Ideala | Page 6

work could be detected in it all. And she was
especially active when efforts were being made to find amusement for
the people. "That is what they want, poor things," she would say.
"Their lives are such a dreary round of dull monotonous toil, and they
have so little sun to cheer them. They ought to be taught to laugh, and
have the brightness put into themselves, and then it would seem as if
they had been relieved of half the atmospheric pressure beneath which
they groan. Think what your own life would be if day day after day
brought you nothing but toil; if you had nothing to look back upon,
nothing to look forward to, but the labour that makes a machine of you,
deadening the power to care, and holding mind and body in the galling
bondage and weariness of everlasting routine."
She thought laughter an unfailing specific for most of the ills of life.
"We can none of us be thankful enough for the sensation," she said.
"Nothing relieves the mental oppression, which does such moral and
physical harm, like mirth; of course, I mean legitimate laughter, not
levity, nor the ill-natured rejoicing of small minds in such subjects for
sorrow as their neighbours' faults, follies, and mistakes. What I am
thinking of is the pleasure without excitement which there is in
sympathetic intercourse with those large, loving natures that elevate,
and the laughter without bitterness which is always a part of it."
Like most people whose goodness is neither affected nor acquired, but
natural to them, Ideala saw no merit in her own works, and would not
take the credit she deserved for them; nor would she have had her good
deeds known at all if she could have helped it. But knowledge of these
things leaks out somehow, although probably not a third of what she
did will ever be even suspected.

CHAPTER II.
Speaking to me of women one day, she said: "Certainly they are
vainqueurs des vainqueurs de la terre in any sense they choose; but the
pity of it is that they do not choose to exercise their power for good to
any great extent. I agree with Madame Bernier--if it were Madame
Bernier--who said: _'L'ignorance où les femmes sont de leurs devoirs,
l'abus qu'elles font de leur puissance, leur font perdre le plus beau et le
plus précieux de leurs avantages, celui d'être utiles.'_ But hundreds of
other quotations will occur to you, written by thoughtful men and
women in all ages, and all to the same effect; it is impossible to
over-estimate their restraining and refining influence as the companions
and mothers of men--and almost equally impossible to make them
realise their responsibility or care to use their strength. I would have
every woman feel herself a power for good in the land--and if only half
of them did, what a world of difference it would make to everybody's
health and happiness! But women should, as a rule, be silent powers.
There are, of course, occasions when they must speak--and all honour
to those who do so when the need arises--but our influence is most felt
when it is quietly persistent and unobtrusive. There is no social reform
that we might not accomplish if we agreed among ourselves to do it,
and then worked, each of us using her influence to that end in her own
family, and among her own friends, only. I once induced some ladies to
try a little experiment to prove this. At that time the gentlemen of our
respective families were all wearing a certain kind of necktie. We
agreed to banish the necktie, and in a month it had disappeared, and not
one of those gentlemen was ever able to tell us why he had given it up.
We don't deserve much credit for our ingenuity, though," she added,
lightly. "Men are so easily managed. All you have to do is to feed them
and flatter them."
"I think that hardly fair," I commented.
"What? The feeding and flattering?"
"No, the conspiracy."

"Well, that occurred to me too--afterwards, when it was too late to do
anything but repent. At the time, I own, I thought of nothing but the
success of the experiment as an example and proof of our will-power."
"You considered one side of the subject only, as per usual, when you
are eager and interested," I softly insinuated.
She frowned at me thoughtfully; then, after a pause, she resumed: "Ah,
yes! You may be sure there is a great deal of good motive power in
women, but most of it is lost for want of knowledge and means to apply
it. It works like the sails of a windmill not attached to the machinery,
which whirl round and round with incredible velocity