wanted to run for member of the
school board, and Sadie didn't want him to, because he was away from
home enough nights anyway, goodness knows. Sim was stubborn, and said
the night before election that he was going down and have some ballots
printed, anyway, and run. But he didn't, because that night Sadie cut
every button off of every garment he had and threw them down into the
well. When the kindergarten business came up about ten years ago, old
Colonel Ackley hung out against it on the board. Said he wasn't going to
stand for wasting the people's money on such foolishness. But he did,
because the Young Ladies' Vigilance Society came and wept upon his
shoulder. It was organized for that purpose, and after the seventh young
lady had soaked up Ackley's coat, he said he'd either vote for
kindergarten or leave town, and he didn't care much which.

Mrs. Wert Payley, who really runs our school system and once marred her
proud record by defeating a good school superintendent because he didn't
give her daughter good marks, says the English suffragettes are poor
sticks and don't know how to demand the ballot. "If the Homeburg women
were ready to go after any more ballot than we have now," says she,
"would we fool away time getting arrested? Not much! We'd turn our
attention to the men. Every Homeburg woman would take care of her
husband and argue with him. Maybe all the men in town would find 'Votes
for Women' in place of their dinners on the table one night, and sewed
on to their coats the next morning. Maybe they would get corn-meal mush
for thirty days, and maybe, if any he politician presumed to get
obnoxious, he would be dealt with on the public street by a committee.
I know Homeburg, I think, and before Calvin Briggs would stand for the
guying he would receive after half a dozen women had gone down on their
knees to him and grabbed him around the legs so he couldn't get away,
he'd go out of politics. Suffragettes? Bah! What do they know about it?
I'd just like to know how long our men-folks in Homeburg would hold out
if we women were to get sick some fine morning and remain hopeless
invalids until we got the ballot. Why, if Wert Payley presumed to deny
me the ballot, I wouldn't think of parading about it. I'd just have the
girl starch his underwear for about two months, and if that didn't fetch
him, I'd start cleaning house and quit in the middle. The men will give
you anything, if you ask them the right way."

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