t have been more than a few weeks old,
struggled a dog, with whom she was harnessed to the cart. Poor wretch! I
thought, and the husband recently dead, too! I could not think of her as
a _widow_, for, in truth, she did not look human enough. She was not
over thirty years of age, but a coarser-looking hag I never saw the
picture of. Presently a man in crossing the street indulged in some
pleasantry at her expense, when she threatened to call her husband to
chastise him. Husband? Yes, sure enough, there he was, walking leisurely
_behind_ the cart, with his hands in his pockets, smoking his pipe and
gazing at the sights along the route.

If we would know the origin of this brutality to women wherever it is
practiced, we must look for it in the history of slavery, for there we
shall always find it. It was not the peasant-man who first brutalized
his wife and daughter, but the lord. If the ancient rights of the
peasantry had not been molested, and an oppressive system of feudal
exactions forced upon men who once were free and owners of the soil they
tilled, the slavery of women could hardly have occurred. It is now
nearly seventy years since the first decree that eventually resulted in
the abolition of serfdom in Prussia was promulgated, and time is rapidly
effacing many of the social evils which that institution entailed. But
this is not the case with Russia, where emancipation was only declared
ten years ago, and is not completed even yet. The causes that
superinduce the degradation and debasement of women can therefore still
be seen at work in that country, and are thus depicted by an
eye-witness. He is speaking of the condition of the peasantry of Russia
subsequent to the decree of emancipation, and so far as my own
observation in that country goes, I can corroborate all that he says:
"Their food begins to get scantier and scantier, and toward spring they
get more and more famished. The officer of government (who since the act
of emancipation replaces the officer of the lord of the manor) comes and
energetically demands the payment of arrears. Driven to desperation, the
peasant acknowledges to the mayor of the village the cause of his want
of punctuality--viz., the demands made upon him by his family, and
particularly by his wife. 'Give her a good thrashing,' is the advice of
the mayor. The mujik goes home, ties his wife by her hair to the tail of
a cart, and flogs her unmercifully with a whip. At a convenient
opportunit