siderable moral effect; perhaps even some legal effect also.

"The Times suggests that her name was put on the register by a 'deep-laid plot of the Women's Suffrage Society.' This was certainly not the case; for neither the Secretary of the Manchester Women's Suffrage Society, nor Mrs. Maxwell herself, was aware, until a day or two before the election, that her name was on the register of electors.

'When informed of the circumstance, Lily Maxwell at once announced her readiness to vote, and her intention of voting in favour of Mr. Jacob Bright, of whose political principles she was a warm admirer, declaring that if she had twenty votes she would give them all to him.

"It is sometimes said that women, especially those of the working class, have no political opinion at all, and would not care to vote. Yet this woman, who by chance was furnished with a vote, professed strong political opinions, and was delighted to have a chance of expressing them.

Accordingly, on the following day she went to Mr. Bright's committee-room, accompanied by Miss Becker, the able and zealous secretary of the Manchester Suffrage Society, and by another lady, also a member of the Committee. From thence the ladies were escorted by several gentlemen to the polling-place, which was a large room containing several booths. Mrs. Maxwell's name being on the list of electors, the returning officer had no choice in the matter, but was bound to accept her vote. "As soon as it was given the other voters in the room,

whether supporters of Mr. Bright's or of the other candidate's, united in three hearty cheers for the heroine of the day. There was not the slightest confusion, and a lady present said there was less inconvenience from the crowd than is often experienced at a public concert or fashionable chapel. How it happened that the name of a woman came to be placed on the electoral list is quite unknown to us. Probably Lily was mistaken for a man's name."

§ 16. Consequent Policy.

Early in 1868 the policy laid down by the Societies was publicly enunciated at a meeting held in the Assembly Room of the Free Trade Hall, Manchester, on April 14th, of which Miss Becker most truly wrote, “Our meeting is an era in the history of our movement."

It was the first public meeting held on the question. It was the first meeting addressed in this country by women. It formulated the policy which has been pursued from that day forth by the Women's Suffrage Societies, as well as the policy of the moment.

The chair was taken by Mr. Pochin (Mayor of Salford). The first resolution, moved by Miss Becker, declared the aims of the movement, in precisely the same terms as are used at the present time by the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies:

"That the exclusion of women from the exercise of the franchise in the election of Members of Parliament being unjust in principle and inexpedient in practice, this meeting is of opinion that the right of voting should be

granted to them on the same terms as it is or may be granted to men."

This was seconded by Archdeacon Sandford and supported by Mr. F. B. Potter, M.P., and Dr. Pankhurst.

The second resolution was moved by Mrs. Pochin.

"That this meeting expresses its cordial approval of the objects of the National Society for Women's Suffrage, and of the course it has hitherto pursued, and pledges itself to support its future efforts by all practical and constitutional methods, especially by urging women possessing legal qualifications to claim to be put on the Parliamentary register."

This was seconded by Mr. Chisholm Anstey and supported by Mr. Jacob Bright, M.P.

A vote of thanks to Mr. Mill was moved by Miss Annie Robertson (of Dublin) and seconded by Mr. F. W. H. Myers.

This meeting was quickly followed by another in Birmingham. Writing on April 18th to Miss Mary Johnson, Honorary Secretary of Birmingham Committee, Miss Becker said: "I am delighted to hear how well you are progressing in Birmingham and that you contemplate a public meeting. Our success ought to be at once an encouragement and an incentive to such a step. Our resolution will then have been moved by Manchester, seconded by Birmingham, and must be accepted by the country." She adds: "I wrote to all the members who voted with Mr. Mill. Some of the answers even of those who could not come were very encouraging."

The further development of the new policy will be

best told by a selection of passages from Miss Becker's correspondence.

"The Act of 1867 has struck out the words 'male person 'from the electoral law and substituted the generic term 'man,' which even in its ordinary grammatical sense is epicene and requires something in the context to restrict it to the male sex, e.g., 'What shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul?' 'God made man in His own image; male and female created He them.' Here the word 'man means both sexes of man.

"But there exists an Act of Parliament (13 & 14 Vict. c. 21) which provides that 'in all Acts words importing the masculine gender, shall be deemed and taken to include female, unless the contrary be expressly provided.' It is not sufficient that the contrary be implied or understood; it must be expressly provided. No such provision is found in the Representation of the People Act of 1867; accordingly the ratepaying clauses of this Act, which throughout use masculine pronouns, are applied to woman ratepayers.

"Now we maintain that if the ratepaying clauses touch women who are ratepayers, the voting clauses must also comprehend them; and that it is not only unjust, but unlawful, to subject women ratepayers to the clauses imposing burdens and leave them out from the benefit of the clauses conferring privileges, of one and the same Act of Parliament.

"But this view of the case is so little understood or made known that there is reason to believe the overseers, in making out their lists of persons now entitled

to be on the register of electors, will take upon themselves, in what I believe to be an arbitrary and unauthorized manner, to omit from this list the seven thousand women householders of Manchester.

"The only remedy in this case for the omitted persons is to send in a formal claim, which the overseer is then bound to present for adjudication by the revising barrister.

"Of course the legal question could be accurately decided if only one woman claimed, but revising barristers are but men, and a man might have little or no hesitation in dismissing one claim, who would think twice before dismissing 2000, in a lump. We therefore desire if possible to have 2000 women claimants to be placed on the register of electors for the City of Manchester.

"The time for making their claims is the first three weeks of August, but if we wait till then to beat up our claimants, we shall find that we have to organize our army when we ought to be marching them off to the field.

"We therefore desire immediately to begin a houseto-house visitation of all the women householders of Manchester, explain to each of them the state of the law, ascertain which of them are willing, when the time comes, to send in their claim, and take a careful note of the names and addresses of these; then we shall need only to take the forms round to each of these, get them filled up and signed, and pour them into the revising barrister's court."

In a letter to Mr. Anstey (April 17th) she writes:"The secretary to the overseers at Manchester in