onspicuous things about the people--this
independence of conventions. In few other grades of society could men
and women dare to be so outspoken together, so much at ease, as these
villagers still often are. Their talk grows Chaucerian at times.
Merrily, or seriously, as the case may be, subjects are spoken of which
are never alluded to between men and women who respect our ordinary
conventions.

Let it be admitted--if anybody wishes to feel superior--that the women
must be wanting in "delicacy" to countenance such things. There are
other aspects of the matter which are better worth considering.
Approaching it, for instance, from an opposite point of view, one
perceives that the average country labourer can talk with less restraint
because he has really less to conceal than many men who look down upon
him. He may use coarse words, but his thoughts are wont to be cleanly,
so that there is no suspicion of foulness behind his conversation, rank
though it sound. A woman consequently may hear what he says, and not be
offended by suggestion of something left unsaid. On these terms the
jolly tale is a jolly tale, and ends at that. It does not linger to
corrupt the mind with an unsavoury after-flavour.

But more than this is indicated by the want of conventional manners in
the village. The main fact is that the two sexes, each engaged daily
upon essential duties, stand on a surprising equality the one to the
other. And where the men are so well aware of the women's experienced
outlook, and the women so well aware of the men's, the affectation of
ignorance might almost be construed as a form of immodesty, or at any
rate as an imprudence. It would, indeed, be too absurd to pretend that
these wives and mothers, who have to face every trial of life and death
for themselves, do not know the things which obviously they cannot help
knowing; too absurd to treat them as though they were all innocence, and
timidity, and daintiness. No labouring man would esteem a woman for
delicacy of that kind, and the women certainly would not like to be
esteemed for it. Hence the sexes habitually meet on almost level terms.
And the absence of convention extends to a neglect--nay, to a
dislike--of ordinary graceful courtesies between them. So far as I have
seen they observe no ceremonial. The men are considerate to spare women
the more exhausting or arduous kinds of work; but they will let a woman
open the door for herself, and will be careless when t