Women and War
were strengthened because they had women to protect.
A casual study of newspapers before and after the proclamation of war is profoundly instructive. Even the illustrated papers and periodicals tell their tale, and spare us the printed page. Pictures of recruits in place of club-women. Pictures of camps in place of convention halls. Pictures of Red Cross nurses bending over hospital beds, in place of militants raiding Buckingham Palace. Pictures of peaceful ladies sewing and knitting for soldiers, in place of formidable committees baiting Mr. Wilson, or pursuing the more elusive Mr. Asquith. Pictures of pitying young girls handing cups of broth and the ever-welcome cigarettes to weary volunteers, in place of suffragists haranguing the mob of Hyde Park. Never was there such a noteworthy illustration of Scott's archaic line,—
"O woman! in our hours of ease."
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