gard to the most famous women of
Connecticut, the historic "Maids of Glastonbury," celebrated for
their resistance to taxation. After the death of Abby, July 23,
1878, Mrs. Elizabeth Oakes Smith, in a beautiful tribute to the
sisters, said:

Many years ago they took a stand akin to that of the illustrious
Hampden, which has made his name a synonym for patriotism as well
as just and manly opposition to unconstitutional revenue
exaction. "The tax may be a small matter for an English gentleman
to pay, but it is too much for a British freeman to pay," was
the ground of his noble resistance, and this view precipitated
that great Revolution which more than all other modern movements
consolidated and strengthened the rights of the British subject.
These two women deserve to stand upon a platform side by side
with the great Hampden. Other women have paid their taxes under
protest, but Abby and Julia Smith have done more than protest;
they have suffered loss as well as inconvenience, their property
having been seized and sold again and again because of their
honest conviction that taxation without representation was as
unjust to women as to men. Their steadfastness has been the more
remarkable because, by their social position, their learning and
their wealth, they might be supposed to be indifferent to the
ballot-box, as so many thus situated claim to be. Abby and her
sister were no ordinary women. The family originally consisted of
five sisters, all more or less accomplished. The father was a man
of learning, a graduate of Yale and a clergyman. The mother was
familiar with French and Italian, and no mean astronomer. Thus
parented, it is not surprising that the Glastonbury sisters were
of marked individualism as well as superior scholarship. They
were more or less acquainted with Hebrew, Greek and Latin, and
have made a translation of the Bible from these sources, giving
its original meaning.

The maids of Glastonbury planted themselves upon the right of the
sex to suffrage, from purely philosophic and statesman-like
grounds. They had no other disabilities of which to complain--no
other grievance--no social ostracism, as is so often charged, and
most unjustly, against other advocates of the doctrine. They were
unmarried, studious, upright, simple-minded gentlewome