would sign the call.  The Universalist minister, Rev. J.H.  Tuttle, agreed to be present and speak.  She secured thirty or forty signatures, engaged the city hall and advertised extensively.  The feeling against Stout was very strong and there was a determination among certain members of the community that this meeting should not be held.  Huge placards were posted throughout the city, urging all opposed to the sentiments of the call to be out in force, a virtual invitation to the mob.

When the evening arrived, October 7, the hall was filled with a crowd of nearly 2,000, a large portion of whom only needed the word to break into a riot.  Miss Anthony called the assemblage to order and Frederick Douglass was made chairman, but when he attempted to speak, his voice was drowned with groans and yells.  Aaron M. Powell, William C. Bloss and others tried to make themselves heard but the mob had full sway.  Miss Anthony was greeted with a perfect storm of hisses.  Finally the demonstrations became so threatening that she and the other speakers were hurried out of the hall by a rear door, the meeting was broken up and the janitor turned out the lights.  No attempt was made by the mayor or police to quell the disturbance and mob law reigned supreme.

The brightest ray of sunshine in the closing days of 1858 was the following letter from Mr. Phillips:  “I have had given me $5,000 for the woman’s rights cause; to procure tracts on that subject, publish and circulate them, pay for lectures and secure such other agitation of the question as we deem fit and best to obtain equal civil and political position for women.  The name of the giver of this generous fund I am not allowed to tell you.  The only condition of the gift is that it is to remain in my keeping.  You, Lucy Stone and myself are a committee of trustees to spend it wisely and efficiently.”  The donor proved to be Francis Jackson, the staunch friend of the emancipation of woman as well as the negro.

[Autograph: 

  With much respect and esteem,
  Francis Jackson”]

[Footnote 24:  Now Elizabeth Powell Bond, dean of Swarthmore College for many years.]

[Footnote 25:  The Bangor Jeffersonian said:  “Miss Anthony is far from being an impracticable enthusiast.  Dignity, conscientiousness and regard for the highest welfare of her sex, are the impressions which one receives of her.  Doubtless all (if any there were) who went to scoff, remained to pray for the success of the doctrine she advocated.  Personally she is good-looking, of symmetrical figure and modest and ladylike demeanor.”

The Bangor Whig was equally favorable.  The Ellsworth American said:  “Her enunciation is very clear and remarkably distinct, yet there is nothing in it of the unfeminine character and tone which people had been led to expect from the usual criticisms of the press.  The lecture itself, as an intellectual effort, was satisfactory as well to those who dissented as to those who sympathized with its positions and arguments.  It was fruitful in ideas and suggestions and we doubt not many a woman, and man too, went home that night, with the germ of more active ideas in their heads than had gathered there for a twelvemonth before.”]