“Love.  Yet it may not be correct to say that he could give that.  He would not love me because he chose to do so, but because he could not help doing so.  At least, that is my idea of love.  He would love me as I was, with all my faults and follies, and I should love him the same way.  I should be as proud of his personality as I would be defensive of my own.  I should not ask him to be like me; I should only ask him to be truly himself and to let me be truly myself.  If our personalities diverged, perhaps they would go around the circle and meet on the other side.”

“Do you think, my dear woman, that you would be able to recognize each other after such a long journey?”

“There would be distinguishing marks,” laughed Kate; “birthmarks of the soul.  But I neglected to say that it would not satisfy me merely to be given a portion of the earnings of the family—­that portion which I would require to conduct the household and which I might claim as my share of the result of labor.  I should also wish, when there was a surplus, to be given half of it that I might make my own experiments.”

“A full partnership!”

“That’s the idea, precisely:  a full partnership.  There is an assumption that marriages are that now, but it is not so, as all frank persons must concede.”

“I concede it, at any rate.”

“Now, you must understand that we women are asking these things because we are acquiring new ideas of duty.  A duty is like a command; it must be obeyed.  It has been laid upon us to demand rights and privileges equal to those enjoyed by men, and we wish them to be extended to us not because we are young or beautiful or winning or chaste, but because we are members of a common humanity with men and are entitled to the same inheritance.  We want our status established, so that when we make a marriage alliance we can do it for love and no other reason—­not for a home, or support, or children or protection.  Marriage should be a privilege and a reward—­not a necessity.  It should be so that if we spinsters want a home, we can earn one; if we desire children, we can take to ourselves some of the motherless ones; and we should be able to entrust society with our protection.  By society I mean, of course, the structure which civilized people have fashioned for themselves, the portals of which are personal rights and the law.”

“But what will all the lovers do?  If everything is adjusted to such a nicety, what will they be able to sacrifice for each other?”

“Lovers,” smiled Kate, “will always be able to make their own paradise, and a jewelled sacrifice will be the keystone of each window in their house of love.  But there are only a few lovers in the world compared with those who have come down through the realm of little morning clouds and are bearing the heat and burden of the day.”

“How do you know all of these things, Wise Woman?  Have you had so much experience?”