Page:Sesame and Lillies - Ruskin (1895).djvu/38

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xxxii
PREFACE.

It is the degree beyond that which to us has proved so fatal, and that I would our example could warn you from as a small repayment for your hospitality and friendliness to us in our days of trouble.

May Englishwomen accept this in a kindly spirit as a New-year's wish from

A French Lady

Dec. 29.

19. That, then, is the substance of what I would fain say convincingly, if it might be, to my girl friends; at all events with certainty in my own mind that I was thus far a safe guide to them. For other and older readers it is needful I should write a few words more, respecting what opportunity I have had to judge, or right. I have to speak, of such things; for, indeed, too much of what I have said about women has been said in faith only. A wise and lovely English lady told me, when 'Sesame and Lilies' first appeared, that she was sure the 'Sesame' would be useful, but that in the 'Lilies' I had been writing of what I knew nothing about. Which was in a measure too