I very soon became aware that the suffragette on the political warpath is a very different woman from the suffragette in other circumstances. None of them in the least degree frightened me or hectored me; in fact, political questions were discussed by them in the quietest, most sensible, and most intelligent manner, giving me the impression then that the extension of the vote to women would not find such women unqualified to make reasonable use of the privilege so long withheld from them. After the figures were added to the Exhibition, two of the four ladies very good-humouredly hinted to me that the portraits were not very flattering. I remember the ladies in question coming to see the group, and I promised I would make what alterations seemed possible and desirable. As I have not heard from them since, I gather that the likenesses have proved satisfactory. Months later, after a batch of laughing damsels had left the building, a paper disc, bearing the words “Votes for Women,” was discovered fixed to a button on Mr. Asquith’s coat. It was soon after the figures of the quartette had been placed in the Exhibition that an incident occurred which comes to me through the medium of a Fleet Street artist in black and white attached to a well-known paper. This gentleman had been instructed to attend a meeting some distance away from town for the purpose of taking some sketches of Miss Christabel Pankhurst, who was announced to speak. Having left things till the last moment, he discovered, to his dismay, that he had missed his train, and, not knowing what to do, he was bewailing his misfortune to a fellow artist, when the latter slapped him on the back and said: “Never mind, old fellow, you just go to Tussaud’s Exhibition and take as many pictures of the fair Christabel’s figure as you like. The model is a speaking likeness, and you can take it from me that the sketches will be all right; they will be quite as good as if drawn from life.” The advice was no sooner given than acted upon, and the result, I am told, was most satisfactory. Another sitter was Mr. T. W. Burgess, who came to my studio a few days after he swam the Channel. The burly Yorkshireman laughed as he entered and remarked: “I am in pretty good training, but I would rather swim the Channel again than sit still for you, Mr. Tussaud. However, I will do the best I can.” He sold the clothes he took off before he entered the water, and these clothes are worn by his portrait, now in the Exhibition. He also parted with the goggles and indiarubber cap he had worn during his swim, and the cup from which he took nourishment. Unfortunately one of Burgess’s too ardent “admirers” purloined his hero’s cup from us. [Illustration: T. W. BURGESS, THE CHANNEL SWIMMER Modeled from life by John T. Tussaud. In common with many of the models in Madame Tussaud’s, this model is dressed in the subject’s own clothing.] CHAPTER XXXIX