WOMAN AND POLITICAL POWER. 93 



into competition with men in all professions, she will have ceased to be 

 woman, though she will not have become man. The experiment, 

 could it really be made on a small scale, would not be without its in- 

 terest to the students of science, though, from the conditions of the 

 problem, it could never be made to illustrate any theory of the origin 

 of species. To the unwomanly woman it is a virtue to be childless. 



A state with an hermaphroditic form of government, if even it could 

 exist for a generation, is by Nature doomed to extinction ; it may, how- 

 ever, be worth while to consider what kind of being a woman would 

 become who should take an active part in the election of a representa- 

 tive. As an energetic memter of his committee she would have to 

 fight the battle, foot by foot, with his opponents of either sex ; she 

 could not always sit at home and restrict herself to the use of a voting- 

 paper, because she would then tacitly admit her unfitness for political 

 life with all its hard work and its turmoil of speech-making; she 

 would be like a foreigner giving a vote from a distance, without a 

 knowledge of the qualities requisite for success in Parliament. It 

 would be necessary for her to be thoroughly prepared for the fray 

 breeched instead of petticoated, with a voice hoarse from shouting, 

 with her hair cropped close to her head, with her deltoid muscles 

 developed at the expense of her bust, prepared with syllogisms instead 

 of smiles, and more ready to plant a blow than to shed a tear. She 

 hurries from her husbandless, childless hearth to make a speech on the 

 hustings; with hard biceps and harder elbows she forces her way 

 through the election mob ; her powerful intellect fully appreciates all 

 the ribald jests and obscene gestures of the British " rough ; " she 

 knows the art of conciliating rude natures, and can exchange "chaff" 

 with a foul-mouthed costermonger ; or, if necessary, she can defend 

 herself, and blacken the eye of a drunken bargee. She has learned all 

 the catechism of politics, and when she mounts the platform she can 

 glibly recite her duty to the world according to the side she has chosen. 

 Experience has taught her the value of invectives, and she denounces 

 her opponents with a choice selection of the strongest epithets ; at first 

 she speaks loud in a tone of contentment and self-satisfaction; she 

 ends by losing her temper and bawling at the top of her voice. The 

 crowd, never very indulgent, has no mind to respect a sex which makes 

 no claim and has forfeited all right to forbearance. The hardened 

 lines of her face are battered with apples, brick-bats, and rotten eggs 

 the recognized weapons of political warfare. Perhaps the very place 

 where she stands is the mark of a storming-party ; and, after enjoying 

 the glory of an encounter with a prize-fighter (it may be of her own 

 sex), she is at last brought to the ground by superior skill and strength. 

 Then probably she retires to her home ; but I, for one, had rather not 

 follow her thither, or into that House of Parliament of which she i8 

 destined one day to become an ornament. 



Such a description, I am aware, could only be applied to an election- 



