Page:The Business of being a Woman by Ida Tarbell.djvu/189

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THE HOMELESS DAUGHTER

city. The attraction the Social Settlement has for the girl finds its base here. The loss to communities of their educated young women, who find no response to their need, no place to serve in their own society, is incalculable.

It is not infrequent that a girl who may have by some chance of fortune a sufficient sense of independence in her home, who knows herself needed there, and is ready to perform the service, is driven out by the persistence of that spirit of parental authority, which looks upon it as a duty to rule the life, particularly of the daughter, as long as she is at home. There is nothing clearer than that the old domination of one person by another is a thing of the past. A new spirit of cooperation and friendly direction has come into the world. The home which it does not pervade cannot keep its young.

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