WOMAN'S WORK 6o8 discredit to Kensington. Visitors to New Zealand from the Old Country say that life there is on the scale of life in a small English provincial town, and they are careful to add that socially it is much more lively, for the New Zealand woman, without a great choice of amusement, makes the most of what she has, and in a week there will be more social happenings in the way of teas and dances, and such small gaieties, than three months in England would see. New Zealand is unlike some of the other colonies in this, that she is troubled by no racial problem, and among her million in- habitants the foreign element is very small ; in fact, most of the emigrants have come from Great Britain and Ireland, and to-day New Zealand is perhaps more purely British in blood than any other part of the Empire — intensely British also in traditions, sym- pathies, and conventions. Opportunities for Women In most civilised countries the women by far outnumber the men, and constant stress is laid on the fact that in England the excess of women over men amounts to about a million ; but in New Zealand, according to the last census, the bachelors of marriageable age outnumber the spinsters by nearly 10,000, a fact seeming to show that the New Zealand woman has a much greater chance of marrying than her sister in England. Whether married or single, the woman there, as in other young countries, has the satis- faction of knowing that she counts for some- thing ; she is not oppressed by the know- ledge that she is only one unit in a great mass, but feels that she, too, has a part in deciding the social conditions and shaping the destinies of the growing country. It is not only, or indeed mainly, because in New Zealand women have the franchise, but that in the smaller community there is more need of them, and more room than can possibly be the case in a thickly-populated country. Much might be said about the pleasantness of New Zealand life as it appears to those bom in the Dominion, but the question is whether New Zealand offers sufficient open- ing and promise of fortune to tempt English women to cut themselves loose from all friends and home ties, and set out for a new life on the other side of the world, and, if so, what class of woman is most likely to be successful. Professional Women For the professional woman there are very few openings. Here and there a woman doctor may build up a good practice, but New Zealand is already fairly well supplied with medical men, and in Wellington, the capital, a town of not more than 70,000 inhabitants, there are no fewer than five medical women practising to-day. Several New Zealand women have taken their medical degree at the Otago University, and others have graduated at Edinburgh or London. Of course, the majority of these women look forward to practising in their own country, and the same may be said of the other graduates of the New Zealand University, and of the women who go through the training colleges for teachers. They look forward to staffing the schools of the Dominion, and, in making appointments, preference would naturally be given to them rather than to women of similar qualifications from other countries. Openinsfs for Teacliers A teacher desiring to find employment in New Zealand would probably find a thorough knowledge of French and German her most valuable qualification, for a correct accent is not commonly met with among those who have only studied these languages academically, and here and there it might be possible to find a good position in a college or private school or to secure a number of private pupils. But it must be remembered that New Zealanders have not the same desire or the same need to learn French or German as have those who live in England. The same teacher might obtain a good position as governess on a station, but only if she could teach music and English as well. There are possible openings here and there for the fully qualified teacher of other subjects — ^the kindergarten teacher, for instance, or the graduate from a school of domestic instruction, but it cannot be too strongly insisted on that there is no special demand for these, that it might be only after a long search that regular and lucra- tive employment would be found, and that it would be most unwise for any woman to risk everything on the chance of obtaining such employment within a short time of her arrival in the Dominion. If a woman with these qualifications could afford to combine a pleasure trip with a search for employment, she might have good reason to feel satisfied with the result, but that is the most that can be said. Clerical Openings It is sometimes suggested that there is a good opening in any of the Colonies for a woman with a thorough knowledge of gardening, fruit-growing, or poultry-farming. Among the many capable women in New Zealand anxious to employ themselves very few have followed these lines, and it is generally acknowledged that poultry-farm- ing is a precarious venture with little prospect of success unless combined with bee-keeping and fruit-growing. For the woman clerk, private secretary, typist, or shorthand writer there is very little chance of employment. There is far more opening in England for women secretaries than there is likely to be in New Zealand for many years to come, and the supply of colonial-made typists already exceeds the demand, the reason being that the working- men, whose daughters some years ago would have gone into domestic service, now send them into shops or offi,ces instead, and the market is overcrowded with girls.
