WOMAN'S LONG STRUGGLE 29 



composes them or because lie has made his wife, whom he 

 married when a mere girl, so learned and so polished." 1 



Scarcely less distinguished for her taste in literature, 

 and for her talent as a letter writer, was Pliny's wife, 

 Calphurnia, who, at his request, wrote to him in his ab- 

 sence every day and sometimes even twice a day. Accord- 

 ing to Cicero, his daughter Tulia was "the best and most 

 learned of women"; but her literary work, it is probable, 

 did not extend much beyond her letters to her illustrious 

 father. Nevertheless, what would we not give to possess 

 these letters to have as complete a collection of them as 

 we have of those of the great orator and philosopher. They 

 would be of inestimable value and would be absolutely be- 

 yond compare, except, possibly, with the letters of Mme. 

 du Deffand or of Elizabeth Barrett Browning of a much 

 later age. 



Considering the number of educated women that lived 

 in the latter days of the Republic and during the earlier 

 part of the Empire, and their well known culture and love 

 of letters, it is reasonable to suppose that they may have 

 written much in both prose and verse cf which we have 

 no record. Literary productions must have more than or- 

 dinary value to survive two thousand years, and especially 

 two thousand years of such revolutions and upheavals as 

 have convulsed the world since the time of the pax Romana, 

 when all the world was at peace under Augustus. 



How much of the literary work of the women of to-day 

 will receive recognition twenty centuries hence? Some of 

 it may, it is true, find a place in the fireproof libraries 

 of the time; but who, outside of a few antiquarians, will 

 take the trouble to read it or estimate its value? A few 

 anthologies containing our gems of prose and poetry will 

 probably be all that our fortieth century readers will deem 

 worthy of notice. In view of the chaotic condition of 

 Europe for so many centuries, the wonder is not that we 

 lEpistolce, Lib. I, 16. 



