Editress

Miss Ishbel MacDonald, who so excellently acted as hostess at No. 10 Downing Street for her father during his tenure of the Premiership, commenced, last week, to function as an editress. The periodical for which she is responsible is a weekly, The Optimist, called in a subtitle The National Organ of the Cheerful Giver. It is being run in the interest of the Margaret MacDonald* and Mary Middleton Baby Clinic. The price is one penny (Id) which is written in this case Id(onation)--one donation. In the first issue, Miss Ishbel wrote a leading article about the baby clinic. Other contributors were U. S. Secretary of State Charles E. Hughes, ex-Lord Chancellor Haldane, General Sir Frederick Maurice, ex-Premier Mac-Donald. The latter was commissioned by his daughter to write on marriage. He wrote in humorous complaint. "I must obey; yet what can I say on this all-important subject?" and proceeded: "We make a great mistake when we assume that a happy marriage is one without a hitch or minor squabble from year to year. A marriage without a hitch or two is a dull affair enjoyed only by dull people. The young man and maiden who look forward to a calm sea voyage for life are, if their expectations be fulfilled, to be of little use to each other. Let us face all the facts and not dream of a drawing-room geniality which is responsible for more disappointments in marriage than anything else. Have it out; don't run to someone on whose lap tears are to be shed and woes poured abundantly, but laugh in the end and make it up without the assistance of relatives and neighbors.

''Perhaps I am getting an old fogey, hut I deplore the temptations offered to our young people to indulge in the artificial and glaring pleasures away from their own firesides, and which in the end deprive them of the power to be happy with themselves."

The late Mrs, Ramsay MacDonald.