could do it as well as men, and that nobody had any right to assert they should not.

Colonel Harris, even for a business man, was also advanced in his ideas. He had advocated for his daughters that they should possess healthy bodies and minds, and be able to observe closely and reason soundly.

Lucille said that she favored an education which would best conserve and enlarge woman's graces, her delicate feeling and thought, and her love for the beautiful.

Then Leo and Alfonso both declared that Lucille had expressed fully their own opinions.

Colonel Harris added, "Come, Gertrude, tell us what you think."

Her face flushed a little as she replied, for she felt all that she said, "Father, I like what Mr. Searles has told us. I think higher education for women should develop purity of heart, self-forgetfulness, and enlarged and enriched minds."

"Well spoken, daughter," said Colonel Harris. "Now, dear, what have you to say?"

Mrs. Harris had listened well, as she had been a slave in the interests of her children, especially of her daughters. She thought that the last twenty-five years had proved that women in physical and intellectual capacity were able to receive and profit by a college education. Often she had longed for the same training of mind that men of her acquaintance enjoyed. The subject was thus discussed with profit, till the Turkish coffee was served. Closing the discussion, Searles thought that America led England in offering better education to woman, but that England had given her more freedom in politics; the English woman voted for nearly all the elective officers, except members of Parliament. He believed that the principle of education of woman belonged to her as a part of humanity; that it gave to her a self-centered poise, that it made her a competent head of the home, where the family is trained as a unit of civilization.

He felt that woman possessed the finest and highest qualities, and that it was her mission to project and incorporate these elevating qualities into society. He thought man had nothing to fear or lose, but much to gain; that to multiply woman's colleges everywhere, was to furnish the twentieth century, or "Woman's Century" as Victor Hugo called it, with a dynamic force, that would beget more blessings for humanity than all previous centuries.

Gertrude thanked Mr. Searles for what he had said, and the party withdrew to the Winter Garden Café, pretty with palms, where Lucille, Leo, and Alfonso talked of society matters, of art and music.

Gertrude read to her mother, while Hugh Searles and Colonel Harris stepped outside into the gentlemen's café for a smoke, as both were fond of a cigar. There the conversation naturally drifted upon the tariff question.

Mr. Searles asserted that he favored free trade, and that he was sorry America was not as far advanced and willing as Great Britain to recognize the universal and fundamental principle of the brotherhood of mankind, and the inborn right of everybody to trade as he liked in the world's cheapest markets. He added that he sometimes felt that Americans were too selfish, too much in love with the vulgar dollar.

Colonel Harris, wounded in his patriotism, now showed that he was a little disturbed. He thanked Searles for his deep interest in Americans, adding, "We are glad you have come to study Americans and America." Then looking the Englishman full in the face he said, "Mr. Searles, you will find human nature much the same wherever you travel. Nations usually strive to legislate, each for its own interest. You say, 'Americans work for the almighty dollar.' So they do, and earnestly too, but our kith and kin across the sea worship with equal enthusiasm the golden sovereign. Look at the monuments to protection in your own city."

"What monuments?" asked Searles.

"Monuments to protection on all your streets, built under British tariff laws. Every stone in costly St. Paul's Church, or cathedral, was laid by a duty of a shilling a ton on all coal coming into London. A shilling a ton profit on coal, mined in America, would create for us fabulous fortunes. Selfishness, Mr. Searles, and not brotherly love, drove your country to adopt free trade."

"I do not agree with you," said Mr. Searles.

"'Tis true, and I can prove it," answered Harris. By this time several patrons of the hotel stood about enjoying the tilt between tariff and free trade.

"Give us the proof then," replied Searles.

"To begin with," said Harris, "I must reply to your first assertion, for I deem your first statement a false doctrine that 'everybody has a right to trade in the world's cheapest markets.' Nobody has a right to trade in the world's cheapest markets, unless the necessary and just laws of his own country, or the country he dwells in, permits it. Now as to the much abused 'brotherhood argument' let me assert that, like England, any nation may adopt free trade, when it can command at least four important things: cheap labor, cheap capital, and cheap raw material. Now Mr. Searles, what is the fourth requisite?"

Searles did not answer. Clearly, he was interested in Harris's novel line of argument for free trade.

"Well," said Harris, "England is inhabited by a virile people, who evidently believe in God's command to 'Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it.' England, with her centuries of rising civilization, her charm of landscape, and her command of the world's affairs, offers at home magnificent attractions for her sons and daughters, that make them loyal and law-abiding citizens.

"It is true that annually many thousands seek fame and fortune in new countries, but most of her citizens prefer poverty even, and, if need be, poverty in the gutters of her thriving cities, to a home of promise in distant lands. Hence, a rapidly increasing and dense population obtains in all the British Isles, and labor becomes abundant and cheap, and often a drug in the market. The repeal of the Corn Laws first became a necessity, then a fact, and the cheaper food made cheaper labor possible. Lynx-eyed capital, in the financial metropolis of the world, was quick to discover surplus labor.

"Already English inventors had made valuable inventions in machinery for the manufacture of iron, cotton, woolen and other goods, which further cheapened labor and the product of labor.

"England with cheap capital and cheap labor, now had two of the four things needed to enable her to go forward to larger trade with the world. The third requisite, cheap and abundant raw material, she also secured. Material, not furnished from her own mines and soils, was brought in plentiful supply at nominal freights, or as ballast, by her vessels, whose sails are spread on every sea.

"For three centuries Great Britain has vigorously and profitably pursued Sir Walter Raleigh's wise policy: 'Whosoever commands the sea, commands the trade, whosoever commands the trade, commands the riches of the world, and consequently the world itself.'

"On the ceiling of the reading-room of the Liverpool Cotton Exchange is painted the pregnant words:—'O Lord, how manifold are thy works, in wisdom hast thou made them all; the earth is full of thy riches.' Under divine inspiration, therefore, English capital seeks investment everywhere, and with cheap capital, cheap labor, and cheap raw materials, she finds herself able to compete successfully with the world. It is possibly pardonable then that the British manufacturer and politician should seek earnestly the fourth requisite, viz., a large market abroad. Hence the necessity of free trade.

"To advocate publicly that other nations should adopt free trade, that England might have an increased number of buyers, and consequently greater profit on her products, perhaps would not be judicious; so the principle of free trade for the world at large must be sugar-coated, to be acceptable. Therefore your philanthropic and alert Richard Cobden, and John Bright, and your skilled writers, both talked and wrote much about