"Many things; the development of machinery, for instance," he replied. "Woman has not changed so much as the conditions of life have changed.
"The development of machinery has caused changes that impress me deeply. It has produced immense alterations in the conditions of life and in the relations between people.
"War has been changed in a striking manner by this development of machinery. Never in the history of warfare was machinery so prominent and important as to-day. In fact, I think I am justified in speaking of this war as a machine-bore!
"Machinery really has had a great deal to do with changing the condition and activities of woman, and has been a powerful influence in bringing about the modern movement for women's suffrage. Machinery has changed the employment of women and forced them into kinds of work which are not domestic.
"The typewriter and the telephone have revolutionized our methods of doing business. The typewriter and the telephone have filled our offices with women. They are doing work which twenty years ago would have been considered most unfeminine.
"The war is strengthening this tendency of women to take up work that is not domestic. I have heard it said that women first got into the undomestic kinds of business in France during the Napoleonic wars. Napoleon wanted to have all the men out in the line of battle, so he had girls instructed in bookkeeping and other kinds of office work.
"The business activities of Frenchwomen date from that time. And a similar result seems to be coming out of this war. In France, in England, in all the countries engaged in the war the women are filling the positions left vacant by the men."
"Do you think," I asked, "that this is a good thing for civilization, this increased activity of women in business?"
"I don't know," said Mr. Martin, musingly. "I don't know. But I do know this, that the main employment of woman is to rear a family. Office work, administrative work—these things are of only secondary importance. The one vital thing for women to do is to rear families. They must do this if the human race is to continue."
"Mr. Martin," I said, "you told me that Thackeray, if he were alive, would satirize the reformers. Just what sort of reformer is it that has taken the place of the snob?"