untry, with little alcohol in it; but those who
warn us against looking on the wine when it is red will be shocked to
hear of these little ones drinking it like milk. Those, however, who
live in Italy say that not once a year do they see any one drunk in the
streets.

I reached South Australia on December 12, 1894, after an absence of 20
months. I found the women's suffrage movement wavering in the balance.
It had apparently come with a rush--as unexpected as it was welcome to
those whose strenuous exertions at last seemed likely to be crowned
with success. Though sympathetic to the cause, I had always been
regarded as a weakkneed sister by the real workers. I had failed to see
the advantage of having a vote that might leave me after an election a
disfranchised voter, instead of an unenfranchised woman. People talk of
citizens being disfranchised for the Legislative Council when they
really mean that they are unenfranchised. You can scarcely be
disfranchised if you have never been enfranchised; and I have regarded
the enfranchisement of the people on the roll as more important for the
time being than adding new names to the rolls. This would only tend to
increase the disproportion between the representative and the
represented. But I rejoiced when the Women's Suffrage Bill was carried,
for I believe that women have thought more and accepted the
responsibilities of voting to a greater extent than was ever expected
of them. During the week I was accorded a welcome home in the old
Academy of Music, Rundle street, where I listened with embarrassment to
the avalanche of eulogium that overwhelmed me. "What a good thing it
is, Miss Spence, that you have only one idea," a gentleman once said to
me on my country tour. He wished thus to express his feeling concerning
my singleness of purpose towards effective voting. But at this welcome
home I felt that others realized what I had often said myself. It is
really because I have so many ideas for making life better, wiser, and
pleasanter all of which effective voting will aid--that I seem so
absorbed in the one reform. My opinions on other matters I give for
what they are worth--for discussion, for acceptance or rejection. My
opinions on equitable representation I hold absolutely, subject to
criticism of methods but impregnable as to principle.

CHAPTER XIX.

PROGRESS OF EFFECTIVE VOTING.

My journalistic work after my return was neither so regular nor so
profitable as