A Girls Student Days and After | Page 7

given to
another. Then there is the friendship based on a purely personal
attraction, with mutual respect and self-respect as its dedicated
corner-stone. This does not mean that one cannot see any faults in the
friend, or know that one's own are seen, without losing affection. There
is always something flimsy and insecure about a friendship that simply
idealizes. Any relation should be all the stronger for a frank
acknowledgment of its imperfections. If a girl cares enough she will be
willing to admit her own faults and wish to make herself more worthy
to be a friend.

And, finally, there is what might be called the lend-a-hand
friendship,--the relation that springs into existence because of the need
which is seen in another. It is not fair to make a packhorse of one's
friend or to turn one's self into the leaning variety of plant, but it is fair
and wise and right, if one is strong enough to accomplish the end in
view, to lend a hand to another girl who is not making the best of
herself.
Have a good time but do not swear eternal allegiance in this first year
to anybody, however wonderful she may seem. Hold yourself in
reserve, if for no other reason, then on account of the old friends at
home, whether they be kin or no-kin, for they have been true. And
remember, as I have said before, friendship is like scholarship and must
by its nature come slowly.

IV
THE STUDENT'S ROOM
There has been a general improvement in student rooms, yet many
rooms to-day have altogether too much in them: too many pictures, too
many banners, too much furniture, too many hangings. The great fault
of most rooms is this overcrowding. If we were only heroic enough to
make a bonfire of nine-tenths of all they contain we should see
suddenly revealed possibilities for something like the ideal room.
One serious and obvious objection to the overcrowding of rooms is the
hygienic. I am tempted to say that this is the most important objection:
indeed, since health is more important than wealth, I will say so. A girl
has neither the time nor the ability to keep so many articles in a room
clean: and while she is busy attending to her studies, some cherished
ornaments are not only laying up dust for the future, as a more
regenerate life will lay up treasures, but also breeding germs, perhaps
collecting the very germs which will take this girl away from school or
college. Besides, bric-à-brac not only gathers dust and breeds germs but
also wearies the nerves. It makes one tired to see so many things about,

and tired to be held responsible for them. Without realizing it, we resist
the amount of space they occupy and in their place want the air and
sunshine. Subconsciously, most of us long to get rid of our bric-à-brac
and then pull down the draperies that keep out the sunlight. The simpler
the window draperies in a room, the more easily washed, the better and
more attractive. For wholesome attractiveness there is no fabric that can
excel a flood of warm sunshine. Any girl or woman who has curtains
which she must protect from strong light by drawing down the shades
is guilty of a household sin whose greatness she cannot know. That
same sunshine, freely admitted, will do more to cleanse a house than all
the soap, all the brooms, and even all the vacuum cleaners ever
invented.
The so-called beauty of a room should always give way before the
hygiene of a room. Not only should the room be sensibly furnished so
that it may have plenty of air and light, but closets should not contain
articles of furniture which belong where the air can reach them. There
is a difference between a room that is not orderly and one that is not
clean. A room that contains unclean articles in drawers or closets,
unclean floors, unclean rugs and hangings and unclean walls, should
not be tolerated for an instant. If a girl turns a combination bedroom
and study in school or college into a kitchen, if an ice-cream freezer
occupies all the foreground of this place she calls home, and
chafing-dishes with cream bottles, sardine tins, cracker boxes, paper
bags full of stale biscuits, fruit skins, dish-cloths and grease-spotted
walls, all the background, it is impossible to have a clean room to live
in.
The Golden Rule applies to rooms as well as to human beings and
should read, "Do unto a room as you would it should do unto you."
And not only for the sake of health should this Golden Rule for Rooms
be observed but also for the sake of the college or school. The room
that belongs