Leading Articles in the Reviews. 



663 



ANTI-SUFFRAGE LOGIC. 



To Mr. P. W. Wilson the Englishwoman for 

 December is indebted for a long article on the 

 question of woman suffrage. 



SUFFRAGIST WOMEN COUNCILLORS. 



The most useful part of the article is that 

 which refers to women and municipal govern- 

 ment and the attitude of anti-suffragists, who 

 lay so much stress on the value of the 

 " domestic "career and make so little attempt to 

 develop it. Out of forty-five women councillors in 

 Great Britain, it has been ascertained that thirty- 

 nine of them are avowed suffragists, two anti- 

 suffragists, one neutral, and three unknown. This 

 does not include three councillors in Ireland. 

 Moreover, during the last year or two a very 

 large number ol Town Councils throughout the 

 United Kingdom, including such important 

 municipalities as Liverpool, Glasgow, Manches- 

 ter, Sheffield, Newcastle, Bradford, Leeds, 

 Leicester, etc., have passed resolutions in favour 

 of the political enfranchisement of women. That 

 is surely a mandate from the great cities which 

 can hardly be ignored by anti-suffragists or 

 others. Mrs. Humphry Ward and her friends 

 are opposed to their names appearing on a Par- 

 liamentary register, but Mr. Wilson, at the 

 time of writing, evidently had not heard of 

 the woman anti-suffragist whose name had acci- 

 dentally been put on the Parliamentary -register 

 at Bow and Bromley and who actually exercised 

 the vote in the recent election to say she did not 

 want the vote. 



POURING OIL ON THE FLAME. 



In regard to the White Slave Traffic Bill 

 and the rittitude of the Government towards it, 

 Mr. Wilson asks whether anyone seriously 

 imagines that you can by such " kindness " kill 

 the suffrage movement. It is not water for 

 that flame, but oil. The House has, in fact, 

 furnished an object-lesson of what the influence 

 of the vote, actual or prospective, may achieve 

 in directions of special concern to the unrepre- 

 sented sex. At one period anti-suffragists 

 urged that under a federal constitution women 

 should vote for and be eligible as candidates for . 

 the provincial legislature, but they blocked that 

 opening for public service effectually by reject- 

 ing the Snowden amendment to the Home Rule 

 Bill. W^hen brought face to face with their 

 own logic they display quite as much hostility 

 to the domestic as to the Imperial franchise. 

 Generally speaking, the municipal register ex- 

 cludes married women, and thus they are also 

 excluded from serving on local authorities. 

 There are other restrictions to the activities of 

 women in municipal work; for instance, in 

 London, where a woman must be an occupier 



(not a lodger) to get her name on the municipal 

 register. Have the anti-suffragists, in their 

 zeal, ever pushed forward any legislation which 

 would admit the mass of women to share not 

 merely in the duties, but in the privileges in 

 this field, the beauties of which they have so 

 much extolled? What, one may ask, are they 

 doing about the Manhood Suffrage Bill, for in- 

 stance, which goes out of its way to take away 

 some municipal privileges which women now 

 enjoy? 



A PRINCESS'S SCHOOLING. 



A PRETTY character-sketch is that of Princess 

 Mary in the Woman's Magazine. The author is 

 William Armstrong, and his picture of Princess 

 Mary's tastes and amusements and daily life is 

 convincing and delightful : — 



There is nothing precocious about the I'rincess. What 

 she learns she learas by hard applicat,ion. At eight she 

 was a passable linguist ; at twelve she received the com- 

 pliments of the French Ambassador on her mastery of nis 

 language ; German she speaks well. She has yet to learn 

 Italian, but she is getting a fundamental knowledge of 

 Latin and Greek, and the piano and singing. Books of 

 adventure recommended by her brothers proved her intro- 

 duction to literature, but her own tastes have now as- 

 sumed definite form, with Tennyson as her favourite 

 poet. It is said that Queen Mary once found her reading 

 his Idylls when she should have been asleep. History, 

 in particular all pertaining to Great Britain, is part of 

 her training, entailing visits, together with her brothers, 

 to the British Museum for research among its manu- 

 scripts. So, all in all, her outlook on the practical side 

 of education has been both broad and serious, as befits 

 one who may be a Queen some day, or at any rate will 

 always occupy an exalted position. 



One longing the Princess Mary has never had ful- 

 filled, and that is her eager desire for girl associates 

 of her own age. A year or two ago the idea was enter- 

 tained of placing her in an exclusive boarding-school, 

 or, at least, allowing her to attend the classes in certain 

 public institutions, as did the Princesses Margaret and 

 Patricia of Connaught and the daughters of the Prin- 

 cess Royal. But even the latter plan was finally aban- 

 doned in favour of the constant supervision and com- 

 panionship of home. 



ABOUT THE MISTLETOE. 



In the course of his paper in TJie IVotnan's 

 Magazine Henry Irving tells us well-nigh every- 

 thing about the mistletoe. Throughout Saxon 

 times it was probably brought into the house at 

 Christmastime with more or less ceremony, 

 being suspended from the ceiling, not to touch 

 e.'irth, as its whole tradition has required, and 

 so affording protection to thane and swineherd, 

 to chance wayfarer and welcome guest, gathered 

 in company about the blazing yule log. So on 

 into feudal times, when, though still regarded as 

 effective against wizardry, it came to be less 

 associated with the spirit of religion, but rather 

 with that of a profuse hospitality, merging into 

 boisterous and unabashed revelry. 



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