The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1894-08-28


but we who know that the good ladies
outnumber them 1000 to 1 are not
afraid on that account to extend and
divide with wives and sisters this
solemn right. We allow our wives
and sisters to go to church for us and
pray for us while we go fishing. Why
not let them vote for usG We allow
our daughters and their mothers to in
tercede for us at the throne of grace.
Why not let then represent us at the
polls also7
But women r peculiar, of course,
from a mans standpoint. For instance,
there can be no law passed to prevent
aeWe-necked woman with gothic shout
der blades and a bloodshot nose if she
should desire to vote. but other ladies
should not get mad and remain at
home because this kind of voter makes
herself offensive and votes. Neither
should the good woman remain at
home because the wealthy Mrs. Dew
flicker does. If woman accepts one
half of mans duty as a patriot and as
a good citizen, not only as a tax payer,
but as a voter, she should be as faith
full to the discharge of that duty as she
is to the discharge of his entire moral
and religious obligations, which she
seems now to attend to almost entirely.
When we admit that woman is very
apt to occupy the front seats in para
disc and wear a big hat so that man
can only see the neck and shoulders of
the bass viol, why are we so Internally
pig headed about the right to the
baIlot9
She doesn'tneed to go to war because
she votes. Nobody is going to war in
30 years from now. We will wear bull
let,proof mackintoshes made in Ger
many and remain at home. When we
get so that we have guns that will shoot
20 miles and the enemy is able to catch
the bullets in the lining of his coat and
give them to the children to play with,
men will turn their swords into cult,
vators and their spears into Limerick
hooks, and we shall learn war no more.
Why should a man whose parents
three OF four generations back lived in
trees and hung by their tails from the
branches thereof vote in America, not
know a ringworm from a joint resolu-
ton, while the noble mother of states
man and warrior, taxed without repre-
s~entation, remains dumb during the
decay of patriotism9
It has been said that the advocacy of
woman suffrage has always been in the
hands of long-haired men and short
haired women, but 1 hope that 1 may
be regarded as a glazing and glossy ex-
ception.
While in England 1 cracked a bon
mot which will be remembered in Lon
don long after the gilded statue of
Prince Albert and the memory of Mrs.
Maybrick's case have moldered into
oblivion. 1 had occasion only twice
while abroad to open a case of bonmots,
and one of these I found damaged, but
a London humorist, Mr.. Odell, was re-
ferring one evening at a dinner given
to me by the archbishop of Canterbury
to the loss of his hair.
"Mr. Nye," he said, doubtless had
very thin, weak hair, even in his youth
but, though I am very, very bald now,
I once had beautiful long flowing hair"
"Ah, sir!' 1 exclaimed, with ready
wit, as I spread a little maple strip on
a trume and ate it jauntily, mime, too,
Mr.. Odell, was long flowing, but now
it is long fed"
C"FIowing" and "fed" of course be-
ing used Interchangeable to make the
wit more pungent, but, as the reader
will see, in utter defiance Of the actual
sense of the words. The wit of the re-
mark is so all fired subtle that some of
the clergy were at sea for some time,
and even began the service generally
used at sea, when all at once the thin
sparkle and delicate f1zz of the joke
flashed like a Damascus blade, as it
were, through the Opaque atmosphere,
80 that the archbishop laughed heartily
and slapped me on the back like every
thing.
But, by way, of conclusion, let me
say one word (for I find that nothing
is better for that purpose). We may
be, after all, better off without woman
suffrage. Perhaps a majority Of that
sex would not accept or exercise the
right if they had it, and to have any
kind of a right and not exercise it,
allowing it perhaps to stand around
ard eat its head off, is folly of the rank
| est kind but I am here to say that it