The Federation of Women’s Clubs!

Two thousand women gathered in the name of—­what?

Why, of culture, of literature, of sisterhood, of benevolence, of music, art, town beautification, the abolition of child-labor, the abolition of sweat-shops, the extension of peace and opportunity.

And run how?  By politics, sharp and keen, far-seeing and combative.

The results?  The cooeperation of forceful women, the encouragement of timid ones; the development of certain forms of talent, and the destruction of some old-time virtues.

The balance?  On the side of good, incontestably.

“Yes, it’s on the side of good,” said Honora, who was, after all, like a nun (save that her laboratory had been her cell, and a man’s fame her passion), and who therefore brought to this vast, highly energized, capable, various gathering a judgment unprejudiced, unworldly, and clear.  As she saw these women of many types, from all of the States, united in great causes, united, too, in the cultivation of things not easy of definition, she felt that, in spite of drawbacks, it must be good.  She listened to their papers, heard their earnest propaganda.  A distinguished Jewess from New York told of the work among the immigrants and the methods by which they were created into intelligent citizens; a beautiful Kentuckian spoke of the work among the white mountaineers; a very venerable gentlewoman from Chicago, exquisitely frail, talked on behalf of the children in factories; a crisp, curt, efficient woman from Oregon advocated the dissemination of books among the “lumber-jacks.”  They were ingenious in their pursuit of benevolences, and their annual reports were the impersonal records of personal labors.  They had started libraries, made little parks, inaugurated playgrounds, instituted exchanges for the sale of women’s wares, secured women internes in hospitals, paid for truant officers, founded children’s protective associations, installed branches of the Associated Charities, encouraged night schools, circulated art exhibits and traveling libraries; they had placed pictures in the public schools, founded kindergartens—­the list seemed inexhaustible.

“Oh, decidedly,” Kate granted Honora, “the thing seems to be good.”

Moreover, there was good being done of a less assertive but equally commendable nature.  The lines of section grew vague when the social Georgian sat side by side with the genial woman from Michigan.  Mrs. Johnson of Minnesota and Mrs. Cabot of Massachusetts, Mrs. Hardin of Kentucky and Mrs. Garcia of California, found no essential differences in each other.  Ladies, the world over, have a similarity of tastes.  So, as they lunched, dined, and drove together they established relationships more intimate than their convention hall could have fostered.  If they had dissensions, these were counterbalanced by the exchange of amenities.  If their points of view diverged in lesser matters, they converged in great ones.