Page:The Feminist Movement - Snowden - 1912.djvu/65

 glory is outshone by that of his wife. He then becomes 'the husband of Mrs So-and-so.' In Korea it is the invariable custom, and, though a small thing in itself, it becomes wholly deplorable when the custom is but the symbol of the spirit that lies behind it.

The Oriental idea about women and the Mohammedan conception of the place of woman in the scheme of things have largely influenced those Slavonic countries lying on their borders, several of which have, at various times, been under the heel of the Mussulman. Such countries are Bulgaria, Servia, Roumania, and Galicia. In these lands the feminist movement is of the most rudimentary kind, and confines its energies to the improvement of the truly awful conditions of the working woman. The feminist element works for this end chiefly through the Social-Democratic movement. When one realises that the makers of ready-made garments in Galicia earn less than sixteen shillings a month, that servant girls are able to command only tenpence to elevenpence a day, and that a skilled needlewoman, working sixteen hours a day, can, by this labour, earn a sum which is equal to not more than eighteen pence of British money, one can readily understand the need for the organisation of working women.

The feminist sentiment works, too, towards