in hand, in a constant fever of
anxiety. As, in the early days, the fees were from one to two hundred
dollars a night, the speakers themselves were desirous of accomplishing
as much as possible.

In 1869 I gave my name, for the first time, to the New York Bureau, and
on November 14 began the long, weary pilgrimages, from Maine to Texas,
that lasted twelve years; speaking steadily for eight months--from
October to June--every season. That was the heyday of the lecturing
period, when a long list of bright men and women were constantly on the
wing. Anna Dickinson, Olive Logan, Kate Field,--later, Mrs. Livermore
and Mrs. Howe, Alcott, Phillips, Douglass, Tilton, Curtis, Beecher, and,
several years later, General Kilpatrick, with Henry Vincent, Bradlaugh,
and Matthew Arnold from England; these and many others were stars of the
lecture platform.

Some of us occasionally managed to spend Sunday together, at a good
hotel in some city, to rest and feast and talk over our joys and
sorrows, the long journeys, the hard fare in the country hotels, the
rainy nights when committees felt blue and tried to cut down our fees;
the being compelled by inconsiderate people to talk on the train; the
overheated, badly ventilated cars; the halls, sometimes too warm,
sometimes too cold; babies crying in our audiences; the rain pattering
on the roof overhead or leaking on the platform--these were common
experiences. In the West, women with babies uniformly occupied the front
seats so that the little ones, not understanding what you said, might be
amused with your gestures and changing facial expression. All these
things, so trying, at the time, to concentrated and enthusiastic
speaking, afterward served as subjects of amusing conversation. We
unanimously complained of the tea and coffee. Mrs. Livermore had the
wisdom to carry a spirit lamp with her own tea and coffee, and thus
supplied herself with the needed stimulants for her oratorical
efforts. The hardships of these lyceum trips can never be appreciated
except by those who have endured them. With accidents to cars and
bridges, with floods and snow blockades, the pitfalls in one of these
campaigns were without number.

[Illustration: ELIZABETH SMITH MILLER.] [Illustration]

On one occasion, when engaged to speak at Maquoketa, Iowa, I arrived at
Lyons about noon, to find the road was blocked with snow, and no chance
of the cars running for days. "Well," said I to the landlord, "I must be
a