Woman’s Ambition.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 858, 10 August 1888, Page 4

Woman’s Ambition.

Ambition forms part of every woman’s life, and these less highly born women have their schemes. Some, doubtless, also hope to make a good marriage, which gives them that freedom and liberty which, though not acknowledged, is the true secret of women wishing for marriage, or seeking an object in life. Those whose minds soar in different directions to matrimony, fix their hopes upon becoming proficient in music, painting, scupture, and not a few are deeply fascinated by the positions of high school mistresses. Here, again, is a proof that independence is the cry of hundreds of women. The position of a mistress in a school gives them that liberty that they so ardently crave for. The gifted women who support and urge the education of their sex have much in their favour, and in these enlightened days, when everything is rapidly developing, why should we break down women’s ambitions if it takes the form of improving her mind, and making it on a par with her brothers’ : It can snrely be no worse than scheming for a brilliant marriage. Five or six sisters at home are rather in the way, and we can easily spare a few for doctors, nursing, teaching, and the many lines they choose for themselves. Many a poor fellow has doubtless considered he was very fortunate in getting good nursing, and was thankful that the gentle creature who ministered to

his comforts had felt that she was one too many at home. Look where you will, in Belgravia, in the homes of professional men, or in the quiet country vicarage, there you will find daughters longing to make their way in the world, feeling the want of definite occupation, and the intellectual power which they have no scope for using; there it is cramped, and they have no sympathy with the sister who is content to go the ‘daily round, the common task.’ We cannot all be moulded in the same shape, and these sisters who must be *up and doing ’ are working for that object; for that end they strive. Years of waiting follow before they gain their desire, if they ever do ; and who can tell how many shining lights have been dimmed in their first spark; how many women who would have ranked as George Eliots and Harriet Martineaus have been lost to the world ?

All honour to those loving spirits who are the ministering angels in the' home-life, whom brothers, sisters, and friends make the recipients of all their confidences. We would not lose those beautiful lives from our homes, neither the only daughter, whose duties seem clearly marked out for her with her parents, to push forward for outside work. The day will come, only too soon, when she may have to eater life’s battle alone, and then let her commence it with the pleasant recollection that she lias done her duty »3 a daughter and a sister : yes—shown that sisterly love and affection which only a sister can give. It will leave its mark, brothers are not insensible to it. Wo would not miss those sweet faces from our homes ; jt is only where there is a superfluity of sisters, or the means are cramped, that their ambition should take the form of mapping out their own outside profession. The young ' lady in town, whose highest ambition is to make a brilliant marriage, the girl who, for want of means, is bound to earn her own livelihood, and is working as a teacher, an artist, or whatever she may choose —the: daughter who iB not content with home-life, but longs to break away from it, who thinks women should be the equal of man, the ministering angel who devotes her life to her parents, brothers, and friends, and sheds a halo of love around her, and who desires, above all things, to make others happy, and even age, with its cherished schemes, all have their ambition. But how many will say, as they look down from the pinnacle—if they ever get there—that they would choose the same road again ? Some other path, they think, would be less thorny ; by some other channels they would have reached the pinnacle easier, and what do they find when they get there? Ambition has its delights, but it is costly. Let those who have failed to reach the summit console theanselves with the thought that their unaccomplished ambition may have been, in its progress, -the means of shedding new light and thought upon the minds of those around them, and will in time reap its own reward. Good works are not forgotten, and to those who have chosen for life’s ambition good, great, and noble duties, the thought that they have striven for what is high and of good repute will, in their disappointment, comfort and speed them on during many a dark day in the future. ‘Worth’in the ‘Queen.’