innuendo than the avowal. She will shrink from the licentiousness which is couched in ambiguous phrase, or veiled in covert allusion; and from the immorality which, though it may not offend the ear, is meant to corrupt the heart.

Delicacy is, indeed, the point of honour in

woman.

Her purity of manner will ensure to her deference; and repress, more effectually than any other influence, impropriety of every kind. A delicate woman, too, will be more loved, as well as more respected, than any other; for affection can scarcely be excited, and certainly cannot long subsist, unless it is founded on esteem.

Yet such delicacy is neither prudish nor insipid. Conversation, for instance, is one great source of a woman's influence; and it is her province, and her peculiar talent, to give zest to it. She is, and ought to be, the enlivener of society: if she restrains impropriety, she may promote cheerfulness; and it is not because her conversation is innocent that it need therefore be dull. The sentiment of woman contributes much to social interest; her feeling imparts life, and her gentleness a polish.

It is not, however, by effort that she will succeed, or by mere volubility that she will render herself agreeable. Some women seem to think time lost when they are not talking;and whether it be mere worldly tittle-tattle, or insipid sentimentalism, in which they indulge, they are equally impatient of listening, and equally anxious to engross. But soliloquising is not conversation. In woman, too, an attempt at display is always disagreeable, and even brilliancy will not atone for it.

The charm of conversation is feeling; a forgetfulness of self, and a sympathy with others. It is not to shine, but to please, that a woman should desire; and she will do so only when she is graceful and unaffected, when her wish is not so much to be admired as to contribute to the gratification of others.

And, for this purpose, she must bring into society heart and mind. The one will teach her how to feel for those around her; the other how to adapt herself to them; and both will greatly contribute to her agreeableness. The insipidity of some women is attributable more to want of interest than of capacity. It is not because

they have nothing to say, that they say nothing; nor because they are deficient, that they are trifling. They sometimes do not trouble themselves to be agreeable. They think that if they look pretty, and are inoffensive, they fulfil their part; and they glide through life like tame animals, and are almost as indolent and as selfish. It is well, if, when they cease to be ornamental, they do not become as troublesome.

A woman should always do her utmost to please; and an expression of interest is often sufficient. To be a good listener, and to reply with ease, good sense, and good breeding, are the most requisite qualities for an agreeable companion: but the sealed lips, the vacant stare, and the abrupt transition, are equally rude and disappointing.

Such indifference is inexcusable in those whose talent for conversation might be so easily improved. English women are proverbially silent : yet there is no reason why they should be so; nor why, because they are exemplary at home, they should be insipid in society. It is their boast that their education is superior; it is, then, the more to their discredit, when it fails

And if

- if

in what is surely an important result. men are too apt to retire to themselves, they talk of politics and the chase, whilst dress and tittle-tattle are discussed upon the sofa, may not their exclusiveness be, in great measure, attributable to the bad grace with which they are too frequently received? Might not the dulness of the one, and the insipidity of the other circle, be often much relieved by a little more sympathy between them?

Again, to be agreeable, a woman must avoid egotism. No matter how superior she may be, she will never be liked if she talks chiefly of herself. The impression of her own importance can convey no pleasure to others: on the contrary, as a desire for distinction is generally mutual, a sense of inferiority must be depressing.

If we would converse pleasingly, we must endeavour to set others at ease: and it is not by flattery that we can succeed in doing so ; but by a courteous and kind address, which delicately avoids all needless irritation; and endeavours to infuse that good humour of which it is itself the result.

In women this is a Christian duty. How habitually should they surpress their own claims, rather than interfere with those of others! How studiously should they employ their talent in developing that of their associates, and not for its own display! How invariably should they discard pretension, and shun even the appearance of conceit; seeking to imbibe the spirit of that lovely religion, of which sympathy is the characteristic feature, and humility the pre-eminent grace!

It is in this way that accomplishment contributes to the agreeableness of woman. The encouragement and cultivation of the arts seem, indeed, appropriate to her. Yet, perhaps, there is nothing in which she oftener errs. In this, as in other things, affectation spoils all. There is a theatrical manner about some women, which, to say the least of it, is an outrage upon taste. The gestures of the stage can never be appropriate in a private circle, nor are they becoming a modest female. She may copy the skill, but surely nothing else that marks the professional performer.

But affectation is not the only mistake into