in counsel, and eminent in public speech. In 1867 she
helped to organize the Universal Franchise Association of the District
of Columbia, of which she was president for years. She was also
Corresponding Secretary of the National Woman Suffrage Association,
and was ever considered the organizing power at Washington. She first
suggested the importance of annual conventions at the capital, in
order to influence Congressional action.

Mrs. Griffing's last appearance in public was at the May Anniversary
of the National Woman Suffrage Association, held in New York in 1871,
and so feeble was her condition that a screen was placed behind her to
enable the audience to hear her voice. At the close of the Convention
she went to the home of her childhood, in Hebron, Conn., hoping that
the bracing air of the New England hills would give her new life and
strength, until she could finish her work. But it was already
finished. She had taxed herself to the uttermost, beyond nature's
power to recuperate. In November she returned to Washington, and
enjoyed the sweet presence and tender care of her daughters until she
passed away on Feb. 18, 1872.

THE LADIES' NATIONAL COVENANT.

After the war was fairly inaugurated, the manufactories of the country
largely turned their attention to the production of material required
by the army, which, combined with the immense number of volunteers
from such avocations, and the rise in prices of all home manufactures,
created an immense import of foreign goods, which, pouring into our
country when gold was at the highest, brought to our doors a danger no
less formidable than that of the Rebellion. It was shown from official
returns, in 1863, that during a period of nine months, the imports, at
the port of New York alone, amounted to $160,000,000 in gold; equal,
including exchange, freight, insurance, etc., to twice that sum, while
our exports amounted to only $120,000,000 in paper.

This ruinous state of our trade brought on us the taunts of foreign
enemies, and roused the attention of the country to devise some method
of meeting the new danger; Congress temporarily raised duties fifty
per cent. in hopes of stemming the tide of importation. The patriotic
women of the nation, ever on the alert for methods of aiding the
country, early in 1864 called a meeting of the loyal women of
Washington, at which time an association, pledging women to the use of
home manufactures, was formed under the name of "