iods. As Havelock Ellis says: "Instead
of being regarded as a being who at periodic intervals becomes the
victim of a spell of impurity, the conception of impurity becomes
amalgamated with the conception of woman; she is, as Tertullian puts it,
_Janua diaboli_; and this is the attitude which still persisted in
medieval days."[71] This is to be expected from what one knows of the
workings of the primitive intelligence, but it is surprising to find Mr.
Ellis continue by saying, on apparently good grounds, that "the belief
in the periodically recurring impurity of women has by no means died out
to-day. Among a very large section of the women of the middle and lower
classes of England and other countries it is firmly believed that the
touch of a menstruating woman will contaminate; only a few years since,
in the course of a correspondence on this subject in the _British
Medical Journal_ (1878), even medical men were found to state from
personal observation that they had no doubt whatever on this point.
Thus, one doctor, who expressed surprise that any doubt could be thrown
on the point, wrote, after quoting cases of spoiled hams, etc., presumed
to be due to this cause, which had come under his own personal
observation: 'For two thousand years the Italians have had this idea of
menstruating women. We English hold to it, the Americans have it, also
the Australians. Now, I should like to know the country where the
evidence of any such observation is unknown.'" Evidently animism is a
more persistent frame of mind than most people are inclined to believe.

It is certain, however, that this conception of woman's nature is
dominant in the lower stages of culture. She is spiritually dangerous,
and the principle of 'taboo' is made to cover a great many of her
relations to man. In Tahiti a woman was not allowed to touch the weapons
or fishing implements of men. Amongst the Todas women are not permitted
to touch the cattle. If a wife touches the food of her husband, among
the Hindus, the food is unfit to be eaten. An Eskimo wife dare not eat
with her husband. In New Zealand wives were not allowed to eat with the
males lest their taboo should kill them. Many tribes are careful to
refrain from contact with women before going to fight. They believe that
this would rob them and their weapons of strength. Other practices
followed by savages before going to war forbid one assuming that this
abstention is due to any rational fear of dissipati