The Revenge of the Sexes

— When Æsop’s lion hinted to Praxiteles that if the leonine mind had been given to the carving as well as to the eating of the human form divine, the canons of art might have been somewhat modified, he only expressed a sentiment not restricted to the tribe of Felis Leo. There runs through the whole range of folk lore, myths, and popular stories the same temper of retort. The man is ever ready to say to the woman, “You’re another,” as he feels the sting of her setting forth of his delinquencies. The woman is none the less ready to tell the story in her way, to the seeming disadvantage of the male version. Thus, the romance of Bluebeard is the

Thus, the romance of Bluebeard is the countercharge to that of the third one-eyed Calendar in the Arabian Nights. Widely as the action, time, and scenic accessories of the two tales differ, the cardinal point of each is curiosity, — the opening of a forbidden chamber by an entrusted key. In the same way, the modified idea appears in the story of Cupid and Psyche, and in that of Pandora. Female curiosity is offset by male inquisitiveness.

There is a like antithesis in the tale of Beauty and the Beast, and in that of the Wedding of Sir Gawaine and “the lothly ladye.” In each of these there is a marriage, the result of an extorted promise. In each there is the same victory of matrimonial duty over repugnance at physical deformity, and the same reward in afterhappiness ; but in one it is the bride, and in the other it is the groom, who is repaid for the sacrifice of self.

On the same line is the legend of the daughter who falls in love with a foreign adventurer, and betrays the secret of her father’s device for the destruction of strangers ; but the result is given differently. The lover is constant in the one case, in the other is fickle. Jason carries off Medea, but Theseus deserts Ariadne.

There is a marked case of retort in the twin myths of Comus and of Circe. The same spells are wrought in the same way. The same imbruting chalice is given, with the same conversion of the drinkers into beasts ; but the worker of the spell is in one case a male, in the other a female magician.

Again, the story of Undine is set off against that of the Lorelei. The moral of both is the unhappiness of love outside of mortal conditions ; but in the one the penalty falls on the water-nymph, in the other upon the human lover. It is “ lui et elle ” and “ elle et lui” told from the differing points of view.

Somewhat the same idea appears in the fairy tales of the mermaid, the swan princess, and the like, where the woman of another sphere is caught by hiding the magic sealskin, swanskin, cap or other garment. The bride of the earthly lover accepts the situation, but one day discovers the robe, or whatever it may be, put away in her husband’s dwelling. She cannot resist the impulse to put it on and go back to her kindred. The countercharge to this is given in the stories of Little Tamlin, Thomas of Ercildoune, Tannhänser, and so on. Here the man wearies of elfin happiness, and gets back to earth and the joys of the taxcollector and family doctor when the chance opens to him.

It is hard to say which is the more common case, that of the lover of high estate who marries the lowly maiden, or that of the princess who condescends to the fortunate adventurer. But King Cophetua and the beggar maid maybe balanced by Aladdin, the tailor’s son, who wins the Sultan’s daughter, or, better yet, by the Countess of Cassilis and Johnny Faa, the gypsy.

Modern literature, with its “all-round” leanings, is inclined to take both sides of the same situation. This is very noteworthy in Shakespeare. Lady Macbeth is the tempter and upholder of her husband, while Gertrude’s sin is the work of the stronger will of the usurping king. In the one case it is the man, in the other the woman, who drifts powerlessly into evil. Both Rosalind and Viola put on male attire to win their lovers, but they match, one below, the other above, her degree. Orlando, the younger son of a country gentleman, and Orsino, the duke regnant of Illyria, stand at quite opposite ends of the social scale. So, again, while Desdemona and Imogen are equally victims of the jealousy of their husbands, wrought almost by the same treachery, Othello suffers, while Leonatus Posthumus is delivered from the consequences of his error.

Tennyson is inclined to show this disposition to try both sides of the same issue. Perhaps it is fairer to say that he reopens the old case for a second hearing. Enoch Arden is the set-off to Penelope, and King Arthur’s forgiveness of Guinevere is the reversal of the story of Othello.

But in spite of the effort of modern novelists to find situations outside of established lines, there is a certain tendency which betrays the influence of sex. The woman’s heroine and the man’s hero are apt to mate above their conditions. Thus, of Scott’s heroes, the greater part aspire. Henry Bertram is supposed to be an orphan adventurer, a subaltern who falls in love with his colonel’s daughter. Level supposes himself to be illegitimate. Frank Osbaldistone is of the younger branch of the Yorkshire family, and is supposed to be disinherited by his wealthy father. Halbert Glendinning is a peasant by birth. Roland Avenel is believed to be a foundling. Henry Morton is below the rank of Edith Bellenden. Edgar Ravenswood is penniless. Sir Kenneth of Scotland wins the heart of Edith Plantagenet as a simple knight of the crusading army. Alan Fairford is only a Scotch lawyer of bourgeois extraction, while Lilias Redgauntlet is of the noblesse. Quentin Durward is a soldier of fortune, and far beneath the Burgundian heiress he wins. Arthur de Vere is, indeed, the heir of the earldom of Oxford, but, as an exiled Lancastrian, with no hope of regaining his rank, he is beneath the Countess of Geierstein. Ivanhoe is held by his own father as unworthy to mate with Rowena, the heiress of the Saxon royalty ; and Damian de Lacy is only a squire, while Evelyn Berenger is the heiress of an earl; and Mordaunt Merton is clearly below the social rank of the daughters of Magnus Troil, the Udaler and Jarl of Zetland.

This, it will be seen, covers the greater part of the Waverley heroes. One ought, perhaps, to add Francis Tyrrel, who is held to be illegitimate, and Markham Everard, who is, if anything, under the rank of Alice Lee. That leaves, on the other side, Captain Edward Waverley (whom old Bradwardine considers to be hardly his daughter’s equal), Julian Peveril, and Lord Glenvarloch ; and both of these latter young gentlemen are, in point of fortune, inferior to their brides.

But, on the other hand, Miss Austen’s heroines approach life from the side of good match-making. Fanny Price, Anne Eliot, Catharine Morland, the Bennet girls, — Jane and Elizabeth, — Jane Fairfax, and the Dashwood sisters, all wed above their position. They are, of course, gentlewomen, but without expectations, and are wooed and won for their own sakes. Emma as an heiress is the single exception.

So it is with Miss Brontë’s heroines. Jane Eyre and Lucy Snowe are governesses. Caroline Helstone is a portionless dependent. Shirley Keeldar is indeed an heirgss, but she is not the leading character, though she gives her name to the novel.

Perhaps the reason is not far to seek. The male mind dwells on the thought that his hero should win by doing. The lady of masculine regard is ex officio a goddess, a princess, a prize to be fought for, The thought of the feminine mind is to picture its ideal as being worth the fighting. She must show herself a heroine as well as be entitled one. The masculine thought is to win; the feminine is to reward. When this was managed in the simple old fashion of knight-errantry, by sheer fighting on the one side, and interested looking-on on the other, matters adjusted themselves with ease. But the complications of modern civilization have brought in all manner of modifying considerations, and the society novel of to-day greatly turns upon the adjustment of these. It deals with the questions of mutual surrender, and this everfluctuating balance makes the subject of the fiction of the present. Family opposition, religious incompatibilities, conflicts of temperament, — all these have to be considered between Cains and Caia, and the point of dispute is what substantial justice to t he rights of each requires of each. Authors of either sex will unconsciously take their own side, and hence it is very rare that sex in authorship does not betray itself. No man has as yet succeeded in passing for a woman, and no woman has remained undetected under a male pseudonym. It is true that, in case of felicitous authorship, the writer is most likely to disclose the secret and claim the renown, but it is not probable that it would remain unsuspected. It is not that male or female author could not, by abnormal cleverness, accomplish the task, but that neither would do it. When it comes to the point, both desire to do that which belongs to their own province ; and the greater the genius, the more it is constrained by its own special limitations.