A Random Passage from the Voyage to the Amazons

As we sat contented by the fire, I fell into conversation with my hunting companions. Most of these men were farmers of Hyrcanea, with one bookkeeper and one blacksmith. I asked if the authority that the women held in their country was resented. They playfully agreed at first, but the conversation grew serious by and by. The farmers to a man believed that a man in Aqualaria was happier than elsewhere, for many reasons. The farmers preferred the 'outdoor work' done in the fields and forest, and did not envy the women's 'indoor work' of keeping books, and making and enforcing rules. What they had heard about the world of the Havnheimer man, that every man was a king in his own house, did not appeal to them. Time spent playing a king was a drain on one's spirit, and was also time lost to more valuable and interesting activity.

The smith also noted that in Aqualaria, men were more equal to each other than in the Havnheim, for whether one was rich or poor, men mostly did similar work. Women, on the other hand, had it worse. Only a few could rise to the nobility, and not everyone could own a good farm or a succeed at a trade. A maid or a seamstress would sometimes feel her lack of fine clothes or invitations to the feasts of the great keenly, as marks of failure.

I will note that the men of Aqualaria are not weaklings, contrary to the myths propagated by the ignorant. It is true that a young man of Aqualaria on the whole does not boast or posture as much as one of the Havnheim, nor will he set out to adventure. He is perhaps inferior in taking the initiative, but once he takes that initiative, he is perhaps more persistent than even his Aqualarian sister. And the highest praise that I have for the men of Aqualaria is that I have never seen, on the whole, in all my travels, a country where, in matters of love, that the women are less interested in the men of other lands, and cherish their native husbands more, than in the Matriarchy.