It happened one spring, that, when the ice broke up on the Fox River, a terrible storm of wind and sleet and rain came with it. Not a man in the State, however great the emergency, would have thought that he could cross. In this state of things, a woman was taken in childbirth, some two or three miles from the ferry. Just as the ferry-woman was going to bed, in the "outer darkness" of that terrible storm, she heard her name shouted from the opposite bank. She listened, and a grievous story was shouted across. She went to the stable and saddled her mare, and, all alone, forded the stream: the floating ice, heaped into walls, struck the sides of the faithful beast, and tore the woman's skirt to tatters. Now and then a flash of lightning showed her what progress she had made. At last, she struggled to the bank, and gave the needful help. Nobody ever asked how she got back. On the grass about Elgin, a whole ship's load died of cholera, nearly forty years ago. All the neighborhood stood back in dread; but I saw one aged woman, who closed the eyes of nine, and received the foreign blessing, which she felt, although she could not understand. In Quincy, I found two ladies just establishing a high school for girls, whom I have previously mentioned as having pushed through the endowment, for women, of the State University at Lawrence, and having opened a class in modelling in clay, under Professor Volkers. At the Cooper Institute I found more women at work than ever before, and to better advantage. A large class had just been formed to color photographs on glass, porcelain, and paper. Under such circumstances, we need not be disheartened because an ignorant woman, in a man's costume, has found the way to attract some attention in Europe and some contempt from Tom Hughes. Neither need it dismay us that the "Boston Advertiser" thinks the Equal-Rights meetings, in New York, have not been largely attended. There are those who want the suffrage, who do not care to encourage women to offer themselves for Congress before public opinion can accept them, and who are sufficiently disgusted by what looks like a mannish coalition with Democrats, to keep away from public meetings. Meanwhile, the women of Parma clamor for the right to vote for Victor Emanuel. A freedwoman, Charlotte Scott, proposes a monument, on behalf of her emancipated race, to President Lincoln; and the noble inspiration of Harriet Hosmer carries out the thought. But the very things we turn from force the necessary issues on the world. Wise action would never have brought the recent debate in Congress; nor prudent measures have secured thirty votes for Mrs. Stanton, and nine senatorial ballots for female suffrage. Once agitated in these quarters, the matter draws nearer to a final test. "Ride on! the prize is near." FOOTNOTES: [47] These have been supplied since my return to Boston.