Ownership In Women

A man was recently hanged in Massaehusotts for taking vengeance ou one who had practicaliy disputüd his property in a girl. The mau was u brute, of course, but he had an opinión that a girl who had given herself to him, in the completest surrender that a woman cau niake, was in some senso his - that her giving herself to anotherinvolved dishonor - and that his property in her was to be defended to the extremity of death. A prominent newspaper, while recording the facts of the oase, takes the occasion to say that this idea oí' ownership in women is the same barbarism out of which grow the evils and wrongs that the " wouian movcment " is intendcd to remove. If we were to respond that owuership in women, only blindly apprehended as it was by our brutal gallows-bird, is the one thing that saves us from the wildest doctrines and practices of free-lovers, and is ono of the strongest conservative torces of society, it is quite likely that we should bo misunderstood ; but we shall run the risk, and make the assertion. There is an instinct in the heart of every woman which tells her that she is his to whom she gives herself, and his alone, - an instinct whicli bids her cling to him while she lives or he lives - which identifies her life with his- which makes of him and her twain, one flesh, When this gift is once made to a true man, he recognizes its significance. He is to provide for her that which she cannot próvida for horself ; he is to protect her to the extent of his power ; she is to share his home, and to be his closest companion. His ownership in her covers his most sacred possession, and dovolves upon him the graves duties. If it were othurwise, why is it that a woman who gives herself away unworthily feels, when she tinds herself deceived, that she is lost? - that she has parted with herself to ono who does not recognize the nature of the gift, and that she who oughtto be owned, and, by being owned, honored, is disowned and dishonoied ? There is no true, pure woman living who, when she gives herself away, does not rejoioe in the ownership which makes her forever the property of one man. She is not nis shtve to be tasked and abused, beoause she is the gift of love and not the purchase of money ; but she is his, in a sense in whieh she oannot be anotheï nian's without dishoior to hiin and danination to herself. Our gallows-bhd was, in his brutal way, right. If he had been living in savage society, without laws, and with the necessity of guarding his own treasures, his aet would have been looked upon as one of heroisin by all the beauties and braves of his tribe. The weak point in his case was, that his ownership in what he was pleasod to cali "his girl " was not established acoording to the laws under which he lived. He was not legally married, and had acquired no rights under the law to be defended. What he was pleased to oonsider his rights were established contrary to law, and he could not appeal to law for their defenso. He took the woman to himselt contrary to law, he defended his property in her by murder, and he was hanged. He was served right. Hemp would grow on a rock for such as he anywhere in the world. Thore is no cure for the man who seduces and slavs but a broken neck. There is nothing more menacing in the aspect of social affairs in this country than the effort among a certain class of rei'ormers to break up the identity of interest and feeling among men and women. Men are alludod to with sneers iind blame, as being opjjosed to the interosts of women, as using the power in their hands - a powor usurped - to inaintajn their own predominance at the expense of woman's rights and woraan's well-being. Marriage, under this kind of teaching, becomes a compact of convenience, into which men and womon may enter, each party taking along the personal independenco enjoyed in a single state, with separate business interests and separate pursiiits. In other words, marriage is regarded simply as the legal c )mpanionship of two beings of opposite sixes, who have their own independent pursuits, with which the bond is not permitted to interfere. lt contemplates no identification of life and destiny. The man holds no ownershipin worman which gives him a right to a family of children, and a Ufe devote to the sacred duties ot nianhood. The man who expects such a Srtcrifice at the bands of his wife is regarded as a tyrant or a brute. Womon are to vote, and trado, and practice law, and preach, and go to Congress, and do everything that a man does irrespective of the marriage bonds. Womfii are to be just as free to do auything outside of their homeB as men are. They are to choose their careers and parsuo them with just as little refprenco to the internal administration of Iheir families as their husbands exercise. This is the aim and logi cal end of all the modern doctrines concerning woman's rights. The identification of woman with man, as the basis of the institution of the family, is scoffed at. Any ownsrship in woman, that comes of tho gitt of herself to hini, and the as8umption of the possession by him, with its lite long train of obligations and duties, is condemnod. It is assumed that interests which aro, and must forever remaní, identical, are opposed to each other. Men and wonien are pitted against each othcr in a struggle for power. Well, let it bo understood, then, that men are opposed to these latter-day doctrines, and thatthey willremain so. They ire determined that the identity of in terest betweon men and women shall nevur be destroyed ; that the sacred ownership in woiuon, bestowed in all true marriagc, shall nevor be Burrehdered ; that the family shall be inaintained, and that the untold millions of true women ia the world who sympathize with them shall be protected from the false philosophies and destructivo policies of their few misguided sisters, who seek to turn the world upside down. Political eonrentions may throw their sops to clamoring reforméis, but they mean nothing by it. They never have redeemed a pledge ' to these refoimers, andwo presume they havo never intended to do so. They oxpect the nutter to blow over, and, if we do not mistake the signs of the times, it is rapidly blowing over, with more or loss thunder and with very little rain. In the meantimo, if the discussions that have grown out ot these questions nave tended to opon a border field to woinanly industry, or oblitemted unjust laws from the gtatute-book, let every man rejoice. No good can come to woraan that does not benefit him, and no harm that does not hurt him. Humanity is one, and man and woman riae or fall together. - Dr. J. 0. Holland, Soribne's for ,irptember.