The pirate queen as a challenge to the natural order of command

“ That personal services were rendered men by the women does not necessarily signify the services were prompted by fear. It is only where militancy prevails that we find an exercise of authority by men over women which suggests the tyranny of the strong over the weak. ”

“ Were the duties of the two sexes confounded together, or, still more, were they inverted—the female, for instance, going forth to face danger or to hunt for prey, while the male was left to nurse the young—the position of the species in the great and constant struggle for existence would be very decidedly altered for the worse. We must conclude, therefore, that the attempt to alter the present relations of the sexes is not a rebellion against some arbitrary law instituted by a despot or a majority—not an attempt to break the yoke of a mere convention; it is a struggle against Nature ”

“ An increasing cackle of complaints, orders, and jests, and what to a European would have been bad language, came from behind the curtains. Here was evidently a woman used to command. ”

“ The pirate of to-day was the patriot of to-morrow, and fleets of adventurers recruited largely from the harbours of Devonshire and Cornwall, twenty and thirty sail together, haunted the mouth of the Channel, pillaging Spanish gold-ships from Panama, French wine-ships from Bordeaux, the rich traders from Antwerp or from their own Thames, with great impartiality, and retired, if pursued, among the dangerous shoals of Scilly, or the distant creeks and coves on the south coast of Ireland. ”

“ The captain of the schooner is abaft with his glass in his hand, occasionally sweeping the offing in expectation of a vessel heaving in sight: the officers and crew are lying down, or lounging listlessly, about the decks, panting with the extreme heat, and impatiently waiting for the sea-breeze to fan their parched foreheads. With their rough beards and exposed chests, and their weather-beaten fierce countenances, they form a group which is terrible even in repose. ”

“ Who is your mistress, as you call her, and what is she to stand in the way of a Desmond? Who is she to come between us and the deliverance of Ireland? Shall a woman block up the path—only a woman!” And on he went in his wrath, saying many injurious things of Grace O’Malley, until at last he applied to her the vilest of names. ”

“ To secure to the poor forsaken wife the right to her earnings? All the women did not ask for these rights, but all accepted them with joy and gladness when they were obtained, and so it will be with the franchise. Woman's right to self-government does not depend upon the numbers that demand it, but upon precisely the same principles on which man claims it for himself. Where did man get the authority which he now exercises to govern one-half of humanity; from what power the right to place woman, his helpmeet in life, in an inferior position? ”

“ It had become very plain to anyone who gave it the slightest thought, or, indeed, to anyone who used his eyes, that Desmond was infatuated with my mistress. Every moment that he could find was spent in her society, to the neglect of other matters, however important they were. Before he had seen her he had been fascinated by what I had told him of her and her deeds; now that he saw her for himself, and marked how like a queen she was, he was as one bound hand and foot before her.
Grace O’Malley had a great power over men when she chose to exercise it ”

“ He declared that he would give all the world if only it would put our affairs right again; indeed, he was like one gone clean mad with trouble, exclaiming that he was the cause of all our woes!”
“The cause of all our woes!” cried I.
“You remember Mistress Sabina Lynch, Ruari,” said Eva. “She it was, said he, who had told the President of Munster to demand Grace O’Malley as a pledge from Desmond of his loyalty to the Queen, and it was through him—for he loves this woman—that she knew our mistress was at Askeaton, though he had never meant to betray her.” ”

“ My woman afterwards managed to leave the Lynches’ unobserved with the letter I wrote you, and gave it to the captain of the Scottish ship we passed on our way to Galway. My only fear was that he might inform the Governor, and so our plans would have been frustrated; but he has proved himself a true man, and one who may be trusted.”
“There is no confidence to be put in Sir Nicholas,” said I.
“The man is hard, stark, relentless,” said she, hotly, “but he shall find I am as hard, stark, and relentless as he is himself. ”

“ Perhaps the sex generally will find that they have paid dear for the fancy of the few who wish to enter into public life.
What would be the effect of public life on female character, and the effect of female intervention on the character of public life, are questions upon which some light has been thrown by our actual experience since the commencement of this agitation. About the most violent and scurrilous production which has appeared in the American press for many a day was a series of letters written by a female politician ”

“ The social regulations from the viewpoint of individual psychology.
The institutionalized forms of social control into which the old sex taboos have developed impose upon all members of the group a uniform type of sexual relationship. These socially enforced standards which govern the sex life are based upon the assumption that men and women conform closely to the masculine and feminine ideals of tradition. The emphasis is much more strongly placed on feminine conformity, however; a great many sexual activities are tolerated in the male that would be unsparingly condemned in the female. ”

“ In perhaps a quarter, the husband becomes the serf [Pg 180] of the wife—who has customs galore and the weight of American advertising to back her in her commands of what he must do, earn, obtain, provide, and so on.
Yet the sexual deed itself is one which, if there be command or obedience, requires that the command come from the male, the obedience from the female. (Male aggression, female passivity, the scientists insanely term it.) This circumstance, however loathsome to feminists, is—again—a simple fact of nature: a man is physiologically incapable of being commanded to make love. ”

“ In the earlier pages of my volume I contrasted the clarity of male thinking processes with their vagueness in woman, and later on showed that the power of orderly speech, in which logical judgments are expressed, acts on women as a male sexual character. Whatever is sexually attractive to the female must be characteristic of the male. Firmness in a man's character makes a sexual impression on a woman, whilst she is repelled by the pliant man. People often speak of the moral influence exerted on men by women, when no more is meant than that women are striving to attain their sexual complements. ”

“ The femme libre (free woman) of the new social order may, indeed, escape the charge of neglecting her family and her household by contending that it is "not her vocation to become a wife and a mother." Why then, we ask, is she constituted a woman at all? Merely that she should become a sort of second-rate man? We have already declared, and we repeat, that we wish a free career for every talent. ”

“ Are they told that woman must also be economically, in order to be physically and intellectually free, to the end that she no longer depend upon the "good-will" and the "mercy" of the other sex?—forthwith their patience is at end; their anger is kindled ”

“ There is another way in which the general opinion, that women are inferior to men, is manifested, that bears with tremendous effect on the laboring class, and indeed on almost all who are obliged to earn a subsistence, whether it be by mental or physical exertion—all allude to the disproportionate value set on the time and labor of men and of women. A man who is engaged in teaching, can always, I believe, command a higher price for tuition than a woman—even when he teaches the same branches, and is not in any respect superior to the woman. ”

“ By most writers upon this subject the fact seems to have been overlooked, or, if observed, has not been acknowledged, that licentiousness among women during a certain period of Greek life, about which so much has been written, was governed wholly by the demands of their masters; in fact, throughout the history of mankind since the ascendency of the male over the female has been gained, the class which has controlled the means of support, and within which has resided all the power to direct the activities of women, has ever regulated the supply of victims to be offered upon the altar of lust ”

“ The point we have reached is this: the primary value of the sexes has to some extent, at least, been reversed under the patriarchal idea, which has pushed the male destructive power into prominence at the expense of the female constructive force. This [248] under-valuing of the one-half of life has lost to society the service of a strong unsubjugated motherhood. ”

“ Grace O’Malley in the meantime went down to her cabin to speak words of hope and comfort to Eva. When I thought of my dear, my heart again fainted within me; then it seemed to grow so big and strong, calling, as it were, loudly to me to play the man this day, that I felt there was nothing that was wholly impossible to me!
[Pg 235]
My mistress now returned to the poop-deck, and taking the helm from the steersman, as we stood close in by the enemy’s vessel, she put it down sharply, so that the galley was thrown into the fore-chains of the Englishman. ”

“ Either The Cross of Blood would be sunk by the enemy’s fire, and we would perish in the sea, or she would be captured, many of us being killed in the struggle, and the rest taken—what would be their fate?
But there was no need to ask that; for I was well assured that the people of the English ship knew who we were, or, at least, whose galley it was, for who in Ireland had such a vessel as The Cross of Blood, except Grace O’Malley?
Such were my thoughts when my mistress spoke in my ear, and said that as it was impossible to escape from the Englishman we must fight him. ”

“ After all, she was a woman, as I have said.
“You are a brave man and a true,” said she, “and I will not plague you more. Let him die in peace,” cried she to me, “if die he must.”
As I was about to place him with his back against a mast so as to ease him, he made a snatch at the dagger which was in my belt; his fingers closed over it, but even as he grasped it his lips parted and his spirit fled.
“God rest thee, thou gallant mariner of Spain!” said Grace O’Malley, when she saw that the captain of the galleon was dead. ”

“ As for your request that I will come up and superintend your establishment, I have advised with Lady Betty on the subject, and she agrees with me that, for the honour of the family, it is better that I should come, as it will save appearances. You are in a peck of troubles, as most men are who are free-livers and are led astray by artful and alluring females. ”

“ The mind of the Governor is set against allowing any of the ancient customs of the land; he is endeavouring quietly and skilfully—for he is not a blustering bully as some others are—to reduce the power of the chiefs and to make them pay tribute to the Queen. ”

“ It is the brave soldier submissive to authority who deserves promotion to rank and honor; so woman, having proved herself a good subject, is now ready for her promotion and advancement. She is urgently asking, not to rule over men, but to take command of herself and all her rightful belongings.... ”