The result of our talk was that Mrs. Dietrick promised to select a lot for me at Wianno, where she herself lived, and even promised to supervise the building of my cottage, and to attend to all the other details connected with it. Thus put, the temptation was irresistible. Besides Mrs. Dietrick, many other delightful friends lived at Wianno—the Garrisons, the Chases of Rhode Island, the Wymans, the Wellingtons—a most charming community. I gave Mrs. Dietrick full authority to use her judgment in every detail connected with the undertaking, and the cottage was built. Having put her hand to this plow of friendship, Mrs. Dietrick did the work with characteristic thoroughness. I did not even visit Wianno to look at my land. She selected it, bought it, engaged a woman architect—Lois Howe of Boston—and followed the latter's work from beginning to end. The only stipulation I made was that the cottage must be far up on the beach, out of sight of everybody—really in the woods; and this was easily met, for along that coast the trees came almost to the water's edge.
The cottage was a great success, and for many years I spent my vacations there, filling the place with young people. From the time of my sister Mary's death I had had the general oversight of her two daughters, Lola and Grace, as well as of Nicolas and Eleanor, the two motherless daughters of my brother John. They were all with me every summer in the new home, together with Lucy Anthony, her sister and brother, Mrs. Rachel Foster Avery, and other friends. We had special fishing costumes made, and wore them much of the time. My nieces wore knickerbockers, and I found vast contentment in short, heavy skirts over bloomers. We lived out of doors, boating, fishing, and clamming all day long, and, as in my early pioneer days in Michigan, my part of the work was in the open. I chopped all the wood, kept the fires going, and looked after the grounds.
Rumors of our care-free and unconventional life began to circulate, and presently our Eden was invaded by the only serpent I have ever found in the newspaper world—a girl reporter from Boston. She telegraphed that she was coming to see us; and though, when she came, we had been warned of her propensities and received her in conventional attire, formally entertaining her with tea on the veranda, she went away and gave free play to a hectic fancy. She wrote a sensational full-page article for a Sunday newspaper, illustrated with pictures showing us all in knickerbockers. In this striking work of art I carried a fish net and pole and wore a handkerchief tied over my head. The article, which was headed THE ADAMLESS EDEN, was almost libelous, and I admit that for a long time it dimmed our enjoyment of our beloved retreat. Then, gradually, my old friends died, Mrs. Dietrick among the first; others moved away; and the character of the entire region changed. It became fashionable, privacy was no longer to be found there, and we ceased to visit it. For five years I have not even seen the cottage.
In 1908 I built the house I now occupy (in Moylan, Pennsylvania), which is the realization of a desire I have always had—to build on a tract which had a stream, a grove of trees, great boulders and rocks, and a hill site for the house with a broad outlook, and a railroad station conveniently near. The friend who finally found the place for me had begun his quest with the pessimistic remark that I would better wait for it until I got to Paradise; but two years later he telegraphed me that he had discovered it on this planet, and he was right. I have only eight acres of land, but no one could ask a more ideal site for a cottage; and on the place is my beloved forest, including a grove of three hundred firs. From every country I have visited I have brought back a tiny tree for this little forest, and now it is as full of memories as of beauty.
To the surprise of my neighbors, I built my house with its back toward the public road, facing the valley and the stream. "But you will never see anybody go by," they protested. I answered that the one person in the house who was necessarily interested in passers-by was my maid, and she could see them perfectly from the kitchen, which faced the road. I enjoy my views from the broad veranda that overlooks the valley, the stream, and the country for miles around.
Every suffragist I have ever met has been a lover of home; and only the conviction that she is fighting for her home, her children, for other women, or for all of these, has sustained her in her public work. Looking back on many campaign experiences, I am forced to admit that it is not always the privations we endure which make us think most tenderly of home. Often we are more overcome by the attentions of well-meaning friends. As an example of this I recall an incident of one Oregon campaign. I was to speak in a small city in the southern part of the state, and on reaching the station, hot, tired, and covered with the grime of a midsummer journey, I found awaiting me a delegation of citizens, a brass-band, and a white carriage drawn by a pair of beautiful white horses. In this carriage, and devotedly escorted by the citizens and the band, the latter playing its hardest, I was driven to the City Hall and there met by the mayor, who delivered an address, after which I was crowned with a laurel wreath. Subsequently, with this wreath still resting upon my perspiring brow, I was again driven through the streets of the city; and if ever a woman felt that her place was in the home and longed to be in her place, I felt it that day.
An almost equally trying occasion had San Francisco for its setting. The city had arranged a Fourth of July celebration, at which Miss Anthony and I were to speak. Here we rode in a carriage decorated with flowers—yellow roses—while just in front of us was the mayor in a carriage gorgeously festooned with purple blossoms. Behind us, for more than a mile, stretched a procession of uniformed policemen, soldiers, and citizens, while the sidewalks were lined with men and women whose enthusiastic greetings came to Miss Anthony from every side. She was enchanted over the whole experience, for to her it meant, as always, not a personal tribute, but a triumph of the Cause. But I sat by her side acutely miserable; for across my shoulders and breast had been draped a huge sash with the word "Orator" emblazoned on it, and this was further embellished by a striking rosette with streamers which hung nearly to the bottom of my gown. It is almost unnecessary to add that this remarkable decoration was furnished by a committee of men, and was also worn by all the men speakers of the day. Possibly I was overheated by the sash, or by the emotions the sash aroused in me, for I was stricken with pneumonia the following day and experienced my first serious illness, from which, however, I soon recovered.
On our way to California in 1895 Miss Anthony and I spent a day at Cheyenne, Wyoming, as the guests of Senator and Mrs. Carey, who gave a dinner for us. At the table I asked Senator Carey what he considered the best result of the enfranchisement of Wyoming women, and even after the lapse of twenty years I am able to give his reply almost word for word, for it impressed me deeply at the time and I have since quoted it again and again.
"There have been many good results," he said, "but the one I consider above all the others is the great change for the better in the character of our candidates for office. Consider this for a moment: Since our women have voted there has never been an embezzlement of public funds, or a scandalous misuse of public funds, or a disgraceful condition of graft. I attribute the better character of our public officials almost entirely to the votes of the women."
"Those are inspiring facts," I conceded, "but let us be just. There are three men in Wyoming to every woman, and no candidate for office could be elected unless the men voted for him, too. Why, then, don't they deserve as much credit for his election as the women?"