Page:Our Girls.pdf/43

 village and Athens a suburb, and even old Rome not much bigger than Battersea.  We will begin at seven in the evening at the gates of Woolwich, where the workers are changing shift. Seventy thousand of them of both sexes are passing in and out in two great streams, like the Rhone and the Saone at Lyons, one quiet and of equal speed, the other (the out going one) loud and urgent. The female workers, now in their outdoor costumes, are recognizable as the women we see in the streets, many of them apparently recruited from domestic service, but not a few out of offices and shops.

Crossing the river, we find the streets crowded with women. The electric cars, like long trains, are full of them. Some are returning to their homes, others are going to their work. One wonders what the ancient world, whose utmost idea of female labour seems to have been covered by the scenes of Ruth gleaning in the fields, or Rachel feeding her flocks, and then returning to her house at nightfall to lie  Rh