ish Parliament passed,
some time ago, certain acts called the Contagious Disease
Acts, as a sanitary measure, on the model of Continental
legislation. To earnest, religious minds, like Mrs.
Butler's, the acts appear immoral in principle, as declaring
vice a necessity; unjust, as inflicting penalties on women
and letting men go free; and cruel in their application,
enrolling women in a degraded class, making their return to
virtue almost impossible. I think if I tell you that by
these acts a woman can be arrested by a policeman on
suspicion of being a prostitute, and subjected to an
examination which amounts to a surgical operation, always
disgraceful, sometimes injurious, even dangerous, I have
made quite clear to an American lady that such a state of
things can not be endured.

The best English women, with Mrs. Butler and Miss
Nightingale as leaders, stand up nobly for the poor,
degraded women whom, with their true Christian hearts, they
still recognize as sisters. Mrs. Butler, who is rather
delicate, devotes all her strength to this cause at present.
She travels much, has been in the garrison towns, where, for
the benefit of the soldiers, these atrocious acts are in
force, and in large meetings denounces the cruelties to
women. By her efforts more than sixty thousand signatures
have been obtained for the repeal of the acts. Many good
men, I am thankful to say, are on our side, and it is a
matter of congratulation that in this point many people join
who widely differ in other respects. I firmly believe that
this question, which can no longer be avoided, will produce
a great social reform. Women who timidly keep aloof from all
political movements, after this experience of male
legislation, eagerly demand the suffrage.

I am sure you will forgive Mrs. Butler for not writing
herself. As soon as she has a little more breathing time she
is sure to write, but she fears she will never be able to
cross the Atlantic.

Yours sincerely, ROSA BRUHN.
Mrs. P. W. DAVIS.

PARIS, RUE NOLLET 92, 7th Se