“They are at once sent to spend their term of probation in less material spheres.”
“Now, in relation to love matters. With which sex rests the onus of proposing marriage?”
“With either sex, of course I do not see how it could be otherwise.”
“It is very much otherwise with us. A woman may be dying for love, but she is not supposed to betray the fact to anyone, until the object of her desires intimates that he has set his affections upon her.”
“But suppose that he intimates no such thing? Do you mean to say that she is not even then to express her preference?”
“Then less than ever! The object of her affections would not think her worth having if she were won too easily, even if he wanted her. If he did not want her, he would most probably sneer about her love-lorn condition to all his acquaintances, and they would be highly amused at her unwomanliness in presuming to love before she had been asked.”
“Well, I do not envy you your social institutions! It seems to me that your men must be insufferable cads, and your women nothing less than fools. Why do they permit such an anomalous state of things? Can they not see that this is only another of the countless meshes with which masculine egotism has woven the net of slavery and oppression? The man who can look upon a true woman’s love for himself with anything but respect and grateful sympathy is nothing better than a cur, who is himself unworthy of the esteem of all honourable people.”
The Principal spoke with considerable warmth, and I was so struck with the force of her remarks, that I promised to lay her views before my own countrywomen at no distant date. I had, however, not much confidence in the efficacy of any appeal I might make to womanly pride, seeing that so little has yet been done in England to induce women to think and act for themselves, and to endeavour to break through the multitude of social barriers which have been erected by man’s selfishness, tyranny, and arrogance. Still, it has often happened that the absurdity of a custom has only needed to be demonstrated in black and white for its doom to be sealed, and I introduce this subject to the notice of my countrywomen, in the hope that it may induce some of them to bestow a little more thought upon the anomalies of their position, and use their best endeavours to remove at least some of the partially self-created disabilities they suffer from.
By way of diverting the Principal’s attention from a subject which aroused both her anger and contempt, I remarked upon the delightful purity of the atmosphere here, and opined that infectious diseases could not be very prevalent.
“We have heard of such evils,” was the reply, “but science and common sense united have combated them effectually. Two of our finest statues are in honour of a couple of scientists who must be ranked amongst the most famous benefactors of their kind who have ever lived. I allude to Koch and Pasteur, whose discoveries inaugurated a happy era of immunity from disorders which once killed thousands of human beings annually. Unfortunately for their contemporaries, the world at large looked upon their discoveries as only interesting from the scientists’ point of view, failing to recognise the fact that a gigantic revolution in medicine was impending. In some of our archives mention is made of a Dr. Austin Flint, who asserted that such a revolution was not far off. But his utterances fell on ears that were mostly deaf or unheeding. And yet, to the discovery and study of bacteria the most incalculable benefits to the human race are to be attributed. So perfect has the knowledge on this subject now become, that the cause of every infectious disease is well known. They are all easily preventible, but where, through possible slight relaxation of watchfulness, they may break out, they are so easily curable as to cause no alarm. It is, however, many years since a case of infectious disease occurred in New Amazonia. Science has succeeded in affording us absolute protection against scarlet fever, measles, yellow fever, cholera, whooping cough, and many other dreadful ailments which formerly decimated nations.”