, also gave it a very careful and complimentary
review. In fact, we received far more praise and less blame than we
anticipated. We began the second volume in June. In reading over the
material concerning woman's work in the War, I felt how little our
labors are appreciated. Who can sum up all the ills the women of a
nation suffer from war? They have all of the misery and none of the
glory; nothing to mitigate their weary waiting and watching for the
loved ones who will return no more.
In the spring of 1881, to vary the monotony of the work on the history,
we decided to hold a series of conventions through the New England
States. We began during the Anniversary week in Boston, and had several
crowded, enthusiastic meetings in Tremont Temple. In addition to our
suffrage meetings, I spoke before the Free Religious, Moral Education,
and Heredity associations. All our speakers stayed at the Parker House,
and we had a very pleasant time visiting together in our leisure hours.
We were received by Governor Long, at the State House. He made a short
speech, in favor of woman suffrage, in reply to Mrs. Hooker. We also
called on the Mayor, at the City Hall, and went through Jordan & Marsh's
great mercantile establishment, where the clerks are chiefly young
girls, who are well fed and housed, and have pleasant rooms, with a good
library, where they sit and read in the evening. We went through the
Sherborn Reformatory Prison for Women, managed entirely by women. We
found it clean and comfortable, more like a pleasant home than a place
of punishment.
Mrs. Robinson, Miss Anthony, and I were invited to dine with the Bird
Club. No woman, other than I, had ever had that honor before. I dined
with them in 1870, escorted by "Warrington" of the Springfield
_Republican_ and Edwin Morton. There I met Frank Sanborn for the first
time. Frank Bird held about the same place in political life in
Massachusetts, that Thurlow Weed did in the State of New York for forty
years. In the evening we had a crowded reception at the home of Mrs.
Fenno Tudor, who occupied a fine old residence facing the Common, where
we met a large gathering of Boston reformers. On Decoration Day, May 30,
we went to Providence, where I was the guest of Dr. William F. Channing.
We had a very successful convention there. Senator Anthony and
ex-Governor Sprague were in the audience and expressed great pleasure,
afterward, in all they had heard. I preached in Rev. Frederick
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