ady wants to buy books, music, artistic bric-a-brac, or
what not, she will find the big store displaying and selling all these
things on commission for the municipal or private producers all over
the world....

So much for the financial and economic position of an ordinary woman
in a Socialist State. But management and economies are but the basal
substance of a woman's life. She will be free not merely financially;
the systematic development of the social organisation and of the
mechanism of life will be constantly releasing her more and more from
the irksome duties and drudgeries that have consumed so much of the
energies of her sex in the past. She will be a citizen, and free as a
man to read for herself, think for herself and seek expression. Under
the law, in politics and all the affairs of life she will be the equal
of a man. No one will control her movements or limit her actions or
stand over her to make decisions for her. All these things are
implicit in the fundamental generalization of Socialism, which denies
property in human beings.

Sec. 3.

Perhaps now the reader will be able to figure a little better the
common texture of the life of a teacher or a housewife under
Socialism. And incidentally I have glanced at the position a clever
milliner or dressmaker would probably have under the altered
conditions. The great mass of the _employes_ in the distributing trade
would obviously be living a sort of clarified, dignified version of
their present existence, freed from their worst anxieties, the terror
of the "swap," the hopeless approach of old age, and from the sweated
food and accommodation of the living-in system. Under Socialism the
"living-in" system would be incredible. Their conditions of life would
approximate to those of the teacher. Like him they would be enrolled a
part of a great public service, and like him entitled to a minimum
wage, and over and above that they would draw salaries commensurate
with the positions their energy and ability had won. The prosperous
merchant of to-day would find himself somewhere high in the hierarchy
of the distributing service. If, for example, you are a tea merchant
or a provision broker, then probably if you like that calling, you
would be handling the same kind of goods, not for profit but
efficiency, "shipping into the Midlands" from Liverpool, let us say,
much as you do now. You would be keener on quality and less keen on
deals; that is all. You would not b