is the case chiefly because certain natural disadvantages render them easily exploitable, as I shall show later. It may be remarked in this connexion, that sexual division of labour appears to be quite arbitrary among primitive peoples; and that it often bears little resemblance to the division which has existed for so long among Europeans that it has apologists who regard it as being divinely ordained.[3] This suggests at least that the European division is arbitrary too. Indeed, it has undergone considerable change. Brewing, for example, was regarded as woman’s work in mediaeval England. It is even supposed that the monasteries, which excluded women from other service within their walls, employed women brewers. In general, it appears a fair conclusion that the occupations which are considered least desirable are given over to the subordinate sex. Thus men, according to the Vaertings, during the period when women dominated in Egypt, were forced to care for children and perform the drudgery of the household. Where military enterprise plays a part in tribal life, the division of labour appears to give validity to the contention of Spencer and others that man is militant and woman industrial; yet the exclusion of women from military activity is no doubt primarily due quite as much to the taboos against them as to their own lack of warlike spirit. Indeed, there are tribes where women take active part in fighting; and there are folk-tales in plenty which tell of their prowess--as, for example, in the epic lore of Greece and Russia. But because of a primitive awe of the function of menstruation, women are often considered unclean, and excluded on this account from many tribal activities, particularly from religious rites. Among such peoples, it would not be surprising to find that the same superstition excluded women from participation in any enterprise in which the tribal gods are so active and their aid so important as in war. In certain tribes of South Africa there is, according to Dr. Elsie Clews Parsons, a direct connexion between militancy and a taboo against woman. “A man sleeping with his wife must be careful not to touch her with his right hand. Otherwise his strength as a warrior goes from him and he will surely be killed.”