Three winters ago, by act of Congress, she was allowed to place her insane son in the Lunatic Asylum here, free of charge, leaving her at liberty to assist her daughter in the support of her young family. Notwithstanding her war services, and the names of twenty prominent men in her native State attached to her papers, it took her six months to obtain, for herself and daughter, the chances to labor which she sought. “Sorrow does not kill,” she says, and as we look into her beaming eyes, we say it does not even extinguish the brightness of a soul forever young,—and yet this lady, in a few eventful years, “lived through sorrow enough to break any heart less stout than hers.” In the Patent Office, fifty-two women clerks are allowed by law. A few women are employed in copying Pension Rolls in the Pension Office, who have a room provided for them in the Patent Office. Ten or twelve women have work given them from the Patent Office, which they do at their homes. This work, as well as that done in the Office, consists chiefly of the drawing of models. Every model of all the tens of thousands received in the Patent Office, from the beginning to the present day, has thus been re-produced and preserved. Glazed transparent linen is placed over the engraved lines, and through this, with ink and stencil, the most intricate and exquisite lines are drawn. To do this work perfectly, a lady must be something of an artist and draughtswoman. Magnifying glasses are used, and even with their aid, the work is most trying, and often destructive to the eyesight. The salary fixed for this work is ten hundred dollars per annum. Those who take their work home, and are paid by the piece, make as much as those who give the work will allow. Here, of course, is a large opportunity for favoritism and injustice. Thus favorites are often allowed to do twice their share, while others get barely work enough to subsist. The Agricultural Department affords temporary employment for numbers of women, for two or three months of the year, and two have permanent positions there. The temporary work is the putting up of seeds for universal distribution, and occasionally copying is given out. Of the two ladies who find constant employment there, one is the assistant of Professor Glover, in taking charge of the Museum. She is the widow of a western editor, and at one time had exclusive control of a public journal (an agricultural one,) herself. She is a woman of large intelligence, a proficient in botany and natural history, which fact gave her, her present position, and enabled her to fill it with credit to herself. The other lady _employé_ is a taxidermist, who prepares the birds and insects for the Museum. The officers of this Department regard her as a proficient in her profession. She is a German, has been connected with the Department over six years, and has a room provided for her in the beautiful agricultural building.