. The status of the
unmarried woman is different from that of her married sister and will,
accordingly, demand separate consideration. The rights of women, again,
are to be viewed both from the legal and the social standpoint. Their
legal rights include those of a private nature, such as the disposal of
property, and public rights, such as suffrage, sitting on a jury, or
holding office. Under social rights are included the right to an
education, to earn a living, and the like. Let us glance first at the
history of the legal rights of single women.

[Sidenote: Single women: Pollock and Maitland i, pp. 482-485.]

From very early times the law has continued to put the single woman of
mature age on practically a par with men so far as private single rights
are concerned. She could hold land, make a will or contract, could sue
and be sued, all of her own initiative; she needed no guardian. She
could herself, if a widow, be guardian of her own children.

[Sidenote: Pollock and Maitland, ii, 260-313. Blackstone, ii, ch. 13.]

In the case of inheritance, however, women have to within extremely
recent times been treated less generously than men. The male sex has
been preferred in an inheritance; males excluded females of equal
degree; or, in the words of Blackstone: "In collateral inheritances the
male stock shall be preferred to the female; that is, kindred derived
from the blood of the male ancestors, however remote, shall be admitted
before those from the blood of the female, however near; unless where
the lands have, in fact, descended from a female. Thus the relations on
the father's side are admitted _in infinitum_ before those on the
mother's side are admitted at all." Blackstone justly remarks that this
harsh enactment of the laws of England was quite unknown to the Roman
law "wherein brethren and sisters were allowed to succeed to equal
portions of the inheritance." As an example, suppose we look for the
heir of John Stiles, deceased. The order of succession would be:

I. The eldest son, Matthew Stiles, or his issue.

II. If his line is extinct, then Gilbert Stiles and the other sons,
respectively, in order of birth, or their issue.

III. In default of these, all the daughters together, Margarite and
Charlotte Stiles, or their issue.

IV. On the failure of the descendants of John Stiles himself, the issue
of Geoffrey and Lucy Stiles, his parents, is called in, viz.: first,
Francis Stiles, the eldest brother of t