Ordinarily, in planning for the future of their daughter, parents might as well consider the problem as having a two-fold aspect. Assuming first of all that the girl instinctively desires to preside over a home of her own, how can she best be prepared for that place? Second, in case that, by some miscarriage of plans, she fails to reach this most worthy ambition, what may she safely fall back upon as an adequate means of self-support? Now, if this statement of the matter be a correct one, it seems that the general scope of the problem of preparing a girl for her vocation ought to be fairly clear. Still another way of putting the situation is this: The girl must be carefully prepared, not only for her first choice of an occupation, but also for her second choice, because of grave danger of the failure of her first choice to be realized. There is a perplexing aspect of the whole question implied here, and every parent who has a daughter should become aware of it and also prepared to confront it. That is to say, almost any ordinary man may go out into the open market and push his quest for a life companion and be able to return in the course of a very short period with one at his side. But with the girl it is radically different. Practically her only stock-in-trade consists of her personal charm and her pecuniary advantages. And many a young woman with both of these qualities very strongly in her favor fails, by some chance or other, to receive an acceptable offer of marriage. Statistics widely gathered will show that age is also a very positive factor in this matter, and that the ratio of probability of marriage of a single woman begins to fall very rapidly before she reaches thirty. DESIRABLE OCCUPATIONS FOR WOMEN While there is abundant evidence to prove that the great majority of normal young women desire instinctively and above all things else a happy marriage, including a contented home life and children to care for, some alternatives must be now pointed out in case of failure to realize the highest ambition. 1. _May teach the young._--School teaching is perhaps the most common, as well as the most commendable, occupation for unmarried women. In many a case, the farmer's daughter will find it greatly to her advantage to engage in this occupation for one or more terms. Thousands of the most worthy young women in our land are devoting their lives to this highest of secondary vocations for women. The work of teaching gives exercise to the altruistic feminine nature and approaches in a fair degree the satisfaction which comes to the mother who is sacrificing for children of her own.