Equal Suffrage Department. Editors: Mrs. Julia Lucky, President of Equal Suffrage League, and Mrs. Sara H. Hood, Secretary.
Seeking health and resting here by
wonderful Gulf of Mexico, one finds
that not even its charm and beauty can
bring forgetfullness(sic.) of the cause of
Equal Suffrage. Watching the great
water with its ebbing and flowing tides,
one begins to seek types and compar-
isons. (Sometimes quiet and shimmering like jewels in the sun. it dazzles and
attracts by the ______ variety of its
appearance. But not long this quiescence
stage. Power lies underneath and
the winds of unrest, as in the woman
soul, began to mow and ripple after ripple,
wave after wave break upon the
shore, w___e ever and still ever to the
attentive ear, comes and an always deep-
ening sound. At first far distant one
scarcely catches it, but nearer and more
insistent the booming voices is heard.
It frightens, it terrifies the timid soul,
it speaks of storm aim possible danger,
yet to man who comprehends, this violent
change is beneficent. The gentle rip-
pies loving and caressing your feet are
beautiful, but it needs the great waves
coming from the deepest depths, to s__e
every atom of water to new and health-bringing life. Lacking this
Stress, vitality would sink
into death, while the great gulf stream would no longer temper the too excessive heat of some lands, nor mitigate the fierce cold that would freeze still other countries.
What matter if the current at times be too swift, or the waves too rough, and
some vessels
go down, and some lives be lost? Evil must ever go with the
good, and the benefits outweigh the
losses. While we see these things, our
thoughts turn to the gulf stream of progress. Beautifully
it curls and dances on the shores of our new age. But soon the gentle ripples under the impulse of awaking knowledge changes to waves, while loud and ever louder come the booming notes that show that the great
depths of womanhood are stirred, and
its strongest powers aroused to do their
great work. Out of the turmoil and
storm of these great waters, irresistable(sic.)
in their advances, will come blesings (sic.) to
the whole world. The heat of strife
and militancy and the wisdom will no
longer burn and enfeeble, while the chill
of misunderstanding, bitterness and prej-
udice will melt away under the glowing
warmth of woman's work. We know
not definitely of beginnings of the gulf
stream, but we do know that the stream
of woman's emancipation took its rise
at Seneca Falls. N. Y. in 1848. For
sixty-five years its current has moved
on and ever on. Sometimes slowly, yet
as inevitably and irresistibly as the
waters of the Gulf of Mexico. Higher
and higher beat its waves upon the
shores of our country; louder and more
compelling sounds the booming of the
power beneath. Storms may come, evils
may follow, yet the results will be good
for this current of equal rights and duties, bears in its bosom the great forces
that make for the highest welfare of the
world. These forces are clarified knowledge, warm, throbbing human interest,
peace, harmony, and justice,— and the
greatest of these is Justice. J. S. L
