In the old days, from which our domestic traditions proceed, little hardship was thus inflicted on the wife.  Her rights and privileges were, indeed, far less than those of the modern woman, but for that very reason the home offered her a larger field; beneath the shelter of her husband the irresponsible wife might exert a maximum of influential activity with a minimum of rights and privileges of her own.  To many men, even to-day, that state of things seems the realisation of an ideal.

Yet to women it seems increasingly less so, and of necessity since the cleavage between the position of woman in society and law, and the position of the wife in the sacramental bonds of wedlock, is daily becoming greater.  To-day a woman, who possibly for ten years has been leading her own life of independent work, earning her own living, choosing her own conditions in accordance with her own needs, and selecting her own periods of recreation in accordance with her own tastes, whether or not this may have included the society of a man-friend—­such a woman suddenly finds on marriage, and without any assertion of authority on her husband’s part, that all the outward circumstances of her life are reversed and all her inner spontaneous movements arrested.  There may be no signs of this on the surface of her conduct.  She loves her husband too much to wish to hurt his feelings by explaining the situation, and she values domestic peace too much to risk friction by making unexpected claims.  But beneath the surface there is often a profound discontent, and even in women who thought they had gained an insight into life, a sense of disillusion.  Everyone knows this who is privileged to catch a glimpse into the hearts of women—­often women of most distinguished intelligence as well as women of quite ordinary nature—­who leave a life of spontaneous activity in the world to enter the home.[13]

[13] While this condition of things is sometimes to be found in the more distinguished minority and in well-to-do families, it is, of course, among the great labouring majority that it is most conspicuous.  Mrs. Will Crooks, of Poplar, speaking to a newspaper reporter (Daily Chronicle, 17 Feb., 1919), truly remarked:  “At present the average married woman’s working day is a flagrant contradiction of all trade-union ideals.  The poor thing is slaving all the time!  What she needs—­what she longs for—­is just a little break or change now and again, an opportunity to get her mind off her work and its worries.  If her husband’s hours are reduced to eight, well that gives her a chance, doesn’t it?  The home and the children are, after all, as much his as hers.  With his enlarged leisure he will now be able to take a fair share in home duties.  I suggest that they take it turn and turn about—­one night he goes out and she looks after the house and the children; the next night she goes out and he takes charge of things at home.  She can sometimes go to the cinema, sometimes call on friends.  Then, say once a week, they can both go out together, taking the children with them.  That will be a little change and treat for everybody.”