​SAN FRANCISCO.

FROM THE SEA.

Serene, indifferent of Fate, Thou sittest at the Western Gate ;

Upon thy heights so lately won Still slant the banners of the sun ;

Thou seest the white seas strike their tents, O Warder of two Continents !

And scornful of the peace that flies Thy angry winds and sullen skies,

Thou drawest all things, small or great, To thee, beside the Western Gate.

• * * * *

O, lion’s whelp, that hidest fast In jungle growth of spire and mast,

I know thy cunning and thy greed, Thy hard high lust and wilful deed,

And all thy glory loves to tell Of specious gifts material.

Drop down, O fleecy Fog, and hide Her skeptic sneer, and all her pride!

Wrap her, O Fog, in gown and hood Of her Franciscan Brotherhood.

Hide me her faults, her sin and blame, With thy grey mantle cloak her shame!

So shall she, cowléd, sit and pray Till morning bears her sins away.

Then rise, O fleecy Fog, and raise The glory of her coming days ;

Be as the cloud that flecks the seas Above her smoky argosies.

When forms familiar shall give place To stranger speech and newer face ;

When all her throes and anxious fears Lie hushed in the repose of years ; ​When Art shall raise and Culture lift The sensual joys and meaner thrift,

And all fulfilled the vision, we Who watch and wait shall never see—

Who, in the morning of her race, Toiled fair or meanly in our place—

But, yielding to the common lot, Lie unrecorded and forgot.

"WOMAN'S Mission" is today the conservative bugbear. Her inability to break into the circles of exclusiveness built up by men, and weakly assented to by herself during past generations, the precarious condition of her employments, and her nothingness in political spheres, have been the texts from which much common-place preaching has been done, and much argument, logical and illogical, taken rise. The battle, so far, has not, in every particular, been as glorious for womanhood as it might have been; her champions, male and female, have not been the ablest she might have commanded; and the gaunt finger of ridicule has often been pointed with effect at the gracelessness of her appearance as she struggled in the fight.

But certain facts have come to be already admitted by the pleadings, that begin to point in what direction the essential truth of feminine duty may be found.

First: It is the general tendency of modern society to view the position of woman, without some relation to marriage, present or in prospect, as abnormal.

Second: A certain ratio, more or less constant, as the nature of the community varies, exists between the percentages of married and unmarried women.

A certain number never can marry; another class have suffered some sad accident in their relations with the opposite sex, and they do not wish to marry; and another class are widows, or those deserted by their legal protectors, through no fault of their own, who still require efficient guardianship.

Third: All unmarried women, whether rich or poor, in consequence of their abnormal relations and of the prejudices of society, have not that proper place and consideration granted them to which they are entitled by the laws of existi 1ce and civilization, and with which they can be content.

Fourth: The sphere of employment for women is contracted, either by reason of irrational prejudice, or of usurpations by certain classes of men, or by force of the chains of habit.

Fifth: To broaden the field of feminine labor, anything tending to render woman less feminine, less modest, or less pleasing in her companionship with man, raises a violent distrust in the minds of conservative thinkers of both sexes, and arouses the vigilance of prejudices, that impede the work for any effectual purpose whatever.

Sixth: To obviate the difficulty, something must be done that, leaving women free in every respect, will yet place and maintain them in a well-de