facts to
him I could see the expression of indignation and the colour come to
his face. He thought a moment and said, "Wait until next Sunday
morning."

The next Sunday the church was packed. When Mr. Beecher gave the notices
and came to Miss Dickinson's lecture, he called the board of directors
to account for this action in refusing to allow a woman to speak in the
Academy of Music. One of the directors, who was present, being ignorant
of the situation, took it up and denied the action of the directors.
Then said Mr. Beecher, "I take back all that I have said." I was there
in the west gallery, and at once decided not to allow a
misrepresentation like that to pass, and, mounted on the backs of two
pews, I recited to the audience all of the facts and the official
notice which I had from the directors, that the Academy could not be
used for this woman to speak in.

[Illustration: INTERIOR OF PLYMOUTH CHURCH]

When I had finished, the congregation broke into great applause. Mr.
Beecher then went on with his remarks, scoring the directors of the
Academy, and created such a sentiment in the community that the
directors rescinded their action, and the great mass meeting, with Miss
Dickinson as speaker, took place.

Since then, not only the Academy of Music, but other public buildings
throughout the country have been open for women to speak in, upon any
subject.

Stories of Mr. Beecher's sayings might be gathered by the thousand,
indeed they have been, and published in a book for the use of
ministers, teachers, and public speakers. Fortunately or unfortunately
the reporter was not quite so ubiquitous then, especially in the earlier
days, as now, but still there was a sufficient amount of newspaper
enterprise, and I often wish I had kept a record of the incidents and
trenchant remarks that were gathered up. A good many, however, never got
into the papers. Whether or not the following did I cannot say.
Certainly I did not get them from the press.

One day the evening papers announced that a terrible accident had
happened to Mrs. Beecher, that she had been thrown out of her carriage
in lower Fulton Street, been dashed against the steps of the Long Island
Bank, and so seriously injured that she was not expected to live, and
some said that she had been killed. That evening at the prayer meeting
no one expected to see Mr. Beecher. He came as usual and the people
crowded around him asking about Mrs. Beecher, as she had been r