Marriage, however, is by no means the only, or even the chief resource in life of the American woman. She evidently looks with a certain favour on the holy estate of matrimony and is quite willing to become an excellent wife and mother if the lines of her destiny run that way, but if they should happen to branch out in another direction, she wastes no time in useless pining. She is too vital, too capable, too intelligent and energetic altogether to play the _rôle_ of an interesting martyr to male neglect. She will teach, or she will lecture,--she will sing, or she will act,--she will take her degrees in medicine and surgery,--she will practise for the Bar,--she will write books, and the days are fast approaching when she will become a high priestess of the Church, and will preach to the lost sheep of Israel as well as to the equally lost ones of New York or Chicago;--she will be a “beauty doctor,” a “physical culture” woman, a “medium,” a stock-broker, a palmist, a florist, a house-decorator, a dealer in lace and old curiosities,--ay! she will even become a tram-car conductor if necessity compels and the situation is open to her,--and she will manage a cattle ranch as easily as a household, should opportunity arise. Marriage is but one link in the long chain of her general efficiency, and like Cleopatra, “age cannot wither her, nor custom stale Her infinite variety.” A curious fact and one worth noting is, that we seldom or never hear Americans use the ill-bred expression “old maid” when alluding to such of their feminine relatives or friends who may happen to remain unmarried. They know too well that these confirmed and settled spinsters are as capable and as well to the front in the rush of life as the wedded wives, if not more so,--they know that among these unmarried feminine forces they have to reckon with some of the cleverest heads of the day, to whom no opprobrious term of contempt dare be applied,--women who are editors and proprietors of great newspapers,--women who manage famous schools and colleges,--women who, being left with large fortunes, dispense the same in magnificently organized but _un_advertised charities,--women who do so command by their unassisted influence certain social movements and events, that if indeed they _were_ to marry, something like confusion and catastrophe might ensue among the circles they control by the introduction of a new and possibly undesirable element. “Old maid,” may apply to the unfortunate female who has passed all the days of her youth in talking about men and in failing to catch so much as one of the wandering tribe, and who, on arriving at forty years, meekly retires to the chimney corner with shawl over her shoulders and some useful knitting,--but it carries neither meaning nor application to the brisk, brilliant American spinster who at fifty keeps her trim svelte figure, dresses well, goes here, there and everywhere, and sheds her beaming smile with good-natured tolerance, and perchance