Mr. Gladstone said of the House of Lords when they opposed the Reform Bill of 1884 that they "lived in a balloon," unconscious of what was happening among the dim common populations living on the earth. The same criticism is applicable to the anti-suffragists. They opened the year 1911 in their _Review_ by saying that they looked "forward with complete confidence to the work of saving women from the immeasurable injury of having their sex brought into the conflict of political life." This was immediately after the election of December 1910, during which Mrs. Humphry Ward had taken an active personal share in her son's electoral contest in West Hertfordshire; and during which a large number of Unionist candidates and others had had the offer from her publishers of her _Letters to my Friends and Neighbours_, written anew for the second election of 1910, price 3d. each or 1000 copies for £5. No suffragist blames Mrs. Humphry Ward for her active interest in politics. Whether people like it or not, women are taking part in active political work; but to talk of "the immeasurable injury of bringing their sex into the conflict of political life," and at the same time to profit by the political knowledge and enthusiasm of women is a practical absurdity. All parties are alike in getting as much work as possible during an election out of the women who sympathise with them. To encourage the political activity of women and at the same time talk about "protecting women from the immeasurable injury of having their sex brought into the conflict of political life," helps one to understand why Frenchmen say that the English are a nation of hypocrites. Some eminent anti-suffragists attacked the Insurance Bill (1911) on the ground that it is "cruelly unfair" to women; others, including some of their most distinguished women, but no men, sent to the Prime Minister in July a carefully worded and powerfully reasoned letter explaining in detail the points in which they felt that the Bill did less than justice to women. Space does not permit a detailed examination of the points raised in this excellent letter, but one sentence in it must be given, for it contains within itself the gist of the case for women's suffrage:-- "We would strongly urge that instead of meeting these and similar cases by amending the Bill in the way which was promised by the Chancellor of the Exchequer on July 10th, _it would be preferable to substitute the insurance which is needed for that which is not needed_." The unrepresented are always liable to be given what they do not need rather than what they do need. This, in one sentence, forms the strength of the case for women's suffrage. However benevolent men may be in their intentions, they cannot know what women want and what suits the necessities of women's lives as well as women know these things themselves. CHAPTER VI THE MILITANT SOCIETIES