Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 4.djvu/311

 ter equipped than were our pioneers to plead their own cases in the courts, the halls of legislation, the pulpit and the press.

Two large receptions were given to the delegates and visitors, one at the Hotel Aragon, and one by Mrs. W. A. Hemphill, chairman of the Committee on the Professional Work of Women at the approaching Cotton States Exposition soon to be held in Atlanta. She was assisted by Mrs. W. Y. Atkinson, wife of the newly-elected Governor of Georgia.

During several weeks before the convention Miss Anthony and Mrs. Chapman Catt had made a tour of the Southern States, speaking in the principal cities to arouse suffrage sentiment, as this section was practically an unvisited field. Immediately after the convention closed a mass meeting was held in the court-house of Atlanta. Afterwards Mrs. Blake was requested to address the Legislature of North Carolina, Miss Anthony lectured in a number of cities on the way northward, and others were invited to hold meetings in the neighboring States. Most of the speakers and delegates met in Washington on February 15 to celebrate Miss Anthony's seventy-fifth birthday and participate in the triennial convention of the National Council of Women.