Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 3.djvu/264

230 now he believes women entitled to stand on an equal plane with men, socially and politically.

The President, Mrs. Stanton, responded. Hannah Whitehall Smith of Germantown, prominent in the temperance movement, spoke of the hardship of farmers' wives, and asked:

If that condition was not one of slavery which obliged a woman to rise early and cook the family breakfast while her husband lay in bed; to work all day long, and then in the evening, while he smoked his pipe or enjoyed himself at the corner grocery, to mend and patch his old clothes. But she thought the position of woman was changing for the better. Even among the Indians a better feeling is beginning to prevail. It is Indian etiquette for the man to kill the deer or bear, and leave it on the spot where it is struck down for the woman to carry home. She must drag it over the ground or carry it on her back as best she may, while he quietly awaits her coming in the family wigwam. A certain Indian, after observing that white folks did differently by their women, once resolved to follow their example. But such was the force of public opinion that, when it was discovered that he brought home his own game, both he and his wife were murdered. This shows what fearful results prejudice may bring about; and the only difference between the prejudice which ruled his tribe in regard to woman and that which rules white American men to-day, is a difference in degree, dependent upon the difference in enlightenment. The principle is the same. The result would be the same were each equally ignorant.

The familiar faces of Edward M. Davis, Mary Grew, Adeline Thompson, Sarah Pugh, Anna McDowell and two of Lucretia Mott's noble daughters, gladdened many a heart during the various sessions of the convention. Beautiful tributes were paid to Mrs. Mott by several of the speakers. The Philadelphia convention was supplemented by a most delightful social gathering, without mention of which a report of the occasion would be incomplete:

Like many historical events, this was entirely unpremeditated, no one who participated in its pleasures had any forewarning, aside from an informal invitation to lunch with Mrs. Hannah Whitehall Smith and her generous husband, both earnest friends of temperance and important allies of the woman suffrage movement. Mrs. Smith met the guests at the station in Philadelphia, tickets in hand, marshaling them to their respective seats in the cars as if born to command, and on arriving at Germantown, transferred them to carriages in waiting, with the promptness of a railroad official. Without noise or confusion one and all crossed the threshold of her well-ordered mansion, and with other invited guests were soon seated in the spacious parlor, talking in groups here and there. "Ah!" said Mrs. Smith on entering, "this will never do, think of all the good things that will be lost in these side talks. My plan is to have a general conversation, a kind of love-feast, each telling her experience. It would be pleasant to