Nor is it any wonder that this should be so. The very form of the
marriage ceremony and contract tends to make it so. The fact that
marriage originated as a form of slavery, and that much of its
original status yet remains--all these things tend to establish these
wrong ideas regarding the estate, in the minds of the parties to it.

Nor are the evils that come from such wrong view of marriage all
confined to one side of the house. On the contrary, they are
about evenly divided between husbands and wives, witness a few
illustrations, as follows:

A couple had been married about a year. They had no children, nor
were there prospects of any. The husband was beginning to spend his
evenings away from home, leaving his wife alone. One evening, as he
was making ready to go out, his wife said: "What makes you go out
evenings now, and leave me alone! You didn't use to do it!" And the
husband replied:

"Why, you don't do anything to make it interesting for me now! You
used to put on your prettiest clothes when I came to see you, fixed
up your hair bewitchingly, had a smile for me that wouldn't come off,
would sing for me, read to me, sit on my lap and pet me and kiss me,
and now you never do anything of the kind." And before he could say
more, the wife responded: "_Oh, but we are married now, and it's your
duty to stay with me!_"

What wonder that the husband went out of the house, slamming the door
after him! The wonder is that he ever came back.

Again: A woman who was a graduate of a famous Eastern College and