Consider it further: The average servant is an ignorant young woman. Ignorant young women are proverbially curious, or old ones. This is not because of their being women, but because of their being ignorant. A well-cultivated mind has matter of its own to contemplate, and mental processes of absorbing interest. An uncultivated mind is comparatively empty and prone to unguarded gossip; its processes are crude and weak, the main faculty being an absorbing appetite for events--the raw material for the thoughts it cannot think. Hence the fondness of the servant class for "penny dreadfuls"--its preferred food is highly seasoned incident of a wholly personal nature. This is the kind of mind to which we offer the close and constant inspection of our family life. This is the kind of tongue which pours forth description and comment in a subdomiciliary stream. This is the always-open avenue of information for lover and enemy, spy and priest, as all history and literature exhibit; and to-day for the reporter--worse than all four. In simple communities the women of the household, but little above the grade of servant in mind, freely gossip with their maids. In those more sophisticated we see less of this free current of exchange, but it is there none the less, between maid and maid, illimitable. Does not this prove that our ideas of privacy are somewhat crude--and that they are kept crude--must remain crude so long as the home is thus vulgarly invaded by low-class strangers? May we not hope for some development of home life by which we may outgrow forever these coarse old customs, and learn a true refinement which keeps inviolate the privacy of both soul and body in the home? One other, yes, two other avenues of publicity are open upon this supposed seclusion. We have seen that the privacy of the mother is at the mercy of four sets of invaders: children, servants, tradesmen, and callers. The tradesmen, in a city flat, are kept at a pleasing distance by the dumb-waiter and speaking tube; and, among rich households everywhere, the telephone is a defence. But, even at such long range, the stillness and peace of the home, the chance to do quiet continued work of any sort, are at the mercy of jarring electric bell or piercing whistle. One of the joys of the country vacation is the escape from just these things; the constant calls on time and attention, the interruption of whatever one seeks to do, by these mercantile demands against which the home offers no protection.