We linger over the sad story of Hypatia, whose father, Theon the younger, was at the head of the Platonic school at Alexandria at the close of the fourth century. He was also the commentator on Ptolemy, and the editor of “Euclid,” adding here and there a demonstration of his own. All that he knew he imparted to his daughter, and Hypatia occupied a position unparalleled in ancient or modern times. Before she had reached her twenty-seventh year she had written a book on “The Astronomical Canon of Diophantes,” and another on “The Conics of Apollonius.” One of her enemies, the historian Socrates, tells us that when she succeeded her father in the Platonic school derived from Plotinus, and “expounded the precepts of philosophy,” studious persons from all parts of the country flocked to hear her, and that “she addressed both them and the magistrates with singular modesty.” But alas! she paid the penalty of her great superiority. And because she was suspected of having “an influence in public affairs,” and was deemed “worthy to sit in the councils of church and state,” she was brutally murdered by a savage mob, that regarded superiority in a woman as an arraignment of inferiority in men. We are familiar with the story of Zenobia, Queen of Palmyra, who reigned A.D. 267, of whom reluctant history tells us that she was a woman of great courage, high spirit, remarkable beauty, and purity of moral character. Her literary acquirements were unusual, and she spoke Latin, Greek, and the Oriental languages with fluency; while in the administration of her government she combined prudence, justice, and liberality, so that nearly the whole of the eastern provinces submitted to her sway. It is a matter of history that 320 B.C., Martia, Queen of London, first formulated the principles of the English common law in her judgments and enactments. Her “Martian Statutes” outlived the Roman, Anglo-Saxon, and Norse invasions. Holinshed, who is regarded as good authority, says that Alfred the Great, after twelve hundred years, revived her Briton laws, and enforced them among Anglo-Saxons and Danes. Two centuries later, they were again re-enacted under Edward the Confessor, and a century after they were again re-enacted by Stephen. The earliest laws of Great Britain, therefore, the substance of which has been in force twenty-two hundred years, were made by a woman. Tacitus says of the Britons that sex was ignored in their government. Cæsar says that women had voice in their councils, and power in their courts, and often commanded in war. Plutarch says that women, among the Britons, took part in deciding on war and peace, as members of the councils, and that differences with their allies were decided by the women.