To the lot of women fell the care of the children, the labor required in the home and in all that directly affected it.

The essential principle governing this division of labor and responsibility between the two sexes lies much deeper than in an apparent tyranny of the man. The ubiquity of danger from human foes as well as from wild beasts, the suddenness of their assaults when least expected, compelled aboriginal men to keep their weapons always at hand. During the day they hardly lay them aside, even for a minute, and at night they are always within reach. This fact explains, why the women and children transport all the loads, while the men carry nothing but their weapons when aborigines move from one place to another.

This division of functions consequently led men to confine their ingenuity and activity chiefly to the improvement and skillful handling of their arms, to the invention of snares for the game and to methods of fighting animal and human foes. It led also to the inclination to regard hunting and warfare as the only occupations worthy of men, and to relegate all domestic work to the women, since such labor would be degrading to the warrior.

But the despised work of the weaker sex has proven of far greater value to the progress of the human race than all heroic acts ever accomplished by fighting men. To woman's ingenuity we owe our comfortable homes. Women kept the warming hearth-fire burning, prepared the meals, watched faithfully over the children and made the clothes that gave protection against rain and cold. To women's inventive sense we owe also our most important industries: agriculture, weaving, pottery, tannery, basketry, dyeing, brewing, and many other peaceful arts.

It has been said that human culture began with man's knowledge and control of fire, that mysterious, ever consuming, ever brightly flaming element, which was regarded by all aborigines as a thing of life, by some even as an animal. It must have all the more forcibly impressed men's imagination, inasmuch as it not alone promoted man's comfort, but even made life endurable, especially in cold climates.

It is certain that the practical knowledge of fire was obtained not at one given spot only but in many different parts of the world and in a variety of ways. In time men discovered also various methods of producing sparks, generally by rubbing two sticks of wood or by knocking two flints together. But as these methods were slow and laborious, it became the custom for each band to maintain a constant fire for the use of all families in order to avoid the troublesome necessity of obtaining it by friction. Generally this constant fire was kept in the centre of the village, to be in reach for

everybody. The duty to keep it always burning fell naturally to the women, as they remained always in the village, and especially to those women not burdened with the cares of maternity. As fire later on was regarded as a present of the good spirits or gods to men, these central fires were held sacred, and so the fire worship grew by degrees into a religious cult of great sanctity and importance.

While searching for edible roots and berries, women became aware of the usefulness of many plants. And soon they made attempts to cultivate them in closer proximity to their lodges.

Having cleaned a suitable spot women made with their primitive digging sticks the holes, into which they sunk the

seeds, from which the plants were expected to develop. Experience, the mother of all wisdom, taught women that these plants needed constant attention. So the ground was kept free from weeds and properly watered. From time to time it was loosened with hoes, which in the beginning were made of bones, shells or stones, and later on of metal.

Such was the origin of our vegetable gardens, orchards, and grain fields. The continuous care, devoted to these plantations, greatly improved the quality of useful plants. Poor and tasteless varieties developed in time into those rich and palatable species, without which our present human race could scarcely exist for a single day. I need only name wheat, corn, barley, rye, peas, lentils, beans, rice, tapioca, potatoes, yams, turnips, bread-fruit, pears, apples, plums, cherries, bananas. dates, figs, nuts, oranges, coffee, cacao, tea, cotton and hemp, to convince the reader of the immense value of women's activity in agriculture.

As simple as were the tools for the cultivation of the soil, just as simple were the implements for the extraction of flour from the grain. Recent archæological research has disclosed the fact that many thousand years before Christ Egyptian women ground corn between two stones in just the same manner as the women of the Apache and Pueblo Indians and many other aboriginal tribes are doing to this day.

Other aboriginal women crushed the seeds in mortars of wood or stone. In several parts of Asia women succeeded in inventing hand-mills, which proved much more effective.

The necessity of storing provisions for the winter and hard times led to the invention of receptacles in which grain, nuts and dried berries might be kept and be safe from destruction by rain and animals. While pondering over the best methods of accomplishing this, women observed that certain insects and birds moulded their nests from wet clay, and that such nests, after hardening, were rain-proof. By this observation women became induced to use the same material for all kinds of nest-like vessels. in which provisions could be stored successfully. By accident such vessels came in contact with fire. Then it was found that by such baking the hardness of the vessels increased considerably, And so the preliminaries were discovered for the art of pottery, in which many aborigines became masters.

Similar observations led to the art of weaving. The nets, spread out everywhere by spiders for the capture of insects, gave women the first hint to make similar fabrics for the capture of birds and fishes. The spider's thread was imitated by long hair and the fibres of certain plants. These were twisted together in a manner similar to that used by the weaver-birds in constructing their airy nests.

For many thousand years weaving was done exclusively by hand. But in time all kinds of apparatus were invented. And so weaving developed into an art that among many aboriginal tribes was improved to the highest degree. At the same time these female weavers created a genuine native art. So for instance the garters, belts, sashes and blankets of the Navajo and Pueblo Indians are, for their splendid quality as well as for their tasteful designs and colors, highly appreciated by all connoisseurs. The same is true in regard to the ponchos of the Mexicans and Peruvians, and the mag

nificent shawls and carpets, made by the women of Cashmere, Afghanistan, Persia and other countries of the Orient.

Basketry, including matting and bagging, belongs also to the primitive textile arts in which many native women excelled. By using choice materials, or by adding resinous substances, some aboriginal women are able to make baskets water-tight for holding or carrying water for cooking. From crude beginnings basketry developed into an industry, which