ion rests upon the following considerations. Women depend
upon men in all the relations of life; men upon women, it might
be said, in one only. So an arrangement is made for mutual
interdependence--man undertaking responsibility for all woman's needs
and also for the children that spring from their union--an arrangement
on which is based the welfare of the whole female race. To carry out
this plan, women have to band together with a show of _esprit de
corps_, and present one undivided front to their common enemy,
man,--who possesses all the good things of the earth, in virtue of his
superior physical and intellectual power,--in order to lay siege to
and conquer him, and so get possession of him and a share of those
good things. To this end the honor of all women depends upon the
enforcement of the rule that no woman should give herself to a man
except in marriage, in order that every man may be forced, as it
were, to surrender and ally himself with a woman; by this arrangement
provision is made for the whole of the female race. This is a result,
however, which can be obtained only by a strict observance of the
rule; and, accordingly, women everywhere show true _esprit de corps_
in carefully insisting upon its maintenance. Any girl who commits a
breach of the rule betrays the whole female race, because its welfare
would be destroyed if every woman were to do likewise; so she is cast
out with shame as one who has lost her honor. No woman will have
anything more to do with her; she is avoided like the plague. The same
doom is awarded to a woman who breaks the marriage tie; for in so
doing she is false to the terms upon which the man capitulated; and
as her conduct is such as to frighten other men from making a similar
surrender, it imperils the welfare of all her sisters. Nay, more; this
deception and coarse breach of troth is a crime punishable by the
loss, not only of personal, but also of civic honor. This is why we
minimize the shame of a girl, but not of a wife; because, in the
former case, marriage can restore honor, while in the latter, no
atonement can be made for the breach of contract.

Once this _esprit de corps_ is acknowledged to be the foundation
of female honor, and is seen to be a wholesome, nay, a necessary
arrangement, as at bottom a matter of prudence and interest, its
extreme importance for the welfare of women will be recognized. But
it does not possess anything more than a relative value. It is no
ab