“It is a very welcome invasion, ma’am,” said he, clearing his throat and pulling at his high collar. “Try this garden chair. What is there that I can do for you? Shall I ring and let Mrs. Denver know that you are here?”
“Pray do not trouble, Admiral. I only looked in with reference to our little chat this morning. I wish that you would give us your powerful support at our coming meeting for the improvement of the condition of woman.”
“No, ma’am, I can’t do that. “He pursed up his lips and shook his grizzled head.
“And why not?”
“Against my principles, ma’am.”
“But why?”
“Because woman has her duties and man has his. I may be old-fashioned, but that is my view. Why, what is the world coming to? I was saying to Dr. Walker only last night that we shall have a woman wanting to command the Channel Fleet next.”
“That is one of the few professions which cannot be improved,” said Mrs. Westmacott, with her sweetest smile. “Poor woman must still look to man for protection.”
“I don’t like these new-fangled ideas, ma’am. I tell you honestly that I don’t. I like discipline, and I think every one is the better for it. Women have got a great deal which they had not in the days of our fathers. They have universities all for themselves, I am told, and there are women doctors, I hear. Surely they should rest contented. What more can they want?”
“You are a sailor, and sailors are always chivalrous. If you could see how things really are, you would change your opinion? What are the poor things to do? There are so many of them and so few things to which they can turn their hands. Governesses? But there are hardly any situations. Music and drawing? There is not one in fifty who has any special talent in that direction. Medicine? It is still surrounded with difficulties for women, and it takes many years and a small fortune to qualify. Nursing? It is hard work ill paid, and none but the strongest can stand it. What would you have them do then, Admiral? Sit down and starve?”
“Tut, tut! It is not so bad as that.”
“The pressure is terrible. Advertise for a lady companion at ten shillings a week, which is less than a cook’s wage, and see how many answers you get. There is no hope, no outlook, for these struggling thousands. Life is a dull, sordid struggle, leading down to a cheerless old age. Yet when we try to bring some little ray of hope, some chance, however distant, of something better, we are told by chivalrous gentlemen that it is against their principles to help.”
The Admiral winced, but shook his head in dissent.
“There is banking, the law, veterinary surgery, government offices, the civil service, all these at least should be thrown freely open to women, if they have brains enough to compete successfully for them. Then if woman were unsuccessful it would be her own fault, and the majority of the population of this country could no longer complain that they live under a different law to the minority, and that they are held down in poverty and serfdom, with every road to independence sealed to them.”
“What would you propose to do, ma’am?”
“To set the more obvious injustices right, and so to pave the way for a reform. Now look at that man digging in the field. I know him. He can neither read nor write, he is steeped in whisky, and he has as much intelligence as the potatoes that he is digging. Yet the man has a vote, can possibly turn the scale of an election, and may help to decide the policy of this empire. Now, to take the nearest example, here am I, a woman who have had some education, who have traveled, and who have seen and studied the institutions of many countries. I hold considerable property, and I pay more in imperial taxes than that man spends in whisky, which is saying a great deal, and yet I have no more direct influence upon the disposal of the money which I pay than that fly which creeps along the wall. Is that right? Is it fair?”