lustrate the
consequences of this female revolution. But perhaps the finest point
about the comedy is its harmonious insight into the workings of women's
minds--a clear sense of what a topsy-turvy world we should have to live
in if women were the lawgivers and governors."

We have thus briefly sketched the indications of the prevalence of the
Woman Question in Athens, as presented in the plays of Aristophanes.
This writer furthermore affords us many ludicrous pictures of woman in
private life, which indicate that the fair sex were not always as weak
as men would have them. The chorus of the _Thesmophoriazusae_ resent the
many ill things said of the race of women,--"that we are an utter evil
to men, and that all evils spring from us, strifes, quarrels, seditions,
painful grief, and war. Come, now, if we are an evil, why do you marry
us, if indeed we are really an evil, and forbid any of us either to go
out, or to be caught peeping out, but wish to guard the evil thing with
so great diligence? And if the wife should go out any whither, and you
then should discover her to be out of doors, you rage with madness, who
ought to offer libations and rejoice, if indeed you really find the evil
thing to be gone away from the house and do not find it at home. And if
we sleep in other peoples' houses, when we play and when we are tired,
everyone searches for this evil thing, going round about the beds. And
if we peep out of a window, everyone seeks to get a sight of the evil
thing. And if we retire again, being ashamed, so much the more does
everyone desire to see the evil thing peep out again. So manifestly are
we much better than you." As portrayed by Aristophanes, the women of his
day manifestly knew how to assert their equality. Feminine foibles and
weaknesses do not escape his satiric pen. Women are overfond of dress,
and no brilliant or prudent action can be expected of them,

"Who sit deck'd out with flowers, and bearing robes
Of saffron hue, and richly border'd o'er
With loose Cimmerian vests and circling sandals."

Furthermore, they are fond of drink, and this vice is mercilessly
satirized. The inexorable oath administered by Lysistrata to her
comrades, in entering upon their crusade to bring about peace, is one
which no Athenian woman would incur the penalty of breaking: "If I
violate my pledge, may the cup be filled with water!"

Occasionally a man found he had married a wife who set aside his
conj