it is discovered, after the ceremony, that the diamond engagement
ring is not yet paid for, and that the mahogany furniture in the new
flat so joyously selected by the young bride-elect, was bought upon the
installment plan! That John earns only twenty dollars a week in the
shipping room instead of the fifty a week he had declared, as assistant
manager! Here the man has not paid as promised and every one feels that
the woman has made a "bad bargain."

On the other hand, women disguise the economic basis of the deal in
every possible way; lie, cheat and compete in a life and death struggle
with others of their sex. A thousand illusions, tricks, subtleties,
hypocrisies are employed to cover the bald fact that wares are being
displayed, are being bidden for by other men. The deal is smothered in
chivalrous urbanities and sentimental verbiage. Unnumbered
circumlocutions are resorted to, to conceal the salesmanship of one who
has a commodity to sell.

MONOGAMY FOR WIVES

When certain strong men found themselves able to garner a larger share
of property than their fellows, they rebelled against the communistic
ownership of property, and the state, with the system of =private=
ownership, was evolved, came into being to protect the private owners in
their private ownership =against= the community, or the mass, which
possessed no private property. Wealthy men then began to desire to leave
their fortunes to their own children and so the marriage system, with
theoretical monogamy for both sexes and practical monogamy for wives,
arose. Men of property then felt tolerably certain that their wealth
would descend to their own sons and to the sons of no others.

We are not inclined to believe this was due to the prevalence of any
so-called =paternal= instinct. Paternal instinct is, we suspect, a minus,
rather than a plus, quantity. It seems to us that fathers more often
learn to love their children through following the conduct prescribed by
good form and pretending to love them, or through love of display, pride
or by =association=, than through any "natural tendency."

The almost universality of the maternal instinct is proven by the
peoples in the world today, for scarcely anybody would have a chance
for existence if it were not for the care of the mothers.

Generally the coming of children is a handicap to a woman in the market
in which Nature and the present system have placed her. Where this is
the case, it is here that s