od now under consideration, had
come to be as preeminently aristocratic. Beginning in the same way as
that of Massachusetts,--even with lower origin, since for a time it
threatened to be a mere penal settlement,--Virginia soon began to
attract to herself a class of adventurers widely differing from those
who sought religious liberty on the bleak shores of Plymouth Bay.

Differing from the general rule in such matters, in Virginia it was the
better class which survived, the convict class being gradually submerged
by the persistence of the higher grade of immigrants. It must not,
however, be forgotten in recalling the origin of the Virginian feminine
culture that even among the convicts there were many who were mere
prisoners of state and were of birth and standing the equal of any free
men whom they left behind them in England. Nor are origins of so much
concern as results; it is only where the former are evidently and
persistently causal that they need dwelling on in this work. Therefore,
we will pass from Virginia in the act of formation to Virginia as
settled by a people who were as individual in their way, though a most
diverse one, as their brethren of New England; but before completing the
journey from Massachusetts to Virginia let us pause for a moment at an
intermediate colony, to commemorate the deed of another woman pioneer in
America, Mistress Margaret Brent, of Maryland, the first American woman
to demand equal rights with men in the councils of state, the prototype
of every female reformer of later times.

It is necessary to suppose the reader familiar with the government and
affairs generally in that peculiar palatinate, the colony of Lord
Baltimore in Maryland. On the 9th of June, 1647, Leonard Calvert, the
Governor of Maryland and vice-gerent of Lord Baltimore, died at St.
Mary's, then the capital of the colony. He was attended during his fatal
illness by his kinswomen, Mistresses Margaret and Mary Brent, and the
former was made administrator to his estate. From this resulted an
unprecedented incident, when in January, 1648, the new governor having
called a session of the Assembly, Mistress Margaret Brent appeared in
the council chamber and demanded "to have a vote in the House for
herself and another as his Lordship's [Lord Baltimore] attorney." Upon
the refusal of the Assembly, shocked at such a revolutionary demand, to
consider the matter, Mistress Brent "protested in form against all the
proceedings