time to time,
sacrificing themselves to their stylish bonnets, cloaks, and dresses,
suffering with the heat of the red-hot stove; and yet they, in turn,
pitying me.

My seventy-third birthday I spent with my son Gerrit Smith Stanton, on
his farm near Portsmouth, Iowa. As we had not met in several years, it
took us a long time, in the network of life, to pick up all the stitches
that had dropped since we parted. I amused myself darning stockings and
drawing plans for an addition to his house. But in the spring my son and
his wife came to the conclusion that they had had enough of the solitude
of farm life and turned their faces eastward.

Soon after my return to Omaha, the editor of the _Woman's Tribune_, Mrs.
Clara B. Colby, called and lunched with us one day. She announced the
coming State convention, at which I was expected "to make the best
speech of my life." She had all the arrangements to make, and invited me
to drive round with her, in order that she might talk by the way. She
engaged the Opera House, made arrangements at the Paxton House for a
reception, called on all her faithful coadjutors to arouse enthusiasm in
the work, and climbed up to the sanctums of the editors,--Democratic and
Republican alike,--asking them to advertise the convention and to say a
kind word for our oppressed class in our struggle for emancipation. They
all promised favorable notices and comments, and they kept their
promises. Mrs. Colby, being president of the Nebraska Suffrage
Association, opened the meeting with an able speech, and presided
throughout with tact and dignity.

I came very near meeting with an unfortunate experience at this
convention. The lady who escorted me in her carriage to the Opera House
carried the manuscript of my speech, which I did not miss until it was
nearly time to speak, when I told a lady who sat by my side that our
friend had forgotten to give me my manuscript. She went at once to her
and asked for it. She remembered taking it, but what she had done with
it she did not know. It was suggested that she might have dropped it in
alighting from the carriage. And lo! they found it lying in the gutter.
As the ground was frozen hard it was not even soiled. When I learned of
my narrow escape, I trembled, for I had not prepared any train of
thought for extemporaneous use. I should have been obliged to talk when
my turn came, and if inspired by the audience or the good angels, might
have done well, or might ha