her pleasant
drawing-room--she said it could not be true! My reports were
exaggerated--women were sentimental--the authorities managed these
places with great wisdom. They are so horrible, I said, they drive women
to the streets. She assured me I was mistaken. I asked her if she had
ever been inside a mixed lodging-house. She never had. But the casual
wards she knew about. They were so well managed she herself wouldn't
mind at all spending a night in one of these municipal provisions for
the homeless. Then I said, "You are the woman I am looking for! Come
with me one night and try it. What night shall it be?" She said she was
engaged in writing a book. She could not interrupt her work. But I said,
if those rate-supported places are so comfortable, it won't interfere
with your work. She _turned the conversation_. She talked about the
Commission. The Commission was going to make a thorough scientific
investigation. Nothing amateur about the Commission. The lady was
sincere'--Mrs. Thomas vouched for it--'she had a comfortable faith in
the Commission. But, I say'--the woman leaned forward in her
earnestness--'I say that Commission will waste its time! I don't deny it
will investigate and discuss the position of the outcast women of this
country. Their plight, which is the work of men, will once more be
inquired into by men. I say there should be women on that Commission. If
the middle and upper class women have the dignity and influence men
pretend they have, why aren't they represented there? Nobody pretends
the matter doesn't concern the mothers of the nation. It concerns them
horribly. Nobody can think so ill of them as to suppose they don't care.
It's monstrous that men should sit upon that committee alone. Women have
had to think about these things. We believe this evil can be met--if men
will let us try. It may be that only women comprehend it, since men
through the ages have been helpless before it. Why, then, once again,
this Commission of _men_? The mockery of it! Setting men to make their
report upon this matter to men! I am not a public speaker, but I am a
wife and a mother. Do you wonder that hearing about that Commission gave
me courage to take the first opportunity to join these brave sisters of
mine who are fighting for political liberty?'

She seemed for the first time to notice that a little group of
sniggerers were becoming more obstreperous.

'We knew, of course, that whatever we say some of you will lau