The sufferings of married women at length got some attention from the State, and in 1895 a law was passed, or rather an addition was made to an old law, for the purpose of affording them protection and giving them some relief. As soon as this Act came into force our police courts became thronged with women applying for protection. Briefly the Act provides that any woman having a persistently cruel husband may leave him, and, having left him, may then apply to the magistrate within whose jurisdiction she lives for a summons against her husband for separation and maintenance. These the magistrate is empowered to grant, provided the woman proves her case, that the cruelty has been persistent. An order being made upon the husband, he must pay or go to prison. A large number of women have been protected by this Act; men have learned the power of the Act, and many have found to their cost that cruelty to a wife does not go unpunished. They have found, too, that they must either work or starve, and that, having wives, they must either support them or go to prison, and in some degree, though only a small degree, women have been protected. But what of the husbands who are possessed of drunken wives? Alas! there is no relief for them; the law moves not its finger to help them. Though their goods and clothes are pawned, though their children be neglected, and though their homes be turned into veritable hells, the law gives them no hope, the State no redress. Again and again strong, honest, industrious men come into our courts seeking the magistrate’s help and counsel, telling the same old tale, exposing the same old sorrow, and the magistrate has no help to give, no counsel to impart. Letter after letter I receive, some badly written, many badly spelt, but letters which for absolute pathos could not be surpassed. Plead with these women, and it is like preaching a sermon to an east wind. Reason with them, and they will make worse appear the better reason, for they lie with impunity, and one and all declare they are the aggrieved and their husbands are the guilty parties. Stupendous are their lies, and yet I feel certain that many believe what they assert.