And, now, I am struck with another idea. It has suddenly occurred to me that I have wandered a long way from the Savilles, and that my readers will wonder where I intend to pick them up again. I have really, however, not very far to go, for they are originally responsible for all the digression which their conversation has suggested, and if the opinions feebly expressed in the preceding pages succeed in winning a few recruits to the cause of progress, the Saville family would not be disposed to cavil at my momentary neglect of them.
I recall a remark John Saville made during that memorable visit.
“Suppose,” he said, “I were to find this fabulous country of yours, and were to set up as a lecturer, how do you think I should succeed?”
“That depends upon the subjects chosen. I do not doubt your power to express your views forcibly.”
“Well, I will give you a short syllabus. I would extol our methods of dealing with children, in preference to yours. I would impress upon all young women the folly of permitting my sex to arrogate to itself the right to be the first to speak of matters amorous or matrimonial. I would scout the idea of women being paid less wages than men, when the work done by both is identically the same in quality and quantity. I would insist not merely upon woman’s electoral rights, but upon woman’s equal right with man to govern her country. You see, I am not quite going the length of leaving us poor men out in the cold altogether. How do you think my programme will take?”
“Indifferently well.”
“Why?”
“Because you would be lecturing in opposition to the ‘no progress’ views of the majority of your hearers.”
“But I have understood you to say that your country boasts far more women than men. How then could I, the ‘Woman’s Apostle,’ be in the minority?”
“Because you would not merely have the opposition of men to overcome, but would have arrayed against you the prejudices of all those women who are too bigoted in their own ignorance to know what is good for themselves or others, and their name is legion. You see, the process of education in the doctrines of the necessity for self-assertion and personal effort is still young, and until we can awaken the self-respect, which it has been for ages the mission of men to extinguish in women, we cannot hope to effect the results which demand united action. Still, the ‘Onward’ portion of my sex grows in numbers every year, as does also the number of our masculine supporters, and I hope to win an immense number of recruits when I get home again, and describe all I have seen here.”