Dodgeville chronicle. [volume] (Dodgeville, Wis.) 1862-current, 1875-04-30
Women as Lab0rers.

In Russia to-day, out of an agricultural
population of 26, ,312, ,435, 90 per cent. are
women; in Prussia from population OF
1856 ,954 employed in agriculture the per-
centage is Al. You cannot travel any
where upon the continent of Europe with
out beholding in the fields sights which
would bring blush upon the cheeks OF
American manhood. In the beautiful
lands where nature has shed her fairest
blessings you can see the women, coarse
handed and large boned, turned to men,
toiling from early sun to nightfall, endur-
ing exposure and hardship which soonrob
them of all charm, turning them into ugly,
coarse, repulsive beings, whose only
thought is how to live, whose only hope
to die.
We are supposed in the United States to
treat our women too much as dolls, and
are constantly being reminded by the
robust school of moralists of the hardy
women of Europe and the healthy nature
of their children.
Mr.. Alexander Delmar has taken some
trouble to reach the truth OF this matter,
and his conclusions, as expressed IN the
current number of LGpp57acott'S M0gd2s1'e,
very clearly prove that, instead OF these
women being the models we are led TO
suppose, they are the most wretched, pltl-
able beings on the face OF the earth, far
greater objects of pity than the poorest
negro that ever worked ON plantation.
Mr.. Delmar confines his observations to
Russia and Prussia; had he extended his
travels through the agricultural districts
of England, Ireland and Scotland he might
have seen the same thing, only intensified
by the fact that these countries are sup
posed to possess superior benefits III the
way of enlightenment and cultivation.
The most melancholy pictures OF female
abasement are of course to be found III
Russia, where the serfs, ever since their
emancipation. are in some districts little
better off than dogs. The principal OBJ
iect of the Russian is to pay OIL his quit
rent and taxes. To do this he has some
times to sell his daughter to ruin, and to
send his wife, ill or well, into the fields
She will leave her child, with vessel full
of milk attached to its mouth, travel miles
to reach the ground, set to work with the
energy of despair, toll until her hands
have become hard as iron, her face coarse
and masculine, all the woman unsexed
within her, and she has learned to drink
and swear with the best of them. Upon
one side there is presented labor from
which the strongest man might shrink, on
the other starvation, or the sale OF all the
| hard earned little household gods. LII IS
scarcely to be wondered that these anna
IONS, ground down, unsexed, reduced 70 q
the condition of beasts of burden, should
become ignorant, licentious even Vicious, fpom
Children in Russia die in HUNDREDS rom !
| sheer want of nutriment; 1nlanllciue y
only too common, and large numbers oi
Hlasy the men zen are afflicted with disease or de
fnrmity for nft entirely the result of early neg
lect Out of 10000 children born, 5,53l
die during their first month.
So much for the robust theory. While
exercise in the open air, and plenty OF it.
is necessary for woman as well as man,
her employments should be indoors, and
of the lightest character. Great, htlscu,
! lar. stupid, coarse-looking. women may
suit the tastes of European ignorance; We
are are happy to think that freer and more more
enlightened policy has given US the TEN
mime graces of form and the hlgneT lntel
| lectual culture of the women OF the Unltee
Gtatos os-Ch5e11O Inter- -Oced1l.