It is needless to extend the list of writers on this subject, but it is a long and remarkable one. The books would make rather interesting reading to-day, whatever we might think of their quality, as problems familiar to us were pretty thoroughly if not always ably discussed, and apparently with great good nature. A distinguished Frenchman, well known in the salons of the eighteenth century, unearthed a great many curious facts and opinions hidden away in these books, which are now mostly buried too deep in the dust of old libraries for resurrection, and his own wise and quite modern conclusions entitled him to more consideration than he received from the women of his time. But this rapid glimpse will suffice, perhaps, to show the spirit in which latter-day questions were treated four or five centuries ago; also to throw a strong light on the position of women during the period, without very precise limits, known as the Renaissance--a period of special interest to us, as it marks the dawn of a new era of feminine intelligence. II We do not know how it happened that Bitisia Gozzadina stepped out of the traditional seclusion of her sex as early as the benighted thirteenth century, to be made doctor of civil and canon law in the University of Bologna at the age of twenty-seven. She had already pronounced a funeral oration in Latin and otherwise distinguished herself several years before. It is no longer the fashion to give Latin orations outside of the universities, but we know how women fared a few decades ago, when they tried to speak publicly in their own language. It was perfectly understood that women of such oratorical proclivities forfeited all right to social consideration. They were practically ostracized. Happily, now they are treated about as well as they were six hundred years ago, when people crowded the university halls and even the public squares to listen to this remarkable woman. We do not hear that she was called any disagreeable names, not even a bas-bleu, though there is a vague tradition that she had peculiar notions about dress. It is said that she had rare beauty, but her charm and esprit made people forget it.