by
the cordial reception given us. In process of time Atlanta and New
Orleans claimed our presence.

Among the many mind-pictures left by our congresses, let me here outline
one.

The place is the court-house of Memphis, Tenn., which has been
temporarily ceded for our use. The time is that of one of our public
sessions, and the large audience is waiting in silent expectancy, when
the entrance of a quaint figure attracts all eyes to the platform. It is
that of a woman of middle height and past middle age, dressed in plain
black, her nearly white hair cut short, and surmounted by a sort of
student's cap of her own devising. Her appearance at first borders on
the grotesque, but is presently seen to be nearer the august. She turns
her pleasant face toward the audience, takes off her cap, and unrolls
the manuscript from which she proposes to read. Her eyes beam with
intelligence and kindly feeling. The spectators applaud her before she
has opened her lips. Her aspect has taken them captive at once.

Her essay, on some educational theme, is terse, direct, and full of good
thought. It is heard with close attention and with manifest approbation,
and whenever, in the proceedings that follow, she rises to say her word,
she is always greeted with a murmur of applause. This lady is Miss Mary
Ripley, a public school teacher of Buffalo city, wise in the instruction
of the young and in the enlightenment of elders. We all rejoice in her
success, which is eminently that of character and intellect.

I feel myself drawn on to offer another picture, not of our congress,
but of a scene which grew out of it.

The ladies of our association have been invited to visit a school for
young girls, of which Miss Conway, one of our members, is the principal.
After witnessing some interesting exercises, we assemble in the large
hall, where a novel entertainment has been provided for us. A band of
twelve young ladies appear upon the platform. They wear the colors of
"Old Glory," but after a new fashion, four of them being arrayed from
head to foot in red, four in blue, and four in white. While the John
Brown tune is heard from the piano, they proceed to act in graceful dumb
show the stanzas of my Battle Hymn. How they did it I cannot tell, but
it was a most lovely performance.

In the year 1898, for the first time since its first meeting, our
association issued no call for a congress of women. The reasons for our
failure to do so may be briefly