The Indian woman wields a strong influence over her husband, and has more of a place in the life around her than we imagine, from the stories we hear of unhappy days spent “Behind Zenana Bars.” We are apt to consider the secluded, shut-in Eastern woman as a cowed, frightened creature, afraid to say her soul is her own, while among the better class, at least, it is quite the contrary. It takes a brave man to go absolutely against the wishes of his womenfolk, as they have the advantage of numbers in their favour. In every great household there are innumerable women relatives, satellites, and servants revolving around the personality of the mistress. These Eastern women have been schooled in the art of intrigue and understand thoroughly the efficacy of passive resistance. If the wife wishes to accomplish a certain object, and is able to enlist the women of the household on her side, the man will be compelled sooner or later to submit to her wishes. The older, conservative women are very tyrannical, and try their best to combat the newer ideas brought to the zenanas by their sons and daughters. Many of the younger generation are trying to break from the patriarchal custom of all the family living under one roof. They say it is very fine in theory, and has worked with good results in the villages, but that it has many bad points, the chief of which is that it allows no expression of individuality. The personality must be sunk in the family. When all the men will work and become producers and contributors to the family fund, it makes for harmony in the home, but when some are drones and live on the toil of others, it makes the burden too heavy for the few and causes quarrels and dissensions. Women are helpless in India in the earning of a living for themselves, and if widowhood comes they must depend for support on some male relative of their own or of the family of their deceased husband. I know a boy of eighteen who is the only support of his wife, his aunt, a widow, his widowed mother, and his young sister. He was compelled to leave school and take a position in an office in order to take care of all these women, as he was the responsible head of the family. It is hard for a boy who is ambitious and anxious to obtain an education, when there are many women in his household, as they care more for the immediate necessities than for a prospective successful future. They feel that his father and his father’s father were able to provide for the wants of the family, so why should the boys of to-day spend years in studying books when they might be adding to the family exchequer?