One chained to the block is the victim of Fashion; Her object in life to be perfectly dressed; Too silly for reason, too shallow for passion, She passes her days 'neath a tyrant's behest. Thus pinioned and fettered, and warily moving, Lest looping should fail her, or band come apart: What room is there left her for thinking or loving? What noble ambition can enter her heart? And one, the worn wife of a grizzled old farmer; She kneads the great loaves for the "men-folks" to eat. In the wheat-fields the green blades are springing like armor; Afar in the forests the flowers are sweet. She lifts not her eyes. Within kitchen walls narrow Her life is pent up. The most hopeless of slaves, Though weary and jaded in sinew and marrow, She never complains. Women _rest_ in their graves. Twin victims, for which have we tenderest pity-- For mother and wife toiling on till she dies, Or the frivolous butterfly child of the city, All blind to the glory of earth and of skies? Is it fate, or ill fortune, hath woven about you Strong meshes which ye are too helpless to break? Shall we scornfully wonder, or angrily flout you, Or strive from their torpor your minds to awake? Yet, Venus of old, with your queenly derision, How you would disdain the belle's tawdry array! _Free footsteps untrammelled_, cool hand of decision, Sweet laugh like bells pealing, were yours in the day When you reigned over men by the might of your beauty; No fetters were o'er you in body or brain; The world would bow down in the gladness of duty Could you but awake in your splendor again. And, Pallas and Venus, if now you were holding A talk over womanhood, what would you say, The words of wise counsel while you were unfolding, If some one should show you these pictures to-day? I dream of your faces: divinest compassion Would yearn the poor toiler to pity and save; And your largeness of scorn would descend on the fashion Which binds, unresisting, the idler a slave. [Illustration: 1878. The period of the tie-back, narrow skirts, and enormous trains.]