They were absorbed with their duties, and contented with their husbands’ love.  The feudal castle, however, was not dull, although it was isolated, and afforded few novelties.  It was full of strangers, and minstrels, and bards, and pedlars, and priests.  Women could gratify their social wants without seductive excitements.  They led a life favorable to friendships, which cannot thrive amid the distractions of cities.  In cities few have time to cultivate friendships, although they may not be extinguished.  In the baronial castle, however, they were necessary to existence.

And here, where she was so well known, woman’s worth was recognized.  Her caprices and frivolities were balanced by sterling qualities,—­as a nurse in sickness, as a devotee to duties, as a friend in distress, ever sympathetic and kind.  She was not exacting, and required very little to amuse her.  Of course, she was not intellectual, since she read but few books and received only the rudiments of education; but she was as learned as her brothers, and quicker in her wits.  She had the vivacity which a healthy life secures.  Nor was she beautiful, according to our standard.  She was a ruddy, cheerful, active, healthy woman, accustomed to exercise in the open air,—­to field-sports and horseback journeys.  Still less was she what we call fashionable, for the word was not known; nor was she a woman of society, for, as we have said, there was no society in a feudal castle.  What we call society was born in cities, where women reign by force of mind and elegant courtesies and grace of manners,—­where woman is an ornament as well as a power, without drudgeries and almost without cares, as at the courts of the Bourbon princes.

Yet I am not certain but that the foundation of courtly elegance and dignity was laid in the baronial home, when woman began her reign as the equal of her wedded lord, when she commanded reverence for her courtesies and friendships, and when her society was valued so highly by aristocratic knights.  In the castle she became genial and kind and sympathetic,—­although haughty to inferiors and hard on the peasantry.  She was ever religious.  Religious duties took up no small part of her time.  Christianity raised her more than all other influences combined.  You never read of an infidel woman when chivalry flourished, any more than of a “strong-minded” woman.  The feudal woman never left her sphere, even amid the pleasures of the chase or the tilt.  Her gentle and domestic virtues remained with her to the end, and were the most prized.  Woman was worshipped because she was a woman, not because she resembled a man.  Benevolence and compassion and simplicity were her cardinal virtues.  Though her sports were masculine, her character was feminine.  She yielded to man in matters of reason and intellect, but he yielded to her in the virtues of the heart and the radiance of the soul.  She associated with man without seductive spectacles or demoralizing excitements,