Advice Gratis

A good many women are, in these days, trying to earn their own living without any, or with very slight, prelimiiiary preparation for the task. Their oallings briog them necessarily in contact with business men, who are busy men ; and thia lack of training ofieo injures their advuncement, by their want of taot in dealing with men. We propose hero to offer a few Hints to Women about to Engage in Business, and tliis, therefore, i a lecture for women only ; nomen admitted, under any circumatunces. "Cali upon a man of business in the hours of businoss ; transact your busi uess, and go about your business": This ia the brief but wise counsel, dear sisters, which you will fiad displaycd in 1 rge print on many counting room walls. Flease to remark that it is not a joke. A business man's minutes are precious. He has not nearly as many ás he needs. 11 he has any to spare at any time, he knows what to do with them. Do nol, therefore, scare a poor over-burdened fellow-oreature out of his wits by demanding whether he has half an hour to spare, or by asking when ho will be at leisure, or by offering to wait till he has nothing to do. If you have business, plunge into the middle of it, and despatch it quickly. Moreover, when you visil an office or counting-room on business, prepire your budget beforehand, so that you may make your statement brief and pertinent. Do not oblige a busy man to cross-examine you as to your purpose ; do not go with half detined or dimly fonned w ishes. Learn to take "yes" or "no" for an answer. A busy man has to decide rapidly ; if he is fit for his place, and if yon have stated your wish or proposition clearly, he can decide at onco. He says ''yes," and your affair is settled ; or he says "no," and it ia also decided. But when he says "yes,1 and you keep him ten minutes or halfan hour detailing if and buts, be sure he regrets his coDsent ; and if he says "no," and you plead with him to take it back, be sure that though be may be polite as a French danoiog-master, he regards you as a bore. Again - learn that every business is necessarily conducted in a certain way, and has oortain forms and rules, which oannot well be violated. They may seem absurd and unreasonable to you ; nay, they always do appear so; therefore you almost always plead that in soine way, in your case, they sball be relaxed, or brokeu through ; and too often you gain your point, just that onoo - for what man can resist a woman ? But though you may prevail, you lose by it in the long run ; it is remembeeed against you ; end when presently you "drop out," and somehow ge. no more employment in that quai ter, jou may know that it is becauso you have rashly violated this rule. When you enter an office or a counting-room, forget, if you oan, that you re a womau. To the business man wliom you are approaohing, you are only a machine, deEirous to be sot in inotiou ; he is only a machine ; all about bim, for the time being, are only machines ; and a machine has no heart ; it makes no allowances ; it exacts the uttermost ; it demanda the best, with the least waste of time. Do your work thoroughly and promptly, present it with few words; learn the customs of the calling you enter, and conform to t'. m ; orifyou do not like them try sometbing else. But do not attempt to change them - at least by plead ing. This is the way to sucoess. Thoee of your sisters wbo have learned it are too busy, and too profitably engaged, to make much noise about it ; they have their hands full, for there is abundance of room in the worid for first rate workers ; for machines that are prompt and regular, that turn out good work, and are never indinposed. Try to remember when you engage in business, when you entar the labor market, you necessarily come in competition witb men. Men are elaves ; t hoy must work ; for they have families to support, or fortunes to make, or enterprises to advance ; and they donot expect to marry. This is to say, marriage will only compel them to work more persistently, and forcu them to be more prompt, more acourate, more regular. These men, these slaves under the lash of all kinds of neceasitiee, you have for oppocents ; they ciumot give place to you if they would, for they are ia the labor market just as you are. If they work harder, better, and for more hours than you do, they will beat you ; and your sex cannot help you. One man succeeds beyond another just in this way. It is not luck, it is not good friendt - for though iriendship may push a man along, it cannot keep him from falling back. It is hard werk, unmitigated, uncuasing, tborough ; it is beeause A works harder, and bet ter, and longer than Z, that he stands at the top, while Z grumbles at the bottom of the ladder. You cannot eat your eake and have it ; try to get that bomely proverb by heart, and you will have dono much for success. In another and more comfortable world this will doubtless be cbanged, and we shull all rejoice. But in this world, which revolves onoe in twenty-four hours on its axis, and circumnavigates the sun once in a year, everythiog is fixed, regular, undeviating; and most things are unpleasant, and the opposito of what reasouable and and sensiblo beings would like them to be. Fiaally, if you get a good offer, marry. Thusyou will exchapgo many masters for oue ; and if you have the least tact yoa will presently ba tbo ter of that ene, without his in the least Buspeoting it. ïhcre are, on the whole, few thiiigs a woman can do so woll as marry. Poisibly this is becaueo her sez hvo been lor so many thousand years trained to that : possibly it may he beoanse this ia, after all, her true callng; but, howovor that may bo, it is certain that, as society is now constituted, and will for some time to come remain, it is the calling in which a woman od the whole hae the ereatest promise of ■uooess. - .