"You have been boasting at the impossibility of our even getting this issue as far as the polls. You have been challenging us to tell you how that can be done. That's what we are here for this afternoon: to tell you, and to leave you perfectly free to act as your judgment directs." The audience moved, drew its breath, crossed and uncrossed its knees, spat its tobacco quids upon the floor, and craned its neck to see her better, to hear more distinctly what she had to say. Every man in Jordan County had been waiting for this news for three months. "How did you get stock low in this county fifteen years ago?" she asked, and waited. "Please, Marm, we voted on it!" whimpered the same waggish voice. "But before you voted, you got up a petition signed by three fourths of the voting register of the county, didn't you? And then you submitted the petition to the Ordinary of the county, who by the laws of this state advertised the election to be held not sooner than thirty days. And you got prohibition the same way! Twenty, fifteen years ago this was the only way to close saloons and grogshops that were open at every crossroad and on the streets of every town and village. We have a state-wide temperance law now as the result of local option laws that were enforced first until public sentiment against liquor was sufficiently strong to control state legislation." She paused, opened one palm, and brought her other fist down upon it with a smack that could be heard to the back of the hall, as she exclaimed: "That, gentlemen, is the way we shall win suffrage for women in this state. We shall get it first by _local option_ in this county! Other counties will follow your illustrious example and get it the same way, until the boundaries of these counties shall touch, and the experiment is no longer an experiment but an assured success!" The women cheered. They made as much noise as they could, they waved their handkerchiefs, and emitted little feminine chirrups. But the men sat silent, staring in amazement at the little fat old lady who was smiling at them like a gratified mother. "Now I have told you, and all you have to do at present is to sign that petition," she went on very pleasantly. "We have already secured to-day and yesterday the names of many of the leading citizens of Jordantown. And you will find just outside the doors of this hall two gentlemen whom you all know very well, Mr. Stark Coleman and Mr. Martin Acres. Each of them has a copy of the petition to be signed, and enough extra sheets of paper for every man here to sign his name. "Now," she concluded, "we will close this meeting by singing the national hymn, not only because this day commemorates the signing of the Declaration of Independence, but because, for all years to come, we shall look back upon this day as the one upon which the men of this county signed the petition which calls for liberty, rights, and justice for women!"