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considered it; but finds it simpler to throw in such sensational allusions here and there as a sort of garnishing for his argument, trusting no doubt that they will produce upon the minds of his readers the same impression which they have evidently made upon his own. The case seems to be this:—Mr. Smith's finer susceptibilities have been rudely shocked by the antics of a sort of Mænad sisterhood holding their revels here and there in the vast territory of the United States; and a state of mind has supervened which leads him to regard with disfavour any cause with which these women happen to be associated. Woman Suffrage, unfortunately, is one of those causes; and therefore Mr. Smith is opposed to Woman Suffrage.
Now, to let one's opinions be formed in this way is not to be guided by experience, as some people would have us believe. Let not anyone suppose that Mr. Smith has any such solid support for the views advanced in his essay. Woman Suffrage has nowhere yet, out of Utah, been tried in the United States; whereas we in England have witnessed its working at least in our municipal and school-board elections. In point of experience, therefore, we who have remained at home have the advantage of Mr. Smith. His sojourn in America, however, has brought to his notice the sort of women—or, more properly, a sort of women—who contrive to make themselves conspicuous in the United States in social and political agitations. It may be allowed that, as depicted by him, they are not a gracious band; though hardly less attractive than some of the male politicians who figure at Caucuses, Rings, and other political gatherings in the same country. Is Mr. Smith, in disgust at this latter product of American institutions, prepared to abolish male suffrage, and with it representative government—to abolish it not merely in the United States, but here and everywhere? for to this length does his argument against Woman Suffrage, drawn from analogous manifestations on the part of some American women, carry him.
As I have said, Mr. Smith has not pointed out the bearing
