Women wanted: The story written in blood red letters on the horizon of the Great World War (2024)

To My Friend

KATHERINE LECKIE

THE ILLUMINATION OF

WHOSE PERSONALITY HAS

LIGHTED MY PATHWAY TO

TRUTH, THIS BOOK IS

AFFECTIONATELY

DEDICATED

ILLUSTRATIONS

CHAPTER I

Glimpsing the Great World War

“Who goes there?”

I hear it yet, the ringing challenge from the waroffices of Europe. Automatically my hand slidesover my left hip. But to-day my tailored skirtdrapes smoothly there.

The chamois bag that for months has bulged beneathis gone. As regularly as I fastened my gartersevery morning I have been wont to buckle the safetybelt about my waist and straighten the bag at myside and feel with careful fingers for its tight shutclasp. You have to be thoughtful like that whenyou’re carrying credentials on which at any momentyour personal safety, even your life may depend.As faithfully as I looked under the bed at night Ialways counted them over: my letter of credit for$3,000, my blue enveloped police book, and my passportcriss-crossed with visés in the varied colours ofall the rubber stamps that must officially vouch forme along my way. Ah, they were still all there.And with a sigh of relief I was wont to retire to my[14]pillow with the sense of one more day safely done.

The long steel lines I have passed, I cannot forget.“Who goes there?” These that speak withauthority are men with pistols in their belts andswords at their sides. And there are rows of them, Orows and rows of them along the way to the front.See the cold glitter of them! I still look nervouslyfirst over one shoulder and then over the other. Thismorning at breakfast a waiter only drops a fork.And I jump at the sound as if a shot had been fired.You know the feeling something’s going to catchyou if you don’t watch out. Well, you have it likethat for a long time after you’ve been in the warzone. Will it be a submarine or a Zeppelin or akhaki clad line of steel?

It was on a summer’s day in 1916 that I rushedinto the office of the Pictorial Review. “Look!” Iexclaimed excitedly to the editor at his desk. “Seethe message in the sky written in letters of bloodabove the battlefields of Europe! There it is, thepromise of freedom for women!”

He brushed aside the magazine “lay out” beforehim, and lifted his eyes to the horizon of the world.And he too saw. Among the feminists of New Yorkhe has been known as the man with the vision.“Yes,” he agreed, “you are right. It is the wonderthat is coming. Will you go over there and findout just what this terrible cataclysm of civilisationmeans to the woman’s cause?”

And he handed me my European commission.The next morning when I applied for my passport[15]I began to be written down in the great books ofjudgment which the chancelleries of the nations keepto-day. Hear the leaves rustle as the pages chroniclemy record in full. I must clear myself of thecharge of even a German relative-in-law. I mustbe able to tell accurately, say, how many blocksintervene between the Baptist Church and the cityhall in the town where I was born. They want toknow the colour of my husband’s eyes. They willask for all that is on my grandfather’s tombstone.They must have my genealogy through all my greatestancestors. I have learned it that I may tell itglibly. For I shall scarcely be able to go round theblock in Europe, you see, without meeting some militaryperson who must know.

Even in New York, every consul of the countriesto which I wish to proceed, puts these inquiries beforemy passport gets his visé. It is the British consulwho is holding his in abeyance. He fixes mewith a look, and he charges: “You’re not a suffragist,are you? Well,” he goes on severely, “theydon’t want any trouble over there. I don’t knowwhat they’ll do about you over there.” And hisvoice rises with his disapproval: “I don’t at allknow that I ought to let you go.”

But finally he does. And he leans across his desk and passesme the pen with which to “sign on the dotted line.” It is therequired documentary evidence. He feels reasonably sure now thatthe Kaiser and I wouldn’t speak if we passed by. And for the rest?Well, all governments demand to know very[16] particularly who goes there when it happensto be a woman. You’re wishing trouble on yourself to be a suffragistalmost as much as if you should elect to be a pacifist or an alienenemy. There is a prevailing opinion—which is a hang-over from say1908 —that you may break something, if it is only a military rule.Why are you wandering about the world anyhow? You’ll take up a man’splace in the boat in a submarine incident. You’ll be so in the way in abombardment. And you’ll eat as much sugar in a day as a soldier. So, doyour dotted lines as you’re told.

They dance before my eyes in a dotted itinerary.It stretches away and away into far distant lands,where death may be the passing event in any day’swork. I shall face eternity from, say, the time thatI awake to step into the bath tub in the morning until,having finished the last one hundredth strokewith the brush at night, I lay my troubled head onthe pillow to rest uneasily beneath a heavy magazineassignment. “There’s going to be some risk,”the editor of the Pictorial Review said to me thatday in his office, with just a note of hesitation in hisvoice. “I’ll take it,” I agreed.

The gangway lifts in Hoboken. We are cuttingadrift from the American shore. Standing at thesteamship’s rail, I am gazing down into faces thatare dear. Slowly, surely they are dimming throughthe ocean’s mists. Shall I ever again look into eyesthat look back love into mine?

I think, right here, some of the sparkle begins to[17]fade from the great adventure on which I am embarked.We are steaming steadily out to sea.Whither? It has commenced, that anxious thoughtfor every to-morrow, that is with a war zone travellereven in his dreams. A cold October wind whipsfull in my face. I shiver and turn up my coat collar.But is it the wind or the pain at my heart? I canno longer see the New York sky line for the tearsin my eyes. And I turn in to my stateroom.

There on the white counterpane of my berthstretches a life-preserver thoughtfully laid out bymy steward. On the wall directly above the wash-stand,a neatly printed card announces: “The occupantof this room is assigned to Lifeboat 17 on thestarboard side.” It makes quite definitely clear thecirc*mstances of ocean travel. This is to be no holidayjaunt. One ought at least to know how to weara life-preserver. Before I read my steamer letters,I try mine on. It isn’t a “perfect 36.” “But theydon’t come any smaller,” the steward says. “Youjust have to fold them over so,” and he ties thestrings tight. Will they hold in the highest sea, Iwonder.

The signs above the washstands, I think, have beenseen by pretty nearly every one before lunch time.When we who are taking the Great Chance together,assemble in the dining-room, each of us has glimpsedthe same shadowy figure at the wheel in the pilothouse. We all earnestly hope it will be the captainwho will take us across the Atlantic. But we[18]know also that it may be the ghostly figure of theboatman Charon who will take us silently across theStyx.

Whatever else we may do on this voyage, we shallhave to be always going-to-be-drowned. It is acuriously continuously present sensation. I don’tknow just how many of my fellow travellers go tobed at night with the old nursery prayer in theirminds if not on their lips. But I know that for meit is as vivid as when I was four years old:

Each morning I awake in faint surprise that I am still here inthis same seasick world. The daily promenade begins with a tour ofinspection to one’s personal lifeboat. Everybody does it. You wishto make sure that it has not sprung a leak over night. Then you leanover the steamship’s rail to look for the great letters four feet highand electrically illuminated after dark, for all prowling underseaGerman craft to notice that this is the neutral New Amsterdamof the Holland-American line. Submarine warfare has not yet reachedits most savage climax. Somebody says with confident courage: “Nowthat makes us quite safe, don’t you think?” And somebody answers aspromptly as expected. “Oh, I’m sure they wouldn’t sink us when they seethat sign.” And no one speaks the thought that’s plain in every[19] face: “But Huns make‘mistakes.’ And remember the Lusitania.”

We always are remembering the Lusitania. Inever dress for dinner at night without recalling:And they went down in evening clothes. We playcards. We dance on deck. But never does onecompletely while away the recurring thought:Death snatched them as suddenly as from this mynext play or as from the Turkey Trot or the Maxixethat the band is just beginning.

We read our Mr. Britlings but intermittently.The plot in which we find ourselves competes withthe best seller. Subconsciously I am always listeningfor the explosion. If the Germans don’t do itwith a submarine, it may be a floating mine that thelast storm has lashed loose from its moorings.

What is this? Rumour spreads among the steamerchairs. Everybody rises. Little groups gatherwith lifted glasses. And—it is a piece of driftwoodsighted on the wide Atlantic. That thrill walks offin about three times around the deck.

But what is that, out there, beyond the steamer’spath? Right over there where the fog is lifting?Surely, yes, that shadowy outline. Don’t you seeit? Why, it’s growing larger every minute. I believeit is! Oh, yes, I’m sure they look like that.Wait. Well, if it were, it does seem as if the torpedowould have been here by now. Ah, we shallnot be sunk this time after all! Our periscopepasses. It is clearly now only a steamship’s funnelagainst the horizon.

[20]

Then one day there is an unusual stir of activityon deck. The sailors are stripping the canvas fromoff the lifeboats. The great crane is hauling the liferafts from out the hold. Oh, what is going to happen?The most nervous passenger wants right awayto know. And the truthful answer to her query is,that no one can tell. But we are making ready nowfor shipwreck. In these days, methodically, like thisit is done. It has to be, as you approach the moreintense danger zone of a mined coast. You see younever can tell.

I go inside once more to try the straps of mylife-preserver. But we are sailing through a sunlitsea. And at dinner the philosopher at our table—heis a Hindu from Calcutta—says smilingly, “Now thiswill do very nicely for shipwreck weather, gentlemen,very nicely for shipwreck weather.” It is theround-faced Hollander at my right, of orthodoxPresbyterian faith, who protests earnestly, “Ah, butplease no. Do not jest.” The next day when thedishes slide back and forth between the table racks,none of us laugh when the Hollander says solemnly,“See, but if God should call us now.” Ah, if heshould, our life boats would never last us to Heaven.They would crumple like floats of paper in Neptune’shand. Eating our dessert, we look out onthe terrible green and white sea that licks and slapsat the portholes and all of us are very still. Thelace importer from New York at my left, is themost quiet of all.

For eight days and nights we have escaped all[21]the perils of the deep. And now it is the morningof the ninth day. You count them over like thatmomentously as God did when he made the world.What will to-morrow bring forth? Well, one preparesof course for landing.

I sit up late, nervously censoring my note bookthrough. The nearer we get to the British coast,the more incriminating it appears to be familiar withso much as the German woman movement. I digmy blue pencil deep through the name of Frau Cauer.I rip open the package of my letters of introduction.What will they do to a person who is going to meeta pacifist by her first name? That’s a narrow escape.Another letter is signed by a perfectly good loyalAmerican who, however, has the misfortune to haveinherited a Fatherland name from some generationsbefore. Oh, I cannot afford to be acquainted witheither of my friends. I’ve got to be pro-ally allwool and yard wide clear to the most inside seamsof my soul. I’ve got to avoid even the appearanceof guilt. So, stealthily I tiptoe from my stateroomto drop both compromising letters into the sea.

Like this a journalist goes through Europe thesedays editing oneself, to be acceptable to the rowsof men in khaki. So I edit and I edit and I edit myselfuntil after midnight for the British government’sinspection. I try to think earnestly. What woulda spy do? So that I may avoid doing it. And Igo to bed so anxious lest I act like a spy that I dreamI am one. When I awake on the morning of thetenth day, all our engines are still. And from bow[22]to stern, our boat is all a-quiver with glad excitement.We have not been drowned! There beside us dancesthe little tender to take us ashore at Falmouth.

FACING THE STEEL LINE OF INQUIRY

The good safe earth is firm beneath our feet beforethe lace importer speaks. Then, looking outon the harbor, he says: “On my last business tripover a few months since, my steamship came in heresafely. But the boat ahead and the next behindeach struck a mine.” So the chances of life are likethat, sometimes as close as one in three. But whileyou take them as they come, there are lesser difficultiesthat it’s a great relief to have some one to dosomething about. At this very moment I am devoutlyglad for the lace importer near at hand. Heis carrying my bag and holding his umbrella overme in the rain. For, you see, he is an Americanman. The more I have travelled, the more certainI have become that it’s a mistake to be a woman anywherein the world there aren’t American men around. Infar foreign lands I have found myself instinctivelylooking round the landscape for their first aid.The others, I am sure, mean well. But they aren’tlike ours. An Englishman gave me his card last nightat dinner: “Now if I can do anything for you inLondon,” he said, and so forth. It was the Americanman now holding his umbrella over me in the rain,who came yesterday to my steamer chair: “It’sgoing to be dark to-morrow[23]night in London,” he said, “and the taxicabs arescarce. You must let me see that you reach yourhotel in safety.” And I felt as sure a reliance inhim as if we’d made mud pies together or he’d carriedmy books to school. You see, you count on anAmerican man like that.

But the cold line of steel! That you have to doalone, even as you go each soul singly to the judgmentgate of heaven. I grip my passport hard. Ithas been removed from its usual place of securesafety. Chamois bags are the eternal bother ofbeing a woman abroad in war-time. Men havepockets, easy ones to get at informally. I haveamong my “most important credentials”—they arein separate packages carefully labelled like that—aspecial “diplomatic letter” commending me officiallyby the Secretary of State to the protection ofall United States embassies and consulates. Whenthey handed it to me in Washington, I rememberthey told me significantly: “We have just pickedout of prison over there, two American correspondentswhose lives we were able to save by the narrowestchance. We don’t want any internationalcomplications. Now, do be careful.”

I’m going to be. The Tower of London and somemodern Bastille on the banks of the Seine and diversother dark damp places of detention over here areat this minute clearly outlining themselves as movingpictures before my mind. I earnestly don’t wantto be in any of them.

We have reached the temporary wooden shack[24]through which governments these days pass all whoknock for admission at their frontiers. Inside thenext room there at a long pine table sit the men withpistols in their belts and swords at their sides, whosebusiness it is to get spies when they see them. Weare to be admitted one by one for the relentless fireof their cross-questioning. They have taken “Britishsubjects first.” Now they summon “aliens.”

To be called an alien in a foreign land feels atonce like some sort of a charge. You never wereconvicted of this before. And it seems like themost unfortunate thing you can possibly be now.Besides, I am every moment becoming more acutelyconscious of my mission. The rest of these my fellowtravellers, it is true, are aliens. I am worse.For a journalist even in peace times appears a mostsuspiciously inquiring person who wishes to knoweverything that should not be found out. But inpeace times one has only to handle individuals. Inwar-times one has to handle governments. The burdenof proof rests heavier and heavier upon me.How shall I convince England that in spite of all,I can be a most harmless, pleasant person?

From the decision the other side of that door, therewill be no appeal. The men in khaki there haveauthority to confiscate my notes—or me! And theyare so particular about journalists. One friend ofmine back from the front a month ago had hisclothes turned inside out and they ripped the liningfrom his coat. Then there is the lemon acid bath,lest you carry notes in invisible writing on your[25]skin. They do it, rumor says, in Germany. Butwho can tell when other War Offices will haveadopted this efficiency method? Oh, dear, what isthe use not to have been drowned if one must facean inquisition? And they may turn me back onthe next boat. My thoughts are with the lemonacid bath. How many lemons will it take to fillthe tub, I am speculatively computing, when “Next,”says the soldier. And it is I.

A battery of searching eyes is turned on me. Iam face to face with my first steel line. The wordsof the British consul again ring warningly in myears, “I don’t at all know what they’ll do about youover there.”

No one ever does know these days. It’s the tormentinguncertainty that keeps you literally guessingfrom day to day whether you’re going or coming.And on what least incidents does human judgmentdepend. Perhaps they’d like me better if myhat were blue instead of brown. Thank heaven Ididn’t economise on the price of my travelling coat.I step bravely forward when the officer at the headof the table reaches out his hand for my passport.

In the upper left hand corner is attached my photograph.The Department of State at Washington requires it forall travellers now before they affix the great redseal that gives authenticity to the personalinformation recorded in this paper. From the passportphotograph to my face, the officer glancessharply, suspiciously, like a bank teller looking fora forgery. I feel him looking straight through me[26]to the very curl at the back of my neck. Ah, apparentlyit is I!

“Now what have you come over here for?” he inquiresin a tone of voice that seems to say, “Nobodyasked you to England. We’re quite too busy aboutother things to entertain strangers.”

I hand him my official journalistic letter addressed“To Whom it may Concern.” Signed by the editorof the Pictorial Review, it states that I am delegatedto study the new position of women due tothe war. Will he want me to? He may be assensitive as the British consul in New York aboutthe woman movement. He may prefer that itshould not move at all.

I hold my breath while he reads the letter. ThenI have to talk. I tell him, I think, the completestory of my life. I show him all of my credentials.I give him my photograph. You always have todo that. Photographs that are duplicates of the oneon your passport, you must carry by the dozen. Youhave to leave them like visiting cards with gentlemenin khaki all over Europe.

Well, what is he going to do about me? I getout my letters of social introduction. There are 84!I strew them on the table for him to read. Thereis a door just behind his head. Will it be in there,the search and the confiscation and the lemon acidbath? I wonder, and I wonder. But I try tostand very still. If I move one foot, it might jarthe decision that is forming in the officer’s mind. Iam watching alertly for his expression. But there[27]isn’t any. I can’t tell at all whether he likes me.An Englishman is always like that, completely shutup behind his face. It may be at this very momenthe has made up his mind that I am a spy. He hasread only four letters——

And he looks up suddenly, in his hand the letterfrom Mrs. Belmont in New York introducing me tothe duch*ess of Marlborough. He nods down theline to all the other military eyes fixed on me:“She’s all right. Let her go.”

I sign on the dotted line. And everything is over!In a flashing moment like that, it is accomplished.And a letter to “Our duch*ess” has done it. At themagic of the name of the American woman who wasConsuelo Vanderbilt, this steel like line of Britishofficers quietly sheathes all opposition!

The soldier at the other end of the room opens alittle wooden door in a wooden wall that lets meinto England. My baggage is already being chalkmarked “passed.” I am here! I clutch my passporthappily and convulsively in my hand. Youhave to do that until you can restore it to the saferplace. It’s the most important item in what theFrench call your “pieces de identité.” At any momenta policeman in the Strand, a gendarme in theAvenue de l’Opéra may tap an alien on the shoulderwith the pertinent inquiry, Who are you?

THE WAY OF JOURNALISM IN WAR TIME NOT EASY

London, when we reached it that night in October,lay under the black pall of darkness in which the[28]cities over here have enveloped themselves againstwar. Death rides above in the sky. To-night,every to-night, it may be the Zeppelins will come.Over there on the horizon, a searchlight streams suddenlyand another and another, their great fingersfeeling through the black clouds for the monsters ofdestruction that may be winging a way above thechimney pots. Every building is tightly shuttered.The street lamps with their globes painted three-quartersblack have their pale lights as it were hidbeneath an inverted bushel. Pedestrians must developa protective sense that enables them to findtheir way at night as a cat does in the dark. “I’msorry,” says an apologetic English voice, and beforeyou know it, you have bumped against anotherpasserby. There is another sudden jolt. And youare scrambling for your balance the other side of thecurb you couldn’t see was there. If you are familiarwith the door knob where you’re going to stop, youwill be so much the surer where you’re at.

Looking out on this darkest London from Paddingtonrailway station at midnight I sit on my trunkand wait. Do you remember the popular song,There’s a Little Street in Heaven Called Broadway?Oh, I hope there is.

I sit on my trunk and wait. In my handbag isthe card of the Englishman politely ready to lookafter me in London. It is the American man who isout there in the night endeavouring to commandeera taxicab. Somehow he has done it. At last thecab comes. He has compelled the chauffeur to take[29]us. I shall not have to sit all night on my trunk.

A small green light within the hooded entrance,picks the Ritz Hotel out of the Piccadilly blackness.Inside, after the gloom through which we have come,I gasp with relief. It is as if one discovers suddenlyin a place that has seemed a graveyard, Why, peoplestill live here! Right then at the hotel register, thevoice of Scotland Yard speaks for the War Office.And before the Ritz can be permitted to give merefuge from the night, I must answer. The “registrationblank” presented for me to fill in, demandscertain definite information: “(1) Surname. (2)Christian names. (3) Nationality. (4) Birthplace.(5) Year of birth. (6) Sex. (7) Full residentialaddress: Full business address. (8) Trade oroccupation. (9) Served in what army, navy or policeforce. (10) Full address where arrived from.(11) Date of signing. (12) Signature.” And alittle below, “(13) Full address of destination.(14) Date of departure. (15) Signature.” Alast line in conspicuous italics admonishes: “Penaltyfor failing to give this information correctly 100pounds or six months imprisonment.” Well, ofcourse a threat like that will make even a woman tellher age as many times as she is asked. But I do itrebelliously against the Kaiser and all his Prussians.For the “registration blank” was made in Germany.I remember it before the war, at the Hotel Adlon inBerlin.

I must sign now on the dotted line before I caneven go to bed. I arrange my clothing carefully on[30]a chair within reach of my hand. You rest that wayin a warring city, always ready to run. The Zeppelinsmay come so swiftly. In London you knowyour nearest cellar. In France you have selectedyour high vaulted entrance arch under which to takerefuge when the sirens go screaming down the street,“Gardez vous, Gardez vous.”

The sense of depression that had enwrapped me inthe first darkness of London was not gone when Iclosed my eyes in sleep. One does not throw it off.You may not be of those who are wearing crêpe.But you cannot escape the woe of the world whichwill enfold you like a garment.

In the morning the ordinary business of living hasbecome one of strenuous detail. The law requiresthat an alien shall register with the police within 24hours of arrival. When I have thus established acalling acquaintance at the Vine Street station, I goout into Piccadilly feeling like a prisoner politely onparole. And I face an environment strung all overwith barbed wire restrictions on my movements.Every letter that comes for me from America will beread before I receive it, marked “Opened by the Censor.”If I wish to go away from this country, Imust ask the permission of the Foreign Office, theconsulate of the country to which I wish to proceedand my own consulate before I can so much as purchasea ticket. I may not leave London for any “restrictedarea” where there has been an Irish revolutionor a German bombardment without the consent ofScotland Yard. I may not even leave the Ritz[31]Hotel, which is registered as my official place of residence,for more steam-heat at the Savoy, withoutnotifying the Vine Street Station of my departureand the Bow Street Station of my arrival. The Defenceof the Realm and the Trading with the EnemyActs and others in a land at war are lying aroundlike bombs all over the place. Have a care that youdon’t run into them!

I am alone one evening at the International SuffrageHeadquarters in Adam Street, deep lost in asociological study of carefully filed data. Do youbelieve in subconscious warnings? Anyhow, I ambending over a box of manila envelopes when suddenly,out of the silence of this top floor room, I amimpressed with a sense of danger. It is as plain andclear as if a voice over my shoulder said “Look out.”I do look up quickly. And there on the wall beforemy eyes, I read Order 4 from the Defence of theRealm Act, commonly enough posted all over London,I discover later. But this is the first time Ihave seen it. It reads: “The curtains of this roommust be drawn at sundown.” And from two windowswith wide open curtains, my brilliant electriclight is streaming out on the London darkness, oh, asfar as Trafalgar Square for all the German Zeppelinsand Scotland Yard to see! Just for an instant I amparalysed with the fear of them all. Then my handfinds the electric button and I hastily switch myselfinto the protecting darkness. Somehow I grope myway through the hall and down the staircase. And Islam the outer door hurriedly. There, when the[32]police arrive, I shall be gone! In the morning papera week or so afterward I read one day of an earl’sdaughter even, who had been arrested and fined 25pounds for “permitting a beam of light to escapefrom her window.”

The government is regulating everything, the icinga housewife may not put on a cake, the number ofcourses one may have for dinner, even the conversationat table. Let an American with the habit offree speech beware! Notices conspicuously postedin public places advise, “Silence.” In France theyput it most picturesquely, “Say nothing. Be suspicious.The ears of the enemy are always open.”Absolutely the only safe rule, then, is to learn tohold your tongue. Everybody’s doing it over here.Very well, I will not talk. But what about all therest of this silent world that will not, either? Forthose under military orders, the rule is absolute.And you’ve no idea how many people are under militaryorders. This is a war with even the women inkhaki. I begin to feel that to get into so much as adrawing-room, I ought to have my merely social letterof introduction crossed with some kind of a visé.Wouldn’t a hostess, even the duch*ess of Marlborough,be able to be more cordial if she knew that Ihad seen the Government before I saw her? Eventhe girl conductor on the ’bus this morning, when Iessayed to ask her as Exhibit 1 in the new-woman-in-industryI was looking for, how she liked her job,turned and scurried down her staircase like a frightenedrabbit.

[33]

So, this is not to be the simple life for researchwork. And though I come through all the submarinesand the lines of steel, and the Zeppelins havenot got me yet, what shall it profit me to save mylife and lose my assignment? I am bound for thefront and for certain information I am to gather onthe way. Now, what should a journalist do?

Well, a journalist, I discovered, should get one’sself personally conducted by Lord Northcliffe.There were those of my masculine contemporariesalready headed for the front whom he was said onarrival here to have received into the bosom of hisnewspaper office and put to bed to rest from thenervous exhaustion of travel, and sent a secretaryand a check and anything else to make them happy.And then he asked them only to name the day theywanted to see Woolwich or to cross to France. Butnothing like that was happening to me. So whatelse should a journalist do?

Well, evidently a journalist should get in goodstanding with a war office which alone can press thebutton to everywhere she wants to go. The shortcut to a war office is through a press bureau. But apress bureau modestly shrinks from the publicity thatit purveys. You do not find it on Main Street witha lettered signboard and a hand pointing: “Journalists,right this way.” And you can’t run rightup the front steps of a war office and ring the bell.It would be a what-do-you-call-it, a faux pas if youdid. Even for a private residence it would be that.There isn’t anywhere that I know of over here even[34]in peace time that as soon as you reach town you cancall a hostess up on the telephone and have her say,“Oh, you’re the friend of Sallie Smith that she’swritten me about. Come right along up to dinner.”Why, the butler would tell you her ladyship or hergrace or something like that was not at home. Itjust can’t be done like that outside of America.You don’t rush into the best English circles that way,much less the English government. Absolutely youronly way around is through a formal correspondence.

One day I wrap myself in the rose satin downbed-quilt at the Ritz and spread out my letters ofintroduction to choose a journalistic lead. Thereare carved cupids on the walls of this bedroom, anda lovely rose velvet carpet on the floor and heavyrose silk hanging at the windows. But there isn’tany place to be warm. The tiny open grate holdssix or it may be seven coals—you see why Dickensalways writes of “coals” in the plural—and you putthem on delicately with things like the sugar tongs.It isn’t good form to be warm in England. Thebest families aren’t. It’s plebeian and Americaneven to want to be.

My soul is all curled up with the cold while I amtrying to determine which letter. This to Sir GilbertParker was the 84th letter handed me by theeditor of the Pictorial Review as I stepped on theboat. It is the one I now select first, quite by chance,without the least idea of where it is to lead me. Thenext evening at 6 o’clock I am on my way to Wellington[35]House. “Sir Gilbert,” speaks the attendantin resplendent livery. And I find myself in a statelyEnglish room. There, down the length of the redvelvet carpet beneath the glow of a red shaded electriclamp, a man with very quiet eyes is rising fromhis chair. “Do you know where you are?” he askswith a smile, glancing at the letter of introduction onhis desk that tells of my mission. “This,” he says,“is the headquarters of the English government’spress bureau for the war and I am in charge of theAmerican publicity.” Who cares for Lord Northcliffenow! Or even the King of England! Of allthe inhabitants of this land, here was the man ajournalist would wish to meet. The man who haswritten “The Seats of the Mighty” sits in them.From his desk here in the red room he can touch thebutton that will open all the right doors to me. Hecan’t do it immediately, in war-time. One has tomake sure first. I must come often to WellingtonHouse. There are days when we talk of manythings, of life and of New York. He is less and lessof a formal Englishman. His title is slipping away.He is beginning to be just Gilbert Parker, who mighthave belonged to the Authors’ League up on Forty-secondStreet. I half suspect he does. “I do knowmy America rather well,” he says at length. “Imarried a girl from Fifty-seventh Street. And Ihave a brother who lives in St. Paul.”

It is the way his voice thrills on “my America.”I am sure any American correspondent hearing itwould have been ready even in the fall of 1916 to[36]clasp hands across the sea in the Anglo-Americancompact to win this war. Gilbert Parker is in tunewith the American temperament. He doesn’t weara monocle. And he says to a woman “Now, whatcan I do for you?” in just the tone of voice that anAmerican man would use when everything is goingto be all right. I remember the red room just beforehe said it. Everything hung in the balance for meat this moment: “I have confidence in Mr. Vance,your editor. I know him,” reflects the man who isdeciding. “But—are you in ‘Who’s Who’?” Justfor the lack of a line in a book, a government’s goodfavour might have been lost! But he reached for thecopy above his desk. “Any more credentials?” heasks. I cast desperately about in my mind—anddrop a Phi Beta key in his hand. “I won’t takethat up on you,” he says with a smile. And mycause is won.

THE WAY IT IS DONE

Long important envelopes lettered across the top“On His Majesty’s Service” begin to arrive in mymail. All the government offices will be “at home”and helpful—when a personal interview has furtherconvinced each that I am clearly not at all a Germanperson nor the dangerous species of the suffragist.Where are the slippers that will match this gown?And which are the beads that will be best? Mine isa hazardous undertaking, you see, that requires all ofthe art at the command of a woman: I must so statethe mission on which I have come that my woman[37]movement may seem pleasing in the eyes of a man—why,possibly a man whose country house even mayhave been burned in behalf of votes for women!Clearly I must mind my phrases, to get my permits.And if you’re a journalist in war-time, you need thepermit as you do your daily bread.

To get it, you write about it and call about it andwrite about it some more. And then it comes likethis:

Or it comes like this:

[38]

England in war-time is open for my inspection.I am getting my data nicely when one day theredevelops the dilemma of getting away with it. Iopen the Times one morning to read a new law:“On and after Dec. 1,” the newspaper announces,“no one may be permitted to take out of Englandany photograph or printed or written material otherthan letters.” I have a trunkful. Clearly I can’tget by any khaki line with that concealed about myperson. Sir Gilbert walks twice, three times up anddown the red room. “I’ll see what I can do aboutit,” he says. “I don’t know. But I’ll try.” A fewdays later my data begins to go right through allthe laws.

“First consignment,” I cabled across the Atlantic,“coming on the St. Louis, if it doesn’t strike a mine.”I follow it with a registered letter to the editor: “Ihope God and you will always be good to GilbertParker. And now if I don’t get back—” And Igive him exact directions about the material on theway. For it is no idle imagining that I may notreach home.

I am facing France and the Channel crossing.Here in London it is so long since the Zeppelinshave been heard from that we are almost lulled intoa sense of security that they will not come again.If they do high government circles usually hear inadvance. A friend whose cousin’s brother-in-law isin the Admiralty will let me know as soon as he findsout. But now all of these neatly arranged life anddeath plans must go into the discard. For you see[39]I am changing my danger back again from Zeppelinsto submarines.

Let us see about the sinkings. Rumour reportsnow that about four out of six boats are gettingacross. I may get one of the four. On the nighttrain from London, I wrap myself in my steamer-rugin the unheated compartment. Travelling is notwhat you might say encouraged. This journey toParis, accomplished ordinarily in four hours, willnow take twenty-four. No two time-tables will anywhereconnect. There are as many difficulties as canpossibly be arranged. Governments don’t want youdoing this every day in the week. And there is alwaysa question whether you will be permitted to doit at all. At Southampton I must meet the steelline with the challenge, “Who goes there?”

Again I tell all my life to the man with a pistol athis belt and a sword at his side. He looks a secondtime at my passport: “You want to go all sorts ofplaces you’ve no business to,” he says sharply.

“Not all of them now,” I answer humbly, “onlyFrance.” “Well, why even France?” he persiststestily. I try to tell him. I present for a secondconsideration one of my “most important credentials.”It is a personal letter from the French consulin New York specially and cordially recommendingme to the “care and protection of all the civil andmilitary authorities in France.” At last he tosses theletter inquiringly down his khaki line as much as tosay, “Oh, well, if they want her over there?” Itcomes back with a nod of acquiescence from the last[40]man, and a visé in purple ink lets me through to theboat.

Shall I remember the Sussex? You don’t somuch after you’ve lived daily with death for a while.Some time during the night I am drowsily consciousthat the boat begins to move. A skilled pilot hastaken the wheel to guide us in and out among minesplaced perilously as a protection against Germansubmarines. Our lives are coming through dangerousnarrows. In the morning we are safe in Havre.The next steel line, here, is French. And with theletter from the consul at New York in my hand Iam literally and cordially and politely bowed intoFrance.

At my hotel in the Rue de Rivoli, the Americanman opposite me at the dinner table the next day isjust about to sail, “going back to God’s country, asfar away home as I can get, to the tall pine trees onthe Pacific Coast,” he tells me. He had come toEurope on an assignment that was to have beenaccomplished in three months. It has taken him ayear to get to the front. My knife and fork dropin despair on my plate as he says it. “Cheer up,”he urges. “You just have to remember to take aFrenchman’s promises as lightly as they’re made.They always aim to please. And your hopes rise sothat you order two co*cktails for dinner to-night.Then to-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow therewill be only more promises. But you’re an Americanwoman. You’ll dig through. Good luck,” hesays. And a taxicab takes him.

[41]

WAR AS YOU FIRST SEE IT

Here in Paris I stand in the boulevards as I stoodin the Strand and Oxford Street, and watch the newwoman movement going by. Every time a man dropsdead in the trenches, a woman steps permanentlyinto the niche he used to hold in industry, in commerce,in the professions, in world affairs. It is thewoman movement for which the ages have waited inghastly truth. But, O God in Heaven, the price wepay! The price we pay! There is Madelaine LaFontaine, whom I saw yesterday in the Rue Renouard.Her black dress outlined her figure againstthe yellow garden wall where she stood in a littledoorway. She leaned and kissed her child on hisway to school. As she lifted her head, I saw thegrief in her eyes and the dead man’s picture in thelocket at her throat.

They are everywhere through England and France,these women with the locket at their throats. Yetnot for these would your heart ache most. Thereare the others, the clear-eyed girls in their ’teens justnow coming up into long dresses. And life may notoffer them so much as the pictured locket! Therewill be no man’s face to fill it! Love that wouldhave been, you see, lies slain there with all the brightboyhood that’s falling on the battlefields. O God,the price we pay!

How far off now seems that summer’s day Iwalked through 39th Street, my pulses throbbingpleasantly with the thrill of adventure and this[42]commission! I wonder if ever life can look likethat again. The heavens arched all blue above NewYork and the sunshine lay all golden on the citypavements. But that was before I knew. Oh, Ihad heard about war, even as have you and your nextdoor neighbour. War was battle dates that had tobe committed to memory at school. Or if instead oftiresome pages in history it should mobilise beforeour eyes, why, of course it would be flags flying,bands playing, and handsome heroes marching downFifth Avenue!

And now I have seen war. Every way I turn Iam looking on men with broken bodies and womenwith broken hearts. War is not merely the hell thatmay pass at Verdun or the Somme in the agony of aday or a night that ends in death. War is worse.War is that big strong fellow with eyes burned outwhen he “went over the top,” whom I saw learningto walk by a strip of oilcloth laid on the floor of theHome for the Blind in London. They’re teachinghim now to make baskets for a living! War is thatboy in his twenties without any legs whom I met inRegents Park in a wheel chair for the rest of his life!War is that peasant from whom to-day I inquired myway in one of the little banlieues of Paris. Therewas the Croix de Guerre in his coat lapel. But hehad to set down on the ground his basket of vegetablesto point down the Quai de Bercy with hisremaining arm. You know how a Frenchman justhas to gesture when he talks? The stump of the[43]other arm twitched a horrible accompaniment as heindicated my direction!

Those are brave men who are dying on all thebattlefields for their native lands. But oh, the braveryof these men who must live for their countries!These who have lost their eyes and their arms andtheir legs are as common over here as, why, as, say,men with brown hair. And these are terribleenough. But the men who have lost their faces!So long as they shall live, in every one’s eyes intowhich they look, they must see a shudder of horrorreflecting as in a looking glass their old agony. Godin Heaven pity the men who have lost their faces!The greatest sculptors in the world are busy to-daymaking faces to be fastened on.

Like this you’ve got to go through Europe thesedays with a sob in the throat. I turn to the difficultdetails of living for relief from the awful drama ofexistence. In Paris there is the nicest United Statesambassador that ever was sent in a black frock coatto represent his country abroad. In the course ofmy travels there are embassies I have met who areabout as useful to the wayfaring American in a foreignland as a Rogers plaster group on a parlour table.But you arrive at Mr. Sharpe’s embassy in the Ruede Chaillot and it doesn’t matter at all if it happensto be perhaps 4:33 and his reception hour closed at,say, 4:31. He says, “Come right in.” Yes, hetalks like that, not at all in the tone of royalty.“When’d you get in town?” he asks as genially as[44]if it might be Albany or Detroit instead of Paris.By this time you’re sitting in a chair drawn up to hisdesk and discussing the last Democratic victory.“How’s Charlie Murphy standing now with theadministration?” perhaps he asks, and then prettysoon, “But what can I do for you in Paris?”

And he does it. You don’t have to call his secretarya week later to ask, How about that letter theembassy was going to give me? And the week afterand the week after ring up some more to recall thatthere’s an American running up an expense accountat the hotel down the street. That’s not Mr.Sharpe’s way. Within ten minutes he had handedme a letter of introduction to M. Briand, PrimeMinister of France. He laughed as he passed it tome. “Honestly, I’d hate to hand any one a goldbrick,” he said. “That document looks imposingenough and important enough that a limousineshould be at your hotel entrance to take you to thefront at 9 A. M. to-morrow. But nothing like thatwill happen. In France you have to remember thatno one hurries. And an American can’t.”

You can hear that in every foreign language. Itwas a spectacled Herr Professor in Berlin who oncesaid to me severely, “You Americans, this hurry it isyour national vice.” I feel that foreign governmentshave duly disciplined me in this direction duringthe past few months. So much of my job inserving the Pictorial Review in Europe seems to beto sit on a chair and wait in a War Office ante room.At the Maison de la Presse, 3 Rue François 1st, in[45]the Service de l’Information Diplomatique, whithermy Briand letter leads me, I seem to spend hours.

They are going to be charmed, as Frenchmen canbe, to take me to the front. And the days pass andthe days pass. “Ah, but you see, for a lady journalistit is so different and so difficult. The trip mustbe specially arranged.” And the weeks go by. AndM. Polignac is so polite and polite and polite—justthat and nothing more.

One day he says to me: “And, Mme. Daggett,how long is it you will be in Paris?” “Why,” Ifalter, “I hadn’t expected to winter here. I’m waiting,you know, just waiting until I can go to thefront.” “And how much longer now could youwait?” he inquires. “Oh,” I answer desperately,“I’ll surely have to go by the 29th. I couldn’t staylonger than that.”

So in the course of the next few days there comesa letter telling me how it pains the French governmentthat they should not be able to “take that tripin hand” before the 29th. And of course if I mustleave them on that date, as I had said I must, oh,they so much regret, etc., etc.

If I intend to get to the front, evidently then Imust dig through! And in my room at the HotelRegina in the Rue de Rivoli, I take my pen in hand.

To “Maison de la Presse, Service de l’InformationDiplomatique,” I write: “Gentlemen, your favourof the 26th inst. with your regrets just received.And I hasten to write you that I cannot, for the sakeof France, accept your decision as final, without presenting[46]to your attention a situation with which youmay not be familiar. You see, gentlemen, in thecountry from which I come, we have a feminism thatis neither an ideal nor a theory, but a working reality.In America, there were when I left, four millionwomen citizens, and the State legislatures everylittle while making more. These are, gentlemen,four million citizens with a vote, whose wishes mustbe consulted by Congress at Washington in determiningthe war policy of the United States. Theirsympathies help to determine the amount of the warrelief contributions that may come across the Atlantic.These are four million women who count,gentlemen, please understand, exactly the same asfour million men.

“Other American publications may offer Maisonde la Presse other facilities for reaching the Americanpublic. But none of them can duplicate thefacilities presented by the Pictorial Review, the leadingmagazine to champion the feminist cause. It isthe magazine that is read by the woman who votes.Is not France interested in what she shall readthere?

“Believe me, gentlemen, the opportunity forpropaganda that I offer you is unparalleled. I begyou therefore to reconsider. I earnestly desire togo to the front this week. Can you, I ask, permitme to leave this land without granting the privilege?For the sake of France, gentlemen! Awaiting yourreply, I remain,” etc.

That letter was posted at 11 o’clock at night.[47]Before noon the next day Maison de la Presse wason the telephone and speaking English. In Francethey do not hurry. It is not customary to use thetelephone. And it is at this time against the law tospeak English on it. But listen: “Will Mme.Daggett find herself able to accept the invitation ofthe French government to go to the front on Thursday?”inquires the voice on the wire.

Close Up Behind the Lines

“It is going to be perhaps a dangerous undertaking,”says the French army officer the next dayin the reception room at Maison de la Presse. Heis speaking solemnly and impressively. “Do youstill wish to go?” he asks, addressing me in particular.I look back steadily into his eyes. “Oui, Monsieur.”Then his glance sweeps inquiringly thesemicircle of faces. There are six journalists anda munitions manufacturer from Bridgeport, Connecticut.And they all nod assent. The room issingularly silent for an instant, the officer just standingquietly, his left hand resting on his sword-hilt.Then he turns and passes to each of us the officialPermis de Correspondent de la Presse aux Armees,for our journey to Rheims the next day. And weall sign on the dotted line.

Before I retire that night I rip the pink rose fromoff my hat and lay out the long dark coat which isto envelop me from my neck to my heels. It is thecamouflage which, in accordance with the armyorders, blends one with the landscape as a means ofconcealment from the German gunners’ range.Rheims is under bombardment. It was fired on yesterday.It may be to-morrow. There must not be,[49]the army officer has assured us, even the flower onthe lady’s hat for a target.

My electric light winks once. Two minutes laterit winks twice, and is gone, according to the martiallaw which puts out all lights in Paris from 11:30at night until 8 o’clock in the morning. I grope myway to bed in the darkness and at 6 o’clock the nextmorning, I dress by candle light. I count carefullythe “pieces de identité” in the chamois safety bagthat hangs over my left hip and place in my handbag my passport and my French permis, both ofwhich must be presented at the railway station beforeI can purchase a ticket. I look to make sure that theinside pocket of my purse still contains my businesscard with its pencilled request: “In case of deathor disaster kindly notify the Pictorial Review, NewYork City.” And as I pass the porter’s desk at thehotel entrance I leave with the sleepy concierge oneother last message: “If Mme. Daggett has not returnedby midnight, will the hotel managementkindly communicate with her friend Mlle. MariePerrin, 12 Rue Ordener?” All these are precautionsthat you take lest you be lost in the great Europeanwar.

The Gare l’Est is crowded always with throngs ofsoldiers arriving and departing for the front. It isnecessary that our party assemble as early as seveno’clock to get in line at the ticket window for theeight o’clock train, for every traveller’s credentialsmust be separately and carefully read and inspected.At Epernay, where we alight at 10:30, the station[50]platform is densely packed with French soldiers inthe sky blue uniforms that have been so carefullymatched with the horizon color of France. A debonnairFrench captain has been appointed by theFrench government to receive us. He is in fulluniform, splendid scarlet trousers and gold braidedcoat, with his left breast ornamented with the Croixde Guerre and the Médaille de Honneur. After theformal salutations are over, however, his orderly envelopsall of the captain’s splendour too in the longsky blue coat for camouflage against the Germans.And we start for Rheims in the convoy of three luxuriouslyappointed “camoens,” the limousines placedat our disposal by the government. They, too, arepainted blue grey to blend with the landscape, andeach flies a little French flag.

“Ou allez vous, Monsieur?” the sentry at thebridge of Epernay challenges our chauffeur. Andthe French captain himself leans from the windowto answer, “À Rheims. Une mission de la gouvernement.”So we pass sentry after sentry. It is 15miles to Rheims. This is the Department of theMarne, with the vineyards that have produced themost famous wines of the world. The “smilingcountryside of France,” the poets have termed it.In September, 1914, history changed it to the grimfield of carnage running red with the blood of civilisationthat here made its stand against the onrushingHuns. Right across that valley see the battlefieldof the Marne. Along this road the German armypassed. From this little village that we are entering,[51]all the inhabitants fled before their approach.The enemy now is not far away. Over there, justagainst that horizon, lie the trenches they now occupy.See this roadside along which we are driving,how it is curiously hung with linen curtains? Theyare strung on wires fifteen feet high. For miles weride behind them. It is the camouflage, the Frenchcaptain says, that hides us from German view. Wehave just emerged from the forest at the edge of theMountain of Rheims when, hark! Hear it—thesharp, distinct sound of an explosion! What is it?Where is it? The captain lays his hand reassuringlyon my arm: “It is, I think, a tire that hasburst on the rear car.”

“Captain,” I say, “no automobile tire I ever heardsounded exactly like that.”

“You are not nervous?” he asks. I shake myhead. “Well,” he admits, “it is sometimes that theGermans do take a chance shot at this road.”

But at Rheims when we arrive, I notice that allour automobile tires are quite intact. We enter thecity through the great bronze gate, the finishing ornamentsof which have been nicked off by Germanshells. We stand in the midst of a scene of desolationthat looks like the ruins of some long ago civilisation.Once, before this world that men hadbuilded began to go to pieces, even as the blocksthat children pile tumble to a nursery floor, here wasa populous busy city of some 120,000 souls. Nowour footsteps echo through deserted streets. Not aman or woman or child is in sight. The grass is[52]growing in the pavement there between the street-cartracks. The Hotel de Ville is only a shell of abuilding with the outer walls standing. This shopis shuttered tight. The next has the entire frontgone, blown away in a bombardment. There areempty houses from which the occupants have monthsago fled. Here stands the skeleton of a pretentiousresidence, the roof gone and the front riddled: welook directly in on the second-story room with adresser and a bed in disarray. There a curtain froma deserted little front parlour flaps dismally througha shattered window-pane almost in our faces. Hereabove the cellar-grating of a house in ruins, therearises a sickening odour. We look at each other inquestioning horror; perhaps the military with thepick and spade assigned to disinterment duty aftersome bombardment did not dig deep enough here.But the captain does not wish to understand andhurries us along to the next street.

A CRUMBLING CIVILISATION

In the ghastly stillness of this city that was onceRheims, at last there is a sound of life. Down theRue de la Paix, the street of peace, an army supply-wagonclatters past us. And you have no idea howpleasant can be the sound even of noise.

Then across the way appears a milk-woman, pushingher cart with four tin cans and jingling a littlebell. There are a few people, it seems, still left,employés in the champagne industry, who cling totheir homes even though they must live in the cellar.[53]Now the devastation increases and the houses beginto be mere rubbish heaps of brick and mortar as weapproach the Place de la Cathédrale.

At length we stand before the famous Cathedralof Rheims itself. I know of no more impressiveplace to be in the closing days of the year 1916 thanhere at the front of the terrible world war.

In this edifice is symbolised all that civilisation ofours that culminated in the Twentieth Century, nowto be razed to the ground. For lo, these seven hundredyears, even as the two great towers above ushave lifted the infinite beauty of their architecturallace-work against the blue-domed sky, some thirtygenerations of the human soul have sent their aspirationsheavenward on the incense of prayer. Overthese very stones beneath our feet, king after kingof France has walked, to receive the crown of Charlemagneand to be anointed before this altar from “lesainte ampouli.” And now here to-day is history inno dead and musty pages but in the making, white-hotfrom the anvil of the hour! Only a little overa mile away are the German guns that from day today shower the shell-fire of their destruction on thecity. This spot upon which we stand is their particularobjective point of attack. Hear! There isa rumbling detonation. We wait hushed for aninstant. But the sound is not repeated. You see,already there have been some 30,000 shells pouredon Rheims. Twelve hundred fell in one day only.At any moment there may be more.

“If the bombardment should begin,” we had been[54]instructed at Maison de la Presse, “you would rushfor the nearest cellar.” I think we all have listeningears. Every little while there is certainly repeatedthat desultory firing on the front.

But nothing is dropping on us. And reassured,we turn to examine the great shell hole in the pavementnot five yards distant. The Archbishop’s Palace,immediately adjoining the church, is flat on theground in ruins. The cathedral itself is slowlybeing wrecked. But in the public square directlybefore it, look here! See Joan of Arc on her horsetriumphantly facing the future! In her hand sheis waving the bright flag of France. Amid the débrisof the great war piling up about her, the famousstatue stands absolutely untouched. Here at thevery storm centre of the attack on civilisation, withthe hell-fire of the enemy falling in a rain of thousandsof shells about her, she seems as secure, as safeunder God’s heaven as when the people passed dailybefore her to prayer. Shall we not call it a miracle?

“See,” says the captain, his head reverently uncovered,his eyes shining, “our Maid of Orleans.No German shall ever harm her!” And since thewar began, it is true, no German ever has. Not astatue of the famous girl-warrior anywhere inFrance has been so much as scratched by the enemy.Her name was the password on the day of the Battleof the Marne and there are those who think it wasthe shadowy figure of a girl on a horse that led thetroops to that victory. Oh, though cathedrals maycrumble and cities be laid waste and fields be devastated,[55]some time again it shall be well with theworld. For the faith of the people of France inJoan of Arc shall never pass away.

That we realize, as we look on the rapt face ofthe captain who leads us now within the great churchitself, where for three years all prayers have ceased.The marvellous stained glass from the thirteenthcentury, which made the religious light of the beautifulwindows, now hangs literally in tatters liketorn bed-quilts blowing in the wind. That greatjagged hole in the roof was torn by a shell at the lastbombardment. There are fissures in the side walls.The rain comes in, and the birds. Doves light thereon the transept rail. Amid the rubbish of brokensaints with which the floor is littered, there yet standshere and there a sorrowful statue hung with the garlandof faded flowers reminiscent of some far-off fêteday. And Requiescat in pace, you may read thelegend cut in the stone of the eastern wall above thetomb of some Christian Father.

In the nearby Rue du Cardinal de Lorraine, in agarden saying his rosary, walks an old man in a redcap, one of the few remaining residents who will notleave the city. He is the venerable Mgr. Lucon,Cardinal of Rheims. Always he is praying, prayingto God to spare the cathedral. And God does not.“I do not understand. I suppose that He in Hiswisdom must have some purpose in permitting thechurch to be destroyed,” says the Cardinal of Rheims.“I do not understand,” he always adds humbly.

“One may not understand,” repeats the captain.[56]And he takes us to luncheon at the Lion d’Or, thelittle inn where the wife of the proprietor still staysto serve any “mission of the French gouvernement.”Then he shows us the famous champagne cellars ofthe Etablissem*nt Pommery. Here one hundredfeet below the ground, in the chalk caves built athousand years ago by the Romans, are twelve milesof subterranean passageways with thirteen millionbottles of the most celebrated champagne in themaking.

The superintendent pours out his choicest brand:“Vive la France and the Allies,” he says, lifting hisglass. He talks more English than the captain can.He is telling us of when the Germans enteredRheims. “Four officers,” he says, “came ridingahead of the army. And I met them by chance justas they arrived in the market place of Rheims.”

“What did you do?” asks the New York correspondentof the London Daily Mail. “I wept,” saysthe Frenchman, simply and impressively. “Gentlemen,”he adds solemnly and sadly, “I hope you maynever meet some day four conquering Chinamen ridingup Broadway.”

I find myself catching my breath suddenly at that.And I am glad when the captain hums a gay littleFrench tune and holds out his glass a second time:“Give us again ‘Vive la France.’”

The sun is dipping red in the west when we turnto leave Rheims and Joan of Arc bravely flying theFrench flag before its crumbling cathedral. Thereis the rumble of guns once more at the front. Then[57]the winter dusk rapidly envelops the road alongwhich we are speeding. It is the same road to Epernay.But now it is alive with traffic. Under theprotecting cover of the soft darkness, all sorts ofvehicles are passing. The headlights of our car flashon a continuous procession of motor lorries, munition-wagons,army supply-wagons, tractors, and peasants’carts carrying produce to market. So we arriveat Epernay for a lunch of red wine and war breadat the little station. By ten o’clock we are safelywithin the walls of Paris. We have escaped bombardment!

It is two days later before the French official communiquéin the daily papers begins again recording:“At Rheims toward six o’clock last night, after aviolent attack with trench mortars, the Germanstwice stormed our advance posts. But these twoattempts completely failed under our machine-gunfire and grenade bombing.”

DIFFICULT DAYS IN THE WAR ZONE

It isn’t what happens necessarily. It’s what’salways-going-to-happen that keeps one guessing betweenlife and death in a war zone. And there arespecial torments of the inquisition devised for journalists.Ordinary civilians are occupied only withsaving their lives. Journalists must save their notes.

At half-past eleven o’clock that night of my returnfrom Rheims, there is dropped in the mail box onmy hotel room door, a cablegram from America:“Steamship St. Louis here. Your material from[58]London not on it.” The room in which I stand, theHotel Regina, and the city of Paris all reel unsteadilyfor an instant. Has the British Governmenteaten up all my journalistic findings so preciouslyentrusted to Wellington House? I grasp the brassfoot rail of the bed and bring myself upstanding.If they have, it is no time for me to lose my head.

Jacques with the empty coat sleeve and the Croixde Guerre on his breast, who operates the elevator, Iam sure thinks it a woman demented who is goingout in the streets of Paris alone at midnight. But“an Americaine,” one can never tell what “an Americaine”will do. “Pardon,” he says hesitatingly asI step out, “madame knows the hour?” Yes, madameknows the hour. But an alien may not senda telegram without presenting a passport, the documentthat never for an instant goes out of one’s personalpossession. No messenger can do this errandfor me.

Five minutes later I am in a taxicab tearing downthe Rue Quatre Septembre to the cable office in theBourse. My appeal for help to Sir Gilbert Parkerin London is being counted on the blue telegraphblank by the operator at the little window, when suddenlyI remember I have forgotten. My hand feelshelplessly over my left hip where there is concealeda letter of credit for three thousand dollars. But Ifalter, “I haven’t any money, that is, where I canget at it.”

“I have,” speaks a voice over my shoulder. I lookaround into a man’s cheerful countenance. “What’s[59]the damage?” he says again in pleasant ManhattanEnglish. I hesitate only for an instant. “It’s sixteenfrancs I need.”

He promptly pulls out his bank-roll. I ask forhis card, of course, to return the loan the next daywith many thanks for his courtesy. He, however,has no security that I will. As he puts me in mytaxicab and lifts his hat beneath the faint war-dimmedlight of the street lamps in the dark RueVivienne, he only knows that I am his country-woman.And he is an American man. The Lordseems to send them when you need them most.

Three days later the awful silence in which I amsuffering all the fears there are for a journalist inwar-time, is broken by a reply from London: “Materialonly delayed. Sailed steamship New Yorkinstead of St. Louis.” After another two weeks offitful nights in which I dream of men in khaki whoconfiscate journalistic data, there comes the messagefrom New York that is like hearing from Heaven:“Your consignment of material safely arrived.”Meanwhile, before I may be permitted to take a lineout of this country, Maison de la Presse must passon my French data. I am feverishly editing it fortheir approval when there is a knock at my door.The maid is there with more letters than the littlebrass mail box will hold. I eagerly open my Americanmail to find it filled with holiday greetings. So,it can still be Christmas somewhere in the world!I am standing at the window with a Christmas cardin my hand, thinking pleasant thoughts of the far-away[60]city called New York where there is still peaceon earth, good-will to men, when down the Rue de Rivolipasses a motor lorry piled high with blackcrosses. There are fields in France that areplanted with black crosses, acres and acres of them.After each new push on the front, more are required,black crosses by the cartload! I glanced at my calendar.Why, to-day is Christmas! I had quite forgotten.You see, over here all joy-making occasionsseem to have been such a long while ago, like thestories of once upon a time.

I turn once more to the task of making ready mydata for Maison de la Presse. Here a too colourfulsentence must be rejected. There is a too flagrantlyfeministic document that will be safest in the wastebasket. It is the martial mind that I must meet. Apress bureau, you see, is prepared to pass promptlypropaganda on the battles of the Somme. But dareone risk, say, a pamphlet on the breast feeding ofinfants? Propaganda about the rising value of ababy! Dear, dear, it might, for all a man could tell,be treason, seditious material calculated to give aidand comfort to the enemy! Already to my inquiriesabout maternity measures in Paris, have I not beenanswered suspiciously: “But why do you ask?This matter it is not of the war.”

My emasculated data at last are ready for reviewby le chef du service de la presse. He stamps it allover with his signature in red ink. It is done up inpackages and officially sealed in red wax with theseal of the state of France. At the Post Office in[61]the Rue Etienne Marcel, I register it and mail it,committing it with a sigh to the mercies of the greatAtlantic.

DEALING WITH GOVERNMENT

Having crossed the Channel once alive, it seemslike tempting fate to try it again. I draw in mybreath as one about to plunge into a cold bath inthe morning, and go out to secure from three governmentsthe necessary permission that will allow meto return to England. From the police alone itsometimes takes eight days to secure this concession.But at the Prefecture of Police, they read my letterof introduction from the French consul in New York.And I have only to leave my photograph and signon the dotted line. In five minutes they have givenmy passport the necessary visé. The American consuleasily enough adds his. All my journey apparentlyis going as pleasantly as a summer holidayplanned by a Cook’s Agency, when at length I comeup with a bump against the British Control office inthe Rue Cheveaux Lagarde. And the going awayfrom here requires some negotiations. The Britishlieutenant in charge reads my nice French letter andwithout comment tosses it aside. “You wish to goto London?” he asks in great surprise. “Now, whyshould you wish to go to London?” He gives medistinctly to understand this is not the open seasonfor tourists in England. “We don’t care to havepeople travelling,” he says in a tone of voice as ifthat settles it. “Why have you come over here in[62]these difficult and dangerous times, anyhow?” heasks querulously and a trifle suspiciously. “Thebest thing you can do is to go home directly. AndAmerica is right across the water from here.”

“But, Lieutenant,” I gasp, “my trunk is in Englandand I’ve got to have a few clothes.”

“No,” he says, “personal reasons like that don’tinterest the British Government. Neither am I ableto understand a journalistic mission which shouldtake a woman travelling in these days of war.” Helooks at me. “The New Position of Women! Itis not of sufficient interest to the British Governmentthat I should let you go,” he says with finality.

“I know, Lieutenant,” I agree. “But surely youare interested in the Allies’ war propaganda for theUnited States?” The light from the window shinesfull on his face and I can see a faint relaxation aboutthe lines of his mouth. “Now I wish to go to Englandso that I may tell the story of the British women’swar work. The readers of Pictorial Review arefour million women who vote.” The lieutenantstirs visibly. His sword rattles against the roundsof his chair.

Well, my request hangs in the balance like thisfor a week. At length one day he says, “I’m thinkingabout letting you go. I shall have to consultwith my superior officer. I don’t at all know that hewill consent.”

There is the day that I have almost given up hope.I am waiting again before the lieutenant’s desk. Hehas gone for a last consultation with the superior[63]officer. Will he never come back? I stare at hisempty chair. The clock on the mantel ticks andticks. The fire in the grate snaps and snaps. Otherpeople at the next desk who get easier visés thanmine, come and go—a Red Cross nurse, two Frenchsisters of charity, a little French boy returning toschool. I have counted the pens in the lieutenant’sglass tray. I know every blot on his desk-pad. Theclock has ticked thirty-five minutes of suspense forme before the little French soldier in red trousersopens the door and the lieutenant is here.

“Well,” he says, “we have decided. You are tobe permitted to go, but on one condition.” And hevisés my passport, “No return to France during theperiod of the war.”

It has taken nearly two weeks to win my case.Two days later at 6 A. M., when the gardens of theTuileries are outlined dimly against the faint rays ofdawn, my taxicab is reeling through the streets ofParis to the Gare St. Lazare. It is noon before thetrain reaches Havre. The Red Cross nurse, the Londonnewspaper correspondent and the Belgian air-manall file out of our compartment and the Irishmajor from Salonica is last. He turns to me witha frank Irish smile: “Your bag can just as well goalong with my military luggage. And they’ll nevereven open it.”

At eight o’clock that night in Havre, my passportand the letter from the French consul in New Yorkare handed down the steel line of ten men at a table.Each looks up with the same curious smile when his[64]glance arrives at the last visé: “Who put that onyour passport?” asks the officer at the head of theline. “The British Control Office?” he says withheat. “It’s none of their business.” In an innerroom, four more men examine my documents. “Didthe British officer see this letter from the Frenchconsul?” I am asked. I nod assent. A laugh goesround the room. “Pardon, madame,” says the manwith the most gold braid, “the British Control Officedoes not control France. You are welcome toFrance, madame, welcome to France any time youchoose to come.”

That is the War Office that speaks. So, with theFrench Government’s cordial invitation ringingpleasantly in my ears, I go on board the Channelboat. But I have no intention of returning toFrance right away, gentlemen. I lay out my life-preserverwith a feeling of great relief that if I survivethis crossing, it will not have to be done overagain. And once more the boat in the darknesssteals safely and silently across the Channel.

In the morning, in Southampton, the major fromSalonica hands me his card: “Letters,” he says, atrifle wistfully, “will always reach me at that address.”I look at the card here before me on mydesk as I write and I wonder. The major with hisIrish smile may now be lying dead on the field ofbattle somewhere on the front. In the midst of lifewe are in death almost anywhere in the world to-day.

[65]

IN COLDEST ENGLAND

I have again “established my residence” with thepolice in London. I feel on terms of the most intimateacquaintance with the London police. Somany of them have my photograph and are conversantwith all the biographical and genealogical detailsof my life. You have to do it, register at a policestation, every time you change your hotel. I havemoved so often, I am nervous lest I seem like aGerman spy. But at the Bow Street Station, theofficer in charge just nods genially: “Oh, that’squite all right. Looking for more heat, aren’t you?I know. You Americans are all alike.”

Have you ever shivered in London in January?Then you don’t know what it is to be cold, not evenwhen the thermometer drops to zero and New York’sall snowed in but the subway, and the street cleaningdepartment has to spend a million dollars to dig youout of the drifts. Yes, I know about the GulfStream. It does pleasantly moderate the outdoorclimate so that it is never really winter in England.But the Gulf Stream does not get into their houses.I was a luncheon guest the other day at a residencewith a crest on its note-paper. The hostess put ona wrap to pass down the staircase from the drawing-roomto the dining-room, and with my bronchitis—allAmericans get it in London—I was simply unableto remove my coat at all. This mansion, Englishivy-covered, and mildewed with ages of aristocracy,has never had a real fire within its walls. There are[66]only the tiny grate fires which are, as it were, mereornaments beneath the mantelpiece. The drawing-roomfire is lighted only just before the guests arrive:the men with lifted coat-tails back up to it, theirhands crossed behind them spread to the blaze; thedog and the cat draw near to the fender; conversationabout the fire becomes general in the tone ofvoice, well, in which one might admire a rare sunset.The dining-room fire, likewise, is lighted only justbefore the butler announces luncheon. And in allthis grand mansion you discover there isn’t any placeto be warm, unless perchance the cook in the kitchenmay have it.

Well, English hotels strive to be as coldly correctas this English high life. And I have suffered coldstorage in Piccadilly at the rate of ten dollars a dayas long as my bronchitis will bear it. I ought to beill in bed at this moment. But I can’t be. Thereisn’t a hospital bed in Europe without a woundedsoldier in it. Schools, orphanages, monasteries,country residences, castles and many hotels havebeen turned into hospitals, all of them full of soldiers.A civilian who may be ill literally has notwhere to lay his head. So I set out desperately tofind heat in London. I think I have searched everyhotel from Mayfair to Bloomsbury Square. As aspecial concession to American patronage a few ofthem have put steam-heat on their letter heads, “centralheat,” they call it. But all European radiators,when there are any, are as reluctant as their elevators.“Lifts” move under groaning protest and if they go[67]up, they let you know they do not expect to comedown. The radiators are equally as sullen aboutradiating. They don’t want to at all. Englishradiators are such toy affairs as to be incapable ofany real action. They are so small they get lostbehind the furniture. At the Hyde Park Hotel,the clerk and I hunted all over the place: “I’m surewe used to have them,” he said. At last our searchwas rewarded. We found the one that was to keepme warm. It was behind the dresser and such aminiature affair, you’d surely have guessed SantaClaus must have left it for the children at Christmastime.

Some one advised me that English hotels reallydidn’t do steam heat well and the best way to bewarm was to go to Brown’s, which is famous for itsgrate fires. The Queen of Holland and the Englishnobility always stop at Brown’s. So I triedBrown’s. I bought all the “coals” the managementwould sell at one time and tipped the maid liberallyto start the fire in my room. To maintain thetemperature anything above fifty, I had to sit bythe grate and keep putting on the coals myself. Inthe bathroom there was no heat at all. “Oh, yes,there was,” the management argued; “didn’t the hot-waterpipe for the bath come right up through thefloor?” No, they insisted, there couldn’t be any firein the grate in the bathroom—because there neverhad been since Brown’s began. Why, probably thehotel would burn up with so much heat as that.

So I moved on and on. At last I came in the[68]Strand to the Savoy, where all Americans eventuallyarrive. It is the only hotel in England with realsteam-heat. Just pull out your dresser and yourwash-stand. Concealed behind each you will discovera radiator, warm, real, life-size! Eureka! Itis the only modern-comfort temperature in London.I am able to remove sundry clothing accessories ofShetland wool accumulated at Selfridge’s DepartmentStore in Oxford Street. And for the first timesince my arrival on these shores I am sitting in myhotel room unwrapped in either a rose satin downbed-quilt or a steamer-rug. My soul once more uncurlsitself for work. It is wonderful to be warmto-day, even if one must be drowned by the Germansto-morrow.

GREATEST DRAMA IN HISTORY

It begins to look gravely as if one may be. Outthere in the yellow fog beyond my window, more andmore ominous are the posters that come hourly driftingdown the Strand from Fleet Street. Germanyhas announced to the world that she is going to doher worst. And she begins to tune her submarinesfor the sink-on-sight frightfulness more terrible thanany that has preceded. The Dutch boats stop.The Scandinavian boats stop. The American boatsstop. The entire ocean is now blanketed in onedanger zone.

All the world’s a stage of swift-moving events,the greatest and most terrible spectacle that has everbeen put on since civilisation began. And we in[69]London are spectators before a drop-curtain tightbuttoned down at the corners! It is lifted now andthen by the hand of the censor to reveal only whatthe Government decides is good for the people tosee. The plain citizen in London has no means ofknowing how much it is that he does not know. Itwas six months after the Battle of Ypres had occurredbefore the English newspapers got around tomention the event. So you see with what a bafflingsense of futility it is that one scans the newspapershere now while history is making so fast that a newpage is turned every day. I am hungry for a reallive paper, bright yellow from along Park Row.And over my breakfast coffee at the Savoy I haveonly the London Times, gravely discussing by thecolumn, “What Is Religion?” and “The Value ofTudor Music,” while the rest of the world is breathlessbefore a Russian revolution, later to be given outin London exactly a week old.

But there is news that even the censor is playingup with a lavish hand. The Strand streams withthe posters: “The United States on the Verge ofWar.” My official permit from Downing Street togo to Holland has arrived in the morning’s mail. Icannot get there. I cannot get to Scandinavia.Can I get home? It is the question that is agitatinga number of Americans abroad. We watchfullywait for a warship to convoy us. But scan the Atlanticas we may from day to day, there is nonearriving. The folks back home have a way of forgettingthat we are here. Those that do remember[70]are saying it serves us right. We had no businessto come in war-time. Sixteen Americans at theSavoy every day rush to read the news bulletins thathourly are tacked up in the lounge. But the wheelsof government at Washington move so slowly. TheSenate only debates and debates. And there is nothingsaid about us! Will it be possible to flag theattention of Congress? The same idea occurs simultaneouslyto Senator Hale in Paris and to several ofus in London. This is the answer to my cabledinquiry to Washington: “Your request the fifth.Impracticable send warship convoy American linerbringing Americans back from Europe. Signed,Robert Lansing, Secretary of State.”

So, that’s settled. The only way for any of us toget away from here will be just—to go. And Ibegin to. There is myself to get home, and mydata. Three consignments have already gone overunder special government auspices. But there havebeen anxious periods of waiting before a cable, “Stuffsafe,” has reached me. I am going to sink or swimwith the remainder of it. Wellington House arrangeswith the censor at Strand House. There thematerial is read and done up in packages, in each ofwhich is enclosed a letter with the War Office Stamp:“Senior Aliens Officer. Port of Embarkation.Please allow the package in which this is enclosedto accompany bearer Mrs. M. P. Daggett as personalluggage. This package has been examined by thecensorship.” All these data are now packed in a[71]suitcase that stands in my hotel room awaiting mydeparture.

When I was caught in the homeward rush ofAmericans from London in 1914, the steamship officesin co*ckspur Street were jammed to the doors.To-day they are silent, empty, echoing places. In1917 it is such a life and death matter to travel, thatmost people don’t. So grave is the danger that theGovernment refuses to permit passports at all forEnglish women. But for me, this that I am facingis the risk of my trade in war-time.

To-day I had a letter from my New York office:

“The best thing for you to do is to get home asquick as you can. Wouldn’t it be safest by way ofSpain? Any way of course is taking a chance anda big one. I wish to the Lord you were here, safeand sound. But there isn’t a darn thing any of uscan do about getting you back. You have eithergot to take your life in your hands and take a chancecoming back, or stay in London. And God knowswhen this war is going to end now!”

It is “safest by way of Spain.” AmbassadorGerard getting home from Germany selected thatroute. But my passport, I remember, is black-marked,“No return to France.” And I shall havethe British Foreign Office to explain to before I canreach my French friends who so cordially invited myreturn. There will be altogether some four steellines to pass that way. I’d rather face the submarines.The Spanish boats are small, only about[72]4,000 tons, which would be like crossing the Atlanticin a bathtub. I’d rather be drowned than seasick.I think I shall make sure of comfort by a Britishboat.

And then—the posters in the Strand begin to announce,“Seven ships sunk to-day.” Four Dutchboats trying for their home port, are submarined inEnglish waters. The Laconia goes down. TheAnchor liner California meets her fate. It’s real, Itell you, on this side where they’re daily bringing inthe survivors. About nine hours in the open boatsis the usual experience for the rescued. Do you seethe deterring, dampening effect that this might haveon one’s enthusiasm for departure?

FACING LIFE OR DEATH?

This is the month of March. Oh, wouldn’t it bewell to wait until the water is warmer? It’s a disquietingsensation to wake up in the night and meditateon whether, say, a week or ten days from now,you may find yourself at the bottom of the Atlantic.In this state of low depression, you decide to live alittle longer. And so to-morrow you select a littlelater date for your sailing. Then the arrival ofAmerican mail proves that at least one more boat hasrun the blockade and escaped the submarines.Yours might.

So I take my courage in both hands, and my passport,too, and buy my ticket. When I have donethis, a nice, quiet calm possesses me. It is as if I hadbeen a long time dying. Now it is over and finished.[73]I have nothing more to do about it. I packmy trunk just curiously wondering, shall I ever wearthis gown again? Or shall I not? Oh, well, it issuch a relief to be going away from all this OldWorld grief. Are the war clouds gathering overNew York, too? But I still can see the city allgolden in the sunlight beneath the clear blue sky.

Last night I was awakened at twelve o’clock bythe sounds of a gay supper party’s revelry in someroom down my corridor. Which of the staid Americangentlemen at this hotel is celebrating? Listen.They are singing, evidently with lifted glasses:“Hail, hail, the gang’s all here.” Not to the nationalanthem could my heart thrill more than toTammany’s own classic refrain. New York! NewYork! Not all the Kaiser’s submarines can stopme from starting.

I may not send word of the steamship or the dateof my departure. But I cable my home office: “IfI do not succeed in reporting to you myself, apply forthe latest information of my movements, to the InternationalFranchise Club, 9 Grafton Street, London.”You see, if I should get the last Long Assignment....

There are only sixteen first class passengers forthis trip on the Carmania in her grim grey warpaint.Two of us are women, at whom the reststare with curious interest. Each of us as we stepaboard is handed a lifeboat ticket. Mine reads:“R. M. S. Carmania. Name, Mrs. M. P. Daggett,Boat No. 5.”

[74]

I think I know now how a person feels who isgoing to his execution. We who walk up this steamshipgangway are under sentence of death by theGerman Government. The old Latin proverbflashes into my mind: “Morituri te salutamus.”It is we who may be about to die who salute eachother here on the Carmania and then we are facingthe steel line. Four British officers with swords attheir sides and pistols in their belts wait for us inthe drawing-room. All the other passengers goeasily by but the New York Jewish gentleman withthe German name. At last he, too, clears. But theBritish Government is not yet finished with a journalist.The Tower of London and its damp darkdungeons is again materialising clearly for me.

The lieutenant has been questioning me for half-an-hour.“I’m sorry,” he says, “but I think I shallhave to have you searched. This suitcase of journalisticdata, you say that there is inside each packagea note stating that the material has been passedby the Government? Why isn’t that note on theoutside of the package?”

“I don’t know,” I answer earnestly. “It’s thequestion I asked in vain at Strand House. Thecensor said that it had to be this way. I assureyou the note is there. But if you break the outsideseal to find out, my government guarantee is gone.And if this boat by any chance goes to Halifax, howare they to know there that I’m not a German spy?”

The lieutenant’s eyes are on my face. I thinkhe believes I am telling the truth. “Well,” he orders[75]his corporal, “go to her stateroom with her andhave a look at her luggage.” The corporal is verynice. He finds a blank note book in my trunk.“You aren’t supposed to have this,” he says. Andthere is a package of business correspondence. “Didyou tell him out there about these letters? Well,you needn’t. And I won’t.” At the suitcase withthe magic seals he gives only one glance. To hissuperior officer, when we return, the corporal reports:“Everything’s quite all right. Stuff’sstamped all over with the seal of the War Office.”

The lieutenant looks at his watch. “I had breakfastat seven. It’s now one o’clock. That’s lunchtime.”

“Don’t let me detain you,” I suggest pleasantly.He shakes his head. “I’ve got to put this jobthrough.”

I am this job. But the lieutenant has smiled.The conversation eases up. “Pretty good suffragedata down at the Houses of Parliament,” he himselfsuggests. “Do you know, I’m almost willing nowthat women should vote. I didn’t used to be. Butthe war has changed my mind.”

“By the way,” he asked suddenly, “you’re notmixed up with any of those militants, are you?” Iexplain that I am not a suffragette, just a plainsuffragist. “Because I think those militants oughtto be shot,” he adds. I can only bite my tongue.Has the lieutenant no sense of humour? No militantin Holloway Jail was ever more militant thanhe is with his sword and pistol at this moment.

[76]

“There’s a question I’d like to ask,” he goes on.“In your country where women have the franchise,do you find that they all vote alike?” “No morethan all the men,” I answer. “Then that’s allright,” he says in a relieved tone. “I’ve been afraidthat if we let women vote, they might all vote againstwar.”

SHALL WE GO DOWN OR ACROSS?

“You really aren’t a militant, are you?” he saysagain, thoughtfully. “Well, I’ll let you go.” Sothat’s my last steel line.

The boat begins to move in the Mersey. Andthe ship’s siren sounds shrilly. It is the summonsto shipwreck drill. We assemble quickly in thelounge on the top deck, every one wearing a life-preserver.At a second call of the siren, we file outfollowing the captain’s lead, to stand by our boatsin which the crew are already clambering to theiroars.

So now we know how for the moment of disaster.The whole steamship waits for it. Thisis a weird voyage that we begin. Mine-sweepersout there ahead of us are cleaning up the seas. AScandinavian boat has just been sowing mines allover the water. The Baltic, here beside us, pokedher nose out yesterday, scented danger and returnedto the river. We wait now in the Mersey twenty-fourhours before the mysterious signal is given thatit is the propitious moment for our boat to getaway. We steal softly to sea under cover of a[77]dense fog and a white snow-storm. The sea-gullsare screaming shrilly above us like birds of prey.And we who look into each other’s eyes are facingwe know not whither, it may be America or theFarthest Country of all.

Three men pace the wind-swept captain’s bridge,scanning the horizon, and there are always two clingingin the crow’s nest in the icy gale. This boat ismanned by a pedigreed crew. From the captain tothe last cabin-boy, everybody has been torpedoedat least once. The Marconi operator never smiles.He sits at his instrument with a grey, drawn lookabout his young boyish mouth. He was on the Lusitaniawhen she went down. He was the last manoff the Laconia the other day. The wrinkled suithe’s wearing is the one they picked him up in out ofthe sea.

For two days out, we have the little destroyerswith us, and then we are left to our luck and thegun in front and the watching men aloft. The lifeboatsare always swung out on their davits for thesiren’s sudden call. The doors of the upper deckstand open, waiting beside each a preparedness exhibit,boxes of biscuit, flasks of brandy, and a pileof blankets we are to seize as we run. We twowomen have filled the pockets of our steamer-coatswith safety-pins, hairpins and a comb, first aid thatno one remembers to bring when they pick you upfrom the open boat. My fellow traveller is huddlingvery close to her six-foot husband, to be tuckedsafely under his arm at the emergency moment. It[78]is good that we are having rough weather. Whenthe waves are tossing high, the periscopes may notfind us.

We are sixteen people who wander like disembodiedspirits from the gay days of old through thesegreat empty rooms that once rang with the joy ofhundreds of tourists on their pleasure-jaunts overthe world. There are no games. There is no dancing.There is no band. There are no steamerchairson deck. At sundown we are closed in tightbehind iron shutters. No one may so much as lighta cigaret outside.

In the ghastly silence of the days that pass, thereis only the strain and quiver of the ship, and thesolemn boom, boom of the sea. Death is so nearthat it seems fitting the glad activities of life shouldcease, as when a corpse is laid out in the front roomof a house. For a while there is a tendency towhisper, as if we were at a funeral, or as if, perchance,the Germans in the sea could hear. Butsoon we find ourselves functioning quite normally.Not until the sixth day out, it is true, does any oneventure to take a bath. You don’t want to be rushedlike that, you know, to your drowning. But weare sleeping regularly at night. We eat bacon andeggs for breakfast as usual. We are pleased whenthere is turkey and cranberry sauce for dinner. Onedoes not maintain an agony of suspense forever.For most of us, I think it began to end when we hadcommitted ourselves to the decision of this voyage.[79]After that, the issue rests with God or with destiny,according to one’s religion.

There is no attempt at dressing for dinner on theCarmania. Evening dress and all the time dress islife-preservers. We do not take them off even atnight for a while. We sleep in them. With thenew styles, of which there are many, you can. Mineis a garment that buttons up exactly like a man’svest. Next to the lining is a padded filling, an Indianvegetable matter that will keep one afloat likecork. To-day one desires the latest modern devicesagainst death. A life-preserver costs anywhere fromfive to fifteen dollars. You carry yours with youas you do your toothbrush and your steamer-rug.

Time ticks off the minutes to life or to death to-morrow.We walk the decks and scan a nearly desertedocean. Only twice do we sight a steamshipon the horizon. At table we discuss as one doesusually, oh, immortality and Christian Science andwoman suffrage. The Englishman says, “Votes forwomen are really impossible, don’t you know.Why, if the British women had voted twelve yearsago, there might not have been any battleships in1914. And then where would England have beento-day?”

“But if the German women too had voted twelveyears ago, have you thought how much happier theworld might be to-day?” I ask. The Englishmandoes not see the point but the American at my leftsays, “Guess you handed him one that time.”

[80]

On April sixth the Cunard Bulletin, the wirelessnewspaper, is laid beside our plates at breakfast withthe announcement that’s thrilled around a world,“The United States has declared for war.” TheEnglishman next me says, “That must be a greatrelief for you.” And I cannot answer for the choking inmy throat. My country, oh, my country, too,at the gates of hell to go in regiment by regiment!

On Sunday the English clergyman reads the serviceincluding the phrases in brackets: “God savethe King (and the President of the United States).Vanquish their enemies and preserve them in felicity.”Down beneath the sea the Germans in theirsubmarines too are praying like that to the same God.But one hopes, oh, one earnestly hopes, that Godwill not hear them.

After the sixth day out, we have probably escapedthe submarines. The American men are no longerkindly asking me in anxious tone, “You’re not nervous,are you?” On the eighth day they get out theshuffleboard. Two mornings later when we awake,the sea is a beautiful blue, all dimpling with sparklingpoints of golden light. It is real New Yorksunlight again! The captain comes down from thepilot house smiling: “Well, we got away thistime,” he says.

The Statue of Liberty is rising on the horizon.The Manhattan sky-line etches itself against theheavens. Do you know, I’d rather be a door-keeperhere at Ellis Island, than a lady-in-waiting anywherein Europe. The Carmania warps into dock[81]in sight of the Metropolitan Tower. Was FourteenthStreet ever cheap, common, sordid? As mytaxicab rolls across town, see how beautiful, oh, seehow beautiful is Fourteenth street, a little landscapecross-section right out of Paradise! Nobodyhere is blinded, nobody maimed, nobody in crêpe,nobody broken-hearted—yet. I have escaped froma nightmare of the Middle Ages. I lift my face tothe sunlight again.

I know I am tired, terribly tired of doing difficultthings and saving my life from day to day. ButI have not realised how near collapse I am until Idrop in a chair before the Editor’s deck in the officeof the Pictorial Review. I, who have been so crazyto get to the country where there is still free speech,that I had insanely hoped to stand in Broadway andshout, have suddenly lost my voice. I can only reportin a whisper!

My chief looks at me in concern. “For God’ssake, girl,” he says, “go somewhere and go to bed!”

Her Country’s Call

One Thousand Women Wanted! You mayread it on a great canvas sign that stretches acrossan industrial establishment in lower Manhattan.The owner of this factory who put it there, onlyknows that it is an advertisem*nt for labour ofwhich he finds himself suddenly in need. But hehas all unwittingly really written a proclamationthat is a sign of the times.

Across the Atlantic I studied that proclamationin Old World cities. Women Wanted! WomenWanted! The capitals of Europe have been forfour years placarded with the sign. And now wein America are writing it on our sky line. All overthe world see it on the street-car barns as on thecolleges. It is hung above the factories and thecoal mines, the halls of government and the farm-yardsand the arsenals and even the War Office.Everywhere from the fireside to the firing line, countryafter country has taken up the call. Now it hasbecome the insistent chorus of civilisation: WomenWanted! Women Wanted!

But yesterday the great war was a phenomenonto which we in America thrilled only as its percussions[83]reverberated around the world. Now our ownsoldiers are marching down Main Street. But theiruniforms still are new. Wait. Soon here too oneshall choke with that sob in the throat. Oh, I amwalking again in the garden of the Tuileries on aday when I had seen war without the flags flying andthe bands playing. It was dead men and disabledmen and hospitals full and insane asylums full andcemeteries full. “You have to remember,” said avoice at my side, “that all freedoms since the worldbegan have had to be fought for. They still haveto be.”

So I repeat it now for you, the women of America,resolutely to remember. And get our your RobertBrownings! Read it over and over again,“God’s in his heaven.” For there are going to bedays when it will seem that God has quite goneaway. Still He hasn’t. Suddenly in a lifting ofthe war clouds above the blackest battle smoke, weshall see again His face as a flashing glimpse ofsome new freedom lights for an instant the darkenedheavens above the globe of the world. Alreadythere has been a Russian revolution which may portendthe end of a German monarchy. In Englanda new democracy has buckled on the sword of a deadaristocracy. And a great Commoner is at the helmof state. But with all the freedoms they are winning,there is one for which not the most decoratedgeneral has any idea he’s fighting. I am not surebut it is the greatest freedom of all: when womanwins the race wins. The new democracy for which[84]a world has taken up arms, for the first time sincethe history of civilisation began, is going to be realdemocracy. There is a light that is breaking highbehind all the battle lines! Look! There on thehorizon in those letters of blood that promise of thenewest freedom of all. When it is finished—theawful throes of this red agony in which a world isbeing reborn—there is going to be a place in the Sunfor women.

Listen, hear the call, Women Wanted! WomenWanted! Last Spring the Government pitched akhaki colored tent in your town on the vacant lotjust beyond the post office, say. How many menhave enlisted there? Perhaps there are seventy-fivewho have gone from the factory across the creek,and the receiving teller at the First National Bank,and the new principal of the High School where thechildren were getting along so well, and the doctorthat everybody had because they liked him so much.

And, oh, last week at dinner your own husbandhad but just finished carving when he looked acrossthe table and said: “Dear, I can’t stand it anylonger. I’m going to get into this fight to makethe world right.” You know how your face wentwhite and your heart for an instant stopped beating.But what I don’t believe you do know is that youare at this moment getting ready to play your partin one of the most tremendous epochs of the world.It is not only Liège and the Marne and Somme, andHaig and Joffre and Pétain and Pershing who aremaking history to-day. Keokuk, Iowa, and Kalamazoo,[85]Mich., and Little Falls, N. Y., are too—andyou and the woman who lives next door!

THE NEW WOMAN MOVEMENT

Every man who enlists at that tent near the postoffice is going to leave a job somewhere whether it’sat the factory or the doctor’s office or the schoolteacher’s desk, or whether it’s your husband. Thatjob will have to be taken by a woman. It’s whathappened in Europe. It’s what now we may seehappen here. A great many women will have awage envelope who never had it before. That maymean affluence to a housefull of daughters. One,two, three, four wage envelopes in a family wherefather’s used to be the only one. You even mayhave to go out to earn enough to support yourselfand the babies. Yes, I know your husband’s armypay and the income from investments carefully accumulatedthrough the savings of your married life,will help quite a little. But with the ever risingwar cost of living, it may not be enough. It hasn’tbeen for thousands of homes in Europe. And eventuallyyou too may go to work as other women have.It’s very strange, is it not, for you of all women whohave always believed that woman’s place was thehome. And you may even have been an “anti,”a most earnest advocate of an ancient régime againstwhich whole societies and associations of what yesterdaywere called “advanced” women organisedtheir “suffrage” protests.

To-day no one any longer has to believe what is[86]woman’s place. No woman even has anything tosay about it. Read everywhere the signs: WomenWanted! Here in New York we are seeing shiploadafter shipload of men going out to sea in khaki.We don’t know how many boat loads like that willgo down the bay. But for an army of every millionAmerican men in Europe, there must be mobilisedanother million women to take their places behindthe lines here 3,000 miles away from the guns,to carry on the auxiliary operations without whichthe armies in the field could not exist.

In the department store where you shopped to-dayyou noticed an elevator girl had arrived, wherethe operator always before has been a boy! Outsidethe window of my country house here as I write,off on that field on the hillside a woman is working,who never worked there before. At Lexington,Mass., I read in my morning paper, the Rev. ChristopherWalter Collier has gone to the front in Franceand his wife has been unanimously elected by thecongregation to fill the pulpit during his absence.Sometimes women by the hundred step into newvacancies. The Æolian Company is advertising forwomen as piano salesmen and has established a specialschool for their instruction. A Chicago manufacturingplant has hung out over its employmentgate the announcement, “Man’s work, man’s pay forall women who can qualify,” and within a week twohundred women were at work. The Pennsylvaniarailroad, which has rigidly opposed the employmentof women on its office staffs, in June, 1917, announced[87]a change of policy and took on in its variousdepartments five hundred women and girls. TheMunicipal Service Commission in New York lastfall was holding its first examination to admit womento the position of junior draughtsmen in the city’semploy. The Civil Service Commission at Washington,preparing to release every possible man fromgovernment positions for war service, had compileda list of 10,000 women eligible for clerical workin government departments.

Like that it is happening all about us. This isthe new woman movement. And you’re in it. Weall are. I know: you may never have carried asuffrage banner or marched in a suffrage processionor so much as addressed a suffrage campaign envelope.But you’re “moving” to-day just the same ifyou’ve only so much as rolled a Red Cross bandageor signed a Food Administration pledge offered youby the women’s committee of the Council of NationalDefence. All the women of the world aremoving.

“Suffrage de la morte,” a Senator on the Seine hastermed the vote offered the French feminists in theform of a proposition that every man dying on thefield of battle may transfer his ballot to a womanwhom he shall designate. And the French womenhave drawn back in horror, exclaiming: “We don’twant a dead man’s vote. We want only our ownvote.” Nevertheless it is something like this whichis occurring.

And we may shudder, but we may not draw back.[88]It is by way of the place de la morte, that womenare moving inexorably to-day into industry and commerceand the professions, on to strange new destiniesthat shall not be denied.

There on the firing line a bullet whizzes straightto the mark. A man drops dead in the trenches.Some wife’s husband, some girl’s sweetheart who beforehe was a soldier was a wage earner, never willbe more. Back home another woman who had beentemporarily enrolled in the ranks of industry, stepsforward, enlisted for life in the army of labour.

Dear God, what a price to pay for the freedom thefeminists have asked. But this is not our womanmovement. This is His woman movement, whom*oves in mysterious ways His ends to command.We may not know. And we do not understand.But as we watch the war clouds, we see, as it were inthe lightning flash of truth, the illuminated waythat is opening for women throughout the world.It is westward to us that this star of opportunity hastaken its course directly from above the battlefieldsof Europe.

A WOMAN OF YESTERDAY LOOKS ON

Women Wanted! Women Wanted! I amhearing it again over there. Outside the windowsof my London hotel in Piccadilly, a shaft of sharpwhite light played against the blackness of the Londonsky. Down these beams that searched the nightfor enemy Zeppelins, a woman’s figure softly moved.And as I looked, the close drawn curtains of my[89]room, it seemed, parted and she stepped lightlyacross the window sill. She was gowned in a quaint,old-time costume. “They’re not wearing them to-day,”I smiled.

She looked down at her cotton gown stamped withthe broad arrows of Holloway jail. There werewomen, you know, who suffered and died in thatprison garb. The way of the broad arrow used tobe the way of the cross for the woman’s cause.

“You ought to see the new styles,” I said. “Governmentsare getting out so many new decorations forwomen.”

“Tell me,” she answered. “Up in heaven wehave heard that it is so. And I have come to see.”

So we went out together, the Soul of a Suffragetteand I, to look on the Great Push of the new womanmovement that is swinging down the twentieth centuryin sweeping battalions. It has the middle ofthe road and all the gates ahead are open wide. Noukase of parliament or king halts it. No churchdogma anathematises it. No social edict ostracisesit. The police do not arrest it and the hooligansdo not mob it. No, indeed! The applauding populacethat’s crying “Place aux dames” would nottolerate any such treatment as that. And in fact, Idon’t think there’s any one left in the world whowould want to so much as pull out a hairpin of thistriumphant processional.

You see, it’s so very different from the womanmovement of yesterday. That was the crusade ofthe pioneers who gave their lives in the struggling[90]service of an unpopular ideal. Who wanted feministsfree to find themselves? Even women themselvescame haltingly as recruits. But this is a pageant,with Everywoman crowding for place at hercountry’s call. And who would not adore to be apatriot? It is with flying colors, albeit to the solemnmeasures of a Dead March that the new columns arecoming on.

It is the Woman Movement against which all theparliaments of men shall never again prevail. Majestically,with sure and rhythmic tread, it is moving,not under its own power of propaganda, but propelledby fearful cosmic forces. At the compulsionof a sublime destiny accelerated under the ægis ofa war office press bureau, suffragists pro and antialike are gathered in. Theirs no longer to reasonwhy. For see, they are keeping step, always keepingstep with the armies at the front!

There is a new offensive on the Somme. Thereis a defeat at the Yser, a victory at Verdun or Marne.The dead men lie deep in the trenches! The waroffice combs out new regiments to face the hell-fireof shrapnel and the woman movement in all nationsjoins up new recruits to fill the vacant places fromwhich the men, about to die, are steadily enlisted.See the sign of the times. I point it out to MySuffragette: “Women Wanted.” With each yearof war the demand becomes more insistent. WomenWanted! Women Wanted!

“But they didn’t used to be,” she gasps in amazement.

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And of course, I too remember when the worldwas barricaded against everywhere a woman wantedto go beyond the dishpan and the wash tub and thenursery. It all seems now such a long while ago.

“Dear old-fashioned girl,” I reply, “women nolonger have to smash a way anywhere. They’lleven be sending after you if you don’t come.”

When the militants of England signed with theirgovernment the truce which abrogated for the periodof the war the Cat and Mouse Act with which theyhad been pursued, it was the formal announcementto the world of the cessation of suffrage activitieswhile the nations settled other issues. From Berlinto Paris and London, feminists acquiesced in the decisionarrived at in Kingsway. It seemed indeedthat the woman’s cause was going to wait. But isit not written: “Whoso loseth his life,” etc., “shallfind it.”

Women Wanted! Women Wanted! “Listen,”I say to the Soul of a Suffragette, as we stand in theStrand. “You hear it? And it’s like that in theAvenue de l’Opéra and in Unter den Linden and inPetrograd and now in Broadway. To every woman,it is her country’s call to service.”

I think we may write it down in history that onAugust 14, 1914, the door of the Doll’s Houseopened. She who stood at the threshold where thetides of the ages surged, waved a brave farewell tolines of gleaming bayonets going down the street.Then the clock on her mantel ticked off the wonderfulmoment of the centuries that only God himself[92]had planned. The force primeval that had heldher in bondage, this it was that should set her free.As straight as ever she went before to the altarand the cook stove and the cradle, she stepped outnow into the wide wide world, the woman behindthe man behind the gun.

“See,” I say to My Suffragette, “not all the politicaleconomists from John Stuart Mill to EllenKey could have accomplished it. Not even yourspectacular martyrdom was able to achieve it. Butnow it is done. For lo, the password the feministshave sought, is found. And it is Love—not logic!”

There are, the statisticians tell us, more thantwenty million men numbered among the embattledhosts out there at the front where the future of thehuman race is being fought for. Modern warfarehas most terrible engines of destruction. But withall of these at command, there is not a brigade ofsoldiers that could stand against their foes withoutthe aid of the women who in the last analysis areholding the line.

Who is it that is feeding and clothing and nursingthe greatest armies of history? See that soldier inthe trenches? A woman raised the grain for thebread, a woman is tending the flocks that providedthe meat for his rations to-day. A woman made theboots and the uniform in which he stands. A womanmade the shells with which his gun is loaded. Awoman will nurse him when he’s wounded. Awoman’s ambulance may even pick him up on thebattlefield. A woman surgeon may perform the[93]operation to save his life. And somewhere backhome a woman holds the job he had to leave behind.There is no task to which women have not turnedto-day to carry on civilisation. For the shot thatwas fired in Serbia summoned men to their most ancientoccupation—and women to every other.

“All the suffrage flags are furled?” questions MySuffragette incredulously, as we pass through thestreets where once her banners waved most militantly.“Gone with your broad arrows of yesterday,”I affirm. “And you should see our modernstyles.”

NEW COSTUMES FOR NEW WOMEN

When women stood at the threshold listeningbreathlessly that August day, there was one costumeready and laid out by the nations for their wear inevery land. Coronets and shimmering ball gowns,cap and gown in university corridors and plain littlehome made dresses in rose bowered cottages werealike exchanged for the new uniform and insignia.And the woman who set the sign of the red crossin the centre of her forehead appeared in her whitegown and her flowing white head dress all overEurope as instantaneously as a new skirt ever flashedout in the pages of a fashion magazine. To her,every country called as naturally, as spontaneouslyas a hurt child might turn to its mother. She it iswho has worn the red cross to her transfiguration inthis new Woman Movement with one of the largestdetachments in hospital service. See her on the[94]sinking hospital ships in the Channel or the Dardanelles,insisting on “wounded soldiers first” as shepasses her charges to safety, and waiting behind herselfgoes quietly under the water. And with bandagedeyes she has even walked unflinchingly todeath before the levelled guns of the enemy soldiery,as did Edith Cavell in Belgium who went with herred cross to immortality. All the world has beenbreathless before the figure of the woman who diesto-day for her country like a soldier. No one knewthat the Red Cross would be carried to these heightsof Calvary. But from the day that the great slaughterbegan, it was accepted as a matter of course thatwoman’s place was going to be at the bedside of thewounded soldier. Even as the troops buckled onsword and pistol and the departing regiments beganto move, it was made sure that she should be waitingfor them on their return.

In Germany in the first month of the war, no lessthan 70,000 women of the Vaterlandischer Frauenverein,trained in first aid to the injured, had arrivedat the doors of the Reichstag to offer themselves forRed Cross service.

I remember in the spring of 1914 to have stoodat Cecilienhaus in Charlottenburg. Cecilienhauswith its crèche and its maternity care and its folkskitchens and its workingmen’s gardens, was devotedto the welfare work in which the VaterlandischerFrauenverein of the nation was engaged. FrauOberin Hanna Kruger showed me with pride allthese social activities. Then she looked away down[95]the Berliner Strasse and said: “But when warcomes—” Had I heard aright? That you knowwas in May, 1914. But she repeated: “Whenwar comes we are going to be able to take care ofseventy-five soldiers in this dining-room and in thatmaternity ward we shall be able to have beds fora dozen officers.” All over Germany the half millionwomen of the Vaterlandischer Frauenvereinplanning like that, “when war comes,” had taken afirst aid nurse’s training course. They were as readyfor mobilisation as were their men. France, viewingwith alarm these preparations across the border,had her women also in training. The Associationdes Dames Français, the Union des Femmes deFrance and the Société Secours aux Blessés Militaires,at once put on the Red Cross uniform andbrought to their country’s service 59,500 nurses. InEngland the Voluntary Aid Detachments of the RedCross had 60,000 members ready to serve under the3,000 trained nurses who were registered for dutywithin a fortnight of the outbreak of war. Similarlyevery country engaged in the conflict, takinginventory of its resources, eagerly accepted the servicesof the war nurse. The same policy of stateactuated every nation as was expressed by the ItalianMinister of War who announced: “By utilisingthe services of women to replace men in the militaryhospitals, we shall release 20,000 soldiers for activeduty at the front.”

The Red Cross of service to the soldier is the mostconspicuous decoration worn by women in all warring[96]countries. Everywhere you meet the nurses’uniform almost as universally adopted a garb as wasthe shirt waist of yesterday. We are here at CharingCross station where nightly under cover of thesoft darkness the procession of grim grey motor ambulancesrolls out bearing the wounded. They arecoming like this too at the Gare du Nord in Paris,at the Potsdam station in Berlin, and up in Petrograd.In each ambulance between the tiers ofstretchers on which the soldiers lie, you may see thefigure of a woman silhouetted faintly against the dimlight of the railroad station as she bends to smootha pillow, to adjust a bandage, or now to light a cigarettefor a maimed man who never can do that leastservice for himself again. She may be a peeress ofthe realm, or she may be a militant on parole grantedthe amnesty of her government that needs her morethese days for saving life than for serving jail sentence.But look, and you shall see the Red Crosson her forehead!

The grey ambulances like this coming from therailroad stations long ago in every land filled up theregular military hospitals through which the patientsare passed by the thousands every month. Andother women taking the Red Cross set it above thedoorways of historic mansions opened to receive thewounded. In Italy, Queen Margherita and QueenElena gave their royal residences. In Paris BaronessRothschild has made her beautiful house withits great garden behind a high yellow wall a HôpitalMilitaire Auxiliaire. And many private residences[97]like this are among the eight hundred hospitals inFrance which are being operated under the directionof one woman’s organisation alone, the Sociétéde Secours aux Blessés Militaires.

Here in London, in Piccadilly, at DevonshireHouse, desks and filing cabinets fill the rooms oncegay with social functions. And hospital messengersgo and come up and down the marvellous gold andcrystal staircase. The duch*ess of Devonshire hasturned over the great mansion as the official headquartersfor the Red Cross. Nearby, in Mayfair,Madame Moravieff, whose husband is connected withthe Russian diplomatic service, is serving as commandantfor the hospital she has opened for Englishsoldiers. Lady Londonderry’s house in Park Laneis a hospital. By the end of the first year of war,like this, no less than 850 private residences in Englandhad been transformed into Voluntary Aid DetachmentRed Cross Hospitals.

In hospital financiering the American woman inEurope has led all the rest. Margaret Cox Benet,the wife of Lawrence V. Benet in Paris, braved theperils of the Atlantic crossing to appeal to Americafor contributions to the American Ambulance Hospitalat Neuilly. It is equalled by only one otherwar hospital in Europe, the splendidly equippedhospital of the American women at Paignton, England,initiated by Lady Arthur Paget, formerlyMary Paran Stevens of New York. Lady Paget,who is president of the American Women’s WarRelief Fund, has just rounded out the first million[98]dollars of the fund which she has personally raisedfor war work.

You see how these also serve who are doing theexecutive and organisation work that makes it possiblefor the woman in the front lines to wear her redcross even to her transfiguration. Accelerated bythe activities of women like these behind the lines,the Red Cross battalions are leading the Great Pushof the new woman movement. The woman in thenurse’s uniform is not exciting the most comment,however. It is by reason of her numbers, the thousandsand thousands of her that she commands themost attention. But she was really expected.

WHERE YOU FIND THE MILITANTS TO-DAY

For the amazing figure that has emerged by magicdirectly out of the battle smoke of this war, see thewoman in khaki! Khaki, I explain to My Suffragette,is one of the most popular of governmentofferings for women’s wear. The material has beenfound most serviceable in a war zone either to diein or to live in, while you save others from dying.It is sometimes varied with woollen cloth preferredfor warmth. But the essential features of the costumeare preserved: the short skirt, the leather leggings,the military hat and the shoulder straps withthe insignia of special service. When governmentshave called for unusual duty that is difficult or disagreeableor dangerous, it is the woman in khaki whor*sponds: “Take me. I am here.” She will, infact, do anything that there’s no one else to do.

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Stick-at-nothings, the London newspapers havenicknamed the women’s Reserve Ambulance Corpsof 400 women who wear a khaki uniform with agreen cross armlet. With white tunics over thesekhaki suits, a detachment of green cross girls at PeelHouse, the soldiers’ club in Westminster, does house-maidduty from seven in the morning until eight atnight. They are making beds and waiting on table,these young women, who, many of them, in statelyEnglish homes have all their lives been served bybutlers and footmen. I saw a Green Cross girl atthe military headquarters of the corps in Piccadillymaking to Commandant Mabel Beatty her report ofanother phase of war work. She was such a youngthing, I should say perhaps eighteen, and delicatelybred. I know I noticed the slender aristocratic handthat she lifted to her hat in salute to her superiorofficer: “I have,” she said, “this morning burnedthree amputated arms, two legs and a section of ajaw bone. And I have carried my end of five heavycoffins to the dead wagon.” That’s all in her day’swork. She’s a hospital orderly. And it’s one ofthe things an orderly is for, to dispose of the by-productsof a great war hospital.

See also, these ambulances that bring the woundedfrom Charing Cross. They are “manned” by awoman outside as well as the nurse within. Thereis a girl at the wheel in the driver’s seat. The MotorTransport Section of the Green Cross Societyaccomplishes an average weekly mileage of 2,000miles transporting wounded and munitions. Like[100]this they respond for any service to which the exigenciesof war may call. There was the time of thefirst serious Zeppelin raid on London when amidthe crash of falling bombs and the horror of fireflaming suddenly in the darkness, the shrieks of themaimed and dying filled the night with terror andthe populace seemed to stand frozen to inaction atthe scene about them. Right up to the centre ofthe worst carnage rolled a Green Cross ambulancefrom which leaped out eight khaki clad women.They were, mind you, women of the carefully shelteredclass, who sit in dinner gowns under soft candlelight in beautifully appointed English houses.And they never before in all their lives had witnessedan evil sight. But they set to work promptlyby the side of the police to pick up the dead and thedying, putting the highway to order as calmly asthey might have gone about adjusting the curtainsand the pillows to set a drawing-room to rights.“Thanks,” said the police, when sometime later anambulance arrived from the nearest headquarters,“the ladies have done this job.” Since then theWoman’s Reserve Ambulance Corps is officially attachedto the “D” Division of the Metropolitan Policefor air raid relief.

That girl in khaki who is serving as a hospitalorderly, you notice, wears shoulder straps of blue.She comes from the great military hospital in HighHolborn that is staffed entirely by women. Wemay walk through the wards there where we shallsee many of her. Above her in authority are women[101]with shoulder straps of red. These are they whowear the surgeon’s white tunic in the operating theatre,who issue the physician’s orders at the patient’sbedside. Now the door at the end of the wardopens. A woman with red shoulder straps standsthere, whom every wounded patient able to lift hisright arm, salutes as if his own military commanderhad appeared. “But it’s my doctor, my doctor,”exclaims the Suffragette of yesterday.

And it is. The doctor, you see, used to hold infact the unofficial post of first aid physician to theWomen’s Social and Political Union. Frequentlyshe was wont to hurry out on an emergency call toattend some militant picked up cut and bleedingfrom the missiles of the mobs or released faint anddying from a hunger strike. And the doctor herselfdid her bit in the old days. The Governmenthad her in Holloway jail for six weeks. Well, to-daythey have her as surgeon in command of thiswar hospital with the rank of major. She’s so wellfitted for the place, you see, by her earlier experience.

But, visibly agitated, My Suffragette again plucksat my sleeve: “Are you quite sure,” she asks, “thatScotland Yard won’t take her?”

Poor dear lady of yesterday. They’re not doingthat to-day. Your woman movement was militantagainst the Government. This woman movement ismilitant with the Government. There’s all the differencein the world. And the woman in khaki hasfound it. Militancy of the popular kind has come[102]to be most exalted in woman. Besides a woman doctoris too valuable in these days to be interfered with.She is no longer sent as a missionary physician tothe heathen or limited to a practice exclusivelyamong women and children. She is good enoughfor anywhere. One issue of the Lancet advertises:“Women doctors wanted for forty municipal appointments.”Women doctors wanted, is the callof every country. This military hospital in Londonof which Dr. Louisa Garrett Anderson, major, is incommand, is entirely staffed with women. Parishas its war hospital with Dr. Nicole Gerard-Mangin,major in command. Dr. Clelia Lollini, sub-lieutenant,is operating surgeon at a war hospital inVenice. In Russia one of the most celebrated wardoctors is the Princess Gurdrovitz, surgeon in chargeof the Imperial Hospital at Tsarkoe Selo.

Oh, the khaki costume I think we may say is admiredof every war office. It has found a vogueamong all the allies. It has appeared the past yearin America, where it has been most recently adopted.But the model for whom it was particularly made tomeasure was the militant suffragette of England.Nearly everybody who used to be in Holloway jail iswearing it. It’s the best fit that any of them find to-dayin the shop windows of government styles. Andit’s so well adapted to women to whom all early Victorianqualities are as foreign as hoop skirts. Youwould not expect one inured to hardship by alternateperiods of starvation and forcible feeding to be eithera fearsome or a delicate creature. And the courage[103]that could horsewhip a prime minister or set off abomb beneath a bishop’s chair, is just the kind thatevery nation’s calling for in these strenuous times.It’s the kind that up close to the firing line gets mentionedin army orders and decorated with all crossesof iron and gold and silver.

You will find the woman who has put on khaki atthe front in all the warring countries. The duch*essof Aosta is doing ambulance work in Italy. TheCountess Elizabeth Shouvaleff of Petrograd commandedher own hospital train that brought in thewounded. But it is the British woman in khaki whohas gone farthest afield. The National Union’s“Scottish Women’s Hospitals,” as they are known,are right behind the armies. Staffed from the surgeonsto the ambulance corps entirely by women,they go out to any part of the war zone where theneed is greatest.

See the latest “unit” that is leaving PaddingtonStation. The equipment they are taking with themincludes every appliance that will be required, froma bed to a bandage, and numbers just 1,051 balesand cases of freight. The entire unit, forty-fivewomen, have had their hair cut short. For sanitaryreasons, is the euphemistic way of explaining it.For protection against the vermin with which patientsfrom the trenches will be infested, if you askfor war facts as they are. Units like this have goneout to settle wherever by army orders a place hasbeen made for them, in a deserted monastery inFrance that they must first scrub and clean, in a[104]refugee barracks in Russia, in a tent in Serbia wherethey themselves must dig the drainage trenches.

Their surgeons have stood at the operating tablea week at a stretch with only an hour or two of sleepeach night. Their doctors have battled with epidemicsof typhoid and plague. Their ambulancegirls have brought in the wounded from the battlefieldunder shell-fire. Hospitals have been conductedunder bombardment with all the patientscarried to the cellar. Hospitals have been capturedby the enemy. Hospitals have been evacuated atcommand with the patients loaded on trains or motorcars or bullock wagons for retreat with the army.There were forty-six British women who shared inthe historic retreat of the Serbian army three hundredmiles over the Plain of Kossovo and the mountainsof Albania. Men and cattle perished by thescore. But the women doctors, freezing, starving,sleeping in the fields, struggling against a blindingblizzard with an amazing physical endurance and adauntless courage, all came through to Scutari. Outon the far-flung frontiers of civilisation, the womanin khaki who has done these things is memorialised.At Mladanovatz, the Serbians have erected a fountainwith the inscription: “In memory of the ScottishWomen’s Hospitals and their founder, Dr. ElsieInglis.”

SUFFRAGISTS LED ALL THE REST

When the great call, “Women wanted,” first commencedin all lands, there were those who stood with[105]reluctant feet at the threshold simply because theydid not know how to step out into the new wideworld of opportunity stretching before them. Inthis crisis it was to the suffragists that every governmentturned. Who else should organise? Thesewomen, like My Suffragette, had devoted their livesto assembling cohorts for a cause! The Assoziazioneper la Donna in Italy, as the Conseil National desFemmes Françaises in France, promptly respondedby offering their office machinery as registration bureausthrough which women could be drafted intoservice. It was the suffrage association at Budapest,Hungary, that filled the order from the citygovernment for five hundred women street sweepers.The Vaterlandischer Frauenverein assembled 25,000women in Berlin alone to take the course of trainingarranged for helferinnen, assistants in all phases ofrelief work. But it was in England where thewoman movement of yesterday had reached its highestpoint in organisation that the woman movementfor to-day was best equipped to start. Britaincounted among the nation’s resources no less thanfifty separate suffrage organisations, one of whichalone, the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies,was able to send out its instructions to over500 branches! And the mobilisation of the womanpower of a nation was under way on a scale thatcould have been witnessed in no other era of theworld.

The woman who has been enlisted in largest numbersin England as in other lands is the woman who[106]at her country’s call hung up the housewife’s kitchenapron in plain little cottages to put on a new uniformwith a distinctive feature that has been hithertoconspicuously missing from women’s clothes. It hasa pocket for a pay envelope. “See,” I say to MySuffragette, “you would not know her at all, now,would you?”

She came marching through the streets of Londonon July 17, 1915, in one of the most significantdetachments mustered for the new woman movement,40,000 women carrying banners with the newdevice: “For men must fight and women mustwork.” And industry, in which she was enlisting,presented her with a new costume. The Ministryof Munitions in London got out the pattern. Employersof labour throughout the world are nowcopying it. There isn’t anything in the chorusmore attractive than the woman who’s walked intothe centre of the stage in shop and factory wearingoverall trousers, tunic and cap. Some English factorieshave the entire woman force thus uniformedand others have adopted only the tunic. Here aregirl window cleaners with pail and ladder comingdown the Strand wearing the khaki trousers. Thegirl conductor of the omnibus that’s just passed hasa very short skirt that just meets at the knees herhigh leather leggings. The girl lift operators at thestores in Oxford Street are in smart peg-top trousers.In Germany the innovation is of course being doneby imperial decree, a government order having putall the railway women in dark grey, wide trousers.[107]In France the new design is accepted slowly. Thegirl conductor who swings at the open door of theParis Metro with a whistle at her lips, wears themen employé’s cap but she still clings to her own“tablier.”

That July London procession organised by thesuffragists, led in fact by Mrs. Pankhurst herself, inresponse to labour’s call, “Women wanted,” is thelast suffrage procession of which the world has heard.And it is the most important feminist parade thathas ever appeared in any city of the world. For itwas a procession marching straight for the goal ofeconomic independence. It was the vanguard ofthe moving procession of women that in every countryis still continuously passing into industry. Germanyin the first year of war had a half millionwomen in one occupation alone, that of makingmunitions. France has 400,000 “munitionettes.”Great Britain in 1916 had a million women who hadenlisted for the places of men since the war began.In every one of Europe’s warring countries and nowin America, women are being rushed as rapidly aspossible into commerce and industry to release men.In Germany nearly all the bank clerks are women.The Bank of France alone in Paris has 700 womenclerks. In England women clerks number over100,000. And the British Government is steadilyadvertising: Wanted, 30,000 women a week to replacemen for the armies.

“Who works, fights,” Lloyd George has said, inthe English Parliament. English women enlisting[108]for agriculture have been given a government certificateattesting: “Every woman who helps in agricultureduring the war is as truly serving her countryas is the man who is fighting in trenches or on thesea.”

“But,” protests the bewildered woman from onlythe other day, “they told us that women didn’tknow enough to do man’s work, that she wasn’tstrong enough for much of anything beyond lightdomestic duty like washing and scrubbing and cookingand raising a family of six or eight or ten children.”

“Nothing that anybody ever said about womenbefore August, 1914,” I answer, “goes to-day. Allthe discoveries the scientists thought they had madeabout her, all the reports the sociologists solemnlyfiled over her, all the limitations the educators laidon her and all the jokes the punsters wrote abouther—everything has gone to the scrap-heap as repudiatedas the one-time theory that the earth wassquare instead of round. Everything they said shewasn’t and she couldn’t and she didn’t, she now isand she can and she does.”

IT IS UNIVERSAL SERVICE

Even women who do not need to work for payare working without it and adding to the demonstrationof what women can do. See the colonel’s ladytaking the place of Julie O’Grady at the lathe forweek-end work in the munition factories to releasethe regular worker for one day’s rest in seven. Lady[109]Lawrence in a white tunic and wearing a diamondwrist watch is in charge of the canteen at the WoolwichArsenal, supervising the serving of kippers andtoast at the tea hour for the 2,000 women employés.Lady Sybil Grant, Lord Rosebery’s daughter, is theofficial photographer to the Royal Naval Air Serviceat Roehampton. The Countess of Limerick, assistedby fifty women of title, among them LadyRandolph Churchill, is running the Soldiers’ FreeRefreshment Buffet at the London Bridge Station.The Marchioness of Londonderry, directing the MilitaryCookery Section of the Women’s Legion, hasgiven to her nation the woman army cook who hasrecently replaced 5,000 men. Women of world-widefame have cheerfully turned to the task thatcalled. Beatrice Harraden, celebrated author of“Ships That Pass in the Night,” is in the uniformof an orderly at the Endell Street War Hospital,where she has done a unique service in organisingthe first hospital library for the patients. May Sinclair,whose recent book, “The Three Sisters,” is oneof the great contributions to feminist literature, isenrolled as a worker at the Kensington War HospitalSupply Department. She has invented the machineused there to turn out “swabs” seven timesfaster than formerly they were made by hand.

There is the greatest diversity in war service.One of the first calls answered by the suffragists wasfor an emergency gang of 300 women from themetropolis to supervise the baling of hay for thearmy. Lloyd George has been supplied with a[110]woman secretary and a woman chauffeur, the lattera girl who was a celebrated hunger striker before thewar. In the royal dockyards and naval establishmentsthere are 7,000 women employed. Throughthe Woman’s National Land Service Corps 5,000university and other women of education have beenrecruited to serve as forewomen of detachments ofwomen farm labourers. The army last spring wasasking for 6,000 women at the War Office to assistin connection with the work of the Royal FlyingCorps. Oh, the list of what women are doing to-dayis as indefinitely long as everything that there is tobe done.

And the woman movement sweeps on directlytoward the gates of government. See the womanwar councillor who recently arrived in 1916. Shecame into view first in Germany, where Frau KommerzienratHedwig Heyl of Berlin is a figure almostas important as is the Imperial Chancellor. Thedaughter of the founder of the North German LloydLine, herself the president of the Berlin LyceumClub and the manager of the Heyl Chemical Works,in which she succeeded her late husband as president,Frau Heyl knows something of organisation.And she it is who has been responsible more thanany other of the Kaiser’s advisers for the conservationof the food supply which keeps the Germanarmies strong against a world of its opponents. Thesecond day after war was declared, in conferencewith the Minister of the Interior, she had formulated[111]the plan that by night the Government had telegraphedto every part of Germany: there was formedthe Nationaler Frauendien to control all of the activitiesof women during the war. She was placed atthe head of the Central Commission. It was theNationaler Frauendien that made the suggestionswhich the Government adopted for the conservationof the food supply. And it was they who were entrustedwith organising the food supplies of thenation and educating the women in their use to thepoint of highest efficiency. As a personal contributionto this end, Frau Heyl has published a WarCook Book, arranged an exhibit of substitute foodsfor war use, and has turned one section of her chemicalworks into a food factory from which she suppliesthe government with 6,000 pounds of tinnedmeat a day for the army.

After all, who are the real food controllers of anation? Could a minister of finance, for instance,bring up a family on, say, 20 shillings a week? Yetthere were women in every nation doing that beforethey achieved fame on the firing line and in themaking of munitions. Last spring, as the foodquestion became a gravely determining factor in thewar, it began to be more and more apparent that thefeminine mind trained to think in terms of domesticeconomy, might have something of value to contributeto questions of state. Why let Germanymonopolise this particular form of efficiency? AndEngland in 1917 called to its Ministry of Food two[112]women, Mrs. Pember Reeves, one of its radical suffragists,and Mrs. C. S. Peel, the editor of a woman’smagazine and a cook book.

About the same time each of the warring nationsdecided that the mobilised women forces everywherecould be most efficiently directed by women. Germanyappointed as an attaché for each of the sixarmy commands throughout the empire a womanwho is to serve as “Directress of the Division forWomen’s Service.” From Dr. Alice Salomon inthe Berlin-Potsdam district to Fraulein Dr. GertrudeWolf in the Bavarian War Bureau, each ofthese new appointees is a feminist leader from thatwoman movement of yesterday. In France the enrolmentof French women is under the direction ofMme. Emile Boutroux and Mme. Emile Borel. InEngland the highest appointment for a woman sincethe war is the calling of Mrs. H. J. Tennant, theprominent suffragist, to be Director of the Woman’sDepartment of National Service. America, preparingto enter the great conflict in the spring of 1917,at the very outset organised a Woman’s Division ofthe National Defence Council and called to its commandDr. Anna Howard Shaw, the great suffrageleader.

It’s a long way back to the Doll’s House, isn’t it,with woman’s place to-day in the workshop and thefactory, the war hospital, the war zone and the waroffice? And now they are calling women to theelectorate. Russia has spoken, England has spoken.America is making ready. Doesn’t Mr. Kipling[113]want to revise his verses: “When man gathers withhis fellow braves for council, he does not have a placefor her”?

It really has ceased to be necessary for woman anylonger to plead her cause. Every government’s doingit for her. The woman movement now is bothcalled and chosen. And the British Government isthe most active feminist advocate of all. The greatestbrief for the woman’s cause that ever was arrangedis a handsome volume on “Women’s WarWork,” issued by the British War Office, as a guideto employers of labour throughout the United Kingdom.This famous publication lists exactly ninety-sixtrades and 1,701 jobs which the Government sayswomen can do just as well as men, some of themeven better. A second publication issued in Londonwith the approval of the War Office, sets forth inmore literary form “Women’s Work in Wartime,”and is dedicated to “The Women of the Empire,God save them every one.”

It was in 1916 that I talked with a German gentlemanwho is near enough to the Kaiser to voicethe point of view from that part of the world.“Women from now on are going to have a more importantplace in civilisation than they ever have heldbefore,” affirmed Count von Bernstorff as we sat inhis official suite at the Ritz Hotel in New York.“In the ultimate analysis,” he spoke slowly and impressively,“in the ultimate analysis,” he repeated,“it is the nation with the best women that’s going towin this war.”

[114]

“Do you know what I think?” says the Soul ofa Suffragette as we stand before the Great Push.“I think that whoever else wins this war, womanwins.”

Her country’s call? Listen: there is a higherovertone—her man’s call. Is it not the woman behindthe man behind the gun who has achieved herapotheosis?

Women Who Wear War Jewelry

There is a new kind of jewelry that will be comingout soon. We shall see it probably this seasonor at least within the next few months. It will takeprecedence of all college fraternity pins and suffragebuttons and society insignia and even of the costliestjewels. For it will be unique. Since no Americanwoman has ever before worn it.

As a Mayflower descendant or a Colonial Dame ora Daughter of the Revolution, you may have proudlypinned on the front of your dress the badge thatestablishes your title perhaps to heroic ancestry. Inthe gilt cabinet in the front parlour you may evencherish among curios of the wide, wide world amedal of honour as your choicest family heirloom.Who was it who won it, grandfather or great-grandfatheror great-great-grandfather? Anyway, it wasthat soldier lad of brave uniformed figure whosephotograph you will find in the old album that disappearedfrom the centre-table something like a generationago. We are getting them out from theattics now, the dusty, musty albums, and turningtheir pages reverently to look into the pictured eyesof the long ago. Some one who still recalls it must[116]tell us again this soldier-boy’s story. Somewhere hedid a deed of daring. Somehow he risked his life forhis country. And a grateful government gave himthis, his badge of courage. It’s fine to have in thefamily, there in the parlour cabinet. You are proud,are you not, to be of a brave man’s race? But blood,they say, will always tell. Heroism and daring maybe pulsing in your veins to-day as once in his.

Have you ever thought how it might be to haveyour own badge of courage? Ah, yes, even thoughyou are a woman. No, it is true, there are no suchdecorations that have been handed down from grandmotheror great-grandmother or great-great-grandmother.It is not that they did not deserve them.But their deeds were done too far behind the frontfor that recognition. To-day, as it happens, the newwoman movement has advanced right up to thefiring line, and it’s different. Every nation fightingover in Europe is bestowing honours of war onwomen. There is no reason to doubt that specialacts of gallantry and service on the part of Americanwomen now in action with the hospitals and reliefa*gencies that have accompanied our troops abroad,shall be similarly recognised by the War Department.To earn a decoration, you see—not merelyto inherit one—that can be done to-day.

She was the first war heroine I had ever seen,Eleanor Warrender. Over in London I gazed ather with bated breath—and to my surprise and astonishmentfound her just like other women.

Among those called to the colours in England in[117]1914, she is one of the specially distinguished whohave followed the battle flags to within sight of thetrenches, within sound of the guns. And, somehow,one will inadvertently think of these as some sort ofsuper-woman. Before this there have been thosewho did what they could for their men under arms.There was one woman who risked her life heroicallyfor British soldiers. And Florence Nightingale’sstatue has been set along with those of great men ina London public square. In this war many womenare risking their lives. They are receiving all thecrosses of iron and silver and gold. And to the ladyof the decoration who wears this war jewelry, it is asouvenir of sights such as women’s eyes have seldomor never looked on before since the world began.

I have said that Eleanor Warrender seemed to mejust like other women. And she is at first; otherwar heroines are. Until you catch the expressionin their eyes, which affords you suddenly, swiftly,the fleeting glimpse of the soul of a woman whoknows. There is that about all real experience thatdoes not fail to leave its mark. You may get it inthe quality of the voice, in a chance gesture that ismerely the sweep of the hand, or in the subtle emanationof the personality that we call atmosphere.But wherever else it may register, there are unveiledmoments when you may read it in the eyes of thesewomen who know—that they have seen such agonyand suffering and horror as have only been approximatedbefore in imaginative writing. The ancientpagans mentioned in their books that have come[118]down to us, a place they called Hades, where everythingconceivable that was frightful and awfulshould happen. The Christians called it Hell.

But nobody had been there. And there werethose in very modern days who said in their superiorwisdom that it could not be, that it did not exist.Now how are we all confounded! For it is hereand now. The Lady with the Decoration has seenit. Look, I say, in her eyes.

For that is where you will find out. She does nottalk of what she has been through.

“My friend Eleanor Warrender,” Lady RandolphChurchill told me, “has been under shell-fire forthree years, nursing at hospitals all along the frontfrom Furnes to the Vosges Mountains. Sometimesshe has spent days with her wounded in dark cellarswhere they had to take refuge from the bombs thatcame like hail—and the cellars were infested withrats.”

Eleanor Warrender, when I saw her, came into theLadies’ Empire Club at 67 Grosvenor Street, London.

High-bred, tall, and slender, she wore the severetailor-made suit in which you expect an Englishwomanto be attired. In the buttonhole of her leftcoat lapel there was a dark silk ribbon striped in acontrasting colour from which hung a small bronzeMaltese cross. It is the Croix de Guerre bestowedon her by the French Government for “conspicuousbravery and gallant service at the front.” Shedropped easily on a chintz-covered lounge before the[119]grate fire in the smoking-room. A club-membercaught sight of the ribbon in the coat lapel. “I say,Eleanor,” she said eagerly, coming over to examineit.

Miss Warrender was home on leave. In a fewdays she would be returning again to her unit inFrance. She has been living where one does not geta bath every day and there are not always cleansheets. One sleeps on the floor if necessary, andwhat water there is available sometimes must becarefully saved for dying men to drink. The RedCross flag that floats over the hospital is of no protectionwhatever. Sometimes it seems only a menace,as if it were a sign to indicate to the enemywhere they may drop bombs on the most helpless.

There is a slight soft patter at the window-paneand it isn’t rain. It’s shrapnel. The warningwhistle has just sounded. There is the cry in thestreets—“Gardez vous!” The taubes are here. AZeppelin bomb explodes on contact, so you seeksafety in the cellar, which it may not reach. But ataube bomb, small and pointed, pierces a floor andexplodes at the lowest level reached. So you maynot flee from a taube bomb to anywhere. You juststay with your wounded and wait. Ah, there is theexplosion which makes the cots here in the ward rockand the men shake as with palsy and turn pale.But, thank God, this time the explosion is outsideand in the garden. Beyond the window there, whatwas a flower-bed three minutes ago is an upturnedheap of earth and stone. They are bringing in now[120]four more patients for whom room must be madebesides these from the battlefield that have beenoperated on, twenty of them, since nine o’clock thismorning. These four who are now being laid tenderlyon the white cots have two of them had theirlegs blown off, and two others are already dying fromwounds more mortal.

Eleanor Warrender a little later closes their eyesin the last sleep. She has watched beside hundredsof men like that as they have gone out into theGreat Beyond. And just now she walks into theLadies’ Empire Club as calmly as if she had butcome from a shopping tour in Oxford Street. Ah,well, but one can suffer just so much, as on a musicalinstrument you may strike the highest key and youmay strike it again and again until it flats a littleon the ear because you have become so accustomedto it. But it is the limit. It is the highest key.There is nothing more beyond, at least. And that iswhat you feel ultimately about these women whohave come through the experience that leads to thedecoration. It is one in the most constant dangerwho arrives at length at the most constant calm.

“I don’t know really why it should be called bravery,”says Eleanor Warrender’s quiet voice. “Yousee, a bomb has never dropped on me, so I have noactual personal experience of what it would be like.Now in that old convent in Flanders turned into ahospital, Sister Gertrude at the third cot from whereI stood had a leg blown off, and Sister Felice had lostan arm, and I think it was very brave of them to go[121]right on nursing in the danger zone afterward. ButI—as I have said—no bomb has ever hit me. Andhaving no experience of what the sensation would belike, it isn’t particularly brave of me to go about mybusiness without special attention to a danger ofwhich I have no experience of pain to remember.As for death,” and Eleanor Warrender looked outin Grosvenor Street into the yellow grey Londonfog, “as for death, it is, after all, only an episode.And what does it matter whether one is here orthere?”

Eleanor Warrender and others have gone out intothe great experience on the borderland with deathfrom quiet and uneventful lives of peace such asours in America up to the present have also been.The call is coming now to us in pleasant cities andnice little villages all over the United States, and thetime is here when we too are summoned from theeven tenor of our ways because the high white flashingmoment of service is come. Eleanor Warrenderwas called quite suddenly from a stately career as anEnglish gentlewoman. She kept house for herbrother, Sir George Warrender, afterward in the warAdmiral Warrender. It was a lovely old countryhouse, High Grove, at Pinnar, in Middlesex County,of which she was the chatelaine. There had been adelightful week-end party there for which she wasthe hostess. She stood on a porch embowered inroses to bid her guests good-bye on an afternoon inAugust. And she had no more idea than perhapsyou have who have touched lightly the hand of[122]friends who have gone out from your dinner tableto-night, that the farewell was final. But two dayslater in a Red Cross uniform she was on her way toher place by the bedside of the war wounded.There has been no more entertaining since, and onecannot say when Eleanor Warrender shall ever againsee English roses in bloom.

THE DEMAND DEVELOPS THE CAPACITY

The Viscountess Elizabeth D’Azy had been withher young son passing a summer holiday at a watering-placein France.

She had just sent the boy back to boarding-schooland herself had returned to her apartment in Parisoverlooking the Esplanade des Invalides. At themoment she had no more intention of becoming awar heroine than of becoming a haloed plaster saintset in a niche in the Madeleine. Yet before she hadordered her trunks to be unpacked, the nation’s callfor Red Cross women had reached her.

“It was so sudden,” she has told me, “and I wasso dazed, I couldn’t even remember where I had putmy Red Cross insignia. At last my maid found itin my jewel case beneath my diamond necklace. Ihadn’t even seen it since I had received it at the endof my Red Cross first-aid course of lectures.” Themaid packed a suitcase of most necessary clothing.Carrying this suitcase, the Viscountess ElizabethBenoit D’Azy, daughter of the Marquis de Vogue ofthe old French aristocracy, in August, 1914, walkedwith high head and firm tread out of a life of luxury[123]and ease into the place of toil and privation and self-sacrificeat the Vosges front where her country hadneed of her.

That was, I think, the last time a maid has doneanything for her for whom up to that day in Augustthere had been servants to answer her least request.Ever since then the Viscountess D’Azy has been doingthings with her own hands for the soldiers of France.It was in the second year of the war that a gentlemanof France, General Joffre, bent to kiss her smallhand, now toil-hardened and not so white as it usedto be. There is a military group in front of a hospitalthat she commands and they stand directly beforea great jagged hole in the wall torn there by aGerman bomb, which, as it fell, missed her by a fewmetres. The General is giving her the “accolade,”and on the front of her white uniform he has pinnedthe Croix de Guerre of France for distinguished service.Last year, on behalf of her grateful country,the Minister of War conferred on her another decoration,the Médaille de Vermeil des Epidémies. Ido not know what others may have been added sinceto these with which the front of her white blousesagged last spring in Paris.

But the woman thus cited for military honourshad before this Armageddon as little expectation ofplaying any such rôle as have you to-day who are,say, the social leader of the four hundred in LosAngeles or the president of a foreign missionarysociety in Bangor, Maine. Her one preparation wasthat two months’ course of Red Cross lectures.[124]Many women of the leisure class were taking it in1910.

“I think I will, too,” she had said to her husband.“Some elemental knowledge of the scientific facts ofnursing I really ought to have when the children areill.” There were five children, four little daughtersand a son. And the Viscount thought of them andreluctantly gave his consent.

“Very well, Elizabeth,” he had said. “I think Iam willing that you should hear the lectures. Buton this I shall insist, my dear: I cannot permityou to take the practical bedside demonstration work.I don’t wish to think of my wife doing that kind ofmenial service even for instruction purposes, and Isimply could not have you so exposed to all sortsof infection.”

Like that it happened when Elizabeth, the ViscountessD’Azy, arrived at the battle front to whichshe was first called at Gérardmer; she had had nopractical nursing experience. Oh, she got it rightaway. She had quite some within twenty-fourhours. But up to now, this flashing white momentof life which she faced so suddenly, she had not somuch as filled a hot-water bag for any one. And shehad never seen a man die.

At this military barracks where she took off herhat to don the flowing white headdress with the redcross in the centre of the forehead, one hundredand fifty men, some of them delirious with agony,some of them just moaning with pain, all of themwounded and waiting most necessary attention, lay[125]on the straw on the floor ranged against the wall.

There weren’t even cots. And there was only herselfwith one other woman to assist her in doing allthat must be done for these one hundred and fiftyhelpless men.

The first that she remembers, a surgeon was callingout orders to her like a pistol exploding at herhead. She got him a basin of water and some absorbentcotton and she managed to find the ether.Oh, his shining instruments were flashing horribly inthe light from the window. He was going to cutoff a man’s leg. “But, Doctor,” she exclaimed, “Inever had that in my Red Cross training. I don’tknow how.” She went so white that he looked ather and he hesitated. “Go out in the garden outside,”he commanded, “and walk in the air.” Helooked at his watch. “I’ll give you just three minutes.Come back then and we’ll do this job.”

They did this job, the Viscountess D’Azy holdingthe patient’s leg while they did it. “After that,”she has told me, “I was never nervous. I was neverafraid. There wasn’t anything I couldn’t do.”

And there wasn’t anything she didn’t do. Therewere always the one hundred and fifty men to becared for: as fast as a cot was vacated for thegrave, it was filled again from the battle-line. Forsix weeks the Viscountess was on her feet for seventeenhours out of every twenty-four, carrying water,preparing food, dressing wounds, closing the eyes ofdying men. It took from eight in the morning untilfive in the afternoon just to do the dressings alone.[126]Twelve men on an average died every night and theywrapped them in white sheets for the burial, theViscountess D’Azy did, daughter of one of the proudesthouses of France.

One day the message came that the Germans,sweeping through the nearby village of St. Dié, haddenuded the hospital there of all supplies. Wouldthe Viscountess with her influence, the commandantbegged, carry a report of their need to Paris. Shewent to Paris and brought back a truck-load of supplies.She and the driver were three days on thereturn journey. German shells were again fallingon the road to St. Dié as they approached. Thechauffeur stopped in terror. “Go on!” commandedthe Viscountess. “Go on!” As the car shot forwardby her order, a bomb dropped behind them,tearing up in a cloud of dust the exact spot in theroad where the car had halted.

Word reached military headquarters of ElizabethD’Azy’s skill in nursing, of her unflinching coolnessin the face of all danger. It was decided that thewar department had need of her at Dunkirk. Thetown was under heavy bombardment, receiving betweenthree hundred and four hundred bombs daily.At the barracks hospital, arranged at the railway station,there were cots for two hundred wounded.Sometimes a thousand men were laid out on thefloors. One night there were three thousand. Andthere was only the Viscountess, who was the commandant,one trained nurse, and some voluntary untrainedassistants. For a protection against the Zeppelins[127]it was necessary that there should be only thedimmest candle light even for the performing ofoperations. As rapidly as possible patients wereevacuated to base hospitals. The commandant onenight was tenderly supervising the lifting into anAmerican ambulance of an officer whose wounds shehad just bandaged. She leaned over the wheel toadmonish “Drive slowly or he cannot live.” And asshe touched the driver’s arm there was an exclamationof mutual surprise. The driver was A. PiattAndrews, under secretary of the treasury in PresidentTaft’s administration. And the last time hehad seen the Viscountess D’Azy he had taken her into dinner at the White House in Washington whenher husband was an attaché there of the French Embassy.How long ago was all the gaiety of diplomaticsocial life at Washington! A siren soundedshrilly now the cry of danger and death in anapproaching taube raid. And the greeting endedhastily, the hospital commandant and the ambulancedriver hurrying in the darkness to their respectiveposts of duty.

The Viscountess has been in charge of a numberof hospitals, having been transferred from place toplace at the front. When I saw her, she was temporarilyin command for a few weeks at the hospitalwhich had been opened at Claridge’s Hotel in LesChamps Elysées in Paris. She didn’t care abouther medals or her own magnificent record. It wasn’teven the achievements of her husband, the ViscountD’Azy, in command of the naval battleship Jauré-guiberry [128],of which she spoke most often. TheViscountess D’Azy’s one theme is her boy. Beforethe war he was her little son. Now he is a tall andhandsome officer in uniform, at the age of nineteen,Sub-lieutenant Charles Benoit D’Azy.

He wanted to enlist when she did. But she insistedthat he remain at school until he had finishedhis examinations in the spring of 1915. He got intoaction in time for the great push on the Somme.Here at the hospital in Les Champs Elysées theViscountess shows me his photograph, snapshots thatshe has taken with her kodak. Last night she walkedunattended and alone three miles through the streetsof Paris at midnight after seeing him off at the Garede l’Est. He had started again for the front afterhis furlough at home. Her one request to the wardepartment is to be detailed to hospital duty whereshe may be near her boy’s regiment. Her pride inthe boy is beautiful. When she speaks his namethat look of experience is gone for the moment, andin the eyes of Elizabeth D’Azy there is only the softluminous mother-love, even as it may be reflectedin your eyes that have never yet seen bloodshed.

“Up to the time of the war,” the Viscountess saidin her pretty broken English as she looked reminiscentlyout on the broad avenue of Paris, “I was doingnothing but going to fêtes all day and dancing mostof the nights. But I think there is no reason why awoman who has danced well should not be able todo her duty as well as she did her pleasure. N’est ce pas?”[129]And from the records of the Europeanwar offices, I think so, too.

THE WOMAN WHOM A NATION ADORES

Among the English war heroines is Lady RalphPaget, whose name has gone round the world forher splendid service in Serbia. In that defencelesslittle land, exposed so cruelly to the ravages of thisterrible war, she commanded with as efficient executiveskill as any of the generals who have been leadingarmies, one of the best-managed hospitals thathave faced the enemy’s fire.

Leila Paget had lived all her life in the environmentwhere ladies have their breakfast in bed andsome one does their hair and hands them even somuch as a pocket handkerchief. “Leila going tocommand a hospital?” questioned some of herfriends, “Leila who has always been so dependenton her mother?”

She is the daughter, you see, of the Lady ArthurPaget, the beautiful Mary Paran Stevens of NewYork, who, ever since her marriage into the Britisharistocracy, has been one of the leaders in the BuckinghamPalace set. Leila Paget was, of course,brought up as is the most carefully shielded and protectedEnglish girl in high life. She grew up in astately mansion in Belgrave Square. She was introducedto society in the crowded drawing-room therewhich has been the scene of her brilliant mother’sso many social triumphs. But she had no ambition[130]to be a social butterfly. She was a débutante whodid not care for a cotillion. You see, it was not yether hour. She was a tall, rather delicate girl whocontinued to be known as the beautiful Lady Paget’s“quiet” daughter. A few seasons passed and shemarried her cousin, the British diplomat, Sir RalphPaget, many years her senior.

She had never known responsibility at all whenone day she sat down in the great red drawing-roomin Belgrave Square to make out a list of the staffpersonnel and the supplies that would be requiredfor running a war hospital in Serbia. Her heart atonce turned to this land in its time of trouble becauseshe had for three years lived in Serbia when SirRalph was the British Minister there. They hadbut recently returned to England on his appointmentas under secretary of foreign affairs. And now shehad determined to go to the relief of Serbia with ahospital unit. I suppose British society has neverbeen more surprised and excited about any of thewomen who have done things in this war than theywere about Leila Paget. This day in the great reddrawing-room Leila Paget found her metier. She isthe daughter of a soldier, General Sir Arthur Paget,and what has developed as her amazing organisingand administrative ability is an inheritance from aline of American ancestors through her beautifulmother. But from her reserved, retiring mannernone of her friends had suspected that she was ofthe stuff of which heroines are made. Now, as shelaid her plans for war relief, she did it with an expeditious[131]directness and a mastery of detail with whichsome Yankee forefather in Boston might have managedhis business affairs. With a comprehensiveglance she seemed to see the equipment that wouldbe needed. Here in the red drawing-room she sat,with long foolscap sheets before her on the antiquecarved writing desk. She listed the requirements,item by item, a staff of so many surgeons, so manyphysicians, so many nurses. Then she estimated thesupplies, so many surgeon’s knives, so many bottlesof quinine, everything from bandages and sheetsdown to the last box of pins. And she planned toa pound the quantity of rice and tapioca. Her hospitalultimately did have jam and tea when all theothers were scouring Serbia in a frantic search tosupplement diminishing supplies. Without anyexcitement, with an utter absence of hysteria as awoman ordering gowns for a gay season in Mayfair,Leila Paget gave her instructions and assembled herequipment. It was, you see, her hour.

She arrived at Uskub in October, 1914, with thefirst English hospital on the scene to stem the tideof the frightful conditions that prevailed toward theend of 1914. After the retreat of the Austrians,Serbia had been left a charnel house of the dead anddying. Every large building of any kind—schools,inns, stables—was filled with the wounded, amongwhom now raged also typhus, typhoid, and smallpox.There were few doctors and no nurses, onlyorderlies who were Austrian prisoners. At one hugebarracks fifteen hundred cases lay on the cots and[132]under them; at another three thousand fever patientsoverflowed the building and lay on the groundoutside in their uniforms, absolutely unattended.Facing conditions like these, Lady Paget opened herhospital in a former school building. And here inthe war zone she instituted for herself such a régimeas probably was never before arranged for an Englishwomanof title.

She arose at four o’clock in the morning, and whenshe slipped from her cot, no one handed her a silkkimono. The regulation “germ proof” uniformworn by women relief workers in Serbia consisted ofa white cotton combination affair, the legs of whichtucked tight into high Serbian boots. Over thiswent an overall tunic with a collar tight about theneck and bands tight about the wrists. There wasa tight-fitting cap to go over the hair. And beneaththis uniform, about neck and arms, you wore bandagessoaked in vaseline and petroleum. It was theprotection against the attacking vermin that swarmedeverywhere as thick as common flies. Woundedmen from the trenches arrived infested with lice, andtyphus is spread by lice. Lady Paget stood heroicallyat her post by their bedsides, with her ownhands attending to their needs. What there was tobe done in the way of every personal service, she didnot shrink from. And she unpacked bales of goods.And she scrubbed floors. And she assisted with therites for the dying. There had to be a lighted candlein a dying Serbian soldier’s hand, and often herown hand closed firmly about the hand too weak to[133]hold the candle alone. Her wonderful nerve neverfailed, but there came a time when her frail physicalstrength gave out. She still held on, working fortwo days with a high fever temperature before shefinally succumbed, herself the victim of typhus.Her husband was telegraphed for. She was unconsciouswhen he arrived and it was three or four daysbefore he could be permitted to see her. Her lifehung in the balance for weeks. But finally recoverybegan and it was planned for her to return toEngland for convalescence. She and Sir Ralphwere attended to the railroad station by the militarygovernor of Macedonia, the archbishop of the SerbianChurch, and a guard of honour of Serbian officers.The Serbian people in their devotion lined the streetand threw flowers beneath her feet and kissed thehem of her dress. At the station the Crown Princepresented her with the highest decoration within hisgift and the Order No. 1 of St. Sava, a cross of diamonds.Never before had it been bestowed on anyother woman save royalty. Seldom has any womanin history been so conspicuously the object of an entirecountry’s gratitude. The street on which thehospital stood was renamed with her name. On thePlain of Kossova there stands a very old and historicchurch, on the walls of which from time to timethrough the centuries, have been inscribed the namesof queens and saints. Leila Paget’s name also hasbeen written there. A nation feels even as does thatcommon Serbian soldier whom she had nursed backfrom death, who afterwards wrote her: “For me[134]only two people exist, you on earth and God inHeaven.”

Well, Leila Paget stayed with Serbia to the end.After two months’ rest in England, she was back inJuly at her hospital in Uskub. Sir Ralph had returnedwith her, having been made general directorof the British medical and relief work in Serbia, withhis headquarters at Nish. In October the Bulgarianstook Uskub. When the city was under bombardmentduring the battle that preceded its fall, SirRalph arrived in a motor car to rescue his wife. Butfour hours later he had to leave without her on hisway in his official capacity to warn the other hospitalswhich were in his charge. “Leila, Leila,” heexpostulated in vain. She only shook her head.“My place is here,” she said, glancing backwardwhere 600 wounded soldiers lay. Lady Paget andher hospital were of course detained by the enemywhen they occupied the town. She remained tonurse Bulgarians, Austrians and Serbians alike.And she organised relief work for the refugees,of whom she fed sometimes as many as 4,000 aday. For weeks and months, it was only by dintof the utmost exertion that it was possible to extractfrom the exhausted town sufficient wood andpetrol just to keep fires going in the hospital kitchenand sterilisers in the operating rooms. “These,”says Lady Paget, “were strange times and in thecommon struggle for mere existence it did notoccur very much to any one to consider who werefriends and who were enemies.” In the spring of[135]1916, in March, arrangements were made by theGerman Government permitting the return to Englandof Lady Paget and her unit. Her war recordreaching America, the New York City Federation ofWomen’s Clubs selected her as the recipient of theirjewelled medal. It is awarded each year to thewoman of all the world who has performed the mostcourageous act beyond the call of duty.

HEROIC SERVICE OF SCOTTISH WOMEN

Woman’s war record in Europe is now starredwith courageous acts. That day in Serbia SirRalph, riding on while the people sprinkled theirmountain roads with white powder in token of surrender,came to the Scottish Women’s Hospitals.These had not even men doctors, as at Uskub. Theywere “manned” wholly by women sent out by theNational Union of Women Suffragists in Great Britain.And there was not a man about the place exceptthe wounded men in the beds. But Dr. AliceHutchinson, at Valjevo, and Dr. Elsie Inglis, atKrushevats, with their staffs, also refused to leavetheir patients. All three of these women made thedecision to face the enemy rather than desert theirposts of duty. They were all three taken prisonersand required to nurse the German wounded alongwith their own. Months afterward they were releasedto be returned to England. Dr. Hutchinson,who has been decorated by the Serbian Governmentwith the order of St. Sava, when she evacuated herhospital at the order of the Austrians, wrapped the[136]British flag about her waist beneath her uniform thatit might not be insulted by the invaders. Dr. Inglishad all her hospital equipment confiscated by theGermans. When she protested that this was in violationof Red Cross rules, the German commanderonly smiled: “You have made your hospital soperfect,” he said, “we must have it.” Dr. Inglishas been decorated with the Serbian order of theWhite Eagle. Since then, at the Russian front withanother Scottish hospital, Dr. Inglis and her entirestaff have again been decorated by the Russian Government.

In London I heard the women of the Scottish hospitalsspoken of at historic St. Margaret’s Chapel as“that glorious regiment of Great Britain called theScottish Women’s Hospitals.” And the clergymanwho said it, spoke reverently in eulogy of one of themost distinguished members of that regiment, “thevery gallant lady who in behalf of her country hasjust laid down her life.” In the historic chapel, thewall at the back of the altar behind the great goldcross was hung with battle flags. Men in khaki andwomen in khaki listened with bowed heads. It wasthe memorial service for Katherine Mary Harley, ofwhom the London papers of the day before hadannounced in large headlines, “Killed at her post ofduty in Monastir.”

In that other world we used to have before thewar, Mrs. Harley was known as one of England’smost distinguished constitutional suffragists, notquite so radical as Mrs. Despard, her sister, who is[137]the leader of the Woman’s Freedom League. Oneof her most notable pieces of work in behalf of votesfor women was the great demonstration she organiseda few years ago in that pilgrimage of women whomarched from all parts of England, addressing vastconcourses of people along the highways and arrivingby diverse routes for a great mass meeting in HydePark. You see, Katherine Harley was an organiserof tried capacity. And she, too, comes of a familyof soldiers. She was the daughter of CaptainFrench, of Kent. Her husband, who died from theeffects of the Boer War, was Colonel Harley, chiefof staff to General Sir Leslie Rindle in South Africa.Her brother is Viscount Sir John French, formerfield marshal of the English forces in France. Andher son is now fighting at the front. With all ofthis brilliant array of military men belonging to her,it is a curious fact, as her friends in London told me,that Mrs. Harley did not believe in war. “Katherinewas a pacifist,” one of them said at the InternationalFranchise Club the night that the announcementof her death was received there in a hushed andsorrowful silence. But she believed if there mustbe war, some one must bind up the wounds of war.And it was with high patriotic zeal and with thefearless spirit of youth, albeit she was 62 years ofa*ge, that Mrs. Harley in 1914 enlisted with the ScottishWomen, taking her two daughters with her intothe service. She went out as administrator of thehospital at Royaumont. And when that was in successfuloperation, she was transferred to Troyes to[138]set up the tent hospital there. Then she was calledto Salonica. It was at Salonica that she commandedthe famous transport flying column of motor ambulancesthat went over precipitous mountain roadsright up to the fighting line to get the wounded.She was in charge of a motor ambulance unit withthe Serbian army at Monastir when in March, 1917,at the time of the regular evening bombardment bythe enemy, she was struck by a shell. They buriedher like a soldier and she lies at rest with the Croixde Guerre for bravery on her breast out there at thefront of the conflict.

Violetta Thurston, you might think, if you mether, a little English schoolgirl who has just seen Londonfor the first time. Then by her eyes you wouldknow that she is more, by the wide, almost startledlook in what were meant to be calm, peaceful, Englisheyes. Violetta Thurston is the little Englishnurse decorated by both Russia and Belgium who inthese last years has lived a life that thrills with theadventures of war. She went out at the head oftwenty-six nurses from the National Union ofTrained Nurses who were at work in Brussels whenthe Germans arrived. They improvised their hospitalin the fire-station. At last the English nurseswere all expelled by German order and sent to Dunkirk.There Miss Thurston connected with the RussianRed Cross.

She has written a book, “Field Hospital and FlyingColumn,” on her experiences in Russia. Therewere four days at Lodz that she neither washed nor[139]had her clothes off. And once she was wounded byshrapnel and once nearly killed by a German bomb.The last record I have of her she was matron incharge of a hospital at La Panne in Belgium.

HEROINES OF FRANCE

No girl has, I suppose, lived a more uneventfullife than did Emilienne Moreau up to the time thatshe became one of the most celebrated heroines ofFrance. You haven’t if your home is, say, down insome little mining village of West Virginia or in thecoal-fields of Pennsylvania, where you are going backand forth to school on week days and to Sundayschool every Sunday. Emilienne was like that inLoos. She was sixteen and so near the end of schoolthat she was about to get out the necessary papersfor taking the examination for institutrice, which isa school teacher in France. Loos was a mining village.The inhabitants lived in houses painted in thebright colours that you always used to see in thisgay and happy land. It was in one of the most pretentioushouses situated in the Place de la Republique,and opposite the church, that the Moreau familylived. The large front room of the house wasM. Moreau’s store. He had worked all his life inthe mines and now at middle age, only the pastsummer, had removed here with his family from aneighbouring village and he had purchased the generalstore. It was with great pride that the familylooked forward to an easier life and a comfortablecareer for the father as a “bonneted merchant.”[140]Emilienne was his favourite child, his darling andhis pride, and she in turn adored her father. Oftenthey took long walks in the woods together. Theyhad just come back from one of these walks, Emiliennewith her arms filled with bluets and marguerites,when on August 1 a long shriek of the siren atthe mines called the miners from the shafts and thefarmers round about from their fields. Assemblingat the Mairie for mobilisation all the men of militaryage marched away from Loos.

That night the sun went down in a blood-redglory. All the houses of Loos were bathed in blood-red.“Bad sign,” muttered an old woman purchasingchocolate at the store. And it was. Soon therefugees from surrounding burning villages cameflocking by in streams, telling of the terrible Germansfrom whom they had escaped. Most of theinhabitants of Loos joined the fleeing throngs. Offive thousand people, ultimately only two hundredremained in the village. Among these were theMoreau family, who, possessing in marked degreethat national trait of love for their home and theirbelongings, refused to leave. “But,” said her fatherto Emilienne, “little daughter, it will, I fear,be a long time before you will gather flowers again.”

And it was. The Germans were in possession ofLoos by October. They poured petrol on the housesand burned many of them. At the store in the Placede la Republique, Emilienne, with quick wit, set abottle of wine out on the counter and they drankand went away without burning, although they[141]looted the store of everything of value. During theyear that followed, Loos remained in the hands of theenemy. In the effort of the French to retake it, itwas often fired upon from the surrounding hills.From the windows in the sloping garret roof, Emilienneand her father watched many a battle untilthe bombs began falling on the garret itself. Theywere exposed to constant danger. They had to liveon the vegetables they could gather from the desertedneighbouring gardens. By December her father wasill from privation and hunger and anxiety, and onenight he died. Emilienne, girl as she was, seems tohave been the main reliance of the family, hermother, her little sister Marguerite, and her littlebrother Leonard, aged nine. The morning after herfather’s death, Emilienne went to the German commandantto ask for assistance. How should she geta coffin? How should it be possible to bury herfather? And the German laughed: “One can getalong very well without a coffin!” He finally permittedher four French prisoners to dig the graveand the curé of Loos, he said, could say a prayer.But Emilienne was heart-broken at the thought ofputting her father into the ground without a coffin.She and her little brother made one with their ownhands from boards she found at the deserted carpenter-shopdown the street.

By the spring of 1915 the bombardment of Loosincreased in violence. There were days at a timewhen the whole family, with their black dog Sultan,did not dare venture out of the cellar. In September,[142]Emilienne, ascending to the demolished garret,where she lay flat on her stomach on the rafters,watched a battle in which the strangest beings sheever saw took part, fantastic creatures of a grey colourwho were throwing themselves on the Germantrenches. As they advanced, she noticed that theywore “little petticoats,” and she hurried to tell hermother that these must be the English suffragettes ofwhom she had heard, coming to the rescue of Loos.What they actually were was the Scottish troops inkilts, the famous “Black Watch,” who a few dayslater had driven the Germans from Loos. As theycame into the village, Emilienne, braving a cycloneof shells, and rallying her French neighbours, ran tomeet them, waving the French flag and singing the“Marseillaise.” Thus, it is said, by her fearlesscourage, was averted a retreat that might have meantdisaster along the whole front.

But the fighting was not yet over. During thenext few days, Emilienne, with the Red Cross doctor’sassistance, turned her house into a first-aid station.Some seven of the stalwart Scotsmen in the“little petticoats,” she herself dragged in to safeshelter when they had been wounded. Two Germanstaking aim at French soldiers she killed witha revolver she had just snatched from the belt of adead man. When the enemy had been finally repulsed,Emilienne Moreau was summoned by theGovernment to be given the Croix de Guerre.

A little later, her pictured face was placarded allover Paris by the French newspapers. They wanted[143]her to write her personal story. At first she shrankfrom it: “It would be presumption on the part of agirl. What would my commune think?” Butfinally she was prevailed upon, and for two monthsdaily “Mes Mémoires” appeared on the front pageof Le Petit Parisien with a double-column headline.Even more honours have come to Emilienne. GreatBritain bestowed on her its order of St. John ofJerusalem and the King has sent her a personal invitationto visit Buckingham Palace as soon as theChannel crossing shall be safe.

With it all, you would think Emilienne, if youmet her, quite a normal girl. You see, she is youngenough to forget. And it is only occasionally thatin the clear blue eyes you catch a glimpse of tragedy.Her smooth brown hair she is as interested in havingin the latest mode as are you who to-day consultedthe fashion-pages of a magazine for coiffures. Ihave seen her on the sands at Trouville with a groupof girls at play at blind man’s buff in the moonlight.And by her silvery laughter you would not know herfrom the rest as a heroine. The next day, when theywere in bathing and the body of a drowned man waswashed ashore, one of the other girls fainted. AfterwardEmilienne said, and there was in her eyes afar-away look of old horrors as she spoke, “Marie,Marie, if your eyes had looked on what mine have,you would not faint so easily.”

There is another French girl, the youngest warheroine I know who has been decorated by any government.And the case of Madeleine Danau is perhaps[144]of special interest, because any girl in theUnited States can even now begin to be a heroineas she was. They say in France that “la petiteDanau” has served her country even though it wasnot while exposed to shot and shell. She lives inthe village of Corbeil and she was only fourteenyears old at the time her father, the baker, was mobilised.A baker in France, it must be remembered,is a most necessary functionary in the community,for as everybody has for years bought bread, nobodyeven knows how to make it at home any more. Thewhole neighbouring countryside, therefore, you see,was most dependent on the baker, and the baker wasgone away to war. It was then that Madeleineproved equal to doing the duty that was nearest toher. She promptly stepped into her father’s placebefore the bread-trough and the oven. She gets upeach morning at four o’clock and with the aid of herlittle brother, a year younger than herself, she makeseach day eight hundred pounds of bread, which isdelivered in a cart by another brother and sister.The radius of the district is some ten miles, and nohousehold since war began has missed its daily supplyof bread.

One day Madeleine was summoned to a publicmeeting for which the citizens of Corbeil assembledat the Mairie. She went in her champagne-coloureddress of toile de laine and her Sunday hat of leghorntrimmed with black velvet and white roses. Andthere before this public assemblage the Préfet desDeux-Sèvres pinned on Madeleine the Cross of Lorraine[145]and read a letter from President Poincaré ofFrance. In it the President presented to MadeleineDanau his sincere compliments and begged her toaccept “this little jewel,” this Cross of Lorraine,which shall proclaim that the valiant child of theDeux-Sèvres through her own labour assuring for theinhabitants of the Commune of Exoudun their dailybread, has performed as patriotic a service and is asgood a Frenchwoman as are any of her sisters of theMeuse.

The ever-lengthening list of heroic women whohave distinguished themselves in this war in Europeis now so many that it is quite impossible even tomention any considerable number of them in lessthan a very large book. You find their names nowin every country quite casually listed along withthose of soldiers in the Roll of Honour published inthe daily newspapers. And it is no surprise to comeon women’s names in any of the lists, “Dead,”“Wounded,” or “Decorated.” The French Academyout of seventy prizes in 1916 awarded no lessthan forty-seven to women “as most distinguishedexamples of military courage.” Among these theCroix de Guerre has been given to Madame Macherez,capable citizeness of Soissons, who has beendaily at the Mairie in an executive capacity, and toMlle. Sellier who has been in charge of the RedCross hospital there during the long months of thebombardment. The Cross of the Legion of Honoralong with the cross of Christ decorates the front ofthe black habit of Sister Julie, the nun of Gerbéviller[146]who held the invading Germans at bay whileshe stood guard over the wounded French soldiersat her improvised hospital.

It’s like this in all of the warring countries. Andall of these women with their war jewelery for splendidservice, are women like you and me. But yesterday,and they might have been pleased with astring of beads to wind about a white throat. Outof every-day feminine stuff like this shall our warheroines too be made.

The New Wage Envelope

The baby had been fretful all that hot summerday. Every time he was passed over to the eldestlittle girl, he cried. So Mrs. Lewis had to keephim herself. All the twenty pounds of him restedheavily on her slender left arm while she went aboutthe kitchen getting supper. With one hand shemanaged now and then to stir the potatoes “warmingover” in the pan on the stove. She put the pinchof tea in the pot and set it steeping. And she friedthe ham. She set on the table a loaf of bread, stillwarm from the day’s baking and called to the eldestlittle girl to bring the butter. “Aren’t we going tohave the apple sauce too?” the child asked. “Oh,yes, bring it,” the mother had answered pettishly.“I’m that tired I don’t care how quickly you eateverything up.”

You see she had been going around like this withthe heavy baby all day while she baked, and therewere the three meals to cook. And she had donesome of the ironing and there was the kitchen floorthat had to be “washed down.” And the secondlittle girl’s dress had to be finished for Sunday. AndJimmie, aged nine, whose food was always disagreeingwith him, was in bed with one of his sick[148]spells and called frequently for her to wait on himin the bedroom at the head of the stairs. And shehad been up with the baby a good deal anyhow thenight before. So you see why Mrs. Lewis was whatis called “cross.”

Besides, she was just now facing a new anxiety.When her husband came in from the shop and hungup his hat and she had dished up the potatoes andthe family sat down to the evening meal, there wasjust one subject of conversation. The State of NewYork was making its preparedness preparation withthe military census that was to begin to-morrow, adetailed inventory of man power and possessions.Hitherto for America the war had been over in Europe.Now for the first time it was here for theLewis family. And other similar supper tables allover the United States were facing it too. “But youcouldn’t possibly go,” the tired woman said acrossthe table.

“I may have to,” the man answered.

“Then what’ll happen to me and the children?”she returned desperately.

And he didn’t know. And she didn’t know.Hardly anybody knew. We on this side of theAtlantic are now beginning to find out.

Mr. Lewis was drafted last week. The rent ispaid one month ahead. You can see the bottom ofthe coal bin. There’s only half a barrel of flour.And there are seven children to feed. No, thereare none of her family nor his that want to adoptany of them as war work. Well, there you are.[149]And there Mrs. Lewis is. In her nervous dread ofthe charity that she sees coming, she slaps the childrentwice as often as she used to and the baby criesall day.

But, Mrs. Lewis, listen. Don’t even ask the ExemptionBoard to release your husband. It’s yourchance to be a patriot and let him go. And thiswar may not be as bad for you as you think. Thereare women on the other side could tell you. Suppose,suppose you never had to do another week’sbaking and you were rested enough to love the lastbaby as you did the first, and all the children couldhave shoes when they needed them, and there wasmoney enough beside for a new spring hat and theright fixings to make you pretty once more. Sothat your man coming back from the front when thewar is won, may fall in love with you all over again.No, it’s not heaven I’m talking about. It’s here ina war-ridden world. This is no fairy tale. It’s thetruth in Britain and France, as it’s going to be in theUnited States.

“Somewhere in England” Mrs. Black, when hercountry took up arms in 1914, was as anxious andconcerned as you are to-day. Her man was a car-cleanerwho earned 22 shillings a week on the GreatWestern Railway. That seems appallingly littlefrom our point of view. But thousands of Britishworking class families were accustomed to living onsuch a wage. The Blacks had to. It is true therewasn’t much margin for joy in it. And when the callto the colours came, it was to Mr. Black an invitation[150]to a Great Adventure. He enlisted. Well, the firstwinter had not passed before it was demonstratedthat Mrs. Black and the children—there were five ofthem—were not going to experience any new hardshipbecause of the absence of the head of the familyin Flanders. By January she was saying hopefullyone morning across the fence to her neighbourin the next little smoke-coloured brick house in thelong dingy row: “If them that’s makin’ this war’llonly keep it up long enough, I’ll be on my feetagain.”

To-day you may say that Mrs. Black is “on herfeet.” There are Nottingham lace curtains at herfront windows as good as any in the whole row ofLamson’s Walk. The new chest of drawers she’sneeded ever since she was married is a place to putthe children’s clothes. And it’s such a help to keepingthe three rooms tidy. Santa Claus came atChristmas with a graphophone. And you ought tosee Mrs. Black’s fur coat! Three other women whohaven’t got theirs yet were in the night she wore ithome “just to feel the softness of it.” Their hands,do you know, hands that are hard and grimy withEngland’s black town soot, had never so much astouched fur before! And they’re going to wear itsoon, if this war keeps up. For they’re all of themthese new women in industry, like Mrs. Black.

Mrs. Black, to begin with, has her “separationallowance” because her husband’s at the front.That’s 12 shillings and sixpence per week for herself,5 shillings for the first child, three shillings sixpence[151]for the second and 2 shillings for each subsequentchild. Well, with the five children, thatmakes 27 shillings a week coming in and there’snone of it going to the Great Boar’s Head on thecorner, which always used to get a look-in on Mr.Black’s weekly wage envelope before Mrs. Blackdid. Now, in addition to this 27 shillings a week,which in itself is 5 shillings more than the familyever had before, Mrs. Black is at the factory whereshe is making 30 shillings a week. That’s 57 shillingsa week, which is her household income morethan doubled. It’s why 60,000 fewer persons inLondon were in receipt of poor relief in September,1915, than in 1903, the previous most prosperousyear known to the Board of Trade. In the WestEnd of this town titled families are counting their“meatless” days. In the East End, families arecelebrating meat days that were never known beforethe war. The Care Committee used to have to provideboots for over 300 school children in this district.This year there was only one family, themother of which was ill, that needed boots!

RIGHT THIS WAY, LADIES, INTO INDUSTRY

Mrs. Lewis, this is the answer to your anxiousinquiry: it’s prosperity that’s coming to you. Inevery warring country there are women of the workingclasses who have found it. You are going to bemobilised for the army of industry as your husbandfor the other army. Only there is no draft or conscriptionnecessary. The recruiting station is just[152]down the street at the factory that recently hungout that sign bright with new paint, “WomenWanted.” See them arriving at the entrance gate.Fall in line, Mrs. Lewis, and get measured for yournew uniform. Yes, you are to have one. It’s someform of the things they call trousers. But I’m sureyou won’t mind that. Put it on. Put it on quickly.In it you will find yourself the real new woman whosecoming has hitherto been only proclaimed or prophesiedon the waving banners of suffrage processionsyou’ve watched parading on the avenues. You areShe for whom the ages have waited. This newgarment they are handing you has the pocket in itfor a pay envelope. You who have been toilingfor your board and the clothes you could get afterthe rest of the family had theirs, are now a labourerworthy of hire. Economic independence, the politicaleconomists call it, as they take their pen in handto make note of the long lines of you going into industry,later to write their deductions into scientifictreatises about you.

Now, it may not particularly interest you that youare like this, a phenomenon of the 20th century,but there are plainer terms that I am sure you willunderstand. Listen, Mrs. Lewis: Every Saturdaynight there is going to be money in your own pocket.The convenience of this is that never again will youunder any circ*mstances have to go through anyone’s else pockets for it. Do you see? Right acrossthose portals there where they want you so much[153]that every obstacle that used to be piled in yourpathway has been so surreptitiously carted awayovernight, that you would hardly believe it everwas there, lie all promised opportunities. Susan B.Anthony pioneered for them. Mrs. Pankhurstsmashed windows for them. Mrs. Catt is even nowpolitically campaigning for them. And you, Mrs.Lewis, are to enter in. What will happen to youwhen you’ve joined up with the new woman movement?

Let us look at the advance columns over on theother side. No one met them with: “Woman, backto your kitchen!” Or, “This is unscriptural andyour habits of marriage and maternity will interferewith shop routine.”

It was one of the most significant decisions of alltime since the day of the Cave Woman, that morningwhen Mrs. Black got her aunt to come in to lookafter the children and, hanging up her ginghamapron, walked out of the kitchen. Women weredoing it all over Europe. They are to be countednow by the hundreds of thousands. Altogether weknow that they number in the millions although wehave not the exact returns from every country. By1916 England had enrolled in industry 4,086,000women and Germany 4,793,472 of whom 866,000in England and 1,387,318 in Germany had neverbefore been gainfully employed outside their ownhomes. France, Italy, Russia all have similar battalions.And the important fact is that these new[154]recruits are going into industry differently. Womenbefore had to push their way in. Women now areinvited in.

Heretofore there were all the reasons in the worldwhy a woman should not work outside her own home.Three generations of employment had not yet sufficedto efface the impression from the minds even of mostyoung girls themselves who went out to earn theirliving that it was only a temporary expedient untilthey could marry and be supported ever after.Even when they discovered after marriage that theywere still earning their own living just as much intheir husband’s kitchen as anywhere they had beenbefore, public opinion and the neighbours disapprovedof their working for any one outside theirown family. Who, Madam, would sew on yourhusband’s buttons? So strong was this sentimentthat it even threatened to crystallise on the statutebooks. There were districts in Germany and in theNorth of England where they talked about passinga law against the employment of the married woman.Then fortunately about this time the world came to1914 and the revolution of all established thought.

Everybody sees now a reason why Mrs. Blackshould work. Her country wants her to. And ithas swept aside to the scrap-heap of ancient prejudiceall the other reasons against the industrial employmentof women. Among the rest, the most materialreason, the most real reason of all, that woman’splace was the home and every other place was man’s.That was true. And it was one of the most incontrovertible[155]facts that each woman who sought employmentcame up against. Industry had neverbeen arranged for her needs or her convenience.

MAKING INDUSTRY OVER FOR HER

Now it’s being made over, actually made over!Already woman wins this victory in the Great War.Don’t we all of us know industries where therehasn’t been so much as a nail to hang a woman’shat on, where it wouldn’t be spoiled, let alone a roomin which she could wash her hands, or change herworking clothes? But go through Europe now andyou will scarcely find any place they haven’t triedthe best they could to fix up for woman’s occupancy.She shall have the nicest hook that they can find tohang her hat on. She shall have a whole cupboard,a locker to keep it in, if she’ll only put it there to-day.And oh, ladies, all of you listen, there’s evena mirror to see if it’s on straight! Just a little whileago I stood in a factory “somewhere in France,”where they had built a beautiful retiring room withlavatories and hot and cold water and a row of shiningwhite enamelled sinks. And one day of coursesome thoughtful woman had brought in her handbaga piece from her cracked looking-glass and fastenedit on the wall between two tacks, you knowthe way you would? A little later, the superintendentof the factory saw it there: “I sent rightout,” he told me himself with feeling, “and boughtthis one.” And he showed me with pride the fulllength plate-glass mirror that hung on the wall[156]where the little old cracked looking-glass used to be.I think every government in Europe now has mirrorslisted among “necessary supplies.” I mentionit as significant of the anxious effort to please thefeminine fancy.

But the first most important thing that was donein making over industry, was opening the door fromthe inside for Mrs. Black’s arrival. Every door-keeperto-day has his instructions from higher upnot to keep the lady knocking out in the cold. Hercoming was in the first instance heralded in England,actually heralded with a flourish of trumpets. Thatprocession of 40,000 women that Mrs. Pankhurstled down the Strand into industry, under the newstandard, “For Men Must Fight and Women MustWork,” had flags flying and bands playing. Andthe English Government paid for the bands. Parliamentrecords show that this Suffrage processionwas financed to the extent of 3,000 pounds, whichis $15,000. Has there ever been a more revolutionaryconversion than this to the Woman’s Cause?For the first time in history, the woman movementis underwritten by Government. It is with this supportthat it’s going strong all over the world to-day.

The place that is being made for Mrs. Black andher contemporaries is everywhere in the first instanceat least, being arranged through Governmentintervention. With every new push on the front,the soldiers that go down in the awful battalions ofdeath have to be replaced by others, which meansthat more and more men must be “combed out” of[157]the shops back home. And to employers governmentshave said: Hire women in their places.

To this employers answered as they have so manytimes to us when we have asked to be hired: “Butwomen don’t know how.”

You see, it has always been so difficult for us tolearn. From the bricklayers and the printers up tothe medical men and the lawyers and the ministers,there has always been that gentlemen’s agreement inevery trade: “Don’t let her in. And if she getsin, don’t let her up, any higher up than you have to.”

But now over all the world, to every industrythat shows a slackening in production, there is issuedone common government General Order: “Teachthe Women.” And the employer looks questioninglytoward the work bench at the figure in theleather apron there, who in some of the most highlyskilled trades, has always threatened to take off thatapron and walk out of the shop when a petticoatcrossed the threshold. There are shops in whichthere has never been a woman apprentice, because hewouldn’t teach her. Would he now?

The skilled workman was summoned in Englandto the Home Office for a heart-to-heart talk withthe Government. He came from the cotton trade,the woollen and the worsted trade, the bleachers anddyers’ trade, the woodworkers and furnishers’ trade,the biscuit trade, the boot and shoe trade, the engineeringtrade and a great many others. The Governmentspoke sternly of its power under martiallaw. The skilled workman, shifting his cap from[158]one hand to the other, began to understand. Buthe still stubbornly protested: “Women haven’t themental capacity for my work.”

“We shall see,” said Government.

“But it will take so long to learn my trade, fiveyears, six years, seven years.”

“Ah, so it will. Very well, then, teach the womena part of your trade at a time, a process in whichinstruction can be given in the shortest length oftime.”

“But the tools of my trade, they are heavy for awoman’s hands.”

“There shall be special tools made.”

And there have been. So, the now famous “dilution”of labour has been arranged. Mrs. Black is“in munitions.” I saw her standing at a machinethat is called a capstan lathe, drilling the openingin a circular piece of brass. There used to be employedin this shop, 1,500 men and the man powerhas been now so diluted, that there are 200 menand 1,300 women. There are rows and rows of thecapstan lathes and down each alleyway, as the spacebetween them is called, there are lines of womenlike Mrs. Black. They have to start the machine,to feed it, and control it, and stop it. In threeweeks’ time most of them were able to learn theserepetitive operations. But they do not yet knowhow to take the machine apart or to fix it if anythingbreaks. So up and down each row there goes askilled man who is still retained for this, a “setter-up,”he is called in the trade. And to supervise[159]each section there is a foreman. It was the foremanwho called my attention to the machines.“They are,” he said, “small lathes, specially adaptedto the women. We had them made in America sincethe war.”

EASY ENOUGH TO ARRANGE

Like that you see, it is done. Sometimes to makeover the job for the woman, there was necessaryonly the simplest expedient like adding the “flap”seat in the Manchester tram-cars for the woman-conductorto rest between rush hours. Even inskilled trades it hasn’t always been necessary toremodel an entire machine. Sometimes only a leverhas to be shortened. Sometimes it has been done bythe addition of “jigs and fixtures,” so that a processformerly involving judgment and experience, is nowautomatically performed at a touch from the operator.Are there heavy weights to be lifted? Thepaper factories met the situation by reducing thesize of the parcel. The leather, tanning and curryingtrade put in special lifting tackle. The chemicalindustries have trucks for transporting theheavy carboys. The pottery and brick trades havetrolleys. And the engineering trade, for manipulatingthe heavy shells, has put in electrical cranesand carriages: they are operated by a woman whosits in a sort of easy chair from which she onlylifts her hand to touch the right lever.

These and other innovations have been made inaccordance with a definite plan. You should hear[160]it just the way a government says it: “In consideringthe physical capacity of a woman factoryworker,” the Home Office directs, “it should be rememberedthat her body is physiologically differentfrom and less strongly built than that of a man.It is desirable that the lifting and carrying of heavyweights and all sudden violent or physically unsuitablemovements in the operation of machinesshould so far as practicable be avoided. Often asimple appliance or the alteration of a movementmodifies an objectionable feature when it does notaltogether remove it. When standing is absolutelyunavoidable, the hours and spells of employmentshould be proportionately short, and seats should beavailable for use during the brief pauses that occasionallyoccur while waiting for material or the adjustmentof a tool.”

There is one further instruction: “The introductionof women into factories where men only havehitherto been employed will necessitate some rearrangementin the way of special attention to thefencing of belts, pulleys and machine tools.”

Well, there are now some ninety-six trades andsome 1,701 processes in which the workshop hasbeen gotten ready like this, and woman labour hasbeen introduced. You see how easily it has allbeen brought about now, when every one, instead ofputting their heads together on How can we keepthe women out, is planning eagerly, How can we getthe women in.

And do you know that Mrs. Black cannot so much[161]as have a headache to-morrow morning, without theEnglish Government being sorry about it? Everyindustry in the land has received its envelope, black-lettered,“On His Majesty’s Business” and insidethis note: “Care on the part of employers to securethe welfare of women brought in to take the placeof men in the present emergency will greatly increasethe probability of their employment provingsuccessful.” A nation, you see, is interested inMrs. Black’s success. “Who works fights,” announcedthe Government when it invited Mrs. Blackinto industry. The badge, a triangle of brass, thatshe wears on the front of her khaki tunic, is inscribed“On War Service.” The French women inthe munitions factories wear on their left sleeve anarmlet with an embroidered insignia, a burstingbomb, which says the same thing.

Mrs. Black, I believe as a matter of fact, did havea headache one morning. And her output of munitionsfell off. Now that must not happen. For thelack of the shells, you know, a battle might be lost.The headache was investigated by the Factory Inspector.And the Government made a great discovery,I think we may say as important to us, toevery woman who works, as was Watt’s discoveryof the principle of the steam-engine that day hewatched the tea kettle. This was what the factory inspectorfound out: Last night after Mrs. Blackleft the shop, there was the dinner to cook, and itwas eight o’clock before she could get it ready.Then, of course, there were the dishes to wash.[162]Then she swept all her house through. Then sheput the clothes to soak in the tub over night. Thenshe worked on the stockings in the piled-up mendingbasket until midnight. Then she went to bed, sothat she could be awake next morning at four o’clock.And in the morning she built a fire under the “copper”and heated the water and washed the clothesand boiled them and hung them out on the line.And Mrs. Black, having already done a woman’swork before dawn, went out to fill in the rest ofthe day at a man’s work!

BEYOND THE PHYSICAL ENDURANCE OF MEN

This, you should remember, was the woman whomthe government had hesitated about asking to work“overtime” on war orders. Would it be possible toextend labour’s eight-hour day, they had asked. TheTrade Unions, when asked, had said it would be agreat tax on the physique of men. It was morethan they were equal to under ordinary circ*mstances.But, well, as an emergency measure, andfor the duration of the war only, Union rules wouldbe suspended to permit of overtime. But even thenthe Government decided on the eight-hour limit forwomen, in exceptional circ*mstances permittingtwelve hours. But an employer working womenlonger should be liable to arrest!

Then came the Factory Inspector’s report laidbefore the Home Office: Mrs. Black was workinga 20-hour day! Her case was not at all unique.“Overtime” on home work is, of course, what the[163]great majority of women who have gotten into industryin the past or into a profession or a career;have been accustomed to. Only nobody ever noticedit before!

Now every War Office saw it as early as the firstyear of the war: No woman could do a woman’swork in the home and a man’s work in the shop andmaintain the maximum output. The efficiency expertswere summoned all over Europe. They wereshocked at such uneconomic management. Couldyou expect any competent workingman to cook hisown dinner? There’d be a strike if you did. Whyin thunder, then, should Mrs. Black be expected tocook hers? And every nation hurried to set up inits factories the industrial canteen, where meals areprepared and served to employés at cost price.

At one of these industrial canteens at a factoryin the suburbs of Paris, I sat down to dinner with600 working people. The chef, who had shown mewith pride through his great store-rooms of supplies,apologised for the day’s menu: He was humiliatedthat there would be neither rabbits nor chicken, butwith a war-market one did the best they could. Thea la carte bill of fare proceeded from hors-d’œuvresthrough entrées and roasts to salads and to dessertand cheese, and there was wine on every table. Youselected, of course, what you wished to pay for.Marie, on my right, I noticed, paid for her dinner,1 franc fifty. Jacques, on my left, I saw hand thewaiter 1 franc seventy-five. My check came to twofrancs. It was a better dinner than I was accustomed[164]to for three times the money at the HotelRegina in the Rue de Rivoli. In England at thegreat Woolwich Arsenal, Mrs. Black gets meat andtwo vegetables for eightpence, which is 16 cents,and dessert for 2½ pence which is 5 cents. For anexpenditure not to exceed 25 pence which is 50cents, you can get at any of the industrial canteensin England, the four meals for the day for whichthe following is a sample menu:

What’s happened from Mrs. Black’s headache islike a tale from the “Arabian Nights.” A magicwand has been waved over the factory. “It should[165]be made,” a Frenchman told me in his enthusiasm,“a little Paradise for woman.” And that seems tobe the way they’re feeling everywhere. Governmentsolicitude in England for the new woman in industryresulted in 1916 in a new act for the statutebooks under which the Home Office is given widepowers to arrange for her comfort. The scientistsof a kingdom have been engaged to study “Woman.”Their observations and deductions are every littlewhile embodied in a “white paper.” There havebeen some fourteen of these “white papers” throughwhich the discoveries are disseminated to the factories.

There is a staff of great chemists in governmentlaboratories who arrange the menus just mentioned,which are really formulas for efficiency. Fat, proteinand carbohydrates have been carefully proportionedto produce the requisite calories of energyfor a maximum output. They emphasise the importanceof the canteen with this announcement: “Fora large class of workers, home meals are hurried and,especially for women, too often consist of whitebread and boiled tea. Probably much broken timeand illness result from this cause.”

There is a staff of competent architects who werefirst called in that there might be provided a placein which to eat the carefully prepared meals. “Environment,”it is announced, “has a distinct effecton digestion.” So a White Paper submitted diagramsfor the canteen building. “The site,” it said,“should have a pleasant, open outlook and a southern[166]aspect. The interior should present a clean andcheerful appearance. The colour scheme may be inpink, duck’s-egg green or primrose grey.” Estimatesare furnished. A dining-room to be built onthe basis of 8.5 square feet of space per person maybe erected at a cost not to exceed 7 pounds per place.Table and cookery equipment can be installed at arate for 1,000 employés of 30 shillings, 500 employés32 shillings, and 100 employés 47 shillingsper head.

And well, you know how it is when you put somuch as a back porch on the house. You sometimesget so interested in improving, that you can’t stop.Often you remodel the whole house. Well, the factoryhad to keep up with the new dining-room.The White Papers began to say that the workroomwindows had better be washed, and the ceilingswhitewashed and for artificial lighting, shaded arc-lightswere recommended. “The question of lighting,”the report reads, “is of special importance, nowthat women are employed in large numbers. Badlighting affects the output unfavourably, not onlyby making good and rapid work more difficult, butby causing eye-strain.”

The doctors were now being assembled and soona White Paper admonished: “The effective maintenanceof ventilation is a matter of increasing importance,because of the large number of womenemployed, and women are especially susceptible tothe effects of defective ventilation.”

Plumbing came next with a White Paper that[167]went exhaustively into the subject of lavatory equipment,with illustrations showing the best fittings:“Fundamental requirements are a plentiful supplyof hot and cold water, soap, nail brushes, and foreach worker an individual towel at least 2 feetsquare, to be renewed daily. If shower-baths areinstalled, it must be recognised that for women theordinary shower-bath is not applicable because ofthe difficulty of keeping her long hair dry or ofdrying it after bathing. A horizontal spray, fixedat the level of the shoulders will overcome this objection.”

EVERY ATTENTION FOR THE WOMAN WHO WORKS

All of this reconstruction was rapidly going onwhen one day it rained and Mrs. Black got her feetwet going to work in the morning. And she was athome in bed for two days away from the lathe.Fortunately the carpenters were still around.“There must be cloak-rooms,” came the hurried orderin a White Paper. “They should afford facilitiesfor changing clothing and boots and for dryingwet outdoor clothes in bad weather. Each peg orlocker should bear the worker’s name or work-number.The cloak-rooms should be kept very clean.”

And really now, a woman’s health is a seriousmatter! Every safeguard must be adopted for itsprotection. If Mrs. Black is indisposed, it is toobad for her to have to go all the way home to go tobed. Immediate attention might prevent a seriousillness. Why was it never thought of before? Of[168]course, there should be a doctor always around atthe works. So the building plans were enlarged toinclude a hospital. The largest building plans Iknow of have been worked out by one English factorythat recently put up a whole village of woodenhouses for women employés, 700 of whom are providedwith board and lodging at 14 shillings a week.There is a public hall, a club, a chapel, a restaurantand a hospital. Many factories now have the“hostel” for lodging women employés who comefrom a distance. The hospital you will find now atany factory of good economic standing, and the doctorand the trained nurse and the “welfare supervisor.”The Government directs: “At every workshopwhere 2,000 persons are employed, there shallbe at least one whole-time medical officer and atleast one additional medical officer, if the numberexceeds 2,000. A woman welfare supervisor shallbe appointed at all factories and workshops wherewomen are employed.”

So now Mrs. Black is given a careful medical examinationwhen she first presents herself for employment.After that, she is looked over at regularintervals. At any time, if she so much asappears pale, the doctor is right there to take herpulse. Any little thing that may be the matterwith her is reported at once on the “sickness register.”A Health of Munition Workers Committee,appointed by Mr. Lloyd George with the concurrenceof the Home Office has directed, “Week byweek the management should scrutinise their chart[169]of sickness returns and study their rise and fall.”Also any factory employing over 20 women is requiredat regular intervals to fill out a questionnaireconcerning the environment and conditions of itsemployés, and this record is kept on file at the HomeOffice.

You see how scientifically the woman in industryis handled? Why, if the munitions output fell offthis afternoon, the whole English Parliament mightrise to demand Mrs. Black’s health record to-morrowmorning.

Mrs. Black must not be allowed to be ill! Sheought not even to be permitted to get tired! Gentlemen,pass her a cup of cocoa or hot milk in themorning at half-past ten. It is a government orderwhich is obligatory for factories where she is employedon specially fatiguing processes. At aboutfour in the afternoon, she should pause for rest anda cup of tea. If she is engaged on a rush order, thetea may be passed to her in the workroom. But itis most advisable that she go to the canteen for itand have a brief period of inactivity in an easy chairin the adjoining rest room. This isn’t fiction. Thisis industrial fact for women to-day. And there ismore. The Health of Munition Workers Committeeare now strongly of the opinion that for womenand girls a portion of Saturday and the whole ofSunday should be available for rest. That Sabbathday commandment, it is discovered, isn’t only writtenin the Bible. It is indelibly recorded in the humanconstitution. Even if you keep at toil for[170]seven days, you are able to produce only a six-days’output. Except for extraordinary, sudden emergencies,“overtime” is a most wasteful expedient.“The effect of all overtime should be carefullywatched and workers should be at once relieved fromit when fatigue becomes apparent.” Recently in a“General Order” for the hosiery trade, a conditionis included “that every fourth week must be keptentirely free from overtime.” A White Paper says:“The result of fatigue which advances beyond physiologicallimits (‘overstrain’) not only reduces capacityat the moment, but does damage of a morepermanent kind which will affect capacity for periodsfar beyond the next normal period of rest. It willplainly be uneconomical to allow this damage to bedone.”

Oh, Mrs. Lewis, you can see that something hashappened, that there’s an entirely new sort of placein industry for woman on the other side, as there’sgoing to be here. In France the gallant governmentalmost sees her home from work, at least they makesure of her safety in getting there. When the employésof a factory live at a distance involving ajourney to and from work by trolley or train, it ispermitted for the women to arrive fifteen minuteslater in the morning and to stop work at night fifteenminutes earlier than the men. Thus they avoidthe rush hour and the congestion on the trains.

It was in a factory on the banks of the Seine thatI noticed another thoughtful attention. There werehundreds of women engaged in making munitions[171]and on the work bench before each operator in abrass fuse filled with water to serve as a vase, wasa flower, fresh and fragrant! Great beautiful LaFrance roses, splendid roses de gloire, bride roses andspicy carnations made lanes of bloom up and downthe workroom. I turned to the foreman: “Is itsome fête day?” He shook his head: “Theflowers are renewed each morning. We do it everyday. Because the women like it.”

In England one of the important duties assignedthe Welfare Supervisor is to teach the employés toplay: “Familiarise the working woman with methodsof recreation hitherto unknown to her,” the instructionsread. So they have organised for herdramatic entertainments and choral classes and theyare even teaching her to dance. One factory recentlyannounced: “We have decided to erect alarge theatre as a cinema and concert hall.” Really,Alice in Wonderland met with no more amazingsurprises than has Mrs. Black.

And to make sure that she misses nothing that iscoming to her, the Home Office arranged its “follow-up”system. A large staff of women inspectors aretravelling up and down England stopping at thefactories. In 1915 alone, they made 13,445 visits.Is there anything more the working lady needs? theGovernment always inquires when the woman factoryinspector returns from a trip. And it was thewoman factory inspector who brought word early inthe war, “Why, yes, the lady should have a newdress.”

[172]

EVEN THEY DESIGN HER CLOTHES

So the Ministry of Munitions took the matter upand summoned the designers. As the result, themost charming “creation” was adapted from thevaudeville stage for industry. The girl “lift” conductorsat Selfridge’s Store in London are the prettiestthings you will find out of a chorus. Theirsare called, I believe, “peg-top” breeches, and thereis a semi-fitted coat, the whole uniform in mauveand beautifully tailored. Well, the Government hasissued a variety of patterns, some of course, for amuch less expensive outfit than this. There is oneuniform that costs not more than 4 shillings: sometimesthe firm even furnishes it and launders it.The costume it is most desired to introduce is thekhaki trousers with the tunic and a round cap, becauseit is really a protection for the workers againstthe revolving machinery. Factories not yet quiteready for the whole innovation, begin with the tunicand a cap and a skirt. But when you have convincedMrs. Black how well she is going to look inthe other things, she’s ready to put them on.

The situation adjusts itself. This report has beenmade on it to the Government. I quote verbatimfrom the published Proceedings of Parliament anda member’s speech: “The Ministry has spent a veryconsiderable amount of time in going into this matter.It would seem to us as men a simple thing.But at any rate now from all I have heard, theyappear to have solved the difficulties. The women’s[173]uniforms up and down the country vary, of course,according to the duties they have to perform, butthey must strike all who have observed them notonly as useful and comely, but also as reflectingcredit on the fatherly care which the ParliamentarySecretary for the Ministry of Munitions has exercisedover the many thousands of the daughters ofEve who look to him as their protector.”

Daughters of Eve in your country’s service, isthere anything more that you require? Yes, onething more: Parliament, please hold the baby!It was a response returned from Northumberland toWales. Every government summoning its womenin industry has sooner or later faced the request.There were lines of women applying for Poor Relief.But why not go to work, the authorities wouldask. And the child in her arms was the woman’sanswer. Not every woman like Mrs. Black had amaiden aunt who could be hired to take care of thechildren. So it happened that, figuratively speaking,the baby was passed to Parliament. Those gentlemen,exclaiming “Goodness gracious!” hastilylooked about for a place to lay it down.

And the public crèche has been promptly erected.Sometimes it’s done by philanthropy, sometimes bythe factory, and sometimes at public expense.“We’ll pay for it,” says perspiring Parliament, “onlyhurry!” And they have hurried all over Europe.The baby of a reigning monarch is scarcely more scientificallycared for to-day than is the working woman’sbaby.

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Industry has been made over to adapt it to maternity!A baby used to be the crowning reason ofall against woman’s industrial employment. Evenif you didn’t have one, you might have. And theywere very likely to tell you they couldn’t bother tohave you around. If you did succeed in gettingemployment, some committee was sure to go “investigating”while you were away from home, andthey’d report that your parlour was dusty and thatyour children had a dirty face. You tried to tellthe sociologists, of course, that it wasn’t so bad forchildren to have a dirty face as a hungry one, andyou’d wash them on Sunday. But no one wouldunderstand and you never could adequately explain.Now you don’t have to any more.

Every facility for first aid for the housekeepingthe woman in industry has left behind her, is beingarranged. They have bought a few more cups andplates and it has been found that the meals at publicschools that used to be for poor children can just aswell be for everybody’s children. It’s a great helpto the maiden aunt. And if you haven’t one, andyou feel that you must go home to dust the parlouror to see that little Mary puts her rubbers on whenshe’s out to play, why that can be arranged. TheLondon Board of Trade, in a special pamphlet on“The Substitution of Women in Industry,” pointedthe way to all nations with this paragraph: “Thesupply of women can be frequently increased byadaptation of the conditions of employment to localcirc*mstances. For example, one large mill in a[175]certain district where ordinary factory operativeswere scarce, obtained many married women by arrangingthe hours of work to suit household exigencies.In one department these hours were from 10A. M. to 5 P. M., while another branch was kept goingby two shifts of women, one set working from7 A. M. to midday, and the other from 1 P. M. to6 P. M.” Also a memorandum from the Health ofMunition Workers’ Committee says: “It is the experienceof managers that concessions to marriedwomen such as half-an-hour’s grace on leaving andarriving, or occasional ‘time off’ is not injurious tooutput, as the lost time is made good by increasedactivity.”

EXPERT AT HER JOB

You see now, there is practically no reason leftwhy a woman shouldn’t work outside her home if shewants to. Such a nice place has been made for herin industry, and she’s getting along so well. Let’stake the British Government’s word for it. TheAdjutant General to the Forces in the report on“Women’s War Work in Maintaining the Industriesand Export Trade of the United Kingdom” announces,“Women have shown themselves capable ofsuccessfully replacing the stronger sex in practicallyevery calling.”

It was before the war that the great feminist, OliveShreiner, wrote her book which has been called theBible of the woman movement. In it occurs amemorable statement: “We claim all labour for[176]our field.” Now it is our field. Women to-day areworking as longshoremen, as navvies barrowing co*ke,as railway porters and conductors and ticket takers,as postal employés and elevator operators, as brick-settlers’labourers, attenders in roller mills, workersin 78 processes of boot and shoe-making, in breweriesfilling beer casks and digging and spreading barley,in 19 processes in grain milling, in 53 processes inpaper making, in 24 processes in furniture making, inboiler making, laboratory work, optical work, aeroplanebuilding, in dyeing, bleaching and printingcotton, in woollen and velvet goods, in making brick,glazed and unglazed wear, stoneware, tiles, glass,leather goods and linoleum. In France a year beforethe war, it happened in the baking trade that a committeeappointed to take under advisem*nt the questionof admitting women reported adversely thatthe trade was not “adapted” to women. To-daythere are 2000 women bakers in France. In allcountries the largest number of women are employedin two occupations, in agriculture and in munitions.England had last spring 150,000 women at work inthe fields and was in process of enrolling 100,000more. In munitions the last returns show Englandwith 400,000, Germany with 500,000 and Francewith 400,000 women.

In this the engineering trade, women have masteredalready 500 processes, three-fourths of whichhad never known the touch of a woman’s hand beforethe war. “I consider myself a first class workman atmy trade. It took me seven years to learn it,” said[177]a foreman to me through the crashing noise of themachines among which we stood, “but,” and hewaved his hand over his domain in which 1700women were at work, “these women, at occupationsrequiring speed and dexterity, already excel me.”

He led me to the side of a girl who was drillingholes in brass. “See,” he said, “she does 1000 holesat 50 centimes an hour. No man we were ever ableto employ, ever did more than 500 holes an hour,and we had to pay him 75 centimes.”’

We came to the gauging department: “Here,”he said, “women are more expert than men. Seehow well adapted to the task are their slender, supplefingers? And they work for 50 centimes an hour,where we should have to pay men 80.”

Like this the evidence of woman’s efficiency at thework they are doing, is everywhere in Europe. Ithas now been written into the records that cannotbe gainsaid. That famous publication, Women’sWar Work, in announcing the 1701 jobs at whicha woman can be employed, asserts under the authorityof the British War Office that at all of these jobsa woman is “just as good as a man, and for someof them she is better.” Then they sent a specialcommission over to see what women were accomplishingin French factories. After a conferencewith M. Albert Thomas, the French Minister ofMunitions, and a wide tour of inspection, the specialcommission returned to England with this report:“The opinion in the French factories is that the outputof females on small work equals and in some[178]cases excels that of men. And in the case of heavierwork, women are of practically the same value asmen, within certain limits (when machinery is introducedto supplement their muscular limitations).”Italy also presents its evidence. The Bolettino dell’officio del Lavoro, Journal of the Italian Labour Department,under date of October 16, 1916, had thisto say: “It is necessary to remove the obstacles tothe larger employment of women. As soon as manufacturersshow plenty of initiative and adaptivenessfor this new class of labour, and cease to cherishpreconceived opinions as to the inferiority of woman’swork and as to the low wages it merits, thelabour of women will respond splendidly to the utmostvariety of demands.”

Apparently one controversy is now at rest: Womanknows enough for all of these things that shehas been permitted to do. Thus far, it is true, it isthe unskilled and the semi-skilled processes at whichshe is employed in the largest numbers. It was, onemight say, the basem*nt of industry to which shewas first admitted. In every land that skilled workmansummoned to receive the government order,“You must let the women in,” about to take his departure,turned at the door with cap in hand to makea stipulation. It was the last clause of the ancient“gentleman’s agreement.”

“All right,” the Government replied, “not anyfarther up than we have to.”

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ON THE WAY TO THE TOP

To-day at every convention or little district meetingof any skilled trade, there is one question forheated discussion, “How far are the women going?”The only answer is the woman movement that keepson steadily moving. And it’s moving up. Withevery year of the war there are more and more vacantplaces. More and more of these are places high upand higher up. And the women who are called, arecoming! There is Henrietta Boardman.

Henrietta Boardman, “somewhere in England”has arrived at one of the highest skilled operationsin munitions, tool-tempering. She sits before a Bunsenburner and holds the tool in the flame while itturns all beautiful tints, straw colour, purple, blue orred. She must be able to distinguish just the rightshade for its perfection. She does it so well that allthe tool-fitters in the shop now have the habit ofbringing to her, in preference to any other workman,the tools they want tempered. Because hers lastlonger! There sits next to her a skilled tool-tempererwho is a member of the Engineers’ Trade Unionand the tools that he tempers will last for three-quartersof an hour: they are considered good bythe trade if they last three-quarters of an hour. Butthe tools that Henrietta Boardman tempers are lastingsometimes all night!

“It’s curious,” the foreman directing my attentionto Henrietta Boardman’s work commented. “Great[180]colour sense a woman seems to have. Nothing likeit in men. Lots of ’em are even colour blind.”

“So?” I replied. “Then you must be putting ina great many women for tool-tempering.”

“Hush!” he answered, raising a warning finger.And then he smiled. “She’s the first woman tool-tempererin England. So far there’s only one other.You see, it’s a highly technical operation,” he wenton to explain. “By the ‘diluting’ of labour schemewe aim to keep women in unskilled processes. Weadmit them to skilled processes only when it’s unavoidable.”

Now the workshop in which we stood, C-F-5, isthe tool-room, confined to highly skilled processes.The employés, he told me, number 1000 and of theseabout 34 are women.

There you have an excellent comparative view ofthe outlook for women in the most desirable occupations.The way, it is true, is still a little steep anddifficult. But with my eyes on Henrietta Boardman’sbright flame, I saw that in making over industrythey at least have set the ladder up: it goes allthe way up! And they’ve made room at the top!Every week of this ghastly war, there is more andmore room made at the top for women! It was inNovember, 1916, that an English manufacturermade the statement: “Given two more years ofwar and we can build a battleship from keel to aërialin all its complex detail and ready for trial, entirelyby woman labour.”

Then what will become of the labour of men?[181]That skilled workman, cap in hand, going down thesteps of the Government House, met Gabrielleduch*ene coming up. At least her message to theGovernment has been carried right to the War Officeby the feminists in all lands. In England, afterMrs. Pankhurst’s great triumphal procession, littleSylvia Pankhurst, feminist, led another which servedas it were as a postscript to the first: it is in a postscript,you know, that a woman always put the reallyimportant thing she has to say. On the banner thatSylvia carried in London’s East End was inscribedthe feminist message: “We are willing to work fora fair wage!”

Gabrielle duch*ene stopped the skilled workmanand showed him the message, which enunciates thedemand: For equal work, equal pay. “It’s youronly protection,” she urged. But he only grinned.And he pulled from his pocket a scrap of paper:“See,” he said, “my government agreement that woman’sadmission into industry is for the duration ofthe war only.” And it is true, he has that agreement.It is the basis on which all over the worldthe bargain was made: “Teach the woman how.It is a necessary but temporary expedient. Whenyou return from the front, you shall have the jobback. And the woman will go home again.” Butwill she?

The message that went up to the GovernmentHouse asking equal pay for equal work is one of themost significant measures in the new woman movement.Ever since women began to be in industry[182]at all, the wage envelope for them has been verysmall, as lady-like an affair as an early Victorianpocket handkerchief—and just about aspractical. Remarks of protest on the part of therecipient were customarily met with irritation or derision:Wages? Why, woman, what would youwant with more wages anyhow—to buy a new ribbonto put on your hat? Now a man, of course, musthave all the wages that he can get: he has to havethem to buy the children’s shoes and to pay the grocerybill and the coal bill and to support a wife whokeeps his house and darns his socks. And, even ifhe has to have them to buy a cigar or a drink? Oh,don’t ask foolish questions! A man has to havewages to meet all of his expenses, a large part ofwhich is Woman. Now run along and be a goodlittle girl!

But the new woman in industry can’t be dismissedso easily as that. Especially a feminist in khakican’t. And she was respectfully saluting Governmentand begging to inquire if women were doingmen’s work so well as Government had said theywere, when would women be getting men’s pay?

EQUAL PAY IS COMING

And it was more than a “foolish question.” Itwas a disturbing interrogation. Government lookedup surprised from its war orders and statistical investigationsto answer: “Why, really, don’t youknow, woman’s work isn’t the same as man’s. Yousee, we have made over the machines for her. And[183]sometimes she stops for an hour and goes home towash the children’s faces.”

But the feminist said: “Isn’t it the output thatcounts?” And she spoke of the better work and thefaster work than man that women were doing fortwo-thirds men’s pay. See the girl drilling 1000holes at 50 centimes an hour where a man oncedrilled 500 holes for 75 centimes an hour!

And about this time the skilled workman, discoveringthat the lady was getting a hearing, camebreathlessly running back to interpolate that men hadto be paid more because they knew more. Thosewomen, for instance, who were “gauging” with suchremarkable success knew only that one process, whereasthe men knew the whole trade.

But the lady had only a woman’s logic: “If Iwish to buy a dozen clothespins,” she insisted, “Idon’t care how much the person who makes theclothespins knows, whether his knowledge reaches tomathematics or Greek. A dozen clothespins just adozen clothespins are to me. What I am concernedabout is only the delivery of the dozen.”

Well, anyhow, Government everywhere said itwould think this matter over. Meanwhile the wallsof Paris began to flame out with a great red andblack poster that Gabrielle duch*ene was putting up.It is some four feet long by three feet wide and atthe top in large letters to be read a long way downthe street, it insists: “A travail egal, salaire egal.”And in every land the trained workman stopped tostare up at a lady like this at work in front of a bill-board:[184]“You fool,” she turned on him in scorn,“can’t you see now that it’s equal pay for equal workfor men’s sakes?”

At last he began to. Mme. duch*ene is the wifeof a celebrated architect in Paris. As the chairmanof the Labour section of the Conseil National desFemmes, she had pled ineffectually for equal payfor women’s sakes. When she cleverly changed thephrase “for men’s sakes” it had a new punch in it.The aroused Bourse de Travail formed the nowworld-known Comité Intersyndical d’Action contrel’Exploitation de la Femme to back the feminist demand.And organised labour in land after land hasbegun to sign up its endorsem*nt. For the flamingposter points out in effect: If a woman can be hadto drill 1000 holes at 50 centimes an hour, who willhire a man to drill 500 holes at 75 centimes an hour?That was the little sum the feminist set labour towork out the answer to.

And for the Government, there was Mrs. Black’sbreakfast. If it takes a breakfast that includes threerashers of bacon to produce the maximum output ofmunitions for a day, how many munitions will bemissing if you don’t get the bacon? Mrs. Blackwasn’t getting the bacon. Welfare supervisors reportedthat while Mrs. Black ate her dinner with allits formulated calories at the canteen, she didn’t eather breakfast there. In fact Mrs. Black didn’t seemto eat much breakfast anywhere. It wasn’t the habitof the British working class woman: She usuallystarted work for the day on merely a piece of bread[185]and a cup of tea. Mrs. Black couldn’t afford threerashers of bacon for breakfast!

The matter was investigated. The average wagefor women in industry in England, it was found, hadbeen 11 shillings a week: in the textile trade, beforethe war the best paid trade in the land, the weeklywage was 15 shillings 15 pence a week. And womenwheeled shells in a munitions factory for 12 shillingsa week, for which a man was paid 25 shillings.

But it began to be arithmetically clear all aroundthat it wasn’t wise for a woman in England or Franceor anywhere else to be working for too little pay tobuy a good breakfast! That reliable organ of publicopinion, The Times, announced September 25, 1916:“Proper meals for the workers is, indeed, an indispensablecondition for the maintenance of output onwhich our fighting forces depend, not only for victory,but for their very lives.”

What should a woman do with wages to-day?Why, she has to have them to buy not only a properbreakfast, but to buy the children’s shoes and to paythe grocery bill and the coal bill and the crèche or themaiden aunt who keeps her house. Even if she hasto have them to buy a new ribbon for her hat—why,she will go without her bacon to get it! What doesa woman have to have wages for to-day? Oh,don’t ask foolish questions. At last she has thosemysterious expenses, even as a man!

I think that Lloyd George was the first man to seeit. Great Britain led the way with the now famousOrders L-2, which has come to be known as the[186]Munition Women’s Charter. There is assured towomen in the government factories and governmentcontrolled factories equal pay on piece work, equalpay on time work for one woman doing the work ofone fully skilled man, and a minimum of £1 a weekfor all women engaged on work that was formerlycustomarily done by men. France followed with adeclaration for equal pay for piece work for women.Governments have now enunciated the principle,have adopted it in practice and have recommendedits justice to the private employer. Watch theskilled workman himself do the rest! Among thetrade unions that have already stipulated equal payfor equal work for women doing war work in theircraft are these: Engineering, cotton, woollen andworsted, china and earthenware, bleaching and dyeing,furniture and woodwork, hosiery manufacturingand the National Union of Railwaymen.

There has begun, like this, the greatest makingover of all! Better than all the bouquets they’vehanded us is the making over of our wage envelopeto man’s size! It isn’t finished yet. Girl lift operatorsin London still get 18 shillings a week on thesame elevator for which men were paid 23 shillings.On the tramways of Orleans, France, women conductorsget 2 francs and 2.50 a day for exactly thesame work for which men were paid 4 francs a day.Nevertheless the new wage envelope is not so lady-likeas it used to be. It’s coming out in larger andlarger sizes. The London tailoring trade has increasedthe women’s minimum wage from 3½d. to[187]6d. an hour. In Paris the women conductors on thesuburban lines have been advanced from the former4 francs a day to the men’s 5 francs. Glasgow has1020 women conductors at men’s pay, 27 shillings aweek. London has 2000 women omnibus conductorswith the wage formerly paid to men, 38 shillingsa week. Even the German brewers have come toequal pay for women. Thousands of women in munitionsin England are making 30 shillings a week.Some at Woolwich are making £2 to £3 per week,a few up to £4 a week. Henrietta Boardman at askilled man’s job gets exactly a man’s pay, 1 shilling1d. and 1 farthing an hour, amounting to about £4a week. At the sixteenth annual congress of the LabourParty, held in Manchester, England, in January,1917, the following resolution was introduced:“That in view of the great national services renderedby women, during this time of war and of the importanceof maintaining a high level of wages forboth men and women workers, the Conference urges,That all women employed in trades formerly closedto them should only continue to be so employed attrade union rates (the wages paid to men).”

For the new woman in industry is too efficient tobe countenanced as a competitor in the labour marketto offer herself at a lower wage than men. Tradeunions may even admit her as a comrade, not yet butsoon. For she’s safer to them that way! In Englandthey are giving their cordial support to MaryMcArthur with her organisation, The National Federationof Women Workers, in which there are already[188]enrolled 350,000 women. In France they arebacking Mme. duch*ene, who in many of the littledim-lit cafés of Paris is holding meetings to organisethe women in industry into what the French call“waiting unions.” Why waiting? Because themen’s trades unions are ready even to make overtheir constitutions to admit women to membershipif necessary, that is, if women stay in industry. Butthey are waiting to see. And every little while theypull out from their pocket a soiled scrap of paper tolook contemplatively at it. It is a government agreement.The Government has said the women willgo home. But will they?

WOMEN WANTED AFTER THE WAR

Read the answer in the columns of “Casualties”appearing in the daily papers from Petrograd to Berlinand Paris and London and now New York.How many millions of men have been drafted fromindustry into the awful battalions of death, no governmentsays. But we at least know with too, tooterrible certainty, that the jobs to which no man willever return from the front, now number millions andmillions. And there is going to be a world to berebuilded! Every nation must enlist all of its resourcesif it is to hold its own in the internationalmarkets of the future. The new woman in industry,her country is going to keep right on needing inindustry!

Her husband and her children may need her there![189]After the men that are dead, there are millions more,the maimed, the halt and the blind, for whom womenmust work for at least a generation after the fight isfinished.

And her employer is going to need her! See allthe rows and rows of little capstan lathes madesmaller for a woman’s hand? See the slender, supplefingers so well adapted to, we will say, gauging.See Henrietta Boardman with her finer colour sensefor tool tempering than any man in C-F-5. See,oh, see the girl who drills 1000 holes an hour, wherethe man drilled 500!

Listen to Sir William Beardmore, owner of a projectilefactory at Glasgow, in an address before theIron and Steel Institute: “In the turning of theshell body, the actual output by girls with the samemachines and working under exactly the same conditions,and for an equal number of hours, is quitedouble that of trained mechanics. In the boring ofshells the output is also quite double, and in thecurving, waving and finishing of shell bases, quite120 per cent. more than that of experienced mechanics.”

Again, in the workshops of Europe, above therattle and the roar of crashing machinery in shopafter shop, I hear the echo of some foreman’s voice:“Here and here and here we shall never again employmen because we cannot afford to.” In one greatfactory on the banks of the Seine where I inquired,“Are you going to keep women after the war?” an[190]American superintendent who had been brought overfrom Bridgeport, Connecticut, answered promptly:“Sure, 9000 of ’em. We’re going to convert thisinto an automobile factory and we’re not going tothrow all this specially made-to-measure-to-woman-sizemachinery on the scrap-heap, you know.”

And the British Association for the Advancementof Science has investigated and decided and announced:“Where female labour is either underpaidor is obviously superior to male labour, a special inducementoffers itself to employers to retain the women.”

Can’t you see the efficiency expert at the elbow ofGovernment, writing “Void” across the face of thatscrap of paper? Industry cannot afford to let thewomen go.

And there are all the cloak-rooms with the plate-glassmirrors and the canteen dining-rooms done inpink, and blue, and duck’s-egg green and the newuniforms that Parliament made for the woman in industry!Oh, gentlemen, after all, why should she gohome? For the new place in industry is the mostcomfortable place in which she has ever been in theworld! Oh, I know the sociologists used to talkabout the factory as so unhealthful for a woman.But you see, that was because no man knew how hardwas domestic labour: he had never done it. And itwas before the experts began to gather data on howunhealthful is the home.

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FACTORY WORK EASY COMPARED WITH KITCHENWORK

There is now a most interesting investigation underway in London. It is a scientific intensive study ofthe housewife, who is at last to be tabulated andindexed, just like any other labourer. The Women’sIndustrial Council, who have undertaken it with theendorsem*nt of the Government, announce: “It isquite probable the results may prove that the stretchingmotions involved in such domestic tasks as thewashing of heavy sheets and blankets are more harmfulthan the stretching motions of the shop assistantor the vibrations which certain engineering employésmeet in their work.” I went one day in London withthe sociological investigator who is trying to find thisout. She took me to Acton, which is the districtwhere the washing is done for the great city. Thereare probably more laundries here than in any similararea in the world. We stopped to look at one ofthem. It is in a sanitary, new, up-to-date buildingwith plenty of light and air and every new labour-savingdevice known to the trade. Then we calledat some of the little cottages where live the womenwho work at this laundry. But to-day is Monday,which is the “slack” day of the week in the laundrybusiness, and on Monday the employés remain athome to do their own “wash,” with the same appliancesthat have been used in home industry fora hundred years! The woman who came to thedoor when we knocked had just taken her hands[192]out of the suds. She was still wiping them onher gingham apron as she talked. Do you knowwhat she said? At house after house it wasthis, that Monday at home was her hardest dayof the week. “O, yes, ma’am,” she said, “muchharder than any of the days that I am at the laundry.”Why? Because at the laundry she has nolifting of any kind to do and no backbreaking scrubbingover a washboard. It is done by machinery,or if there are heavy sheets that must be lifted byhand, men are employed to do it. At home evenwhen she’s so fortunate as to have a faucet, all ofthe water she must carry in pails from the sink tothe “copper” to be heated.

Do you know, each time as we turned from a cottagedoor where the woman in the gingham apronstood wiping her wet hands, I thought of that ladyin the engineering trade who operates an electricalcrane from her easy chair; and the women conductorsin Manchester sitting down between fares on the“flap” seats put in for their comfort. I think I knowwhat the medical journal, The Lancet, means whenit announced in the February, 1917, number that“Factory work, under fitting conditions may be sobeneficial to women that it may lead to permanentbenefit to the race.” And I am not surprised tolearn that the Insurance Department of the EnglishGovernment has recently discovered that the greatestpercentage of illness among women occurs amongdomestic workers.

You see, these new tasks are not so much more[193]laborious than the old as the world feared. Andthis war has somehow brought about the most undreamedof readjustments. In a London tube stationI came upon one of them: my startled gaze encountereda man on his knees scrubbing the floor anda woman at the ticket window taking tickets!

Do you know, the more I see of the woman inindustry, the more it looks to me as if she could standit. Anyhow, she’s stronger than she used to be.One insurance society at Manchester with 26,000members found that it paid out for sickness benefitsin 1915, £300 less than in 1914. The insuranceactuary attributed the improved health to the betterfood and better clothing the members were now ableto buy through the wages they were receiving in themunitions factories. The annual report of GreatBritain’s chief inspector of factories and workshopsfor 1916, commenting on the good health of thewomen employés, observes: “There can be littledoubt that the high wages and the better food theyhave been able to enjoy in consequence, have donemuch to bring about this result.” And you don’tfind among employers any more the complaint thatwomen employés are less reliable than men becauseof their more frequent absences on account of illness.Very likely they may once have been so.Only a very strong woman could have been equal tothe old overstrain of a man’s work in the shop plusa woman’s work in the home. And there was oftena marked lowering of her vitality and efficiency.But the new improved man’s size wage envelope is[194]proving, you see, the effectual remedy. Wagesenough to buy good food and then to pay for someone to cook it—that has made a new woman of thiswoman in industry.

And she doesn’t want to go back to general houseworkin her own home, and to the “home” meals ofwhite bread and boiled tea which the Home Office hasspecifically pointed out are not good enough on whichto produce shells. She’s accustomed now to herbreakfast bacon! The workingman’s wife at householdlabour had no Saturday half holidays in thekitchen. She had something like a sixteen hour daywith no laws against overtime. Nobody botheredabout how many hours she worked. Nobodycounted her food calories. Nobody brought herroses. Nobody taught her to dance. Nobodynoticed that she ought to be happy, without whichshe couldn’t be efficient. Most of all, gentlemen,there wasn’t any wage envelope there!

Do you know of any reason why she should wishto go back? Some 3000 of her were asked about itthrough a questionnaire recently sent out in England.And of these 3000, 2500 answered: “I preferto remain in the work I am now doing.” I amsure Mrs. Black would.

And I know the world is going to be very muchsurprised about it. But I think that Mr. Black,when he returns from the front, will prefer that sheshould. For Mr. Black is going to get a better dinnerthat way! The industrial canteen can cook betterand cheaper for him and Mrs. Black than she[195]could at home. She can’t make plum pudding inthe home, as they can at the canteen for 2d. a portion.The chef who is buying for 1500 people gets ratesthat she never could for seven from the huckster andthe fish-monger and the rest. Besides, Mrs. Blacknever had any special training for cooking, as shenow has for engineering. In the shop she has learnedto do one thing very well indeed. In her homethere wasn’t any one thing she ever had learned todo very well. And she worked ineffectually andinefficiently at several highly skilled occupations:child rearing and sewing and cooking and bakingand laundry work and, occasionally, nursing. Isn’tit remarkable at any stage of the world’s evolution,that woman should have been expected to carry aschedule like that? You never found Mr. Blackattempting to be a carpenter and a tailor and aplumber and a gardener and a whole lot of otheruseful trades all in one. No, Mr. Black’s rule alwayswas, stick to one trade. Jack-of-all-trades!Why, everybody knows that he could have been masterof none!

And Mrs. Black wasn’t. Now, if after the war,she prefers to stay in engineering or some other trade,why should Mr. Black worry? The lady will payfor her own dinner and other things besides. Shecan send the wash to the laundry, and the baby willbe at the crèche for the day, and the children willhave dinner at school. And at night, the family willhave supper together, which Mr. and Mrs. Blackon their way home from the factory can bring from[196]the communal kitchen. Governments already havestarted the fire in the new cookstove in the communalkitchen which England has set up in London andGermany in Berlin, because Ministries of Food havedecided food can be more scientifically and efficientlycooked there than in the homes of the working people.

THE NEW IMPROVED HOME

Oh, can there be any one who would still wish totake away the new wage envelope? Think whatit’s already done for the working class home! Childrenwith shoes on their feet, you know. Women inEngland are wearing fur coats. Women in Francewho once wore sabots are now wearing shoes forwhich they have paid 40 francs, which is $8 a pair.In every warring country working women are shopping,shopping, shopping, as they never shopped before.O yes, it’s thrift and prudence and all that’sproper, to put your earnings in war bonds instead.The rainy day, you know, that’s ahead. And ofcourse one must, for patriotism’s sake, put some of itin war bonds, but not quite all. You see, whenthere have been almost all rainy days behind andyou’ve always wanted something you couldn’t have?Well, Mrs. Black thinks you might as well live inthe sunshine and have it, now you can.

That’s the way affluence seems to have happenedto the working class home all over Europe. Prosperityis fairly gilding over every district in whicha munitions plant has arisen. And, oh, well, whatif it is gilt? Gilt’s good for little cheerless dingy[197]houses. Do you know that, next to the war trades,the most flourishing trade in all Europe to-day isthe cheap jewelry trade? There are places in London’sEast End where every other shop or two hascome to be a jeweller’s shop, with the windows hungsplendidly with all the shining trinkets that bring ashining light to women’s eyes.

Mr. Black was home on leave a while ago. Hestopped the first thing at the jeweller’s round thecorner in Hardwick Row and bought the gold chainand the locket Mrs. Black’s wearing now with hispicture in it. Do you know, it was so long sincehe’d given his wife a present, not since their courtingdays, that he’d forgotten how? He was a lot moreawkward about it than he is about facing a fusilladeof German gun-fire. The perspiration just stood outon his forehead as he laid the little package on thekitchen table and said, “Mary, here’s something Ithought you might like.”

There was a note in his voice by which she knewit wasn’t bloaters from the fish-shop over the way.But she no more expected what it really was thanshe hoped for an angel to lean out of the windowsof the sky and say, “Mary Black, here’s a gold crownfor you.” The paper crackled in the silent roomwhile she untied the string. The chain just shimmeredonce through her fingers. Her lips trembled.With a little cry, “O Jim!” she turned to lay herhead in the old forgotten place on his shoulder.And there she sobbed out all the bitterness of sevenyears’ married hardship and privation with the bearing[198]and rearing of five children in three rooms on 22shillings a week.

Oh, there are things that gold chains are good formore than show. The famous uses of adversity arevarious. But they have been much oversung. Andafter all, God in his heaven perhaps knows that evena war may be worth while, if it’s the only way.Two wage envelopes are better than one. The newwoman with the old love revived in her heart, I’msure, won’t be so often cross and she won’t have toslap the children so much as she did. Just think ofthe new home that the man at the front’s coming backto! Mrs. Black’s saving now for a piano!

Mrs. Lewis, are you ready? The work-whistlecalls you. My morning paper to-day advertises fora New York department store: “To patrioticwomen seeking practical means of expressing theirearnestness: During the coming season, women ofintelligence will have the greatest opportunity thatwas ever offered them to become producing factorson the nation’s industrial balance sheet. Whetherthey need to work or not, they should work, becauseit will make them happier and give them a sense ofsatisfaction as nothing else in the world can underpresent circ*mstances. We can give many womenwork to do to occupy part of their time. This part-timework affords a woman, if she has home duties,plenty of leisure for her own housework—she neednot leave her home in the morning until after theman of the house goes. She may return in theevening before he does—she will have more money[199]for her home or for herself and be an independentproducing factor in her community, helping herself,her home, and in this way her country in a timewhen this kind of help is most needed.”

An American woman to-day will find opportunitiesfor work on every hand. The Homestead Worksof the Carnegie Steel Company has 1000 womenon the pay roll. At McKee’s Rocks, Pa., thePressed Steel Car Company has 100 girls buildingartillery cars for use on the French front. TheFarrell plant of the American Sheet & Tin-plateCompany at Sharon, Pa., is employing women at$4.50 a day. A munitions factory at Dayton, Ohio,has 5000 women working at men’s pay. The DetroitTaxicab and Transfer Company have womenoperating their electric taxicabs at the wages formerlypaid to men. The United Cigar Stores Companyis offering women salesmen men’s wages. Atthe July, 1917, Lumbermen’s Convention at Memphis,Tenn., the Southern Pine Association by aunanimous vote decided that women employed inmen’s places at the lumber camps should be paidthe same salaries formerly paid to men.

And Gabrielle duch*ene’s flaming poster has senta light across the sea. The American Federationof Labour has voted: “Resolved that we endorsethe movement to obtain from all governments at thetime of the signature of the Treaty of Peace, theestablishment of an international agreement embodyingthe principle of equal pay for equal work regardlessof sex.”

[200]

So? Then no one really expects the new womanin industry to go home after the war. There is agreat High Court of the Ages in which man maypropose the regulation of the Universe, but GodHimself disposes. And that soiled scrap of paperwill be, after all, only a scrap of paper in the greatwhirlwind of economic law that bloweth where itlisteth.

The Open Door in Commerce

Something has just happened. A hidden handhas touched a secret spring. A closed door in ablank wall has opened. And one in the long cloak ofauthority seems to be standing at the threshold pleasantlybeckoning the Lady to cross formerly forbiddenportals.

For I feel like that, like a little girl living in afairy tale that is turning true right before my eyes.This morning there has arrived in my mail a letterpersonally addressed to me from the New York UniversitySchool of Commerce, Accounts and Finance.It announces that the entrance of the United Statesinto the war has revolutionised American business.That hundreds of thousands of men off for the frontare leaving behind them hundreds of thousands ofvacancies. That commercial houses are facing ashortage of trained and capable assistants. That tofill the positions which are daily presenting themselves,women must enter business. That to givethem the necessary training, this school offers no lessthan 142 courses from which they may make theirpreparation for executive positions of responsibility.

It is the first time that I and the League for BusinessOpportunities for Women to which I belong,[202]have ever thus received a personal invitation to thewide open world of commerce. The League sinceits inception some five years ago has been alertly engagedin looking, as its name implies, for businessopportunities for women. We have always beenobliged to look pretty persistently for them. Neverbefore have they been presented to us. Now, see,the way is clear, they tell us, right up the steeps ofhigh finance.

The bursting bombs of war have done it. A ghastlyPlace aux Dames, it is in truth. But the stageis set. The cue is given. There is not even time tohesitate. Draughted, the long lines come on withsteady tread. Now our battalions fall in step withthe battalions of the Allies and the Central Powers.For English or Hun or French or Magyar or Russianor Serb or American, the woman movement is onelike that. Through the same doorway of opportunitywe all of us shall enter in. There are bloodstains on the lintel, I know. But this door, for thefirst time set ajar, is the only way, it appears, betweenthe past and the future. With the invitationfrom the New York School of Commerce on my deskbefore me, I too am at the threshold where the centuriesmeet. Down the vista that stretches beforeme, I look with long, long thoughts.

And once more, Cecile Bornozi somewhere in Europeis passing the sugar. In pursuit of food conservation,hotel waiters have a way of removing thesugar bowl to the dining-room sideboard and thoughtfullyforgetting to offer it a second time. And the[203]pretty young woman in the chic hat, who sat oppositeme at breakfast that morning, was near enough toreach it and daring enough to commandeer the sugarbowl for our common use. There is nothing, I believe,like a lump of sugar that so quickly makes war-timetravellers kin. That is the way I came to knowCecile Bornozi, new woman in commerce.

She is a type distinct from her predecessors in thatold world of ours that is going up in battle smoke.Her brown hair is done in as coquettish a curl onher forehead, her eyes are as sparkling blue, her lipsare as curving red as any girl’s who used to havenothing to do but to dance the tango and pour afternoontea. But her horizon has widened beyond thedrawing-room. Nor is she the business womanwhom we have had with us for a generation. Why,the stenographer who takes my dictation is a businesswoman. But from her hand bag as anotherwoman might produce a shopping list, Cecile Bornozihas just drawn forth a $50,000 bill of sale to herfor a freight steamer.

She has just purchased it because of the increasingscarcity of tonnage in which to transport the firebrick that she is buying for the reconstruction offactory furnaces in the devastated districts of France.Yesterday she shipped 90 cwt. of oil boxes and bearingsand 6 railway coal wagons. In the past fewmonths she has sent over some 2000 railway wagons.Like this, during the past year, she has expended amillion dollars for railway rolling stock that sherents to the French Government. She is specially[204]commissioned by France for this undertaking, as herCommission Internationale de Ravitaillement spreadin front of my breakfast roll shows to me and all ofthe Allies. A shipper has to have a license like thisin these days. It is what secures for her her exportpermit from the London Board of Trade. Now shesets down her coffee cup and folds her newspaperand is off for India House in Kingsway where fore-gatherother merchants who have confidential appointmentswith the War Office and the English Government.Upon her decisions to-day will dependso much more than the selection of a ribbon to matchthe blue of her eyes or the choice of the card to win atan afternoon bridge whist party. Her care and herforethought, her planning and her enterprise mustoutwit even the German submarines and get thegoods across the English Channel to keep the transportationlines of a nation open for communicationwith the front. And there will be no superior at herelbow to tell her how.

“I like big ventures. I like to do things myself.I’d sell flowers on the curb before I’d consent to beany one’s else employé,” the new woman in commerceflashed back at me as she buttoned her coatcollar and started out in a ten o’clock morning fog.

RISING TO THE NEW OCCASION

You see, it’s like that. The big venture is thefascinating field that lies beyond humdrum directedroutine. We have by now forgotten the stir thatwas created when perhaps thirty years ago the first[205]woman walked into a business house to take herplace at a typewriter desk. Let us not lose sightof the innovation of our own day that is about tocommand attention: the woman at the typewriter isrising. I think we shall see her take the chair beforethe mahogany desk in the president’s office.

The Woman’s Association of Commerce of Americawas recently organised at Chicago in a conventionof business women gathered from cities fromNew York to Chicago. For the first time adequatetraining to fit a woman for real commercial responsibilitiesis beginning to be as freely offered as to men.Cecile Bornozi, widely known as the only railwaywoman in France, came by her commercial knowledgelargely through instinct and inheritance. She gaveup literature at the Sorbonne for it, because as thedaughter of Philip Bornozi, from Constantinople,who supplied rolling stock to the railways of theOrient, France, and Belgium, the call to commercewas in her blood. But except for the few speciallyplaced women like that, the way up in commercebefore the year 1914 was not plain and easy. Nowall over the world there are floating in on the morningmail invitations like the one that has just come tome from the New York University.

How much it means, I suppose no man can quiteunderstand. Suppose you, sir, were going to attemptto talk glibly in terms of chiffon and voile and chambrayand all the rest of those mystifying terms thattangle the tongue of a novice sent down the aisle ofa department store with a sample in his lower left[206]hand vest pocket to be properly matched—you’d feel,wouldn’t you, that a course in this positively unknowntongue would be helpful in making yourselfand your errand rightly understood. Just so. Nowall unknown language is a handicap as is this oneto you, which is quite familiar to every woman, forwe learn to lisp in terms of our clothes. But onthe other hand, there are commercial terms whichyou as a boy imbibed as naturally from your environment,which are to your sister a foreign tongue. Weneed the schools to teach it. And I am not sure butit is the schools now being set up by the women whohave learned through their own experience that offerthe surest interpretation of the way in these newpaths in which women’s feet are set to-day.

Just off from Central Park West in New YorkCity, the Financial Centre for Women has been establishedin direct response to the war demand. WallStreet asked for it. Already 60 young women instructedin practical banking, investments, accountancy,and managerial duties have been sent out tofill responsible positions in the National Bank ofCommerce, Morgan’s, the Federal Reserve and overhalf a dozen other of the leading banks of New YorkCity. These young women have been given an intimateworking knowledge of such mysteries as stoppayments and certified checks, gold imports, cumulativeand preferred shares and all the intricaciesof the market and the terms in which “the street”talks. In the room with the green cloth coveredtable, about which sit these future financiers and[207]captains of industry in training, there is a blackboard.See the chalk marked diagram. By theroutes mapped out in those white lines, they havebrought furs from Russia, wheat from Canada, sugarfrom Hawaii. And all the money transactions involvedhave been properly put through. Thoroughlyfamiliarised like this with international operations,there is more to learn for the making of a financier.I doubt if any but a woman would think to teach it.Miss Elizabeth Rachel Wylie, who directs the FinancialCentre, recalls her classes from the wide world ofaffairs through which they circle the globe, for personalinstruction. They have now the groundworkof the knowledge with which a business man is familiar.And Miss Wylie adds earnestly, impressivelythe last lesson: “Don’t darn.”

You see, captains of industry don’t. Even somuch as an office boy who aspires to become a captainof industry doesn’t. And the woman in the officewho spends her evenings mending her stockings andwashing her handkerchiefs, misses, say, the movingpictures where the man in the office is adding to hisstock of general information. This tendency to revertto type has been the fatal handicap of the past.By the faint beginnings of an intention to discard it,you differentiate the new woman in commerce fromher predecessor the business woman. By way ofdiscipline that girl there at the green cloth coveredtable, whose bag of war knitting hangs on the backof her chair the while she’s shipping furs from Russia,will leave it at home to-morrow. Cecile Bornozi[208]wouldn’t have done a million dollars’ worth ofbusiness with the French Government the past yearif she had stopped to knit. And if her thoughtshad been on her stockings, she might have missed importantdetails in railway rolling stock. In her roomat the Hotel Savoy in London, I never saw a needleor thimble or spool of thread. But on her table Inoticed System, the magazine of business.

APPROACHING HIGH FINANCE IN FRANCE

Over on the banks of the Seine even as here onthe banks of the Hudson, they are teaching womennow the things that Cecile Bornozi knows. Not solong ago I stood in the École Pratique de Haut EnseignementCommercial pour les Jeunes Filles inParis. This practical school of high commercial instructionfor young girls is in the Rue Saint Martinin an old monastery, the Ancien Prieure de SaintMartin des Champs, where the Government has giventhem quarters. Here a high vaulted room of prayerhas been turned into an amphitheatre. On rows ofbenches lifted tier after tier above the grey andwhite tiled floor, a hundred and twenty-five girls satfacing a new future. For the first time in history,la jeune fille who has always been more domesticminded than the young girl of any other nation exceptGermany, is being taught to be commerciallyminded. Curiously enough, “Thou shalt not darn”is a fundamental precept for success laid down by thedirector of the new school in France even as at thenew school in America. Mlle. Sanua in Paris has to[209]be perhaps even more insistent about it than MissWylie in New York. These are 125 girls of thebourgeoise families, any one of whom, if the greatwar had not come about, would be this morning goingto market with her mother to learn the relative valuesof the different varieties of soup greens. And thisafternoon she would be occupied, needle in hand, ona chemise or a robe de nuit for her trousseau. Nowshe has been called to a totally new environment.Here she sits on a wooden bench, the sofa pillow shehas brought with her at her back, a fountain pen inhand, her note book on her knee, adjusting herself toa career which up to 1914 no one so much as dreamedof for her. She is hearing this morning a lecture oncommercial law, delivered by Mme. Suzanne Grinberg,one of Paris’ famous lawyers. Le Professeursits on a high stool before a great walnut table, hershapely hands in graceful gesture accentuating herlegal phrases. Every little while you catch the“n’est ce pas?” with which she closes a period.And now and then she turns to the blackboard behindher to illustrate her meaning with a diagram.

Mlle. Sanua passes the school catalogue for myinspection and I notice a course of study that includes:industrial trade marks, designs, etc.; foreigncommercial legislation; commercial documents, buyingand selling, banking, etc.; bookkeeping, commercialand financial arithmetic; course in merchandising,including textiles, dyes, etc.; political economy,including the distribution of wealth, the monetarysystems of the world, the consumption of wealth;[210]pauperism, insurance, and charities; the state and itsrôle in the economic order, taxes, socialism; economicgeography and world markets; law, including publiclaw, civil law and laws relating to women; foreignlanguages. This is the curriculum now being approachedby the young girl who up to yesterday hadnothing more serious in the world to occupy herleisure than to sit at the window with an embroideryframe in her lap watching and waiting for a husband.

But you see three years ago, four years ago, Pierremarched by the window in a poilu’s blue uniformand he may never come back. Marriage has hithertobeen the fixed fact of every French girl’s life.Now numbers of women must inevitably, inexorablyfind another career. These girls here are many ofthem the daughters of professional men, doctors andlawyers. The girl in the third row back with theblue feather in her hat is the niece of President Poincaré.That one with the pretty soft brown eyes inthe front row is married. The wife of a manufacturerwho is serving his country as a lieutenant inthe army, she is trying as best she may to take hisplace at the head of the great industrial enterprisehe had to leave at a day’s notice when his call to thecolours came. She found herself confronted withall sorts of difficult situations. Somehow she’smanaged so far by sheer force of will and somewhatperhaps by intuition to come through some prettynarrow situations. For the future she’s not willingto take any more such chances. She has come to[211]learn all that a school has to teach of the scientificprinciples and the established facts of commerce.Two girls here are the granddaughters of one of theleading merchants of the Havre. Their brother,who was to have succeeded to the management ofthe celebrated financial house, gave his life for hiscountry instead at the Marne. And these girls, withthe consent of the family, have dedicated their livesto taking their brother’s place in the economic up-buildingof France to which the financial world looksforward after the war.

You see like this the new woman in commerce allover the world is planning for a career that willnever again rest with stenography and typewriting.Bringing furs from Russia and wheat from Canadais more interesting. There is nothing like preparedness.You are almost sure to do that for which youhave specially made ready. And one glance at theprogramme of study for the École Pratique de HautEnseignement Commercial shows clearly enough toany one who reads, that it is what Cecile Bornoziwith her flashing glance calls the “big venture”which is the ultimate aim of this girl with the newnote book on her knee. Meantime France canscarcely wait for her to complete her training.Mlle. Sanua has almost to stand at the door of theAncien Prieure to turn away the employers whocome to the Rue St. Martin to offer positions to herpupils. “Always they are asking,” she says, “haveI any more graduates ready?”

Avocat Suzanne Grinberg’s soft musical voice[212]goes on in the amphitheatre expounding commerciallaw. Outside in her adjoining office, the little stonewalled room with the religious Gothic window,Mlle. Sanua tells me how it has come about, thisnew attitude on the part of her country to womenwho are going to find economic independence in thebusiness world. In the cold little room in a warburdened land where coal is $80 a ton, we drawour chairs closer to the tiny grate. Mlle. Sanualeans forward and selects two fa*gots to be addedto the fire that must be carefully conserved withrigid war-time economy.

As she begins to talk, I catch the look in her eyes,the glow of idealism that I have felt somewherebefore. Where? Ah, yes. It was Frau Anna vonWunsch in whose eyes I have seen the gleam thatflashed the same feminist message. Frau vonWunsch was before the war the presedient of DieFrauenbanck. This was for Germany a most revolutionaryinstitution that hung out its gold letteredsign at 39 Motzstrasse, Berlin, a woman’s bank ina land where it was contrary to custom for a marriedwoman to be permitted to do any banking at all.But “Women will never become a world power untilthey become a money power,” said Frau vonWunsch. And they put that motto in black letterson all of their letter heads and checks. The armiesof the world are now entrenched between the Seineand the Rhine and since 1914 of course hardly anypersonal word at all has come through the censoredlines from the feminists of Germany to the feminists[213]of France. One does not even know what has becomeof Frau von Wunsch and her Frauenbanck overthere in Mittel Europa. But the ideal that shelighted, flames now in every land.

Mlle. Sanua’s plan too is for a new woman incommerce who shall be a money power and a worldpower. And perhaps it may be France that is temperamentallyfitted to lead all lands in achievingthat ideal. The jeune fille, so carefully trained fordomesticity only, has been known to develop wonderfulbusiness qualities after marriage. Invariablyin the small shops of France it is Madame who presidesat her husband’s cash drawer. A woman’shand has led industries for which France is worldfamous: Mme. Pommerey whose champagne ischosen by the epicure in every land, Mme. Paquinwhose house has dictated clothes for the women ofall countries, and Mme. Duval whose restaurantsare on nearly every street corner of Paris. Thecommercial instinct is really latent in every Frenchwoman. There is scarcely a French household inwhich a husband making an investment of any kinddoes not first consult with his wife. This birthrightthen, why not develop it by training and add scientificknowledge to intuition?

That was the proposition with which the FrenchMinister of Commerce was approached at the beginningof the war. It was his own daughter whocame to the Bureau of State over which he presided,with a new programme. Mlle. Valentine Thomsonis the editor of La Vie Feminine, in whose columns[214]she had already advocated wider business opportunitiesfor women on the ground that France wouldhave need of women in many new capacities. Nowshe came to ask that the High Schools of Commercethroughout the land should be opened to girls.Hitherto they had been exclusively for boys. TheMinister of Commerce took the matter under consideration.The argument that girls should be preparedfor responsibilities that every year of warwould more surely bring to them sounded to himlogical enough. Besides Mlle. Valentine Thomsonis a daughter with a most pretty and persuading way,a way that is as helpful to a feminist as to any otherwoman. So it happened that the Minister of Commerce,in September, 1915, issued a circular recommendingthe opening of the national Schools of Commerceto women. The Ministry could only recommend.Each Chamber of Commerce could ultimatelydecide for its own city. And there were butthree cities in which the final court of authority refused,Paris, Lyons and Marseilles.

Then in Paris Mlle. Sanua decided that womentoo must somehow have their chance. She had alreadyorganised her countrywomen in the Federationof French Toy Makers, for which she has far-flungambitions. This new industry which she is puttingon its feet in France, she has planned shall supplantthe made-in-Germany toys in the markets of theworld. But the women who are handling the industrymust know how on more than a domesticscale. And Paris, the metropolis of France, offered[215]them no commercial training. In the spring of1916 Mlle. Sanua decided to go to the Departmentof State about the matter. There the Minister ofCommerce, M. Thomson, furrowed his brow:“After all, Mademoiselle,” he said, “have womenthe mentality for business? The Ministry of Warhas opened employment in its offices to women.And these girls now whom the Government has admittedto clerkships here, some of them seem quiteuseless. Mademoiselle,” he added wearily, “is awoman’s brain really capable for commerce?”

“Train it. Then try it. What we need isschools,” said Mlle. Sanua.

A few moments later the conversation turned onthe toy industry. “What do you know about thetoy industry?” asked the Minister of State curiously.She told him. And as the woman talked,his wonder grew. She did know about toys, thatwhich would enable the French to defeat the Germansin this branch of commerce after the other defeatis finished. Would Mlle. Sanua give a lectureon the toy industry before the Association Nationaled’Expansions Economique? And would shemake a report before the Conference Economique desAllies? Which she did. So here was a womanwho had a brain worth while for commerce. Well,there might be others. If the Chamber of Commercein Paris was still doubtful, the Ministry ofCommerce would take a chance on endorsing Mlle.Sanua’s proposal. They secured for her the AncienPrieure. And she established the school for which[216]she gives her services. She has gathered a facultywhich includes celebrated names in France, mostof whom are serving without compensation. Threeformer Ministers of Commerce form part of the committeeof patronage for the school. And the firstdiplomas last June were conferred by a state official,the Inspector General of Education. For France isarriving at the conclusion that she will have need oftrained women as well as such men as she can musterfor the great economic conflict that is going to followwhen the other battle flags are furled.

So here at the Ancien Prieure 125 new women arecoming into commerce. “N’est ce pas?” I hearAvocat Suzanne Grinberg’s voice repeat. Mlle.Sanua adds another fa*got to the fire. Again as shelooks up her eyes are illumined with the ideal thatanimates her in the service in which she is now engagedfor her country. I think the women ofFrance will be a money power and a world power.

See them starting on the way. Already the Bankof France to-day has 700 women employés, theCredit Foncier has 400, and the Credit Lyonnaisehas 1200 women employés. Clerical positions inall the government departments, including the WarOffice, have been opened to women. M. Metin, theunder secretary of the French Ministry of Finance,has recently appointed Mlle. Jeanne Tardy an attachéof his department, the first time in the historyof France that a woman has held such a position.

Now in every country this same movement hastaken place. Russia has had women clerks at the[217]War Office, the Ministries of the Interior, Agriculture,Education, Transportation, and at the Chancelleriesof the Imperial Court and Crown Property.The Imperial Russian Bank employed women bypreference.

In the German government bureaus and offices,the women employés outnumber the men and theyare to be found now in every bank in Germany.There are even new women in commerce in Germanyconducting business houses that soldier husbandshave left in their hands, who are beginningopenly to rebel against the restriction which excludeswomen along with “idiots, bankrupts, and dishonesttraders” from the Bourse in Berlin. And recently apetition has been addressed to the Reichstag for theremoval of this bar sinister in business.

MOVING ON LONDON’S FINANCIAL DISTRICT

Probably the largest invasion of the business office,whether that of the government or of the privateemployer, has taken place in England. Noless than 278,000 women have directly replaced incommerce men released for military duty. Petticoatsin the district that is known as the “city,” Isuppose are as unprecedented as they could be anywherein the world. The most visionary, advancedfeminist, who before 1914 might have timidly suggestedsuch an invasion, would have been curtly dismissedwith, “It isn’t done.” And in truth I believeit never would have been done without a war.Down in Fenchurch Avenue, in the great shipping[218]district, I was told: “Really, don’t you know, thisis the last place we ever expected to see women.But they are here.”

The gentleman who spoke might have come outof a page of “Pickwick Papers.” His silk hat hungon a nail in the wall above his desk. And he worea black Prince Albert coat. He looked over hisgold bowed eye glasses out into the adjoining roomat the clerical staff of the Orient Steamship Companyof which he has charge. He indicated for myinspection among the grey haired men on the highstools, rows of women on stools specially madehigher for their convenience. And he spoke in thetone of voice in which a geologist might refer tosome newly discovered specimen.

It was withal a very kindly voice and there wasin it a distinct note of pride when he said: “NowI want you to see a journal one of my girls hasdone.” He came back with it and as he turned thepages for my inspection, he commented: “I findthe greatest success with those who at 17 or 18 comedirect from school, ‘fresh off the arms,’ as we say inScotland. They, well, they know their arithmeticbetter. My one criticism of women employés is thatsome of them are not always quite strong on figures.And they lack somewhat in what I might call stayingpower. Business is business and it must go on everyday. Now and then my girls want to stay home fora day. And the long hours, 9:30 to 5:00 in the city,well, I suppose they are arduous for a woman.”

“Mr. Clarke,” I said, “may I ask you a question:[219]What preparation have these new employés had forbusiness?”

And it turns out, as a matter of fact, most of themhaven’t had any. A large number of this quarterof a million women who came at the call of theLondon Board of Trade to take the places of menin the offices, are of the class who since they were“finished” at school, have been living quiet Englishlives in pleasant suburbs where the rose trees growand everybody strives to be truly a lady who doesn’tdescend to working for money. It is difficult for anAmerican woman of any class to visualise such anideal. But it was a British fact. There were thousandsof correct English girls like this, whose pulseshad never thrilled to a career who are finding it nowsuddenly thrust upon them.

“Mr. Clarke,” I said, “suppose a quarter of amillion men were to be hastily turned loose in akitchen or nursery to do the work to which womenhave been born and trained for generations. Perhapsthey might not be able to handle the job withjust the precision of their predecessors. Now doyou think they would?”

Mr. Clarke raised his commercial hand in a quickgesture of protest: “Dear lady,” he said, “I rememberwhen my wife once tried me out one day in thenursery—one day was enough for her and for me—I,well, I wasn’t equal to the strain. Frankly, I’mquite sure most men wouldn’t have the staying powerfor the tasks you mention.”

So you see, in comparison, perhaps the new women[220]on the high stools that have been specially made totheir size, are doing pretty well anyhow. There are73,000 more of them in government offices, thelower clerkships in the civil service having beenopened to them since the war. And no less than42,000 more women have replaced men in financeand banking.

Really, it was like taking the last trench in theGreat Push when the women’s battalions arrived atLombard and Threadneedle streets. That bulwarkof the conservatism of the ages, the Bank of England,even, capitulates. And the woman movementhas swept directly past the resplendent functionaryin the red coat and bright brass buttons who walksup and down before its outer portals like somethingthe receding centuries forgot and left behind on thescene. He still has the habit of challenging so muchas a woman visitor. It is a hold-over perhaps fromthe strenuous days of that other woman movementwhen every government institution had to be barricadedagainst the suffragettes, and your hand bagwas always searched to see if you carried a bomb.But the bright red gentleman is more likely to letyou by now than before 1914.

Inside, as you penetrate the innermost recesses,you will go past glass partitioned doors throughwhich are to be seen girls’ heads bending over thehigh desks. And you will meet girl clerks withledgers under their arms hurrying across court yardsand in and out and up and down all curious, winding,musty passage ways. I know of nowhere in the[221]world that you feel the solemn significance of thenew woman movement more than here as you catchthe echo of these new footsteps on stone floors wherefor hundreds of years no woman’s foot has ever trodbefore.

The Bank of England isn’t giving out the figuresabout the number of its women employés. An officialjust looks the other way and directs you downthe corridor to put the inquiry to another blackfrock coat. O, well, if that’s the way they feelabout it! Others with less ivy on the walls mayspeak. The London and Southwestern Bank whichbefore the war employed but two women, and thesestenographers, now has 900 women. One of London’sgreatest banks, the London, City and Midland,has among 3000 employés 2600 women. The newwoman in commerce is emerging in England andthese are some of the verdicts on her efficiency:

Bank of England: “We find the women quickat writing, slow at figures. We have been surprisedto find that they do as well as they do. But theyare not so efficient as men.”

London, City and Midland Bank: “For accuracy,willingness, and attention to duty, we may saythat women employés excel.”

Morgan and Grenfells: “We employ women onledger work. But we find they lack the esprit decorps of men. And they don’t like to work afterhours.”

Barclay’s Bank: “We cannot speak too highlyof our women clerks. They have shown great zeal[222]to acquire a knowledge of the necessary details.”

London and Southwestern Bank: “Women employésare even more faithful and steady than men.But when there is a sudden rush of work, as say atthe end of the year, they go into hysterics. We findthat we cannot let them see the work piled up.It must be given out to them gradually. This, Ithink, is due to inexperience. When women havehad the same length of experience and the sametraining as men, we see no reason why they shouldnot be equally as capable.”

Now that’s about the way the evidence runs.You would probably get it about like that anywherein Europe. There is some criticism. Isn’t it surprisingthat there is not more when you rememberthat it is mostly raw recruits chosen by chance whoseservices are being compared with the picked menwhom they have replaced? In England in 1915the Home Office moved to provide educational facilitiesfor women for their new commercial responsibilities.There was appointed its Clerical andBusiness Occupations Committee which opened inLondon, and requested the mayors of all other citiessimilarly to open, emergency training classes forgiving a ground work in commercial knowledge andoffice routine. These government training coursescover a period of from three to ten weeks. It israther sudden, isn’t it, three weeks’ preparation fora job in preparation for which the previous incumbenthad years?

And there are thousands of the women who have[223]gone into the offices without even that three weeks’training. The cousin of the wife of the head ofthe firm knew of some woman of “very good family”whose supporting man was now enlisted and whomust therefore earn her own living. Or some otherwoman was specially recommended as needing work.And there was another method of selection: “Shehad such nice manners and she was such a prettylittle thing I liked her at once, don’t you know.”

WHAT EVERY WOMAN KNOWS

’Um, yes, I do know. Somewhere in Americaonce there was an editorial chief who said to me,his assistant, “Now I need a secretary. There’ll besome here to-day to answer my advertisem*nt.Won’t you see them and let me know about theirqualifications.” There were, as I remember, somefourteen of them, grey haired and experienced ones,technically expert and highly recommended ones,college trained ones, and one was a dimpled littlething with pink cheeks and eyes of baby blue. Mydetailed report was quite superfluous. Through theopen door, as I entered his office, the chief had oneglance: “That one,” he said eagerly, “that littlepeach at the end of the row. She’s the one I want.”

Like that, little peaches are getting picked in alllanguages. And after them are the others freshfrom the gardens where the rose trees grow. Andamong these ornamental companions of her employer’sselection, the really useful employé who gets in,finds herself at a disadvantage. The little peach[224]“bears” the whole woman’s wage market. She hashysterics: all the wise commercial world shakes itshead about the staying power of woman in business.And the whole female of the species gets listed onthe pay roll at two-thirds man’s pay.

The Orient Steamship Company, I believe, is givingequal pay for equal work. To an official ofanother steamship company complaining of the inefficiencyof women employés, Sir Kenneth Anderson,President of the Orient Line, put the query,“How much do you pay them?” “Twenty-fiveshillings a week,” was the answer. “Then youdon’t deserve to have efficient women,” was theprompt retort. “We pay those who prove competentup to three pounds a week. And they’re sucha success we’ve decided we can’t let them go afterthe war.” But Sir Kenneth Anderson is the son ofone of England’s pioneer feminists, Dr. ElizabethGarrett Anderson, and the nephew of another, Mrs.Millicent Garrett Fawcett, president of the NationalUnion of Women’s Suffrage Societies. AndI suppose there isn’t another business house in Londonthat has the Orient Steamship Company’s vision.Women clerks in London business circles generallyare getting twenty shillings to thirty shillings aweek. The city of Manchester, advertising forwomen clerks for the public health offices, offeredsalaries respectively of ten shillings, eighteen shillingsand twenty shillings a week, “candidates to sitfor examination.”

Little peaches might not be worth more, it is true.[225]The troubled French minister was probably rightwhen he complained that some of his new office forcewere quite useless. But there is a Federation ofUniversity women in England with perfectly goodUniversity degrees attesting mathematical proficiency.They say, however, that they cannot liveon less than a minimum wage of three pounds aweek. Awhile ago in Italy a group of women accountantswere asked by the Administration of PublicInstruction to replace men called to the front.With exactly the same academic licenses as men,they were nevertheless offered but two-thirds men’spay. And they declined the proffered positions.Nor is it only England or Italy or Russia or Francethat presents this ratio between the wages of menand those of women in the business offices. Thefirst resolution adopted by the new Women’s Associationof Commerce of America was one demandingequal pay for equal work. Eventually the Women’sAssociation of Commerce and the Financial Centrefor Women and the École Pratique de HautEnseignement Commercial may succeed in cultivatingin the commercial world a taste for a higher typeof employé than the little peaches of the past. Butfor the present it is the handicap that the businesswoman in routine office positions has to accept.And there is no Trade Union in commerce to care.Can you manage to give equal work on two-thirdsman’s pay?

If you can, this is the hour of your opportunity.The women’s battalions are with every month of the[226]war drawing nearer, moving onward toward thepresident’s office. The London and SouthwesternBank has advanced 200 of its women clerks to thecashier’s window. The London City and MidlandBank a year ago promoted a woman to the positionof manager of one of its branches. It was the firsttime that a woman in England had held such a position.Newspaper reporters were hurriedly despatchedto Sir Edward Holden, the president, to seeabout it. But he only smilingly affirmed the truthof the rumour that had spread like wildfire throughthe city. It was indeed so. And he had no lessthan thirty more women making ready for similarpositions.

Over in France at Bordeaux and at Nancy inboth cities the first class graduated from the HighSchool of Commerce after the admission of women,had a woman leading in the examinations. In thesame year, 1916, a girl had carried off the first honoursin the historic Gilbart Banking Lectures inLondon. I suppose no other event could have moreprofoundly impressed financial circles. The Banker’sMagazine came out with Rose Esther Kingston’sportrait in a half page illustration and the announcementthat a new era in banking had commenced. Itwas the first time that women had been admitted tothe lectures. There were some sixty-two men candidateswho presented themselves for examinationat the termination of the two months’ course. RoseKingston, who outstripped them all, had been for ayear a stenographer in the correspondence department[227]of the Southwestern Bank. Now she was invitedto the cashier’s desk.

To correctly estimate the achievement, it shouldbe remembered that the men with whom she competed,had years of commercial background and thisgirl had practically one year. There were so manytechnical terms with which they were as familiar asshe is with all the varieties of voile. What was themeaning of “allonge”? she asked three of her fellowemployés bending over their ledgers before she foundone who was willing to make it clear that this wasthe term for the piece of paper attached to a bill ofexchange. Fragment by fragment like this, shepicked up her banking knowledge. Once the Gilbartlecturer mentioned the “Gordon Case,” withwhich every man among his hearers was quite familiar.She searched through three volumes to getan intelligent understanding of the reference.Meantime, I think she did “darn” nights. You see,her salary was thirty shillings a week.

THE NEW WOMAN AT THE PARTING OF THE WAYS

This is for the feminine mind the besetting temptationmost difficult to avoid. Can we give up our“darning” and all of the habits of domesticity whichthe word connotes? It is the question which womenface the world over to-day. Success beckons nowalong the broad highway of commerce. But thedifficult details of living detain us on the way tofame or fortune. And we’ve got to cut the apron-stringsthat tie us to yesterday if we would go ahead.[228]Which shall it be, new woman or old? Most of useither in business or the professions cannot be both.Dr. Ella Flagg Young, widely known as the firstwoman to so arrive at the top of her profession asSuperintendent of Schools in the city of Chicago,received a salary of $10,000 a year. She had madeit the inviolable rule of her life to live as comfortablyas a man. She told me that she did not permither mind to be distracted from her work for any ofthe affairs of less moment that she could hire someone else to attend to. She did not so much as buyher own gloves. Her housekeeper-companion attendedto all of her shopping. And never, she said,even when she was a $10 a week school teacher,had she darned her own stockings!

There are a few women who have, it is true, managedto achieve success in spite of the handicap ofdomestic duties. But they must be women of exceptionalphysique to stand the strain. I know abusiness woman in New York who, at the head ofa department of a great life insurance company, enjoysan income of $20,000 a year. Yet that womanstill does up with her own hands all of the preservesthat are used in her household. Her husband, whois a physician with a most lucrative practice, youwill note doesn’t do preserves. He wouldn’t if thefamily never had them.

A woman who is a member of the New York lawfirm of which her husband is the other partner waswith him spending last summer at their country[229]place. She, during their “vacation,” put up a hundredcans of fruit. I think it was between strawberrytime and blackberry time that she had to returnto town to conduct a case in court. She had cautionedher husband that while she was gone, he besure to “see about” the little green cucumbers. But,of course, he didn’t. What heed does a man—andhe happens also to be a judge of one of the highercourts—give to little green cucumbers? Long afterthey should have been picked, they had grown to belarge and yellow, which, as any woman knows, takesthem way past their pickling prime. That was howthe woman who cared about little green cucumbersfound them, when she returned from the city. Indespair she threw them all out on the ground. Thenext day, turning the pages of her cook book, shehappened to discover another use for yellow cucumbers.Putting on a blue gingham sunbonnet, shewent out to the field back of the orchard and laboriouslygathered them all up again. And she couldnot rest until on the shelf in her farm house cellarstood three stone crocks filled with sweet cucumberpickle. She just couldn’t bear to see those cucumbersgo to waste. It is the sense of thrift inculcatedby generations of forbears whose occupation wasthe practice of housewifery.

The Judge doesn’t have any such feeling aboutpickles or any other household affairs. When hegoes home at night, he reads or smokes or plays billiards.When the lady who is his law partner goeshome, even though their New York residence is at[230]an apartment hotel, she finds many duties to engageher attention. The magazines on the table wouldget to be as ancient as those in a dentist’s office ifshe didn’t remove the back numbers. Who elsewould conduct the correspondence that makes andbreaks dinner engagements and do it so gracefullyas to maintain the family’s perfect social balance?Who else would indite with an appropriate sentimentand tie up and address all the Christmas packagesthat have to be sent annually to a large circleof relatives? Well, all these and innumerable otherthings you may be sure the Judge wouldn’t do. Hesimply can’t be annoyed with petty and trivial matters.He says that for the successful practice of hisprofession, he requires outside of his office hours restand relaxation. Now the other partner practiseswithout them. And you can see which is likely tomake the greater legal reputation.

In upper Manhattan, at a Central Park West address,a woman physician’s sign occupies the frontwindow of a brown stone front residence. She happensto be a friend of mine. Katherine is one ofthe most successful women practitioners in NewYork. Nine patients waited for her in the anteroom the last time I was there. From the basem*ntdoor, inadvertently left ajar, there floated up thesound of the doctor’s voice: “That chicken,” shewas saying, “you may cream for luncheon. I have acase at the hospital at two o’clock. We’ll hang thenew curtains in the dining-room at three. And—well,[231]I’ll be down again before I start out thismorning.”

I know the Doctor so well that I can tell youpretty accurately what were the other domesticduties that had already received her attention. Shehas a most wonderful kitchen. She had glancedthrough it to see that the sink was clean and thateach shining pot and pan was hanging on its ownhook. She had given the order for the day to thebutcher. She had planned the dinner for the evening,probably with a soup to utilise the remnantsof Sunday’s roast. Then—I have known it to happen—someone perhaps called, “O, say, dear, here’sa button coming loose. Could you, ’er, just sparethe time?”

Well, ultimately she stands in the doorway of heroffice with her calm, pleasant “This way, please” tothe first patient, and turns her attention to the diagnosis,we will say, of an appendicitis case. Meanwhile,down the front staircase a carefree gentlemanhas passed on his way to the doorway of the otheroffice. He is the doctor whose sign is in the otherfront window of this same brown stone residence.What has he been doing in the early morning hoursbefore taking up his professional duties for the day?His sole employment has been the reading of themorning newspaper! Katherine never interruptshim in that. It is one of the ways she has been sucha successful wife. She learned the first year of theirmarriage how important he considered concentration.

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MAN’S EASY WAY TO FAME

Now you can see that there’s a difference in beingthese two doctors. And it’s a good deal easier beingthe doctor who doesn’t have to sew on his own buttonsand who needs take less thought than the birdsof the air about his breakfasts and his luncheons andhis dinners, how they shall be ordered for the day.That’s the way every man I know in business or theprofessions has the bothersome details of living allarranged for him by some one else. I noted recentlya business man who was thus speeded on his way tohis office from the moment of his call to breakfast.The breakfast table was perfectly appointed. “Isyour coffee all right, dear?” his wife inquired solicitously.It was. As it always is. The eggs placedbefore him had been boiled just one and a half minutesby the clock. He has to have them that way,and by painstaking insistence she has accomplishedit with the cook. The muffins were a perfect goldenbrown. He adores perfection and in every detailshe studies to attain it for him. The breakfast thathe had finished was a culinary achievement. “Don’tforget your sanatogen, dear,” she cautioned as hefolded his napkin. “Honey, you fix it so much betterthan I can,” he suggested in the persuasive toneof voice that is his particular charm. She hastilyset down her coffee cup and rose from the table todo it. Then she selected a white carnation from thecentrepiece vase and pinned it in his buttonhole.He likes flowers. She picked up his gloves from the[233]hall table, and discovering a tiny rip, ran lightly upstairsto exchange them for another pair, while hepassed round the breakfast table, hat in hand, kissingthe five children in turn. Then he kissed her tooand went swinging down the front walk to catch thelast commuters’ train.

I happened to see him go that morning. But it’salways like that. And when she welcomes himhome at night, smiling on the threshold there, thefive children are all washed and dressed and in goodorder, with their latest quarrel hushed to cherubicstillness. The newest magazine is on the librarytable beneath the softly shaded reading lamp, and acarefully appointed dinner waits. All of the wearisomedomestic details of existence he has to beshielded from. For he is a captain of industry.

There are even more difficult men. I know ofone who writes. He has to be so protected from therude environment of this material world that whilethe muse moves him, his meals carefully preparedby his wife’s own hands, because she knows so wellwhat suits his sensitive digestion, are brought to hisdoor. She may not speak to him as she passes inthe tray. No servant is ever permitted to do thecleaning in his sanctum. It disturbs the “atmosphere,”he says. So his wife herself even washesthe floor. Hush! His last novel went into thesixth edition. He’s a genius. And his wife says,“You have to take every care of a man who possessestemperament. He’s so easily upset.” For the lackof a salad just right, a book might have failed.

[234]

’Er, do you know of any genius of the femininegender for whom the gods arrange such happy auspicesas that? Is there any one trying to be a prominentbusiness or professional woman for whom thewrinkles are all smoothed out of the way of life asfor the prominent professional man whom I havementioned?

We who sat around a dinner table not long agoknew of no such fortunate women among our acquaintance.That dinner, for instance, hadn’t appointeditself. Our hostess, a magazine editor, hadhurried in breathless haste from her office at fifteenminutes of six to take up all of the details thatdemand the “touch of a woman’s hand.” The penetratingodour of a roast about to burn had greetedher as she turned her key in the hall door. Sherushed to the oven and rescued that. Two of thenapkins on the table didn’t match the set. Marie,the maid, apologetically thought they would “do.”They didn’t. It was the magazine editor whor*ached into the basket of clean laundry for the rightones and ironed them herself because Marie had tobe busy by this time with the soup. The flowershadn’t come. She telephoned the florist. He wasso sorry. But she had ordered marguerites, andthere weren’t any that day. Yes, if roses wouldanswer instead, certainly he would send them atonce. The bon bons in yellow she found set out onthe sideboard in a blue dish. Why weren’t they inthe dish of delicate Venetian glass of which she wasparticularly fond? Well, because the dish of delicate[235]Venetian glass had gone the way of so manydelicate dishes, down the dumb waiter shaft an hourago. Marie didn’t mean to break it, as she assuredher mistress by dissolving in tears for some five minuteswhile more important matters waited. A particularsauce for the dessert depending on the delicacyof its flavouring, the editor must make herself.Well—after everything was all right, it was a composedand unperturbed and smiling hostess who extendedthe welcome to her invited company.

The guest of honour was a woman playwrightwhose problem play was one of the successes of lastseason. She has just finished another. That waswhy she could be here to-night. While she writes,no dinner invitation can lure her from her desk.“You see, I just have to do my work in the evening,”she told us. “After midnight I write best. It’s theonly time I am sure that no one will interrupt withthe announcement that my cousin from the West ishere, or the steam pipes have burst, or some otherevent has come to pass in a busy day.”

We had struck the domestic chord. Over the coffeewe discussed a book that has stirred the worldwith its profound contribution to the interpretationof the woman movement. The author easily holdsa place among the most famous. We all know herpublic life. One who knew her home life, told usmore. She wrote that book in the intervals of doingher own housework. The same hand that held herinspired pen, washed the dishes and baked the breadand wielded the broom at her house—and made all[236]of her own clothes. It was necessary because herentire fortune had been swept away. Does any oneknow of a man who has made a profound contributionto literature the while he prepared three mealsa day or in the intervals of his rest and recreationcut out and made, say, his own shirts? I met lastyear in London this famous woman who has compassedall of these tasks on her way to literary fame.She’s in a sanitarium trying to recuperate from nervousprostration.

THE RECIPE FOR SUCCESS

The hand that knows how to stir with a spoon andto sew with a needle has got to forget its cunning ifwomen are to live successfully and engage in businessand the professions. The woman of the presentgeneration has struggled to do her own work in theoffice and, after hours that of the woman of yesterdayin the home. It’s two days’ work in one. It hasbeen decided by the scientific experts, you remember,who found the women munition workers of Englandattempting this, that it cannot be done consistentlywith the highest efficiency in output. And theTrade Unions in industry endorse the decision.

This is the critical hour for the new women incommerce to accept the same principle. I know itis difficult to adopt a man’s standard of comfortableliving on two-thirds a man’s pay. And I know ofno one to pin carnations in your buttonhole. Butsomehow the woman in business has got to conserveher energy and concentrate her force in bridging the[237]distance that has in the past separated her fromman’s pay. There is now the greatest chance thathas ever come to her to achieve it—if she preparesherself by every means of self-improvement to performequal work. Don’t darn. Go to the movingpictures even, instead.

For great opportunities wait. Lady Mackworthof England, when her father, Lord Rhondda, was absenton a government war mission in America recently,assumed complete charge of his vast coal andshipping interests. So successful was her businessadministration, that on his resignation from thechairmanship of the Sanatogen Company, she waselected to fill his place. Like this the new womanin commerce is going to take her seat at the mahoganydesk. Are you ready?

The New York newspapers have lately announcedthe New York University’s advertisem*nt in largetype: “Present conditions emphasise the opportunitiesopen to women in the field of business. Businessis not sentimental. Women who shoulder equal responsibilitieswith men will receive equal consideration.It is unnecessary to point out that training isessential. The high rewards do not go to the unprepared.Classes at the New York University arecomposed of both men and women.”

Why shouldn’t they be? It is with madame athis side that the thrifty shop keeper of France hasalways made his way to success.

The terrible eternal purpose that flashes like zig-zaglightning through the black war clouds of[238]Europe, again appears. From the old civilisationreduced to its elements on the battle fields, a newworld is slowly taking shape. And in it, the newman and the new woman shall make the new moneypower—together.

Taking Title in the Professions

They are the grimmest outposts of all that markthe winning of the woman’s cause. But they starthe map of Europe to-day—the Women’s War Hospitals.

Out of the night darkness that envelops a war-riddenland, a bell sounds a faint alarm. From bedto bed down the white wards there passes the wordin a hoarse whisper: “The convoy, the convoyagain.” Instantly the whole vast house of pain isat taut attention. Boyish women surgeons, throwingaside the cigarettes with which they have been relaxingoverstrained nerves, hastily don white tunicsand take their place by the operating tables.Women physicians hurry from the laboratories withthe anesthetics that will be needed. Girl orderlies,lounging at leisure in the corridors, remove theirhands from their pockets to seize the stretchers andrush to their line-up in the courtyard. The gatekeeper turns a heavy iron key. From out the darknessbeyond, the convoy of grey ambulances reachingin a continuous line from the railway station beginsto roll in.

On and on they come in great waves of agony[240]lashed up by the latest seething storm of horror anddestruction out there on the front. In the dimmedrays of the carefully hooded light at the entrance,the girl chauffeur in khaki deftly swings into placethe great vehicle with her load of human freight. Anurse in a flowing headdress, ghostly white againstthe night, alights from the rear step. The wreckageinside of what has been four men, now dead,dying or maimed, is passed out. Groans and sharpcries of pain mingle with the rasping of the motor asthe ambulance rolls on to make way for another.

The last drive in the trenches has been perhaps aparticularly terrible one. All night like this, everynight for a week, for two weeks, the rush for humanrepairs may go on. Men broken on the giganticwheel of fate to which the world is lashed to-daywill be brought in like this, battalion after battalionto be mended by women’s hands. The appallingdistress of a world in agony has requisitioned anyhands that know how, all hands with the skill tobind up a wound.

It is very plain. You cannot stand like this ina woman staffed hospital in the war zone withoutcatching a vision of the great moving picture spectaclethat here flashes through the smoke of battle.Hush! From man’s extremity, it is, that theGreat Director of all is himself staging woman’sopportunity.

The heights toward which the woman movementof yesterday struggled in vain are taken at last.The battle has been won over there in Europe. Between[241]the forces of the Allies and the Kaiser, it is,that another fortress of ancient prejudice has fallento the waiting women’s legions. It was entirely unexpected,entirely unplanned by any of the embattledbelligerents. Woman had been summoned toindustry. The proclamation that called her wentup on the walls of the cities almost as soon as thecall of the men to the colours. There were womenporters at the railway stations of Europe, womenrunning railroads, women driving motor vans,women unloading ships, women street cleaners,women navvies, women butchers, women coal heavers,women building aeroplanes, women doingdanger duty in the T. N. T. factories of the arsenals,and in every land women engaged in those 96 tradesand 1701 jobs in which the British War Office authoritativelyannounced: “They have shown themselvescapable of successfully replacing the strongersex.”

Let the lady plough. Teach her to milk. Shecan have the hired man’s place on the farm. Shecan release the ten dollar a week clerk poring overa ledger. She can make munitions. Her countrycalls her. But the female constitution has not beenreckoned strong enough to sit on the judge’s bench.And Christian lands unanimously deem it indelicatefor a woman to talk to God from a pulpit. Fromthe arduous duties of the professions, the worldwould to the last professional man protect theweaker sex.

Then, hark! Hear the Dead March again! As[242]inexorably as in the workshops and the offices, itbegan to echo through the seminaries and the colleges,through the laboratories and the law courts.Listen! The sound of marching feet. The newwoman movement is here too at the doors. Highon the walls of Leipzig and the Sorbonne, of Oxfordand Cambridge and Moscow and Milan, on all ofthe old world institutions of learning, the long scrollsof the casualty lists commenced to go up. Wholecloisters and corridors began to be black with thenames of men “dead on the field of honour.” Andcivilisation faced the inexorable sequel. Women atlast in the professions now are taking title on equalterms with men.

The doors of a very old established institution inFifty-ninth Street, New York, swung open on a daylast autumn. And a line of young women passedthrough. They went up the steps to take their place—forthe first time that women had ever been there—inthe class rooms of the College of Physicians andSurgeons. There is perhaps a little awkward momentof surprise, of curiosity. A professor nods inrecognition to the new comers. The class of 1921smiles good naturedly. An incident is closed.

And an epoch is begun. Outside on a high scaffoldingthere are masons and carpenters at work.See them up there against a golden Indian summersky. They are putting the finishing touches on anew $80,000 building addition. And the ringing oftheir hammers and chisels, the scraping of theirtrowels is but significant of larger building operations[243]on a stupendous scale not made by humanhands.

A LOOK BACKWARD IN MEDICINE

This is the College of Physicians and Surgeons ofColumbia University, which after more than a hundredyears of history has decided to enlarge its accommodationsand add a paragraph to its catalogannouncing the admission of women. To understandthe significance of this departure from customand precedent we should recall the ostracism whichwomen have in the past been obliged to endure inthe medical profession. Elizabeth Blackwell, thefirst woman of modern times in any land to achievea medical education, knocked in vain at the doorsof some twelve medical colleges of these UnitedStates before one reluctantly admitted her. Shewas graduated in 1849 at the Geneva Medical Collegenow a part of Syracuse University. The entranceof this first woman into the medical professioncreated such a stir that Emily Blackwell the secondwoman to become a doctor, following in the footstepsof her sister, found even more obstacles in herpath. The Geneva college having incurred the displeasureof the entire medical fraternity now closedits doors and refused to admit another woman.Emily Blackwell going from city to city was at lastsuccessful in an appeal to the medical college ofCleveland, Ohio, which graduated her in 1852. Sogreat was the opposition now to women in the profession,that it was clear that they must create their[244]own opportunities for medical education. In turnthere were founded in 1850 the Philadelphia MedicalCollege for Women with which the name ofAnn Preston is associated as the first woman dean;in 1853 the New York Infirmary to which in 1865was added the Woman’s Medical College both institutionsfounded by the Drs. Blackwell; in 1863the New York Medical College and Hospital forWomen. “Females are ambitious to dabble in medicineas in other matters with a view to reorganisingsociety,” sarcastically commented the Boston Medicaland Surgical Journal. Society as also the medicalprofession coldly averted its face from thesepioneer women doctors.

“Good” women used to draw aside their skirtswhen they passed Elizabeth Blackwell in church.When she started in practice in New York City shehad to buy a house because no respectable residencewould rent her office room. Dr. Anna ManningComfort had her sign torn down in New York.Druggists in Philadelphia refused to fill prescriptionsfor Dr. Hannah Longshore. Girl medicalstudents were hissed and jeered at in hospital wards.Men physicians were forbidden by the profession tolecture in women’s colleges or to consult with womendoctors. Not until 1876 did the American MedicalAssociation admit women to membership. Howmedical men felt about the innovation, which Stateafter State was now compelled to accept, was voicedby the Boston Medical and Surgical Journal of 1879which said: “We regret to be obliged to announce[245]that, at a meeting of the councillors held Oct. 1, itwas voted to admit women to the MassachusettsMedical Society.”

Syracuse University, recovering from the censurevisited upon it for receiving Elizabeth Blackwell,was the first of the coeducational institutions to welcomewomen on equal terms with men to its medicalcollege. Other coeducational colleges in the Westlater began to take them. In 1894 when Miss MaryGarrett endowed Johns Hopkins University withhalf a million dollars on condition that its facilitiesfor the study of medicine be extended to womenequally with men, a new attitude toward the womanphysician began to be manifest. From that time on,she was going to be able with little opposition to getinto the medical profession. Her difficulty wouldbe to get up. Now no longer was a woman doctorrefused office facilities in the most fashionable residentialquarters in which she could pay the rent.Her problem however was just that—to pay therent. A medical diploma doesn’t do it. And topractise medicine successfully, therapeutically andfinancially, without a hospital training and experienceis about as easy as to learn to swim withoutgoing near the water. The most desirable opportunitiesfor this hospital experience were by the tacitgentleman’s agreement in the profession quite generallyclosed to women.

Until very recently, internships in general hospitalswere assigned almost exclusively to men. Dr.Emily Dunnung Barringer in 1903 swung herself[246]aboard the padded seat in the rear of the GouverneurHospital ambulance, the first woman to receivean appointment as ambulance surgeon in New YorkCity. Twice before in competitive examinationsshe had won such a place, but the commissioner ofpublic charities had declined to appoint her becauseshe was a woman. In 1908 another girl doctor, Dr.Mary W. Crawford in a surgeon’s blue cap and coatwith a red cross on her sleeve, answered her firstemergency call as ambulance surgeon for WilliamsburgHospital, Brooklyn. It happened this way:the notification sent by the Williamsburg Hospitalto Cornell Medical College that year by some oversightread that the examination for internship wouldbe open to “any member of the graduating class.”

When “M. W. Crawford” who had made applicationin writing, appeared with a perfectly goodCornell diploma in her hand, the authorities wereamazed. But they did not turn her away. Theyundoubtedly thought as did one of the confidentyoung men applicants who said: “She hasn’t achance of passing. Being a girl is a terrible handicapin the medical profession.” When she hadpassed however at the head of the list of thirty-fiveyoung men, the trustees endeavoured to get Dr. Maryto withdraw. When she firmly declined to do so,though they said it violated all established precedent,they gave her the place. And a new era in medicinehad been inaugurated.

Here and there throughout the country, otherwomen now began to be admitted to examinations[247]for internships. They exhibited an embarrassingtendency for passing at the head of the list. Any ofthem were likely to do it. The only way out of thedilemma, then was for the hospital authorities todeclare, as some did, that the institution had “noaccommodations for women doctors” which simplymeant that all of the accommodations had been assignedto men. It is on this ground that Philadelphia’sBlockley Hospital, the first large city almshousein the country to open to women the competitiveexamination for internship, again and againrefused the appointment even to a woman who hadpassed at the head of the list. It was 1914 beforeBellevue in New York City found a place forthe woman intern: five women were admitted amongthe eighty-three men of the staff.

This unequal distribution of professional privilegeswas the indication of a lack of professional fellowshipfar reaching in consequences. Among theexhibits in the laboratories to-day, there is a glassbottle containing a kidney preserved in alcohol. Inall the annals of the medical profession, I believe,there has seldom been another kidney just like it.For some reason or other, too technical for a laymanto understand, it is a very wonderful kidney. Nowit happens that a young woman physician discoveredthe patient with that kidney and diagnosed it. Awoman surgeon operated on that kidney and removedit successfully. Then a man physician came alongand borrowed it and read a paper on it at a medicalconvention. He is now chronicled throughout the[248]medical fraternity with the entire credit for thekidney.

“And it isn’t his. It’s our kidney,” I heard thegirl doctor say with flashing eyes. “You’ll take iteasier than that when you’re a little older, my dear,”answered the woman surgeon who had lived longerin the professional atmosphere that is so chilling toambition.

It was against handicaps like this that the womenin medicine were making progress. Dr. Gertrude B.Kelly’s name, in New York, is at the top in the annalsof surgery. Dr. Bertha Van Hoesen is a famoussurgeon in Chicago. Dr. Mary A. Smith andDr. Emma V. P. Culbertson are leading membersof the medical profession in Boston. Dr. LillianK. P. Farrar was in 1917 appointed visiting surgeonon the staff of the Women’s Hospital in New York,the first woman in New York City to receive such anappointment. Dr. S. Josephine Baker, who establishedin New York the first bureau of child hygienein the world, is probably more written of than is anyman in medicine. As chief of this department, shehas under her direction 720 employés and is chargedwith the expenditure annually of over a million dollarsof public money. She is a graduate of Dr.Blackwell’s medical college in which social hygienefirst began to be taught with the idea of makingmedicine a preventive as well as a curative art. Itwas the idea that Harvard University a few years laterincorporated in a course leading to the degree “Doctor[249]of Public Health.” And though a woman hadthus practically invented “public health” and anotherwoman, Dr. Baker is the first real and originaldoctor of public health, Dr. Baker herself was refusedat Harvard the opportunity to take their courseleading to such a title. The university did not admitwomen. But a little later the trustees of BellevueHospital Medical College, initiating the courseand looking about for the greatest living authority totake this university chair, came hat in hand to Dr.Baker, even though their institution does not admitwomen to the class rooms. “Gentlemen,” she answered,“I’ll accept the chair you offer me with onestipulation, that I may take my own course of lecturesand obtain the degree Doctor of Public Healthelsewhere refused me because I am a woman.” Likethis the woman who has practically established themodern science of public health, in 1916 came intoher title. It is probably the last difficulty and discriminationthat the American woman in medicinewill ever encounter.

The struggle of women for a foothold in themedical profession is the same story in all lands. Itwas the celebrated Sir William Jenner of Englandwho pronounced women physically, mentally andmorally unfit for the practice of medicine. Underhis distinguished leadership the graduates of theRoyal College of Physicians in London pledged themselves,“As a duty we owe it to the college and to theprofession and to the public to offer the fullest resistance[250]to the admission of women to the medicalprofession.” Well, they have. The medical fraternityin all lands took up the burden of that pledge.

A WORLD-WIDE RECONSTRUCTION

But to-day see the builders at work at the Collegeof Physicians and Surgeons in New York. Yaleand Harvard have also announced the admission ofwomen to their medical colleges. And it is not bychance now that these three most exclusive medicalcolleges in the United States have almost simultaneouslyremoved their restrictions. They aredoing it too at the University of Edinburgh and atthe University of Moscow. The reverberation fromthe firing line on the front is shaking all institutionsto their foundations. As surely as if shattered bya bomb, their barriers go down. Like that, theboards of trustees in all countries are capitulating tothe Great Push of the new woman movement. Allover the world to-day the hammers and chisels areringing in reconstruction. It is the new place in thesun that is being made for woman. The little doorsof Harvard and Yale and Columbia are creaking ontheir ancient hinges because the gates of the futureare swinging wide. It is not a thin line that ispassing through. The cohorts of the woman’s causeare sweeping on to occupy the field for which theirpredecessors so desperately pioneered.

Forward march, the woman doctor! It is theclear call flung back from the battle fields. Hearthem coming! See the shadowy figures that lead[251]the living women! With 8000 American womendoctors to-day marches the soul of Elizabeth Blackwell.Leading 3000 Russian women doctors thereis the silent figure of Marie Souslova, the first medicalwoman of that land, who in 1865 was denied herprofessional appellation and limited to the title“scientific midwife.” With the 1100 British womenthere keeps step the spirit of Sophia Jex Blake peltedwith mud and denied a degree at EdinburghUniversity, who in 1874 founded the London Schoolof Medicine for Women.

And there is one grand old woman who lived tosee the cause she led for a lifetime won at last.The turn of the tide to victory, as surely as for theAllies at Verdun or the Marne, came for the professionalwoman’s cause when the British War Officeunfurled the English flag over Endell Street Hospital,London. It floated out on the dawn of anew day, the coming of which flashed with fullestsignificance on the vision of Elizabeth Garrett Anderson.[1]The beautiful eyes of her youth were notyet so dimmed with her eighty years but that all oftheir old star fire glowed again when the news of thisgreat war hospital, entirely staffed by women, wasbrought to her at her home in Aldeburgh, Suffolk,where she sat in her white cap, her active hands thathad wrought a remarkable career now folded quietlyin her lap.

[1] Dr. Elizabeth Garrett Anderson died at Aldeburgh, Suffolk,England, Dec. 17, 1917.

Dr. Anderson was the second woman physician of[252]modern times, the first in England. When as ElizabethGarrett she came to London to be a doctor in1860, there was no University in her land thatwould admit her. Physicians with whom she wishedto study, were some of them scornful and some ofthem rude, and some were simply amazed. “Whynot become a nurse?” one more tolerant than therest suggested. The girl shook her head: “BecauseI mean to make an income of a thousand pounds ayear instead of forty.” The kindly old doctor whofinally yielded to her importunities and admitted herto his office, also let her in to the lectures at theMiddlesex Hospital with the specific arrangementthat she should “dress like a nurse” and promiseearnestly “not to look intelligent.” Her degree shehad to go to Paris for. Like that she got into themedical profession in 1871 a year before her marriageto the director of the Orient steamship line.Dean of the London School of Medicine for Womenand founder of the New Hospital for Women, shecame through the difficult days when it was only in“zenana” practice in India that English women doctorshad a free field. Russia too dedicated her pioneermedical women to the heathen, modestly designingthem for the Mussulman population and atlength permitting them the designation “physicianto women and children.” That idea lingered longwith civilisation. As late as 1910 a distinguishedBritish surgeon in a public address allowed that therewas this province for the woman physician, the treatmentof women and children. But any medical[253]woman “who professed to treat all comers,” her heheld to be an “abomination.”

Then the world turned in its orbit and came to1914. And Elizabeth Anderson’s eyes looked onthe glory of Endell Street. Do you happen to be ofthat woman movement which but yesterday movedupward toward the top in any of the professions solaboriously and so heavily handicapped? Then foryou also, Endell Street is the shining citadel that to-daymarks the final capitulation of the medical professionto the woman’s cause, as surely as the NewYork Infirmary in Livingston Place still stands asthe early outpost established by the brave pioneers.But the ordinary chance traveller who may searchout the unique war hospital in the parish of St.Giles in High Holborn, I suppose may miss some ofthis spiritual significance to which a woman thrills.The buildings which have been converted from anancient almshouse to the uses of a hospital are asdismal and as dingy as any can be in London. Theyare surrounded by a fifteen foot high brick wall coveredwith war placards, a red one “Air Raid Warning,”a blue one “Join the Royal Marines,” and ablack one “Why More Men are Needed. This isgoing to be a long drawn out struggle. We shallnot sheathe the sword until—” and the rest is tornoff where it flapped loose in the winter wind.

In a corner of this wall is set Christ Church, besidewhich a porter opens a gate to admit you tothe courtyard. Here where the ambulances comethrough in the dark, the bands play on visitors’ day.[254]It is a grey court yard with ornamental boxes ofbright green privet. On the benches about wait thesoldiers, legless soldiers, armless soldiers, some ofthem blind soldiers. On convalescent parade in bluecotton uniform with the gaiety of red neckties, everyman of them at two o’clock on a Tuesday is eager, expectant,waiting—for his woman. Mothers, wives,sweethearts are arriving, the girls with flowers, thewomen with babies in their arms. And each grabshis own to his hungry heart. You go by the terriblepain and the terrible joy of it all that grips you soat the throat. Inside where each woman just sits bythe bedside to hold her man’s hand, it is more numband more still. A girl orderly in khaki takes youthrough. Her blue shoulder straps are brass lettered“W. H. C.,” “Women’s Hospital Corps.”The only man about the place who is not a patientis the porter at the gate. The women in khaki withthe epaulets in red, also brass lettered “W. H. C.,”are the physicians and surgeons.

There is one of these you should not miss. Youwill know her by her mascot, the little fluffy whitedog “Baby” that follows close at her heels. Herfigure in its Norfolk belted jacket is slightly belowthe medium height. Her short swinging skirt revealstrim brown clad ankles and low brown shoes.She has abundant red brown hair that is plainlyparted and rolled away on either side from a lowsmooth brow to fasten in a heavy knot at the backof her head. I set down all of these details as beingof some interest concerning a woman you surely will[255]want to see. Surgeon in chief and the commandingofficer in charge of this military hospital with 600beds, she is the daughter of Dr. Elizabeth GarrettAnderson. She is also the niece of Mrs. MillicentGarrett Fawcett, president of the National Union ofWomen’s Suffrage Societies. And she is to-day oneof England’s greatest surgeons, Dr. Louisa GarrettAnderson, with the rank of major in the Englisharmy.

Her place in this new woman movement is themore significant because of her prominent affiliationwith that of yesterday. For the militancy in whichshe is now enlisted Dr. Anderson had her trainingin that other militancy that landed women in HollowayJail. Her transfer to her present place of governmentservice has come about in a way that makesher one of our most famous victory exhibits. “Youhave silenced all your critics” the War Office toldher when they bestowed on her the honour of herpresent official rank as she and her Woman’s HospitalCorps “took” Endell Street.

It was a stronghold that did not capitulate by anymeans at the first onslaught of the women’s forces.There was, at least, as you might say, a preliminaryskirmish. The Woman’s Hospital Corps raised andfinanced by British medical women was at the beginningof the war offered to the British Government.But in the public eye these were only “physicians towomen and children.” Kitchener swore a great oathand said he’d have none of them for his soldiers.Practically the War Office told them to “run along.”[256]Well, they did. They went over the Channel.“They are going now to advance the woman’s causeby a hundred years. O, if only I were ten yearsyounger,” sighed Elizabeth Anderson wistfully asshe waved them farewell at Southampton on themorning of Sept. 15, 1914.

France was in worse plight than England. Underthe Femmes de France of the Croix Rouge, theGovernment there permitted the Women’s HospitalCorps to establish themselves in what had beenClaridge’s Hotel in the Champs Elysées. In thecourse of time rumours reached the British Waroffice of this soldiers’ hospital in Paris run by Englishwomen. Oh, well, of course, women surgeonsmight do for French poilus. At length it waslearned however that even the British Tommies werefalling into their hands. And Sir Alfred Keogh,director of the General Medical Council, was hurriedacross to see about it.

“Miss Anderson,” he addressed the surgeon incharge, “I should like to look over the institution.”

“Certainly,” she acquiesced. “But it’s Dr. Anderson,if you please.” Three times as they wentthrough the wards, he repeated his mistake. Andthree times she suggested gravely, “Dr. Anderson,if you please.”

They had finished the rounds. “This,” he said,“is remarkable, ’er quite remarkable, don’t you know.But may I talk with some of your patients privately?”

Then the soldiers themselves, British soldiers, assured[257]him of their complete satisfaction with thesurgical treatment they had received. Indeed theword, they said, was out in all the trenches that theWomen’s Hospital was the place to get to when aman was wounded. Women surgeons took morepains, they were less hasty about cutting off armsand legs, you see. Oh, the Women’s Hospital wasall right.

“Extraordinary, most extraordinary,” murmuredSir Alfred Keogh. And this report he carried backto the General Medical Council. “Incredible as itmay seem, gentlemen,” he announced gravely, “itseems to be so.”

“It appears then,” brusquely decided Kitchener,“that these women surgeons are too good to bewasted on France.” And promptly their countryand the War Office invited them to London. It wasEngland’s crack regiment after the great drive onthe Somme that was tucked under the covers forrepairs at Endell Street. The issue was no longer indoubt. “Major” Anderson and the Women’s HospitalCorps held the fort for the professional woman’scause in England.

WINNING ON THE FRENCH FRONT

Dr. Nicole Gerard-Mangan, fascinating littleFrench feminist, meanwhile was executing a brilliantcoup in demonstration to her government. France,it was true, had seen that British women could bemilitary doctors and surgeons. But the Frenchwoman doctor, oh, every one was sure that the French[258]woman doctor’s place was the home. And if everthere was a woman whom God made just to be “protected,”you’d say positively it was Nicole Gerard-Mangin.

She stood before me as she came from her operatingroom, curling tendrils of bright brown hairescaping from the surgeon’s white cap set firmly onher pretty head, a surgeon’s white apron tied closelyback over her hips accentuating all their lovelinessof line. She is soft and round and dainty andcharming. She has small shapely hands, as exquisitelydone as if modelled by a sculptor. I lookedat her hands in the most amazement, the hands thathave had men’s lives in their keeping, little handsthat by the sure swift skill of them have broughtthousands of men back from death’s door. You’deasily think of her as belonging in a pink satin boudoiror leading a cotillion with a King of France.And she’s been at the war front instead. “Madamela petite Major” she is lovingly known to the soldiersof France. She too has that rank. You willnotice on one of the sleeves of her uniform the goldstripe that denotes a wound and on her right pinkcheek you will see the scar of it. On her other coatsleeve are the gold bars for three years of militaryservice.

This was the way it happened. In August, 1914,Dr. Gerard-Mangin was in charge of the tuberculosissanitarium, Hôpital Beaugou, in Paris. Whenthe call came for volunteers for army doctors, shesigned and sent in an application, carefully omitting[259]however to write her first name. The War Office,hurrying down the lists, just drafted Dr. Gerard-Manginas any other man. One night at twelveo’clock her concierge stood before her door with agovernment command ordering the doctor to reportat once at the Vosges front. The next morning witha suit case in one hand and a surgeon’s kit in theother, she was on her way. The astonished militarymedecin-en-chef, before whom she arrived, threw uphis hands: “A woman surgeon for the Frencharmy! It could not be.”

She held out her government order: “N’est cepas?” He examined it more closely. “But yet,”he insisted, “it must be a mistake.”

“En ce moment,” as they say in France, a thousandwounded soldiers were practically laid at thecommander’s feet—and he had only five doctors athand. He turned with a whimsical smile to the toyof a woman before him. After all there was analertness, an independent defiance of her femininitythat straightened at attention to duty now everycurving line of the little figure. His glance sweptthe wounded men: “Take off your hat and stay awhile,” he said in desperation. “But,” he added,“I shall have to report this to the War Office.There must be an investigation.”

Three months later when the Inspector Generalof the French army arrived to make it, he learnedthat Dr. Gerard-Mangin had performed six hundredoperations without losing a single patient. “You’lldo even though you are not a man,” he hazarded.

[260]

A little later she was ordered to Verdun to organisea hastily improvised epidemic hospital. Forthe first week she had no doctors and no nurses.There was no equipment but a barracks and the beds.As fast as these could be set up, a patient was putin. There were no utensils of any kind but the tincans which she picked up outside where they hadbeen cast away by the commissary department whenemptied of meat. There was no heat. There wasno water in which to bathe her patients except thatwhich she melted from the ice over an oil lamp.For six weeks she worked without once having herclothing off. One of her feet froze and she had tolimp about in one shoe. Eventually medical aid arrivedand she had a staff of twenty-five men underher direction. There were eight hundred beds.For seventeen months the hospital was under shellfire. There were officers in the beds who went mad.Three hundred and twenty-nine panes of glasswere shattered one day. A man next the littledoctor fell dead. A piece of shell struck herbut she had only time to staunch the flow ofblood with her handkerchief. Outside the Americanambulance men were coming on in their steadylines. They delivered to Nicole Gerard-Mangin18,000 wounded in four days, whom she in turn gavefirst aid and passed on to interior hospitals. Laterwhen 150,000 French soldiers were coming backfrom the army infected with tuberculosis, the Governmentrequired its greatest expert for the diagnosisof such cases. And Dr. Gerard-Mangin in the fall[261]of 1916 was recalled from the front to be mademedecin-en-chef of the new Hôpital MilitaireEdith Cavell in the Rue Desnouettes, Paris. It is agroup of low white buildings with red roofs. Thewhite walls inside are ornamented above the patients’beds with garlands of red and blue and yellowflowers. And the commanding officer’s own gay littleoffice has curtains of pink flowered calico. Greyhaired French scientists in the laboratories here aretaking their orders from Madame la petite Major.Soldiers in the corridors are giving her the militarysalute. One day there came a celebrated Frenchgeneral: “When I heard about you at Verdun,”he said, “I could not believe it. I insisted, she cannotbe a surgeon. She is only a nurse. I have madethe journey all the way to Paris,” he smiled in candour,“to find out if you are real.”

The records of the War Office show how real.Dr. Gerard-Mangin did her two years’ service at thefront without a day off for illness and never so muchas an hour’s absence from her post of duty. She isthe only surgeon with the French army who has sucha record. Her right to a place in the profession inwhich no man has been able to equal, let alone surpass,her achievement, would seem to be assured beyondquestion. Let us write high on the wavingbanners carried by the cohorts of the woman’s causethe name of Nicole Gerard-Mangin. It was not asimple or an easy thing that she has done. Youwould know if you heard her voice tremulous yetwith the agony on which she has looked. “I shall[262]nevair forget! I shall nevair forget!” she told mebrokenly, in the gay little pink calico office. Andthe beautiful brown eyes of the little French major,successful army surgeon, were suddenly suffusedwith woman’s tears.

WHAT SCOTTISH WOMEN DOCTORS DID

Like this the woman war doctor began. Beforethe first year of the great conflict was concluded,there was not a battle front on which she had notarrived. And the Scottish Women’s Hospitals haveappeared on five battle fronts. Organised by theScottish Federation of the National Union of Women’sSuffrage Societies and supported by the entirebody of constitutional suffragists under Mrs. Fawcettof London, they afford spectacular evidence of howcompletely the forces of the woman movement ofyesterday have been marshalled into formation forthe winning of the new woman movement of to-day.Dr. Elsie Inglis[2] the intrepid leader of the ScottishWomen’s Hospitals, like a general disposing hertroops to the best strategic advantage, has literallyfollowed the armies of Europe, placing her now indispensableauxiliary aid where the world’s distressat the moment seems greatest. There have been atone time as many as twelve of the Scottish hospitalsin simultaneous operation. Sometimes they areforced to pick up their entire equipment and retreatwith the Allies before the onslaught of the Hunhordes. Sometimes they have been captured by[263]the enemy, only eventually to reach London andstart out once more for new fields to conquer.

[2] Died 1917.

These women in the grey uniforms with Tartantrimmings and the sign of the thistle embroideredon their hats and their epaulets, have crossed thevision of the central armies with a frequency thathas seemed, to the common soldier at least, to partakeof the supernatural. Bulgarian prisonersbrought into the Scottish Women’s Hospital operatingat Mejidia on the Roumanian front looked upinto the doctors’ faces in amazement to inquire:“Who are you? We thought we had done for you.There you were in the south. Now here you are innorth. Are you double?” Of this work in thenorth, in the Dobrudja from where they wereobliged to retreat into Russia, the Prefect of Constanzasaid in admiration: “It is extraordinary howthese women endure hardship. They refuse helpand carry the wounded themselves. They work likenavvies.”

At the very beginning of the war, the Scottishwomen left their first record of efficiency at Calais.Their hospital there in the Rue Archimede, operatedby Dr. Alice Hutchinson, had the lowest percentageof mortality for the epidemic of entericfever. In France the hospital at Troyes under Dr.Louise McElroy was so good that it received anofficial command to pick up and proceed to Salonikato be regularly attached to the French army, thisbeing one of the very few instances on record wherea voluntary hospital has been so honoured. The[264]Scottish Hospital under Dr. Francis Ivins, establishedin the deserted old Cistercian abbey at Royaumont,is one of the show hospitals of France. Whenthe doctors first took possession of the ancient abbeythey had no heat, no light but candles stuck in bottles,no water but that supplied by a tap in the holyfountain, and they themselves slept on the floor.But eventually they had transformed the greatvaulted religious corridors into the comfortablewards of Hôpital Auxiliarie 301. They might, theFrench Government had said, have the “petiteblessé.” They would be entrusted with operationson fingers and toes! And every week or so, someFrench general ran down from Paris to see if theywere doing these right. But within two months theWar Office itself had asked to have the capacityof the hospital increased from 100 to 400 beds.And the medical department of the army had beennotified to send to Royaumont only the “grandeblessés.” At the end of the first week’s drive onthe Somme, all of the other hospitals were objectingthat they could receive no more patients: their overworkedstaffs could not keep up with the operationsalready awaiting them in the crowded wards.“But,” said the French Government, “see the Damesdu Royaumont! Already they have evacuated theirwounded and report to us for more.”

It was in Serbia that four Scottish hospitals behindthe Serbian armies on the Danube and the Savaachieved a successful campaign in spite of the mostinsurmountable difficulties. Here under the most[265]primitive conditions of existence, every service frombookkeeping to bacteriology, from digging ditches todrawing water was done by women’s hands. It wasnot only the wounded to whom they had to minister.They came into Serbia through fields of white poppiesand fields of equally thick white crosses overfresh graves. They faced a country that was overcomewith pestilence. All the fevers there are ragedthrough the hospitals where patients lay three in abed, and under the beds and in the corridors andon the steps and on the grass outside. After monthsof heartbreaking labour when the plague had finallyabated, the enemy again overran Serbia and theScottish Women’s Hospitals, hastily evacuating, retreatedto the West Moravian Valley. Some of thedoctors were taken prisoners and obliged to spendmonths with the German and Austrian armies beforetheir release. Others joined in the desperate undertakingof that remarkable winter trek of the entireSerbian nation fleeing over the mountains of Montenegro.Scores perished. But the Scottish womendoctors, ministering to the others, survived. Dr.Curcin, chief of the Serbian medical command, hassaid: “As regards powers of endurance, they wereequal to the Serbian soldiers. As regards morale,nobody was equal to them. In Albania I learnedthat the capacity of the ordinary Englishwoman forwork and suffering is greater than anything we everknew before about women.”

Like that the record of the woman war doctor runs.Where, oh, where are all those earlier fabled disabilities[266]of the female sex for the practice of theprofession of medicine? A very celebrated Englishmedical man, returning recently from the front,found a woman resident physician in charge of theLondon hospital of whose staff he was a particularlydistinguished member. In hurt dignity, he promptlytendered his resignation, only to be told by theBoard of Directors practically to forget it. And hehad to.

Why man, you see you can’t do that sort of thingany more! Yesterday, it is true, a woman physicianwas only a woman. To-day her title to herplace in her profession is as secure as yours is. Sevengreat London hospitals that never before permittedso much as a woman on their staff, now have womenresident physicians in charge. Five of them areentirely staffed by women. The British MedicalResearch Commission is employing over a score ofwomen for the highly scientific work of pathology.When one of those Scottish Women’s Hospitals onits way to Serbia was requisitioned for six weeks toassist the British army at Malta where the woundedwere coming in from Gallipoli, the authorities there,at length reluctantly obliged to let them go, decidedthat the Malta military hospitals in the future couldnot do without the woman doctor. They sent toLondon for sixty of her. And the War Office readingtheir report asked for eighty more for othermilitary hospitals. By January, 1915, professionalposts for women doctors were being offered at therate of four and five a day to the London School of[267]Medicine for Women, and they hadn’t graduatesenough to meet the demand!

Like that the nations have capitulated. Thewoman physician’s place in Europe to-day is anyplace she may desire. Russia, which before the war,would not permit a woman physician on the PetrogradBoard of Health because its duties were tooonerous and too high salaried for a woman, had by1915 mobilised for war service even all of herwomen medical students of the third and fourthyears. France has Dr. Marthe Francillon-Lobre,eminent gynecologist, commanding the military hospital,Ambulance Maurice de Rothschild in the Ruede Monceau, Paris. In Lyons the medecin-en-chefof the military hospital is Dr. Thyss-Monod whowas nursing a new baby when she assumed her militaryresponsibilities. Everywhere the woman doctorrejected of the War Office of yesterday is nowcounted one of her country’s most valuable assets.And so precious is she become to her own land, thatshe may not be permitted to leave for any other.“Over there” the governments of Europe have ceasedto issue passports to their women doctors.

You of the class of 1921, you go up and occupy.Medical associations will no longer bar you as inAmerica until the seventies and in England until thenineties. Salaried positions will not be denied you.Clinical and hospital opportunities will not be closedto you. You of to-day will no more be elbowed andjostled aside. You will not even be crowded outfrom anywhere. For there is room everywhere. Oh,[268]the horror and the anguish of it, room everywhere.And every day of the frightful world conflict theyare making more of it. Great Britain alone has sent10,000 medical men to the front. America, theysay, is sending 35,000.

Hurry, hurry, urges this the first profession inwhich the women’s battalions have actually arrivedas it hastily clears the way for you. The New YorkMedical College and Hospital for Women, not tobe outdone by any institution now bidding for women’sfavour, has rushed up an “emergency” plant,a new $200,000 building. The London School ofMedicine has erected a thirty thousand pound additionand the public appeal for the funds was signedby Premier Asquith himself. The nations to-day arewaiting for the women who shall come out from thecolleges equipped for medical service.

A PLACE IN EVERY PROFESSION

And after the most arduous profession of all, howabout the others? If a woman can be a doctor at abattle front, how long before she can be a doctorof divinity? At the City Temple in London on aSunday in March, 1917, a slender black robed figurepreceded an aged clergyman up the pulpit steps.With one hand resting on the cushioned Bible shestood silhouetted against the black hanging at theback of the pulpit, her face shining, illumined. Bythe time that the white surpliced choir had ceasedchanting “We have done those things that we oughtnot to have done,” the ushers were hanging in the[269]entrance corridor the great red lettered signs “Full.”

The house was packed to the last seat in the galleryto hear Miss Maude Royden, one of England’sleading suffragists, “preach.” This church is nearly300 years old and only once before, when Mrs. Boothof the Salvation Army was granted the privilege,has a woman ever spoken from its pulpit. Some sixmonths since, Maude Royden has now been appointedpulpit assistant at the City Temple, the firstwoman in England to hold such a position. Dr.Fort Newton, the pastor, in announcing the innovation,declared: “We want the woman point ofview, the woman insight and the woman counsel.”The City Temple is not an Episcopalian Church.But even the established church has recently heard anarchbishop cautiously pronounce the opinion that“we may invite our church women to a much largershare in the Christian service than has been usual.”You see there are 2000 English clergymen enrolledas chaplains at the front. Laywomen were lastyear permitted to make public addresses in the NationalMission of Repentance. They thus ascendedthe chancel steps. A committee of bishops andscholars—and one woman—has now been appointedto see how much farther women may be permittedto go on the way to the pulpit itself. A few ofthe smaller churches in America have a woman ministerin charge. But from the arduous duties of thehighest ecclesiastical positions women in all landsare still “protected.” High established places areof course the last to yield. Theology continues to[270]be the most closed profession. But Maude Roydenin the pulpit of the London City Temple, the highestecclesiastical place to which a woman anywherein the world has yet attained, has, we may say, capturedan important trench.

In the field of science the opposing forces areeven more steadily falling back before the advancingwoman movement. One of the most conservativebodies, the Royal Astronomical Society of England,has added a clause to its charter permittingwomen to become fellows. The Royal Institute ofBritish Architects has also decided to accept womenas fellows and in 1917 the Architectural Associationfor the first time opened its doors to women students.Germany even has several women architects employedin military service, among them PrincessVictoria of Bentheim. Russia, in 1916, admittedwomen to architecture and engineering.

Chemistry is distinctly calling women in all lands.Sheffield University, England, in 1916 announcedfor the first time courses in the metallurgical departmentfor training girls as steel chemists to replaceyoung men who have been “combed out” of Sheffield’slarge industrial works. Firms in Leeds,Bradford and South Wales are filling similar vacancieswith women. Bedford College of London Universityhad last year started a propaganda to induceyoung women to study chemistry. In 1916 therewere some twelve graduates in the chemical departmentand the college received applications from theindustrial world for no less than 100 women chemists.[271]So insistent was the demand that even WoolwichArsenal was willing to take a graduate without waitingfor her to get her degree. Women are wantedtoo in physics and bacteriology. A London Universitywoman has been appointed to a position at theNational Physical Laboratory at Teddington andthere were last year, at this one university, offers oftwenty positions for women physicists that could notbe filled. All over the world now, in trade journalsare beginning to appear advertisem*nts for womenchemists and physicists.

Even in the teaching profession there is the recordof new ground won. Women have of course beenlongest admitted to this the poorest paid profession,and in it they have been relegated to the poorest paidplaces. But now over in Europe, note that one-thirdof all the masters in the German upper highschools are enlisted in the army and with the consentof the Department of Education women are for thefirst time being appointed to these places, in someinstances even at the same salaries as were receivedby the men whom they replace. Russia had in thefirst year of the war opened the highest teaching positionsin that country to women, by a special act ofthe Duma providing that “their salaries shall equalthose of men in the same position.” Russia also in1915 had her first woman college professor, Mme.Ostrovskaia, occupying the chair of Russian historyat the University of Petrograd. In 1916 Mlle.Josephine Ioteyko, a celebrated Polish scientist, hadbeen invited to lecture at the College de France in[272]Paris. In 1917 Germany had its first woman professorof music, Fraulein Marie Bender, at the RoyalHigh School of Music in Charlottenburg. And inthe same year England had appointed its first womanto an open university chair, when Dr. Caroline Spurgeonwas made professor of English literature atBedford College.

In each country like this, where the opposing professionallines begin to show a weakened resistance,surely, sometimes silently, but irresistibly and inevitably,the new woman movement is taking possession.Next to medicine the legal profession, onemay say, is at present the scene of active operations.The woman movement in law, as in medicine, beganfor all the world in the United States. It was in1872 that one Mrs. Myra Bradwell of Chicagoknocked at the tight shut doors of the legal professionin the State of Illinois. Of course her requestwas refused. Public opinion blushed that a womanshould be guilty of such effrontery, and the learnedjudges of the court rebuked the ambitious lady withtheir finding that: “The natural and proper timiditywhich belongs to the female sex unfits it for manyof the occupations of civil life. And the harmonyof interests which belong to the family institutionis repugnant to the idea of a woman adopting a distinctand independent career from that of her husband.”Syracuse University, which gave to theworld the first woman physician, also graduatedBelva A. Lockwood, who in 1879 was the firstwoman to be permitted to practise law before theSupreme Court of the United States. Every Statebut Virginia has now admitted women to the practiceof law. There are something over 1000 womenlawyers in the United States. Their way in andtheir way up has been attended with the same difficultiesthat women encountered just about a generationahead of them in the medical profession. TheUniversity of Michigan was one of the first institutionsto admit women to its law school on the sameterms as men. The Women’s Law class at NewYork University was started in the nineties. Manylaw colleges, as Boston, Buffalo and Cornell, havesince opened their doors. It was in 1915 that HarvardUniversity announced the Cambridge LawSchool, the first graduate law school in America exclusivelyfor women, and the only graduate lawschool open to them in the East.

But opportunities for professional advancementfor women in law have been exceedingly limited.It is on the judge’s bench, in every land, that theirmasculine colleagues have most stubbornly refusedto move up and make room. So it is noteworthythat Georgiana P. Bullock was in 1916 made aJudge of the Woman’s Court in Los Angeles, thefirst tribunal of its kind in the world. A few womenhave been allowed a place as judges in the children’scourts. Catherine Waugh McCulloch of Chicago,who some years ago as justice of the peace was thefirst woman anywhere in the world to have arrivedat any judicial office, scored another victory in December,1917, when she was made a master in chancery,[274]the first woman to receive such an appointment.Litta Belle Hibben, deputy district attorney in LosAngeles in 1915, and Annette Abbot Adams, assistantUnited States district attorney in San Franciscoin the same year, were the first women to arrive atthese appointments. Helen P. McCormick, in 1917assistant district attorney in New York, is the firstwoman in the more conservative East to become apublic prosecutor. There is a reason for this advance.Could a woman really be accepted as anexpert in the interpretation of laws, so long as shewas permitted no share in making them? With thepressure of the woman movement at the gates ofgovernment resulting in enfranchisem*nt, thathandicap of civic inferiority is being removed.

Like this even in the United States farthest fromthe war zone, the rear guard of the women’s lines inthe legal profession are moving. At the front “overthere,” every country reports distinct progress.Even a deputation of Austrian women have been totheir department of state to demand admission tothe legal profession. In October, 1917, on a petitionfrom the German Association of Women Lawyers,the Prussian Ministry of Justice made the firstappointment of women in the Central Berlin lawcourts, three women having legally qualified thereas law clerks. In Russia directly after the revolutionone of the first reforms secured by the Ministerof Justice was the admission of women lawyers tothe privilege of conducting cases in court on equalterms with the men of the profession. The Italian[275]Parliament in 1917 passed a bill granting to womenin that country the right to practise law.

Specially significant is the legal situation in England,the land where Chrystabel Pankhurst, deniedthe opportunity to practise law, became instead asmashing suffragette. Now, see the vacant placesin the London law courts where day by day womenclerks are appearing with all of the duties, thoughnot yet the recognition, as solicitors. And the EnglishParliament at last is considering a bill whichshall permit women to be admitted to this branchof the legal profession in England. This bill reallyshould be known as Nancy Nettlefold’s bill. Theyear that Nancy Nettlefold arrived at her twenty-firstbirthday and was presented at court, CambridgeUniversity announced in June, 1912, that she hadtaken the law tripos, her place being between thefirst and second man in the first class honours list.And she at the time determined to make the winningof the legal profession her contribution to the woman’scause. With four other English women, whohave also passed brilliant law examinations, she hasfinanced and worked indefatigably in the campaignto that end. To-day they have that conservativeorgan of public opinion, the London Times, urgingin favour of their case: “Many prejudices againstwomen have been shattered in this war. And thereis no stronger theoretical case against the womanlawyer as such than against the woman doctor.”The bill permitting women to enter the Law Societyhas passed a second reading in the House of Lords,[276]Lord Buckmaster, its sponsor, declaring: “Thetrue sphere of a woman’s work ought to be measuredby the world’s need for her services and by her capacityto perform that work.”

And the world’s need presses steadily, inexorablyday by day. France had called 1500 men lawyersto the colours when the War Office sent a briefnotice to the bar association of Paris: “On accountof the absence of so many men at the front,” readthe summons, “women lawyers are wanted in theMinistry of War.” Women have been in the legalprofession in France since 1900. There are 52women lawyers in Paris. But their practice hasbeen limited largely to women clients. MadameMiropolsky has made a reputation as a divorce lawyer.Madame Maria Verone is the prominent barristerof the Children’s Court. A year ago I heardAvocat Suzanne Grinberg plead a case before atribunal which up to 1914 had never listened to awoman’s voice.

As she stood there in the ancient Palais de Justiceof Paris, her small, well formed head wound roundwith its black braid, her red lips framing with easyfacility the learned legal phrases, her expressivehands accentuating her points with eager gesture,her woman’s figure in the flowing legal robe of blackserge with the white muslin cravat, was outlinedagainst a thousand years of history. Eight soldierswith bayonets stood on guard at the rear of the room.The court whom she addressed was seven judges ofmilitary rank in splendid military uniform. And[277]her client was a soldier. This is the Conseil de laGuerre. See the epitage, the sash that falls fromSuzanne Grinberg’s left shoulder. It is edged withermine, the sign that she is entitled to plead beforethe Tribunal of War. It is the first time in the historyof the world, here in France, that women lawyershave been empowered to appear in militarycases. The Salle de Pas-Perdus, they call the greatcentral promenade at the Palais de Justice. Notethat these new women lawyers who wear the erminewalk in the Hall of Lost Footsteps! On the wallsof this court house in which Suzanne Grinbergpleads, you may read wreathed in the tricolours ofFrance, “Avocats à la Cour d’Appel de Paris Mortspour la Patrie,” and there follow 127 names.

Only the day before yesterday woman’s capacityfor the higher education to fit her for the professionswas in grave doubt. Vassar College once stood asthe farthest outpost of radical feminism, and Christianwomen were counselled by their clergymen notto send their daughters there. Even after the moralstigma of a college education had passed, the criticssaid that anyhow the female mind was not made tomaster science and Greek and mathematics. And itwas only about twenty years ago that Phi BetaKappa decided to risk the opening of its ranks tocollege women—of course provided that any of themshould be able to attain the high scholarship that itrequired. The female mind, you know!

Well, at the last Phi Beta Kappa council meeting,the secretary reported to that distinguished body that[278]in the elections of the past three years, women havecaptured in Phi Beta Kappa an aggregate of 1979places to 2202 for men. What shall the oldest collegefraternity do in the face of this feminine invasion?A letter on my desk says that the committeeon fraternity policy has been commissioned to takeunder advisem*nt this grave situation and report tothe council meeting of 1919! So the present PhiBeta Kappa record seems to dispose forever of theold tradition of the mental inferiority of the alwayschallenged sex.

Ladies, right this way for titles, please, one professionafter another takes up the call to-day. NewYork University at its opening last fall registered110 women in its law school, the largest numberever entered there. Already the American medicalwomen are called and coming. New York City hasrecently appointed women doctors for nearly everymunicipal institution. The first mobile hospitalunit of American women physicians with a hospitalof 100 beds, to be known as the Women’s OverseaHospital Unit, is now in France. It is backedfinancially by the National Women’s Suffrage Association.And it goes from that first original outpostof the professional woman’s cause, Elizabeth Blackwell’sNew York Infirmary for Women and Children.Meanwhile the entire Medical Women’s NationalAssociation is being organised for war serviceunder the direction of Dr. Rosalie S. Morton, whohas been made a member of the General MedicalBoard of the United States Government at Washington.[279]The American Women’s Hospitals arebeing formed for civilian relief at home and forservice with Pershing’s army. From the SurgeonGeneral’s headquarters in Washington the announcementis made: “There will be need for the warservice of every woman physician in the UnitedStates.”

And through the vast Salle de Pas-Perdus of theworld, the professional women are passing. TheLost Footsteps! O, the Lost Footsteps! Forwardthe advancing columns. Hush, there are ways thatare not our ways! On with the new woman movement,but with banners furled before the woe of aworld! For all the pæans of our victory aredrowned in the dirge of our grief.

At the Gates of Government

The man in khaki stood at the door. And heheld a woman close to his heart in mansion or cottage—ina rose bowered cottage on the Englishdowns, or red roofed behind the yellow walls ofFrance and Italy, or blue trimmed beside a lindentree in Germany, or ikon blessed in Russia. Allthat he had in the world, his estates, his fields or hisvineyards, his flocks or his factory, his shop or hisjob, his home and his children, he was leaving behind.“I leave them to you, dear,” he said.

The bugles blew. And he kissed her again.Then he went marching down the street in those fatefuldays of August, 1914, when all the world begangoing to war.

So in land after land she took up the trust andthe burden that the man who marched away hadleft her, to “carry on” civilisation. It was thewoman movement that was to be under the flags ofall nations. Ours too now flies behind the battlesmoke. A little while since and our men commencedto stand in khaki on our front porches, thenwent down the front walk to join the long brownlines passing along Main Street on their way to[281]France. At Washington they told us why it hadto be. “They were going,” the President himselfexplained, “to fight for Democracy, for the right ofthose who submit to authority, to have a voice intheir own government.” In the name of liberty, wetoo pass under the rod. But we fall in line to catchstep with the women’s battalions of the world. Weshall see them moving triumphantly even on thevery strongholds against which the woman’s causeof yesterday dashed itself most vainly.

The tasks of the world were one by one beinghanded over to women by men who were taking uparms instead. By solemn proclamation of churchand state, the patriotic duty of thus releasing everypossible citizen for military service was profoundlyimpressed on the women of every nation. Onlythere was still one function that no country wasasking them to assume. In England a thoughtfulwoman filling in her registration paper stating thenational service that she could render, wrote downher qualifications like this: “Possessed of a perfectlygood mentality and a University training,prepared to relieve a member of Parliament whowishes to go to the front.”

But the lady wasn’t called. Whole brigades ofwomen swung out across the threshold of the homeinto industry. Regiment after regiment went byinto commerce. Companies passed into the professions.Cohorts even crossed the danger zone forduty right up to the firing line. But governmentwas still reserved for men. Could a woman vote?[282]O, my lords, the legislative hall was not woman’splace!

Then the armies of Europe got into action. Evenas their primitive forefathers had done, the men ofthe modern world came together to put liberty tothe test of the sword. They fight for the freedomstheir leaders have formulated—and for anotherthey did not know and did not understand. A freedomthat was enunciated from Holloway jail andturbulently contested in London streets is also beingfought to a finish in front line trenches even alongthe Somme and the Aisne and the Yser.

Sergeant Jones of Company C of the 14th regimentof the Cold Stream Guards was a combatant.He was a British soldier bravely defending his flagagainst the Huns. And he found himself up againsta great deal more that his enemies also equally face,the most revolutionary force that the world has everknown in this Great War that is overturning thedestinies and opinions of individuals and the decreesof the social order as lightly and as easily as thedynasties of kings.

Sergeant Jones was bowled completely over. AGerman bullet hit him, and another and another.For weeks thereafter he was wandering on theborderlands of death. At length he was driftingback to earth in a roseate blur of warmth and softcomfort. Slowly his mind began to establish againthe realities of existence. The roseate blur straightenedaway and away from beneath his chin: it wasthe cherry red comforter that covered his bed at[283]Endell Street Hospital, London. Rip Van Winklehimself came back with no more wonderment. Thesergeant awoke, a soldier literally in the hands ofwomen.

He couldn’t so much as bathe his own face. Awoman in a white headdress, with a red cross in thecentre of her forehead, was doing it for him. Whenhe opened his eyes again, a girl orderly in a bluetunic was saying, “You can smoke if you want to.”And she began propping pillows softly about hisshoulders. There was a queer numb feeling alonghis side. He couldn’t find his right hand. “Nevermind,” the girl said hastily. She placed the cigarettebetween his lips and held the lighted match.He smoked and began to remember that he had goneover the top. He pulled gently again for his righthand. He tried to draw up his left leg. At theleast movement, somewhere outside the numb, tightbound area of him, there were answering stabs andtwinges of pain. He wanted to flick the ashes fromhis cigarette. As he turned his head and his lefthand found the tray on the little bedside stand, heglimpsed a long row of cherry red comforters thatundulated in irregular lines. From where he lay,he could see still, white faces, bandaged heads, anarm in a sling, a man in a convalescent uniformclumsily trying out crutches. The man in the verynext bed to his own lay moaning with face upturnedto the light, hollow, empty, staring sockets wherethe eyes had been. In the bed beyond was a manwith his face sewed up in an awful twisted seam[284]that was the writhing caricature of the agony thathad slashed it. A sickening sensation of nauseaswept over the sergeant. God in heaven, hethought, then how much was the matter with him?

A woman was coming down the room, pausingnow and then by the side of a cherry red comforter.By the waving mass of her red brown hair, she wasa woman, but not such as the sergeant had seenbefore. His mother wore a black dress and hiswife’s, he remembered, was a blue silk for Sundaysand at home, why he supposed it was calico beneaththeir gingham aprons. But this woman was inkhaki as surely as ever he had been.

Now she reached his bed. She stood lookingdown on him with an air of proprietorship, almostof possession. “How are you, this morning, SergeantJones?” she asked, with firm professionalfingers reaching authoritatively for the pulse in hisleft wrist. Without waiting for a reply, she wasproceeding calmly to turn back the covers. “Wehave a little work to do here, I think,” she said,gently grasping—could the sergeant be sure—itseemed to be his left leg. “The dressings, youknow,” she was saying easily.

“But, but, ’er—the doctor,” he gasped in protest.

“I am the doctor,” she answered.

Of the female of the species, Sergeant Jones ofcourse had heard. He had never before seen one.“I’ll be—” he started to say. But he wasn’t.Then he would have jerked away. But he couldn’t.“I want a doctor, a real one,” he blurted out angrily.

[285]

A shadow of a smile flickered for an instant inthe woman’s eyes. Often she had seen them likethis. “I am the surgeon in charge, the commandingmilitary officer here,” she replied evenly. “Afterawhile, I’m sure you won’t mind.”

She went quietly on unwinding him. He heardher scissors snip. She was going to take somestitches. Once or twice she had to hurt horribly.She did it with deft precision. With the same quickmotions, the sergeant had seen his wife at home rollout a pudding crust or flap a pancake. It was theconvincing sureness of the woman who knows herbusiness. Could a woman be a doctor, after all?The strips of linen had piled in a blood stained heapon the floor. With an effort the sergeant steadiedhis voice: “What is there left of me?” he asked.

The doctor smoothed his pillow first. “Sergeant,”she said very gently, “you have one perfectlygood arm. I think there will be one leg. Lastweek the other—” But the sergeant did not haveto hear the rest of the sentence. When he struggledback from somewhere in a black abyss, the handthat last week had held the surgeon’s knife wassoftly smoothing back the damp locks of hair fromhis cold forehead. She drew the cherry red comforterup and patted it about his shoulders with theinfinite sympathy that speaks in a woman’s touch.She leaned over him with a glance that signalledcourage and understanding. Then she left him tofight the fight he had to fight in the grim grey lightof that London day for his own readjustment to the[286]cruelty of existence. Was he glad that a womanwas a doctor? She had saved his life.

There were weeks of convalescence. The hospitallibrarian in khaki stopped beside his cherryred comforter. He turned his face to the wall.There was nothing she could do for him. But intime he came to watch for her on her rounds as hedid for the doctor. Finally he asked for books andmagazines and the papers. And the news of the daythat she brought him, flared with just two topics,War and Woman. The one was man’s universalactivity, the other was his Great Discovery. Youknow how pleased a boy is with a Christmas toy hefinds will go with some new unexpected action?Women were in all kinds of unprecedented action.

THE NEW WOMAN’S SLOGAN

The girl orderly in the blue tunic dressed SergeantJones one day for the convalescent soldiers’outing. A girl chauffeur of the Woman’s ReserveAmbulance Corps picked him up in her arms like achild and set him on the seat beside her and tookher place at the wheel. Could a woman drive a car?She shot hers in and out of the tangled maze of theLondon traffic as easily as a girl he had seen senda croquet ball through a wicket. Other carswhizzed by with women at the wheel. Great motorvans, with a woman on the high driver’s seat, swungsafely past. Fleets of motor busses came careeningalong with girl conductors in short skirts balancingjauntily in command on the rear platforms. The[287]bus marked “Woolwich Special” drew up at theHaymarket curb to take on a load of women munitionworkers going out for the night shift at thegreat arsenal. High on a ladder against a buildinghere in co*ckspur Street, two girl window cleanersstand at work in tunic and trousers. Girl footmenare opening the doors of carriages before the fashionableshops of Oxford Street. Girl operators arerunning the lifts. Girl messengers in governmentuniform are going in and out of Whitehall.

A kingdom is in the hands of its women. Roundand round the world has turned since yesterday.

Here in Trafalgar Square a crowd of a thousandpeople hang on the words that a woman is speaking.Jones had never heard Mrs. Pankhurst; he had forbiddenhis wife to when she came to their town.Rampant, women’s rights females were against thelaws of God and England. This, the arch conspiratorof them all, he pictured in his mind’s eye as permanentlyoccupied in burning country residences andbombing cathedrals and engaging in hand to handconflicts with the London police.

Now wouldn’t it take your breath away? Hereshe was doing nothing at all of the kind. A verywell gowned lady stood directly between the Britishlions, her slender figure outlined against the statueof Nelson. Her clear, ringing tones carried over thelistening throng to Jones and his comrades in theWomen’s Reserve Ambulance car. One small handfrequently came down into the palm of the other inthe emphatic gesture that in times past brought two[288]continents to attention. It is the hand that hurledthe stone that cracked the windows of houses of governmentaround the world.

To-day, as England’s most active recruiting agent,the greatest leader of the woman’s cause is callingmen to the colours to win the war. Had she oncea slogan, Votes for Women? ’Tis a phrase forgot.In the public squares of London since the war, hercountrymen have heard from Mrs. Pankhurst only“Work for Women.” Round and round, you see,the world has turned.

A puzzled Sergeant Jones asked the next day fora book about the woman movement. It was OliveSchreiner’s “Woman and Labour” the librarian inkhaki brought him. “But I wanted to know aboutthe suffragettes, the suffragettes. Did you ever hearof them?” he questioned. So Rip Van Winklemight have asked, I suppose, why, say, for womenwho once wore hoop skirts.

The woman beside the hospital bed smiled inscrutablyfor an instant. “Sergeant,” she said witha level glance, “I was one, a militant, Sergeant,”she added evenly. “And the doctor was in Hollowayjail, and your nurse. And the girl who droveyour car yesterday was a hunger striker and—”She stopped. The truce! By the pact that wassigned in Kingsway, the most radical suffragists inthe world, along with all the others, were war workersnow in their country’s cause and not their own.

The woman in khaki was still. Jones stared.She was dropping no bombs. Only the armies were[289]smashing. Nothing about here was broken but men—andwomen were mending them!

At length they had the sergeant patched up aswell as they could. He would never again work athis skilled trade. But they pinned a medal forvalour on his coat lapel. And they sent him back tohis wife in the north of England. The woman whomet him at the door fell on her knees: “My dear,my dear!” She gathered him from a wheel chairinto her arms with a sob. The man who had goneout in khaki was home again.

“Mustered out of the service,” his papers read.But his wife will never be!

Mustered out of service. So was the man withthe twisted face, who never again can smile. Andso was the man with the blinded eyes, whose littledaughter on sunny days leads him to the Green Parkwhere he sits on a bench and talks to the squirrels.Just so I have seen him sitting in the Gardens of theTuileries. Just so he sits in the Tiergarten by theside of the River Spree. He is going to be “re-educated”to keep chickens. And Sergeant Jones shalllearn basket weaving for a living! Oh, and thereare thousands of others!

After each great drive on the front, they are passingthrough the hospitals to the cottage rose boweredand red roofed, to the blue trimmed cottage and theikon blessed cottage. And now they are waited forin plain little white houses where a woman on thefront porch shades her eyes with her hand to lookdown Main Street as far as she can see. And it[290]isn’t the woman who can fall on her knees and gatherher burden to a hungry heart whose shoulders willbear the heaviest load. It is the woman whose armsare empty never again to be filled!

These are the women whom not even the peacetreaty will discharge from their “national service.”Every Great Push makes more of them. And therest must always watch fearfully, furtively lookingdown Main Street as the years of strife wear on.Who shall say whether she too may be conscriptedto “carry on” for life. For this is the way of warwith women.

Like this, the trust and the burden have restedheavier and heavier on woman’s heart and hands.Millions of men will never be able to lift it for heragain. No one knows when the others will. Menmust fight and women must work.

So many men are with the flag at the front. Somany men are under the crosses, the acres of crosseswith which battle fields are planted. So many menare in wheel chairs and on crutches. Women arecarrying on in the home, in industry, in commerceand in the professions. Then why not in the State?

Little by little, in every land, a voice began to beheard. It was the voice of the man with the flag,and the man with the twisted face, and the manwith the blinded eyes, and the voice of SergeantJones. It said what the sergeant said, when fromhis wheel chair by the window where his wife hadplaced it, he took his pen in hand and wrote back toEndell Street hospital: “Women are wonderful. I[291]didn’t know before. Now I wouldn’t be afraid foryou even to have the vote.”

And curiously enough, what the man in the wheelchair and the man in the Green Park and the Tuileriesand the man with the flag was saying, thenewspapers began to repeat as if it had been syndicatedround the world. The Matin had it in Paris,the Times in London and the Tageblatt in Berlin.You read it in all languages: “The women arewonderful. We didn’t know before.”

GREATEST DRIVE FOR DEMOCRACY

Then couldn’t a woman who could cast a shell,cast a vote? Parliaments trembled on the verge ofletting her try.

It wouldn’t be at all the difficult undertaking itused to look to those women of yesterday, whoseplace was in the home pouring afternoon tea or embroideringa flower in a piece of lace. Why, to-daythey would scarcely have to go out of their way atall to the polls! They could just stop in as easilyas not, as they went down the street to their day’swork in shop and office and factory. SergeantJones’s wife is out of the home now anyway fromsix o’clock in the morning until seven at night makingmunitions. Some one must support her family,you know. Well, all over the world a new callbegan. Simultaneously in every civilised land,through the crack in the window of the governmenthouse where man gathered with his fellow man, youcould hear it. In some lands yet it is only a murmur[292]of dissent. But in many lands now it is a risingchorus of consent: “Women wanted in the counselsof the nation!”

At the gates of government, the new womanmovement has arrived. And not through the brokenwindow is it entering in. Without benefit of evena riot, suffrage walking very softly and sedately isgoing through an open door. In England, a gentlemanholds it ajar, a gentleman suave and smilingand bowing the ladies to pass!

Democracy, the right of those who submit to authorityto have a voice in their own government, isbreaking through apparently on all the fronts atonce. It is a most remarkable coincidence. InAugust, 1917, Parliament in England removed the“grille,” the brass lattice barring the ladies’ galleryin the House of Commons and symbolising what hadbeen the English woman’s position. The Times,commenting on the proceeding, characterised it as a“domestic revolution.” In the same month in India5000 Hindus were applauding Shimrati PanditaLejjawati who at Jullundur had come out on a publicplatform to urge that her country abolish purdah!

But the great drive for Democracy that nowthrills around the world at the International SuffrageAlliance headquarters, began unmistakably inBritain. Mrs. Pankhurst in the old days neverstaged a raid on the houses of Parliament more spectacularly.Just see the gentleman bowing at theopen door! It is Mr. Asquith, the former leaderwho for years held the Parliamentary line against[293]all woman’s progress. And smiling right over hisshoulder stands Mr. Lloyd George, the presentpremier. Oh, well! The girl in the green sweaterwho horsewhipped one member of Parliament, at theBrighton races, is driving a Red Cross ambulance inFlanders. The quiet little woman in a grey coat,who fired the country house of another in 1912, isrolling lint bandages. Sergeant Jones’s wife has becomea bread winner. Soldiers are not afraid forwomen to vote. And cabinet ministers take courage!

There is a town in the north of England with amonument erected to a shipwrecked crew: “Inmemory of 17 souls and 3 women,” says the marbletestimonial. That categorical classification to whichthe English ivy clings is about to be changed. Sixmillion English women are about to be made people![3]

[3] Bill passed by House of Lords and received King’ssanction, Feb. 6, 1918.

At the outbreak of hostilities, politicians the worldover hastened to declare woman’s suffrage a “controversial”question that must be put aside during thewar. And every government engaged said to itssuffragists: “We’re in so much trouble, for heaven’ssake don’t you make us any more.”

“Well, we won’t,” the women agreed, as the organisationsin land after land called off their politicalcampaigns. It was for his sake—the man inkhaki. And in every land, the trained women ofthe suffrage societies assembled their countrywomen[294]to stand ready with first aid for him. Day by day,week after week, now year after year, they have beenfeeding the nation’s defenders, clothing them, nursingthem, passing up ammunition to them. To-daythere isn’t an army that could hold the field but forthe women behind the men behind the guns.

In England Mrs. Millicent Garrett Fawcett, presidentof the National Union of Women’s SuffrageSocieties, had been a member of the committee thatin 1866 sent up to Parliament the first petition forthe enfranchisem*nt of women. She had been a girlof twenty then. It was a cause, you see, to whichshe had given a lifetime, that she now laid aside.With the summons, “Let us show ourselves worthyof citizenship,” she turned 500 women’s societiesfrom suffrage propaganda and Parliamentary petitioningto hospital and relief work.

But it was when Mrs. Pankhurst, the dramaticleader of the Woman’s Social and Political Unionwho had first smashed suffrage into the front pageof the newspapers of all nations, lay down her armsto give her country’s claims precedence above herown, that the world realised that there was a newformation in the lines of the woman movement.

Emmeline Pankhurst was on parole from Hollowayjail recuperating from a hunger strike, whenthere came to her from her government the overturesfor a peace parley. When the authorities offeredher release for all of the suffragettes in prison andamnesty for those under sentence, she ran up theUnion Jack where her suffrage flag had been. In[295]no uncertain terms she announced in Kingsway, “Iwho have been against the government, am now forit. Our country’s war shall be our war.”

For a minute after that proclamation, you couldhave heard a pin drop in the great assembly hall ofthe smashing suffragettes. Then in a burst of applauseshe had them with her: they would followtheir leader. Some few at first drew back in consternation.Had their late leader lost her mind?The girl in the green sweater looked dazed: “I wasin the front ranks of her body guard when westormed Buckingham Palace,” she murmured. Avery few were angry: “She’s selling out the cause,”they exclaimed bitterly.

But she wasn’t. The greatest little field marshalthe woman movement has ever known, was leadingit to final victory.

When Kitchener announced, “We shall not beable to win this war until women are doing nearlyeverything that men have done,” it was the womanwho had organised raids on Parliament who noworganised the woman labour of a nation. On theday that she led 40,000 women down the Strand toman the factories of England and turned Lincoln’sInn House, her headquarters in Kingsway, into amunitions employment bureau, opponents of thewoman’s cause the world over began an orderly retirementfrom their front line trenches. The nextmorning the London Post announced: “We standon the threshold of a new age.”

We do. You see, you could not have practically[296]the men of all nations in arms for Democracy withouttheir finding it. And some of them who buckledon their armour to go far crusading for it, are comingto the conviction that there is also Democracy tobe done at home. When the history of these daysat length is written, it will come to be recorded thatthe right of women to have a voice in the governmentto whose authority they submit, was practicallyassured by the events of 1917.

In that year, the women who came to petition theEnglish Parliament for citizenship, got what theyhad for fifty years been asking in vain. For thewomen who with Mrs. Pankhurst and Mrs. Fawcettand Mrs. Despard of the Women’s Freedom Leaguenow stood at the gates of government were: womenshell makers and howitzer makers, pit brow lassies,chain makers, textile workers, railway engine cleaners,women motor lorry drivers in khaki, women lettercarriers, women window cleaners, women busconductors, women engineers, women clerks, womenin the civil service, women tailors, women bakers,women bookbinders, women teachers, women armynurses, women army doctors, women dentists, womenchemists, and women farm labourers. Among themwas the wife of the man with the twisted face andthe wife of the man with the blinded eyes and thewife of Sergeant Jones.

The capitulation of the English Government wasassured in the recantations of its greatest men. Ex-premierHerbert H. Asquith spoke first: “I myself,”he declared, “as I believe many others, no[297]longer regard the woman suffrage question from thestandpoint we occupied before the war.... I havesaid that women should work out their own salvation.They have done it. The woman’s cause inEngland now presents an unanswerable case.”

Mr. Lloyd George agreed: “The place ofwoman,” he said, “is altered for good and all. Itwould be an outrage not to give her the vote. Thefurther parliamentary action now involved may beregarded as a formality.”

General French, former commander of the Britisharmies, the brother of Mrs. Despard and of Mrs.Harley who died at the front, crossed the Channelto announce his conversion to the woman’s causethrough “the heroism, the endurance and the organisingability of the women on the battlefields ofFrance and Belgium.”

The press of the country burst into print with anew confession of faith. The Observer declared:“In the past we have opposed the claim on oneground and one ground alone—namely, that womanby the fact of her sex was debarred from bearing ashare in national defence. We were wrong.”The Daily Mail: “The old argument against givingwomen the franchise was that they were uselessin war. But we have found out that we could notcarry on the war without them.” The EveningNews: “In the home woman has long been a partner—notalways in name, perhaps, but generally inpractice. Now she is a partner in our national effort.And if she demands a partner’s voice in the[298]concerns of the firm, who shall say her Nay?” TheNorthern Daily Telegraph: “The duties of citizenshipare fulfilled by women to the uttermost. Thecontinuance of the sex disqualification would be acruel crime and a blind folly as well.” The Referee:“Women have earned a right to be heard inthe nation’s councils. The part they have played inwinning the war is their victory.”

Like this, the cause that yesterday was rejectedand most bitterly assailed of men was now championedby the nation. This was a kingdom sayingVotes for Women. Field Marshal Pankhurstwould never again have to. Her war-time strategyhad won. When Mr. Asquith rose in the House ofCommons himself to move the woman’s suffrage resolution,it had ceased to be a “controversial” question.The measure was passed by an overwhelming majority.

RECORD YEAR FOR SUFFRAGE CAUSE

The domestic reform that was begun in Englandhas echoed round the world. See that which hadcome to pass in 1917: Four other nations, France,Italy, Hungary and the United States had suffragemeasures before their parliaments. Members of theReichstag were warning that Germany cannot avoidit if she would keep up in efficiency with the rest ofthe world. King Albert announced that it shouldbe one of his first acts for a restored Belgium to confercitizenship on its women. Holland and Canadahave just accomplished it in limited measure. Russia[299]and Mexico in the throes of revolution have actuallyachieved it. Women have for the first timetaken their seats in the governing bodies of threenations, Hermila Galindo in the Congress of Mexico,Mrs. McKinney and Lieutenant Roberta CatherineMcAdams in Canada and Jeanette Rankin in theUnited States. A woman, the Countess SophiaPanin, has been a cabinet minister in Russia. Andfor the first time since civilisation began, a woman,Dr. Poliksena Schiskina Yavein, as a member of theCouncil of 61 at Petrograd, has assisted in writinga nation’s constitution.

On with Democracy! Nations are convinced thatthose who serve their country should have a voice indirecting its destinies. Land after land preparing toextend its franchise for soldiers, as England with herRepresentation of the People Bill, is reflecting on areal representation. For every country is findingitself face to face with the question with whichAsquith first startled Britain, “Then what are yougoing to do with the women?” Everywhere at thegates of government are deputations like that inEngland who are saying, “We also serve who standbehind the armies. We too want to be people.”

And some one else wants them to be. From thetraining camps to the trenches, the supporting columnof the man in khaki stretches. Every knittedsweater, every package of cigarettes tied with yellowribbon has been helping votes for women. And nowover there he is getting anxious about his job or hishome or his children. What can he know at the[300]front about food control or the regulation of schoolhours in Paris or London or New York? And whenthere are decisions like that to be made, “I’d like toleave it to Her,” the soldier is beginning to conclude.Why, war-time is the time for women to be free!The whole world is athrill with the new ideal.

See the lines of women arriving before the governmenthouses. Theresa Labriola voices the demandof the National Federation in Italy:“Women,” she says, “form the inner lines of defencefor the nations. We need the ballot to make ourlines strong.” Yes, yes, agrees her country. Youshall begin right away with the municipal franchise.And Premier Boselli and the Italian Parliament areproceeding to get it ready.

In France, Mme. Dewitt Schlumberger and Mme.Charles LeVerrier for the Union Française pour leSuffrage des Femmes, present the “unanswerablecase.” The senate on the Seine, looking out, seesmany women wearing long crêpe veils in the delegationbefore its doors. “Let us give them,” says amember of the Chamber of Deputies in a burst ofpoetic chivalry, “the suffrage de la morte: every soldierdying on the battle field shall be permittedto designate the woman relative he wishes to havecarry on his citizenship for him.” Very gently thewomen of France declined the suffrage of the dead.Presenting a carefully prepared brief that was thereview of their war work, they said, “We can votefor ourselves, please.” And who else shall?There are whole communes with most of the men[301]dead. There are villages with not so much as a manto be made mayor, and a woman filling the office instead.The French Chamber of Deputies has beforeit a bill to confer the municipal franchise onwomen. “It is an act of justice,” says ex-PremierViviani. The Droit du Peuple declares, “After thewar, many homes will be maintained by women whowill perform men’s tasks and fulfil men’s obligations.They ought to have men’s rights.”

Canada, too, thought to reward her women witha vicarious vote. The “next of kin” franchise wasdevised, by which the Government has conferred onthe wife or widow, mother, sisters and daughters ofmen in the service the right to vote. But the delegationsof women outside the government house atOttawa do not go away. They still wait. “Wealso serve,” they repeat. And the country, in whichno less than five provinces last year gave to all oftheir women full citizenship, has promised now toprepare the full direct federal franchise.

In Mittel Europa, Rosika Schwimmer is marshallingthe feminist forces. Under her leadership, agreat deputation has marched to the Town Hall inBudapest. The resolution there presented for universalsuffrage was carried by the Burgomaster tothe Emperor. In reply, the Hungarian FeministUnion has received the assurance of the prime ministerthat the Government will introduce a measureextending the franchise to a limited class of women.At Prague, Austria, the Town Council has appointeda committee to draw up a new local government[302]franchise which shall include women. The freetown of Hamburg, Germany, preparing to enlargeits franchise in recognition of the self-sacrifice of soldiers,hears the voice of Helene Lange and 27,000women. They are reminding the Hamburg Senatethat women, too, who have borne the burdens of war,will wish to devote themselves to reconstruction andin order to fulfil the duties of citizens, they claimcitizens’ rights. The Prussian Diet has before itthe petition of Frau Minna Cauer and the Frauenstimmrechtsbundurging that suffrage for women beincluded in the projected franchise reform. TheReichstag arranging a Representation of the PeopleBill has at last referred the petition of the Reichverbund,the German National Union for WomanSuffrage, “for consideration” zur kenntnisnahme,which is the first indication of their change of attitudebefore the women’s offensive. The Socialists inthe Reichstag are urging: “Women suffrage ismarching triumphantly through other lands. CanGermany afford to fall behind the other nations, withher women less fully equipped than the rest for thestruggle for existence?” Meanwhile, Germany, asother countries, is depending more and more uponher women. Two leading cities, Berlin and Frankfort-on-Main,both have women appointed to theirmunicipal committees. Frau Hedwig Heyl, thatwoman behind the food control policy for theEmpire, who has turned her great chemical factoryon the Salzufer to canning meat for the army, says:“Woman suffrage in Germany is a fruit not yet ripe[303]for the picking. I water the tree,” she adds significantly.

Holland has seen in The Hague 4,000 women assembledin the Binnehof, the public square beforethe House of Parliament. On their behalf, Dr.Aletta Jacobs, president of the VereenigingvoorVronwenkeisrecht, presented to Premier Cort Vander Linden a petition with 164,696 signatures, askingfor citizenship for women. “Society,” Dr. Jacobstold him, “can only gain when the forces and energyof its women, now concentrated on the struggle forthe vote, can be used along with men’s in findinga solution for the many social problems for whichthe insight of both is necessary.” And the DutchParliament, making over its Constitution to enlargethe franchise for men, decided on the amazing planabout women, “We will try them first, as membersof Parliament. And if we find they can make thelaws, afterward we shall let them vote for lawmakers.” So the new Dutch constitution gives towomen the “passive” franchise, which is the right tohold all administrative offices, including representationin Parliament. There is also removed an oldprohibitory clause, so that the way is now clear forthe introduction of a measure for the “active” franchisefor women—if it is found the dinner doesn’tburn while they are sitting in Parliament.

A South African Party Congress, for the first timeit has ever listened to women, has received a delegationwho urge: “Half the population of the countryis composed of women. Can you any longer[304]afford to do without our point of view in yournational deliberations?” The Grand Council ofSwitzerland is considering a bill which is before it,proposing to give women the franchise in communalaffairs. Mexico is struggling toward national freedomwith her women at the side of her men. Itwas not even considered necessary to incorporate inthe new constitution the woman suffrage provisionsuggested by Hermila Galindo at the national convention.The new Mexican Federal constitutionstates explicitly that “Voters are those Mexicans whoare 21 if unmarried and over 18 if married and possessedof an honest means of livelihood.” Andunder this constitution, in the March, 1917, elections,Mexican women quietly voted as a matter ofcourse along with the other citizens.

In all of Russia’s turbulent revolutionary unrest,none of the divers parties struggling for supremacythere, denies the claim of half the race to the freedomwhich it is hoped ultimately to establish. TheProvisional government’s first announcement was foruniversal suffrage. But the Russian women weren’tgoing to take any chance. They remembered aFrench revolution that also proclaimed “universal”suffrage and has not yet done anything of the kind.The Russian League for the Defence of Women’sRights said, “Let’s be certain about this. We wantour calling to citizenship made sure.” So Dr. SchiskinaYavein, the president of the League, led 45,000women to the Imperial Duma in Petrograd. As[305]their spokesman she told the government: “At thistime of national crisis we should have no confusionof terms. Without the participation of women, nofranchise can be universal. We have come for anofficial declaration concerning the abolition of alllimitations with regard to women. We demand aclear and definite answer to two questions: Arewomen to have votes in Russia? And are womento have a voice in the Constituent Assembly whichonly in that case can represent the will of the people?We are here to remain until we receive the answer.”

Well, the answer came. It was an unconditionalaffirmative, received in turn from the men who cameout from the government house to reply to the waitingwomen: M. V. Rodzianko, president of the ImperialDuma; N. S. Tchkeidze, president of theCouncil of Workingmen’s and Soldiers’ Deputies,and Prince Lvoff, president of the Council of Ministers.And when the preliminary parliament of theRussian Republic was opened at Petrograd in October,1917, the chair was offered to Madame Breshkovsky,the celebrated “Little Grandmother” of theRussian Revolutionaries, as the senior member ofthe council.

In New York City on election night of November,1917, the newsboys shrilled out a new cry, “Thewimmin win!” “The wimmin win!” It was like avictory at Verdun or the Somme. The cablesthrobbed with the news that New York State, wherethe woman movement for all the world began ninetyyears before, had made its over three million womenpeople. It is now only a question of time when all[306]other American women will be. New York Statecarries with it almost as many electoral votes as allof the 17 previous States combined, which have conferredon women the Presidential franchise. Thestrongest fortress of the opposition is fallen. AndPresident Wilson has already recommended womensuffrage to the rest of the States as a war measurefor immediate consideration.

It was from the hand of Susan B. Anthony thatthe torch of freedom was received by every leader ofthe woman movement now carrying it. On hergrave at Rochester, N. Y., we have already laid thevictory wreath. For Democracy, the right of womento have a voice in the government to whose authoritythey submit, is about to be established in the earth!

“One thing that emerges from this war, I feelabsolutely convinced,” (it is Mr. Lloyd George,Premier of England, who is speaking in a public address),“is the conviction that women must be admittedto a complete partnership in the governmentof nations. And when they are so admitted, I ammore firmly rooted than ever in the confident hopethat they will help to insure the peace of nationsand to prevent the repetition of this terrible conditionof things which we are now deploring. Ifwomen by their enfranchisem*nt save the world onewar, they will have justified their vote before Godand man.”

There is a story that the anti-suffragists started.But it’s our best suffrage propaganda now. Afarmer’s wife in Maine, who had cooked the meals[307]and swept the house, and washed the children andsent them to school, and hoed the garden and fedthe chickens, and worked all the afternoon in thehayfield, and was now on her way to the barn tofinish her day’s work with the milking, was accostedby an earnest agitator, who asked her if she didn’twant the vote. But the farmer’s wife shook herhead: “No,” she answered, “if there’s any one littlething the men can be trusted to do alone, forheaven’s sake, let ’em!”

But is there? From the rose bowered cottage, thecottage red roofed and the blue trimmed cottage andthe ikon blessed cottage, and the plain little whitehouse somewhere off Main Street, there is a rising tothe question.

Lest we forget, this war was made in the landwhere woman’s place was in the kitchen!

And the mere housewifely mind asks, Could confusionbe anywhere worse confounded than in thegovernment houses of the world to-day?

Hark! You cannot fail to hear it! The cry ofthe nations is now sharp and clear. It is the cry oftheir distress: “Women wanted in the counsels ofstate.”

The Rising Value Of a Baby

You unto whom a child is born to-day, unto youis this written. I bring you glad tidings. Blessedare you among the nations of the earth. Wise menall over the world are hurrying to bring you gifts.Only lift your eyes from the baby at your breastand in your mirror I am sure you shall see the shiningaureole about your head. Exalted are you, O,woman among all people. Know that you have becomea Most Important Person. Governments aregetting ready to give your job a priority it never hadbefore. For you, why you are the maker of men!

The particular commodity that you furnish hasbeen alarmingly diminished of late. It is clear whathas happened with the present world shortage ofsugar: we pay 11c and 16c a pound where once wepaid four. The world shortage in coal has increasedits cost in certain localities almost to that of a preciousmetal, so that in Paris within the year it has soldfor $80 a ton. It is just as the political economistshave always told us, that the law of supply and demandfixes prices. That which becomes scarce isalready made dear.

Thus is explained quite simply over the world to-daythe rising value of a baby. Civilisation is running[309]short in the supply of men. We don’t knowexactly how short. There are the Red Cross returnsthat say in the first six months alone of the warthere were 2,146,000 men killed in battle and 1,150,000more seriously wounded. Figures, however, ofcold statistics, as always, may be challenged. Thereis a living figure that may not be. See the woman inblack all over Europe and to-morrow we shall meether in Broadway. There are so many of her in everybelligerent land over there that her crêpe veil fluttersacross her country’s flag like the smoke that dims thelandscape in a factory town. It is the mourningemblem of her grief unmistakably symbolising thedark catastrophe of civilisation that has signalledParliaments to assemble in important session.Population is being killed off at such an appallingrate at the front that the means for replacing itbehind the lines must be speeded up without delay.To-day registrar generals in every land in white-facedpanic are scanning the figures of the birth ratesthat continue to show steadily diminishing returns.And in every house of government in the world,above all the debates on aeroplanes and submarinesand shipping and shells, there is the rising alarm ofanother demand. Fill the cradles! In the defenceof the state men bear arms. It is women who mustbear the armies.

Whole battalions of babies have been called for.If we in America have had no requisitions as yet, itis because we have not yet begun to count our casualtycosts. L’Alliance Nationale pour L’Accroissem*nt[310]de la Population Française is calling on theFrench mothers for at least four children apiece duringthe next decade. Britain’s Birth Rate Commissionwants a million new babies from Scotlandalone. The Gesellschaft fur Bevolkerungs Politik,which is the society for increase of population organisedat a great meeting in the Prussian Diet House,has entered its order with the German women for amillion more babies annually for the next ten years.And that is the “birth politics” of men.

Then to the proposals of savants and scientists,sociologists and statesmen, military men and clergymenand kings, there has been entered a demurrer.Governments may propose, Increase and multiply.She-who-shall-dispose overlays their falling birthrate figures with the rising death rate statistics.And there is tragedy in her eyes: “What,” she asks,“have you done with my children? The babies thatI have given you, you have wasted them so!”

Is it not true? Even now along with the war’s destructionof life on the most colossal scale known tohistory, children throughout the world are dying ata rate that equals the military losses. In England ahundred thousand babies under one year of age anda hundred thousand more that do not succeed ingetting born are lost annually. In America our infantmortality is 300,000 a year. In Germany it ishalf a million babies who die annually. The economicsof the situation to a woman is not obscure.Conservation of the children we already have, is theadvice of the real specialist in repopulation. One[311]other suggestion she contributes. She has made itpractically unanimously in all lands. In the PrussianDiet House it was one speaking with authorityas the mother of eight who interpolated: “MeineHerren, if you would induce women to bring morechildren into the world you must make life easierfor mothers.” “Messieurs, Messieurs,” called theUnion Française pour le Suffrage des Femmes to theSociété pour la Vie with its curious proposal ofmoney grants in reward to fathers of large families,“to get children, you must cultivate mothers!”“Gentlemen,” declared the duch*ess of Marlboroughat a great public meeting on race renewal held in theGuild Hall, London, “care of the nation’s motherhoodis the war measure that will safeguard thefuture of the state.”

These amendments in birth politics offered on behalfof the Most Important Person have been practicallyadopted the world over. Chancellors of theExchequer are everywhere busy writing off expendituresfrom the taxes running into millions, in supportof nation-wide campaigns for the conservation of thechild. Maternity from now on in every land takesthe status of a protected industry. Britain is readyto devote two and one-half million dollars a year toschools for mothers. France has voted a “wards of thenation” bill, to provide for the care of 700,000 warorphans, at a cost to the state which it is estimatedwill mean an outlay of two hundred million dollars.Public provisions for motherhood and infancy areproceeding apace with provisions for the armies. If[312]you are going to have a baby in Nottingham, England,a public health visitor comes round to see thatyou are perfectly comfortable and quite all right.And the municipality that is thus anxiously watchingover your welfare solicitously inquires through aprinted blank on which the reply is to be recorded,“Have you two nightgowns?” In Berlin large signsat the subway and elevated stations direct you toinstitutions where rates are moderate, or even theKaiser himself will be glad to pay the bill. Similarfacilities are offered by the government of France inthe “Guide des Services Gratuits Protegeant laMaternite,” with which the walls of Paris are placarded.Even the war baby, whose cry for attentionnot all the ecclesiastical councils and the militarytribunals commanding “Hush” has been able tostill, at last is too valuable to be lost. And everyParliament has arranged to extend the nation’s protectionon practically equal terms to all children, notexcluding those we have called “illegitimate,” becausesomebody before them has broken a law.

FINANCING MATERNITY

You see, yesterday only a mother counted herjewels. To-day states count them too. Even JimmieSmith in, we will say, England, who beforethe war might have been regarded as among theleast of these little ones, has become the object ofhis country’s concern. Jimmie came screaming intothis troublous world in a borough of London’s EastEnd, where there were already so many people that[313]you didn’t seem to miss Jimmie’s father and some ofthe others who had gone to the war. Jimmie belongsto one of those 300,000 London families whoare obliged to live in one and two room tenements.Five or six, perhaps it was five, little previousbrothers and sisters waited on the stair landing outsidethe door until the midwife in attendance usheredthem in to welcome the new arrival. Now Jimmieis the stuff from which soldiers are made, either soldiersof war or soldiers of industry. And howeveryou look at the future, his country’s going to needJimmie. He is entered in the great new ledgerwhich has been opened by his government. TheNotification of Births Act, completed by Parliamentin 1915, definitely put the British baby on a businessbasis. Every child must now, within thirty-sixhours of its advent, be listed by the local healthauthorities. Jimmie was.

And he was thereby automatically linked up withthe great national child saving campaign. Sincethen, so much as a fly in his milk is a matter of solicitudeto the borough council. If he sneezes, it’s heardin Westminster. And it’s at least worried aboutthere. Though all the King’s councillors and allthe King’s men don’t yet quite know what they’reto do with the many problems of infancy and complicationsof pregnancy with which they are confronted,now that these are matters for state attention.

A first and most natural conclusion that theyreached, as equally has been the case in other lands,[314]was that the illness of babies was due to the ignoranceof mothers. Well, some of it is. And that hasproven a very good place to begin. For every oneelse, from a plumber to a professor, there has alwaysbeen training. Only a mother was supposed to findout how by herself. Now she no longer has to.The registration of Jimmie’s birth itself brought theHealth Visitor, detailed from the public health departmentof the borough, for her first municipal callon his mother. She found Mrs. Smith up and tryingto make gruel for herself. After serious expostulation,the maternity patient was induced to return tobed, where she belonged. Gruel, the white-facedwoman who sank back on the pillow insisted, waseasy. Why, probably she should not have mindedit at all. Only that day before yesterday she hadgotten up to do a bit of wash and had fainted at thetub. She hadn’t seemed to be just right since.Neither had the baby.

The visitor leaned across the bed and removed a“pacifier” from the baby’s mouth. “But he has tohave it,” said the mother, “he cries so much. Allmy children had it.” Looking round at them, thevisitor saw that it was true. Each exhibited someform of the facial malformation that substantiatedthe statement. And one was deaf from the adenoidgrowth. And one was not quite bright.This was, of course, no time for a medical lecturebeyond Mrs. Smith’s comprehension. But the effortwas made to impress her with the simple statementof fact that a pacifier really was harmful for a[315]child. There were inquiries about the baby’s feeding.No, of course, it was not being done scientifically.Well, the mother was told, if he were fedat regular intervals he would be in better conditionnot to cry all the time. And of course she herselfmust not get tired. It was Mrs. Smith’s first introductionto the practice of mothercraft as an art. Atthe school for mothers recently opened in the nextsquare, where the Health Visitor had her enrolledwithin a month, her regular instruction began.

The schools for mothers are now being establishedas rapidly as possible throughout the country. It isnot an absolutely new enterprise. The first one inEngland, from which all the others are being copied,had been started in London by an American womanwho had married an Englishman, Mrs. Alys Russell,a graduate of Bryn Mawr. Women recognised atonce the value of the plan. It was only a questionof popularising and paying for it. This the war hasaccomplished. Government will now defray 50 percent. of the cost of a school under the operation ofeither voluntary agencies or borough authorities.Already 800 schools have been opened. Some ofthe most successful are at Birmingham, Sheffield andGlasgow, under municipal direction. Parliament,you see, by financing it has established the school formothers as a national institution.

The “infant consultation” is the feature aboutwhich its activities centre. Jimmie was taken regularlyfor the doctor’s inspection and advice and thereis on file there at the school a comprehensive[316]record in which is entered every fact of his familyhistory and environment and his own physical condition,with the phenomena of its changes from weekto week. The weekly weighing indicated very accuratelyhis progress. And the week that his wearymother’s milk failed, the scales reported it. Themodified milk was carefully prescribed but the nextweek’s weighing indicated that Mrs. Smith wasn’tgetting the ingredients together right. The HealthVisitor was assigned to go home with her and showher just how. Like that, Jimmie was constantlysupervised. When the doctor at the consultation,tapping the little distended abdomen with skilledfingers, announced, “This baby is troubled withcolic,” Mrs. Smith said he had been having it a gooddeal lately. Well, a little questioning corrected thedifficulty. The trouble was pickles, and he neverhad them after that. Also he never had the summercomplaint, which the former Smith babies always hadin September.

You see, there is no proper cupboard at Jimmie’shouse. There is only the recess beside the chimney,and flies come straight from the manure heap at theback of the house to the milk pitcher on the shelf.Mrs. Smith didn’t know that flies mattered. Sheknows now, and at the school she has learned thatyou protect the baby from summer complaint bycovering the pitcher with a muslin cloth. She alsohas learned how to make the most ingenious cradlethat ever was contrived. It’s constructed from abanana box, but it perfectly well serves the purpose[317]for which it was designed. That Jimmie shouldsleep alone, is one of the primary directions at theschool. Of course, it is clear that this is hygienicallyadvisable, and there is another reason: these crowdedLondon areas are so crowded that even the one bedthe family usually possesses is also overcrowded.With some five other children occupying it withtheir mother, there was danger that Jimmie wouldsome night be smothered. “Overlaying,” as it iscalled, is the reason assigned in the death certificatefor the loss of a good many London babies.

BETTER BABIES ARE PRODUCED

Jimmie in his banana cradle slept better than anyof the other babies had. He had a little more air.Also he was cleaner than the others, because hismother had learned that dirt and disease germs aredangerous. But it is not easy, you should know, tokeep children clean where every pint of water youwash them in must be carried up stairs from the tapon the first floor and down stairs again to the drain.A frequent bath all around in the one stewpan thatperforce must serve for the purpose is out of thequestion. But there was a real wash basin nowamong the new household furnishings that Mrs.Smith was gradually acquiring. There are so manythings that one goes without when one’s husband isan ordinary labourer at the limit line of 18s. a week.But when he becomes a soldier and you get yourregular separation allowance from the government,you begin to rise in the social scale. Mrs. Smith,[318]like so many others of the English working classwomen, now during the war was “getting on herfeet.” And some of the improvement in family lifewas certainly registering in that chart card at theschool consultation that recorded Jimmie’s progress.

When his father, home from Flanders on furlough,held him on his knee, it was a better baby than hehad ever held there before. For one thing it was aheavier baby: children in this district used to averagethirteen pounds at one year of age. And now thosewhose attendance at the consultations is regularaverage sixteen and seventy-five hundredths pounds.Also Jimmie was a healthier baby. He hadn’trickets, like the first baby, who had suffered frommalnutrition. What could you do when there was apint of milk a day for the family and the baby had“what was left”? He hadn’t tuberculous joints,like the second baby. He hadn’t died of summercomplaint, like the third and the fifth babies. Andhe hadn’t had convulsions, like the seventh baby,who had been born blind and who fortunately haddied too. Yes, when one counts them up, there havebeen a good many, and if some hadn’t died, wherewould Mrs. Smith have put them all? The six thatthere are, seem quite to fill two rooms and the onebed.

Still in the course of time there was going to beanother baby. Governments crying, “Fill thecradles,” seem not to see those that are already spillingover. But the development of birth politics hasat last arrived at an important epoch—important to[319]all the women in the world—in the recognition ofthe economic valuation of maternity. It has dashedacquiescent compliance in a world old point of viewmost tersely expressed in that religious dictum ofLuther: “If a woman die from bearing, let her.She is only here to do it.” Mrs. Smith will not diefrom bearing to-day if her government can help it—norany other mother in any other land. Instead,all science and sociology are summoned to see herthrough. The rising value of a baby demonstratesclearly that you cannot afford to lose a maker ofmen. The British Government and the GermanGovernment and the French Government, speedingup population, are now taking every precaution forthe protection of maternity. The mortality recordfor women dying in child birth in England has beenabout 6,000 a year. In Germany it has been 10,000.There was also in addition to this death rate a damagerate. The national health insurance plan inauguratedby several countries before the war wasbeginning to reveal it: the claims for pregnancy disabilities,the actuaries reported, were threatening toswamp the insurance societies. New significancewas added to these phenomena when there began tobe the real war necessity for conserving population.

The Registrar General, laying the case before Parliamentin England, found it suddenly strengthenedby a book presented by the Women’s Co-operativeGuild. The volume constitutes one of the mostamazing documents that ever found a place in anystate archives. It is entitled “Maternity,” and is a[320]symposium constituting the cry of woman in travail.A compilation of 160 letters written by members ofthis working women’s organisation recounting thepersonal experiences of each in childbirth, it reflectsconditions under which motherhood is accomplishedamong the 32,000 members of the Guild. “Maternity,”with its simple, direct annals of agony is aclassic in literature, a human document recommendedfor all nations to study. The gentlemen in theHouse of Commons, who had turned its tragic pages,looked into each other’s faces with a new understanding:there was more than maternal ignorancethe matter with infant mortality! And a new populationmeasure was determined on.

“These letters” impressively announced the RightHonourable Herbert Samuel, “give an intimate pictureof the difficulties, the miseries, the agonies thatafflict many millions of our people as a consequenceof normal functions of their lives. An unwise reticencehas hitherto prevented the public mind fromrealising that maternity presents a whole series ofurgent social problems. It is necessary to take actionto solve the problems here revealed. The conclusionis clear that it is the duty of the communityso far as it can to relieve motherhood of its burdens.”So you will now find the maternity centre beingerected next door to the school for mothers. TheGovernment in 1916, announcing that it would assumealso 50 per cent. of this expense, sent a circularletter to all local authorities throughout the kingdom,[321]urgently recommending the new institution “inspite of the war need for economy at the present timein all other directions.”

STARTING THE BABY RIGHT

Mrs. Smith was automatically registered from theschool for mothers to the books of the maternitycentre when the Health Visitor learned that it wastime. The medical authorities report that 40 percent. of the total deaths of infants occur within amonth after birth and are due very largely to conditionsdetermined by the state of the mother’s health.A specific trouble is maternal exhaustion. Mrs.Smith, under weekly observation at the ante-natalclinic, was discovered to be hungry. She didn’tknow it herself, because she had so long been thatway. It gets to be a sort of habit with the workingclass woman, who must feed her husband first, becausehe is the bread winner. He has the meat andthe children have the soup, and she is very likely tohave the bread and tea. The clinic doctor, lookingMrs. Smith over, wrote out a prescription. It wasn’tput up in a bottle. It was put on a plate. Mrs.Smith was to attend the mothers’ dinner, servedevery day at the centre. The mother, being themedium of nourishment for the child, the good foodthat she would get here would do more than any dosingthat might be done afterward to ensure theright kind of constitution for the coming little Britishcitizen. In the “pre-natal class,” under the instructionof a sewing teacher and with municipalpatterns furnished by the city of London, she made[322]better baby clothes than she had ever had before.The materials, bought at wholesale, are furnished atcost price, the entire layette at 10s. to be paid for bya deposit of 6d. a week.

As time went on, Mrs. Smith’s headaches becamemore severe. Carrying water and coal upstairsgreatly aggravated the heart trouble she had hadsince Jimmie’s birth. Suddenly dizzy one day, shenearly fell from a chair on which she was standingto wash the windows. The next morning her feetwere so swollen she could with difficulty get on hershoes. Her neighbour on the lower landing remarked,“Of course, you’ll have to be worse beforeyou’re better.” And she herself knew no other way.

But the ante-natal clinic did. The doctor wrotekidney trouble on her attendance card. That, ofcourse, was the technical diagnosis. He might havesaid it another way had he written “overwork” and“overbearing.” It was a long time since Mrs. Smithhad been strong. She had nursed two of the childrenwith measles right up to the day that theseventh had arrived. Three months later, with theeighth expected, she was going out charring. Herhusband was out of work. The 30 shillings maternitybenefit that would be coming to her from thenational insurance department on the birth of herbaby, would have to be supplemented somehow inorder to meet all the additional expenses of the occasion.Well, the eighth baby was a miscarriage instead.Then there was the ninth, and then therewas Jimmie, in quick succession. And with the five[323]others and trying to keep up with all that she waslearning at the school for mothers should be done forchildren, why it was more than one pair of handswas equal to. She had now reached the verge of collapse.

The clinic doctor was telling her gravely that shemust have medical attendance at once. The businessof a centre is to supply supervision, but formedical treatment the patient is referred to her ownphysician. Mrs. Smith didn’t have one. Half thebabies of the kingdom are brought into the world bymidwives. Mrs. Smith could not afford a doctor.Well, Parliament could. The bill, presented by thephysician in whose care she was now placed, was paidhalf by the national government and half by thehealth department of this borough. It is an arrangementwhich is considered a good investment bythe national treasury. Without this aid Mrs. Smithwould have died in convulsions and a new babymight never have been born. Careful feeding andcareful doctoring obviated both disasters and carriedthe case to a triumphant conclusion. The baby ishere. On his first birthday anniversary he tippedthe scales at 20 pounds.

Mrs. Smith counts it a confinement de luxe thatbrought him. For the first occasion in her maternalhistory she did not have to get out of bed to do thewashing. For two weeks she just “laid up” while aHome Help took the helm in her household. TheHome Help is an adaptable person in a clean blouseand a clean apron, who comes in each morning, and[324]cooks and scrubs, and washes, and gets the childrenoff to school. Her wages of 13s. a week were paidhalf by the centre and half by Mrs. Smith throughher weekly 6d. contribution to the Home HelpSociety. But there was a greater event than even theHome Help. A “bed to yourself to have a baby in,”is the dream of luxury to which the working classwoman with her new war-time allowance looks forward.Mrs. Smith, carefully saving out a shillinghere from the “coal and lights,” and another shillingthere, perhaps, from “clothes and boots,” painfullyaccumulating the little fund, had achieved the bedof her ambition. And neighbours from the lengthof the square and around the next turning came in tolook at her as she lay in state, as it were, the newimproved baby by her side.

There are improved babies like Mrs. Smith’s arrivingevery day in England. They are not allamong the working class. They are reported withincreasing frequency, as at Nottingham and Huddersfield,among the artisan class. Even comparativelywell-to-do mothers in the best of homes havenot in the past been always accustomed to the skilledmedical supervision during pregnancy which is nowafforded without cost. It is Parliament’s plan tohave the new maternity service as available for theentire population as is public education for schoolchildren. The city of Bradford exhibits the ideal ofa complete municipal system now in successful operation:an infants’ department occupying a newthree-story building, with a consultation to which[325]600 mothers come weekly; a maternity departmentwith the ante-natal clinic; a maternity hospital, announcedas “the first of its kind” in the world; astaff of municipal midwives for service in the homes;a cooking depot, from which meals in heat-proof vesselsdistributed by motor vans are dispensed to 500expectant mothers daily; and a staff of 20 womenhealth visitors to connect the homes of Bradford withall of this municipal maternity service.

Still England’s comprehensive scheme of assistanceto mothers grows. Down the street, Mrs. Smithnoticed one day another new institution that hasbeen started. It is a municipal crèche, for which theGovernment pays 75 per cent. of the cost of operation.The sign in the window says that it is anursery for the care and maintenance of the childrenof munition workers. Three meals are provided,and the charge is 6d. a day. Just around the corner,the Labour Exchange has out a sign, “8,000 womenwanted at once for shell-filling factories. Age 16 to40. No previous experience necessary. Fill thefactories and help to win the war.”

And Mrs. Smith is thinking. The school formothers has taught her to. Do you know that thenumber of children who survive the first year in goodhealth is 71 per cent. in homes where the wage incomeis over 20s. a week and it drops to 51 per cent.in homes where the wage income is less than 20s. aweek? The sociologists have also some very interestingfigures that were compiled at Bradford. In1911 the infant mortality rate there in houses that[326]rented for six pounds and less was 163 in 1,000;house rent six to eight pounds, infant mortality,128; house rent eight to twelve pounds, infant mortality,123; house rent over twelve pounds, infantmortality, 88. And here in London infant mortalityis over 200 per 1,000 in one-room tenements,as compared with 100 in tenements of four roomsand upwards. Now, Mrs. Smith, I don’t suppose,has ever seen those figures. But she doesn’t need to.She understands why the small white hearse goes socontinuously up and down some streets. She knowsperfectly well that there will be more light and airfor her children in three or four rooms than in two.Also that the rent will cost her 9s. 6d. a week, wherenow she pays 4s. 6d. But in a factory there arewomen earning 25 and 30s. a week, and even up totwo pounds a week. Mrs. Smith is thinking.

THE MADONNA IN INDUSTRY

Meanwhile over in France Azalie de Rigeaux, athalf-past ten this morning, will step aside from thelathe where she turns fuses, to retire for say half-an-hourfor another service. Azalie de Rigeaux is amunitions worker in trousers in a Usine le Guerre ina banlieu of Paris. See her now as she takes herbaby in her arms and seats herself in a low chair by asmall crib. A wedding-ringed hand opens her workingblouse from the throat downward, the black linesof the cloth fold away from her bosom, revealing inlovely contrast the white, satiny texture of her skin.And she, too, even as you, a mother anywhere in the[327]world, smiles happily into her baby’s eyes as sheholds him to her breast. It is a mother and childpicture the like of which you will not find in anygallery of Europe. Azalie de Rigeaux, crooningsoftly here to her child, is a new figure in life, so newthat she has not yet reached the canvas of even themodern masters in art. See just above the curve ofher arm where rests the bay’s head, the armlet thatshe wears on her left sleeve. Embroidered on it isthat sign of her national enlistment, a burstingbomb. It is important because it is the clue to thenew picture. All over the world war has called thewoman to the factory. And what shall she do withthe baby? Well, the baby is so valuable that thestate is not going to let it cry.

It is France that makes the security for maternitygilt-edged. By the gifts they are bringing here, onewould say that this is the country that to-day takesprecedence of all others in its appreciation of the risingvalue of a baby. As every one has heard, therehas not in a long time, in generations indeed, been asurplus of babies in France. As a matter of fact,they have always been scarce. And they are so dearthat the passion for the child is the distinctive nationaltrait. This building in which Azalie deRigeaux nurses her child to-day was erected at acost of 75,000 francs. It stands in the factory yard,adjacent to the shop in which women make shells.In this sunny high-ceilinged room, with plenty ofsunlight and air, rows and rows of dimpled babiessleep in the blue cribs with the dainty white cover-lids.[328]Four times a day the mothers from the shopacross the way, as Azalie de Rigeaux has now, cometo nurse them. Outside the long French windowsthere is a large French “jardin,” where the olderchildren, in blue and pink check aprons, play. Thenursery dining-room has a low table with little lowchairs, where they come to their meals. Nourishingbroths and other foods are prepared in a shining,perfectly equipped kitchen. There is a white bathroomwith porcelain basins and baths of varyingsizes; on the long shelf across the room are the separatebaskets that hold the individual brushes.Each child, on arrival in the morning, is given abath and a complete change of clothes. Once aweek they are weighed. The doctor and the staffof trained nurses are alert to detect the least deviationfrom normal. Scientific supervision like thiscosts the firm 1 franc 35 centimes per day per child.To Azalie de Rigeaux and the other mothers in theiremploy, it is free.

It is this crèche at Ivry-sur-Seine which is themodel recommended by the ministry of munitions tothe factories of France. The last feature to makethis, a national institution, absolutely complete, hasbeen added. It was the Union Française pour leSuffrage des Femmes that one day held a conferencewith the ministry of munitions. “Gentlemen,” theysaid, “a mother who must go home from a factoryto stand over a wash tub, gets so tired that the baby’ssource of nourishment is imperilled. And when ababy languishes, a future soldier may be lost.”—A[329]state department was at instant attention—“Gentlemen,”it was pointed out, “there is one thing morethat you must do.” Well, they have done it. Inthis model babies’ building at Ivry-sur-Seine there isa steam laundry in which two women are kept constantlyemployed, so that there shall be no nightlaundry work for the child whom the mother takeshome. There are washed eight hundred diapers aday. You see there is nothing that the Governmentwill not do for a child in France. Nothing is toomuch trouble.

Even her employers will be equally as pleased asthe state if Azalie de Rigeaux shall decide to giveanother citizen to France. They have told me so.“Why, it is patriotism,” the factory owner explainedto me, as we stood there among the whirring beltsand the revolving wheels of a thousand machines inthis Usine de Guerre. “Don’t you see,” he patientlyelucidated, “I’m sure if she will only have the babyevery one else should do what they can.”

This is what they do for Azalie de Rigeaux. Shecomes directly under the protection of L’Office Centrald’Assistance Maternelle et Infantile, which, asyou will read on all the walls of Paris, is organised“to secure to all pregnant women adequate and suitablenourishment, proper housing accommodations,relief from overwork and skilled medical advice, allof the social, legal and medical protection to whichshe is entitled in a civilised society.” A visitor willarrive from the nearest Mairie to inform the prospectivemother of all the aids that are available for[330]her. All of the municipally subsidised institutionshave had their accommodations increased since thewar. There are the Municipal Maternity Hospitals,where care is free, or there is the Mutualité Maternelle,the self-supporting maternity club throughwhich one may make arrangements for accouchement.There are free meals for mothers at the CantinesMaternelles, which are spread over Paris. Are thereother children in the family, so that their care is aburden to the mother? She must not tire herselfwith the housework. They will be taken to thecountry at municipal expense and she shall go to aRefuge to rest in preparation for the coming confinement.There are free layettes to be had at everyMairie. A limousine will even take the lady to ahospital if necessary. The military automobiles ofthe army are subject to requisition for this purposeby L’Office Central d’Assistance Maternelle et Infantileof Paris.

There is also definite financial assistance. TheGovernment will pay to Azalie de Rigeaux ten francsand fifty centimes a week for four weeks before andfour weeks after the confinement, with an additionalthree francs fifty centimes a week if she nurses thechild. To this her employer tells me he will addhis bonus for the baby, 105 francs if she has been inhis employ for one year, 135 francs after three years,and after six years it will be 165 francs. All indicationspoint to market quotations on the Frenchbaby rising even higher. Prof. Pinard, the celebratedaccoucher of Paris, who has assisted into the[331]world so many babies that he should know their valueas much as any man may, is saying they are reallyworth more. Through the Academy of Medicine inFrance he is recommending to the Senate a measureproviding for a payment to a mother, from the timethat gestation begins until the child is one year old,of five francs a day.

IT MEANS THE LIBERATION OF THE MOTHER

But most significant to the woman movement ofall lands is the welcome that the Usine de Guerre isextending to Azalie de Rigeaux. Of all the makingover they have been doing for us in industry, this isperhaps the most revolutionary in its effects on thewhole social structure. For when industry takes thebaby, it means the passing of the wage envelope to awhole class of the population whose arms werehitherto literally too burdened to reach for it. Hereat Ivry-sur-Seine they do not shake their heads andsay, “Oh, you might have a baby. We prefer to employa man who won’t.” On the contrary preferencein employment is given to a woman who has a child.The only person who takes precedence of her is thewoman with two children or, of course, with three.From the day that she signifies she is going to haveanother, she becomes an object of special solicitude.She will be shielded from any injurious strain. Becauseit may not be well for her to stand at the lathe,she will be transferred to the gauging department,where she may remain continuously seated. And,while the gauging department’s regular rate of pay is[332]but 50 centimes an hour, her own job’s rate of pay,60, 70, 80 centimes an hour, whatever it may be,will be continued.

“But isn’t it an interruption to your business tohave employés who every now and then have to stopto have a baby?” I asked the French manufacturer.“Ah, no, Madame,” he replied, “surely it is no disturbanceat all. It is nothing even if a womanshould wish to be absent for two or three months.Is she not serving her country? We simply arrangea large enough staff of employés so that always thereare some to fill the gaps. Maternity is somethingthat may be estimated by percentage. We count onit that Camille here will probably have a baby inJuly. Etienne, next to her, may have one in September.Well, by the time a substitute employé is finishedwith taking Camille’s place, she will be requiredin Etienne’s place, then, perhaps, in Azalie’splace. It is very easy, I say, to arrange.”

And it is because the rising value of a baby makesit worth while. It is in France, where maternity hasalways been important, that all of the institutionsfor the welfare of the child now being rushed tocompletion in other lands have been originally invented.We in America, in some of our large cities,have started the “clinic” and the “consultation” andthe crèche. Italy is inaugurating them. Russiasent to Paris for specific information about them beforethe war. Germany’s “Kaiserin Auguste VictoriaHaus” in Berlin, a veritable “laboratory of thechild,” from which the child culture system adapted[333]from France has been developed for the Empire, is amonument to the national thoroughness, which, makingmilitary preparation for the conquest of theworld, made maternity preparation on almost ascomprehensive a scale.

Industry to-day beckoning the woman, you see,Parliament is bound to provide for the child. Mrs.Smith in England—or in America or anywhere else—youneed not hesitate.

Azalie de Rigeaux’s baby is, what is it one shallsay, as good as gold all day long. Do you knowthat he is so well regulated that there is no deviationfrom his perfection save on Mondays when he getsback to the crèche fretful and perhaps a little inclinedto be colicky after a week end at home? Atthat munitions crèche down your street the babiesshall have a bath every day and no one will have tocarry the water toilsomely upstairs by the pint.Think of the dainty cribs to sleep in and the beautifulgreen garden to play in! There are three mealsa day that never fail. You can easier pay for thosemeals than cook them. How many skilled vocationsare you trying to follow in your home! Thegraduate of a school for mothers, you are doing, thebest you can, more than the winner of a Cambridgetripos would attempt to undertake! Cooking andsewing and nursing, laundry work and scrubbing andchild culture, that is the gamut of the achievementsyou are trying to accomplish. Oh, Mrs. Smith, onetrade in the factory is easier. What artisan can begood at his job if he must also putter with half a[334]dozen others? Well, the world is no longer goingto ask it of you, the maker of men!

THE CHILD’S CHANCE DEPENDS ON FAMILY INCOME

Tradition may still rise to protest: But the home!You wouldn’t abolish the home! I think you wouldif you had seen it, Mrs. Smith’s home. Child mortalityin her street is at the rate of 200 per 1,000.I know a home in the other end of London that isas lovely as a poet’s dream. Child mortality inthis district is 40 per 1,000. There is a great housefacing a park. There are three children in it. Theyhave a day nursery and a night nursery and a schoolroom all to themselves. They are cared for by ahead nurse, and an assistant nurse, a governess, anda mother who now and then comes to caress themand see that they are happy. There are, you see,four women—to say nothing of the household staffof eight servants indirectly contributing to the sameservice—to care for three children in the West End.

In the East End Mrs. Smith has only one pairof hands to do for seven, and she is no super-woman.They live in two rooms that the fiercest all the timescrubbing could not keep clean. The discolouredwalls are damp with mildew. You can see thevermin in the cracks. There isn’t any pantry.There isn’t any sink. There isn’t so much as a cookstove, only an open grate. There isn’t any poetryin a home on less than a pound a week!

Down the street is the way out to the new homethat Mrs. Smith’s wage envelope will help to build.[335]There will be at least 4 rooms and the children awayduring the day under expert care. The little childrenof the rich in the West End nursery have nomore scientific supervision than the municipal crèchewill afford Mrs. Smith for hers. I know she willnot longer personally wash their faces and wipetheir noses. Even when she tries to, as you mayhave noticed in any land, she cannot possibly dothose tasks as often as they should be done. Themere physical needs of children, any one else canattend to. But only a mother can love them.Hadn’t we better conserve her more for that specialfunction? The rising value of a baby begins todemand it.

And don’t worry about the effect of factory employmenton her health. Two government commissionsof experts, one in France and one in England,tell us it’s all right after all. Both report that aproperly arranged factory is as good a place as anyfor a woman. Some significant figures presented toEngland’s Birth Rate Commission show that theproportion of miscarriages is among factory workers9.2 per cent. as compared with 16 per cent. amongwomen doing housework in the home. Hard workand heavy work, you see, are just as harmful inMrs. Smith’s kitchen as they might be anywhereelse—and not nearly so well paid! Really, in spiteof its historic setting there is no sacred significanceattaching to the figure of a woman bending over awashtub or on her knees scrubbing a floor. Let usvenerate instead Azalie de Rigeaux nursing her child[336]in a Usine de Guerre! After the schools for mothersand the maternity clinics have done what theymay to reduce infant mortality, the mothers in industrymay do some more. Take your babies inyour arms, Mrs. Smith, and flee from that stalkingspectre of poverty that has already snatched fourof them to the grave. The door of the municipalcrèche stands ajar!

Like this, the world is making ready for reconstruction.Let there be every first aid for the makerof men. We await one more measure: Mrs. Smithmust never again have ten babies when she livesin two rooms—nor Frau Schmidt in Berlin. Thisunlimited increase that crowds children from thecradle to the coffin, in the haste to make room formore, has been the fatal force that has impellednations teeming with too many people to make warfor territorial expansion. We shall not blot outfrom civilisation the Prussian military ideal until wehave likewise effaced the Prussian maternity idealof reckless reproduction. That the cradles of theworld may never again spill over, the nations mustrise from the peace table with a new populationpolicy. In the “birth politics” of the future theremust be birth control. When children are scarce,are they dear. See France! The rising value of ababy may yet lift the curse of Eve!

Then shall we be ready to repopulate right.After the battles are won and man’s work of conquestis done, woman’s war work will only havebegun. I have stood in the cathedral at Rheims[337]and in the stricken silence looked with sickening dismayon the destruction of the beautiful temple ofworship builded with such exquisite art and suchinfinite labour. But I assure you not all the cathedralsof Europe piled in a single colossal ruin,broken sculptured saint on saint, can stir the beholderwith the poignant pain of one war hospital!There in the whitewashed wards with the smell ofblood and ether, where the maimed lie stiff andstill and the dying moan and the mad rave in wilddelirium, stand there and your soul shall shrivel inhorror at the destruction of men! It is the agonyof it all, and the suffering and the sorrow and thegrief of it all—and then something more. Youcreep with the feeling that every one of these menonce was builded with such exquisite art and suchinfinite labour and such toilsome pain and anguishby God and a woman! It is a stupendous task ofcreation to be done over again when the armies shallhave finished their work. Bone of her bone andflesh of her flesh, God and woman must rebuild therace. You unto whom a child can be born to-day,to you Parliaments make their prayer!

Not a captain of industry who assembles the enginesof war, not a general who directs the armies,may do for his country what you can do who standbeside its cradles. The cry that rings out overEmpires bleeding in the throes of death is the oldestcry in the world. Women wanted for maternity!

The Ring and the Woman

That woman who crossed the threshold of theDoll’s House awhile ago—you would scarcely recogniseher as you meet her to-day anywhere abroad inthe world. She has put aside yesterday as it werean old cloak that has just slipped from her shoulders.And she stands revealed as the one of whomsome of us have for a long time written and someof us have read. For a generation at least she hasbeen looked for. Now she is here.

You see when her country called her, it was destinythat spoke. Though no nation knew. Governmentshave only thought they were makingwomen munition workers and women conductors andwomen bank tellers and women doctors and womenlawyers and women citizens and all the rest. Idoubt if there is a statesman anywhere who hasleaned to unlock a door of opportunity to let thewoman movement by, who has realised that he wasbut the instrument in the hands of a higher powerthat is reshaping the world for mighty ends, roughhewn though they be to-day from the awful chaosof war.

But there is one who will know. When the manat the front gets back and stands again before the[339]cottage rose bowered on the English downs, redroofed in France and Italy, blue trimmed in Germanyor ikon blessed in Russia or white porched offMain Street in America, he will clasp her to hisheart once more. Then he will hold her off, so, atarm’s length and look long into her eyes and deepinto her soul. And lo, he shall see there the NewWoman. This is not the woman whom he left behindwhen he marched away to the Great WorldWar. Something profound has happened to hersince. It is woman’s coming of age. Look, she isturning the ring on her finger to-day.

When the man in khaki went away, that ring wassign and symbol of the status assigned to her by allthe oldest law books and religious books of the world.And none of the modern ones had been able whollyto eradicate from their pages the point of view thatwas the most prevailing opinion of civilisation. Themost ancient classification of all listed in one category“a man’s house and his wife, his man servantand his maidservant, his ox and his ass and any otherpossessions that are his.” An English state churchhas given her in marriage to him “to obey him andserve him.” A German state church has bound her“to be subject to him as to her lord and master.”Christian lands have agreed that a woman whenshe marries enters into a state of coverture by whichthey tell us “the husband hath power and dominionover his wife.” Religious teachers from St. Paulto Martin Luther, law givers from Moses to Napoleonhave been unanimous on this point, which Napoleon[340]framing his code for France summed upbriefly, Woman belongs to man.

This has been the basic assumption of church andstate from whose courts of authority each concessionof individuality for woman has been won only byprocess of slow amendment. It is still so subtlyinterwoven in dogma and statute that there is notyet any land where a woman, though thinking herselffree, may not trip against a legal disability thathas not yet been dislodged. For Blackstone, thegreat authority of reference, declares “the very beingor legal existence of the woman is suspended duringthe marriage or at least is incorporated in that ofthe husband.” And all over the world, all thechurch councils and all the state courts have not yetbeen so reformed but that by reversion to type theywill hark back to the pronouncement. Man and wifeare one—and he is the one. So the man’s mindthinketh.

And the woman’s mind? Since he went away inkhaki, it has thought long, long thoughts. Whenhe comes back, this new woman looking into hiseyes with the level glance, he will find is a womanwho has earned money—in a new world that hasbeen made over for her so that she can. You seeall those lines of women in industry and commerceand the professions? Some of them walk up to apaymaster’s window on Saturday night and someof them wait for the checks that arrive in their mail.But it is an experience in common through whichall are passing. The open door to the shop and the[341]factory and the counting room, to law or to medicineis the great gateway to the future where dreamsshall come true. For the women who have passedthrough, have arrived at last at the great goal, economicindependence.

Now what that means the sociologists could tell.Though they might not think to put it in termsof, for instance, Elsa von Stuttgart’s slippers. Theywould, I suppose, agree that economic independenceis the right to earn one’s living—and be paid for itlike a man. One earned it yesterday if one washedthe dishes and cooked the meals and reared the childrenand kept the house for the other person whoheld the purse. Housekeepers of this class havebeen the busiest people we have had about us. Andyet the census offices administered by men had solittle idea of these women’s economic value, thatthey have been actually listed in government statisticalreturns as “unoccupied.” So also of coursewere the other housekeepers who, eliminating someof these most arduous tasks from the long day,nevertheless were not at least idle when they borea man’s children and presided at his dinner tableand entertained his friends and practised generallythe graceful art of making a home. When theyundertook these duties, there was a church promise,With all my worldly goods, I thee endow. Thatfigure of speech, the law courts reduce to “maintenance,”that is to say, board and clothes. But, sowidely disseminated has been the idea that the ladyis “unoccupied” that these are generally regarded[342]not in the nature of a recognition of service and areturn for value received, but rather as perquisitesbountifully bestowed on the recipient. So that frequentlyher range of choice in the matter has been,we may say, limited.

Frau Elsa von Stuttgart before the war had herboard and clothes. But her husband had forbiddenher to get her hats at a certain little French shop inUnter den Linden that she had always patronisedbefore her marriage. And with all his money, hedecided that one pair of evening slippers would doeven for a woman in the social position of a Prussianofficer’s wife. They lived in a villa at Zehlendorffthat was perfectly equipped with everythingthat he considered desirable. There was a grandpiano of marvellous tone, though she didn’t evenplay the piano at all. She was a doctor of philosophy,who before her marriage had been a teacherat the High School in Berlin and her hobby, it happened,was books. She liked them in beautifulbindings and she always used to buy them that way.But of course she couldn’t any more because herhusband said it was extravagance, quite useless extravagance.Well, really you know, maintenancemay be slippers and hats, but it isn’t books afterall. And she had a lovely house and a piano ofmarvellous tone. How hard it was about the slippers,I suppose only a woman can understand. Yousee Elsa von Stuttgart has pretty feet, small anddainty feet. Every other woman in her set has Germanfeet. “Look at them,” she whispered to me at[343]a kaffee klatch one day in 1914. And I did. AndI knew why her soul loved little satin slippers betterthan Beethoven or Lizst. She has them now oncemore. The house with the grand piano is closedand her husband is with his regiment. Elsa vonStuttgart in a class room is lecturing on philosophyagain. She has rented a small apartment the wallsof which are lined with books. You think the slippersa luxury for war-time perhaps? Well, shewrote me that she has done penance for them inextra meatless days to atone for the price.

In France the Countess Madelaine de Ranierlived in a château of the old aristocracy. And shehad a fortune of hundreds of thousands of francsbut not a sou to spend as she pleased. You wouldhave thought that she had everything that heartcould wish, until you caught unawares the wistfulexpression in her eyes when they forgot their smiling.Madelaine de Ranier, having no children ofher own, would have loved to write checks for thecharities that took care of other people’s children.But she couldn’t. It was a very large dot that shehad brought to her husband. But by the laws ofFrance he administered it. Out of the income, heof course paid her bills. The third year of hermarriage there occurred to her the idea for a confidentialarrangement which she made with her dressmakerfor doubling on the bills submitted for herevening gowns and dividing the proceeds accruing.It was the Countess’ only source of ready money.She kept it in the secret drawer of her jewel case,[344]these few francs that she could count her own,among her costly articles of adornment valued atthousands. To-day the Count is somewhere on theSomme and Madelaine de Ranier is daily at a deskin Paris directing the great commercial house inwhich her dot and the family fortune are invested.I saw her in the winter of 1917. Her eyes weresparkling. From the large income that she nowhandles, she had just written off a contribution tothe Orphans of France Fund for the nation. Andnobody had said, “You must not,” or equally as authoritatively,“I do not wish it.”

In England there is Edith Russell, Dr. Edith Russellshe really is. She gave up her profession whenshe married, to devote herself wholly to home makingin the great house in Cavendish Square, London.It requires nine servants and careful planning tomeet the expenses, even though her husband turnsover to her all of his income. “Can’t we go outto Hampstead to a smaller house instead?” she askedhim one day, laying her housekeeping accounts beforehim. She was trying somehow to plan for afinancial surplus. The Malthusian League was inneed of funds and she used to be one of its mostearnest workers. But her husband said: “Not atall.” Even if there were indeed hundreds of poundsavailable, he did not approve of the League’s principlesanyhow. Now Dr. Edith Russell in responseto her country’s call is back on the staff of the boroughhealth department in the medical work in whichshe was engaged before her marriage. And she is[345]again a Malthusian League contributor. You see,it’s her own money now, not her husband’s.

Up in the north of England there is a factorytown where the largest works in November, 1914,hung out a notice that any women who before theirmarriage had been employed there would be takenback. Mrs. Webber was. The regular weeklywage is so much better than the occasional charingwhich was all that she had been able to get to supplementher husband’s frequent unemployment.Her children are among those who have been sincethe war transferred at school from the free list tothe paid dinners. Before the war there were 11,000children in this town to be supplied with free schooldinners. Now since their mothers work outside thehome, this figure has dropped to 2,370. Mrs. Webberalso is one of those women who have been shopping.All over Europe they have been doing it.From Petrograd to Berlin and Paris and London,delighted shop keepers report that women who neverhad money before are spending it. The curate inthe parish to which Mrs. Webber belongs—Mrs.Webber used to char for his wife, but is no longeravailable—told me that these working classes havegone perfectly mad about money and the recklessexpenditure of it. And I asked him how and hesaid: “Why cheese, they all of them have it forsupper now. And the woman in that house, thethird from the end of the row,” he pointed it outfrom his study window, “has a fur coat.” It wasMrs. Webber’s house the curate mentioned.

[346]

HIS PERSONALITY—AND HERS

Well now, you see, to Elsa von Stuttgart in Berlin,it may be little satin evening slippers, and toMadelaine de Ranier in Paris it may be orphans ofFrance, and to Dr. Edith Russell in London it maybe the great reform for which the Malthusian Leagueis organised, and to Mrs. Webber it may be schooldinners and cheese and a fur coat—but to all of themit’s economic independence. Mrs. Webber says, “Ashilling of your own is worth two that ’e gives you.”Edith Russell and the rest I have not heard say it.But from Countess to char woman, you see, thisabout the wage envelope is certain: It’s yours toburn if you care to—or to buy with it what youchoose! There are millions of women over this warracked world who have it to-day, who never had itbefore. And the hand that holds this new wage envelopeholds the future of the race in its keeping.Not since that magna charta that the barons wrestedfrom King John, has so powerful a guarantee ofliberty been won. It carries with it all the freedomsthat the feminists have ever formulated. She whostepped out of the Doll’s House stands at the thresholdof a new earth. Something very much morethan little satin slippers and books and fur coatsand their own money is coming to women!

Let us see. You would have been astounded, Ibelieve, if Elsa von Stuttgart had attempted to dictateto her husband his hats or his slippers. Anyway,Herr von Stuttgart would. You would not[347]have expected Edith Russell to have suggested acrossthe breakfast table: “My dear, the propaganda ofsuch and such a society to which you belong is notpleasing to me. I do not care to have you supportit.” Why, either gentleman would have been ahenpecked husband to have permitted any such interferencewith his personal liberty. Not even inAmerica would any wife so presume to dare. It isquite likely that a lady living in New York couldannounce over the coffee cups, “My dear, we willmove to Long Island to-day.” And the voice behindthe newspaper would probably agree withouta demurrer, “I’ll be out on the 4:30 train.” Probablyalso he has never heard how many pairs ofslippers she has, and all he knows about her hatsis their price. But after all, it is only by the privilegehe permits her that the lady can put it overlike this. At any moment that he cares to assert it,he still holds the balance of power in this household.

Because man and wife are one, he who carries thepurse is the one. It’s only the new purse in thefamily that can alter the situation anywhere in theworld. She who carries it is another one, with herpersonal liberty too. In the last analysis, it is onlya person who can pay the rent who can talk withassertion about where “we” shall live and how.

No economist in any university chair understandsthis any more clearly than does Mrs. Webber, whoonce lived in two rooms and now lives in three becauseshe can pay the rent! The new purse in her[348]family has raised the whole scale of living for herand for her children. Yesterday her personality wasmerged and submerged in that of a husband to whosestandard of maintenance she was limited. To-dayshe is emerging with a wage envelope in her handand a personality of her own, as is likewise Elsa vonStuttgart and Edith Russell and Madelaine deRanier. Society may be tremendously startled tofind them at last counted so that one and one in themarriage relation shall make two. When in thisgreat world war, that autocracy with its divine rightof kings that has ruled and wrecked civilisation shallhave been swept from the throne, there is anotherautocracy with its “divine” authority of one sex overthe other that is going into the scrap-heap of oldsystems.

Through the events of these war days already itis clear that such an eternal purpose runs. Nobodythought of it when woman was called from the homein all lands. But there has really begun the castingoff of that ancient chrysalis of “coverture.” Haveyou by chance yet met among your acquaintancesthe woman who is refusing to part with her ownname? Mary McArthur, the great English labourleader, is the wife of Mr. Anderson, a member ofParliament and she is the mother of a baby. Butshe has never ceased to be herself. “You call yourselfMiss McArthur,” a curious inquirer remarked toher one day, “and yet they say your cook tells thatyou are very respectable.”

There are numbers of women like this in London[349]and in New York, who are preferring their own identityto that of their husbands. The German andScandinavian women going a little farther say, “Letus at mature age take an adult title.” Master Jones,you know, does not wait for the day of his marriageto emerge from his adolescence as “Mr.” Jones,Fraulein is but a diminutive, “little Frau,” a prefixof immaturity. Rosika Schwimmer, touring Americafor a lecture bureau, assured inquiring reporters:“Of course I am Frau Schwimmer. Why shouldn’tI be? I have passed my 35th birthday.” The ImperialUnion of Women Suffragists of Germany inconvention assembled, not long ago decided to adoptthe adult title Frau for all women of mature age, the“unity title,” they call it. In this first faint stirring,there is significance of wide changes.

She whose identity had so disappeared at the altar,that the law actually wrote her down on the statutebooks as civiliter mortua, one “civilly dead,” is aboutto be restored to the status of an individual. Thelong road, along which the woman movement of yesterdaymade its slow way, is now at the sharpestturning.

The struggle of women in all lands to be releasedfrom the discriminations that have limited their humanactivities set free the spinster some time ago.The point of view that is now generally acceptedabout her, and without contravention in the mostadvanced countries, was most definitely formulatedsome sixty years ago in Scandinavia. There theyput on the statute books a law abolishing the previous[350]male guardianship over unmarried women andpermitting a person “of staid age and character” tomanage her own affairs. At first this was a privilegeto be granted only on special appeal to the king.But at last the right of self-government at 21 wasestablished for all unmarried women. So radical adeparture from custom was of course not accomplishedwithout misgivings. There were those whofeared that for a woman to manage her own affairs,was not in accordance with true womanly dignity andthe dictates of religion. They said, The majority ofwomen do not want it. Why, then, give them aresponsibility they do not wish or ask for? But inspite of those objections, the spinster came to be recognisedas a responsible individual.

For so long now has the world been accustomed toseeing her going about, doing as she pleases almostas any other adult, that we have forgotten that sheever couldn’t. She can acquire education. She canown property. She has been able for some time nowto get into a great many occupations and professions:only her difficulty was to get up. And there hasbeen that limitation to her income. It has remainedstationary at a figure seldom passing two-thirds thatof a man’s income. The teaching profession affordsstatistics that are world-wide testimony to the situationthat has prevailed from, say, Newark, N. J., toArchangel, Russia: there have been women schoolteachers working for a less wage than the man schooljanitor: there have been women professors at thehead of high school departments at a salary less than[351]that of the men subordinates whom they directed.Still, in all of her personal affairs, a spinster in everycountry has been for a long time now as free as therest of the people.

SIGNING AWAY HER FREEDOM

Then, on the day that the ring is slipped on herfinger, she has put her name to a contract that hasmore or less signed away her liberty, according to thepart of the world in which she happens to live. InFinland, for instance, where the position of womenhas been in many respects as advanced as anywherein the world, even a woman member of Parliamentat her marriage reverts to type, as it were: thoughshe still sits in Parliament, she passes under theguardianship of her husband! In Sweden, she losther vote: for that country, in 1862 the first to grantthe municipal franchise to women, cautiously withheldit until 1909 from married women. There is,indeed, almost no land in which marriage does notin some way limit for the rest of her life a woman’sparticipation in world affairs. She may have lostproperty rights, personal rights, political rights, orperhaps she has lost her job, her right to work andbe paid for it. At any rate, she must look around todetermine how many of these things may have happenedto her. Any of them that haven’t, are specialexemptions from that universal ruling of all nationsthat a woman on marriage enters into a state ofcoverture, with its accompanying legal disability.“Disability” is defined by Dicey’s “Digest” as the[352]“status of being an infant, lunatic, or married woman.”And there you are.

It was from that predicament that the earliestwoman’s rights’ associations sought to extricate thewoman who had taken the wedding veil and ring.Susan B. Anthony’s first most famous achievementback in the sixties was a law establishing the rightof a married woman in New York State to the ownershipof her own clothes! By specific enactmentssince then, one and another of the rights to whichother human beings are naturally born have beenbestowed on married women. The most clearly definedof these, and the most widely recognised at last,are the right to their separate property and the rightto their own earnings, which prevails in most of theUnited States. The Married Women’s PropertyAct accomplished it in England. In France, after14 years of agitation for it, Mme. Jeanne Schmalland the Société l’Avant Courriere in 1907 at lastsecured the law giving to the married woman the freedisposition of her salary. But these concessions itis not easy to disentangle from that basic notion,which is warp and woof of the whole fabric of law,that a married woman has passed under the guardianshipof her husband.

For in Germany and Scandinavia and France,“separate property” to ensure her title to it, must bespecially secured to her by an antenuptial contract.In Sweden, her earnings are hers, only if they remainin cash. In France she is permitted to invest themin bonds, provided first she either makes affidavit[353]before a notary proving her ownership or brings awritten permit from her husband. In the State ofWashington, the supreme attempt to confer equalityon woman finds expression in the statute: “Alllaws which impose or recognise civil disabilities upona wife which are not imposed or recognised as existingas to the husband, are abolished.” But in spiteof that most laudable effort, the end is not yet attained.For the State of Washington is still enmeshedin the community property system, by whichthe management and control of the common propertyin marriage is vested in the husband. And althoughthe law has been distinctly framed that a marriedwoman is entitled to her own earnings, it practicallytakes them away from her by requiring her to countthem in with the community property which is underher husband’s control. The atomic theory, you see,was not more firmly fixed in science than is this ideathat has been embedded in the social structure thata married woman is legally, civilly, and politicallya minor!

Even in these United States, where the mention ofthe “subjection of woman” raises a smile, so largelyhas it by the grace of the American man been permittedto become a dead letter, the employment ofmarried women has remained against public policy.Many boards of education have by-laws about it.Even these women teachers who commit matrimonyand conceal it are almost invariably later on detectedand dropped from the pay roll when foundguilty of maternity. Business houses have shared[354]in the prejudice. A Chicago bank as lately as 1913adopted a rule requiring the resignation of womanemployés on marriage. Because the married woman,the bank president said, “should be at home, not ata typewriter or an adding machine.” Similarly aUnited States civil service regulation reads: “Nomarried woman will be appointed to a classified positionin the postal service, nor will any woman occupyinga classified position in the postal service bereappointed to such position when she shall marry.”

A world has been arranged, you see, on the assumptionof the complete eclipse of the personalityof the married woman—with the burden resting onher to disprove it in the legal situations where shehas come to be recognised as an individual. Customprefers that a married woman should be a dependentperson. It was an idea that fifty years of feministbombardment had not dislodged from the popularmind. Now in four years of war, it has crumbled.

“Women wanted,” called the world in need,wanted even though married! And out of the seclusionand separation to which she was hitherto consigned,the woman with the ring has come to findher wage envelope. All regulations against her employmentare now rescinded in Europe, as soon theywill be here. The working woman in particular hasbeen given her release. The state, you remember,will now cook her meals and care for her children.And it was all a mistake that attributed infant mortalityto the industrial employment of mothers.Now it is found that a wife’s wage envelope really[355]reduces infant mortality by improving environment.There will be fewer of Mrs. Webber’s children, youknow, dying in three rooms than in two!

The ban on the married woman in the civil serviceand in the professions is lifted. The Association ofAustrian Women’s Organisations in their 1916 conventionpassed the resolution demanding the abolitionof the “celibacy clause” for women office holders.And although no country has as yet formallyerased this from the statute books, governments haveat least tacitly consented to remember it no moreagainst a woman that she has married. That is whyDr. Edith Russell is again practising medicine in thepublic health service and Prof. Elsa von Stuttgartis teaching philosophy. Especially in medicine is itrecognised that the married woman physician is morethan ever fitted for a part in the campaign for theconservation of child life. And if she is also amother, so much the better. Why was it neverthought of before? Of course a person who has hada baby is the real expert who knows more about itthan the person who never can have one. Womenformerly dropped from the civil service on accountof marriage have been recalled all over Europe.Even Germany has opened to them post, telegraph,and railway positions. So many masters in Germany’supper high schools are at the front, that marriedwomen have been called to these positions.Hundreds of married women have been reinstatedin the school rooms of England. Detroit, Mich.,the other day repealed its regulations which forbade[356]the employment of married women as teachers in thepublic schools. It is Russia that has led all landsin her recognition of the woman teacher, not onlyrefusing longer to penalise her for marriage butactually, as we have seen, establishing for her theprinciple of equal pay for equal work.

WHAT IT MEANS TO BE A MINOR

Like this, the married woman has to-day beenwelcomed in industry, in commerce, and in the professions.This person of affairs abroad in the worlda minor! It is more than a disability that she herselfmust endure. It becomes an annoyance to theworld to have her so. According to Bacon’sAbridgement, a very imposing volume, it is stillwritten that “the law looks upon husband and wifebut as one person and therefore allows but of onewill between them, which is placed in the husband.”But you see what a far cry it is from the woman inLondon or Paris or Berlin to “the one” on the westernfront. How is she to “obey” that man in theVosges or on the Somme since she cannot havetelegraphic communication about her daily movements?And without it, the French woman was leftin a helpless tangle in the Napoleonic code.

Madelaine de Ranier at the head of a great businessconcern in Paris found herself forbidden to signa check, unable to open a bank account. The Counthad enlisted on the second day after war was declaredand he had left with her a sum of gold.When it was exhausted and she faced the need of[357]funds, she was unable to negotiate a loan on valuablebonds that she owned. Oh, the bonds were allright. The difficulty was that she was a marriedwoman. And though very rich, she neverthelesswas obliged to turn to friends who relieved her immediatefinancial necessities. Now in the drawerof her office desk there is a legal paper bearing theseal of France: across the bottom is printed “Bonpour autorisation maritale” and beneath is theCount’s signature. Until he had consented to makethis arrangement, sending on from the front this“authorisation of the husband,” she was prohibitedfrom transacting any business. For a marriedwoman in France might not sell property or mortgageit or acquire it or sign a business contract orgo to law without the consent of her husband!Women acting temporarily as mayors of some ofthe French villages, from which almost the entiremale population has been mobilised, have found itnecessary in order to execute municipal papers toturn to a male citizen for his signature, even thoughhe might not be able to write and could only makehis mark. Finally in 1916, the situation came up,for legal decision. The validity of a building contractentered into by a French woman was questionedin court. The judge after mature deliberationrendered a decision that although the womanwas not empowered to sign the contract, yet as shehad acted with the tacit consent of her husband andin his interest and that of the country, the courtwould uphold the validity of the act. “It is necessary,”[358]he said, “that for the welfare of France,women shall take the place of men and performduties which have hitherto been considered outsidetheir sphere.” The Union Fraternelle des Femmes atonce began pressing Parliament for the removal fromthe statute books of the requirement for “maritaleautorisation.” And not long ago the Chamber ofDeputies passed the bill granting to married womenfor the period of the war, permission to demand fromthe courts the right to do without this legal formality.Italy in 1917 completely swept away this sameancient restriction. The bill introduced by the ItalianMinister of Justice, Signor Sacchi, abrogated notonly maritale autorisation, but “every other lawwhich in the field of civil and commercial rightscurtails the capacities of Italian women.” Speakingfor the measure in Parliament, Signor Sacchideclared it an “act of justice—of reparation almost,to which women have now more right than ever.”

But these civil disabilities have not been limitedto Latin countries. You may find them anywhereas a hang-over from past ages. It is simply thenatural corollary to that old doctrine of coverturethat the acts of the dependent person should lackauthority before the law. Even in the State ofWashington, a wife may not sue alone in a court oflaw to recover personal damages: her husband mustjoin with her in the suit. Everywhere in the professionsand in business, woman’s progress has beenblocked because the courts, looking into the lawbooks, found the status of this person in question.[359]If her protected position more or less prevents herfrom entering into legal contracts, doubt is cast onall of her agreements. What prudent business manwould wish to engage in a business transaction withher? There are provisions of the Married Women’sProperty Act in England, which make her not liableto imprisonment for refusal to pay her debts. Andwho would choose to be represented in a court of lawby an advocate who, though to-day in clear possessionof all of her capacities, may to-morrow cease tobe “responsible” before the law? For any woman,though not yet married, is always subject to thatliability! That was what the courts of the UnitedStates decided when the first women began to applyfor admission to the legal profession. And it is tocorrect the position in which women are placed bythe common law that their admission to the practiceof law in America has been by the slow process of an“enabling act” from State to State. In England,where this common law still bars the way, their presentappeal now before Parliament is significantly entitled“A Bill to remove disqualifications on theground of sex or marriage for the admission of personsas solicitors.”

There is still another “disability” which is causingto-day perhaps the most world-wide concern ofall. A spectacular figure has been silhouettedagainst the background of the great war. In thetranquil days of peace, a woman might have beenall her life married to a man of differing nationalitywithout making the discovery that she had thereby[360]lost her own: by law when she married, she becameof her husband’s nationality. When the troopsbegan to march in 1914, a wife like this suddenlyfound herself a woman without a country. FrightenedEnglish women married to Germans resident inLondon, panic-stricken German women married toEnglishmen who happened to be resident in Berlin,knew not which way to turn for a haven from theterrors of war. Pronounced aliens in their homeland, their position was even worse than that of, thewoman of actual enemy birth who was stranded ina foreign country when the war burst. She could atleast go home. But where should a woman whowas married to an enemy alien go?

Her own country turned on her coldly with thedeclaration, His people are your people. And nowherein the world would she be so little welcomeas among his people now at war with and bitterlyhostile to hers. There are instances where thesewomen have been obliged to find refuge in neutralcountries. In some lands they have been permittedto remain in the place of their birth, but under policeespionage. A man and his wife, you know, are one.And if he controls her absolutely, from her slippersto her principles, is it likely that she will dare to bea free agent in her war sympathies? As a matter offact, this war has developed that she is always moreor less under the cold suspicion even of relatives andneighbours, of having along with the loss of her ownnationality lost also her patriotism. Who shall say[361]but that in obedience to her husband she may be aspy? I stood at the desk in the Bow Street PoliceStation registering my arrival in London one warday, when a timid voice of inquiry at my side alsoaddressed the sergeant: “I want to ask,” she saiddiffidently, “if I could possibly have my mail senthere to police headquarters? You see, it’s lettersfrom my husband interned here in England becausehe’s a German. I’m an English woman. But everyboarding house in London where I try to live, as soonas that envelope marked ‘Enemy Internment Camp’arrives in my mail, turns me out.”

Like this, the “alien wife” has to be shunted aboutin many lands to-day. Even a woman who has notso lost her nationality may not travel without all ofthe credentials of her marital status to establish it.If you apply for a passport at Washington, you areasked for your husband’s birth certificate and undersome conditions your marriage certificate. A marriedman is not asked for his. Why this inquiry intoyour personal affairs? Because it is tacitly assumedthat you are so under the authority of another personthat there is no knowing what he may make you do.By all law and religion you have been taught to obeyhim. Then if he told you to blow up a ship, wouldyou? The only way to make sure that you are a“safe” person to be at large, is to make sure of yourhusband’s loyalty. For your identity is not yourown, you see, it’s his. If he happens to be Frenchor Russian or German or Hottentot, so you must be.

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WOMAN’S COMING OF AGE

That’s the way that men have made the world.Now see it beginning to be made over. Womeneverywhere are crying out in their conventions andassociations that the married woman’s own nationalityshould be restored to her. America is the firstcountry to take action about it. And here, becausewomen have arrived at the halls of government, it ismore than resolution and petition. The UnitedStates Congress has before it a bill proposing therepeal of the law compelling women to relinquishtheir American citizenship on marriage to foreigners.The bill was introduced, let us note, by the Hon.Jeanette Rankin, the first woman to be a memberof the national law-making body.

What was it man said a little while ago: “Youdo not need a vote, my dear. I will represent youin government and make the laws for you.” So allover the world he did. But isn’t it plain now thathe made a mess of some of the laws he made for her?It is a conviction that has crystallised simultaneouslyin all countries that woman in her present independentsphere of activity has won her right to self-determinationin all matters personally important toher. That is why measures for her enfranchisem*ntare so universally under way. Let her vote for herself.Let her represent herself. No one else hasbeen able successfully to do this for her. And itmay be that now she will be able to make better[363]arrangements for herself than others have for herin this world where certainly a great deal has gonewrong.

So we have arrived at woman’s coming of age.She who used to be by the most ancient family lawpassed as a chattel from the guardianship of a fatherto that of a husband, is now to be an individual. Itis only now that she could be. In a way they wereright yesterday who refused to regard her as a responsibleperson. For she wasn’t. Under the coercionof coverture, she even had to think the way thatpleased the person who paid her bills! To-day witha wage envelope in one hand and a ballot in theother, she is as much of a human being as any oneelse is. As such, she is in a position to find the fullstatus of her own personality. For the first timesince history began, she will be under no one else’sauthority.

No greater revolution than this will have beenwrought by the Great World War. It is going tobe safe to permit to wives in all lands that theyretain their own nationality. The reason is clear:because no one can compel this new woman, eventhough she is a wife, to be a spy, or anything elsethat she does not wish to be. Or anything else thatshe does not wish to be!

In those words, the woman movement of to-dayfull-throated carols a hope for humanity that hasnot echoed before in all the epics or the sagas or theinspired revelations since the fall of man. Who[364]giveth this woman in marriage? She who was abondwoman now is free. And church and stateshall hear her terms!

Oh, yes, they shall! For a reform of the institutionon which society rests is all that will prevent arebellion against it. What do women want? Thiswoman who turns the ring on her finger? Read thepublications that during the past decade have said:The Free Woman, edited by Dora Marsden in England;Minna Cauer’s Die Frauenbewegung andMarie Stritt’s Die Frauenfrage and Helene Stocker’sDie Neue Generation in Germany; La Française,edited by Jane Misme in France; and MargaretSanger’s The Woman Rebel in New York; the teachingsof Dr. Alice Vickerey in London and of Dr.Aletta Jacobs in Amsterdam. There were evenwomen in the radical vanguard of that woman movementof yesterday who were ready to end marriageif it were not mended.

The world—and man who made it—had no adequateconception of the hurt that was smothered andsmouldering in the heart of her over whom he exercisedhis dominion and power. Windows were heardsmashing in England. Over in Germany therehad begun a breaking with less noise about it, so thatthe world in general did not know. In the Kaiser’skingdom right in the face of the mailed fist, traditionsnot to be so easily repaired as glass were beingshattered. But it was the suffragette outburst inLondon that caught public attention. Thoughtfulmen who honestly wanted to know—and never[365]could understand—turned to each other with thequestion, Why do women do this? And no mancould tell.

Gentlemen, come with me. There is sitting inWestminster in 1910 a Royal Commission on Marriageand Divorce. Not yet even have their findingschanged English law. But the commission was appointedto make inquiry into these matters in responseto a rising feeling of unrest over the presentarrangements. Witnesses, to give evidence that itmay be determined what ought to be done, are in1910 being called. This government commission, itshould be noted, quite contrary to precedent, includesamong the churchmen and statesmen who have beenappointed to decide the question, also two women.One of them, the Lady Francis Balfour, is interrogatinga witness whom she has summoned to thestand because she has a particular point that shewishes to elucidate. He is the Bishop of Birmingham,whose church insists that at marriage the womanpasses indissolubly into the power of the husband.To the man, it is permitted that he may divorce herfor adultery. But so long as these two shall live,not even for that offence on his part may she haverelease. He may beat her. He may flay her soul.But she is his—unless she gets all of these detailsspread on the public records and the judges of thecourts decide that there are enough of them legallyto constitute “cruelty.” Then, for adultery togetherwith this cruelty on the part of a husband, a fewEnglish women have been allowed divorce. But it[366]is very difficult and very expensive and very offensiveto the clergy when it has been actually accomplished.

The Lady Francis Balfour is speaking. To theBishop of Birmingham she is saying: “Let me takea concrete case. You may have a woman who is aChristian and you may have her husband ill usingher in some sort of way. We have had evidenceput before us, which is of course known to us all,that there are even men who live on the prostitutionof their wives. Now, is that not a contract whichhas been broken on the one side in the worst possibleway? Are they twain one flesh? Is that for betterand for worse?”

Bishop of Birmingham: “Yes, I am afraid so.”

Lady Francis Balfour: “And is that wife to stickto that husband, she being a Christian, and to do ashe commands her?”

Bishop of Birmingham: “Yes, I am afraid so.”

WHAT WOULD MEN HAVE DONE?

That’s all, gentlemen. You and I will go.There will be other witnesses and days of testimony.But isn’t this enough? What would you yourselvesdo if your church and your state handed you overbody and soul, like this, to any other human beingto have and to hold and to exercise this power anddominion over you? I don’t believe you’d ever stopat all to parade and respectfully to petition about it.I think you’d be mobbing and rioting and bombingright away. And if they had arrested you and put[367]you in Holloway Jail, you’d have raised the roofand torn down the whole social structure!

Well, in England women broke windows. InGermany, as I have said, they broke more. “Yourstatutes have limited the liberties of the woman whomarries. Then you shall never limit us,” was thegauntlet thrown down to society by the extremists.They were university women, some of them withdoctor of philosophy degrees, who scathingly refusedthe ring and faced free love instead. They werequite frank about it—and quite fearless. I havetalked with them there in Berlin. They looked atme as clear eyed, when they told me of what theyhad done, as any women who have walked ringedand veiled down a church aisle into legal wedlock.Well, they seemed to think it was the only way, toact directly instead of to agitate.

And they got out the book of the church ritualthat they had repudiated. And they turned to aparagraph and said to me, Read. And I read:“The woman’s will, as God says, shall be subject tothe man and he shall be her master: that is, thewoman shall not live according to her free will ...and must neither begin nor complete anything withoutthe man. Where he is, there must she be andbend before him as her master, whom she shall fearand to whom she shall be subject and obedient.”

So I write it here, gentlemen, for you to see. Andagain, I submit, What would you do if they hadsaid it that way to you? Be fair. Could any ringhave held you?

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It was natural, I think, that revolt should be mostbitter in England and in Germany, the two countrieswhere women were driven to the verge of desperation.A Frenchman may hold the reins of his authorityso gaily that a woman with skill evades them.And the dear American man will pass them rightover to you if you’re a woman of any judgment andfinesse at all. But in those lands where a wife mustnot only promise to obey, but also they made her, theeruption was due. Action and reaction are equal inthe old law of physics, and you can pretty accuratelymeasure the rebound by that. It was because thering hurt worse in Germany than anywhere else inthe world, that they just tore it off. But the marriagestrike that was started in Germany wasn’tstaying there.

In nearby Sweden, a woman who is a very prominentlawyer and a man who is a university professor,decided to do with an announcement in a newspaperinstead of a ceremony in a church—and the ladyremains a lawyer. It was the only way that shecould. The law of that land places the woman, onthe day that she marries, under her husband’s guardianship,and pronounces her incompetent thereafterto act as an attorney in court! The newspaper announcementas it is now used in Scandinavia iscalled the “conscience marriage.”

There were also Anglo-Saxon women who hadrebelled. In London, an Oxford graduate who haddone with window breaking told me quite candidlythat she was living what she called the “unorthodox[369]life.” And there were others in her particular Londonsuburb. In New York City, even, there arewomen who have preferred the “free union.”

You see how near it was to being wrecked, this aninstitution more revered by society than all of thecathedrals and art galleries. Only this war, probably,could have averted the disaster. Now thisnew woman, with her wage envelope and her vote,has become articulate. She can speak as one whocan pay the rent, about how “we” shall live.

Oh, it’s not either Hampstead or Long Island.Never mind for a while whether the lace curtainswill be long enough or shall the floors be done over.Yesterday her domain was the home. To-day it’sthe wide, wide world to be set to order. For thefirst time she’s facing her destiny, with the right todecide more than the parlour carpet or her satin slippersor even her sociological principles.

How “we” shall live and love together, is thequestion for consultation. And there is statute anddogma and custom and convention and tradition tobe done over. These have been handed down untilthey are many of them past all usefulness. Some ofthem are moth-eaten and quite outworn. None ofthem, please note this, gentlemen, none of them isof her selection. Just think of that. There’s not acode in the world that was formulated by a woman.The creeds that have come from Rome and Wittenbergand Westminster were not even submitted forwoman’s inspection. And marriage was made forher by law courts and church councils to which she[370]was not even asked. There was not so much as aby-your-leave to the lady, in the matter of her mostintimate personal concern. Oh, isn’t this clearlywhere the reconstruction of civilisation shall commence?

MAKING OVER MARRIAGE

Only for the man in khaki to come home again itwaits. Then with the new woman, together at last,they can build the new world aright. For neveragain shall we permit any such skewed and twistedand one-sided job as that of the past. “Dear,” shewill say, “you did it as well as you could, probably,that old world. But the trouble was, that you didit alone.”

And with a little whimsical smile, she’ll quote forhim the old proverb that “two heads are better thanone.” Then perhaps they will walk in the gardenin the evening. And with her hand in his arm, shewill speak as she never could speak before—as afree woman who has found her soul! There werethings, I think, that God forgot when he talked toMoses and to St. Paul. But now he’s told them toher.

Listen: “Marriage,” she will say, “marriage,dear, we must make over so that it shall be somethingvery sweet and very sacred.”

Oh, it wasn’t always that yesterday. There arewomen who know it wasn’t. When a man couldsay to the woman the law gave to him, “Come untome to-night, or I shall not give you money with[371]which to buy shoes for the children to-morrow.” Orhe may have said, “the slippers for your pretty feet”—whenmarriage was that way, everything in itdivine just died! It shall never be so again.

Hear the new woman. “We shall have more loveabout marriage and less law,” she will say. “Andwe shall never let them lock us in. Love alwayslaughed even yesterday at the clumsy locksmithswho thought they had bolted and barred the Doll’sHouse with ordinance and ritual. For how lovecometh, we may not say, who are mute before somuch as the mystery of the tint of the rose or theperfume of the lilies in June. Nor how love goeth,dare we define. Presumptuous mortals who havethought to hold back love with law and enactment,have made of marriage an empty form, echoing withthe mockery of the happiness that fled.”

Well, we will say that she is talking like this underthe stars. The next morning at breakfast she willcome right to the point. And I know where shewill begin. “That old doctrine of coverture,” shewill say, “take it away!” There is a place for therelics of an antiquated civilisation. In the museumof the Tower of London they have in a glass casethe little model of the rack and thumb screw. Theexecutioner’s block and the headsman’s axe is an importantand impressive exhibit. And there are thecoats of mail of early warriors. It is customary, Ibelieve, to put there all things that are passing intodesuetude: a hansom cab went in the other day.Now let them take also this ancient doctrine of coverture,[372]and put it in a glass case for future generationsto wonder at its barbarity. Then may the marriagecontract be rewritten with a really free hand.

How it will be done all over the world, we evenat present may prophesy. See already Scandinavia.The northern sky was alight with the forecast ofwoman’s freedom, even before this war broke. Contemporaneouslywith the enfranchisem*nt of womenup there, completed in Denmark only in 1915, almostthe first act of governments in which all of thepeople were for the first time represented, was toappoint a marriage commission. On it are bothmen and women from the three lands, Norway, Denmark,and Sweden. It is still at work revising themarriage laws. The task is not completed. Butthere are important sections of the new code ready:they have taken the “obey” out of the marriage service;they have stipulated for divorce by mutual consent,that is by request of the parties interested, whoare to be let out of wedlock as simply and as easilyas they were let in. Further personal rights andproperty rights are all being defined and arrangedon the new basis of equality of morality and dutyand responsibility and on the assumption that thewife is a separate personality from her husband.

The nearby country of Finland, where the womanmovement has always kept step with Scandinavia,has also taken similar action. The Law Committeeof the Finnish Parliament had in 1917 appealed tolocal authorities and other qualified bodies for suggestionson the subject of the reform of the marriage[373]laws. Seven women’s associations united in formulatingthe pronouncement which was returned.There is no paragraph about divorce for the reasonthat Finland has already accomplished divorce bymutual consent. For the rest, it is probably themost complete presentment available of the newwoman’s point of view. This is what she asks:—

1. That the guardianship of the husband shallcease, and the married woman have an equal rightof action in all legal matters, even against her husband;that she shall have the right to plead in courtsof law and to carry on business independently.

2. That the married couple shall have equal responsibilitiesand rights as regards the children andprovide for them together.

3. That the husband and wife shall have equalright to represent the family in public matters. Ifeither party uses this right improperly, it can betaken from him or her by the courts on the demandof the other party.

4. If either husband or wife should be a cause ofdanger to the other, the party who is endangeredshall have the right to separate from the other. Thecourts shall be empowered to decide whether the circ*mstancesare such as to entitle the complainingparty to receive maintenance.

5. That if a married couple separates, the partywho retains the care of the child shall decide thequestion of the child’s education. If this right bemisused, the other party shall have the right toappeal to the courts for rectification.

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6. That if any labour contract or business be conductedby one of the parties to the detriment of thefamily, the other party shall have the right of appealto the courts with the object of annulling the contractor forbidding the business.

7. That in regard to the property of marriedcouples, there shall be three possible alternativemethods of arrangement: (a) Joint possession inthe case of earned income. (b) Joint possession ofevery description of property. (c) Separation ofproperty.

8. Several points must be taken into considerationin regard to the working of these different methodsof arrangement: (a) That the distinction betweenreal and other descriptions of property shall cease.(b) That each party shall have control over his orher separate property and the income derived from itand over all earned income. (c) That each partyshall be bound to contribute to the maintenance ofthe family in proportion to his or her means, eitherin work or in financial resource. (d) That in caseof joint possession, the whole income, earned or unearned,of each party shall belong to the commonfamily fund. (e) That in the case of joint possession,both parties shall have equal rights of disposition.These rights shall be used by them jointly insuch a manner that neither party shall be able todispose of the property without the consent of theother, and no transaction can take place without theconsent of both parties. (f) That the party whogives the chief labour and attention to the home shall[375]have a due share of the common property and of theearned income, with full power to defray his or herpersonal expenses and those of the home.

9. Before marriage, the contracting parties shallagree on which of the three systems the propertyshall be arranged. This agreement shall be capableof alteration after marriage with due legal formalitiesand safeguards.

10. Husband and wife shall inherit from eachother on the same footing with the children.

This memorial from the Finnish women coincidesperfectly in spirit with the new laws in process ofconstruction for Scandinavia. When the DutchParliament, which has just conferred a new measureof suffrage on the women of the Netherlands, was in1917 debating the matter, an alarmed reactionaryrose to object: “But how can married women vote?For married women are not free. They are like soldiersin barracks, who have lost the liberty to expresstheir thoughts.”

THE NEW FATHERHOOD

Sir, that’s just the point. But the liberty thatwas lost, is found. No one, as we have seen, isgoing to compel this new woman to be anything thatshe does not want to be. Let us not forget this nowas she goes on talking. For she is coming presentlyto that which is at the heart of the whole womanquestion, nay, more, the human question.

“Dear,” she is going to say, “there is that whichmatters more than all the rest for us now to decide.[376]It’s the children, the children are on my mind.”Then she is going to emphasise how important it isthat parenthood shall be equalised. By the lawsthat men have made about it, quite universally,equally in fact in England and Germany and Franceand Italy and Russia and the United States, thefather is the only parent. His will decides its religion,its education, and all of the conditions underwhich the child shall be reared. There are a few ofthe United States, most notably those where womenvote and one or two others in which pressure has beenbrought to bear by the feminists, where the law hasbeen corrected. Also in Scandinavia and in Australia,as soon as women have come into the vote,one of their first efforts has been to establish what isknown as “equal guardianship,” the right of a marriedmother to her own child. To an unmarriedmother, by a strange perversity in the statutes ofmen, is conceded not only all the right to the childbut there is put upon her all of the responsibility ofits parenthood.

The new woman is not going to rest content tohave it stand that way. Already the world is beingforced to a new deal for childhood. The sins of thefathers are being lifted from the children on whomsociety in the past has so heavily visited them. Ababy has broken no law. Why brand it, then, as“illegitimate”? War babies crying in all landshave brought statesmen to startled attention. Governmentafter government has arranged for what iscalled the “separation allowance” to go to the woman[377]at home to whom the soldier at the front knows thatit belongs—even though she has no marriage lines toshow. So the War Office pen writes off one discrimination.Of children who used to be called “illegitimate,”50,000 born annually in England and 180,000born annually in Germany will now be entitledto start life with equal financial government aid thatthe others get.

It is the first step in the direction of the new arrangementsabout parenthood. The polite fictionthat used to pass, that there were any children withoutfathers, is going to be ruled out of court. Of allthe laws that have been written that evidence thedifference in the point of view of men and women,see the illegitimacy laws. Napoleon put it in hiscode “La recherche de la paternité est interdite,”and it was only in 1913 that the feminists of France,led by Margaret Durand, succeeded in getting thatedict modified so that a woman in France is nolonger “forbidden” to look for the father of herchild. Up in Norway, where women vote, they puton the statute books in 1915 a very different law:it commands that the father of the child shall befound. This is the famous law framed by JohanCastberg, minister of justice, and inspired by hissister-in-law, Fru Kathe Anker Moler. The draftof the bill was submitted in advance to the women’sclubs of the country: the National Women’s Councilof Norway stamped it with the seal of approval. Sothat there can be no doubt but that it has put thematter as a woman thinketh. Even the title of the[378]new law significantly omits all objectionable reference:it is a “Law Concerning Children whose Parentshave not Married Each Other.” They areequally entitled to a father’s name and support andto an inheritance in his property as are any otherkind of children. The father must be found! Noteven if the paternity is a matter of doubt amongthree men or six men or any several men, can any ofthem, or all of them, escape behind “exceptio plurium,”which in other lands affords them protection.In Norway, they are every one of them a party to thepossible obligation. And the financial responsibilityof fathering the child in question is distributed prorata among them. What the Norwegian law accomplishes,you see, is the abolition of anonymous paternity.

Like this, there is a great deal in the laws and thereligion and the public opinion of the world of yesterdaythat will need revision. Lastly, there is thatwhich is of more significance than all the rest. Wayback in the beginning of things, the lady who wascalled Eve, you remember as the Sunday schoollesson ran, got the world into a lot of trouble, itwas said, by eating of the fruit of the tree of knowledge.Too little knowledge, some one else has toldus, may prove a dangerous thing. But there is aLatin proverb on which a school of therapeutics isfounded, “Similia similibus curantur.” Then, if“like cures like,” what we need to-day is moreknowledge to make right the ancient wrong thatafflicts the earth! Well, we have it.

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THE WHISPER OF GOD

This new woman will look back into the dear eyesthat search hers. In her level glance there will flashan understanding of life that never was in woman’seyes before in all the ages of sorrow since the angelfixed up the flaming swords that shut her out ofEden. For in the white silence where she has foundher soul, she has heard even the closest whisper ofGod. If man before missed it, why, maternity wasnaturally the matter that he could not know andcould not understand. This is the new revelation,that maternity shall be made more divine! Therehas been a halo about it in song and picture andstory. But we want to put a halo on in London’seast end and New York’s east side. Creation itselfis to be corrected.

Doesn’t it need to be? See how many men, it isbeing discovered to-day, are not well enough madefor soldiers. England is obliged to reject 25% ofher men as physically unfit. America is reported tohave rejected 29%. The other nations cannot showany better figures. If in the great arsenals that aremanufacturing munitions of war, one shell in fourturned out was spoiled, the industry would have tobe at once investigated and put on a more efficientbasis than that. Quite likely the mistake might bediscovered to be “speeding up.” There had been aneffort to turn out too many shells. If fewer shellsare made, they can be better made. And you willget just as many in the end. For by the present[380]process, all these shells that fail, you see, do notcount in the real output.

It’s just like this about people. We’ve been tryingto have too many. When Mrs. Smith in Londonor in New York or Frau Schmidt in Berlin, hassix or eight or more children in, say, two rooms,some of them are going to have rickets and some ofthem are going to have tuberculosis and some of themare going into penal institutions. So that when youcome to want them for the army, you find that onein four has failed. Why, even chickens would. Apoultry fancier does not presume to try to raise abrood of chickens in quarters too crowded for theirdevelopment. He measures his poultry house anddetermines how many chickens he can accommodatewith enough air and space—and how many he canafford to feed. He limits the flock accordingly.Mrs. Smith in London or New York and FrauSchmidt in Berlin, can too!

Fire and electricity and other useful forces we havelong since obtained the mastery over and turned froma menace to a blessing to mankind. But anothereven mightier force has ravaged the world like unchainedlightning. Because it has not been controlled.Men thought that it must not be. So thefear of its consequences has haunted homes in everyland since the pronouncement, “I will greatly multiplythy conceptions.” All of the great religiousteachers said that you must not take the misery outof maternity. It was meant to be there. And science,which had accomplished miracles in mitigating[381]other suffering, stood afar off from the woman inchildbirth. So much as an anæsthetic to deaden thepain was forbidden, until quite recent times, as aninterference with the will of the Almighty. It wasQueen Elizabeth of England who broke that taboo.By virtue of her royal authority, she demanded chloroform.And got it. Her daring could then, ofcourse, be followed by other women. Newer iconoclastsare calling for twilight sleep, that achievesmaternity in a dream. Add birth control. And weshall be out of the trouble in which the unhappylady called Eve so long ago involved all of herdaughters.

Birth control means, instead of a maternity thatis perpetual, unregulated and haphazard and miserable,a maternity that is intelligently directed andlimited. So that it shall be volitional. The risingvalue of a baby at last requires that people shall beas carefully produced as the shells we are makingwith such infinite accuracy. Most of all, it is importantthat there shall not be too many babies lestsome of them not well done shall be only worthlessand good for nothing. You see, you have to thinkabout quality as well as quantity when you arecounting for a final output. Russia, which had abirth rate of 50 per thousand, the highest birth ratein Europe, is the nation whose military defences havecrumpled like paper. It was France, with a birthrate of 28 per thousand, the lowest in Europe, thatheld the line for civilisation at the Marne. And itwas Germany, which has always imposed on its[382]women as a national service the speeding up of population,that plunged the world into the agony of thiswar. Because 55% of the families of Berlin live inone-room tenements and there is nowhere to putthe babies that have kept on coming, Germanyreached out for the territory of her neighbours. Thepressure of population too large for too narrowboundaries is as certain in its consequences as is thepressure of steam in a tea kettle with the spoutstopped up. There’s sure to be an explosion. Germanyexploded. Back of her military system, it isher maternity system that is responsible for the woeof the world to-day. It’s plain that the way not tohave war anywhere ever again is not to have toomany babies!

John Stuart Mill, the great economist who twogenerations ago looked into the future and saw avision of the woman movement that would be, said:“Little advance can be expected in morality untilthe production of large families is regarded in thesame light as drunkenness or any other physicalexcess.” And he added: “Among the probableconsequences of the industrial and social independenceof women, I predict a great diminution of theevil of overpopulation.” John Stuart Mill meantMrs. Webber and Mrs. Smith. Two children to beenjoyed instead of ten to be endured, is an ideal offamily policy possible of attainment even in the eastends and the east sides of the world. For to Mrs.Webber or to Mrs. Smith, handling her own wage[383]envelope, no one any more may say, “I shall notgive you money for shoes to-morrow unless—” Volitionalmotherhood is the final truth that shall makewomen free. No one can compel the new womanto be anything that she does not wish to be, not evento be a mother until she chooses the time.

After that curse pronounced upon Eve, there wasa promise: “The seed of the woman shall bruisethe serpent’s head!” “We can do it, dear.” That’swhat the new woman will say triumphantly to theman who comes back to her from the Great War.Together they will take up the task of making, notonly a new earth, but a new race!

And I think he will be glad for what she tells him.The wonder is, not so much that women in the pastwere willing to endure the “subjection of women,”but that men consented to it. A bird in a cage canof course be made to eat out of the hand of theowner who feeds it. But see the bird that is freeand will come at your call!

The women in industry and commerce and theprofessions and in government, whom we are seeingin these years of war passing all barriers, will at lastmake their final stand for what? It is for happiness.Look! Even now, who has the vision to discern,may discover the gates of Eden swinging wide.And when the man in khaki, with the age-old yearningin his heart, “Woman wanted, my woman,”comes back to clasp her in his arms once more, thesetwo everywhere shall enter in. For the ultimate[384]programme toward which the modern woman movementto-day is moving is no less than paradise regained!It may even, I think, have been worth thiswar to be there.

THE END