Of the power of adages, and that barbaric experience and civilization of which they are generally the exponent, we might write volumes; but the subject must be dismissed in this connection without a word. We must pass on to consider the force of social instincts and prejudices which underlie this general literature, and are as much stronger than it as the character of a man is stronger than his intellectual quality. A lecturer once said, "that the first prejudice which women have to encounter is one which exists before they are born, which leads fathers instinctively to look forward to the birth of sons, and to leave little room in their happy or ambitious schemes for the coming of a daughter." Not long since, a highly educated Englishman told me that this remark smote him to the heart. "I never expected to have any thing but a son," he declared; "and, when my little Minnie was born, I had made no preparation for her. I had neither a thought nor a scheme at her service."
Fanny Wright, in some essays published thirty years ago, says, "There are some parents who take one step in duty, and halt at the second. Our sons," they say, "will have to exercise political rights, and fill public offices. We must help them to whatever knowledge there is going, and make them as sharp-witted as their neighbors. As for our daughters, they can never be any thing; in fact, they are nothing. We give them to their mothers, who will take them to church and dancing-school, and, with the aid of fine clothes, fit them out for the market.
"But," she goes on to say, "let possibilities be what they will, no man has a right to calculate on them for his sons. He has only to consider them as human beings, and insure them a full development of all the faculties which belong to them as such. So, as respects his daughters, he has nothing to do with the injustice of law, nor the absurdities of society. His duty is plain,—to train them up as human beings, to seek for them, and with them, all just knowledge. Who among men contend best with the difficulties of life and society,—the strong-minded or the weak, the wise or the foolish? Who best control and mould opposing circumstances,—the educated or the ignorant? What is true of them is true of women also."
In the customs of nations, women find the most discouraging educational influences. While with us these customs all set one way, they are easily broken through by the untutored races, who still rely on the force of their primal instincts. When Captain Wallis went to see the Queen of Otaheite, a marsh which crossed the way proved a formidable obstacle to the puny Anglo-Saxon. No sooner did the queen perceive it, than, taking him up as if he were a meal-bag, she threw him over her shoulder, and strode along. Nobody smiled; even Captain Wallis does not appear to have felt mortified. These people were accustomed to the physical strength of their queen. It would be well if civilized nations could imitate them, far enough at least to remember, that wherever strength, whether mental or physical, is found, there it certainly belongs.
In Peru and the Formosa Isles, it is the women who choose their husbands, and not the men who choose their wives; and, from the moment of marriage, the man takes up his abode in his wife's family. Lord of creation in every other respect, he still owes to her whatever social standing and privileges he may possess. Such an exception is valueless, save that it shows us that sex does not absolutely, of itself, determine such customs.
The African kings are permitted to have many wives; but they respect the chastity of women, and require it. Dr. Livingstone tells us of an instance in which the royal succession finally lapsed upon a woman. Her counsellors forbade her to marry a single husband, telling her that it would create jealousies and divisions in the tribe. She must follow the royal custom. But pure womanly nature spoke louder than the counsellors. The poor queen renounced marriage altogether, and associated a half-brother in the government, upon whose children she settled the succession. Let this beautiful fact shame those coward souls who fear to trust to the instinctive purity of the sex.
He goes on to state, in a recent letter, that he has found nothing more remarkable, among the highly intelligent tribes of the Upper Sambesi, than the respect universally accorded to women.
"Many of the tribes are governed by a female chief. If you demand any thing of a man," remarks the intrepid explorer, "he replies, 'I will talk with my wife about it.' If the woman consents, your demand is granted. If she refuse, you will receive a negative reply. Women vote in all the public assemblies. Among the Bushwanas and Kaffirs, the men swear by their fathers; but among the veritable Africans, occupying the centre of the continent, they always swear by their mother. If a young man falls in love with a maiden of another village, he leaves his own, and takes up his dwelling in hers. He is obliged to provide in part for the maintenance of his mother-in-law, and to assume a respectful attitude, a sort of semi-kneeling, in her presence. I was so much astonished at all these marks of respect for women, that I inquired of the Portuguese if such had always been the habit of the country. They assured me that such had always been the case."
If women were unwise managers of money,—a statement frequently made, but which we may safely deny,—it would be owing to the custom which has, through long ages, put the purse in the hands of "their master;" a custom so old, that to "husband" one's resources is a phrase which expresses man's pecuniary responsibility, and is always equivalent to locking one's money up. "It will be time enough," says Mrs. Kirkland, "to expect from woman a just economy when she is permitted to distribute a portion of the family resources. Witness those proud subscription-lists where one reads, 'Mr. B., twenty dollars;' and, just below, 'Mrs. B., ten dollars,'—which ten dollars Mrs. B. never saw, and would ask for in vain to distribute for her own pleasure."
And this custom has such educational force, that very liberal men refuse the smallest pecuniary independence to their wives to their very dying day. "The Turk does not lock up his wife with more care than the Christian his strong box. To that lock there is ever but one key, and that the master carries in his pocket. The case is not altered when the wife is about to close her weary eyes in death. She may have earned or inherited or saved the greater part of their common property, but without his consent she cannot bequeath a dollar." This passage reminds us of a criticism on the marriage service attributed to Sir John Bowring. This eccentric man considers it wicked from beginning to end. "Look at it," he says: "'with this ring I thee wed,'—that's sorcery; 'with my body I thee worship,'—that's idolatry; 'and with all my worldly goods I thee endow,'—that's a lie!"