The second remedy that is suggested is Christianity, a remedy which is even now at work. Wherever one finds in Japan a Christian home, there one finds the wife and mother occupying the position that she occupies all over Christendom. The Christian man, in choosing his wife, feels that it is not an ordinary contract, which may be dissolved at any time at the will of the contracting parties, but that it is a union for life. Consequently, in making his choice he is more careful, takes more time, and thinks more of the personal qualities of the woman he is about to marry. Thus the chances are better at the beginning for the establishment of a happy home, and such homes form centres of influence throughout the length and breadth of the land to-day. Christianity in the future will do much to mould public sentiment in the right way, and can be trusted as a force that is sure to grow in time to be a mighty power in the councils of the nation. One more remedy might be suggested, as a preliminary to proper legislation, or a necessary accompaniment of it, and that is, the opening of new avenues of employment for women, and especially for women of the cultivated classes. To-day marriage, no matter how distasteful, is the only opening for a woman; for she can do nothing for her own support, and cannot require her father to support her after she has reached a marriageable age. As new ways of self-support present themselves, and a woman may look forward to making a single life tolerable by her own labor, the intelligent girls of the middle class will no longer accept marriage as inevitable, but will only marry when the suitor can offer a good home, kindness, affection, and security in the tenure of these blessings. So far, there is little employment for women, except as teachers; but even this change in the condition of things is forming a class, as yet small, but increasing yearly, of women who enjoy a life of independence, though accompanied by much hard work, more than the present life of a Japanese married woman. In this class we find some of the most intelligent and respected of the women of new Japan; and the growth of this class is one of the surest signs that the present state of the laws and customs concerning marriage and divorce is so unsatisfactory to the women that it must eventually be remedied, if the educated and intelligent of the men care to take for their wives, and for the mothers of their children, any but the less educated and less intelligent of the women of their own nation. CHAPTER IV. WIFE AND MOTHER.[*84]