Page:My Dear Cornelia (1924).pdf/115



always looked with admiring astonishment on parents who have daughters on their minds, and yet are not broken by the responsibility; and next to the weight of immediate responsibility for a daughter I should place the burden, which some mothers still take upon themselves, of choosing a daughter-in-law. In my callous moods, I say that the ordinary run of children make as good matches for themselves as they deserve, and that they had better be left to their own devices. But if I were a parent and had successfully brought up to the "magnetic age" two such delightful children as Cornelia's, I suspect that I myself shouldn't be able to resist attempting to be a Providence to them. Over a daughter, especially, I suppose I should make a particular fool of myself. I should probably try to keep her for the most part like a bird-of-paradise in a cage, and when I let her out, should endeavor to control her flight by "a thread of my own heart's weaving." And I am positive that any youth who presented himself as a