t I have not alienated the two best-beloved of all my girls."

They finally effected a compromise on the money feature by sending out
handsomely engraved invitations to those whom they wished as guests and
letting them pay $4 a plate if they came. Although they proved to Miss
Anthony that this always was done in such cases, she assented very
unwillingly, and begged that they would ask the friends to contribute $4
apiece to the fund for South Dakota instead of the birthday banquet.
Finally, when all her scruples had been overcome, she made out so long a
list of people whom she wished to have complimentary invitations that
they would have filled every seat in the dining hall. She also was so
anxious that no one should be slighted in a chance to speak that Mrs.
Avery wrote: "The banquet would have to last through eternity to hear
all those Miss Anthony thinks ought to be heard."

On the evening of the birthday over 200 of her distinguished friends
were seated in the great dining-room of the Riggs House, including a
delegation from Rochester and a number of relatives from Leavenworth,
Chicago, New York and Philadelphia. Miss Anthony occupied the place of
honor, on her right hand were Senator Blair and Mrs. Stanton; on her
left, Robert Purvis, Isabella Beecher Hooker and May Wright Sewall.
(Mrs. Foster Avery was detained at home.) The room was beautifully
decorated and the repast elaborate, but with such an array of intellect,
the after-dinner speeches were the distinguishing feature of the
occasion. The Washington Star, in a long account, said:

A company of the most remarkable women in the world were assembled.
As she sat there, surrounded by the skirted knights of her long
crusade, Miss Anthony looked no older than fifty, but she had got a
good start into her seventy-first year before the dinner ended. May
Wright Sewall presided. Elizabeth Cady Stanton, that venerable and
beautiful old stateswoman, sat at the right of Senator Blair,
looking as if she should be the Lord Chief-Justice, with her white
hair puffed all over her head, and her amiable and intellectual
face marked with the lines of wisdom. Isabella Beecher Hooker, who
reminds one of her great brother, with the stamp of genius on her
brow and an energy of intellect expressed upon her face, sat at the
left of Miss Anthony. Old John Hutchinson, the last of the famous
singing family, his white hair and