And oh! what an enviable advantage the ubiquitous tin-peddler, that “licensed vagrom,” has over every convention-trammelled china hunter! What a delight, what a dream it would be to go a-china hunting with a tin-peddler’s cart; what lonely out-of-the-way roads and by-lanes I would take, careless where I went, since wherever I wandered I should be welcome. How I would sit on my lofty seat and view the lovely country o’er, in the “sessions of sweet, silent thought,” with my strong and willing and safe horse to pull me up hill and down dale; with my stock of shining tin-ware, my brooms and notions and gaily painted pails, all ready for advantageous exchange; with my big, red, roomy wagon, in whose mysterious cavernous interior I could store in safety unwieldy china treasures, such as tureens and bowls and pitchers; with my air of ready assurance, of intimate familiarity with the family, my jovial raillery, my opportunities of kitchen and pantry investigation, my anxious health inquiries and profound medical advice, backed up by bottles of patent medicines which I should sell at half-price to curry favor and china; or, better still, exchange, giving a bottle of liniment for a “Landing of Lafayette,” or a box of pills for a Pilgrim plate—oh! next to being a gipsy living under the greenwood tree, who would not be a Yankee tin-peddler a-china hunting? But perhaps the farm-wife might wish me to take in exchange for my wares, eggs, or butter, or rolls of wool—what should I do with a pail of butter in summer-time on a tin-peddler’s cart? Or, worse still, old rags—just fancy it—instead of old china! I should then answer her with an air of deep and sombre mystery: “Madam, I would gladly take your readily exchangeable merchandise an’ I could; the old rags are particularly desirable and attractive, but I have sworn a vow—I have a secret which I cannot now divulge—it must be crockery or naught, especially dark blue crockery with American designs, else I and my glittering and uncommonly cheap wares must pass wearily on, homeless, chinaless, a wanderer on the face of the earth.” Alack-a-day! such happy peaceful joys are forbidden to me, not because of lack of inclination or capacity, but—thrice bitter thought—because I am a woman. Tin-peddlering is not for me, it is not “woman’s sphere.” Perhaps when I am old, too old to clamber up and proudly sit on that exalted driver’s seat (though never too old to go china hunting), perhaps when women have crowded into every other profession, calling, and business in the land, some happy, bold feminine soul will taste the pleasures of “advanced life for women,” the pleasures forbidden to me, and dare to go tin-peddlering, though there will then be no old china left in the country to buy.