THE FEMALE SUFFRAGISTS

Evening Star, Issue 13003, 24 December 1906, Page 6

THE FEMALE SUFFRAGISTS

Mr T. G. Cobdcn-Snndcrsnn. in * letter | to the Home Press, tells bow bis wife and. tho other ladies who -were imprisoned for ! refusing to enter into bonds to keep the | peace, -Wf-ic treated. He says: i On entering the prison my ■wife was j stripped of all her things rave her -wedding ring and redressed in the clothing of tie I prison, and in place of her name, was numI bered with a. number winch is now her name, deprived of ail associations KiTe those of the prison which is now her new ! and silent world. Her food—she, 13 a vegc- ' tarian—consists of dry bread, tea or cocoa, ■ and potatoes. .She is in solitary ccnfitirI ment for twentv-thrce hours out of tho i twentv-fonr. For one hour, in science, she ' is with otM prisoners. 6ft apart, walked backwards and forwards m a yard in the . prison enclosure. In bcr cell she has .or I occupation the making of postmen s bags. j For reading, the Bibk—that book of revoI lotions! What a mockery! And a book ! called "A Healthy llome/ whici, she say:-, I with a smile, is of no use to her there, hna | ajked for a. Shakespeare. 'J was but one volume in the prison, and that was eiu -aped. Sho ai.kcd for pen and paper that : £e might write down her meditations. That. was refused : it w.« a S a>nst the prison regulations. She asked mc-ii was her only I request-to apply to the H«. Secretary ofl \, l-.rilf. and on behalf of :-Jl prisoners and captive,'." to be allowed the nse of pen and piper and ink wherewith to **•« , themselves of their thought*, burning withm tl-in all <Uv and all night, and Tumtterabra. She makes no complaint for herself, bat :u isolation prays for the can*- of -woman. Will that prayer K- answered? Is there, then, no soul of woman nally. no anything in tbc world'- A v.orld of shadows only.' No man of heait, of gtniu?, to bid all legis-I'-tior stop and the world's vain tormoi cease till woman shall have stepped with th- help of man to where man stands, that hand in bund and heart to heart they may together climb the sto=p path of life! Snefl 0 foolish world and vain! Such, if yon will hear it, is the appeal, voiceless now, of tho daughter of him who gave you bread.