Volume 3 - Electric Scotland

wo MEM. 283
at Westminster school, what these better-grounded classical
scholars practise. In Sicily, to this day, the women
are harnessed in the mill, and a man drives them; per-
petuating the ancient chivalrous usages of Magna Grsecia.
To work in a mill, and to be an Aspasia or a Phryne,
were the only two roads to female honours in that sub-
lime country ; and which led to the highest degree, must
not be told to the ladies of Stornoway.
There are two modes of arguing this question of the
mill and the harrow, for the fair sex ; one on the broad
bottom of utility, a principle which, among many great
metaphysicians, forms the basis of all morals and politics ;
and the other on the principle of chivalry, which, accord-
ing to another great metaphysician, is dead and gone.
But I need not dilate on matters so obvious; except to
remark that the chivalrous principle would be rather in-
convenient in the Highlands, as there is neither time nor
money to spend upon idolatry. That women were cre-
ated to be looked at, is certainly a beautiful refinement
on the usages of those savages who load them with more
than one half of the burden. While young and pretty, it
may not be very irrational ; since sun, moon, stars, roses,
and picture galleries, are nothing in the comparison,
Stornoway is another matter. Perhaps the division of
labour is not indeed very fair here ; yet I know not that
it is much otherwise. There are no horses ; a man cannot
dig-, and fish, and carry peats all at once, and a family
cannot go without fire. The Stornowegian may fairly
say with the Italian Orpheus, *' Che faro senzaEuridice."
To be sure, I have seen a great lazy fellow ride his wife
across a ford ; which, I admit, does not look like civil
and polished usage. Yet so much do opinions differ in
the world, that it is the chartered privilege and " limited
service" of the women of Holland, that they should be
ridden into the boats by the other gender : and should the