The old Roman, Cato the elder, complained of their having much power in political matters, and statues were even then erected in the provinces to Roman ladies. Unfortunately the emancipation of woman among the Romans was attended with a license which had the most deplorable results, both moral and social. In Greece the peculiar institutions established by Lycurgus gave the Spartan women much influence, and they were even said by the other Greeks to have brought their husbands under the yoke. On the other hand, among the Athenians, women were generally viewed as inferior to men, and wives were treated rather as household drudges than as companions. Before marriage girls were kept in strict seclusion, a habit which, in the middle and higher classes, was long retained after marriage, wives seeing little even of their husbands or fathers. It would appear, however, to have been different during the heroic age, when the intercourse between husband and wife, says Mr. Gladstone, was “thoroughly natural, full of warmth, dignity, reciprocal deference, and substantial, if not conventional, delicacy.” It is to the development of the emotion of love that the full recognition of the true position to which woman is united must be traced. The parent has influence because he or she is respected, and love induces the same feeling in relation to the wife and woman in general. Thus, at least, it would seem to be with Eastern peoples, who probably closely agree in social habits with the ancient Greeks. Among the Bedouins, in whose manners we may doubtless trace those of the early Hebrews, women enjoy a considerable degree of liberty; and hence marriages, although accompanied by the incidents of wife-purchase, are often governed by choice, and husbands make real companions of their wives. The respect paid to them is so great that, if a homicide can succeed in concealing his head under the sleeve of a woman and cry _fyardhék_, “under thy protection,” his safety is insured. Pallas mentions an analogous custom as existing among the Circassians, who also highly esteem woman. The same may be said of the Afghans, among whom, although marriage is still a matter of purchase, love-matches are by no means rare. Wives often exercise great influence in Afghan households, the husband sometimes sinking into a secondary place.