rigorously and strictly than in the Low Countries." The Duke of Wirtemberg who was in England about 1592 remarked on the great liberty accorded women and recorded their fondness for finery; so "that, as I am informed, many a one does not hesitate to wear velvet in the street, which is common with them, whilst at home perhaps they have not a piece of dry bread." One observer says, "The females have great liberty and are almost like masters. Foreign observers tend to confine their attention to the middle and upper classes. The condition of the lower class, nevertheless, is of equal importance at least. Europe had been slipping toward the starvation point. Firewood was becoming a luxury in many parts of western Europe. Especially in England had the price of building materials risen to what seemed a very high point. Vagabondage was repeatedly the subject of cruel legislation. Any one might take the children of vagabonds and keep them as apprentices. In Henry VIII.'s day the culture of wool had desolated many homes. In order to extend pasturage greedy men resorted to force and fraud and ejected the husbandmen, occasioning thereby poverty, misery, and crime among those deprived of employment. By the middle of the sixteenth century, castle architecture was being superseded. Even in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries domestic arrangements had shown a tendency to improve. There was more desire for privacy. The sixteenth century revolutionized domestic architecture. Dissolution of the monasteries threw property into hands concerned more with pleasure than with defense. 28 Traill and Mann. Social England, vol. iii, 785-786; Hill. Women in English Life, vol. i, 115-118. In Elizabethan England peasant cottages usually had but two rooms, one for the servants, the other for the family. Substantial farmers had houses with several rooms. For some time housing had been a problem in London. The crowded condition of the city made it an unpleasant abode. Vacated palaces were transformed into tenements that would hold a score or more of families. Elizabeth issued an edict against the housing of different families in the same building but the proclamation was of course mainly futile. Even the people of the better class seem to have had no notion of privacy of daily home life. Rooms opened into one another. Often half a dozen rooms were so connected that some of them could be reached only by passing through several or all of the others. This was the case even with bedrooms. Frequently a large room was converted into several sleeping quarters by means of curtains. The lure of the city was already felt. People flocked to London and wasted their substance in revels. When husband hath at play set up his rest, The master may keep revel all the year, And leave the wife at home like silly fool. It seems that country dames did not often share their husbands' trips to the capital. The wife of the city burgess also found ample employment in looking after the multitudinous duties of her household. Little attention was given to improving the education of women of the middle class. Sir Thomas Overbury's poem, "A Wife," expresses the sentiment of the age: Give me next good, an understanding wife, By nature wise, not learned much by art. Some knowledge on her part will all my life. A passive understanding to conceive, Learning and pregnant wit in woman-kind, And doth not add more ballast but more sail. Domestic charge doth best that sexe befit, Books are a part of man's Prerogatives In the words of Gervase Markham [died 1637] also appears the ideal for the English housewife: Next unto her sanctity and holiness of life, it is meet that our English housewife be a woman of great modesty and temperance, as well inwardly as outwardly; inwardly as in her behavior and carriage towards her husband, wherein she shall shun all violence of rage, passion, and humour, coveting less to direct than to be directed, appearing ever unto him pleasant, amiable and delightful; and, tho' occasions of mishaps, or the misgovernment of his will may induce her to contrary thoughts, yet virtuously to suppress them, and with a mild sufferance rather to call him home from his error, than with the strength of anger to abate the least spark of his evil, calling into her mind, that evil and uncomely language is deformed, tho uttered even to servants; but most monstrous and ugly when it appears before the presence of a husband; outwardly as in her apparel and diet, both of which she shall proportion according to the competency of her husband's estate and calling, making her circle rather straight than large. She should avoid fantastic fashions and remember that diet should be nutritive rather than epicurish. He says the housewife ought to understand medicine and nursing, cookery, gardening, care of poultry, making of butter and cheese, cutting up of meat, distilling, and the care of wool and flax. The average Elizabethan housewife was proficient in all these duties. Even if she did not have to perform them it was often necessary to train household servants. Their numerous retinue constituted a veritable familia- a burden of responsibility to mistress and master. For instance, John Harrington in 1566 drew up rules for his servants requiring them among other things to attend family prayers under penalty of two pence fine. With the passing of convent life marriage was more essential to woman than ever. There were not husbands enough to go round. Girls that failed to find mates had a dark outlook-perhaps as drudges for their relatives. For an old maid the Elizabethans could think of no better employment than "to lead apes in hell;" 29 so a younger sister was rarely permitted to marry first. Girls married very young; unmarried daughters were undesirable members of the household. A poet makes a girl of fifteen lament that she has not found a husband; and he was probably not exaggerating. Fifteen or sixteen was a common age for marriage in Shakespeare's day. The maiden of twenty was regarded as a confirmed spinster. Sometimes girls were married so young that it was necessary to wait several years before they were old enough for actual wives. This may have been shrewd business but much immorality resulted from this child-marriage common in fashionable life. 29 Compare Katherine in Shakespeare, "Taming of the Shrew," act ii, Scene I. Courtship in the England of Elizabeth was bolder and ruder than to-day. It was, however, improper to propose to the girl before obtaining the parents' consent and as often as not it was they that conveyed the proposal to the girl. Old plays contain more references to the necessity of the lover's trying to win the mother's aid than the father's. A girl rarely dared, however, withstand the father's will for a marriage, and few lovers would risk the loss of a marriage portion through failure to obtain paternal assent to their suit. Lyly presents the situation vividly in these words: Parents in these days are grown peevish, they rock their children in their cradles till they sleep, and cross them about their bridals until their hearts ache. Marriage among them has become a market. What will you give with your daughter? What jointure will you make for your son? And many a match is broken off for a penny more or less, as tho they could not afford their children at such a price; when none should cheapen such ware but affection, and none buy it but love. . Our parents give us pap with a spoon before we can speak, and when we speak for that we love, pap with a hatchet. He adds, "I shall measure my love by mine own judgment, not my father's purse or peevishness. Nature hath made me his child not his slave." The Elizabethan girl that opposed her father's choice was indeed treated like a slave. "Romeo and Juliet" and the "Two Gentlemen of Verona" reflect this fact and Ophelia's implicit acquiescence in her father's despotism shows what was expected of a well-bred English girl in Shakespeare's day. Ceremonial betrothal often preceded marriage. It took place before a responsible witness, preferably a priest. After the ceremony the terms husband and wife could be applied and possibly the privilege of the |