Yet how kind was my first companion to me, when the others had left us alone again! We parted at the next stopping-place, but during the waiting interval she was like a good daughter in her care of me. I think that in paying me sweet attentions she thought of the mother of her girlhood whom she had lost. The pity of it was that memory did not take her further back, so that, in thinking of the needs of infancy and her own childhood, she might have been stirred to sympathy with other helpless little ones of the human family. Another girl, whom I know to be really warm-hearted and affectionate, said of her sister’s baby, “She’s a horrid little creature, more like a skinned rabbit than anything else. I cannot bear to look at her, and I would not touch her for the world.” We know that newly-born babies are not always beautiful to look upon, but how soon the redness of their faces tones down to lovely pink and white, and the puckered skin fills out and becomes soft as satin to the touch. That girl’s heart must be unwomanly indeed for which a baby’s smile and outstretched arms have not an irresistible charm. Putting aside the fascination of external beauty, we should bear in mind the great fact that the frailest, least attractive infant that comes into the world is the home of an immortal soul. It brings with it a burden of sweet but solemn responsibility to be borne, first of all by the parents, but shared in a less degree by all whose companionship must influence it for good or evil. I am not going to imagine that amongst you, my dear girl friends and twilight companions, any can be found who have no warm comers in their hearts for helpless little ones, or who are insensible to the glory and responsibility of motherhood. So, having given vent to the little croak suggested by the sayings of sundry girls whom I have met elsewhere, let us talk about the children over whom we have, or may have in the future, the strongest influence of all. Strongest and best also; if we are only true to our divinely-given instincts, and alive to the vastness of the responsibilities of motherhood. I cannot help thinking that the study of child life and character should form part of every girl’s education. Surely no branch of natural history can be equally interesting.