kind of “dark ages” period wherein we peer backward dubiously,
wondering what everybody was like then. History, taking us by the hand,
shows us, as in a magic glass, the Coronation of Victoria, one of the
best Queens that the world has ever known, and tells us of the great
men and masterly intellects of that past time, whose immortal works we
still have with us, but whose mere mortal place knows them no more.
Much may be seen in the backward glimpse that some of us may possibly
regret and wish that we possessed again. Men of power and dominance,
for example--great writers, great thinkers, great reformers--surely we
lack these! Surely we need them sorely! But it seems to be a rule of
Nature that if we gain in one direction we must lose in another, and
whatever we have lost in that far-gone period, we have certainly gained
much in the forward direction. One of the most remarkable changes,
perhaps, that has taken place in the passing of the years is the
different position assigned to Woman from that which she occupied when
Dickens and Thackeray wrote their wonderful novels, and when Charlotte
Brontë astonished the world by her woman’s genius, to be followed by
the still more powerful and Scott-like display of brainpower in Mary
Ann Evans (“George Eliot”). At that time men were still chivalrous.
Woman was so rarely brilliant--or, shall we put it, she so rarely had
the chance of asserting the brilliant qualities that are her natural
endowment--that man was content to acknowledge any unusual talent
on her part as an abnormal quality, infrequent enough to be safely
admired. In this spirit, more or less, Sir Walter Scott paid tribute
to Jane Austen, and Thackeray to Charlotte Brontë; but as time has
progressed, and women have arisen one after another in the various
departments of Art and Literature, men have begun to fall back and look
askance, and somewhat threateningly, on the fair trespassers in their
hitherto guarded domains. And the falling back and the looking askance
continue in exact proportion to the swift and steady onward march of
the white-robed Amazons into the Battle of Life. Braced with the golden
shield of Courage, helmeted with Patience, and armed with the sword of
Faith, the women-warriors are taking the field, and are to be seen now
in massed ranks, daily marshalling themselves in more compact order,
firm-footed and fearless, prepared to fight for intellectual freedom,
and die rather than yield. They, too, will earn the right to live;
they, too, will be something greater than the mere vessels of man’s
desire--whether maids, wives, or mothers, they will prove themselves
worthy to be all these three, and more than these, to the very utmost
extent of their moral and intellectual being!
Perhaps there is nothing more entertaining to the wit of a cultured and
intelligent woman than the recurrent piping wail of man’s assertion
that “woman has no creative power.” Her place, says the didactic
male, is the kitchen, the nursery, and beside the cradle. _Certes_,
she can manage these three departments infinitely better than he can,
especially the cradle part of it, wherein his fractious disposition
is generally well displayed the moment he starts in life. But, as a
matter of fact, there is hardly any vocation in which she cannot,
if she puts her mind to it, distinguish herself just as easily and
successfully as he can if he will only kindly stand out of her way.
He makes himself ludicrous by persistently “crying her down” when all
the world _en masse_ beholds her taking the highest University honours
over his head, and beating him intellectually on his own ground. In
physical force he certainly outstrips her. Item,--he can kick her as
heartily and skilfully as he can kick a football, _vide_ the daily
police reports. Item,--he can eat and drink much more than she can,
because he devotes a great deal more time and attention to the study
of gastronomy. Item,--he can smoke more. Item,--he can indulge freely
in unbridled licentiousness, and amply prove his original savage right
to be considered a polygamous animal, without being banned from “good
society,” or anything being said against his moral character. This
a woman cannot do. If she has many lovers, her conduct is severely
criticized. But if she has none, she is still more bitterly condemned,
especially if she happens to be in the least good-looking. And why?
Simply because her indifference “reflects” on the male sex generally.
The ugliest of masculine creatures experiences a vague sense of offence
when he meets a charming woman who neither seeks his advice nor his
company. And here we have the gist of the whole matter: man is a vain
animal and wants to be admired. Like the peacock, he struts forward
and spreads out his glittering tail. The central feature of the
landscape, as he considers himself, he waits for the pea-hen to worship
him. If, instead of the humble pea-hen, he finds another sort of bird
entirely--with not only a tail as brilliant as his own, but wings which
will carry it over his head, he is mightily incensed, and his shrill
cry of rage echoes through that particular part of the universe where
he is no longer “monarch of all he surveys.” His “other world” must be
pea-hens or none!
And yet Man’s delightful and utter want of the commonest logic is never
more flagrantly exhibited than in this vital matter of his estimate
of Woman, taking it all round in a broad sense. Daily, hourly, in the
household and in the market-place, he may be heard cheapening her
abilities, sneering at such triumphs as she attains, cracking stale
jests at her “love of gossip,” “love of dress” (for he is seldom
original even in a joke), and her “incessant tongue,” blissfully
ignoring the fact that his own is wagging all the time; and yet no
one can twist him so limply and helplessly round the littlest of her
little fingers as she can. Moreover, throughout all the ages, so far as
the keenest explorer or historical student can discover, his highest
ideals of life have been depicted in the Feminine form. Fortune, Fame,
Justice, the Arts and Sciences, are all represented by female figures
lovingly designed by male hands. Evidently conscious in himself that
a woman’s purity, honesty, fidelity, and courage are nobler types of
these virtues than his own, Man apparently is never weary of idealizing
them as Woman womanly. Thoroughly aware of the supreme sovereignty
Woman can exercise whenever he gives her the chance, he, while
endeavouring to bind and hold her intellectual forces by his various
edicts and customs, takes ever an incongruous satisfaction in doing
her full justice by the magnitude of his feminine ideals. The divine
spirit of Nature itself, called “Egeria,” is always depicted by man as
a woman. Faith, Hope and Charity, are represented as female spirits,
as are the Three Graces. The Muses are women; so are the Fates. Hence,
as all the virtues, morals, arts, and sciences are shown by the
highest masculine skill as wearing woman’s form and possessing woman’s
attributes, it is easy to see that man has always been perfectly aware
in his inward intelligence of Woman’s true worth and right place in
creation, though, by such laws as he has made for his own better
convenience, he has put up whatever barriers he can in the way of the
too swift advancement of so superior and victorious a creature. Now
that she is beginning to take an important share in the world’s work
and progress, he is becoming vaguely alarmed. In each art, in each
profession he sees her gaining step by step to higher intellectual
dominance. He watches her move from plane to plane of study, learning,
as she goes, that the mere animalism of unthinking subservience to his
passions is not her only heritage. And straightway the long-spoilt
child begins to whimper. “A woman has no creative power!” he cries. “No
imagination!--no originality!--no force of character! What she does in
the Arts is so very little----!”
Stop, oh Man! You have had a very long, long innings, remember! From
the time of Abraham, and ages before that worthy patriarch ever turned
Hagar out into the wilderness, you have been setting Woman alongside
your cattle, and curling your whip with a magnificent carelessness
round both at your pleasure, yea! even offering both with indifferent
readiness for sale and barter. You have enjoyed centuries of liberty;
it is now woman’s turn to taste the sweets of freedom. She does very
little in the Arts, you say? I grant you that in the first of them,
Poetry, she does little indeed. I do not think we shall ever have a
female Shakespeare, for instance. But, at the same time, I equally do
not think we shall ever again have a male one! Yet it is to be admitted
that none of the leading women poets can compare for an instant with
the leading men in that most divine and primæval of Arts. But I should
not like to assert that the great woman-Dante or woman-Shelley may not
yet arise, for it is to be borne in mind that woman’s education and
woman’s chances have only just begun. In Music, again, she is deemed
deficient. Yet we are confronted at the present day by the fact that
many of the most successful and charming of song writers are women.
And the following appears in the Dresden _Neueste Nachricten_ (October
18, 1902):--
“Up to the present date we have always entertained the opinion that
the composition of music was a gift denied to the female sex, elegant
trifles (as exceptions) only confirming our doubts. And now an English
lady appears on the scene, amazing the musical world of Dresden. She
was as a young girl already a distinguished artist, a virtuoso on
the piano, and played--as ‘Miss Bright,’--under the direction of Dr.
Wullner, a piano concerto of her own composition, with extraordinary
success. Then marriage separated her from her art for several years.
Now (after the death of her husband), the young widow, Mrs. Knatchbull,
has composed an opera--text, music, and instrumentation all being her
own work--and has brought it with her to Dresden. The music is so
captivating, and above all, holds one so strongly that one exclaims
in astonishment, ‘Can this be the work of a woman?’ It is more than
probable that the opera will be produced at the Dresden Opera House.”
Here followeth an instructive story:--A recent opera performed with
considerable success at Monte Carlo and other Continental resorts
is the work of a woman, stolen by a man. The facts are well known,
as are the names of the hero and heroine of the sordid tragedy. A
little love-making on the part of the male composer, who could show
nothing of ability save the composition of a few amorous drawing-room
songs--a confiding trust on the part of the woman-genius, whose brain
was full of God-given melody--these were the motives of the drama.
She played the score of her opera through to him--he listened with
admiration--with words of tender flattery, precious to her who was
weak enough to care for such a rascal; and then he took it away to be
“transcribed,” as he said, and set out for the orchestra. He loved
her, so the poor credulous soul thought!--and she trusted him--such
an old story! He copied her opera in his own manuscript--stole it, in
short, and left for the Continent, where he had it produced as his own
composition. Had she complained, the law would have gone against her.
She had no proof save that of her love. Before a grinning, jesting
court of law she would have had to publish the secret of her heart.
People would have shaken their heads and said, “Poor thing! A case
of self-delusion and hysteria!” He himself would have shaken his
dirty pate and said, “Poor soul! Mad--quite mad! Many women have had
their heads turned likewise for love of me!” So it chances that only
those “in the know” are aware of the story, and the man-Fraud is left
unmolested; but it is a curious and suggestive fact that he produces no
more operas.
There is one thing that women generally, in the struggle for
intellectual free life, should always remember--one that they are
too often apt to forget--namely, that the Laws, as they at present
exist, are made _by_ men, _for_ men. There are no really stringent
laws for the protection of women’s interests except the Married
Woman’s Property Act, which is a great and needful boon. But take the
following instances of the eccentricities of English law, both of
which have come under my own knowledge as having occurred to personal
friends. A certain foreign nobleman residing in England made a will
leaving all his fortune to his mistress. His legitimate children were
advised to dispute the will, as under the law of his native country
he could not dispossess his lawful heirs of their inheritance. He had
not naturalized himself at any time as a British subject, and the
plain proof of this was, that but a year before his death, he had
applied to the Government of his own country for permission to wear
a certain decoration, which permission was accorded him. The nature
of his application proved that he still considered himself a subject
of his own native land. The case came before an English judge, who
had apparently eaten some very indigestible matter for his luncheon.
With an apoplectic countenance and an injured demeanour, the learned
gentleman declined to go into any of the details of the case, and
administered “justice” by deciding the whole thing on “a question of
domicile”--namely, that as the man had lived in England twenty-five
years, he was, naturalized or unnaturalized, a British subject and
could make his will as he liked. The fortune was, therefore, handed
over to his mistress, and the legal wife and legitimately-born children
were left out in the cold! Another case is that of a lady, well-born
and well-educated, who married a man with a fortune of some twenty
thousand a year. After the expiration of about fifteen years, when she
had borne her husband three children, he suddenly took a fantastic
dislike to her, and an equally fantastic liking for a chorus girl.
He promptly sought a divorce. As there was no ground for divorce,
he failed to obtain it. He, therefore, adopted a course of action
emanating entirely from his own brilliant brain. Starting for a cruise
on board his yacht, in company with the bewildering chorus girl,
he left orders with his solicitor to have the whole of his house
dismantled of its furniture and “cleared.” This was promptly done, the
wife and children being left without so much as a bed to lie upon, or a
chair to sit upon. The unfortunate lady told her story to a court, and
applied for “maintenance.” This, of course, the recalcitrant husband
was forced to pay, but the sum was cut down to the smallest possible
amount, under the supervision of the blandly approving court, with the
result that this man’s wife, accustomed from her girlhood to every home
comfort and care, now lives with her children in a condition of genteel
penury more degrading than absolute poverty. _There is no remedy for
these things._ One welcomes heartily the idea of women lawyers, in
the hope that when their keen, quick brains learn to grasp the huge,
unwieldy, and complex machinery of the muddle called Legal Justice,
they may, perhaps, be able to effect some reforms on behalf of their
own sex. As matters at present stand, the unbridled and extravagant
licentiousness of men, and the consequent degradation of women, are
_protected_ by law. Even a fraudulent financial concern is so guarded
by “legal” advice that it would take the lifetime’s earning of an
honest man to bring about any exposure. We want women-lawyers--Portias,
with quick brains, to see the way out of a difficulty into which men
plunge only to flounder more hopelessly. “Can the blind lead the blind?
Shall they not both fall into the ditch?”
In Medicine, women have made more than a decided mark of triumph. It
is almost impossible to over-estimate the priceless value of the work
done by women doctors and women surgeons in the harems of India and
Turkey, where the selfishness and jealousy of the Eastern sybarite
would give his women over to cruel agonies of disease and death, rather
than suffer them to be so much as looked upon by another of his own
sex. Yet, though perfectly conscious that Woman’s work in this branch
of science is day by day becoming more and more precious to suffering
humanity, we have quite recently been confronted by the spectacle of
a number of men deciding to resign their appointments at a certain
hospital, rather than suffer a woman to be nominated house-surgeon.
Her skill and efficiency were as great as theirs, and she had all the
qualifications necessary for the post; but no! sooner than honour a
woman’s ability, they preferred to resign. Comment on this incident
is needless, but it is one of the straws that show which way the wind
blows.
Much excellent work is done, and remains yet to be done by women, as
inspectors of schools. They alone are really fitted for the task of
ascertaining the conditions under which children are made to study,
and they are not likely, while examining infant classes, to make such
ponderous statements as that passed by a certain male inspector, who,
according to an amusing story told me by Sir John Gorst, found the
babies (not above five years old) “deplorably deficient in mental
arithmetic!” It takes a man to deplore “lack of mental arithmetic” in
a baby. A woman would never be capable of such weighty stupidity.
Perhaps it will be just as well to glance casually at the state of
things in this country respecting the education of mere infants, as
arranged by certain laws drawn up by men, laws in which women, who are
the mothers of the race, are not allowed to have a voice.
1. The law _allows_ them to enter at three years old, and _compels_
them to enter at five years old.
2. Men inspectors constantly examine children of four years old
in arithmetic, and the “mental arithmetic of the baby class,” is
constantly mentioned in reports.
3. Needlework is taught before five years old; two to three hours form
the staple instruction. Needlework injures the eyesight at such a
tender age, and two or three hours are a cruelty and a waste of time
for tiny children.
4. Desks, blackboards, slates and books are everywhere in excess of
“Kindergarten” occupations, and the “development of the spontaneous
activity in the child” is twisted into the development of uniformity.
To differ from the usual is to be naughty; every one must do the same
thing at the same time. Every one must build a like house, a like
table, a like chair; each brick must be on the table at the same minute.
5. Despite male inspectors, the babies sleep. They fall off their
seats and bump their foreheads against the desks, and their spines are
twisted and crooked as they lie on their arms, heads forward, upon the
hard supports. Curvature must be produced in many cases, solely from
these causes.
6. To maintain order, corporal punishment is habitual, and “fear”
the chief motive for right-doing. To quote from a letter of Sir John
Gorst’s:--
“The reform of this system is not a matter of sentiment. These babies
are the future scholars of our improved schools that the Education Act
is intended to produce, and the future citizens by whom our Imperial
position is to be maintained. If we prematurely addle their intellects
by schooling--for which their tender years are unfit; if we cripple
their bodies by cooping them up in deforming desks; if we destroy their
sight by premature needlework, and confuse their senses by over-study
of subjects which they are too young to understand, we shall neither
have fit scholars for our future schools, nor fit citizens to uphold
the Empire.”
Starting on these premises it will surely be acknowledged that women
have an indisputable right to be inspectors of schools. They have the
natural instinct to know what is best for the health and well-being
of children, and they are also capable of correctly judging by that
maternal sympathy which is their inherited gift, how a child’s mental
abilities should best be encouraged and trained.
I have often been asked if I would like to see women in Parliament.
I may say frankly, and at once, that I should detest it. I should
not like to see the sex, pre-eminent for grace and beauty, degraded
by having to witness or to take part in such “scenes” of heated and
undignified disputation as have frequently lowered the prestige of
the House of Commons. On the same lines I may say that I do not care
to see women playing “hockey” or indulging in any purely “tom-boy”
sports and pastimes. They lose “caste” and individuality. One of the
many brilliant and original remarks of mankind concerning the female
sex is that women should be cooks and housekeepers. So they should. No
woman is a good housekeeper unless she understands cooking, nor can she
be a good cook unless she be a good housekeeper. The two things are
inseparable, and combine to make comfort with economy. A woman should
know how to cook and keep house for _herself_, not only for man. Man
says to her: “Be a cook,”--because of all things in the world he loves
a good dinner; loves it better than his wife, inasmuch as he will often
“bully” the wife if the dinner fails. But a woman must also eat, and
she should learn to cook _for her own comfort_, quite apart from his.
In the same way she should study housekeeping. If she lives a single
life, she will find such knowledge eminently useful. But to devote all
her energy and attention to cooking and housekeeping, as most men would
have her do, would be a waste of power and intelligence. As well ask a
great military hero to devote his entire time to the canteen.
In breaking her rusty fetters, and stepping out into the glorious
liberty of the free, Woman has one great thing to remember and to
strive for,--a thing that she is at present, in her newly emancipated
condition, somewhat prone to forget. In claiming and securing
intellectual equality with Man, she should ever bear in mind that such
a position is only to be held by always maintaining and preserving as
great an Unlikeness to him as possible in her life and surroundings.
Let her imitate him in nothing but independence and individuality. Let
her eschew his fashions in dress, his talk and his manners. A woman who
wears “mannish” clothes, smokes cigars, rattles out slang, gambles at
cards, and drinks brandy and soda on the slightest provocation, is lost
altogether, both as woman and man, and becomes sexless. But the woman
whose dress is always becoming and graceful, whose voice is equable and
tender, who enhances whatever beauty she possesses by exquisite manner,
unblemished reputation, and intellectual capacity combined, raises
herself not only to an equality with man, but goes so far above him
that she straightway becomes the Goddess and he the Worshipper. This is
as it should be. Men adore what they cannot imitate. Therefore when men
are drunken, let women be sober; when men are licentious, let women be
chaste; when men are turf-hunters and card-players, let women absent
themselves from both the race-course and the gambling-table; and while
placing a gentle yet firm ban on laxity in morals and disregard of the
binding sanctity of family life, let them silently work on and make
progress in every art, every profession, every useful handicraft, that
they may not be dependent for home or livelihood on man’s merely casual
fancy or idle whim. The mistake of Woman’s progress up to the present,
has been her slavish imitation of Man’s often unadmirable tastes, and
a pathetic “going down” under his lofty disdain. Once grasp the fact
that his disdain is not “lofty” but merely comic, and that his case
is only that of the Distressful Peacock, hurt by indifference to his
tail, things will right themselves. Nature has already endowed Woman
with the contrasting elements of beauty, delicacy, and soft charm, as
opposed to man’s frequent ugliness and roughness; let Woman herself
continue to emphasize the difference by bringing out her original and
individual qualities in all she does or attempts to do. Of course
for a long time yet, Man will declare “feminine individuality” to be
non-existent; but as we know the quality is as plain and patent as
“masculine individuality,” we have only to insist upon it and assert
it, and in due course it will be fully admitted and acknowledged.
Meantime, while pressing on towards the desired goal, Woman must learn
the chief lesson of successful progress, which is, not to copy Man, but
to carefully preserve her beautiful Unlikeness to him in every possible
way, so that, while asserting and gaining intellectual equality with
him, she shall gradually arrive at such ascendancy as to prove herself
ever the finer and the nobler Creature.
THE PALM OF BEAUTY