in this respect on a level with a slave, could not be a witness, except in certain matrimonial questions, and when her own individual interests were involved. She had no right to be instructed. The schools were closed against her, and even in the bosom of the family the study of the law was forbidden her, because according to some of the rabbis, it was not suitable "to the fragility of her spirit, the delicacy of her feelings, and the especial modesty of her sex."

The Pentateuch commanded that children should be instructed in the law of God; tradition has taken care to inform us that this should only apply to male children.—(Talmud Kidouschin, f. 29, b.)

"As far as one teaches the law to a woman, so far does he teach her impiety," say several doctors.-(Mischna Sota, III. 4.) It was necessary to make this study inaccessible to woman's comprehension, and to spare her the difficulties of legal and sacred science.

It is not surprising that under the influence of such principles, the doctors should pronounce in favor of excluding women from judicial and priestly functions.-(M. Kidouschin, I. 8; M. Sebahim, III. 1; T. Nidda, 50, a.) However, in spite of these prohibitions, several Jewish women did succeed in breaking from the very small circle of their legal capacity, and in distinguishing themselves in the domain of theology and of law. Anna and the prophetess Deborah have left to us sublime sayings, inspired by the most noble sentiments, and expressed in a language of most striking beauty. The prophetess Deborah gave evidence of great genius; her renown was such that Barak offered to her the command of the army of Israel.— (Judges, IV, 9.) Deborah even filled the office of judge among the Jews.

The Talmud cites to us a line of educated women, deeply versed in science. The rabbis had recourse to their light, and deferred greatly to their opinions.—(T. H'oulin, 109, b.)

Among those Jewish women who were particularly distinguished in the study of juridical and sacred science, we content ourselves with mentioning Beruria, who lived in the time of Hadrian, Maria, in the fifteenth century, El Muallima, Mirjam

Shapira, in the twelfth century, Sara Coppia Sullam, Eva Bacharach, Bella Falk Cohen and Mirjam Loria of Padua, in the seventeenth.

The subject of this sketch does not permit us to recall the numerous Jewesses who shone in politics, in medical science, arts, letters and benevolence, or who delivered admirable polemics in defence of the rights of the Jews.

IN GREECE, M. Dupin contents himself with saying, women were excluded from the bar.-(Dupin, Profession d'avocat, Edit. belge, p. 27.) We shall endeavor to interpret this statement by pointing out the portion of error and the depth of exactness concealed in it.

Among the Greeks, particularly at Athens, every citizen had a right and an obligation to fill all public offices and functions. He was at the same time warrior and legislator, judge, and public accuser and defender. The administration of justice was considered an accessary of legislative action. Justice was meted out in the assemblies of the people, and the number of the judges varied from five hundred to six thousand.

In penal matters a purely accusatorial system was in use. Criminal prosecutions were public. In case of a transgression to the injury of the State, any citizen whatever was authorized to prosecute the guilty party; if the wrong was committed to the injury of one only, the right to prosecute belonged to the injured party alone.

Each accused citizen conducted his defense in person. The bar, in the modern sense of the word, was a thing absolutely unknown in Greece. A party could obtain the assistance of one of his relatives, of a friend, or a trustworthy person. The party began by defending himself, then the assistant followed, taking care always to justify his intervention in the debate by invoking the bonds of parentage or friendship which united him to the party to the cause.

As to women, they were considered inferior and subordinate beings with a weak and inefficient will. From the instant of their birth to the moment of their death, they were bowed down under the guardianship of their father, their husband, or of the heir at law of the father. They were the disgraced

victims of a tyrannical legislation. During the day they could only go out from their homes in certain exceptional cases, and they were submitted to the authority of special functionaries whose duty it was to watch over them. Under a pretext of regulating their journeys, Solon imposed divers obligations upon them; among others that they should not go out at night unless in a chariot, and preceded by a torch, intended to give light and warning at each step.—(Plutarch, Life of Solon, XXVIII.)

Women received no instruction,-at the very most they were taught dancing and singing, in order to allow them to take part in the choruses in certain religious ceremonies. Most of the women of Athens did not know how to read or to write.

Relegated to the women's apartments they dwelt as total strangers to the splendor of that Hellenic civilization whose brilliancy we admire. They lived in ignorance of city affairs, and in indifference to them, and kept themselves at a distance from political strife and legal debates. One class of women alone, the courtesans, succeeded in enjoying a privileged position, in taking part in philosophical conversations and the discussions of the men, and in acquiring an influence in the government of the republic, indirect, but nevertheless actually powerful.

The most renowned of these courtesans was Aspasia, who instructed both Socrates and Plato in eloquence. Celebrated for her brilliant beauty, remarkable for the charm of her conversation, Aspasia exercised a veritable fascination over the people of Athens. The charms of her wit, the depth of her conceptions, the power of her eloquence, permitted her to rule over all who came in contact with her. This learned and able woman became the legitimate wife of Pericles, after having been his mistress. She inspired her former lover with several of his ideas; history even attributes to her one of the most beautiful orations of Pericles, that delivered in honor of the citizens of Athens slain in the war against the Samians.-(Plutarch, Life of Pericles. Diodorus Siculus, Hist., Lib. XII.)

A prodigy among all women, Aspasia plead causes before the people of Athens.

IN ROME, an unmarried woman was placed under the authority of her father or of her guardian. Deprived of the free disposition of her property, she was held under the perpetual guardianship of her male kindred.

When married, she came under the power of her husband, and remained incapable of disposing of her property, even by will. (Later, women were allowed to make a will, provided they were free from family bonds. When the tutela muliebris. disappeared, they acquired a complete testamenti factio activa.)

It was not, as is generally supposed, in the interest of women, with a view to sheltering them from their incompetence or their inexperience, that this inferiority was declared. The guardianship was instituted in the interest of the guardian himself. Gaius, with laudable frankness has made confession of it. "Common opinion," he says, "is that women should be governed by tutors, because they have too scanty wit to govern themselves. This reasoning is more specious than solid. This tutelage has been established in the interest of the tutors themselves, in order that the woman of whom they are heirs presumptive, shall not have the power to deprive them by will, of their inheritance, nor impoverish them by alienation or by debts."-(Gaius, I. 190-192.)

Before Gaius, Cicero had already pronounced against this tutelage. "In place of tutors," he wrote, "in place of officers set apart, as among the Greeks, for the surveillance of women, there should be a censor to teach the men to control their wives." (Cicero, De Republica, III. 7, nec vero mulieribus praefectus praeponatur qui apud Graecos creari solet; sed sit censor, qui viros doceat moderari uxoribus.)

In spite of the legal inferiority of the Roman woman and her exclusion from the comitia, she was not absolutely shut out from the forum. She was admitted into the judicial enclosure. Accompanied by her guardian she could appear in the tribunal, and when her personal interest was not at stake, she could appear alone, as witness for instance, or as representing another.

For a long time, the right to assist a pleader or an accused person was recognized as belonging to women. History has

preserved the names of Amesia Sentia and Hortensia, two courageous women who distinguished themselves in the Roman forum.

A law made for a special case, excluded woman from the profession of advocate. A certain Afrania, or Caia Afrania (Juvenal calls her Cafrinia, Juvenal, Sat. II, 69), made herself unendurable in the forum. Continually haranguing in her own cause, she by her loquacity, effrontery and violent behavior, scandalized the judges to such an extent that she was henceforth forbidden to speak in public. Ultimately this prohibition was extended to all women.

Valerius Maximus, in that chapter of his History which is devoted to women who contested their own cases before the magistrates, has left to us a curious and original portrait of this singular woman.

"C. Afrania," he writes, "wife of the senator Licinius Buccio, being extremely litigious, plead continually her own causes before the praetor. This was not for lack of advocates, but from excess of boldness. By reason of making the tribunals resound with howlings uncommon in the forum, she became the most famous example of chicanery ever afforded by her sex. Thus the surname of Afrania was inflicted as a disgrace upon shrewish women. She lived until the year when C. Cæsar became consul for the second time. For in speaking of such a scourge, history should rather record the time of her extinction, than that of her beginning."-(Valerius Maximus, Hist. Lib. VIII, ch. III, 2. C. vero Afrania, prompta ad lites contrahendas, pro se semper apud praetorem verba fecit; non quod advocatis deficiebatur, sed quod impudentia abundabat. Itaque inusitatis foro latribus assidue tribunalia exercendo, muliebris calumniæ notissimum evasit exemplum; adeo, ut pro crimine improbis feminarum moribus C. Afraniæ nomen objiciatur. Tale enim monstrum magis quo tempore exstinctum, quam quo sit ortum, memoriæ tradendum est.)

In speaking of these "inusitatis foro latratibus" in connection with Caphrania, Valerius Maximus falls into error. These howlings were not at all unusual, and did not pertain par