When I said " No," he looked worried and as if he
pitied me. Suddenly the mist seemed to clear out of
my brain and I saw individual faces down in front,
some of them old friends who smiled at me encourag-
ingly. Mr. Brett talked for a few minutes, I think
he was giving me a chance to pull my wits together.
I heard him speak of an audience made up of old
friends, old pupils and old schoolmates.
That cheered me. I saw a few people in the front
row who would never go back on me. Then came an
outburst of applause, when it died down, I began to
speak.
All the time I had been feeling there was something
back in my mind I wanted to say. When I got to
my feet it was as easy to say as if I had been talking
to children in the little red school at the Crossroads.
I began to speak of the days when our country was
a vast, untrodden wilderness. I told the story of
our ancestors, beginning with the day when they set



THE SUFFRAGE SITUATION 179

foot on the shore of a lonely bay. I hesitated there.
Somehow I could not find words to make it sufficiently
vivid, then back to my memory verses came leaping
which I had not thought of since I learned them in
childhood. Mrs. Hemans* poem pictured the scene
as I could never do it :

The breaking waves dashed high

On a stern and rockbound coast,
And the woods against a stormy sky,

Their giant branches tossed.
And the heavy night hung dark

The hills and waters o'er
When a band of exiles moored their bark

On the wild New England shore.
