u.

They say all this means that they are our equals, and intend to show it.
Listen. In a town some hundreds of miles distant there is a law firm
whose sign reads thus:

MRS. SMITH _and husband_.

Shades of our forefathers! Ghost of BLUEBEARD! Spirit of HENRY VIII! can
this thing be? Imagine old LABAN'S daughter starting in business, and
hanging out a sign something like this:

+-------------------------------------------+
| |
| MRS. JACOB _and husband, |
| Having large orders from the West_, |
| SOLICIT CUSTOM. |
| N.B.--Gentlemen attended to by Mr. JACOB. |
| _The Original Mrs_. JACOB. |
| |
+-------------------------------------------+

Don't you suppose that JACOB, if he had found that sign over his
doorstep, would have raised a row, and if he had been overcome, don't
you suppose he would have wondered what he served those seven years for?

Oh, young man, sitting by the side of that dainty damsel, looking so
spoonily into her deep blue eyes, playing so daintily with her golden
curls, sucking honey so frequently from her ruby lips, beware! _beware!_
BEWARE! Remember, when she wants stamps, you can't put her off as your
pa did your ma. You can't say, "Business is awful dull," because she'll
do the business, and make you her book-keeper or porter or something of
that sort

Petticoat government is all very well for those who like it. Some men go
through life playing a sort of insane tag, in which, first their
mothers' petticoats, and then their wives', are hunk, and they never
leave hunk. As for me, give me trouser government, or give me a first
class funeral procession with me for the corpse.

Brethren, listen! Give me your ears! (the big ones first.) This thing
must be stopped _now_. Let us form an association for the suppression of
women, or a society for the prevention of cruelty to men. There is but
one way to cure this thing. Far out on the Western prairies dwells the
only sensible man on this continent. In the city ruled by him a man may
come home as tired as gin can make him, and his wife opens not her
mouth; he may jump over as many counters as he pleases, and none of his
wives will desire to go and do likewise. There she is the weaker vessel,
and it takes so many of her to equal one man, that she is kept in a
proper state of subjecti