tion created by Mrs. Stowe in her literary career—an article published in the "Atlantic Monthly" called "A Vindication of Lady Byron."

While Mrs. Stowe was abroad she became very intimate with that unfortunate lady, who confided to her under the seal of absolute secrecy as long as Lady Byron herself lived the reasons for her separation from her husband. Mrs. Stowe, however, was requested by Lady Byron, if ever a necessity arose after her death, to make her secret known to the public.

When a "Life of Byron," edited by the notorious Countess Guiccioli, was published in England, and aroused new interest in the poems and character of Byron, being written by a woman who had shared his licentious and indecent life, Mrs. Stowe felt that the time had come when Lady Byron's character as a wife needed to be vindicated from the implied or open assertions of Byron's mistress; and, accordingly, she gave to the public the painful and not by any means delicate story of Lady Byron's wrong and suffering.

In doing this, Mrs. Stowe was impelled, as all who knew her thoroughly understood, by a generous and brave affection for the dead woman who had been her lovely, living friend. It was an act of heroic justice, such as such a woman alone could have done.

Whether Lady Byron was deranged at the time her sorrows and her solitude began, or whether by long brooding over her loss in her worse than widowed loneliness, she created out of her suspicions what seemed to her grief an actual fact, or whether her story was indeed true to the letter, is still a matter of conjecture with most people; but it is certain that Mrs. Stowe believed her story implicitly, and was filled with the deepest pity and indignation when she heard it; and made its revelation in a conscientious desire to do good and not evil.

But a tale like this, which in vindicating the character of one woman blasted in a peculiarly dreadful manner the reputation of another, and involved, collaterally, persons yet liv

ing, in the black shame and crime of near and dear relatives, could not fail to arouse a storm of indignation and disgust in England, and give rise to much low scoff and vulgar comment wherever it was read.

It is a melancholy reflection on human nature that it is never safe to trust its nobler instincts in a matter like this,— the story which Mrs. Stowe's best friends must regret that she ever published became a weapon in the hands of her enemies; and instead of vindicating her deceased friend from the attacks of post-mortem slander, she not only aroused them to fresh vigor, but drew upon herself a cloud of misrepresentation and scandalous sarcasm that pained all her myriad admirers, and must, no doubt, have wounded and discomfited her woman's delicate nature.

Still, with the rare, unflinching courage of her birthright, which has ever been one of her prominent characteristics, she says to-day, under her own hand, "I am never sorry for having written it, spite of the devil and all his angels!"

"Poganuc People," a sketch of old Litchfield and its inhabitants, is the latest volume from her pen, though she still writes brief articles for the public. But her working days are merged at last in the rest which she has so well earned and deserved.

On the occasion of her seventy-first birthday her Boston publishers, Messrs. Houghton and Mifflin, gave a garden party in her honor, at the house of Governor Claflin, of Newton, Mass., near Boston. Here were assembled all those brethren of the literary guild who delighted to honor their queen, and here too were the veterans of the abolition "Old Guard;" quaint, simple, "fanatical" as ever, but calm and satisfied as never before, for their prophetess had ceased to prophesy, fulfilment having come. On a stage, under the kindly shade of a great tent, sat the sweet, kindly-faced woman whose clustering curls had whitened to snow-wreaths in the service of humanity; praise was showered upon her like incense; poems read in her honor; and before her gathered a crowd of friends with love and laud in every eye, on every lip; but it

was not for the praise of man to ruffle her serene countenance or disturb the dreamy peace of her eyes, that seemed bent on some far distance, where the babble of earth is heard no more, but the silent welcome of heaven is ready and waiting.

She received her ovation with the calm simplicity of a child, and in a few words of gracious thanks and counsel dismissed her guests when all their speech had been uttered, and went out with her husband, her son, and her grandchildren into the fresh June air, the young summer verdure, and the crowding flowers, and away to her home and its duties, as a saint to her cell, untouched by the hot breath of flattery, unmoved by the loud plaudits of men, calm in that mild consciousness of devotion and duty that is deeper and dearer than this life's most earnest homage, or its richest gifts.

She says of herself, "I am seventy-two years old, and am more interested in the other side of Jordan than this, though this still has its pleasures."

Mrs. Stowe has two homes: one in Hartford, Connecticut, where she spends her summers; and one in Mandarin, Florida, where her winters are passed. Long may it be, prays every soul that knows her, before she leaves them for the city which is in heaven.

Earth will be bereft indeed when her gracious presence forsakes it to go home forever; and leaves us only a memory, holy and mighty though that memory be, of America's greatest woman, Harriet Beecher Stowe.

CHAPTER XXVI.

ELIZABETH CADY STANTON.

BY LAURA CURTIS BULLARD.

George Sand's Inquiry - Mrs. Stanton as the Originator of the Woman Suffrage Movement - Birth and Parentage-Early Sympathies with ill-treated Women-Tries to be a Boy-Studies Law in Her Father's Office - Her Marriage and Wedding-Tour- Meets Lucretia Mott, and Decides upon a Future Career-Calls the First Woman Suffrage Convention - Frederick Douglass Her only Helper-Effect of the Convention - Progress of the Movement-Lectures and Addresses-Edits "The Revolution" - Travels in France and England-Her Wit-Anecdotes-Her Personal Appearance and Characteristics-The Future of the Cause.

O you know Mrs. Elizabeth Cady Stanton? was the first question put to me by Madame George Sand, when I met her a few years ago in Paris. "Yes, I know her well," I replied. The famous Frenchwoman inquired minutely concerning my distinguished friend- her personal appearance, her views and purposes, her style as a writer and speaker, and her method of reformatory agitation. As I then found it no easy matter, even during a long and free conversation, to answer all these queries, so now I find it still more difficult to make a fit record, in a few pages, of the busy career and varied labors of a lady who, in addition to the cares of a large family, has been the originator of one of the chief public movements of our times, and who has also been an active participant in many kindred reforms. For although Mrs. Stanton is best known as the leader of the agitation for woman suffrage, she is not "a person of one idea," but has been among the foremost of the many zealous laborers, both American and English, who have striven for the abolition of

slavery - for temperance for a working day of eight hours - for the suppression of usury - for the co-education of the sexes for co-operative industry and last, but not least,

for international arbitration and peace.

biography of this representative woman

tory of the political, social, and religious thought of the last two generations. Moreover, not even such a history could reflect a faithful image of such a life's work; for Mrs. Stanton's public efforts have taken the evanescent form of lectures, speeches, resolutions, protests, criticisms, and editorials all growing out of the events of the day, and which it is not possible to reproduce at a later period in their original vitality, however accessible they may be in the archives of the various movements which have called them forth. But though her finest intellectual productions have been of an ephemeral type, like those of any other speaker or journalist, yet in her representative capacity as the head and front of a movement peculiarly her own a novel reform whose novelty seems never to wear out Elizabeth Cady Stanton, now in her green and sunny old age, is still what she has been for the last thirty years an object of affection to one class of her countrywomen, of aversion to another, and of curiosity to all.

As the movement for woman suffrage has proved of sufficient vitality, since it was first set on foot by Mrs. Stanton in this country, to have made itself seriously felt also in other lands, and notably in England, France, and Italy, I will detail with some minuteness the early beginnings, in this able woman's mind, of those strong and bold thoughts which she was the first to promulgate nearly forty years ago, and which have since resulted in a new system of political philosophy.

She was born November 12, 1816, at Johnstown, N.Y. Her father, Judge Daniel Cady, was a jurist whose legal learning and blameless life have passed into the traditions of the bar of the Empire State. Her mother, Margaret Livingstone, at the time of Elizabeth's birth, was a young lady of high spirit, dash, and vivacity, retaining to a remarkable