take the nineteenth century by the throat and strangle it; he squared
himself against the universe.

"What," said Miss Quincey, "do you not believe in equal chances for men
and women?" She was eager to redeem herself from the charge of
flightiness.

"Equal chances? I daresay. But not unequal work. The work must be unequal
if the conditions are unequal. It's not the same machine. To turn a woman
on to a man's work is like trying to run an express train by clock-work,
with a pendulum for a piston, and a hairspring for steam."

Miss Quincey timidly hinted that the question was a large one, that there
was another side to it.

"Of course there is; there are fifty sides to it; but there are too many
people looking at the other forty-nine for my taste. I loathe a crowd."

Stirred by a faint _esprit de corps_ Miss Quincey asked him if he did not
believe in the open door for women?

He said, "It would be kinder to shut it in their faces."

She threw in a word about the women's labour market--the enormous demand.

He said that only meant that women's labour could be bought cheap and
sold dear.

She sighed.