It has been claimed that only men and men of business experience can be successful friendly visitors where the head of the family is concerned; that, in matters of employment especially, a woman visitor is not capable of giving sound advice. It is undoubtedly true {42} that such work could be better done if more men, instead of contenting themselves with service on charitable boards, would take the trouble to become personally acquainted with a few poor families. This would be better for the boards and better for the men that are charitable trustees. But the woman visitor need not despair. It is true that she could do her work better, as will appear in this book, if she were in her own person a lawyer, a sanitary engineer, a trained cook, a kindergartner, and an expert financier; but she may be none of these things and still be a very good friendly visitor. When legal complications arise, she will go to some friend who is a lawyer; when the children get into trouble, she will consult a teacher, or an agent of the children's aid society, and, in the same way, the matter of employment will send her to a business man, or some one who can advise her, when her own store of experience is too scant. The poor man often has a mean opinion of the judgment of "charitable ladies," and this opinion has not always been without a degree of justification; but the visitor who {43} takes the trouble to go on Sunday and get acquainted with the men folk, or makes occasion for them to come to her house from time to time, who proves herself, moreover, not without resource or common sense as emergencies arise, will soon overcome this prejudice and become the friend of every member of the family. Collateral Readings: "The Settlement and Municipal Reform," James B. Reynolds in Proceedings of Twenty-third National Conference of Charities, pp. 138 _sq_. "Benevolent Features of Trades-Unions," John D. Flannigan in the same, pp. 154 _sq_. "The Ethical Basis of Municipal Corruption," Miss Jane Addams in "International Journal of Ethics," for April, 1898. "The Workers," Walter A. Wyckoff. "Working People and their Employers," Washington Gladden. "Problem of the Unemployed," Hobson. "The Unemployed," Geoffrey Drage. "Korbey's Fortune," William T. Elsing in "Scribner's," Vol. XVI, pp. 590 _sq_. [1] "Rich and Poor," p. 211. [2] pp. 141 _sq_. [3] "Charities Record," Baltimore, Vol. I, No. 6. [4] "Rich and Poor," pp. 138 _sq_. [5] pp. 242 _sq_. [6] See Warner's "American Charities," pp. 177 _sq_. [7] George Eliot in "Daniel Deronda." [8] pp. 22 _sq_. [9] "Charities Review," Vol. II, p. 54. [10] p. 11. [11] Thirteenth Report of Boston Associated Charities, p. 42. [12] See "Charities Review," Vol. VI, pp. 402 _sq_. {44} CHAPTER III THE BREADWINNER AT HOME