th permanent and peculiar danger, produced by the
feudal condition of women. I allude to the increasing curse of
Mormonism, a consequence of woman's legalized inferiority or
nonentity. With power from your local situation and undoubted
sphere, to influence, for all time, the destiny of every
civilized country, the members of your Convention, conscious of
their duty, will never flinch from the responsibility of their
position. It requires an unequivocal and uncompromising claim for
perfect equality of rights in every department of manual and
machine labor, of thought, of speech, of government, of society,
and of life itself. Indeed, testamentary provision for assertion
of that claim, by those few fortunate women who have, like Mrs.
Blandina Dudley[152], wealth to bestow, should become a ruling
principle, instead of that passion, so strong in death, for
posthumous pulpit and newspaper applause, which Protestantism has
sagaciously substituted in lieu of the saving ordinances of the
Roman Catholic Church.

Respectfully yours,
WILLIAM HAY.

LETTER FROM FRANCES D. GAGE

ST. LOUIS, _November 19, 1856_.

DEAR LUCY STONE:--Most earnestly did I desire to attend this
Seventh National Convention, more especially as I felt that I
should be the only representative from the west side of the great
Father of Waters. But it is impossible for me to remove the
barriers just now opposed to so long a journey and absence from
home. There is much thought in the free States of the great
West--much less of conservatism and rigid adherence to the
old-time customs of law and theology among the masses, than in
the East. Thousands are becoming ready to be baptized into a new
faith, a broader and holier recognition of the rights of
humanity. The harvest-fields are ripening for the reapers.

The gloomy night is breaking--
E'en now the sunbeams rest
With a bright and cheering radiance
On the hill-tops of the West;
The mists are slowly rising
From the valley and the plain,
And a spirit is awaking
That shall never sleep again.

But since I can not meet you in your counci