ed thousand people
stopping their mad grabs at limousines and country houses, and blocking
up the streets to watch a few women parading in the interest of the
ballot for psyche knots as well as bald heads. It's wonderful! How did
the women persuade you to do it? I can't help thinking that they lost a
tremendous chance for the cause. Think how much money the ladies would
have made if each one had worn a sandwich board advertising some new
breakfast food or velveteen tobacco! With a crowd like this reading
every word, they could have charged enough to pay the expenses of a
whole campaign!

It's the crowd that interested me. As far as the parade went, it wasn't
so much. Half a hundred women in cloaks and staffs setting off on foot
for Washington or Honolulu isn't terrifically exciting. I'd a lot rather
go down the line about twenty or thirty miles and watch them come in to
roost at night. There would be some inhuman interest in that. But what
does all this mob mean? Have you New Yorkers gone crazy over suffrage?
What! Just the novelty of the thing? Well, let me tell you then, you are
goners! You may not want suffrage now, but if the women are going to
choke traffic every time they spring a novelty, you're going to have to
grant them suffrage just to get the chance to attend to business now and
then.

Me? Of course I'm a suffragist. I'm a suffragist on twenty counts. No,
thanks, I won't argue the question now, because we have to get over to
the hotel for dinner in an hour or two, and there's no use starting a
thing you will have to leave in the middle. I'll just tell you the last
count to save time, and let it go at that. I'm a suffragist because I
want the rest of mankind to have what we've had in Homeburg for the last
twenty years or so. We've been through the whole thing. Whenever a man's
been through anything, he naturally isn't content until he can stand by
and watch some other man get his. Understand? I'm for suffrage in aged
little New York. I want you to have it and have it a plenty. And I want
to watch you while you're having it. It's a grand thing when you've got
used to it. It will do you good, Jim, just like medicine.

Do women vote in Homeburg? Of course they do. I'd like to see anybody
stop them. I don't mean that they vote for President. That is, they
won't until next time. It's only the more important elections that they
take part in. Oh, I know you folks in the big town think that unless
you're voting fo