NEWCASTLE: POLICE STATION CELL
I was at Birmingham in October, 1909, and I had two meetings with
Mrs. Pankhurst. Whenever this happened one felt most singularly
useless beside that great woman. I was overcome by the sense of being
superfluous, and oppressed at having to go through the same ordeal
in the evening. After the first meeting she took me with her to a
nursing home to see the girl who had been the first to be released
after the hunger-strike and forcible feeding. It was a fine evening,
and a beautiful red light lit up the window as we came in; against it
was merely the shadow of a girl, sitting in an arm-chair. She did not
look ill in an ordinary way, but young and fresh, only so absolutely
thin and wasted, it would not have surprised us if life had gone out.
She told her story very simply, just the bare facts and nothing more.
She had been fed for a month. Mrs. Pankhurst, in cross-questioning
her, elicited some of the horrors. She had resisted the gag as long as
possible, then, with the increasing weakness, she had not the strength
to resist much. Yes, the tube was a long one, pushed down the throat,
in spite of all attempts to prevent it, and into the stomach. The
feeling was that the tube was absolutely choking you, and when it was
withdrawn that it dragged after it the whole of your inside.
She looked absolutely ethereal as she smiled at us and said “Good-bye.”
For several days her face haunted me, it was startlingly like
something. Then I remembered the paintings of Fra Angelico in the
Chapel of St. Mark’s at Florence. I bought one of the little sixpenny
editions of his pictures. There it was, the thing I had seen lately,
the look of spiritual strength shining through physical weakness.
I looked through the book to choose one specially like the girl at
Birmingham; there were several that reminded me of her. I had looked
at these pictures in my younger days, and their great beauty had given
me joy, but I had felt annoyed with the man for painting beings so
inhuman, women that were ethereal but so little real, a look of purity
that no living creature has. Now I had longed for them, having seen the
thing portrayed in life. As I looked through the book, I turned over
suddenly on a picture that was quite different. There was a crowd of
women, real women, doing battle with men. One hit out at a soldier--the
men were soldiers--another thrust out her arm, and with her hand over
his face, kept him away with all the strength she could, a third had
been thrown to the ground, but, with a face of raging despair was
thrusting out in every direction. The soldiers were simply carrying out
their duty, an order had gone forth and they obeyed it; in the arms
of the women were little babies, they had been told to kill them, and
they did as they were told. In a seat above, looking on quite calmly,
was Herod. It was the Massacre of the Innocents. The picture made a
deep impression upon me, yet it all seemed so small compared with
the unnecessary death rates of now. I was, just then, reading some
facts that dealt with the death rate of infants. I found in one of the
booklets by J. Johnston, Esq., M.D., 1909, this passage: “The first
big fact which faces us upon this subject is that while the death rate
for England and Wales for 1906 was 15.4, the infantile mortality--the
death rate of children under twelve months--was 132.” This means that
one in eight of the children born in this country dies before its first
birthday--a death roll of 339 per day--a massacre of the innocents
greater than that of King Herod at Bethlehem. And this wholesale
slaughter of young life goes on, not for one day, as did that historic
butchery, but is repeated every day, every week, every month, year in
and year out, until in the year 1906 the army of baby martyrs reached
a grand total of 123,895. Well might the African monarch, King Khama,
say, “You English take great care of your goods, but you throw away
your children.”
I left that room in Birmingham in a maze of feelings. An angel had been
in my presence and I, who agreed with all she did, had left her and
many others to go through with this alone. My mind was made up. I would
take the very next opportunity of making my protest with a stone.
* * * * *
On Friday, October 8, Christabel Pankhurst and I were on our way to
Newcastle. We were seated opposite to each other in the midst of a
crowded third-class carriage. It was on this occasion that I realised,
as I had not yet done, the wonderful character, the imperturable good
temper, the brilliant intellect of my companion. As we could not talk
in this crowded train, I showed her some letters and papers on which I
wanted her advice, or which I wanted her to know about. Whether they
were print, typewritten, or manuscript, she had read them all in a
moment, so as to discuss them with me afterwards. When we arrived at
Newcastle we found that we had accompanied Mr. Lloyd George; there
was a small crowd that welcomed him and that cheered half-heartedly.
We went, after depositing our things at an hotel, to join an outdoor
meeting. Christabel spoke. I sold _Votes for Women_ in the crowd,
which, though a large one, was mostly composed of out-of-work men,
who took little interest in what was said. We drove round the town
in honour of Miss New, who had just come out of prison, and went to
a tea in her honour in an hotel where some fifty or sixty women were
assembled. After this there was a strange meeting in the ground-floor
room of a lodging-house. There were twelve women; we were all intending
stone-throwers, and Christabel was there to hearten us up and to go
into details about the way in which we were to do it. Mrs. Brailsford
was there, whose husband was lately on the staff of the _Daily News_;
he and Mr. Nevinson had resigned their posts because of the shameful
way in which that paper and the Liberal Government had forsaken the
women.
I had made up my mind that I was going to throw a stone--that was
as sure as death, but the manner of it was going to be my own; I
was equally sure of that. I was not sure of “the stone-throwers.”
I had vaguely felt that they would have different reasons from mine
for this errand, that perhaps, though they could not be more certain
than myself, they would mind it less. I had not been in the room with
them five minutes before I realised that I was mistaken. I was the
“hooligan,” if there were one amongst them. One I specially remember.
She was pretty, with a great deal of fair hair. She had not, I thought,
the look of determination, of silent, unhesitating determination, which
gave an air of inflexibility to the others. She leaned forward and
asked many questions: the wardresses, would they, too, be disagreeable,
would they pull down her hair and tear out the tortoise-shell combs?
One somehow knew by her voice that she was not ready, she asked her
questions as if something of a nightmare was in her mind; they were
asked quite simply, but seemed to say, “Oh! save me from this!” I asked
Christabel, when alone with her at the hotel, if I might tell her
there was no need for her to do it, that I thought she was not quite
prepared. “Of course,” she answered, “if she does not feel up to it,
let her stand aside. One cannot tell how one is going to feel, she has
never done anything before.” Not long ago Mrs. Pethick Lawrence had met
her, it was at a bazaar. She wore a big hat and looked as remote as it
is possible to look from stone throwing. She expressed the greatest
admiration for the militants. “There is only one thing,” she said,
“which I cannot think worth while--that they should go to prison.” I
was to get her out of it the next morning, the day of Lloyd George’s
meetings and of our militancy.
That evening there was an immense meeting at the drill hall where
Christabel was to speak, but before she began a gang of about forty
students howled and threw squibs, so that nothing could be heard. When
she got up for a moment the applause drowned everything, but it soon
was again impossible to hear her. The students broke up the seats and
threw everything about. Then some ten of them charged the platform.
A row of stewards hastily ranged themselves and tried to check their
advance, but their arms were wrenched apart, until the husband of one
of them took his turn and gave it to one of the students, whereupon the
other men turned tail and ran. At this man coming forward the police
interfered, they had been appealed to in vain by some of the stewards.
It was most difficult not to help them, but I had sworn to keep myself
till the next day. The row made by the other students went on unabated.
Meanwhile, Christabel remained perfectly good-tempered. For the first
quarter of an hour she spoke up, but as it was impossible for her
voice to carry above the noise she lowered her voice and spoke only to
reporters. The next day her speech appeared in full in all the local
press.
The next morning, October 9, we were to meet early at the same
lodging-house. The morning papers were full of Mr. Lloyd George, and in
biographical sketches emphasised the glory of his having been militant,
and successfully militant, through several questions that he cared
about in his early days. It was different in the lodging-house from
the night before. All was hurry and determination. Two of the women
had gone already to deliver their stony messages. The organiser, a
very straightforward and reasonable woman, was sending each one to a
different place. She said, “There is a stone wants to be put through
the door of the Palace Theatre in the Haymarket. It must be done at
once or the gang of detectives will have become too thick.” A firm
voice said: “I’ll go.” It was the young girl with fair hair who had
asked so many questions the night before, and whom I was going to set
free. “Oh, no,” said the organiser, “this job will have to be done
alone--two would be detected at once.” “I’ll go.” It was like a force
of nature that reiterated this, and there was something of adamant at
the back of the voice. She picked up two or three papers to sell, and
was out in the street before we any of us knew what she was doing. I
dashed after her. I couldn’t believe that there was so much change in
her since the night before. I moved quickly, but it was only down the
street that led out of the lodging-house street that I caught her up.
“I had thought of getting you out of it, because you seemed too young
to do the work,” I said. “That was last night; to-day all is quite
different.” “But let me try and say what I have in my mind. You are
going to throw a stone. Think, as you lift your arm to do it, of the
majority in the House of Commons who for years have said they are for
Votes for Women, who over and over again for twenty years have voted
for the second reading of a Woman’s Bill, and were quite content that
it should stop there. Think of the nearly total Cabinet for Woman
Suffrage when the Liberals came in, under a Suffrage Prime Minister,
but all attempts to pass a Bill were treated as futile. Think of the
women who work with a sweated wage, who have not the energy to rebel,
who are cloaked with poverty; the thousands who, stricken with poverty
more hideous than we can think of on one side, and tempted with money
on the other, sink into a life of shame, which is endured for five
or six years, till death releases them. Think of Lloyd George, whose
speech is always fair but who carefully prevents anything being done
for women. Think of the women who have been sent to prison for their
protest against these things, who have hunger-struck as a fresh protest
and who now have been fed by force. Then throw your stone and make it
do its work.”
“Thank you,” she said, “thank you.” I looked up at her, as I had not
liked to do till that minute. A changed being stood before me. I had
noticed that she had changed from the night before, she had changed
unbelievably at this minute, and all that strength, determination,
complete forgetfulness of self could give her, were with her now.
We parted. I went back to the others. The next thing I heard of her
was in the other office, where we provided ourselves with stones. A
little girl of about sixteen, who kept on running messages for us, came
rapidly into the room. “Miss X.,” she said, “has thrown her stone,
broken her window, and been arrested.” Then she went out. From that
moment I knew that all was well. Miss X. got through the two days
in the police-court, the trial, the hunger strike, and the forcible
feeding that followed for the space of fourteen days, as did the
others. Her body was weakness, but her soul was strength.
No particular job was given to me. Miss Emily Davison and I were to
keep together. It was still early, and first we had to make sure of our
stones. We went to the other office to get them. I was doing up mine
in brown paper, double thick. “You will not be able to throw those,”
said the organiser, “if there is the least bit of wind, it will get
inside and send them you don’t know where.” That was true. I found
some much thinner paper which kept closely round the stone. I took
four or five. On each one I wrote a different thing, I think they were
all taken from Mr. Lloyd George’s recent speech. I put them into my
pockets and went out. Miss Davison had been speaking from every part
of the town during the last week. I recommended her to buy another
hat for partial disguise. We went into a hat shop and did so. In the
shop there was a fascinating little black kitten which it was hard
to leave. Then we went into an eating shop, thinking it was as well
to have some luncheon. The shop was overpoweringly stuffy and hot. I
had not met Miss Davison before, and it was most interesting to hear
her experiences. Still, we could neither of us speak nor listen with
anything but effort. We decided to go and see what it was like at the
Haymarket, a large, open space, where the car with Mr. Lloyd George
would probably pass. There was still more than an hour before he could
come. The crowd was already considerable. Nearly every woman that I saw
looked friendly; this was probably my imagination, but it did me good.
The Suffragettes were greatly thought of that day. The place, we found,
was divided in two by a hoarding of about ten feet in height; there
was a space, guarded by police, that could be opened to let a carriage
through. We looked round at the windows of all the adjacent buildings,
but they were not of an official or of a sufficiently conspicuous
character for our stones. Presently a man in front of us--the crowd
now was pretty thick--was twirling round one of his cards in his hands
which were folded behind him. He then held it up, so that we could
see there was writing on it. At last his signals grew more desperate.
One of us took the card from him. On it was written his deferential
greeting, that he knew what we were out for, could he help us in any
way, run messages for us or anything? We answered, writing on the other
side, that we thanked him cordially, but as we had no particular job,
it was best for him to “wait and see.” He had a kindly face and looked
the right sort, but we thought it was just as well that this was the
true answer. There was a monument to the soldiers who had died in the
war in the midst of the open space. Their names were written on it, and
the little boys were clambering up the monument to see above the crowd.
They had died for their country, that was the one fact which seemed to
stand out very clearly from the monument. Yes, nobly, and in a good
fight, they had died--where is the statue to the women who had given
their lives to the nation?
We heard cheering in the distance, it was the arrival of Mr. Lloyd
George at the theatre, he having driven by another way. My companion
began to think that our chance was over until the evening. A feeling
came over me that I could not wait any longer, and that somehow or
other I must throw my stone. As it would anyhow be but symbolical, it
seemed to me one could find an occasion as well here as elsewhere. One
thing, however, I was determined upon--it must be more zealously done,
more deliberate in its character than the stone-throwing at ordinary
windows, which had been done lately. I was determined that when they
had me in court my act should inevitably be worse than that of other
women. At this moment there was a hurry in the crowd, the police were
making a clearing and opening the carriage entrance for a motor-car. We
found ourselves on the very edge of the crowd. As the motor appeared,
I whispered to Miss Davison: “Is this any good?” “Not the least in
the world,” was her reply, “just one of the motors coming back.” I
knew this, of course, but the instinct was too much for me. To throw a
stone against the car as it ran along the side was dangerous, as there
were two men in the front. I stepped out into the road, stood straight
in front of the car, shouted out “How can you, who say you back the
women’s cause, stay on in a Government which refuses them the vote, and
is persecuting them for asking it,” and threw a stone at the car, but
very low down. I thought I had thrown it too low, so that it would
not hit the car. I was going on, in the space of time which seemed
infinitely long, to tell the car to turn back and get their answer from
Mr. Lloyd George, then call to the people to come through the gap and
hear his answer. I had time to think out all this. Miss Davison came to
my side, and I saw someone take hold of her before she could throw her
stone. Then two plain-clothes detectives caught hold of me, but what
was my intense surprise, without any violence whatever. They simply
led me back through the crowd which surged around on every side. I had
thought there were no actual friends where we stood, but I at once saw
one or two ready to come and help me if I wanted it. So I was still
and said not a word. My part was finished, and I saw that anything
said might easily cause a tremendous disturbance at those close
quarters. Miss Davison was arrested at the same time, though she had
done nothing, and we were led away together. It was a business getting
through the crowd. When we had left the Haymarket the crush was very
much less, and the two detectives in plain clothes who were responsible
for me walked on either side without touching me. This went rather
strangely with the newspaper contention that I was “very excitable.”
Another incident which got put into the papers was, that when we were
going down a main street, two tramcars, going different ways, were
about to meet. This pressed the crowd that followed us and pushed us
all together. We were walking, of course, in the roadway. A little girl
with a baby in a perambulator and a small boy on foot had got on to the
island and were wishing to pass to the pavement, being afraid of the
two trams. I realised that I was the policeman of that show. I stopped
and just held out my hand to the detective on my right. We let the baby
and its leaders pass, then we moved on.
We were taken to the central police station of the town. The police
here were most civil, and, indeed, kind. We gave our names and
addresses, and then we waited in the main room. Poor Miss Davison
was very distressed at doing nothing. Her heroism had to wait for
another day.[9] Mrs. Baines came into the police court and spoke to
us. I was filled with disappointment that I had not been able to do
more. She told me that she was quite content, that I had thrown my
stone straight, and, she believed, hit the car. She was delightfully
encouraging, and made one think one had done well. Presently Mrs.
Brailsford joined us, she had done exactly what she meant to do, and
with a hatchet had hit one of the barricades.
FOOTNOTE: [9] Soon after this Miss Davison was forcibly fed in
Manchester Prison, and, on barricading her cell, the hose-pipe was
played upon her from the window, a process of force that caused
her infinite pain. She fainted, and it was many days before she
recovered. She owed her life probably to being released from prison,
and to the fact that she was a great swimmer, used to the shock
of cold water and to withstanding its force. In 1913 she met her
death with the most heroic courage at the Derby race. It was her
opportunity of proclaiming to the whole world, perhaps heedless till
then, that women claim citizenship and human rights. She stood in
front of the race and was knocked down by the King’s horse Anmer,
rendered unconscious, and died the following Sunday, June 8. Millions
of people, not only in our own but other countries, knew, from this
act, that there are women who care so passionately for the vote and
all it means that they are willing to die for it.
I noticed in this central police station a large iron cage. It was
empty, and we wondered what purpose it could serve. On one of the
benches a little boy was sitting, of about seven or eight years old. He
had on ragged clothes, but seemed quite happy with a cup of soup which
he had been given. It seemed odd though to bring small children to such
a place, with nothing but policemen, although several of these were
good-natured.
After we had been here a considerable time and were joined by some
of our companions, we heard that it was unlikely they would allow us
bail, and we were taken off to the cells. Who could have believed that
in the central police station of a place like Newcastle they could be
so dirty? Mine was No. 2. It was on the left side of a broad gangway,
which could be shut off by an iron gate. It was October and inclined to
be dark, and when I was first put into the cell it was impossible to
see what it was like or what it contained. It was rather high, the very
small window opposite the doorway was either of foggy glass or grimed
with dirt, it scarcely lit up anything but itself. To the right was a
plank, rather wide and long, and with a kind of bolster made of wood.
This was all for seat or bed. When the evening light was lit above the
door, where it was barred with iron on the side of the cell, I saw
that the wood was filthy. There was a plenitude of fleas, but no lice.
Under the window to the right was a lavatory, it was extremely dirty,
the water could only be turned on from outside. There was a ledge about
three feet high, which sheltered the seat. Under the window, but this
I could not see till the second day, was a men’s urinal, there was a
gutter in the floor for this, but no water. The cleanliness of the wall
can be imagined. The smell in the cell was continuously foul.[10] I was
very tired, but only liked to sit, not lie, on the bed.
FOOTNOTE: [10] I have been in police station cells in several other
places--a variety in London and two in Liverpool--but never have I
seen anything like this. The other cells were scrupulously clean.
After what seemed a very long time, a policeman summoned me, and said
we were all to have food together in the wardresses’ room. As I was let
out I noticed seven of the others being let out too--Winifred Jones,
Ellen Wines Pitman, Kathleen Brown, Kitty Marion, Dorothy Pethick and
Emily Davison. Mrs. Brailsford was the only one I did not see. The
four others--Violet Bryant, Ellen Pitfield, Lily Asquith and Dorothy
Shallard--had all done their work the previous evening, and had been
sentenced on this, Saturday, morning to two weeks’ imprisonment.
It was, of course, a joy to see them. It seemed so very long since
that morning. When we had passed the central police office, and were
ushered into the wardresses’ room, it appeared that Mrs. Brailsford
was shut into the wardresses’ bedroom--whether for a more honourable
imprisonment, she being a woman whose public work none could call
deficient in selflessness and courage, or whether because she was a
“dangerous criminal,” having used a hatchet in making her mark on
the barricade, we did not know. I remember catching sight of her as
the door was opened to let in a cup of tea. There she sat, calm and
erect, and Mr. Brailsford, who had been let in to see her, in piteous
trouble, having the one thought--“Will my wife be fed by force--how can
they dare to do it? How will she be able to bear it?”
Most of the others I had not seen before, yet I felt exuberant delight
at being with them. One only I knew well, and that was Miss Ellen
Pitman. She was in the Deputation of February and, after being in
prison some ten days, she was brought to the hospital for neuralgic
pains in her leg. She was a trained nurse, we had got to know each
other well, and her fine face will always be very dear to me. We now
got to know the wardresses--they were as kind to us as possible.
I was so tired I could scarcely see, and after a time we retired
to rest. There was a deafening noise; the cells were filled mostly
with drunkards, for it was Saturday. Thundering blows on the doors,
accompanied by a string of oaths, went on all through the night. The
police were very kind to them, bringing them fresh water to drink,
chaffing them and coaxing them. No bedding of any kind or rugs were
provided by the police, but our friends outside were most wonderfully
good to us, and, when they found we were not to be bailed out, they
were busy collecting rugs and blankets. At about 12 they sent me
in a rug and a sort of air-cushion bed, which would have been most
delightful, but I tried every end in vain, I didn’t know how to put air
into it. I was stiff for several days from my rest on the plank, but I
owed it to the friends that I did not have two nights of it. On Sunday
they brought a mattress instead of the air bed, and my flannel sheets
which gave me a restful night.
On Sunday I sent for the district visitor, supposing she would be a
woman, but was told there was no district visitor; a police-court
missionary? not one either; finally, I sent for the doctor. My
complaint was that no toilet paper was provided, and no sanitary towels
for the women. Prisoners are kept from Saturday afternoon until Monday.
I said, were not these people the same as those who go to prison, they
have these necessaries there? “I don’t know about a prison, I’m sure
they would never use them in Police Station cells.” Exactly the same
remark was made about the prisons, but all the same these things were
instituted and now used by prisoners. I begged that, at least, they
might be kept in charge of the wardress.
Not long after I had seen the doctor, I was summoned out to see someone
else. To my great delight it was Mrs. Pankhurst. She was all sympathy,
and it was delightful seeing her.
I was had out of my cell yet another time, for my name, age, etc.,
to be “taken down” by a policeman in a book. I was able to look over
the book as he wrote, and I saw, to my intense surprise, that the law
brought three charges against me, first, of assault on Sir Walter
Runciman, who was in the car; secondly, of malicious injury to the car
at £4; thirdly, of disorderly behaviour in a public place. I felt very
exalted to think I had done so much, and thought that three months was
the least they could give me. I could not help being pleased to think
that the car had contained the host of Mr. Lloyd George, not merely the
chauffeur. But what pleased me most was the £4 damage. How I could
have done it was indeed a mystery, but I was glad to know that the
stone had not gone on the ground, as I had feared. As I went through
the central room on one of these occasions, the cage which I had seen
before, to my astonishment, was inhabited--by a man, I expected to see
some fierce brute, but he was small, frail and miserably degraded,
without power to do anyone an injury, with marks of abnormal weakness
in his face. When I saw him, the feeling came over me with a great
tide, that I should throw myself at his feet and try to bear something
of his burden, because if I had done my duty, and if my contemporary
women and those who went before had done their duty, we should have
given him another life, by securing better, more human conditions, for
himself and for his mother who gave him birth. He had lived in that
terrible state of things which make it hardly possible to survive.
Here, at any rate, was a man intensely feeble in his body, and he was
put in an iron cage as the only suitable place!
We were called out and made to stand at the doors of our cells.
Presently, the plain-clothes police came to “learn our faces,” and
after looking at us steadfastly for some minutes, we were put back
again.
The food was brought for us by our friends from outside, who provided
for us deliciously, and we had our meals all together in the
wardresses’ room. Only Mrs. Brailsford never appeared, being shut in
the inner room, but we sent her some of our food. On Sunday night, the
wardress had brought us a little basin with some warm water to our
cells, which was indeed a boon.
That Sunday night the police were most kind, they allowed me to sit
at a table outside my cell and write. My cell was much too dark for
writing. To-night the place was more full of noise than it had been
before. The wild yells, and blows on the doors, made my hand shake so
that at first I could not write, but by holding the pencil, lent to me
by the police, over the paper, it came sufficiently legibly at last.
I wrote to my mother and my sister. I also wrote to the _Times_ the
following letter, from the eleven[11] who were imprisoned:--
“SIR,--We ask you to give us our last opportunity, before we go
through the ordeal awaiting us in Newcastle Prison, of explaining to
the public the action which we are now about to take.
“We want to make it known that we shall carry on our protest in our
prison cells. We shall put before the Government by means of the
hunger-strike four alternatives: To release us in a few days; to
inflict violence upon our bodies; to add death to the champions of our
cause by leaving us to starve; or, and this is the best and only wise
alternative, to give women the vote.
“We appeal to the Government to yield, not to the violence of our
protest, but to the reasonableness of our demand, and to grant the
vote to the duly qualified women of the country. We shall then serve
our full sentence quietly and obediently and without complaint. Our
protest is against the action of the Government in opposing Woman
Suffrage, and against that alone. We have no quarrel with those who
may be ordered to maltreat us.
“Yours sincerely,
“LILY ASQUITH.
“JANE E. BRAILSFORD.
“KATHLEEN BROWN.
“VIOLET BRYANT.
“ELLEN PITFIELD.
“DOROTHY SHALLARD.
“WINIFRED JONES.
“CONSTANCE LYTTON.
“KITTY MARION.
“DOROTHY PETHICK.
“ELLEN W. PITMAN.
“CENTRAL POLICE STATION,
“NEWCASTLE,
“_October 10, 1909_.”
FOOTNOTE: [11] I handed this letter to a friend on Monday morning. At
the trial Miss Davison was dismissed, so her name was taken from the
signatures.
I wrote on the wall of my cell my name and the words which rung in my
head over and over again, from the Book of Joshua: “Only be thou strong
and very courageous.”
I received a letter in the police cell, saying that I had thrown my
stone not far from a family residence of relatives of ours--did I not
feel it hence a double disgrace? In answer to this I had thought some
time. Who were those for whom we fought? I seemed to hear them in my
cell, the defenceless ones who had no one to speak for their hungry
need. The sweated workers, the mothers widowed with little children,
the women on the streets, and I saw that their backs were bent, their
eyes grown sorrowful, their hearts dead without hope. And they were not
a few, but thousands upon thousands. Side by side I considered what
they could do, what they had done, where women had the vote. The wife
has half her husband’s wages, by law, and when he does not give it,
she can have the amount paid direct to her. She is given money for her
children by the State when her husband dies. When she is not married,
if she has a child she is paid for it, not by the father direct, but
through the public authority, and she has not to apply to the father
for her money. I thought of all these helpless women, of the Parliament
that had given its theoretic consent for over twenty years, but refused
to pass a Bill, and I thought what are my relations? I do not know,
but if anything, they are for us, and if they are still asleep, in the
fog of the “don’t know and don’t care,” am I bound to consider their
dreaming?
I wrote on the wall:--
“To defend the oppressed,
To fight for the defenceless,
Not counting the cost.”