THE RBVOLUTIOl^AET MOVEMENT AMONG WOMEN. 171 



fuge, with its treasures of new and old, its enchanting fabrications 

 in story aad verse, and its record of all that has been done, and 

 hoped, and failed, — it is here that woman finds herself in the full 

 habiliment of her subordination. It is not the bold avowal of her 

 inferiority and the scorn of her sphere, of which there is no lack; 

 it is not the meaningless i)araded recognition of her charms and 

 gifts, as the decorator and subserver of his leisure, nor yet the vows 

 and homage accorded her as ministering angel of the house and 

 purifier of society; it is that inexpressible tone and spirit pervading 

 the whole, as she turns its pages, announcing everywhere to woman 

 the measure of her esteem among men. Out of literature proper 

 she is eased down into society — where the virus of all takes most 

 fatal effect — by the newspaper press. There is nothing more offen- 

 sive, and nothing more damaging to the moral sense of the average 

 reader, of either sex, than the manner in which woman is distorted 

 and bemeaued by the newspaper craft. Woman, the scandal of 

 the double-leaded column, the gist of every well-told tale, the butt 

 of the best joke, the glint of sarcasm, the ridicule of domestic dis- 

 content and diabolism, and the unknown quantify of all innuendo 

 and suspicion. And woman not at her best, or half best of admit- 

 ted worth, but at her worst of disadvantage. 



In society, the attitude and the speech of man to woman is most 

 decorous; for it is here, in the presence of her physical charms, that 

 the fascinations of her intellectual and spiritual beauty unite in ap- 

 peal from the decrees of his calculating intellect. And yet it is 

 here that woman brings the largess of an unreserved sacrifice — her 

 time, labor, means, capability, her health, herself. 



As a last cause distinctively considered, we have the direct edu- 

 cation furnished in schools for girls. And it may be that here 

 will be found the chief cause of the attempt of women to revolu- 

 tionize public sentiment in their interest, since the language of 

 positive education is the plainest possible statement to woman of 

 the inferiority of her duties and of herself. 



The rule of less compensation for labor may come in part from 

 a mistaken judgment as to the number of dependent women; the 

 depreciation of home duties from an imperfect knowledge of do- 

 mestic economy; and much of indirect teaching may be the half 

 unconscious growth of a belief that, things being as they are, it is 



