In case of her having no sister, or female friend or relation, to whom she might be glad to offer a home, she should seek a cheerful lady-help, who would be pleased to feel she is putting her time to profit. And if strong, healthy, and a skilful manager, the lady-help will find how far more interesting this varied work may be made, than the drudgery of sitting in a dreary school-room as governess to a tribe of tiresome children, where her only recreation is the monotonous daily walk; or the more independent, but far more laborious, occupation of a fine-art needleworker, to whom eight hours' continuous daily toil are obligatory. As far as I can see and judge by letters written to the _Queen_ and other papers, and the jokes in _Punch_, the difficulty, almost impossibility, of getting gentlewomen as helps is the drawback to their being put forward as a solution of the domestic difficulty. The engagement of half-educated or pretentious daughters of small tradespeople is by no means desirable, either for themselves or for us. We do not wish them to be our companions, yet they must be treated with a greater degree of familiarity than ordinary servants; and if they are allowed to be on a nominal footing of equality, it can only tend to lower the tone of the whole household. But the lady-help, in an establishment suited to the feelings of such an one, may easily be a gentlewoman by birth and education, and not a lady in name merely. As regards the invasion of domestic privacy, which has ever been found such a disadvantage where a companion, or a governess, is always the sharer of our meals and conversation, it is by no means necessary, hardly even possible, that this should be the case with a lady-help; except at breakfast, when it is surely no hardship, but the contrary--indeed, it must be a pleasure--to have at our children's most important meal the assistance of a lady whose care of their wants prevents our own breakfast being uncomfortably hurried. For breakfast is unlike dinner-time in this, that as husband and wives have already had plenty of time for all they wish to say to each other, the presence of a third person is not inconvenient, while at their reunion about dinner-time, when each has the day's adventures to relate and comment upon, a stranger is sometimes in the way. Indeed, it is one of the greatest difficulties in the lady-help system, that of necessity she cannot sit at table while serving the dinner. The greater number of ladies will be as well pleased to have their spare time for their own pursuits, as to be obliged to sit in the drawing-room all the evening, trying to seem amused with doing nothing. A lady offering herself for work of this kind will generally be of an energetic temperament, and able to employ her leisure profitably in reading, drawing, or needlework, or perhaps she may have her own piano in her room.