ibune, at this time, was the only paper in New
York, and, with few exceptions, the only large newspaper in the
country, which treated the question of woman's rights in any but a
contemptuous, abusive manner.]

[Footnote 12: They may have been preceded by the Moral Reform Societies
for the Rescue of Fallen Women, which originated in New York City, and
by a few Female Anti-Slavery Societies.]

[Footnote 13: At the first Woman's Rights Convention in 1848, Mrs. Mott
and Mrs. Stanton were so opposed to having a woman for chairman that
they came near leaving the hall. Four years later Mrs. Mott is herself
the presiding officer.]

[Footnote 14: Several of the speakers had weak, piping voices which did
not reach beyond a few of the front seats and, after one of these had
finished, Miss Anthony said: "Mrs. President, I move that hereafter the
papers shall be given to some one to read who can be heard. It is an
imposition on an audience to have to sit quietly through a long speech
of which they can not hear a word. We do not stand up here to be seen,
but to be heard." Then there was a protest. Mrs. Davis said she wished
it understood that "ladies did not come there to screech; they came to
behave like ladies and to speak like ladies." Miss Anthony held her
ground, declaring that the question of being ladylike had nothing to do
with it; the business of any one who read a paper was to be heard. Mr.
May, always the peacemaker, said Miss Anthony was right; there was not
a woman that had spoken in the convention who if she had been in her
own home would not have adjusted her voice to the occasion. "If your
boy were across the street you would not go to the door, put your head
down and say in a little, weak voice, 'Jim, come home;' but you would
fix your eye on him and shout, 'Jim, come home!' If the ladies, instead
of looking down and talking to those on the front seats, would address
their remarks to the farthermost persons in the house, all between
would hear."]

[Footnote 15: Mrs. Mott was the mother of six and Mrs. Stanton of seven
children. Both were devoted mothers and noteworthy housekeepers.]

[Footnote 16: No one of these ladies was married.]

CHAPTER VI.

TEMPERANCE AND TEACHERS' CONVENTIONS.

1852--1853.

Miss Anthony came away from the Syracuse convention thoroughly
convinced that the right which woman needed above every other, the one
indeed which would secure to her all others, was the right of suffrag