They finally effected a compromise on the money feature by sending out handsomely engraved invitations to those whom they wished as guests and letting them pay $4 a plate if they came. Although they proved to Miss Anthony that this always was done in such cases, she assented very unwillingly, and begged that they would ask the friends to contribute $4 apiece to the fund for South Dakota instead of the birthday banquet. Finally, when all her scruples had been overcome, she made out so long a list of people whom she wished to have complimentary invitations that they would have filled every seat in the dining hall. She also was so anxious that no one should be slighted in a chance to speak that Mrs. Avery wrote: "The banquet would have to last through eternity to hear all those Miss Anthony thinks ought to be heard."
On the evening of the birthday over 200 of her distinguished friends were seated in the great dining-room of the Riggs House, including a delegation from Rochester and a number of relatives from Leavenworth, Chicago, New York and Philadelphia. Miss Anthony occupied the place of honor, on her right hand were Senator Blair and Mrs. Stanton; on her left, Robert Purvis, Isabella Beecher Hooker and May Wright Sewall. (Mrs. Foster Avery was detained at home.) The room was beautifully decorated and the repast elaborate, but with such an array of intellect, the after-dinner speeches were the distinguishing feature of the occasion. The Washington Star, in a long account, said:
A company of the most remarkable women in the world were assembled. As she sat there, surrounded by the skirted knights of her long crusade, Miss Anthony looked no older than fifty, but she had got a good start into her seventy-first year before the dinner ended. May Wright Sewall presided. Elizabeth Cady Stanton, that venerable and beautiful old stateswoman, sat at the right of Senator Blair, looking as if she should be the Lord Chief-Justice, with her white hair puffed all over her head, and her amiable and intellectual face marked with the lines of wisdom. Isabella Beecher Hooker, who reminds one of her great brother, with the stamp of genius on her brow and an energy of intellect expressed upon her face, sat at the left of Miss Anthony. Old John Hutchinson, the last of the famous singing family, his white hair and beard forming a fringe about his shoulders; Clara Barton, her breast sparkling with Red Cross medals; and many other women of wide fame were present. Before the banquet the guests assembled in the Red Parlor of the Riggs, where a levee was held and congratulations were offered. It was after 10 o'clock when the line was formed and the guests marched down to the dining-room, Miss Anthony, on the arm of Senator Blair, leading the way.
The correspondent of the New York Sun said in a brilliant description: "The dining-room was a splendid scene, long to be remembered. The American flag was everywhere and, with tropical flowers and foliage, made bright decorations.... It was a notable gathering of women world-wide in fame, and of distinguished men. The lady with a birthday—seventy of them indeed—was of course the star on which all others gazed. She never looked better, never happier, and never so much like breaking down before her feelings. No wonder, with such a birthday party! Friends of her youth calling her 'Susan,' affectionate deference from everybody, and all saying she deserved a thousand just such birthdays—young in heart, beautiful in spirit."
Phoebe Couzins replied to the toast "St. Susan," making a witty contrast between the austere St. Anthony of old and the St. Anthony of today, representing self-abnegation for the good, the beautiful, the true. Rev. Anna Shaw made a delightfully humorous response to "The Modern Peripatetic," referring to the ancient philosopher who had founded the school of men, and Miss Anthony who had founded the modern school of women peripatetics, ready to grab their grips and start around the world at a moment's notice. Matilda Joslyn Gage responded to "Miss Anthony as a Fellow-worker;" Clara Bewick Colby to "Miss Anthony as a Journalist;" Laura Ormiston Chant, of England, to "American Womanhood;" Mrs. Jane Marsh Parker, sent by the Ignorance Club of Rochester, to "Miss Anthony at Home," beginning: "To have brought to Miss Anthony all the testimonials which Rochester would have laid at her feet tonight would have made me appear at the banquet like the modern Santa Claus—the postman at Christmastide." Rev. Frederick W. Hinckley, of Providence, began his graceful address by saying:
King Arthur, sword in hand, is not at the head of the table, but Queen Susan is, the silver crown of seventy honorable years upon her brow; and we gather here from every quarter of the Union, little knights and great knights, without distinction of sex, to take anew at her hands the oath of loyal service to the cause of universal liberty. Those of us who have followed her through all these years know that she has been a knight without reproach, that her head has been level and her heart true. Faithful to the cause of her sex, she has been broad enough to grasp great general principles. She has been not only an advocate of equal rights, but the prophet of humanity; and a better advocate of equal rights because a prophet of humanity. There never has been a time when Whittier's lines concerning Sumner would not have been applicable to her:
"Wherever wrong doth right deny,
Or suffering spirits urge their plea,
Here is a voice to smite the lie,
A hand to set the captive free."Nineteenth century chivalry renders all honor to that type of womanhood of which she is an illustrious example.
Robert Purvis eloquently referred to Miss Anthony's grand work for the abolition of slavery, which, he said, was still continued in the vaster and more complicated work for the freedom of women. Mrs. Stanton's two daughters, Mrs. Lawrence and Mrs. Blatch, made sparkling responses. Representative J. A. Pickler said in part:
Five years since, when a member of the Dakota legislature and in charge of the bill giving full suffrage to women, I was characterized in the public press as "Susan B. Pickler." I look upon this as one of the greatest honors ever bestowed upon me. I have never learned how Miss Anthony regarded it....
Unswerved by the shafts of ridicule, without love of gain, she has sublimely borne through all these years ridicule and reproach for principle, for humanity, for womanhood. The soldier battles amid the plaudits of his countrymen, the statesman supported by his party, the clergyman sanctioned by his church, but alone, this great woman has stood for half a century, contending for the rights of women. Says Professor Swing: "Mark any life pervaded by a worthy plan, and how beautiful it is! Webster, Gladstone, Sumner, Disraeli; fifty years were these temples in the building!" How aptly these words describe our great advocate of woman. Gratifying it must be to Susan B. Anthony; gratifying, we bear witness, it is to her friends, that in her maturer years we see this cause, long hated by others but by her always loved, now respected by all; and herself, its representative and exponent, revered, loved and honored by a whole nation.
The main address was made by Mrs. Stanton, who responded to the sentiment "The Friendships of Women," in an oration full of humor, and closed:
If there is one part of my life which gives me more intense satisfaction than another, it is my friendship of more than forty years' standing with Susan B. Anthony. Ours has been a friendship of hard work and self-denial.... Emerson says, "It is better to be a thorn in the side of your friend than his echo." If this add weight and stability to friendship, then ours will endure forever, for we have indeed been thorns in the side of each other. Sub rosa, dear friends, I have had no peace for forty years, since the day we started together on the suffrage expedition in search of woman's place in the National Constitution. She has kept me on the war-path at the point of the bayonet so long that I have often wished my untiring coadjutor might, like Elijah, be translated a few years before I was summoned, that I might spend the sunset of my life in some quiet chimney-corner and lag superfluous on the stage no longer.
After giving up all hope of her sweet repose in Abraham's bosom, I sailed some years ago for Europe. With an ocean between us I said, now I shall enjoy a course of light reading. I shall visit all the wonders of the old world, and write no more calls, resolutions or speeches for conventions—when lo! one day I met Susan face to face in the streets of London with a new light in her eyes. Behold there were more worlds to conquer. She had decided on an international council in Washington, so I had to return with her to the scenes of our conflict.... Well, I prefer a tyrant of my own sex, so I shall not deny the patent fact of my subjection; for I do believe that I have developed into much more of a woman under her jurisdiction, fed on statute laws and constitutional amendments, than if left to myself reading novels in an easy-chair, lost in sweet reveries of the golden age to come without any effort of my own.