredible ascendant
of authority and tenderness. A daughter has
such faith in her father! He can make of her
whatever he will. The strength of this second
love, so lofty, so pure, must evolve the WOMAN
in her, the adorable ideal of grace combined with
wisdom, by whom alone future family life and
future society are to be recommenced and
regenerated."

               The Fifth Journey of
     THE UNCOMMERCIAL TRAVELLER
  A SERIES OF OCCASIONAL JOURNEYS
             BY CHARLES DICKENS
            Will appear Next Week

Early in April, price 5s 6d, bound in cloth will be                                     published
            THE SECOND VOLUME,
Including Nos. 27 to 59 and the Christmas double
       Number of ALL THE YEAR ROUND