There was in the Suffrage movement a wise policy of action. And this using of women’s stored-up energy, however wastefully it may have been expended, inflamed in them a gladness that made easy all their payments of imprisonment, of forcible feeding, and even of death. In militancy women gained an object and a satisfaction: they were the centre of something that depended on them. Their movement, with all its absurdities, was a live thing in their hands. Thus the members gave to the cause their labour and their enthusiasm, and, because they had given it so much, they came to love it. Their energetic organisation came to stand above them like a big, greedy child, grabbing at anything and everything. It robbed from them the flying hours of life, little by little devouring them. But in so doing new fuel was thrown on the dead flames of women’s passions. For they gained that for which they were seeking. A new, strange opportunity for sacrifice was here, supplying the need which, however unrecognised and denied, is the fundamental desire of woman. This was the joy that was gained by the Suffrage martyrs—something vivifying, flooding dead lives with colour, action and emotion. Yes, these women yielded themselves to their movement with joy, just as a woman yields herself to her lover that she may give life to his child. And then all this audacious, hardly understood movement was brought to an end by war. Militarism put a swift close to militancy. As far as women were concerned, their hope of forcing political recognition fell to confusion. The war came like a great shadow across the whole bright complex problem of the future. So much was this so that writing of militancy now feels almost like referring to a forgotten event that happened in the very far past. It would be easy to pass over the whole Suffrage movement in silence. And, indeed, I should have done this if I did not believe that its inner effect on women had been more lasting than the outward gain. I wish to emphasise the change that came to women in the period immediately before the war. The Suffrage movement was a collective movement in which the individual had to win honour in self-forgetfulness and in group work. And this co-operation for the gaining of the Vote carried with it also a co-operation of service and a great development of mutual helpfulness. And from this it has followed very directly that many women have turned their backs for ever on petty interests and disloyalties to one another, and have recovered a quite fresh sense of honourable emulations and loyalty.