Shortly after these essays were written,--in June, 1859,--I received from London Mrs. Jameson's "Letter to Lord John Russell;" and I cannot refrain from expressing the deep emotion with which I read what she had written to him upon the same subject. Well may she wear the silver hairs of her sixty years like a crown, if, only through their sanction, she may speak such noble words. But-- "Earnest purposes do age us fast;" and many a true-hearted woman, far younger in years, would gladly bear witness with her. I would not write, if I could, an "exhaustive" treatise. All I ask for my work is, that it should be "suggestive." With that purpose, I have worked out my schemes, in the last lecture, far enough to provoke objection, to stimulate the spirit of adventure, to show how easily the "work" may wait upon the "will." May the "Opening of the Gates" be near at hand! It remains only to acknowledge my indebtedness to some English and American friends: and first to the "Englishwoman's Journal;" not merely for its own excellent articles, but for references and suggestions, most valuable when followed out. The story of the young straw-braider was drawn from its pages; and, disappointed in the arrival of original material from Paris, long expected, I have been compelled to depend upon it largely for my sketch of Félicie de Fauveau. To one of its editors, Miss B.R. Parkes, and to Madame Bodichon in London, as well as to the Rev. Mr. Higginson, I am under pleasant private obligations. I must rest content to seem largely indebted to the "Edinburgh Review," of April 1859, for condensing the results of the census. My materials were collected and arranged, when the article on "Female Industry" reached me; and the differences in treatment were so few, that I at once drew my pen through whatever was not sanctioned by its authority. The ladies who first directed my attention to the Waltham watch-factory, and to the inventors of artificial marble in France, will see from these few words that I am not forgetful. BOSTON, November, 1859. * * * * * There seems, at first sight, a certain presumption in offering to an American public, at this moment, any book which does not treat of the great interests which convulse and perplex the United States. But experience has shown, that neither the individual nor the national mind can remain continually upon the rack; and both author and publisher have thought that a book upon a serious subject, popular in form and low in price, would find perhaps a more hearty welcome, under present circumstances, than in those prosperous days, when romances and poems, travels and biographies, were scattered over every table by the score.