Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 5.djvu/213

 The program assuredly showed no inferiority of mental power. Mrs. Belle de Rivera (N. Y.) depicted Women of Genius, quoting Sappho, Margaret of Navarre, Vittoria Colonna, Angelica Kauffman and others eminent in the annals of history. A newspaper report said of Mrs. Oreola Williams Haskell (N. Y.): "The thoroughness of her address gave the lie to any intimation of frivolity made by her youth and beauty, the pink crêpe de chine dress and the giddy pink bow in her fluffy brown hair." In discussing Women in Politics she said that. "even though debarred from Parliaments and Congresses women will take part in politics because political situations and public events vitally affect their lives" and concluded:

The student. remembering the laws that strove to make women nonentities. the tremendous force of adverse public opinion, the lack of training and preparation. must repudiate forever the usual query of the scoffer. "Why have there not been more eminent women?" and in amazement ask himself. "How does it happen that there have been any?" To those women who would do great things. who sigh for the old days. when the political queen ruled from the salon or the throne, we may say that today woman stands on the threshold of a broader and more real political life than she has ever known. In the future there may he no Sarah Jennings or Mme. de Maintenons. but when to the million-and-a-quarter of the women of our time, who in the United States, in Australia and in New Zealand are exercising the mighty power of the ballot as fully and freely as their brothers. we shall be able to add other enfranchised women of the world. we will have a mighty political sisterhood. free to realize their patriotic dreams and powerful to bring about better conditions for humanity.

Miss Campbell described in an able and interesting manner Women Scholars of the Middle Ages. Miss Brehm pictured Heroes and Heroines. Mrs. Maud Nathan, who had as a subject Women Warriors, according to the reporter, "remarked as she took off her long white kids that she could not handle it with gloves." Declaring that she did not approve of war, she said that nevertheless whenever there was a fight for municipal reform in New York she was in the thick of it. After showing how women had led wars and fallen in battles she concluded:

In the middle ages, when the electors were called upon to defend their cities at the point of the bayonet. we can understand why men considered that women should be debarred from the privilege of