fulsome
adulation, and given a seat of honor near the officers of the day;
Prince Oscar of Sweden, a stripling of sixteen, on whose shoulder
rests the promise of a future kingship, was seated near. Count
Rochambeau of France, the Japanese commissioners, high officials
from Russia and Prussia, from Austria, Spain, England, Turkey,
representing the barbarism and semi-civilization of the day, found
no difficulty in securing recognition and places of honor upon that
platform, where representative womanhood was denied.

Though refused by their own countrymen a place and part in the
centennial celebration, the women who had taken this presentation
in hand were not to be conquered. They had respectfully asked for
recognition; now that it had been denied, they determined to seize
upon the moment when the reading of the Declaration of Independence
closed, to proclaim to the world the tyranny and injustice of the
nation toward one-half its people. Five officers of the National
Woman Suffrage Association, with that heroic spirit which has ever
animated lovers of liberty in resistance to tyranny, determined,
whatever the result, to present the woman's declaration of rights
at the chosen hour. They would not, they dared not sacrifice the
golden opportunity to which they had so long looked forward; their
work was not for themselves alone, nor for the present generation,
but for all women of all time. The hopes of posterity were in their
hands and they determined to place on record for the daughters of
1976, the fact that their mothers of 1876 had asserted their
equality of rights, and impeached the government of that day for
its injustice toward woman. Thus, in taking a grander step toward
freedom than ever before, they would leave one bright remembrance
for the women of the next centennial.

That historic Fourth of July dawned at last, one of the most
oppressive days of that terribly heated season. Susan B. Anthony,
Matilda Joslyn Gage, Sara Andrews Spencer, Lillie Devereux Blake
and Phoebe W. Couzins made their way through the crowds under the
broiling sun to Independence Square, carrying the Woman's
Declaration of Rights. This declaration had been handsomely
engrossed by one of their number, and signed by the oldest and most
prominent advocates of woman's enfranchisement. Their tickets of
admission proved open sesame through the military and all other
barriers, and a few moments before the opening of the ceremonies,
these wom