The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1895-06-02
THE WOMEN OF FRANCE.
Heroines and Martyrs Who Have Eek
erted a Powerful Influence.

Heroines and Martyrs Who Have Ex-
erted Powerful Influence.
At all times in France women have exer-
cised patient influence, practically, socially
and sentimentally The country of Jeanne
dare has never lacked heroines and mar
tyrs. During the reign of Catherine de
Medici's miserable sons their Italian
mother, by her absolute, cruel and narrow
minded policy, plunged the country into
the horrors of Bartholomew, which were
only equaled by the excuses of the Reign
OF Terror. During the corrupt relgns OF
Louis XIV and Louis XIV the influence OF
women at court and therefore all over
France was paramount and entirely per-
nicious to the welfare of the people.
Women in all ages have matched the
men; so, as noble aspirations, unselish-
ness, love of justice and right were at
discount among the men who crowded the
courts of the licentious Bourbons, where
the debauchery and depravity were unpar-
alleled since the era of Tiberius ana Com
modus, the throngs of titled courtesans
merrily joined their royal and aristocratic
lovers in spending the revenues exacted
from the miserable peasants with tears OF
blood, until similar tears were eXtorted
from them in turn by the revolution they
originated.
Many generations of bad government by
pressions of the rich clergy and mobiles,
who monopolized all that was worth hav-
ing in the State and eXacted their taxes
and seignioral dues from those who at last
had nothing left to tax, eliminated in the
intense misery of the years Immediately
preceding 1879, the first year OF deliver
ance, and bred in the hearts of the victims
ferocity of hate for their oppressors,
fierce love of the principles of liberty and
an overwhelming desire for It's immediate
frui.ion. In 1889 women of all classes
threw themselves with ardor into the great
revolutionary movement, and by their
burning enthusiasm intensified the zeal of
the men and urged them on to heroic
deeds of self-sacriice and duty to suffering
humanity.
Women of noble and unselfish ideals,
such as Nine, Roland, or of stainless life
and character like Charlotte Corday, or the
fascinating, fearless, unhappy Theroigne
de Mericourt, the heroine of the women'S
march to Versailles, or the women of the
people, full of hate and desire of ven
geance, who crowded round the guillotine
in 1898, uttering ferocious shouts and
counting with exultation the CHASTITY heads
as they fell before the ak of Samson, were
one and all animated by the same passion
ate love of liberty, the mother OF all viz
tues. All were ready to sacrifice their lives
gladly for freedom, conscious of the right
eousness of their cause and of its ultimate
triumph
Many unthinking, superficial people even
now, who have never known what it is to
suffer and be despoiled to support the lux
ury and vice of tyrants, while shuddering
at the excuses of the Reign of Terror, en-
tirely ignore the causes OF the sanguinary
deeds which stand forth so luridly. They
do not realize that nothing but a terrible
baptism of blood could have regenerated
such corrupt country and purged it from
! 4 u,
wrongdoing. 1t was a civil war in an
other form. When the day of vengeance
came how was it that the women seemed
more ferocious than the men? The an
swer is very simple. They had suffered
more, and great miseries are always fero-
cious. "-Belgravia.
| Bach's mother had marvellous ear for
music. He said she was better Judge of
music than his father