THE WORLD'S DEBT TO THE IRISH 
woman in her own name which had been appropri- 
ated by a father to his daughter “out of affection,” 
was very interesting, because even after her mar- 
riage the woman's rights to dispose of it appear to 
have been as absolute as those of the professional 
man with respect to his earnings. There was no 
difficulty therefore as to the transmission of her 
heritage to her children. It is said to have been the 
celebrated woman Brehon or female judge, Brigh, 
who made the decision which fixed this rule with 
regard to succession to lands in respect of which 
contracts had been entered into upon the occasion 
of a woman's marriage. Under tribe law the 
ownership of property was not so simple as under a 
commonwealth of the people with individual rights 
to ownership without any obligations necessarily 
going with them. In spite of this fact however a 
woman's rights to the property were very carefully 
guarded by Irish law and the Irish were in this far 
~head of their neighbors in other countries and had 
anticipated, as I have said, some of the rights that 
women are insisting on claiming for themselves at 
the present time. Miss Bryant in her study of Irish 
law, “Liberty, Order and Law under Native Irish 
Rule,” has brought out these facts. 
Even under the Christian dispensation in Ireland, 
there were certain cases of a legal separation from 
bed and board for a married couple, though not 
such divorce as permitted remarriage with another 
while the wife or husband was alive. This tradition 
was so deep in the hearts of the Irish people mainly 
276