That is what mothers are for, even if they suffer in the process. I know you will not make me suffer willingly: but I would rather suffer anything than feel that you were ashamed to turn to me for help and sympathy in any difficulty.” Such confidence breeds strength, the strength in which every good English home should abound. And it must come from that centre of the home—the mother. * * * * * The relation of mother and son is essentially different from that of mother and daughter; or rather, the son and the daughter stand in different relations to the home. Also the needs of the two sexes during their growth are different. The natural independence of a girl at the school age is smaller than that of the boy, so that, taking all these things into consideration, there is not the same acuteness about the question of her leaving home during her education. The far greater concentration and the far smaller degree of freedom in most girls’ schools, when compared with the public schools for boys, which are complete little worlds in themselves, limit the advantages which they give to compensate for any loss of home influence. Further, women are not, like men, naturally gregarious, and those who are not suited for living in a herd profit little from being placed in it. Certainly there are difficulties of adjustment to be overcome if girls remain entirely at home, but the adjustment is easier than it is for boys, who are so expansive in their energies and want such a deal of room for their exuberant vitalities. Besides, it is at the “awkward age” that a girl, however great a complication she may then become in the life of her parents, is most dependent on the help and support of her mother. Even the most brazen flapper, so I have been told, endures agonies at her first entry into society as one of its fully fledged members. In fine, a girl’s education may very well take place at home, and I support this theory by the fact that, whereas a home-bred boy is always distinguishable from one who has had the advantages of a public school, it is almost impossible to tell whether a girl has been to a boarding school or not, except where she exhibits an exaggerated hoydenism which is one of the less favourable marks of girls’ boarding schools.