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sentimental. It is said that their interference might increase the spasmodic and changeable tendency of modern politics, and that women are always under the influence of their emotions, while men are governed by their reason; but might it not be said with equal justice that men are governed by their passions, and that the true instincts of women would tend to modify the dangers of democracy towards which those passions would impel them? They would perhaps be more easily swayed by a master mind, and more impressed by great eloquence. They would, however, require a high political morality in the character of any great leader, whose increase of power would in that case be of no disadvantage to the State. Women might well be called upon to take a deep and practical interest in the important questions of social reform, education and religion. Their freedom from the business cares of life should give them time to know and appreciate the true wants of their fellow creatures, and their home life should teach them to understand the educational requirements of their country. It must be borne in mind that the advocacy of these subjects would require the judgment of married as well as of unmarried women to be really advantageous to the State. They should adopt the position and the power formerly held on these subjects by the Church, and keep steadily before Parliament the necessity of some form of religious teaching, and the recognition of Divine authority as essential to the well-being of the community. It would be in opposing the modern Radical notion that religion and morality can be divorced, that the true and highest influence of women would be most justly felt in politics.

The great danger in giving voting power to women is that those best qualified would hold aloof from those whose distorted views of their social duties and surroundings would lead them to seek a public life, and women's views would be represented by the noisiest and least womanly of their sex. If, as Mrs. Chapman says, the majority of women do not wish for the suffrage, and a large proportion are satisfied to vote as it were by proxy, it must be taken into consideration that once in possession of what might seem to be a weapon, an energetic minority would use it in the direction of what they consider emancipation. This movement belongs to a mistaken estimate of women's true influence, and each step taken which puts them into competition with men tends to destroy those attributes which specially qualify them for a voice and opinion on the social side of politics. A glance through English history shows what power women have always hitherto wielded. The special virtues of Boadicea may perhaps be put aside, but Margaret of Anjou is an imposing figure, and no one now denies to Queen Elizabeth the right to rank with the greatest English kings. She had the faculty of judging men, and governed the country with a firm will and purpose, while at the same time she was a woman in her faults and failings. The sovereign qualities of

our present Queen, and the power for good that she has exercised, are too well known and appreciated to need recalling here. The further risk is that some women might wish to take an active part in politics even so far as to enter Parliament themselves. A seat in Parliament, it is said, would not absorb more time or strength than many other of their pursuits,though as a pleasure it does not seem very attractive, and as a career it would certainly not be very lucrative. The objections which exist against their adopting some other professions may not seem so evident here; no particular or very heavy course of study is needed to make a man a dabbler in politics or a member of Parliament, and in the present day all educated women probably care more for politics than for anything else outside their home duties and their charities. It has been objected that their presence would exaggerate the unbusinesslike defects of the House of Commons, and render it even more of a debating club than it is at present; but it has not been found that they in any way hinder public business by taking part in the work of citizens as members of School Boards, and as Guardians of the Poor. Here it is that their special characteristics of sympathy and love of their fellows make their presence and work most useful, and it is very much to be desired that they would take even keener interest in these departments. Whilst, however, for the sake of argument it has been admitted that some few advocates of Women's Rights might attempt to follow a political career, and that their doing so might produce no detrimental effect, yet the incongruity and absurdity of their sitting in Parliament, or taking office as members of a Government, bring such ridicule on the whole subject that these possibilities cannot be considered serious or practical objections to the proposed extension of the suffrage. One or two enthusiasts trying to rival men and asserting imaginary rights would not affect the social status of women at large; and actual competition being almost impossible, it does not seem likely that the franchise will in any way diminish their personal or moral influence, which latter is far more valuable to most of them than any amount of consideration as citizens.

Mrs. Fawcett seems to argue that with the greater opportunities of development accorded to English women during the present century, not only have their intellectual powers increased, but their special work has been done with greater zeal and intelligence, and implies that this is due to a large extent to the Women's Rights Movement. It is almost impossible to prove or disprove such assertions. It would be very easy to make a list of thinkers and workers among women in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries which would compare favourably with the names given by Mrs. Fawcett, and we may cite in reply to her statements the opinion of bygone poets and writers. No one will deny that such great men as Spenser, Dante, Shakespeare give an ideal of woman and her powers and work such as no living author can surpass. Their heroines are not depicted as

useless, ignorant, or inactive. [Neither did they require special legislation or look upon themselves as denied the rights of human beings. The advancement made, if any such there be, has only kept pace with the advancement of civilisation throughout the human race, and women as well as men have floated with the wave of intellectual activity and mental energy which has been flowing over the world since the Renaissance. Mrs. Fawcett also asserts that the French Revolution was the beginning of the recognition of woman's true position. The answer is easy. In almost all religions men have deified womanhood as well as manhood. In the ancient mythologies of the Greeks and Romans, wisdom and knowledge were personified as women. Athêne was a woman, the Sibyls were women, and the Muses. Woman's place in Western civilisation was given to her by Christianity, and by the very doctrine which has now become an error in the Roman Church. The Chivalry of the Middle Ages was its first result. The idea from which St. Paul takes his text is not so much the absolute submission of women to men as that they were too precious for ordinary life in the world, and it taught reverence and respect quite as much, or at any rate at the same time, as the need of protection and support. Women have left their mark on every page of history, and one is sometimes tempted to wish that they were irresponsible for their actions, as well as for the misery and misfortune of which they have been the cause, from the days of Helen of Troy downwards. That they should become more and more aware of the part allotted to them in dispelling the clouds of passion and selfishness which have overhung the past, and that it is important that they should maintain their softening and civilising effect on the rougher natures of men, will not be denied. An educated, intelligent, and refined woman has an ideal to which she hopes to attain as far above the ideal of the keenest advocate for Women's Rights' as the song of the nightingale is above the song of other birds. Such a woman does not dream of equality with men; her power is motive rather than active, and she rightly resents any doctrines which would seem to deprive her of this. The ancient saying that woman was made for man takes a new meaning for her, and she is as far removed from the butterfly existence as she is from the woman who apes men's ways and tries to prove herself the equal if not the superior of man. She prefers to accentuate her special characteristics, being fully imbued with the feeling that the moral and intellectual existence of man is incomplete without her as her moral and intellectual existence is incomplete without man. The elements which each can supply are two currents which must meet and harmonise to accomplish the destiny of humanity. The conclusion is, then, that, precisely because of their differences from men, women's influence in politics, apart from their influence through men, may be of definite value, and would be increased

in a right direction by giving the married as well as unmarried the franchise, and that it would not materially alter their social standing. Might and right will always go together; and although there may be a majority of women in the country, this fact would he neutralised by man's stronger position intellectually and physically. Woman must always remain the weaker vessel, and as such will be able to exact the deference and respect she now receives in all educated societies. The wider scope given to her faculties, and her deeper interest in human affairs, need not distract her nor lead her to desert her true mission in the world.

Let her make herself her own

To give or keep, to live, and learn to be
All that harms not distinctive womanhood;

for, says the Laureate,

Woman is not undeveloped man

But diverse.

M. A. A. GALLOWAY.

ALLOTMENTS.

AN exceedingly curious' survival' of the old condition of land tenure in England was still to be found up to 1845, in a Buckinghamshire village. The manor belongs to the charity of Ewelme for poor brethren, and had continued in the same condition as when given to the charity in 1441.

The account, in Domesday Book, of the parish shows an earlier phase of ownership. Edward the Confessor had bestowed one hide (120 acres) of very good land to Christ and St. Peter at Westminster,' by which the Dean, their successor, still profits. A man called 'Bondus the Standard-bearer,' his name showing that he or his father had been a bond-slave, held a large portion under the Earl of Morton : 'Alric held under him, and had four hides for his manor.' Graviter miserabiliter is added-not an engaging description. The manor of Marsh Gibbon was taken possession of by the Conqueror, and bestowed on his son, the Earl of Cornwall. After passing through two or three other hands, it was given by the Earl of Suffolk to Ewelme; but under all the changes above, the subordinate manner of culture and of holding continued apparently the same. The property consisted of 2,752 acres, which were divided into 3,509 strips of land set at every possible angle, from nine to thirty feet wide and about nine or ten chains long, with a grass path called a balk between each. As a number of lots belonged often to the same holder, each ownership was marked by some sign, such as a pitchfork, a pair of pincers, a hook, or a letter: The allotments were an acre or half an acre in size, the clerk by right of his office holding about six acres in seven or eight strips at the time of the last change.

The number of farmers had much diminished, and some had as much as three yard lands' (a yard land is thirty acres). The whole parish was entirely uninclosed, and the agriculture most primitive. A threefold course was enforced on the arable land, which was divided into three portions, on each of which a sequence of corn, beans (or potatoes), and then a fallow, was rigorously carried out. No man was allowed to cultivate his pieces as he pleased; the succession of crop, or no crop, on each parcel must be complied with by all alike. The village chronology was calculated by the rotation, e.g. 'The child as were born two year sin the lower field was in beans,' &c. Another

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