Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 1.djvu/486

462 always writing.and talking about the Constitution, interrupted with occasional visits from others of the faithful. Hither came Elizabeth Oakes Smith, Paulina Wright Davis, Frances Dana Gage, Dr. Harriot Hunt, Antoinette Brown, Lucy Stone, Abby Kelly, by turn, until all these names were as familiar as household words to the children.

Martha C. Wright, of Auburn, was a frequent visitor at the center of the rebellion, as my sequestered cottage on Locust Hill was facetiously called. She brought to these councils of war not only her own individual wisdom, but that of the wife and sister of William H. Seward, and sometimes encouraging suggestions from the great statesman himself, from whose writings we often gleaned grand and radical sentiments. Lucretia Mott, too, being an occasional guest at her sister's in Auburn, added the dignity of her presence at many of these important consultations. She was uniformly in favor of toning down our fiery pronunciamentoes. For Miss Anthony and myself, the English language had no words strong enough to express the indignation we felt in view of the prolonged injustice to woman. We found, however, that after expressing ourselves in the most vehement manner, and thus in a measure giving our feelings an outlet, we were reconciled to issue the documents at last in milder terms. If the men of the State could have known the stern rebukes, the denunciations, the wit, the irony, the sarcasm that were garnered there, and then judiciously pigeon-holed, and milder and more persuasive appeals substituted, they would have been truly thankful that they fared no worse.

Mr. Seward, in the brief intervals in his Washington life, made frequent visits in our neighborhood at the house of Judge G. V. Sackett, a man of wealth and some political influence. One of the Senator's standing anecdotes at dinner to illustrate the purifying influence of woman at the polls, which he always told with great zest for my special benefit, was in regard to the manner his wife's sister exercised the right of suffrage.

"Mrs. Worden having the supervision of a farm near Auburn, was obliged to hire two or three men for its cultivation. It was her custom, having examined them as to their capacity to perform the required labor, their knowledge of tools, horses, cattle, gardening, and horticulture, to inquire as to their politics. She informed them that being a woman and a widow, and having no one to represent her, she must have Republicans to do her voting, to represent her political opinions, and it always so happened that the men who offered their services belonged to the Republican party.