256 . Transactions.— Miscellaneous, 
And in those old times women were largely disinherited, and were legally 
incapable of holding property. These old wrongs continue to a considerable 
extent unredressed. Though somewhat modified and white-washed, they 
still survive. Women, married women, are still wronged in reference to the 
marriage contract, and conjugal infidelity; and in reference to the up- 
bringing and guardianship of their children; and in reference to property. 
2. Marriage, which ought to be a fair and equal partnership, is, amongst 
us, a contract which gives undue advantage and power to one of the con- 
tracting parties over the other. Its injustice in punishing a woman for 
marrying, by spoiling her of her property, I will speak of by-and-by. At 
present I speak of some other respects in which the contract is grossly one- 
sided, or uni-lateral. Neither general opinion nor law requires a man to be as 
faithful to this contract as a woman. For unfaithfulness, both opinion and 
law inflict heavier penalties on the woman than on the man. All this seems 
to have resulted from the prevalent polygamy of former times. Amongst 
us polygamy has long ceased to be a lawful institution, except, perhaps, 
in the case of the males of royal houses. In Germany and in Britain, 
for instance, the law seems to tolerate, or to wink at, the disguised poly- 
gamy of left-handed marriages in high places. This polygamy has left its 
mark upon us ;—upon our opinions, manners, and institutions: for, where- 
ever it existed as a lawful institution, people could not help thinking that 
men were entitled to more liberty of a licentious kind than women. ‘This 
idea still survives, contaminating public opinion. We observe it in the 
different degrees of reprobation with which we treat impurity in women 
and in men. To a woman, impurity brings disgrace, ruin, social damna- 
tion; but in a man it is only an excusable peccadillo, which scarcely affects 
his social position or fortunes. A parallel survival or out-come, of the 
polygamous epoch, we have in the fact that the female partner, in the 
marriage contract, is more severely punished for unfaithfulness than the 
male—not only by public opinion, but also by law. A husband can obtain 
a divorce from his wife by proving that she has been unfaithful to the 
marriage vow ; but, in most civilized nations, a wife eannot obtain a divorce 
from her husband on the same ground. In France, a wife cannot obtain a 
divorce unless the adulterous husband keeps his concubine in the same 
house with her. In England, a wife can obtain a divorce only when her 
husband, besides being unfaithful, has treated her with cruelty, or beaten 
her, not in moderation. In the paper whence I gathered these curiosities it 
was stated that at present only in two European countries, Italy and Scot- 
land, does an equal, or bi-lateral, law of divorce prevail. (Is the New 
Zealand law also bi-lateral?) We have now seen that legislation has 
stamped a uni-lateral character on conjugal infidelity, and inflicts severer 
