If, then, a Woman's Movement be not in its ultimate essence a sudden and insane desire on the part of woman for increased material enjoyment and physical ease, nor, on the other hand, the result of a sudden revelation to herself of her own sufferings, what in its ultimate essence is this movement? Vast social phenomena, rising up in what appears to be obedience to an almost universal instinct, must be based on some equally comprehensive social condition, which acts everywhere as its cause; a cause which will not be less irresistibly operative because those who are acted upon by it have not always grasped it intellectually, nor are capable of reasoning on its nature. As those vast herds of antelope which at times sweep down across our South African plains from the north, bearing all before them, are propelled, not by any logical induction, the result of an intellectual process, but are driven onwards, whether they will or no, by the pressure of a stern fact which forces itself painfully on the consciousness of each isolated individual in the herd--the fact, that behind lie parched deserts desolated by drought, while before are green lands;--so nineteenth-century women are urged on by the pressure of a condition which they have not created, and of whose nature they have not even in many cases a clear intellectual perception, yet which acts upon the whole mass, causing irresistible social movement through its pressure on each isolated unit. Looking at the modern Woman's Movement from the widest standpoint, and analysing, not isolated phenomena connected with it here and there, but its manifestation as a whole, the conviction is forced upon us that the Woman's Movement of the nineteenth century in its ultimate essence is _The Movement of a Vast Unemployed_. Let us pause for a moment to consider how and why this is so. In primitive societies woman performed the major part of the labours necessary for the sustenance of her community, as she still does in Africa and elsewhere, where primitive conditions exist. In addition to child bearing she was the agricultural labourer of the community; and while the male of necessity reserved his energies for war and the chase, the agricultural and domestic labours devolved on woman. Not only did she plant the grain and reap it, but she ground it and made it into bread and beer; it was she who built the hut, shaped the domestic utensils, and in travelling she was the beast of burden, and carried the household goods; she was generally the doctress, and often the wizard or priestess of her people.