"You're getting pretty close to things I used to know something about," I remarked drily.
"If you knew all that was known, then, you wouldn't know this, John. Don't you remember what Lester Ward calls 'the illusion of the near'—how the most familiar facts were precisely those we often failed to understand? In all our history, ancient and modern, we had the underlying assumption that men were the human race, the people who did things; and that women—were 'their women.'"
"And precisely what have you lately discovered? That Horatio at the bridge was Horatio, after all? That the world was conquered by an Alexandra—and a Napoleona?" I laughed with some bitterness.
"No," said Owen gently, "There is no question about the battles—men did the fighting, of course. But we have learned that 'the decisive battles of history' were not so decisive as we thought them. Man, as a destructive agent did modify history, unquestionably. What did make history, make civilization, was constructive industry. And for many ages women did most of that."
"Did women build the Pyramids? the Acropolis? the Roads of Rome?"
"No, nor many other things. But they gave the world its first start in agriculture and the care of animals; they clothed it and fed it and ornamented it and kept it warm; their ceaseless industry made rich the simple early cultures. Consider—without men, Egypt and Assyria could not have fought—but they could have grown rich and wise. Without women—they could have fought until the last man died alone—if the food held out.
"But I won't bother you with this, John. You'll get all you want out of books better than I can give it. What I set out to say was that the most important influence in weeding out intemperance was that of the women."
I was in a very bad temper by this time, it was disagreeable enough to have this—or any other part of it, true; but what I could not stand was to see that big hearted man speak of it in such a cheerful matter-of-fact way.
"Have the men of to-day no pride?" I asked. "How can you stand it—being treated as inferiors—by women?"
"Women stood it for ten thousand years," he answered, "being treated as inferiors—by men."