There is not even any very special disgrace in it according to the present standard of social observances.

Were public whipping the recognized penalty for the crime of a married woman's infidelity, there would be fewer of the like scandals--the divorce might follow the scourging.

A daintily brought-up feminine creature would think twice, nay, fifty times, before she would run the risk of allowing her delicate body to be lashed by whips wielded by the merciless hands of a couple of her own sex--such a prospect of degradation, pain, shame, and outraged vanity would be more effectual to kill the brute in her than all the imposing ceremonials of courts of law and special juries.

Think of it, kings, lords, and commons! Whipping at the cart's tail was once a legal punishment--if you would stop the growing immorality and reckless vice of women you had best revive it again--only apply it to rich as well as to poor, for it is most probable that the gay duchesses and countesses of your lands will need its sharp services more frequently than the work-worn wives of your laboring men.

Luxury, idleness, and love of dress are hot-beds for sin--look for it, therefore, not so much in the hovels of the starving and naked as in the rose-tinted, musk-scented boudoirs of the aristocracy--look for it, as your brave physicians would search out the seeds of a pestilence that threatens to depopulate a great city, and trample it out if you CAN and WILL--if you desire to keep the name of your countries glorious in the eyes of future history.