The Mountie of early Hollywood fame knew how to treat a lady. He protected her in the wilderness, saved her from American bandits and-if he was feeling romantic-warbled a moun-taintop duet with her. But women were strictly for rescuing: if the Mountie had a female partner when he rode off to pursue justice, she was probably a horse. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) began recruiting women in 1974; they now make up a fifth of its 19,000 officers as well as most of its 7,000 support staff. But a recently launched class-action suit for sexual harassment, which almost 300 current and former female Mounties are expected to join, suggests that the force famed for "always getting its man" still doesn't quite "get" women.
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