Page:May Walden - Woman and Socialism (1909).pdf/12

 12 villages were forbidden to let rooms to single men and women, and the latter could be cast into prison if they refused to become servants, even if they were employed at any other work. such as sowing seeds for the peasants at daily wages, or even buying and selling corn."

Women probably suffered more during this period than at any time since savagery. Many sold themselves as indentured servants to people in America.

Important inventions at this time, especially the application of steam as a motive force to machinery, brought in the Factory System, and the evolution from the hand tool to the ponderous machine. This brought about a revolution in the relation of woman to society; for the first time in civilization her value as a worker was made equal, and in some industries superior, to that of man. Her weaker muscles are sufficient to run the machine, and her patience and persistence, learned through her long centuries of slavery, make her a more dependable worker. But the Factory System has also made another change in her condition. Instead of being dependent upon the men of her family, she is now dependent, as the men are, upon the owners of the machine for a living. And now, men, women and children are fighting against each other for a chance to live.

Let us look a little more closely into this relation of the worker to the machine and see what the trouble is. We have noticed in the earliest period, when there was no division of labor, that there were no tools to speak of and