meetings, to look at pictures and books, to listen to music or a talk, though perhaps attended by discouragements at first, would finally bring a response. Tired mothers returning home would feel more strongly, though perhaps less hopefully than their children, the contrasts between the homes, and the desire for a change would be awakened. This desire, if met with sympathy and kindly suggestions from the worker, would accomplish a gradual transformation, manifest in the actual beautifying of the dwelling by cleanliness and order, and in a spirit of thoughtfulness and good-will between parents and children.

This survey of the work that might be accomplished by the college graduate in her home, is the work of an ideal woman under ideal circumstances; but such women do exist; our colleges each year are sending out young women who are strong in willingness to work, who can only learn from experience, and who will have tact and courage to adapt circumstances to their individual needs. Such women going among the people, opening their hearts and their homes to them, will hasten the day when the Settlement idea will be the universal idea, because all men will recognize one another as members of one great family.

Edith C. Holmes, '95.

Editors' Table.

Is it really our turn to say "good-by?" It seems only yesterday that we were writing our first editorials, and trembling lest the public should regard them with our own critical eyes. Time does fly, as the world has known ever since its babyhood, but there are moments like this, when even self-evident truths come home with peculiar emphasis. THE MISCELLANY'S "good-by" is almost the first to be heard, and in virtue of this distinction, we intend to set an example of stern common sense and to reserve all sentiment for the sacred seclusion of the sanctum.

Before we step out of office, however, and hand over our cherished hopes and plans to the incoming board, we wish to state clearly the changes that have been made recently in the management and arrangement of THE MISCELLANY. The increased number of departments has made the present editorial divisions wholly out of proportion. Beginning with the April number, De Temporibus et Moribus will be discontinued as a separate department. The Literary Miscellany, together with At Random, will be conducted by the first senior editor and a junior assistant. Book Reviews and Points of View will be under the charge of the second senior editor and a junior assistant. Home Matters and College Notes and Personals will be merged into one department under the third senior editor. The business management will remain as before.

To the incoming editors we would give our heartiest good-wishes. We know that under their efficient charge, all our plans and many more, will be realized and developed. With the remembrance of our cozy "board meetings" on Monday evenings, our confidential talks on

the future of THE MISCELLANY, our editorial struggles shared together, we feel that we are making way for them to enter upon one of the pleasantest parts of their college life.

Our attention was called the other day to a neat little book, which has just been published, bearing the rather unattractive title of "New York Charities Directory." We would not advise anyone to wade through the five hundred pages of rather close print, but a glance over the table of contents and an occasional plunge into the midst of this charitable labyrinth, rewards one with a new knowledge of what is being done in the world in the way of relief. The names of more than three hundred charitable, and five hundred congregational, agencies are to be found in this compact little volume and under their names directions where to find them, statistics regarding their management and expenses, and various other interesting information. After turning over the leaves we do not need to be told by the compiler that "a remedy exists in this city for nearly every evil to which flesh is heir." Our only surprise is that all evil should not long ago have forsaken its hereditary grasp on hospital-and reform-guarded humanity. We are unable to conceive of a needy individual who could not find provision made for him in some one of these charities. If Jewish or Roman Catholic or Protestant societies have no place for him, the Society of Ethical Culture is still left. He may be a discharged convict or a "juvenile delinquent "; there are homes of refuge for him in either case. The relief ranges all the way from the Two Cent Diet Kitchen to the Vassar Students' Aid Society.

Some of the names are a pleasure to the ear, such as "The Lunacy Law Reform and Anti-Kidnapping League," or "The Austrian-Hungarian Hebrew Free Burial Association." Many are delightfully mysterious; for example, the "Benevolent Order of Buffaloes";

one wonders over the "Free Circulating Library for the Blind," and is curious to know what the "East Side Ladies' Society" may be like.

But, idle curiosity aside, the lasting impression that this book makes is a sense of half contempt and half pity for the state of society, which can see misery and relief side by side and not have ingenuity enough to make a really binding connection between them. Of course a great deal is done by these many hundred charities; we all acknowledge that. The question is whether a very great deal more might not be done with no greater expenditure. It is the old trouble that we find in so many lines of life, lack of organization and concentration, competition run wild, work done by twenty organizations which might be done better and more economically by one. If the one hundred different hospitals and other means of medical relief were united into ten or twenty what a saving there would be to spend on enlargement and improvement of the work! Even our directory recognizes this in its motto on the title page, "United, an Army; Divided a Mob." We do not agree with the directory, however, in thinking that union means tabulation of all charities or even general oversight of them all. We hope the directory of 1992 may differ from this of 1892 by showing a decrease of numbers proportionate to the increase of power.

A rather interesting item appeared in one of the weekly papers recently, stating that a bill had been introduced in a state legislature to the effect that the wearing of hoop-skirts by women should be made a legal offense. This seems very amusing, and yet the fact that one of our representatives seriously proposed such a bill-for it was a serious suggestion and as such was severely censured by the paper which noticed it-might turn our attention to a side of the question of fashions which perhaps is seldom brought up. We think how a thing looks and

how it affects our own comfort but do we think how the fashions of women affect the comfort of men? Imagine a man in a street car filled with hoop skirted women. How lost, how insignificant his slender frame would appear amid the billows of dress-goods surrounding him! And then think how the little chivalry left in men would be taxed! If two or three women entered a car full of men, four or six men would have to rise simultaneously to give them seats-twice the amount of collective chivalry would be required! Suppose there should be but one man willing to give up his place to a lady-what a difficult position would be his if he conld not induce some fellow traveler to rise with him and provide the new comer a seat! Should he sit and appear unchivalrous, or should he rise and appear quixotic in leaving empty a space sufficient for himself but of no use to the fair passenger?

Then think of crowded concert rooms and lecture halls. Only half the number of people would have the opportunity to hear a Paderewski at one time. And so, of course, prices for tickets would have to double, seats being twice as valuable. The effect on the economic world would be deplorable. After all, we do not blame the man who introduced that bill. Let us act in accordance with its spirit, even though we disapprove of its enforcement.

HOME MATTERS.

On the evening of February 8, Professor J. B. Greenough of Harvard lectured on Roman Wall Painting. The lecture was illustrated by interesting stereopticon views. Prof. Greenough explained that the furniture in a Roman house was very scanty, and that the beauty and ornamentation of the rooms depended largely on their elaborate wall painting. The motif was always architectural. The earliest style was a representation of columns in front with a wall of squares of marble in the rear. Sometimes a balustrade or low wall with columns resting on it was repre