Many, through my intercessions, received their first drink of water, and were emancipated from woolen hoods, veils, tight strings under their chins, and endless swaddling bands.

It is a startling assertion, but true, that I have met few women who know how to take care of a baby.

And this fact led me, on one trip, to lecture to my fair countrywomen on "Marriage and Maternity," hoping to aid in the inauguration of a new era of happy, healthy babies.
After twenty-four hours in the express I found myself in a pleasant room in the International Hotel at La Crosse, looking out on the Great Mother of Waters, on whose cold bosom the ice and the steamers were struggling for mastery.

Beyond stretched the snow-clad bluffs, sternly looking down on the Mississippi, as if to say, "'Thus far shalt thou come and no farther'-- though sluggish, you are aggressive, ever pushing where you should not; but all attempts in this direction are alike vain; since creation's dawn, we have defied you, and here we stand, to-day, calm, majestic, immovable.

Coquette as you will in other latitudes, with flowery banks and youthful piers in the busy marts of trade, and undermine them, one and all, with your deceitful wooings, but bow in reverence as you gaze on us.