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or twenty years ago, when a woman of family and refinement met with financial reverses, her relatives either arranged a desirable match for her, or secured for her the very genteel post of "companion" to a woman of wealth and generally uncertain temper. The duties of the "companion" were indefinite and her income was uncertain. She was in favor one day and out the next. She was socially superior to the servants in the household, yet she did not share their spirit of independence. She generally drooped until she became a pitiable, dun-colored figure, with a "what's-the-use" expression in her tired eyes.

Even to-day, girls and women of mature years, gentle breeding and good education, but with no special training for the ungentle task of earning their own living, when face to face with the problem of self-support turn, panic stricken, to this old-fashioned profession, in