But we cannot close this brief sketch without mentioning the Orient, that region of transition between the darkness of Asia and the light of occidental Europe; for, though the position of woman is in general so lamentable that at first glance it seems best to pass over this portion of the continent in silence, one catches here and there a glimmer of progress that portends a better day in the still distant future. And, too, regenerate Greece commands our attention, for she indeed is a rich oasis in this desert of Mohammedan conquest.
There are many Ottoman women, especially among the rich families, who desire to change their dress and enter into relations with the women of other religions, but the ecclesiastical and civil authorities are always ready to check this tendency and to rigorously enforce the ancient customs. In certain harems earnest efforts have been made to establish true family life and to bring up the children under the eye and care of the parents, with the aid of foreign governesses, who, along with the languages, inculcate the habits and manners of occidental nations. Vain attempts have been made to found girls' schools. There are noble natures who long for amelioration of their state, and for progress, but fanaticism condemns everything to mortal stagnation.
The Jewish woman leads a contracted, monotonous existence under the authority of the priest. The wives of many rich bankers have tried to do something to improve the condition of Hebrew women by founding aid societies, primary schools, and normal schools. The Bulgarian women of the country enjoy an agricultural and pastoral life, and those of the city are simple and primitive in their habits and customs. But little has been done for woman's instruction, though some worthy attempts have been made to establish schools. The hope of the regeneration of the Oriental woman lies in the influence of Greek civilization. The emancipation of the Greek woman means the emancipation of the Turkish woman.
The Greek woman in the Orient must be studied under two heads: the Greek woman in Turkey and the Greek woman in Greece. In both cases we find them filled with the spirit of western civilization—perhaps it would be better to say, with the spirit of their classic ancestors. Primary, secondary and normal schools, asylums, hospitals, societies—all for women and generally managed by women—are found in all the Greek centers of Turkey. Calliope A. Kechayia, the cultured principal of the Zappion, the famous girls' college at Constantinople, says:
The intellectual condition of the Greek woman in the Orient is, generally speaking, not inferior to that of women in many parts of Europe; and as regards the instruction of the girls of the lower classes, it is much superior to that of several Latin countries.
The Greek woman in Greece differs essentially from the Oriental woman. With the independence of Greece came a great patriotic movement for the building up of the new nationality, a movement in which women took a most active and prominent part. Several American women, especially Mrs. Hill, lent their aid and founded the first girls' school at Athens. "A whole generation of women," says a Greek lady, "distinguished for their social and family virtues, received their education in this college." An association of Greeks soon afterward established a normal school for women. The Greek government also early took up the question of popular education without excluding women from its plans. The way in which young Greek schoolmistresses hastened all over the peninsula, spreading knowledge, the Greek language and their own enthusiasm throughout the newly liberated nation, is one of the most unique episodes in modern history. "It is true and beyond dispute," I am told by Miss Kechayia, "that the Greece of to-day owes its rapid progress and its Greek instruction to its women." But the Greek woman is more than a school-mistress. The wife of a public man has other than social duties to occupy her. She often represents her husband before his constituents. She participates actively and usefully in many of his political affairs. It frequently happens that the wife goes into the provinces to solicit votes for her husband, and sometimes in drawing-room lectures she defends his political conduct. "In truth these facts would not be believed by a foreigner if he had not seen them with his own eyes," I was once told by a Greek. Associations of various kinds have been formed by women during the past few years, and there is at least one instance of a woman lecturing in public on literary topics. However, woman's rights in the American sense has not yet penetrated into Greece, but from what has just been said it will be seen that when that day comes, the reform will find a soil well prepared for its reception.
Such is a brief and general view of the present status of the Woman Question on the European Continent. It will have been constantly noticed in the preceding pages that in every country there are evidences of progress. Public opinion in the Old World is slowly but surely accepting Voltaire's statement when the broad-minded philosopher says, with a dash of French gallantry: "Women are capable of doing everything we do, with this single difference between them and us, that they are more amiable than we are." In matters of instruction, the ideas of Montesquieu and Aimé Martin are gaining ground. "The powers of the sexes," wrote the penetrating author of the "Spirit of the Laws," "would be equal if their education were, too. Test women in the talents that have not been enfeebled by the way they have been educated, and we will then see if we are so strong." "It is in spite of our stupid system of education," declared Aimé Martin, more than fifty years ago, "that women have an idea, a mind and a soul." And even the more radical utterances of the late Eugène Pelletan find an echo. "By keeping women outside of politics," once said the distinguished senator, "the soul of our country is diminished by one-half." No wonder then that Frances Power Cobbe likens this revolution to the irresistible waves of the ocean. "Of all the movements, political, social and religious, of past ages, there is, I think," writes Miss Cobbe, "not one so unmistakably tide-like in its extension and the uniformity of its impulse, as that which has taken place within living memory among the women of almost every race on the globe. Other agitations, reforms and revolutions have pervaded and lifted up classes, tribes, nations, churches. But this movement has stirred an entire sex, even half the human race. * * * When the time comes to look back on the slow, universal awakening of women all over the globe, on their gradual entrance into one privileged profession after another, on the attainment by them of rights of person and property, and, at last, on their admission to the full privileges of citizenship, it will be acknowledged that of all the 'Decisive Battles of History,' this has been, to the moralist and philosopher, the most interesting; even as it will be (I cannot doubt) the one followed by the happiest Peace which the world has ever seen."