Page:Marriage as a Trade.djvu/131

 Rh a woman from hurt and molestation. If It were not so the unprotected spinster would be In a truly piteous plight. As a matter of fact, she usually finds that the ordinary constable is quite adequate for all her requirements in the protective line.

Closely allied to this idea of individual masculine protection is that other, and still more vaguely nebulous, idea of chivalry or preferential treatment of women In general by men in general. Which necessitates an inquiry into what the average modern man really means when he talks of chivalry in this connection.

Frankly, It does not seem to me that he means very much. My own experience leads me to define chivalry—not the real thing, but the term as It is commonly used, say, in the public press—to define chivalry as a form, not of respect for an equal, but of condescension to an inferior; a condescension which expresses Itself in certain rules of behaviour where non-essentials are involved. In very few really essential matters between man and woman is the chlvalric principle allowed to get so much as a hearing; in practically all such matters it is, as I have