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Government ordinances regarding the barrack life of the military have awakened much opposition, as tending to break up family life for the soldiers, and thus to introduce an element of demoralization." Mrs. Butler gave me much helpful advice, and some helpful introductions. Through her aid I visited a number of the leading cities of England, holding in these places meetings which were numerously attended, and at which the magistrates of the town sometimes presided. In London I hired a hall in the well-known Free Masons Tavern for a number of Sundays, advertising a meeting at which I was the only speaker. The attendance on these occasions was larger than I had dared to hope. I received also much personal kindness among my new friends. I may mention Professor Seeley, author of "Ecce Homo," Sir John Bowring, poet and publicist, and the sisters and brother of John Bright.

A well-attended meeting at Willis' rooms closed my efforts in London.

A flying visit to Paris gave me the opportunity of introducing my theme at a public convention, and when I returned to my own country I felt that I had done all that I was capable of doing in behalf of a Women's Peace Movement.

What has made the difference between that time and this? Two things, chiefly, as far as women are concerned. These are the higher education now conceded to them, and the discipline of associated action with which recent years have made them familiar. Who shall say how great an element of progress has unfolded itself in this last clause? Who shall say what pettiness of personal ambition has become merged in the higher ideal of service to the state and the world? The noble army of women which I saw as in a dream, and to which I made my appeal, has now come into being. The mothers have a voice in the councils of the nations. On the wide field where the world's greatest citizens band together to uphold the highest interests of society women of the same type employ their gifts and graces to the same end. Oh, happy change! Oh, glorious metamorphosis! In less than half a century the conscience of mankind has made its greatest stride toward the control of human affairs. The Women's Colleges and the Women's Clubs have had everything to do with the great advance which we see in the moral efficiency

of our sex. These two agencies have been derided and decried, but they have done their work.

If a word of elderly counsel may become me at this moment, let me say to the women here assembled: "Do not let us go back from what we have gained. Let us, on the contrary, ever press forward in the light of the new knowledge, of the new experience. If we have rocked the cradle, have soothed the slumber of mankind, let us be on hand at their great awakening, to make steadfast the peace of the world."

MRS. SPENCER:

Our other guest of honor is here; she was not invited because age and feebleness had retired her from active conflict, but for exactly the opposite reason that she is still in the field, the active chairman of the Committee on Peace of the International Council of Women, a body including in its membership the National Councils of Women of nineteen of the enlightened nations of the world. We have not used the time of this morning for the presentation of the work of women's organizations, but inasmuch as the International Council of Women holds a unique and commanding position in respect to the Peace Movement, we have asked our honored guest, Mrs. May Wright Sewall, to present a printed summary of the work of the Women's Councils in behalf of Peace and Arbitration, copies of which are distributed throughout the audience. addition Mrs. Sewall will now give you very briefly the closing word of this session.

The International Council of Women

MRS. MAY WRIGHT SEWALL

In

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, AND DELEGATES: You who are my auditors, realize that between the other honored guest and myself, measured by time, there lies a generation, measured by service much more than a generation. It is, indeed, Mrs. Spencer, an honor to have been invited here as the guest of this great Congress, but, Oh! I felt it was not an honor when the price was my silence before this vast assembly. I have the honor to bring to this congress the great interest of the International Council of Women, which I think will be introduced to you more specifically than it has ever been before, if you will

kindly read the pamphlet which has been printed by this Congress for your instruction concerning it. Now, it is from twenty-three National Councils, Madam President, containing within that membership seven and one-quarter millions of women, that I bring greetings. Could I hope to speak for such a vast multitude in three minutes, Madam President? No, not in three hours.

Organized in 1888, the National Council of Women of the United States committed itself unanimously to active work for the promotion of Peace and International Arbitration as the one great moral cause in which women of all classes and all organizations could unite their efforts. This National Council welcomed the establishment of the Hague Tribunal in 1899 by appropriate resolutions forwarded to the Czar of Russia through the courtesy of the State Department and by the approval of President McKinley. It has celebrated the establishment of the Hague Court each 18th of May by holding Peace Demonstrations. It has enlisted the interest and aid of clergymen, lawyers, the press, important organizations and leading individuals in all walks of life in the preparation for and the programs and reports of these meetings. Over 1,400 such Peace and Arbitration meetings held in six consecutive years, and in every State of our Union, except Florida, Mississippi and Alabama, attest the deep and widespread interest in this cause on the part of the women of America.

The International Council of Women received in 1897 from Lady Aberdeen, then its President, a communication urging that "great prominence" should be given in the organization to the subject of "International Arbitration." At the second quinquennial of this International Council this subject was made conspicuous through the holding of a great public meeting, addressed by representatives of all the National Councils then affiliated. At this meeting the following resolution was introduced by Mrs. Byles, acting as the representative of Baroness Von Suttner, and seconded by Frau Salenka, who had initiated the demonstration meetings in support of the Hague Convention:

Resolved, That the International Council of Women take steps in every country to further and advance by every means in its power the movement toward International Arbitration.

This resolution, unanimously passed, committed this great body of women to Peace as its first, and for five years its only propaganda; and the first Standing Committee was constituted to promote this great interest. Since 1899, therefore, the International Council of Women has stood ready to be used for the noble purposes of the promotion of social Peace, the reduction. of armaments, the substitution of an International Tribunal of Justice for warfare, and the establishment of a permanent International Parliament which shall legislate for the world, as the congress or parliament of each of its constituent parts legislates for a single nation.

But I must express my conviction that what has been said this morning in all of these splendid messages, is after all only an indication of a means to an end, the International Parliament,— which shall ultimately sit to legislate for the nations of the world. It is after all but a means, an agency, as the International Court of Arbitration is but a means, so I shall hurriedly pass the means and try to propound the end to our International Council, the end that looks for this result, not for the abatement of war, but for its extinction (applause); not to the limitation of armaments but the remanding of the war ships into the museums of history, where it will require as much patience and skill to reconstruct their forms and rehabilitate them as it now requires scientific skill to reproduce the form of the mastodon.

Our result, our ultimate object, is the cessation of all warfare by the extinction of all competition, by the supplanting of competition by co-operation (applause), by the displacement of hate, all international hate and international envy, by international affection. That is indeed no sentimental ground, Madam President, it had its origin in our creation, born out of the heart of God. This humanity, which the conflict of its development upon this plane has divided into so many races, but which its evolution into the likeness of its father shall unite,-a United States of Europe, Mr. Archer says. Long ago the International Council announced the United States of the World. These United States of the World must include all the countries of the world, from the Western Hemisphere where the sun sets, onward to the Orient where the sun rises,-where it still rises obscured not by any abatement of its power of enlightenment, but only obscured by the narrow limitations of national patriot

ism of nations, only obscured by ignorance and prejudice. It is the Old World which the International Congress hopes to include, and already has that Old World begun to make its flag. This banner holds but one star, which Mr. Archer has suggested it should include. Whether that banner shall be the ultimate banner of the world, we cannot say,-probably not, because we are all in an evolutionary movement, and the International Council of Women recognizes itself as an evolution. The possibility of our movement has been born out of the struggles, the hopes, the agitations, the growing faith in the other movements that have tended toward the salvation of humanity and the solidarity of humanity for which our Council stands.

MRS. SPENCER:

We will now all rise and dismiss ourselves with the hymn "Heroes of Peace."

HEROES OF PEACE.

ANNA GARLIN SPENCER.

Sir Arthur S. Sullivan.

Hail the Hero workers of the mighty Past!

They whose labor builded all the things that last.
Thoughts of wisest meaning; deeds of noblest right;
Patient toil in weakness; battles in the night;

Hail, then, noble workers, builders of the Past!
All whose lives have blest us with the gains that last.

Hail ye, Hero workers, who to-day do hear

Duty's myriad voices sounding high and clear;
Ye who quick responding, haste ye to your task,
Be it grand or simple, ye forget to ask!
Hail ye, noble workers, builders of to-day,

Who life's treasures gather, that shall last alway.

Hail ye, Hero workers, ye who yet shall come,
When to the world's calling all our lips are dumb!
Ye shall build more nobly if our work be true
As we pass Life's treasure on from Old to New.
Hail ye, then, all workers, of all lands and time,
One brave band of Heroes with one task sublime.

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