The free press. (Poplarville, Miss.) 1890-19??, 1894-06-21

| Society IL 70 be reconstructed on the SUBJ
| iect OF woman's toll. A vast majority of those
| VINO would have woman Industrious shut her
up to a few kinds OF work. Ny judgment in
/ this matter is that woman has right TO
! do ANYTHING she can do well. There should
| be no department OF merchandise, mechan-
| ism, art or science barred against her. II
/ Miss Hosmen has genius for sculpture. give
/ her chisel II Rosa Bonheur has fond
ness fer delineating animals, let her make
| 'The Horse Fair. II Miss Mitchell VIII
| study astronomy. let her mount the starry
| lad ,er. IT LYDIA will be merchant, let her
\ sell purple II Lucretia Mott will preach the
Gospel. let her thrill with her womanly elo-
quence the Quaker meeting house.
1t is said that il a woman is given such op-
portunities she will occupy places that might
be taken by men, / say if she have more
skill and adapteduess tor any position than a
man has let her have it. She has as much
right to her bread, to her apparel and TO her
home as men have.
But it is said that her nature is so delicat g
that she is untitled for exhausting toll. |
ask in the name of all past history what toll
on earth Is more severe, exhausting and ire
mendous than that toll of the needle to
which for ages she has been subjected? The
battering ram, the sword, the carbine, the
battIeax have made no such havoc as the
needle would that these living sepulchres
in which women have for ages been buried
might be opened, and that some resurrection
trumpet might bring up these living corpses
to the fresh air and sunlight.
Go with me- and | will show you woman
who by hardest toll supports her children.
her drunken husband. her old father and
mother, pays her house rent, always has
wholesome food on the table, and when sne
can get some neighbor on the Sabbath to
come in and take care OF her family appears
in church with hat and cloak that are far
ia +ta fntt 10 xrhi oh h.
jected.
Such woman as that has body and soul
enough to fit her for any position. She
could stand beside the majority OF your
statesmen and dispose Of more goods. She
could 90 into your wheewriCht shops and
beat one-half of your workmen at making
carriages. We talk about woman as though
we had resigned to her all the light WORK,
and ourselves had shouldered the heavier.
But tine day of judgment, which will reveal
the suferings Of the stake and inquisition.
will marshal before the throne OF God and
the hierarchs of heaven the martyrs OF wash
tub and needle.
Now. say, if there be any preference in
occupation. let woman have it. God knows
her trials are the severest. By her acuter
sensitiveness to misfortune, by her hour of
anguish. demand that no one hedge up her
pathway to livelihood. Oh, the meanness,
the despicability of men who begrudge
woman the right TO work anywhere in any
honorable calling!
| go still further and say that women
should have equal compensation with men.
By what principle of Justice is it that women
in many of our cities get only two-thirds as
much pay as men. and in many cases only
half? Here is the gigantic injustice-that
work equally we'll If not better done woman
receives tar less compensation than man.
Start with the national government. For
long while women clerks In Washington got
$500 for doing that for which men received
$500.
To thousands of young women in our cities
to-day there is only this alternative-starva-
ton or dishonor Many of tho largest mer-
camille establishments of our cities are ac-
cessory to these denominations, and from
their large establishments there are scores Of
souls being pitched off into death, and their
employers know it
Is there a God? Will there be a judgment?
I tell YOU if God rises up to redress woman's
wrongs, many of our large establishments
will be swallowed up quicker than South
American earthquake ever took down city.
God will catch these oppressor5 between the
two milstones of His wrath and grind them
to powder!
L hear from all this land the wall OF wo-
manhood. Man has nothing to answer TO
that wall but batteries. He says she is an
angel. She is not She knows she is not.
She is a human being, who gets hungry when
she has no food and cold when she has no
fire. Give her no more batteries. Give her
justice
There are about so. 900 sewing girls in New
York and BROOKLYN. Across the darkness Of
this night hear their death groans. 1t is
not such cry ns comes from those who are
suddenly hurled out OF life, but slow,
grinding, horrible wasting away. Gather
them before you and look into their faces,
pinched, CHASTITY, hunger struck! Look at
their fingers, needle pricked and blood
tipped See that premature stoop in the
shoulders Hear that dry, hacking, merci-
less cough
At n large meeting of these women, held
in a hall in Philadelphia, grand speeches
were delivered, but a needle-woman took
the stand, threw aside her faded shawl, and
with her snriveled arm hurled very thunder
bolt OF eloquence, speaking out the horrors
of her own experience.
Stand at the corner OF street in New
York in the very early morning as the wo-
men go to their work. Many OF them had
no breakfast except the crumbs that were
left over from the night before or crust
they chew on their way through the
streets Here they come-the work
ing girls of the city These engaged in
beadwork, these in flower making. in millin-
cry, enameling, cigar making, bookbinding,
labelling, feather picking, print cooring,
paper box making, but. most overworked OF
all and least compensated, the sewing
women. Why do they not take the city cars
on their way up2 They cannot afford the
five cents. If, concluding to deny herself
something else, she gets into the car, give
her seat. You want to see how Latimer and
Ridley appeared in the fire. Look at that
woman and behold q more horrible martyr
dom--a hotter fire. a more agonizing death.
One Sabbath night, in the vestibule of my
church. after service Il woman fell in con
wilson's The doctor said she needed medi
cine not so much ~ something TO eat. As
she began 70 revive, in her delirium she said
gaspingly Eight cents Eight cents Eight
cents l wish 1 could get it done am so
tired | wish l could get some sleep. but
must get it done Eight cents Eight cents ~
We found afterwarI that she was making
garments at eight cents apiece, and that she
could make but three OF them in day Hear
it Three times eight are twentyfour Hear
it. men and women who have comfortable
homes
Some of the worst villains of the city are
the employers of these women. They beat
them down to the last penny and try to
cheat them out of that. The woman must
deposit 81 or 80 before she gets the gar
ments to work on. When the work is done,
il is sharply inspected, the most insignifl-