Feminism -- Fiction; Sex role -- Fiction; Women's rights -- Fiction
But I sez, “Wait and see,” (we wuz under a awnin’ and protected).
But the young and pretty speaker who wore a light silk dress and
exquisite bunnet, kep’ right on talkin’ jest as calmly as if she didn’t
know her pretty dress wuz bein’ spilte and her bunnet gittin’ wet as
sop, and I sez to Josiah:
“When wimmen are so in earnest, and want anything so much they can
stand soakin’ in their best dresses, and let their Sunday bunnets be
spilte on their heads, not noticin’ ’em seemin’ly, but keep right on
pleadin’ for right and justice, they are in a fair way of gittin’ what
they are after.”
He looked kinder meachin’ but didn’t dispute me.
The speeches wuz beautiful and convincin’, and pretty soon old Mom
Nater stopped cryin’ to hear ’em, and she and I both listened full of
joy and happiness to see with what eloquence and justice our sect wuz
pleadin’ our cause. Their arguments wuz so reasonable and convincin’
that I said to myself, I don’t see how anybody can help bein’ converted
to this righteous cause, the liftin’ up of wimmen from her
uncomfortable crouchin’ poster with criminals and idiots, up to the
place she should occupy by the side of other good citizens of the
United States, with all the legal and moral rights that go with that
noble title.
And right whilst I wuz thinkin’ this, sunthin’ wuz happenin’ that
proved I wuz right in my eppisodin’, and somebody awful sot agin it wuz
bein’ converted then and there (but of this more anon and bom-bye). We
stayed till we heard the last word of the last speech, I happy and
proud in sperit, Lorinda partly converted, she couldn’t help it, though
she wouldn’t own up to it at that juncter. And Josiah lookin’ real
deprested, the thought of representin’ me wuz worryin’ him I knew, for
I hearn him say (soty vosy), “Represent wimmen or not, I hain’t goin’
to set up all night with no old woman, and lift her round, nor dry nuss
no twins.”
And thinkin’ his sperit wuz pierced to a sufficient depth by his
apprehension, so reason could be planted and take root, and he wouldn’t
be so anxious in the future to represent a woman, I told him what
Diantha said and we all went home in good sperits. The sun shone clear,
the rain had washed the face of the Earth till it shone, and everything
looked gay and joyous.
When we got to Lorinda’s we see a auto standin’ in front of the door
full of flowery branches in front and the pink posies lookin’ no more
bright and rosy than the faces of the two young folks settin’ there. It
wuz Polly and Royal.
It seemed that when he and Maud got back from the country (and they
didn’t stay long, Royal wuz so restless and oneasy) Maud insisted on
his takin’ her to the suffrage meetin’ jest to make fun on’t, so I
spoze. She thought she had rubbed out Polly’s image and made a
impression herself on Royal’s heart that only needed stompin’ in a
little deeper, and she thought ridicule would be the stomper she
needed.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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