planning another marriage (as he is); that she could bear his second marriage if she had self-control. He says that women think all is well if married life is smooth, but that men should have been able to get children some other way without the existence of any women. Medea appeals to Jason's oaths and promises to her which he pledged with his right hand; she would not complain if she were childless, but they have children. The sneak answers that he is going to marry the king's daughter for the good of the family. Medea says: "He who was all the world to me — my own husband — has turned out a villain. Women are unfortunate. They buy a husband at the high price and get a tyrant. It is always a great question whether they make a good choice. Divorce is discreditable to women. If we are clever enough to manage a husband, it is well; otherwise we may better die. The husband can go out, if vexed; the wife must stay at home. Better go through battle three times than through childbirth once." She is led to discuss the status of woman: "The dawn of respect to women is breaking. They shall be basely slandered no more. The ancient poets wrote much about their faithlessness. This shall cease. If Apollo had given us the gift of versifying I would have answered them. History shows up their sex as much as ours." In the Bacchantes the question is raised whether chastity is native to women; if it is, they will not fall when assailed in the mysteries of Dionysus. In the Andromache the heroine says that a wife must learn the ways of her husband's country and his own, and not try to impose the ways in which she was brought up. Her lord also has taken a wife who maltreats Andromache, the bond-maid. The wife says to her: "Do not bring amongst us barbaric customs which we think crimes. It is a shame here for a man to have
