Anti 1–2 League.
Again I asked my companion for an explanation. “This is simply to call a meeting for the purpose of forming a league to oppose the one-two men.” I was just as wise as before; but Bacon continued his explanation with his wonted courtesy. No mean introduction, however, was required to make the affair intelligible to me. I first gathered then from him that the right of universal suffrage had long since been entrusted to men and women alike. At first the privilege had been solely restricted to such persons as were of age, but since then the very consistent remark had been made that this restrictive measure was very inconsistent indeed. Why had the money qualification been abolished? because it was ostensibly unfair that a man paying taxes to the amount of two pounds should have a vote, and another paying only £1 19s. 11d. should be excluded from the poll. If the difference of one penny constituted no vital distinction, why not still further descend until we arrived at zero? Now the clear-headed and far-seeing people gradually learned to perceive that the question of being or not being of age was in itself a time-qualification, and these pioneers of progress began to argue as follows: “Why, you grant the right of voting, of influencing for good or for evil the interests of country and town, to doting old men, and you withhold it from young persons in the vigour of intellect, merely because the law has deemed proper to call them “infants.” You would not scruple to enlist them as soldiers, and they should have no vote in matters concerning their own interests. Why should a man at one and twenty be better than he was at twenty? Was not Pitt England’s prime minister on his coming of age? Is it not the height of folly and absurdity to attempt to determine by law at what period of life a man will just have sense enough to be entrusted with the performance of a duty which is the birth-right of every free-born citizen? Such laws are arbitrary and obsolete, a logical inconsistency, diametrically opposed to the grand and fundamental principle of equality before the law—aye, and a last remnant of those forms of paternal government which already in the nineteenth century began to be ridiculed and condemned; what could be opposed to such conclusive arguments? Some efforts were made, but those that attempted the struggle were cried down as unprincipled persons, weather-cocks, etc. A kind of compromise was arrived at; the period of coming of age was “recoiled,” but still nothing yet would satisfy the zealots for the principle of logical consistency. Once more the date of majority was moved back, until even the babies were admitted by law to come into their “birth-right.” The principle had been saved! the principle! and that was everything with the agitators. Difficulties there were involved in the principle no doubt, for some of the newly enfranchised babies could not walk, and others could not speak, and none could read or write. Under these doleful circumstances the mothers claimed the right to go to the poll for those youthful interesting voters, and this exorbitant demand the league proposed to counteract. One was one, and not two. The most learned mathematicians went out of their way to prove that either was wrong, and neither was right, meaning that both were nonsense; but the mothers laughed heartily at such ironical demonstrations, “and,” added Bacon, “the female party is by far stronger now than the male party.”
Woman’s Rights.
“Male and female parties!” exclaimed I, in utter astonishment. “Have those then become the two contending parties in politics?”
“Naturally enough,” replied he. “Nothing else could have happened; it is the direct and natural consequence of the emancipation of women, whereby all rights have been granted them that were formerly exclusively accorded to men.”
I could not help expressing my surprise at such a result, and added that I was afraid that it must have materially affected the relation between the sexes.
A sarcastic smile seemed for once to ruffle the placid features of Bacon as he laconically answered, “Perhaps so.” But Miss Phantasia, who suddenly from a listener became a speaker, made the following oral affidavit: “I will just tell you the truth of the matter. I for one am heartily tired of the present state of affairs, and so are many of my sisters. When our mothers and grandmothers first agitated and ultimately carried these so-called woman’s rights, they certainly knew but half what they were about. Equal rights suppose equal duties, and equal obligations impose equal burdens. Woman, demanding as a right that which men had hitherto withheld from her, forfeited thereby the privileges at one time acceded to her by men. In the old works of fiction, which to us are the sources whence we draw the morals of bygone days, the man figures conspicuously as the protector of woman; any man laying any claim to the title of a gentleman treated a woman with respect and affability; hers was the place of honour in society; she was both loved and respected, respected on account of her belonging to the weaker sex, loved as man’s helpmate, not his competitor or rival. All this has changed now-a-days. We wished to protect ourselves, and we are less protected than ever. We have not taken our places by the side of the men, but against them, as they stand opposite us. Woman’s weakness, once her strength, is no longer regarded by rival man, and now we begin to feel it. That which was formerly given us freely and willingly has now to be wrenched from our male opponents. The old feeling of chivalry has given way to the habit of rudeness. Politeness, though the word is not quite expunged from men’s vocabulary, is seldom extended towards our sex. You must have noticed how, on going upstairs this morning, the men rudely pushed us aside so as to secure the best seats for themselves. This is a slight specimen of what happens and is tolerated in ‘modern’ society. Opposite man’s violence is to be found woman’s cunning, and the ultimate chances of success are pretty well balanced on both sides; but to whichsoever victory may fall, it can only be bought at the price of domestic peace and bliss, and of all those nobler qualities which then only will be properly developed when both sexes keep within the sphere allotted them by nature and disposition. Whatever we have gained in direct political influence we have lost in the indirect influence on the hearts of men, and it remains to be seen whether the gain has been greater than the loss. No, Stuart Mill, you who two hundred years ago were the first to put the dormant idea of female emancipation into the shape of words, and supported the agitation with all the weight of your name, you may have been a great philosopher, you may have known every possible thing about political economy, but you did not understand the human heart; and with regard to us women, you have played us a very bad trick.”
That Miss Phantasia was earnest in her conviction was evinced by the unusual warmth with which she had spoken. Yet it appeared to me that she was a little too hard upon Mill. All that he and his followers undoubtedly intended to carry was that the right of voting should be extended to unmarried women, and to those that were possessed of some property. They could not be blamed for the extremes rushed into by their junior adherents. But there recurred to my mind the dreadful qualification scale, which had been lowered and lowered again, and I began to recognise that, here as elsewhere, all arguments have to give way before the so-called principles and logical consistency.
During our political conversation we had entirely lost sight of the Orumiah observatory, nor was I slow in observing that all the surrounding objects were gradually decreasing in size; the barometer too, which depended from the ceiling of the saloon, had considerably gone down, whence I concluded that we were ascending rapidly, no doubt for the purpose of seeking a more propitious current in the higher atmospheric regions. Our ascent was unfortunately, but naturally, attended with disappointing circumstances; for all the places over which we travelled became more and more indistinct to our vision. It was not, however, until after some considerable time had elapsed that the surface of our planet became altogether of a greenish-blue colour. No doubt we were passing over the Indian sea. Of course the scene in the saloon was anything but lively under the circumstances. Most of the passengers ventured upon their slumbers, and I observed that with them, as with myself, respiration began to quicken, owing to the higher air in which we breathed. The snoring of the “trunculant figure” was utterly objectionable, not to say more. Even Miss Phantasia, lively and excitable as she was, had by this time fallen asleep, thereby depriving me of her animated dialogue with a pretty French lady with whom she had been discussing her pet subjects—poetry and the fine arts. Bacon alone seemed absorbed in the reading of a learned dissertation “concerning the possibility of intercommunication between the various spheres of the universe by means of optic-telegraphic signals.” As for me, I recapitulated in undisturbed silence all the wonderful things which I had seen and heard of during the last two days, and I could not help saying to myself: if two single centuries can bring about such radical revolutions, what will the work of ages be?