llen below, not only their
own democratic principles, but the practice of some parts of the Old
World.

"The unconsciousness of both parties as to the injuries suffered by
women at the hands of those who hold the power, is a sufficient proof of
the low degree of civilisation in this important particular at which
they rest, while woman's intellect is confined, her morals crushed, her
health ruined, her weaknesses encouraged, and her strength punished, she
is told that her lot is cast in the paradise of women: and there is no
country in the world where there is so much boasting of the `chivalrous'
treatment she enjoys. That is to say,--she has the best place in
stage-coaches: when there are not chairs enough for everybody, the
gentlemen stand she hears oratorical flourishes on public occasions
about wives and home, and apostrophes to woman: her husband's hair
stands on end at the idea of her working, and he toils to indulge her
with money: she has liberty to get her brain turned by religious
excitements, that her attention may be diverted from morals, politics,
and philosophy; and, especially, her morals are guarded by the strictest
observance of propriety in her presence. In short, indulgence is given
her as a substitute for justice."

If Miss Martineau had stopped here, she had done well; but she follows
this up by claiming for her sex all the privileges of our own, and seems
to be highly indignant, that they are not permitted to take their due
share of the government of the country, and hold the most important
situations. To follow up her ideas, we should have a "teeming" prime
minister, and the Lord Chancellor obliged to leave the woolsack to nurse
his baby; Miss M forgets that her prayer has been half granted already,
for we never yet had a ministry without a certain proportion of _old
women_ in it; and we can, therefore dispense with her services.

There is, however, one remark of Miss Martineau's which I cannot pass
over without expressing indignation; I will quote the passage.

"It is no secret on the spot, that the habit of intemperance is not
infrequent among women of station and education in the most enlightened
parts of the country. I witnessed some instances, and heard of more.
It does not seem to me to be regarded with all the dismay which such a
symptom ought to excite. To the stranger, a novelty so horrible, a
spectacle so fearful, suggests wide and deep subjects of investigation.
If women, in a r