my and the harem. Both still exist almost undisturbed in
the Orient and the Far East.

TURKEY AND EGYPT

Total population: 34,000,000.

A federation of women's clubs has just been founded in each country.

In all the Mohammedan countries the wealthy woman lives in the harem with
her slaves. The woman of the lower classes, however, is guarded or
restricted no more than with us. Apparently the Turkish and the Arabian
women of the lower classes have an unrestrained existence. But because
they are subject to the absolute authority of their husbands, their life
is in most cases that of a beast of burden. They work hard and
incessantly. For the Mohammedan of the lower classes polygamy is
economically a useful institution: four women are four laborers that earn
more than they consume.

Domestic service offers workingwomen in the Orient the broadest field of
labor. The women slaves in the harems[110] are usually well treated, and
they have sufficient to live on. They associate with women shopkeepers,
women dancers, midwives, hairdressers, manicurists, pedicures, etc. These
are in the pay of the wives of the wealthy. Thanks to this army of spies,
a Turkish woman is informed, without leaving her harem, of every step of
her husband.

The oppression that all women must endure, and the general fear of the
infidelity of husbands, have created among oriental women an _esprit de
corps_ that is unknown to European women. Among the upper classes polygamy
is being abolished because the country is impoverished and the large
estates have been squandered; moreover, each wife is now demanding her own
household, whereas formerly the wives all lived together.

Through the influence of the European women educators, an emancipation
movement has been started among the younger generation of women in
Constantinople. Many fathers, often through vanity, have given their
daughters a European education. Elementary schools, secondary schools, and
technical schools have existed in Turkey and Egypt since 1839. The women
graduates of these schools are now opposing oriental marriage and life in
the harem. At present this is causing tragic conflicts.[111]

To the present, two Turkish women have spoken publicly at international
congresses of women. Selma Riza, sister of the "Young Turkish" General,
Ahmed Riza, spoke in Paris in 1900, and Mrs. Hairie Ben-Aid spoke in
Berlin in 1904.

The Mohammedan women have a legal supporter of their demands i