The Friendships of Women. William Rounseville Alger
Lady Jane Grey and Elmer.
Elizabeth Robinson and Middleton.
Hester Salusbury and Dr. Collier.
Blanche of Lancaster and Chaucer.
Venetia Digby and Ben Jonson.
Countess of Bedford and Ben Jonson.
Countess Ranelagh and Milton.
Duchess of Queensbury and Gay.
Relations with Women, of Sophocles, Virgil,
Frauenlob, Bernadin
St. Pierre, Rousseau, and Jean Paul Richter.
Rahel Levin and her Friendships with Men.
Madame Récamier and her Friendships with Men.
Elizabeth Barrett, Hugh Stuart Boyd, and John Kenyon.
Clotilde de Vaux and Auguste Comte.
Madame Swetchine and her Friendships with Men.
FRIENDSHIPS OF MOTHERS AND DAUGHTERS
Madame de Sévigné and Madame de Grignan
Madame de Rambouillet and Julie d'Angenne
Mrs. Browne and Felicia Hemans.
Naomi and Ruth.
FRIENDSHIPS OF SISTERS
Dido and Anna.
Hannah and Martha More.
Mary and Agnes Berry.
Charlotte, Anne, and Emily Bronte.
Joanna and Agnes Baillie.
FRIENDSHIPS OF WOMAN WITH WOMAN
Treatment of Female Friendship in Literature.
School-girl Friendships.
Friendships in Conventual Life.
Jeanne Philippon and Angélique Boufflers.
Agnes Arnauld and Jacqueline Pascal.
Madame de Longueville and Angélique Arnauld.
Friendships between Queens and their Maids of Honor.
Sakoontali and Anastiya.
Marie de Medicis and Eleanora Galigäi.
Queen Philippa and Philippa Picard.
Lady Jane Beaufort and Catherine Douglas.
Mary Stuart and her Four Marys.
Queen Elizabeth and her Attendants.
Queen Anne and Sarah Jennings.
Marie Antoinette and the Princess de Lamballe.
Queen Hortense and Madame de Faverolles.
PAIRS OF FEMALE FRIENDS
Beatrice Portinari and Giovanna.
Dorothea Sydney and Sophia Murray.
Katherine Phillips and Regina Collier.
Elizabeth Rowe and the Countess of Hertford.
Countess of Pomfret and Countess of Hertford.
Lady Harley and Mrs. Montague.
Hannah More and Mrs. Garrick.
Elizabeth Carter and Catherine Talbot.
Charlotte Smith and Lady O'Niel.
Anna Seward and Honora Sneyd.
The Countess of Northesk and Anna Seward.
Eleanor Butler and Sarah Ponsonby,
the Ladies of Llangollen.
Fanny Burney and Mrs. Thrale.
Günderode and Bettine Brentano.
Miss Benger and Lucy Aikin.
Lucy Aikin and Joanna Baillie.
Mrs. Hemans and Miss Jewshury.
Mary Mitford and Mrs. Browning.
Madame de Staid and Madame Récamier.
Madame Swetchine and the Countess Edling.
Countess D'Ossoli and the Marchioness Arconati.
The Duchess of Orleans and her Lady Companion.
THE NEEDS AND DUTIES OF WOMAN IN THIS AGE
Evils and Defects of Society and their Remedy.
The Ideal of Marriage.
Public Life versus Domestic Life.
Caste: Diminution of its Influence.
The Common Destiny, and the Peculiar Destiny, of Woman.
Life in the Harems of the East.
Right of Woman to every form of Education and Labor.
Grounds of the exclusion of Women from Public Life
The Right of Women to engage in Politics.
The Inexpediency of their doing so
Impartial Consideration of both sides of the Question.
Morality, eternal; Politics, temporary.
Gradual historic Emancipation of Woman.
Comparative Condition of Woman in the Oriental, the Classic,
the early Christian, and the Modern World.
Relation of Mohammed and of Jesus to Women.
Light thrown on the Condition of Women in Greece by the
History of Sappho.
Sentiment of Chivalry towards Woman.
Woman ennobled by sharing in great public Interests.
Decline of Letter-writing in our day.
Duty of Women to cultivate Conversation.
Duty of Women to cultivate the art of Manners.
Value of model Types of Women.
Disinterestedness, the Redemption of Man.
Woman as seen in Mythology.
Conclusion of the matter.
Friendship in the Future.
THE FRIENDSHIPS OF WOMEN.
INTRODUCTION.
THE peculiar mission of woman, it has been said, is to be a wife and mother. Is it not as truly the peculiar mission of man to be a husband and father? If she is called to add to the happiness and worth of her husband, he is called to add to the happiness and worth of his wife. They are alike bound to protect and educate their children. And the other duties, the private improvement of self and the public improvement of society rest on them in common. The assertion, then, that the distinctive Office of woman is to be the helpmeet of man, does not imply that she ought to be legally or morally any more subservient to him than he to her; for the supreme duty of a woman, as of every other human being, is, through the perfecting of her own nature as a child of God, to fulfil her personal destiny in the universe. To love, to marry, to rear a family, is by no means an entire statement of the obligations and privileges of women: because no woman always has lover, husband, or children; many fail to have all of them in succession; and a few never have either of them.
In some of these cases the domestic appointment of woman is defeated; but her personal destiny may still De achieved. The qualities of her soul and the fruitions of her life, as a free individual, may be perfected in spite of this relative mutilation in her lot. The growing desire in our time for show and luxury, the increase of the excitements of publicity, the sensational literature of fiction, which is absorbing an ever-larger share of attention from the more sensitive portion of the feminine public, these causes are concentrating an undue interest on the passion