“The cause of all dishonor is woman; the cause of hostility is woman; the cause of our worldly existence is woman; therefore we must turn away from woman.”—“Girls and wives must never do anything of their own will, not even in their own homes.”—“Women are by their nature inclined to seduce men; therefore no man shall sit even with his own relative in lonely places.”—“The wife must be devoted to her husband during her whole life as well as after his death. Even if he is not without blame, even if he is unfaithful and without a good character, she must nevertheless respect him like a god. She must do nothing that might displease him, neither during his life nor after his death.”—“Day and night must women be held in a state of dependence.”— As the subjection of women was made a cardinal principle of the Brahman priests, they did not shrink from misinterpreting the text of the Vedas accordingly. So the sentence: “You wife, ascend into the realm of life! Come to us! Do your duty toward your husband!” was explained to mean that a widow must not marry again but ought to follow her husband also in death. This led to the voluntary burning of the widows with the corpse of the husband, a practice which assumed great dimensions and was observed till the middle of the 19th Century. Mrs. Postans, an English lady, who during the first part of the last century resided many years in Cutch, one of the northern provinces of India, gave the following account of such a ceremony: “News of the widow’s intentions having spread, a great concourse of people of both sexes, the women clad in their gala costumes, assembled round the pyre. In a short time after their arrival the fated victim appeared, accompanied by the Brahmins, her relatives, and the body of the deceased. The spectators showered chaplets of mogree on her head, and greeted her appearance with laudatory exclamations at her constancy and virtue. The women especially pressed forward to touch her garments—an act which is considered meritorious, and highly desirable for absolution and protection from the “evil eye.”” “The widow was a remarkably handsome woman, apparently about thirty, and most superbly attired. Her manner was marked by great apathy to all around her, and by a complete indifference to the preparations which for the first time met her eye. Physical pangs evidently excited no fears in her; her singular creed, the customs of her country, and her sense of confused duty excluded from her mind the natural emotions of personal dread, and never did martyr to a true cause go to the stake with more constancy and firmness, than did this delicate and gentle woman prepare to become the victim of a deliberate sacrifice to the demoniacal tenets of her heathen creed.” [Illustration] [Illustration: A LADIES’ PARLOR IN CHINA. ] WOMAN IN CHINA AND JAPAN.