The mighty Roman nation followed in the same path. In the days of her strength, and national health, the women took their full share of the domestic burden, and as well fulfilled important social functions. Then came slave labor, and the Roman woman no longer worked at honorable employment. She did not have to. She painted her face, wore patches on her cheeks, drove in her chariot, and adopted a mincing foolish gait that has come down to us even in this day. Her children were reared by someone else--the nursery governess idea began to take hold. She took no interest in the government of the state, and soon was not fit to take any. Even then, there were writers who saw the danger, and cried out against it, and were not a bit more beloved than the people who proclaim these things now. The writers who told of these things and the dangers to which they were leading unfortunately suggested no remedy. They thought they could drive women back to the water pitcher and the loom, but that was impossible. The clock of time will not turn back. Neither is it by a return to hand-sewing, or a resurrection of quilt-patching that women of the present day will save the race. The old avenues of labor are closed. It is no longer necessary for women to spin and weave, cure meats, and make household remedies, or even fashion the garments for their household. All these things are done in factories. But there are new avenues for women's activities, if we could only clear away the rubbish of prejudice which blocks the entrance. Some women, indeed many women, are busy clearing away the prejudice; many more are eagerly watching from their boudoir windows; many, many more--the "gentle ladies," reclining on their couches, fed, housed, clothed by other hands than their own--say: "What fools these women be!" There are many women who are already bitten by the poisonous fly of parasitism; there are many women in whose hearts all sense of duty to the race has died, and these belong to many classes. A woman may become a parasite on a very limited amount of money, for the corroding and enervating effect of wealth and comfort sets in just as soon as the individuality becomes clogged, and causes one to rest content from further efforts, on the strength of the labor of someone else. Queen Victoria, in her palace of marble and gold, was able to retain her virility of thought and independence of action as clearly as any pioneer woman who ever battled with conditions, while many a tradesman's wife whose husband gets a raise sufficient for her to keep one maid, immediately goes on the retired list, and lets her brain and muscles atrophy. The woman movement, which has been scoffed and jeered at and misunderstood most of all by the people whom it is destined to help, is a spiritual revival of the best instincts of womanhood--the instinct to serve and save the race.