The fact has been that male lawgivers, in whatever land, have generally asserted for their code of feminine ethics or conduct a divine origin, and have announced the punishment for breach thereof as a divine injunction. In very few instances, indeed, was there any attempt to decree an equal punishment to the male who was partner with the female in a mutual breach of this morality, and very frequently no punishment of the male attached at all; and even in the few cases where such a punishment was nominally threatened, the man’s share in the offence was most generally connived at, and passed unpunished. This double code of morality has a flagrant exemplification in the English Law of Divorce, by which, while a man can procure a Decree of Divorce on the simple ground of the adultery of his wife, a woman cannot obtain a like decree for her husband’s adultery unless that offence be accompanied by such treatment of herself as the Court will recognise as “cruelty,” or with “desertion.” The double scheme of sexual morality, so revoltingly tolerated, in so far as man is concerned, by “society” in the present day is too patent to need further words here. And the repulsive cant is still that, while the man is allowed to go free, the punishment of the woman is due and commendable as in accordance with “divine law.” (See Note XIV., 3.) XXXVII. 3, 4.—“... _lowest boor is lordly ‘baron’ styled, And highest bride as common ‘feme’ reviled_.” “... husband and wife; or, as most of our elder law books call them, ‘baron’ and ‘feme.’”—(Blackstone’s “Commentaries,” Bk. I. Chap. 15.) But the context of the words “baron” and “feme” involved something more than a mere _façon de parler_ of the law books. Edward Christian says, in Note 23 to the Chapter in “Blackstone” above quoted:—“Husband and wife, in the language of the law, are styled _baron_ and _feme_; the word baron, or lord, attributes to the husband not a very courteous superiority. But we might be inclined to think this merely an unmeaning technical phrase, if we did not recollect, that if the baron kills his feme it is the same as if he had killed a stranger or any other person; but if the feme kills her baron it is regarded by the laws as a much more atrocious crime, as she not only breaks through the restraints of humanity and conjugal affection, but throws off all subjection to the authority of her husband. And, therefore, the law denominates her crime a species of treason, and condemns her to the same punishment as if she had killed the king. And for every species of treason (though in petit treason the punishment of men was only to be drawn and hanged), till the 30 Geo. III., Chap. 48, the sentence of woman was to be drawn and burnt alive.”