 Chapter 21 of 80 Years and More, Reminisances, 1815 to 1897. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Teresa Sheridan. 80 Years and More, Reminisances, 1815 to 1897. By Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Chapter 21 in the South of France. Having worked diligently through nearly two years on the second volume of the history of woman's suffrage, I looked forward with pleasure to arrest, in the old world, beyond the reach and sound of my beloved Susan and the woman's suffrage movement. On May 27, 1892, I sailed with my daughter Harriet on the Chateau Léovil for Bordeaux. The many friends who came to see us off brought fruits and flowers, boxes of candied ginger to ward off any seasickness, letters of introduction, and light literature for the voyage. All the daily and weekly papers, secular and religious, the new monthly magazines, and several novels. We thought we would do an immense amount of reading, but we did very little. Eating, sleeping, walking on deck, and watching the ever-changing ocean are about all that most people care to do. The sail down the harbor that bright, warm evening was beautiful. At the end, we lingered on deck in the moonlight until a late hour. I slept but little that night, as two cats kept running in and out of my state room, and my birth was so narrow that I could only lie in one position, as straight as if already in my coffin. Under such circumstances, I spent the night thinking over everything that was painful in my whole life and imagining all the different calamities that might befall my family in my absence. It was a night of severe introspection, an intense dissatisfaction. I was glad when the morning dawned and I could go on deck. During the day, my couch was widened one foot, and, at night, the cats relegated to other quarters. We had a smooth, pleasant, uneventful voyage until the last night, when, on nearing the French coast, the weather became dark and stormy. The next morning, our good steamer pushed slowly and carefully up the broad, muddy geronde and landed us on the bustling keys of Bordeaux, where my son Theodore stood waiting to receive us. As we turned to say farewell to our sturdy ship, gazing up at its black iron sides besprinkled with salty foam, a feeling of deep thankfulness took possession of us, for she had been faithful to her trust and had borne us safely from the new world to the old, over thousands of miles of treacherous sea. We spent a day in driving about Bordeaux, enjoying the mere fact of restoration to the terra firma after twelve days' imprisonment on the ocean. Maritime cities are much the same all the world over. The forests of Mass, the heavily laden drays, the lounging sailors, the rough longshoremen, and the dirty keys are no more characteristic of Bordeaux than New York, London, and Liverpool. But Bordeaux was interesting as the birthplace of Montesquieu and as the capital of ancient Guyane and Gascony. But I must not forget to mention an accident that happened on landing at Bordeaux. We had innumerable pieces of baggage, a baby carriage, rocking chair, a box of the history of woman's suffrage for foreign libraries, besides the usual number of trunks and satchels, and one hamper in which were many things we were undecided whether to take or leave. Into this a loaded pistol had been carelessly thrown. The hamper, being handled with an emphatic jerk by some jovial French sailor, the pistol exploded, shooting the bear through the shoulder. He fell bleeding on the key. The dynamite scare being just at its height, the general consternation was indescribable. The Frenchman, with vehement gestures, was chattering to his utmost capacity, but keeping at a respectable distance from the hamper. No one knew what had caused the trouble, but Theodore was bound to make an investigation. He proceeded to untie the ropes and examine the contents, and there he found the pistol, from which pointing upward he fired two other bullets. Alas! said Haiti. I put that pistol in there, never dreaming it was loaded. The wounded man was taken to the hospital. His injuries were very slight, but the incident cost us two thousand francs and no end of annoyance. I was thankful that by some chance the pistol had not gone off in the hold of the vessel and set the ship on fire, and possibly sacrificed three hundred lives through one girl's carelessness. Verily, we cannot be too careful in the use of firearms. Bordeaux is a quarter old town, with its innumerable soldiers and priests, preambulating in all directions. The priests in long black gowns and large black hats have a solemn aspect, but the soldiers walking lazily along or guarding buildings that seem in no danger from any living thing are useless and ridiculous. The heavy carts and harness move the unaccustomed observer to constant pity for the horses. Besides everything that is necessary for locomotion, they have an endless number of ornaments, rising two or three feet above the horses' heads, horns, bells, feathers, and tassels. One of their carts would weigh as much as three of ours, and all their carriages are equally heavy. It was a bright, cool day on which we took the train for Toulouse, and we enjoyed the delightful run through the very heart of old Gascony and Languedoc. It was evident that we were in the south, where the sun is strong. For, although summer had scarcely begun, the country already wore a brown hue. But the narrow strips of growing grain, the acres of grapevines, looking like young, current bushes, and the fig trees scattered here and there looked odd to the eye of a native of New York. We passed many historical spots during that afternoon journey up the valley of the groan. At Portitz are the ruins of the Chateau of Langorion, built before America was discovered. And a few miles further on, we came to the region of the famous wines of Sautern and Chateau-Yakoum. Saint-Macar is a very ancient Gallar-Roman town where they show one churches, walls, and houses built 15 centuries ago. One of the largest towns has its history typical of this part of France, where wars of religion and conquest were once the order of the day. It was taken and retaken by the Goths, Huns, Burgundians, and Saracens. Nobody knows how many times and belonged, successfully to the kings of France, to the dukes of Aquitaine, to the kings of England, and to the counts of Toulouse. I sometimes wonder whether the inhabitants of our American towns, whose growth and development have been free and untrammeled as that of a favorite child, appreciate the blessings that have been theirs, how true the lines of Guerta. America thou art much happier than our old continent, thou hast no castles in ruins, no fortresses, no useless remembrances, no vain enemies will interrupt the inward workings of thy life. We pass through Moisac, with its celebrated organ, a gift of Mazarin, through Castle Serrazum, founded by the Saracens in the 8th century, through Montabon, that stronghold of the early Protestants, which suffered martyrdom for its religious faith, through gristles built on a Roman highway, and, at last, in the dusk of the evening. We reached the capital of the south, that city of learning, curious, interesting, old Toulouse. Laura Curtis Bellard, in her sketch of me and our famous women, says, In 1882, Mrs. Stanton went to France on a visit to her son Theodore, and spent three months at the Covenant of La Sagesse, in the city of Toulouse. This is quite true, but I have sometimes tried to guess what her readers thought I was doing for three months in a convent. Worry of the trials and tribulations of this world, had I gone there to prepare insolitude for the next? Had I taken the veil in my old age? Or, like high church Anglicans and Roman Catholics, had I made this my retreat? Not at all. My daughter wished to study French advantageously, my son lived in the mountains hard by, and the Garden of La suggests, with its big trees, clean gravel paths, and cool shade was the most delightful spot. In this religious retreat I met, from time to time, some of the most radical and liberal-minded residents of the south. Toulouse is one of the most important university centers of France, and bears with credit the proud title of The Learned City. With two distinguished members of the faculty, the late Dr. Nicholas Jolly and Professor Moliner of the Law School, I often had most interesting discussions on all the great questions of the hour. That three heretics, I should say six, for my daughter, son, and his wife, often joined the circle, could thus sit in perfect security and debate in the most unorthodox fashion. In these holy precincts all the reforms, social, political, and religious, which the United States and France need in order to be in harmony with the spirit of the age, was a striking proof of the progress the world has made in freedom of speech. The time was when such acts would have cost us our lives, even if we had been caught expressing our heresies in the seclusion of our own homes. But here, under the oaks of a Catholic convent with the gray-robed sisters all around us, we could point out the fallacies of romanticism itself without fear or trembling. Glorious 19th century, what conquests are thine. I shall say nothing of the picturesque streets of antique Toulouse, nothing of the priests who swarm like children in an English town, nothing of the beautifully carved stone facades of the ancient mansions, once inhabited by the nobility of Languedoc. But now, given up to trade and commerce, nothing of the lofty brick cathedrals, whose exteriors remind one of London and whose interiors transfer you to the gorgeous east, nothing of the capital, with its gallery rich in buss of the celebrated sons of the south, nothing of the museum, public garden, and the broad river winding through all. I must leave all these interesting features of Toulouse and hasten up into the Black Mountains, a few miles away where I saw the country life of modern Languedoc. At Jack Kornassi, the country seat of Madame Berry, whose daughter and my son Theodore married, I spent a month full of surprises, how everything differed from America and even from the plain below. The peasants, many of them at least, can neither speak French nor understand it. Their language is a patah, resembling both Spanish and Italian, and they cling to it with astonishing pertinacity. Their agricultural implements are not less quaint than their speech. The plow is a long beam with a most primitive share in the middle, a cow at one end and a boy at the other. The grain is cut with a sickle and threshed with a flail on the barn floor. As in scripture times, manure is scattered over the fields with the hands. There was a certain pleasure in studying these old-time ways. I caught glimpses of the anti-revolutionary epic. When the king ruled the state and the nobles held the lands, here again I saw, as never before, what vast strides the world has made within one century. But indoors, one returns to modern times. The table, beds, rooms of the chateau were much the same as those of Toulouse and New York City. The cooking is not like ours, however, unless Delmonico's skill be supposed to have extended to all the homes in Manhattan Island, which is, unfortunately, not the case. What an admirable product of French genius is the art of cooking. Of incalculable value have been the culinary teachings of Vattel and his followers. One of the sources of amusement during my sojourn at Jack Cornassie was of a literary nature. My son Theodore was then busy collecting the materials for his book entitled The Woman Question in Europe, and every post brought in manuscripts and letters from all parts of the continent, written in almost every tongue known to battle. So just what I came abroad to avoid, I found on the very threshold where I came to rest. We had good linguists at the chateau, and every document finally came forth in English dress, which, however, often needed much altering and polishing. This was my part of the work. So way off in the heart of France, high up in the Black Mountains, surrounded with French-speaking relatives and patois-speaking peasants, I found myself once more putting bad English into the best I could command. Just as I had so often done in America when editor of The Revolution, or when arranging manuscript for The History of Woman Suffrage, but it was labor in the cause of my sex. It was aiding in the creation of The Woman Question in Europe. And so my pen did not grow slack nor my hand weary. The scenery in the Black Mountains is very grand and reminds one of the lofty ranges of mountains around the Yosemite Valley in California. In the distance are the snow-capped Pyrenees, producing a solemn beauty, a profound solitude. We used to go every evening where we could see the sun set and watch the changing shadows in the broad valley below. Another great pleasure here was watching the gradual development of my first grandchild, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, born at Paris on the 3rd of May, 1882. She was a fine child, though only three months old, her head was covered with dark hair, and her large blue eyes looked out with intense earnestness from beneath her well-shaped brow. One night I had a terrible fright. I was the only person sleeping on the ground floor of the chateau, and my room was at the extreme end of the building, with the staircase on the other side. I had frequently been cautioned not to leave my windows open, as someone might get in. But as I always slept with an open window, winter and summer, I thought I would take the risk rather than endure a feeling of suffocation night after night. The blinds were solid, and to close them was to exclude all the air, so I left them open about a foot, braced by an iron hook. A favorite resort for a pet donkey was under my window, where he had uniformly slept in profound silence. But one glorious moonlit night, probably to arouse me to enjoy with him the exquisite beauty of our surroundings, he put his nose through this aperture and gave one of the most prolonged, resounding braids I ever heard. Started from a deep sleep, I was so frightened that at first I could not move. My next impulse was to rush out and arouse the family. But seeing a dark head in the window, I thought I would slam down the heavy sash and check the intruder before starting. But just as I approached the window, another agonizing bray announced the innocent character of my midnight visitor. Stretching out of the window to frighten him away, a gentleman in the room above me, for the same purpose, dashed down a pail of water, which the donkey and I shared equally. He ran off at a double-quick pace while I made a hasty retreat. On August 20th, I returned to Toulouse in our quiet convent. The sisters gave me a most affectionate welcome, and I had many pleasant chats, sitting in the gardens with priests and professors. Several times, my daughter and I attended high mass in the cathedral, built in the 11th century. Being entirely new to us, it was a most entertaining, spectacular performance. With our American ideas of religious devotion, it seemed to us that the people, as well as the building, belonged to the Dark Ages. About 50 priests in mantles, gowns, and capes, some black, some yellow, with tinseled fringes and ornamentation, with all manner of gestures, genuflections, salutations, kneelings, and burning of incense, with prayers, admonitions, and sacraments, filled the altar with constant motion. A tall man, dressed in red, wheeled in a large basket filled with bread, which the priests with cups of wine passed up and down among those kneeling at the altar. At least half a dozen times, the places at the altar were filled, chiefly with women. We counted the men, only seven, and those were old and tremulous, with one foot in the grave. The whole performance was hollow and mechanical. People walked in, crossed themselves at the door with holy water, and while kneeling and saying their prayers, looked about, examining the dress of each newcomer, their lips moving throughout, satisfied in reeling off the allotted number of prayers in a given time. The one redeeming feature in the whole performance was the grand music. The deep-toned organ, whose sounds reverberated through the lofty arches, was impressive. The convent consisted of three large buildings, each three stories high, and a residence for the priests. Also a chapel where women at their devotions might be seen at various hours, from four o'clock in the morning until evening. Enclosed within a high stone wall were beautiful gardens with fountains and shrines, where images of departed saints in alcoves lighted with tapers were worshiped on certain days of the year. Such were our environments and our minds naturally often dwelt on the nature and power of the religion that had built up and maintained for centuries these peaceful resorts, where cultivated scholarly men and women of fine sensibilities could find rest from the struggles of the outside world. The sisters who managed this large establishment seemed happy in the midst of their severe and multifarious duties. Of the undercurrent of their lives I could not judge, but on the surface all seemed smooth and satisfactory. They evidently took great pleasure in the society of each other. Every evening from six to eight they all sat in the gardens in a circle together, sewing, knitting, and chatting, with occasional merry bursts of laughter. Their existence is not, by many degrees, as monotonous as that of most women in isolated households, especially of the farmer's wife in her solitary home, miles away from a village and a post office. They taught a school of fifty orphan girls who lived in the convent and for whom they frequently had entertainments. They also had a few boarders of the old aristocracy of France who hate the republic and still cling to their belief in popes and kings. For the purpose of perfecting herself in the language, my daughter embraced every opportunity to talk with all she met, and thus learned the secrets of their inner life. As Sister Rose spoke English, I gleaned from her what knowledge I could as to their views of time and eternity. I found their faith had not made much progress through the terrible upheavals of the French Revolution. Although the Jesuits have been driven out of France and the pictures of saints the Virgin Mary and Christ have been banished from the walls of their schools and colleges, the sincere Catholics are more devoted to their religion because of these very persecutions. Theodore, his wife and baby, and Mr. Blatch, a young Englishman, came to visit us. The sisters and school children manifested great delight in the baby and the former equal pleasure in Mr. Blatch's marked attention to my daughter as babies and courtships were unusual tableaux in a convent. As my daughter was studying for a university degree in mathematics, I went with her to the lycee, a dreary apartment in a gloomy old building with bare walls, bare floors, dilapidated desks and benches, and an old rusty stove. Yet mid such surroundings the professor always appeared in full dress making a stately bow to his class. I had heard so much of the universities of France that I had pictured to myself grand buildings like those of our universities, but instead I found that the lectures were given in isolated rooms here, there, and anywhere, uniformly dreary inside and outside. The first day we called on professor de Pays-Zoran's. After making all our arrangements for books and lectures, he suddenly turned to my daughter and pointing to the flounces on her dress, her jaunty hat, and some flowers in a buttonhole. He smiled and said, All this and yet you love mathematics? As we entered the court on our way to the lycee and inquired for the professor's lecture room, the students in little groups watched us closely. The one who escorted us asked several questions and discovered by our accent that we were foreigners, a sufficient excuse for the novelty of our proceeding. The professor received us most graciously and ordered the janitor to bring us chairs, table, paper, and pencils. Then we chatted pleasantly until the owl arrived for his lecture. As I had but little interest in the subject and as the problems were pronounced in a foreign tongue, I took my afternoon nap. There was no danger of affronting the professor by such indifference to his eloquence. As he faced the blackbird, filling it with signs and figures as rapidly as possible, then expunging them to refill again and again without a break in his explanations, talking as fast as his hand moved. Harriet struggled several days to follow him, but found it impossible. So we gave up the chase after cubes and squares and she devoted herself wholly to the study of the language. These were days for me of perfect rest and peace. Everything moved as if by magic, no hurry and bustle, never a cross or impatient word spoken. As only one or two of the sisters spoke English, I could read under the trees unerruptedly for hours. Emerson, Ruskin, and Carlisle were my chosen companions. We made several pleasant acquaintances among some Irish families who were trying to live on their reduced incomes in Toulouse. One of these gave us a farewell ball. As several companies of the French army were stationed there, we met a large number of officers at the ball. I had always supposed the French were graceful dancers. I was a quiet looker on in Vienna, so I had an opportunity of comparing the skill of the different nationalities. All admitted that none glided about so easily and gracefully as the Americans. They seemed to move without the least effort while the English, the French, and the Germans labored in their dancing, bobbing up and down, jumping and jerking out of breath and red in the face in five minutes. One great pleasure we had in Toulouse was the music of the military band in the public gardens, where for half a cent we could have a chair and enjoy pure air and sweet music for two hours. We gave a farewell dinner at the Tivoliere Hotel to some of our friends. With speeches and toasts, we had a merry time. Professor Jolly was the life of the occasion. He had been a teacher in France for forty years and had just retired on a pension. I presented to him the history of woman suffrage, and he wrote a most complimentary review of it in one of the leading French journals. Every holiday must have its end. Other duties called me to England, so after a hasty goodbye to Jack Cronassie and La Seguessie, to the Black Mountains and Toulouse, to Languedoc and the South, we took train one day in October, just as the first leaves began to fall, and in fourteen hours were at Paris. I had not seen the beautiful French capitals since 1840. My sojourn within its enchanting walls was short, too short, and I woke one morning to find myself, after an absence of forty-two years, again on the shores of England, and before my eyes were fairly open, grim old London welcomed me back. But the many happy hours spent in merry England during the winter of 1882 to 1883 have not effaced from my memory the four months in Languedoc. End of Chapter 21 in the South of France, recording by Teresa Sheridan. Chapter 22 of 80 Years and More, Reminiscences 1815-1897 This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. This recording by Karen Cummins. 80 Years and More, Reminiscences 1815-1897 by Elizabeth Katie Stanton. Chapter 22. Reforms and Reformers in Great Britain Reaching London in the fogs and mist of November 1882, The first person I met, after a separation of many years, was our revered and beloved friend William Henry Channing. The tall, graceful form was somewhat bent. The sweet, thoughtful face somewhat sadder. The crimes and miseries of the world seemed heavy on his heart. With his refined, nervous organization, the gloomy moral and physical atmosphere of London was the last place on earth where that beautiful life should have ended. I found him in earnest conversation with my daughter and the young Englishman she was soon to marry, advising them not only as to the importance of the step they were about to take, but as to the minor points to be observed in the ceremony. At the appointed time a few friends gathered in Portland Street Chapel, and as we approached the altar our friend appeared in surplus and gown, his pale spiritual face more tender and beautiful than ever. This was the last marriage service he ever performed, and it was as pathetic as original. His whole appearance was so in harmony with the exquisite sentiments he uttered that we who listened felt as if for the time being we had entered with him into the holy of holies. Sometime after Miss Anthony and I called on him to return our thanks for the very complimentary review he had written of the history of woman suffrage. He thanked us in turn for the many pleasant memories we had revived in those pages. But, said he, they have filled me with indignation too at the repeated insults offered to women so earnestly engaged in honest endeavors for the uplifting of mankind. I blushed for my sex more than once in reading these volumes. We lingered long talking over the events connected with our great struggle for freedom. He dwelt with tenderness on our disappointments and entered more fully into the humiliations suffered by women than any man we ever met. His views were as appreciative of the humiliation of women through the degradation of sex as those expressed by John Stuart Mill and his wonderful work on the subjection of women. He was intensely interested in Francis Power Cobb's efforts to suppress vivisection and the last time I saw him he was presiding at a parlor meeting where Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell gave an admirable address on the cause and cure of the social evil. Mr. Channing spoke beautifully in closing, paying a warm and merited compliment to Dr. Blackwell's clear and concise review of all the difficulties involved in the question. Reading so much of English reformers in our journals of the Brights, McLarens, the Tailors of Lydia Becker, Josephine Butler, and Octavia Hill and of their great demonstrations with lords and members of Parliament in the chair, we had longed to compare the actors in those scenes with our speakers on this side of the water. At last we met them, one in all, in great public meetings and parlor reunions at dinners and receptions. We listened to their public men in Parliament, the courts and the pulpit, to the women in their various assemblies, and came to the conclusion that Americans surpassed them in oratory and the conduct of their meetings. A hesitating, a polygenic manner seems to be the national custom for an exhortium on all questions. Even their ablest men who have visited this country, such as Kingsley, Stanley, Arnold, Tendall, and Colleridge, have all been criticized by the American public for their elocutionary defects. They have no speakers to compare with Wendell Phillips, George William Curtis, or Anna Dickinson, although John Bright is without peer among his countrymen, as is Mrs. Basant among the women. The women, as a general rule, are more fluent than the men. I reached England in time to attend the great demonstration in Glasgow to celebrate the extension of the municipal franchise to the women of Scotland. It was a remarkable occasion. St Andrew's immense hall was packed with women. A few men were admitted to the gallery at half a crown apiece. Over 5,000 people were present. When a scotch audience is thoroughly roused, nothing can equal the enthusiasm. The arrival of the speakers on the platform was announced with the wildest applause. The entire audience rising, waving their handkerchiefs and clapping their hands. And every compliment paid the people of Scotland was received with similar outbursts. Mrs. McLaren, a sister of John Bright, presided and made the opening speech. I had the honour, on this occasion, of addressing an audience for the first time in the old world. Many others spoke briefly. There were too many speakers. No one had time to warm up to the point of eloquence. Our system of conventions of two or three days duration with long speeches discussing pointed and radical resolutions is quite unknown in England. Their meetings consist of one session of a few hours into which they crowd all the speakers they can summon. They have a few tame printed resolutions on which there can be no possible difference of opinion with the names of those who are to speak appended. Each of these is read and a few short speeches are made that may or may not have the slightest reference to the resolutions, which are then passed. The last is usually one of thanks to some Lord or member of the House of Commons who may have condescended to preside at the meeting or do something for the measure in Parliament. The Queen is referred to tenderly in most of the speeches, although she has never done anything to merit the approbation of the advocates of suffrage for women. From Glasgow, quite a large party of the Brights and McLarens went to Edinburgh, where the Honourable Duncan McLaren gave us a warm welcome to Newington House. Under the very shadow of the Salisbury crags, these and the Pentland Hills are remarkable features in the landscape as you approach this beautiful city with its mountains and castles. We passed a few charming days driving about, visiting old friends, and discussing the status of women on both sides of the Atlantic. Here we met Elizabeth Pease-Nickel and Jane and Eliza Wiggum, whom I had not seen since we sat together in the world's anti-slavery convention in London in 1840. Yet I knew Mrs. Nickel at once. Her strongly marked face was not readily forgotten. I went with the family on Sunday to the friends meeting, where a most unusual manifestation for that decorous sect occurred. I had been told that, if I felt inclined, it would be considered quite proper for me to make some remarks. And just as I was revolving an opening sentence to a few thoughts I desired to present, a man arose in a remote part of the house and began, in a low voice, to give his testimony as to the truth that was in him. All eyes were turned toward him, when suddenly a friend leaned over the back of the seat, seized his coattails, and jerked him down in a most emphatic manner. The poor man buried his face in his hands and maintained a profound silence. I learned afterward that he was a bore, and the friend in the rear thought it wise to nip him in the bud. This scene put to flight all intentions of speaking on my part, lest I too might get outside the prescribed limits and be suppressed by force. I dined that day with Mrs. Nickel at Huntley Lodge, where she has entertained in turn many of our American reformers. Her walls have echoed to the voices of Garrison, Rogers, Samuel J. May, Parker Pillsbury, Henry C. Wright, Douglas, Ramond, and host of English Philanthropist. Though over eighty years of age, she was still awake to all questions of the hour, and generous in her hospitalities as of your. Mrs. Margaret Lucas, whose whole soul was in the temperance movement, escorted me from Edinburgh to Manchester to be present at another great demonstration in the town hall, the finest building in that district. It had just been completed, and with its anti-room dining hall and various apartments for social entertainments, was by far the most perfect hall I had seen in England. There I was entertained by Mrs. Matilda Roby, who, with her husband, gave me a most hospitable reception. She invited several friends to luncheon one day, among others, Miss Lydia Becker, editor of The Suffrage Journal in that city, and the Reverend Mr. Steinthal, who had visited this country and spoken on our platform. The chief topic at the table was John Stuart Mill, his life, character, writings, and his position with reference to the political rights of women. In the evening we went to see Restory in Queen Elizabeth. Having seen her many years before in America, I was surprised to find her still so vigorous, and thus, week after week, suffrage meetings, receptions, dinners, luncheons, and theaters pleasantly alternated. The following Sunday we heard in London a grand sermon from Moncure D. Conway, and had a pleasant interview with him and Mrs. Conway at the close of the session. Later we spent a few days at their artistic home, filled with books, pictures, and mementos from loving friends. A billiard room with well-worn cues, balls, and table. Quite a novel adjunct to a parsonage. May, in a measure, account for his vigorous sermons. A garden reception to Mr. and Mrs. Howells gave us an opportunity to see the American novelist surrounded by his English friends. Soon after this, Mr. Conway asked me to fill his pulpit. I retired Saturday night, very nervous over my sermon for the next day, and the feeling steadily increased until I reached the platform. But once there my fears were all dissipated, and I never enjoyed speaking more than on that occasion, for I had been so long oppressed with the degradation of woman under canon law and church discipline that I had a sense of relief in pouring out my indignation. My theme was, what has Christianity done for woman? And by the facts of history, I showed clearly that to no form of religion was woman indebted for one impulse of freedom, as all alike have taught her inferiority and subjection. No lofty virtues can emanate from such a condition. Whatever heights of dignity and purity women have individually attained can in no way be attributed to the dogmas of their religion. With my son Theodore always deeply interested in my friends and public work, I called, during my stay in London, on Mrs. Gray, Mrs. Jessie Boucherette, and Dr. Hogan, who had written essays for the woman questioned in Europe on our American minister, Mr. Lowell, Mr. and Mrs. George W. Smalley, and many other notable men and women. By appointment we had an hour with the Honorable John Bright at his residence on Piccadilly. As his photograph, with his fame, had reached America, his fine face and head, as well as his political opinions, were quite familiar to us. He received us with great cordiality and manifested a clear knowledge and deep interest in regard to all American affairs. Pre-trade and woman suffrage formed the basis of our conversation. The literature of our respective countries and our great men and women were the lighter topics of the occasion. He was not sound in regard to the political rights of women, but it is not given to any one man to be equally clear on all questions. He voted for John Stuart Mill's amendment to the Household Suffrage Bill in 1867, but he said, that was a personal favor to a friend, without any strong convictions as to the merit of what I considered a purely sentimental measure. We attended the meeting called to rejoice over the passage of the Married Women's Property Bill, which gave to the women of England in 1882 what we had enjoyed in many states in this country since 1848, Mrs. Jacob Bright, Mrs. Scatchard, Mrs. Elme and several members of Parliament made short speeches of congratulation to those who had been instrumental in carrying the measure. It was generally conceded that to the tact and persistence of Mrs. Jacob Bright, more than to any other person, belonged the credit of that achievement. Jacob Bright was at the time a member of Parliament and fully in sympathy with the bill, and while Mrs. Bright exerted all her social influence to make it popular with the members, her husband, thoroughly versed in parliamentary tactics, availed himself of every technicality to push the bill through the House of Commons. Mrs. Bright's chief object in securing this bill, aside from establishing the right that every human being has to his own property, was to place married women on an even plane with widows and spinsters, thereby making them qualified voters. The next day we went out to Barn Elms to visit Mr. and Mrs. Charles McLaren. He was a member of Parliament, a Quaker by birth and education, and had sustained to his uttermost ability the suffrage movement. His charming wife, the daughter of Mrs. Pochin, is worthy of the noble mother who was among the earliest leaders on that question. Speaking and writing with ability on all phases of the subject, Barn Elms is a grand old estate, a few miles out of London. It was the dairy farm of Queen Elizabeth and was presented to her by Sir Francis Walsingham. Since then, it has been inhabited by many persons of note. It has existed as an estate since the time of the early Saxon kings and the record of the sale of Barn Elms in the time of King Athelstain is still extant. What with its well-kept lawns, fine old trees, glimpses here and there of the Thames winding round its borders and its wealth of old associations, it is indeed a charming spot. Our memory of those days will not go back to Saxon kings, but remain with the liberal host and hostess, the beautiful children, and the many charming acquaintances we met at that fireside. I doubt whether any of the ancient lords and ladies who dispensed their hospitalities under that roof did in any way surpass the present occupants. Mrs. McLaren, interested in all the reforms of the day, is radical in her ideas, a brilliant talker and, for one so young, remarkably well-informed on all political questions. It was at Barn Elms I met, for the first time, Mrs. Fanny Hertz, to whom I was indebted for many pleasant acquaintances afterward. She is said to know more distinguished literary people than any other woman in London. I saw her too several times in her home. Meeting, at her Sunday afternoon receptions, many persons I was desirous to know. On one occasion I found George Jacob Holyoak there, surrounded by several young ladies, all stoutly defending the nihilist in Russia, and their right to plot their way to freedom. They counted a dynasty of czars as nothing in the balance with the liberties of a whole people. As I joined the circle, Mr. Holyoak called my attention to the fact that he was the only one in favour of peaceful measures. Now, said he, I have often heard it said on your platform that the feminine element in politics would bring about perpetual peace and government. And here all these ladies are advocating the worst forms of violence in the name of liberty. Ah, said I, lay on their shoulders the responsibility of governing, and they would soon become as mild and conservative as you seem to be. He then gave us his views on cooperation, the only remedy for many existing evils, which he thought would be the next step toward a higher civilization. There, too, I met some positivists who, though liberal on religious questions, were very narrow as to the sphere of women. The difference in sex, which is the very reason why men and women should be associated in all forms of activity, is to them the strongest reason why they should be separated. Mrs. Hertz belongs to the Harrison School of Positivist. I went with her to one of Mrs. Orr's receptions, where we met Robert Browning, a fine-looking man of seventy years, with white hair and mustache. He was frank, easy, playful, and brilliant in conversation. Mrs. Orr seemed to be taking a very pessimistic view of our present sphere of action, which Mr. Browning, with poetic coloring, was trying to paint more hopefully. The next day I dined with Margaret Bright Lucas, in company with John P. Thomason, member of Parliament, and his wife, and afterward we went to the House of Commons and had the good fortune to hear Gladstone, Carnell, and Sir Charles Dilkey. Seeing Bradlowe seated outside of the charmed circle, I sent my card to him, and in the corridor we had a few moments' conversation. I asked him if he thought he would eventually get his seat. He replied, Most assuredly I will. I shall open the next campaign with such an agitation as will rouse our politicians to some consideration of the changes gradually coming over the face of things in this country. The place assigned ladies in the House of Commons is really a disgrace to a country ruled by a queen. This dark perch is the highest gallery, immediately over the speaker's desk and government seats, behind a fine wire netting, so that it is quite impossible to see or hear anything. The sixteen persons who can crowd into the front row standing with their noses partly through the open network can have the satisfaction of seeing the cranial arch of their rulers and hearing an occasional PN to liberty or an Irish growl at the lack of it. I was told that this network was to prevent the members on the floor from being disturbed by the beauty of the women. On hearing this, I remarked that I was devoutly thankful for our American men were not so easily disturbed and that the beauty of our women was not of so dangerous a type. I could but contrast our spacious galleries in that magnificent capital at Washington as well as in our grand state capitals where hundreds of women can sit at their ease and see and hear their rulers with these dark, dingy buildings. My son, who had a seat on the floor just opposite the ladies' gallery, said he could compare our appearance to nothing but birds in a cage. He could not distinguish an outline of anybody. All he could see was the moving of feathers and furs or some bright ribbon or flower. In the libraries, the courts, and the House of Lords, I found many suggestive subjects of thought. It was interesting to find on the frescoed walls many historical scenes in which women had taken a prominent part. Among others, there was Jane Lane assisting Charles II to escape and Alice Lyle concealing the fugitives after the Battle of Sedgemore. Six wives of Henry VIII stood forth, a solemn pageant when one recalled their sad fate. Alas, whether for good or ill, women must ever fill a large space in the tragedies of the world. I passed a few pleasant hours in the house where Macaulay spent his last years, the once spacious library and the large bow window, looking out on a beautiful lawn where he sat from day to day, writing his glowing periods. Possessed a peculiar charm for me as the surroundings of genius always do. I thought, as I stood there, how often he had unconsciously gazed on each object in searching for words rich enough to gild his ideas. The house was owned and occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Stephen Winkworth. It was at one of their sociable Sunday teas that pleasant memories of the great historian were revived. One of the most remarkable and genial women I met was Miss Frances Power Cobb. She called one afternoon and sipped with me the five o'clock tea, a uniform practice in England. She was of medium height, stout, rosy and vigorous-looking, with a large well-shaped head, a strong happy face, and gifted with rare powers of conversation. I felt very strongly attracted to her. She was frank and cordial and pronounced in all her views. She gave us an account of her efforts to rescue unhappy cats and dogs from the hands of the vivisectionist. We saw her too in her home and in her office in Victoria Street, the perfect order in which her books and papers were arranged and the exquisite neatness of the apartments were refreshing to behold. My daughter, having decided opinions of her own, was soon at loggerheads with Miss Cobb on the question of vivisection. After we had examined several German and French books with illustrations showing the horrible cruelty inflicted on cats and dogs, she enlarged on the hypocrisy and wickedness of these scientists and, turning to my daughter, said, Would you shake hands with one of these vivisectionists? Yes, said Harriet. I should be proud to shake hands with Virchow, the great German scientist, for his kindness to a young American girl. She applied to several professors to be admitted to their classes, but all refused except Virchow. He readily assented and requested his students to treat her with becoming courtesy. If any of you behave otherwise, said he, I shall feel myself personally insulted. She entered his classes and pursued her studies, unmolested and with great success. Now, would you, Miss Cobb, refuse to shake hands with any of your statesmen, scientists, clergymen, lawyers or physicians who treat women with constant indignities and insult? Oh, no, said Miss Cobb. Then, said Harriet, You estimate the physical suffering of cats and dogs as of more consequence than the humiliation of human beings. The man who tortures a cat for a scientific purpose is not as low in the scale of beings in my judgment as one who sacrifices his own daughter to some cruel custom. As we were, just then, reading Frude's Life of Carlisle, we drove by the house where Carlisle had lived and paused a moment at the door where poor Jenny went in and out so often with a heavy heart. The book gives a painful record of a great soul struggling with poverty and disappointment. The hope of success, as an author, so long deferred and never realized, his foolish pride of independence and headship and his utter indifference to his domestic duties and the comfort of his wife made the picture still darker. Poor Jenny! Fitted to shine in any circle, yet doomed all her married life to domestic drudgery instead of associations with the great man for whose literary companionship she had sacrificed everything. At one of Miss Big's receptions, Miss Anthony and I met Mr. Stansfeld, MP, who had labored faithfully for the repeal of the Contagious Diseases Act and had in a measure been successful. We had the honor of an interview with Lord Shaftesbury, one of his crowded at-homes, and found him a little uncertain to the wisdom of allowing married women to vote for fear of disturbing the peace of the family. I have often wondered if men see, in this objection, what a fatal admission they make as to their love of domination. Miss Anthony was present at the Great Liberal Conference at Leeds on October 17, 1882, to which Mrs. Helen Bright-Clark, Miss Jane Cobden, Mrs. Tanner, Mrs. Scatchard, and several other ladies were duly elected delegates from their respective Liberal Leagues. Mrs. Clark and Miss Cobden, daughters of the great Cornelaw Reformers, spoke eloquently in favor of the resolution to extend parliamentary suffrage to women, which was presented by Walter McLaren of Bradford. As Mrs. Clark made her impassioned appeal to the recognition of women's political equality in the next bill for extension of suffrage, that immense gathering of 1,600 delegates was hushed into profound silence. For a daughter to speak thus in that great representative convention, in opposition to her loved and honored father, the acknowledged leader of that party, was an act of heroism and fidelity to her own highest convictions, almost without a parallel in English history. And the effect on the audience was as thrilling as it was surprising. The resolution was passed by a large majority. At the reception given to John Bright that evening, as Mrs. Clark approached the dais on which her noble father stood shaking the hands of passing friends, she remarked to her husband, I wonder if father has heard of my speech this morning, and if he will forgive me for thus publicly differing with him. The query was soon answered. As he caught the first glimpse of his daughter, he stepped down and, pressing her hand affectionately, kissed her on either cheek. The next evening the great Quaker statesman was heard by the admiring thousands who could crowd into Victoria Hall, while thousands equally desirous to hear failed to get tickets of admission. It was a magnificent sight, and altogether a most impressive gathering of the people. Miss Anthony, with her friends, sat in the gallery opposite the great platform, where they had a fine view of the whole audience. When John Bright, escorted by Sir Wilfred Lawson, took his seat, the immense crowd rose, waving hats and handkerchiefs, and, with the wildest enthusiasm, gave cheer after cheer in honor of the great leader. Sir Wilfred Lawson, in his introductory remarks, facetiously alluded to the resolution adopted by the conference as somewhat in advance of the ideas of the speaker of the evening. The house broke into roars of laughter, while the father of liberalism, perfectly convulsed, joined in the general merriment. But when at length his time to speak had come, and Mr. Bright went over the many steps of progress that had been taken by the Liberal Party, he cunningly dodged the question of the emancipation of the women of England. He skipped round the agitation of 1867, and John Stuart Mills' amendment presented at that time in the House of Commons, the extension of the municipal suffrage in 1869, the participation of women in the establishment of national schools under the law of 1870, both as voters and members of school boards, the Married Women's Property Bill of 1882, the large and increasing vote for the extension of parliamentary suffrage in the House of Commons, and the adoption of the resolution by that great conference the day before. All these successive steps toward women's emancipation, he carefully remembered to forget. While in London, Miss Anthony and I attended several enthusiastic reform meetings, we heard Brad Lowe address his constituency on that memorable day at Trafalgar Square at the opening of Parliament, when violence was anticipated, and the Parliament houses were surrounded by immense crowds with the military and police in large numbers to maintain order. We heard Michael Davit and Miss Helen Taylor at a great meeting in Exeter Hall, the former on-home rule for Ireland, and the latter on the nationalization of land. The facts and figures given in these two lectures, as to the abject poverty of the people and the cruel system by which every inch of land has been grabbed by their oppressors, were indeed appalling. A few days before sailing, we made our last visit to Ernestine L. Rose and found our noble co-agitor, though in delicate health, pleasantly situated in the heart of London, as deeply interested as ever in the struggles of the hour. A great discomfort in all English homes is the inadequate system of heating. A moderate fire in the grate is the only mode of heating, and they seem quite oblivious to the danger of throwing a door open into a cold hall at one's back, while the servants pass in and out with the various courses at dinner. As we Americans were sorely tried under such circumstances, it was decided, in the home of my son-in-law, Mr. Blatch, to have a hall stove, which, after a prolonged search, was found in London and duly installed as a presiding deity to defy the dampness that pervades all those ivy-covered habitations, as well as the neuralgia that rings their possessors. What a blessing it proved! More than any one thing making the old English house seem like an American home. The delightful summer heat we in America enjoy in the coldest seasons is quite unknown to our Saxon cousins. Although many came to see our stove in full working order, yet we could not persuade them to adopt the American system of heating the whole house at an even temperature. They cling to the customs of their fathers with an obstinacy that is incomprehensible to us who are always ready to try experiments. Americans complain bitterly of the same freezing experiences in France and Germany, and in turn, foreigners all criticize our overheated houses in places of amusement. While attending a meeting in Birmingham, I stayed with a relative of Joseph Sturge, whose home I had visited 40 years before. The meeting was called to discuss the degradation of women under the Contagious Diseases Act. Led by Josephine Butler, the women of England were deeply stirred on the question of its repeal and have since secured it. I heard Mrs. Butler speak in many of her society meetings, as well as on other occasions. Her style was not unlike that one here's in Methodist camp meetings, from the best cultivated of that sect. Her power lies in her deeply religious enthusiasm. In London, we met Emily Faithful, who had just returned from a lecturing tour in the United States, and were much amused with her experiences. Having taken prolonged trips over the whole country, from Maine to Texas for many successive years, Ms. Anthony and I could easily add the superlative to all her narrations. It was a pleasant surprise to meet the large number of Americans usually at the receptions of Mrs. Peter Taylor. Graceful and beautiful in full dress, standing beside her husband, who evidently idolized her, Mrs. Taylor appeared quite as refined in her drawing room, as if she had never been exposed to the public gaze while presiding over a suffrage convention. Mrs. Taylor is called the mother of the suffrage movement. The reform has not been carried on in all respects to her taste, nor on what she considers the basis of high principle. Neither she nor Mrs. Jacob Bright has ever been satisfied with the bill asking the rights of suffrage for widows and spinsters only. To have asked this right for all women duly qualified, as but few married women are qualified through possessing property in their own right, would have been substantially the same without making any invidious distinctions. Mrs. Taylor and Mrs. Bright felt that as married women were the greatest sufferers under the law, they should be the first, rather than the last, to be enfranchised. The others, led by Ms. Becker, claimed that it was good policy to make the demand for spinsters and widows and thus exclude the family unit and man's headship from the discussion. And yet, these were the very points on which the objections were invariably based. They claimed that if spinsters and widows were enfranchised, they would be an added power to secure to married women their rights. But the history of the past gives us no such assurance. It is not certain that women would be more just than men, and a small privileged class of aristocrats have long governed their fellow countrymen. The fact that the spinsters in the movement advocated such a bill shows that they were not to be trusted in extending it. John Stuart Mill, too, was always opposed to the exclusion of married women in the demand for suffrage. My sense of justice was severely tried by all I heard of the persecutions of Mrs. Besant and Mr. Bradlow for their publications on the right and duty of parents to limit population. Who can contemplate the sad condition of multitudes of young children in the old world whose fate is to be brought up by ignorance and vice? A swarming, seething mass which nobody owns without seeing the need of free discussion of the philosophical principles that underlie these tangled social problems. The trials of Foote and Ramsey, too, for blasphemy seemed unworthy a great nation in the 19th century. Think of well-educated men of good moral standing in prison in solitary confinement for speaking lightly of the Hebrew idea of Jehovah and the New Testament account of the birth of Jesus. Our Protestant clergy never hesitate to make the dogmas and superstitions of the Catholic Church seem as absurd as possible, and why should not those who imagine they have outgrown Protestant superstitions make them equally ridiculous? Whatever is true can stand investigation and ridicule. In the last of April when the wildflowers were in their glory, Mrs. Mellon and her lovely daughter Daisy came down to our home at Basingstoke to enjoy its beauty. As Mrs. Mellon had known Charles Kingsley and entertained him at her residence in Colorado, she felt a desire to see his former home. Accordingly, one bright morning, Mr. Blanche drove us to Eversley through Strathfield, say, the Park of the Duke of Wellington. This magnificent place was given to him by the English government after the Battle of Waterloo. A lofty statue of the Duke that can be seen for miles around stands at one entrance. A drive of a few miles further brought us to the parish church of Cannon Kingsley where he preached many years and where all that is mortal of him now lies buried. We wandered through the old church among the moss-covered tombstones and into the once-happy home now silent and deserted, his loved ones being scattered in different quarters of the globe. Standing near the last resting place of the author of Hypatia, his warning words for women in a letter to John Stuart Mill, seemed like a voice from heaven saying, with new inspiration and power, this will never be a good world for women until the last remnant of the canon law is civilized off the face of the earth. We heard Mr. Fawcett speak to his hackney constituents at one of his campaign meetings. In the course of his remarks, he mentioned with evident favor, as one of the coming measures, the disestablishment of the church and was greeted with loud applause. Soon after, he spoke of woman's suffrage as another question demanding consideration, but this was received with laughter and jeers, although the platform was crowded with advocates of the measure, among whom were the wife of the speaker and her sister, Dr. Garrett Anderson. The audience were evidently in favor of releasing themselves from being taxed to support the church, forgetting that women were taxed not only to support a church but also a state in the management of neither of which they had a voice. Mr. Fawcett was not an orator, but a simple straightforward speaker. He made one gesture, striking his right-clenched fist into the palm of his left hand at the close of all his strongest assertions, and although more liberal than his party, he was a great favorite with his constituents. One pleasant trip I made in England was to Bristol to visit the Mrs. Priestman and Mrs. Turner, sisters-in-law of John Bright. I had stayed at their father's house 40 years before, so we felt like old friends. I found them all liberal women, and we enjoyed a few days together, talking over our mutual struggles and admiring the beautiful scenery for which that part of the country is celebrated. The women of England were just then organizing political clubs, and I was invited to speak before many of them. There is an earnestness of purpose among English women that is very encouraging under the prolonged disappointments reformers inevitably suffer, and the order of English homes, too, among the wealthy classes is very enjoyable. All go on from year to year with the same servants, the same surroundings, no changes, no moving, no building even. In delightful contrast with our periodical upheavals, always uncertain where we shall go next or how long our main dependence will stand by us. From Bristol I went to Greenbank to visit Mrs. Helen Bright-Clark. One evening her parlours were crowded, and I was asked to give an account of the suffrage movement in America. Some clergymen questioned me in regard to the Bible position of women, whereupon I gave quite an exposition of its general principles in favour of liberty and equality. As two distinct lines of argument can be woven out of those pages on any subject, on this occasion I selected all the most favourable texts for justice to women and closed by stating the limits of its authority. Mrs. Clark, though thoroughly in sympathy with the views I had expressed, feared lest my very liberal utterances might have shocked some of the strictest of the laymen in clergy. Well, said I, if we who do see the absurdities of the old superstitions never unveil them to others, how is the world to make any progress in the theologies? I am in the sunset of life and I feel it to be my special mission to tell people what they are not prepared to hear instead of echoing worn-out opinions. The result showed the wisdom of my speaking out of my own soul. To the surprise of Mrs. Clark, the primitive Methodist clergymen called on Sunday morning to invite me to occupy his pulpit in the afternoon and present the same line of thought I had the previous evening. I accepted his invitation. He led the services and I took my text from Genesis chapter 1, verses 27 and 28, showing that man and woman were a simultaneous creation, endowed in the beginning with equal power. Returning to London, I accepted an invitation to take tea one afternoon with Mrs. Jacob Bright, who in earnest conversation had helped us each to a cup of tea and was turning to help us to something more. When overwent table and all, tea, bread and butter, cake, strawberries and cream, silver, china, in one conglomerate mess, silence reigned. No one started. No one said, oh! Mrs. Bright went on with what she was saying as if nothing unusual had occurred, rang the bell, and when the servant appeared, pointing to the debris, she said, Charles, remove this. I was filled with admiration at her coolness and devoutly thankful that we Americans maintained an equally dignified silence. At a grand reception, given in our honor by the National Central Committee in Princesses Hall, Jacob Bright, MP, presided and made an admirable opening speech followed by a sister, Mrs. McLaren, with a highly complimentary address of welcome. By particular request, Ms. Anthony explained the industrial, legal and political status of American women, while I set forth their educational, social and religious condition. John P. Thomason, MP, made the closing address as satisfaction with our addresses and the progress made in both countries. Mrs. Thomason, daughter of Mrs. Lucas, gave several parties, receptions and dinners, some for ladies only, where an abundant opportunity was offered for a critical analysis of the idiosyncrasies of the superior sex, especially in their dealings with women. The patience of even such heroic souls as Lydia Becker and Caroline Biggs was almost exhausted with the transversations of members of the House of Commons. Alas for the many fair promises broken, the hopes deferred, the votes fully relied on and counted, all missing in the hour of action. One crack of Mr. Gladstone's whip put a hundred liberal members to flight, members whom these noble women had spent years in educating. I never visited the House of Commons that I did not see Ms. Becker and Ms. Biggs trying to elucidate the fundamental principles of just government to some of the legislators. Verily, their divine faith and patience merited more worthy action on the part of their alleged representatives. Ms. Henrietta Mueller gave a farewell reception to Ms. Anthony and me on the eve of our departure for America when we had the opportunity of meeting once more most of the pleasant acquaintances we had made in London. Although it was announced for the afternoon, we did in fact receive all day, as many could not come at the hour appointed. Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell took breakfast with us. Mrs. Fawcett, Mrs. Seville and Ms. Lord were with us at luncheon. Harriet Hosmer and Olive Logan soon after, Mrs. Peter Taylor later, and from three to six o'clock the parlors were crowded. Returning from London, I passed my birthday, November 12, 1883, in Basingstoke. It was a sad day for us all, knowing that it was the last day with my loved ones before my departure for America. When I imprinted the farewell kiss on the soft cheek of my little granddaughter Nora in the cradle, she and the dawn and I in the sunset of life, I realized how widely the broad ocean would separate us. Ms. Anthony met me at Alderley Edge where we spent a few days with Mr. and Mrs. Jacob Bright. There we found their noble sisters, Mrs. McLaren and Mrs. Lucas, young Walter McLaren and his lovely bride Eva Mueller, whom we had heard several times on the suffrage platform. We rallied her on the steps she had lately taken, notwithstanding her sister's able paper on the blessedness of a single life. While there we visited Dean Stanley's birthplace, but on his death the light and joy went out. The old church whose walls had once echoed to his voice and the house where he had spent so many useful years seemed sad and deserted. But the day was bright and warm, the scenery beautiful, cows and sheep were still grazing in the meadows, and the grass was as green as in June. This is England's chief charm. It is forever green, perhaps in compensation for the many cloudy days. As our good friends Mrs. McLaren and Mrs. Lucas had determined to see us safely on board the Serbia, they escorted us to Liverpool, where we met Mrs. Margaret Parker and Mrs. Scatchard. Another reception was given us at the residence of Dr. Ewing Whittle. Several short speeches were made, and all present cheered the parting guest with words of hope and encouragement for the good cause. Here the wisdom of forming an international association was first considered. The proposition met with such favor from those present that a committee was appointed to correspond with the friends in different nations. Ms. Anthony and I were placed on the committee, and while this project has not yet been fully carried out, the idea of the intellectual cooperation of women to secure equal rights and opportunities for their sex was the basis of the International Council of Women, which was held under the auspices of the National Woman Suffrage Association in Washington D.C. in March 1888. On the Atlantic for ten days, we had many opportunities to review all we had seen and heard. Sitting on deck hour after hour, how often I queried with myself as to the significance of the boon for which we were so earnestly struggling. In asking for a voice in the government under which we live, have we been pursuing a shadow for fifty years? In seeking political power, are we abdicating that social throne where they tell us our influence is unbounded? No, no, the right of suffrage is no shadow, but a substantial entity that the citizen can seize and hold for his own protection and his country's welfare. A direct power over one's own person and property. An individual opinion to be counted on all questions of public interest are better than indirect influence. Be that ever so far reaching. Though influence, like the pure white light, is all pervading, yet it is off times obscured with passing clouds and nights of darkness. Like the sun's rays, it may be healthy, genial, inspiring, though sometimes too direct for comfort, too oblique for warmth, too scattered for any purpose. But as the prism divides the rays, revealing the brilliant colors of the light, so does individual sovereignty reveal the beauty of representative government, and as the burning glass shows the power of concentrating the rays, so does the combined power of the multitude reveal the beauty of united effort to carry a grand measure. 1815 to 1897 This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Avaí in November 2010. 80 Years and More Reminisances 1815 to 1897 by Elizabeth Cady Stanton Chapter 23 Women and Theology Returning from Europe in the autumn of 1883 after visiting a large circle of relatives and friends, I spent six weeks with my cousin, Elizabeth Smith Miller, at her home at Geneva on Seneca Lake. Through Miss Frances Lord, a woman of rare culture and research, my daughter and I had become interested in the School of Theosophy and read Isis Unveiled by Madame Blavatsky, Sinet's Works on the Occult World and The Perfect Way by Anna Kingsford. Full of these ideas, I soon interested my cousins in the subject and we resolved to explore as far as possible some of these eastern mysteries of which we had heard so much. We looked in all directions to find some pilot to start us on the right course. We heard that Gerald Massey was in New York City lecturing on the devil, ghosts and evil spirits generally, so we invited him to visit us and give a course of lectures in Geneva. But unfortunately he was ill and could not open new fields of thoughts to us at that time, though we were very desirous to get a glimpse into the unknown world and hold converse with the immortals. As I soon left Geneva with my daughter, Mrs. Stanton Lawrence, our occult studies were, for a time, abandoned. My daughter and I often talked of writing a story. She described the characters and their environments and I attending to the philosophy and soliloquies. As I had no special duties in prospect, we decided that this was the time to make our experiment. Accordingly we hastened to the family homestead at Johnstown, New York, where we could be entirely alone. Friends on all sides wondered what had brought us there in the depth of the winter, but we kept our secret and set ourselves to work with diligence and after three months our story was finished to our entire satisfaction. We felt sure that everyone who read it would be deeply interested and that we should readily find a publisher. It was a romance. The first thing in the morning and talked of it the last thing at night. But alas, friendly critics who read our story pointed out its defects and in due time we reached their conclusions and the unpublished manuscript now rests in a pigeonhole of my desk. We had not many days to mourn our disappointment as Madge was summoned to her western home and Miss Anthony arrived armed with a series of documents for Volume 3 of the History of Woman Suffrage. The summer and autumn of 1884 Miss Anthony and I passed at Johnstown working diligently on the history indulging only in an occasional drive or stroll around the town in the evening or a ride in the open streetcars. Mrs. Devereaux Blake was holding a series of conventions at this time in New York and we urged her to expend some of her missionary efforts in my native town which she did with good results. As the school election was near at hand Miss Anthony and I had several preliminary meetings to arouse the women to their duty as voters and to the necessity of nominating some woman for trustee. When the day of the election arrived the large upper room of the Academy was filled with ladies and gentlemen some timid souls who should have been there stayed at home fearing there would be a row but everything was conducted with decency and in order. The chairman Mr. Rosa welcomed the ladies to their new duties in a very complimentary manner. Donald McMartin stated a law as to what persons were eligible to vote in school elections. Mrs. Horace Smith filled the office of teller on the occasion with promptness and dignity and Mrs. Elizabeth Wallace-Jost was elected trustee by a majority of seven. It is strange that intelligent women who are supposed to feel some interest in the question of education should be so indifferent to the power they possess to make our schools all that they should be. This was the year of the presidential campaign. The Republicans and Democrats had each held the nominating conventions and all classes participated in the general excitement. There being great dissatisfaction in the Republican ranks we issued a manifesto stand by the Republican Party not that we loved playing more but Cleveland less. The letter was elected therefore it was evident that our efforts did not have much influence in turning the tide of national politics though the Republican papers gave a broad circulation to our appeal. Doudin's description of the poet Shelley's efforts in scattering one of his suppressed pamphlets reminded me of ours. He purchased bushels of empty bottles in which he placed his pamphlets. Having corked them up tight he threw the bottles into the sea at various fashionably watering places hoping they would wash ashore. Walking the streets of London in the evening he would slip his pamphlets into the hoods of old ladies' cloaks throw them in shop doors and leave them in cabs and omnibuses. We scattered ours in the cars enclosed them in every letter we wrote on newspaper we sent through the country. The night before election Mr. Stanton and Professor Horace Smith spoke in the Johnstown courthouse and took rather pessimistic views of the future of the Republic should James G. Blaine be defeated. Cleveland was elected and we still live as a nation and are able to digest the thousands of foreign immigrants daily landing at our shores. The night of the election a large party of us set up until two o'clock to hear the news. Mr. Stanton had long been one of the editorial writers on the New York Sun and they sent him telegrams from that office until a late hour. However, the election was so close that we were kept in suspense several days before it was decided. Miss Anthony left in December 1884 for Washington and I went to work on an article for the North American Review entitled What has Christianity done for women? I took the ground that woman was not indebted to any form of religion for the liberty she now enjoys but that on the contrary the religious element in her nature had always been perverted by the nation. Bishop Spalding in the same issue of the review took the opposite ground but I did not feel that he answered my points. In January 1885 my niece Mrs. Baldwin and I went to Washington to attend the annual convention of the National Women's Sofrage Association. It was held in the Unitarian Church on the 20th, 21st and 22nd days of that month with great success as did the usual reception given by Mrs. Brofford at the Riggs House. This dear friend one of our most urgent co-ajuters always made the annual convention a time for many social enjoyments. The main feature in this convention was the attempt to pass the following resolutions. Whereas the dogmas incorporated in religious creeds derived from Judaism teaching that there was an afterthought in the creation her sex and misfortune marriage a condition of subordination and maternity a curse are contrary to the law of God as revealed in nature and to the precepts of Christ and whereas these dogmas are an insidious poison sapping the vitality of our civilization blighting woman and through her paralyzing humanity therefore be it resolved that we call under Christian ministry as leaders of thought to teach and enforce the fundamental idea of creation that man was made in the image of God male and female and given equal rights over the earth but none over each other and furthermore we ask their recognition of the scriptural declaration that in the Christian religion there is neither male nor female, bond nor free but all are one in Christ Jesus as chairman of the committee I presented a series of resolutions impeaching the Christian theology as well as all other forms of religion for their degrading teachings in regard to woman which the majority of the committee thought too strong and pointed and after much deliberation they substituted the above handing over to the Jews who laid at the door of the Christians they thought they had so sugar coated my ideas that the resolutions would pass without discussion but some Jews in the convention promptly repudiated this impression of their faith and precipitated the very discussion I desired but which are more politic friends would feign have avoided from the time of the decade meeting in Rochester in 1878 Matilda Jocelyn Gage Edward M. Davis and I had sedulously labored to rouse women to a realization of their degraded position in the church and presented resolutions at every annual convention for that purpose but they were either suppressed or so amended as to be meaningless the resolutions of the annual convention of 1885 tame as they are got into print and roused the ire of the clergy and the following Sunday Dr. Patton of Howard University preached a sermon on woman and skepticism in which he unequivocally took the ground that freedom for women led to skepticism and immorality he illustrated his position by pointing to Hippathia Mary Wollstonecraft Francis Wright George Elliott Harriet Martinot Madame Roland Wotholl He made a grave mistake in the last names mentioned as Mrs. Wotholl was a devout believer in the Christian religion and surely anyone conversant with Miss Cobb's writings would never accuse her of skepticism his sermon was received with intense indignation even by the women of his own congregation when he found what a whirlwind he had started he tried to shift his position and explain away much that he had said we asked him to let us have the sermon for publication that we might not do him injustice but as he contradicted himself flatly in trying to restate his discourse and refuse to let us see his sermon those who hurt him were disgusted with his sophistry and turgivisation however our labors in this direction are having an effect women are now making their attacks on the church all along the line they are demanding their right to be ordained as ministers elders, deacons and to be received as delegates in all the ecclesiastical convocations at last they ask of the church just what they have asked of the state for the last half century perfect equality and the clergy as a body are quite as hostile to their demands as the statesmen on my way back to Johnstown I spent ten days at Troy where I preached at the Unitarian church on Sunday evening during this visit we had two hearings in the capital at Albany one in the senate chamber and one in the assembly before the committee on grievances on both occasions Mrs. Mary Seymour Howell Mrs. Devereaux Blake Mrs. Caroline Gilkey Rogers and I addressed the committee being open to the public the chamber was crowded it was nearly 40 years since I had made my first appeal in the old capital at Albany my reflections were sad and discouraging as I sat there and listened to the speakers and remembered how long we had made our appeals at that bar from year to year in vain the members of the committee presented the same calm aspect as their predecessors as if to say be patient dear sisters eternity is before us this is simply a question of time what may not come in your day future generations will surely possess it is always pleasant to know that our descendants are to enjoy life liberty and happiness but when one is gasping for one breath of freedom this reflection is not satisfying returning to my native hills I found the Lenten season had fairly set in which I always dreaded on account of the solemn tolling bell the episcopal church being just opposite our residence on Sunday we had the bells of six churches all going at the same time it is strange how long customs continue after the original object has ceased to exist at an early day when the country was sparsely settled and the people lived at great distances bells were useful to call them together when there was to be a church service but now when the church are always open on Sunday and every congregation knows the hour of services and all have clocks bells are not only useless but they are terrible nuisance to invalids and nervous people if I am ever so fortunate as to be elected a member of a town council my first efforts will be toward the suppression of bells to encourage one of my sex in the trying profession of book agent I purchased about this time Dr. Lord's beacon lights of history and read the last volume devoted to women, pagan and Christian saints and sinners it is very amusing to see the author's intellectual wriggling and twisting to show that no one can be good or happy without believing in the Christian religion in describing great women who are not Christians he attributes all their follies and miseries to that fact in describing pagan women possessed of great virtues he attributes all their virtues to natures gifts which enable them to rise superior to superstitions after dwelling on the dreary existence of those not of Christian faith he forthwith pictures his saint Teresa going through 20 years of doubts and fears about the salvation of her soul the happiest people I have known have been those themselves no concern about their own souls but that there are the most to mitigate the miseries of others in May 1885 we left Johnstown and took possession of our house at Tennafly, New Jersey it seemed very pleasant after wandering in the old world and the new to be in my own home once more surrounded by the grand trees I so dearly loved to see the gorgeous sunsets the twinkling fireflies to hear the whippoor-wills call their familiar note while the Junebugs and the Mosquito buzz outside the nets through which they cannot enter many people complain of the Mosquito in New Jersey when he can so easily be shut out of the family circle by nets over all the doors and windows I had a long piazza encased in netting Vapata familias with his pipe could news and gaze at the stars un molested June brought Miss Anthony and a box of fresh documents for another season of work on volume three of our history we had a flying visit from Miss Eddie of Providence daughter of Miss Eddie who gave $50,000 to the woman's safrage movement and the grand daughter of Francis Jackson of Boston who also left a generous request to our reform we found Miss Eddie a charming young woman with artistic tastes she showed us several pen sketches she had made of summer reformers that were admirable likenesses Mr. Stanton's random recollections were published at this time and were well received a dinner was given him on his 80th birthday June 27 1885 by the press club of New York City with speeches and toasts by his lifelong friends as no ladies were invited and only judged from the reports and the daily papers and what I could glean from the honored guest himself that it was a very interesting occasion sitting in the summer house one day I witnessed the most amusing scene two of the boys in search of employment broke up a hornet's nest Bruno our large st. Bernard dog seeing them jumping about thought he would join in the fun the boys tried to drive them away knowing that the hornets would get in his long hair but Bruno's curiosity outran his caution and he plunged into the midst of the swarm and was soon completely covered the buzzing and stinging soon sent the poor dog howling on the run he rushed as usual in his distress to Amelia in the kitchen where she and the girls were making preserves and ironing when they saw the hornets spoons, jars, everything and rushed out of doors screaming I appreciated the danger in time to get safely into the house before Bruno came to me for aid and comfort at last they played the hose on him until he found some relief the maidens armed with towels thrashed right and left and the boys with evergreen branches fought bravely I had often heard of stirring up a hornet's nest but I had never before seen a practical demonstration of its danger for days after if Bruno heard anything buzz he would rush for the house at the top of his speed but in spite of these occasional lively episodes volume 3 went steadily on my safarage sons and daughters all through the northern and western states decided to celebrate on the 12th of November 1885 my 17th birthday by holding meetings or sending me gifts and congratulations this honor was suggested by Mrs. Elizabeth Pointon Harbert in the new era a paper she was editing at that time the suggestion met with a ready response I was invited to deliver an essay on the pleasures of age before the suffrage association in New York City it took me a week to think them up but with the inspiration of longfellows murrituri salutamus I was almost converted to the idea that we old folks had the best of it the day was ushered in with telegrams, letters and express packages which continued to arrive during the week from England, France and Germany came cablegrams presents and letters of congratulation and from all the quarters came books, pictures silver, bronzes, california blankets and baskets of fruits and flowers the eulogies in prose and verse were so hearty and numerous that the ridicule and criticism of 40 years were buried so deep that I shall remember them no more there is no class who enjoyed a praise of their fellow men like those who have had only blame most of their lives the evening of the 12th we had a delightful reunion at the home of Dr. Clemens in Lausia where I gave my essay after which Mrs. Lausia Mrs. Blake, Mrs. Anthony Jenny June and some of the younger converts to our platform all made short speeches of praise and congratulation which were followed by music, recitations and refreshments all during the autumn Mrs. Anthony and I looked forward to the spring when we hoped to have completed the third and last volume of our history and the labors of ten years we had neither time nor eyesight to read aunt but the imperative documents for the history I was hungering for some other mental papulum in January 1886 I was invited to dine with Laura Curtis Ballard to meet Madame Durand Henri Créville, the novelist she seemed a politic rather than an earnest woman of principle she was often very inconvenient for me to entertain distinguished visitors who desired to meet me in my country home during the winter Mrs. Ballard generously offered always to invite them to her home she and her good mother have done their part in the reform movements in New York by their generous hospitalities reading the debates in congress at that time on a proposed approbation for a monument to General Grant I see that Senator Plumb of Kansas was brave enough to express his opinion against it I fully agree with him so long as multitudes of our people who are doing the work of the world live in garrets and cellars in ignorance, poverty and vice it is the duty of congress to apply the surplus international treasury to objects which will feed, clothe, shelter and educate these words of the state if we must keep on continually building monuments to great men they should be handsome blocks of comfortable homes for the poor such as Peabody built in London Senator Hoare of Massachusetts favoured the Grant Monument partly to cultivate the artistic tastes of our people we might as well cultivate our tastes on useful dwellings as on useless monuments surely sanitary homes and schoolhouses for the living would be more appropriate monuments to wise statement than the purest pariah and shafts among the sepultures of the dead the strikes and mobs and settled discontent of the masses warn us that although we forget and neglect their interests and our duties we do it at the peril of all English statesmen are at their wits end today with their tangled social and industrial problems threatening the throne of a long line the impending danger cannot be averted by any surface measures there must be a radical change in the relations of capital and labour in April rumours of a domestic invasion wafted on every Atlantic breeze warned us that our children were coming from England and France a party of six fortunately the last line of the history was written so Miss Anthony William III and bushels of manuscripts fled to the peaceful home of her sister Mary at Rochester the expected party sailed from Liverpool the 26th of May on the America after being out three days the piston rod broke and they were obliged to return my son-in-law W. H. Blanche was so seasick and disgusted that he remained in England and took a fresh start two months later and had a swift passage without any accidents the rest were transferred to the Germanic and reached New York the 12th of June different divisions of the party were arriving until midnight five people and 20 pieces of baggage the confusion of such an invasion quite upset the even tenor of our days and it took some time for people and trunks to find their respective niches however crowded elsewhere there was plenty of room in our hearts and we were unspeakably happy to have our flock all around us once more I had long heard so many conflicting opinions about the Bible some saying it taught women's emancipation and some her subjection that during this visit of my children the thought came to me that it would be well to collect every biblical reference to women in one small compact volume and see on which side the balance of influence really was to this end I proposed to organize a committee of competent women with some Latin, Greek and Hebrew scholars in England and the United States for a thorough revision of the old and new testaments and to ascertain what the status of woman really was under the Jewish and Christian religion as the church has thus far interpreted the Bible as teaching women's subjection and none of the revisions by learned ecclesiastics have thrown any new light on the question it seemed to me preeminently proper and timely for women themselves to review the book as they are now studying theology in many institutes of learning asking to be ordained as preachers elders, deacons and to be admitted as delegates to synods and general assemblies and are refused on Bible grounds it seemed to me high time for women to consider those scriptural arguments and authorities a happy coincidence enabled me at last to begin this work while my daughter Mrs. Stanton Blanche was with me our friend Mrs. Francis Lord on our earnest invitation came to America to visit us she landed in New York the 4th of August 1886 as it was Sunday she could not telegraph hence there was no one to meet her and as we all sat chatting on the front piazza suddenly to our surprise and delight she drove up after a few days rest and general talk of passing events I laid the subject so near my heart before her and my daughter they responded promptly and heartily and we immediately set to work I wrote to every woman who I thought might join such a committee and Mrs. Lord ran through the Bible in a few days marking each chapter that in any way referred to women we found that the work would not be so great as we imagined as all the facts and teachings in regard to women occupied less than one tenth of the whole scriptures we purchased some cheap Bibles cut out the texts pasted them at the head of the page we wrote our commentaries as clearly and concisely as possible we did not intend to have sermons or essays but brief comments to keep the women's Bible as small as possible Mrs. Lord and I worked several weeks together and Mrs. Blanch and I during the winter of 1887 wrote all our commentaries on the Pentateuch but we could not success in forming the committee even after writing innumerable letters make the women understand what we wanted to do I still have the commentaries of the few who responded and the letters of those who declined a most varied and amusing bundle of manuscripts in themselves some said the Bible had no special authority with them that like the American Constitution it could be interpreted to mean anything slavery when we protected that constitution and freedom when it existed no longer others said that women's sphere was clearly marked out in the scriptures and all attempted emancipation was flying in the face of providence others said they considered all the revisions made by men thus far had been so many acts of sacrilege and they did hope women would not add their influence to weaken the faith of the people in the divine origin of the Holy Book for if men and women could change it in one particular they could in all on the whole the correspondence was discouraging later Miss Lord became deeply interested in psychical researches and I could get no more work out of her and as soon as we had finished the Pentateuch Mrs. Blanche declared she would go no further that it was the driest history and most derogatory to women my beloved co-edutor Susan B. Anthony said that she thought it a work of super-erogation that when our political equality was recognized and we became full-fledged American citizens the church would make haste to bring her bibles and prayer books creeds and discipline up to the same high-water mark of liberty Helen Gardner said quote I consider this a most important proposal and if you and I can ever stand the same side of the Atlantic long enough we will join hands and do the work in fact I have begun already with Paul's epistols and I'm fascinated with the work the untenable and unscientific positions he takes in regard to women are very amusing although the first chapter of Genesis teaches the simultaneous creation of man and woman Paul bases woman's subjection on the priority of man and because woman was of the man as the historical fact is that as far back as history dates the man has been of the woman should he therefore be forever in bondage to her logically according to Paul he should end quote I consulted several friends such as Dr. William F. Channing Mr. and Mrs. Mon Q. D. Conway Gertrude Garrison Frederick Cabot and Edward M. Davis as to the advisability of the work and they all agreed that such a volume showing woman's position under the Jewish and Christian religions would be valuable but none of them had time to assist in the project though owing to all these discouragements I discontinued my work I never gave up the hope of renewing it some time when other of my co-adjuders should awake to its importance and offer their services on October 27th 1886 with my daughter nurse and grandchild I again sailed for England going out of the harbor in the clear early morning we had a fine view of Bartaldi's Statue of Liberty enlightening the world we had a warm gentle rain and a smooth sea most of the way and as we had a state room on deck we could have the portholes open and dusk at all the air we desired with novels and letters chess and wist the time passed pleasantly and on the ninth day we landed in Liverpool end of chapter 23