the members of the family just as he tyrannizes over the whole of the inheritance, or the most of it. And so long as woman is a dependent upon him, unable to live by herself, the relation of each to the other becomes a relation of wariness and dissembling, like the relation of master to slave. Each humors the other out of need of him, not because he sees in the arrangement an ideal solution. If many women were given the choice, they would prefer to live independently — if the law were fair to them, or if they were able to support themselves. How many a father has died leaving behind him a wife and daughters, where-upon the uncles and the relatives came to dispute the inheritance with them, set themselves up as guardians, and forced them into a life of privation, that they themselves might enjoy money they had never toiled to gather.

In addition to the foregoing, we find that people's attitude toward woman takes its shape from the law's attitude toward her. They see no harm in wronging her and cheating her, in conformity with the double rule that counts her right as half the right of man. Thus her misfortune becomes double. And one wrong draws another after it.

The laws of inheritance under which we proceed were suitable in the tribal ages, when the members of the tribe formed a compact unit, their livelihoods held in common, and their interests likewise. The chief of the tribe was then anxious to keep all his possessions in the hands of the males of his clan, that the tribe might remain proud in its possessions and unassailable, and that nothing of those possessions should slip away to the strange families into which the daughters ordinarily pass by marriage. But in this age, when the clan system is dissolving and the system of the small independent family — composed of the father, the mother, and the children only — is spreading, it is in the interest of the man who desires independence to help woman, be she his mother or his sister or his wife, to secure

her economic independence and to avoid living upon others: first, by giving her rights equal to his own in inheritance; second, by encouraging her toward liberating work and smoothing its paths before her. In this way he does justice to her and to himself, and delivers her from the inferiority complex that so often causes him trouble in his relations with her. And then his family life becomes freer, clearer in its atmosphere, and less exposed to troubles and disturbances.

There remains a third kind of the social injustice which the laws inflict upon our women. It is the law that regards the killing of a woman in defense of honor, or for the safeguarding of reputation, as a trifling offense that does not criminalize its perpetrator or expose him to stern punishment. It is obvious that the source of this law is neither justice nor natural right, for the smallest measure of reflection shows us that the crime of the adulterer is no less grave than the crime of his partner. But public opinion acquits the man and fastens the whole responsibility upon the woman, for no reason except that she is ruled, held weak, and subject to man. He loads upon her what he pleases and demands of her what he does not demand of himself. He commits what forbidden things he will, and calls her to account for the smallest slip. Had he set her a good example, the matter would be lighter; but the straying woman is precisely the one who lives in an atmosphere of stifling pressure, or in an atmosphere of moral decay that makes going astray easy for her and encourages her in it. And yet, if she strays, she is slaugh-tered as ewes are slaughtered, and no blame falls upon her killer, and no sin. By my life, this is a custom from the ages of savagery, which civilized man had no right to apply to the slaves he bought with his money or enslaved in war; how then may it be applied to woman, over whom he has made himself guardian? If she goes wrong under his charge, he is responsible for her corruption, and he deserves the punishment before her.

All the civil laws to which I have pointed were enacted in an age other than ours. They are no longer fit today; rather, with the change in the manner of living and the enlightenment of the women of this age, they have become a source of ills and troubles for men and women alike. The woman who feels a revolt within her, and sees that, measured against man, she is wronged and robbed of her rights, is bound to show her revolt in one form or another. She takes revenge upon her surroundings by striving to dominate those around her, or by her quick fretfulness, or by turning to cunning and deceit and the rest of the weapons of the weak and the resentful.

In the book 'The Other Sex' by Simone de Beauvoir, the author observes that the problem of woman does not differ from the problem of the workers and the problem of the Negroes of America. All the members of these three groups feel the pain and demand fair dealing. It is as though she were saying: beware the vengeance of the wronged. He may bear his condition for a time, but before long he rises up, as the workers rise up in many places in the world. Nor is Simone de Beauvoir the only one who warns men of the anger of the deprived classes that have begun to open their eyes to the light.

Some time ago our government took several measures which tes-tify to its desire for progress, and for bringing the people out of the darkness of the remote past. The first measure was the prohibition of firing shots at celebrations and feasts. The second was the campaign against begging and the punishment of beggars. Recently there was laid before it a bill for the equality of woman with man in inheritance, and the bill still lies folded away in some file or other, awaiting discussion. May it find among the responsible men a sufficient number of supporters who will succeed in passing it, making of it the first link in a chain of important social reforms that will bring us nearer to the level of the emancipated peoples.