And as a result of our having been in prison, our headquarters has never ceased being the mecca of many discouraged "inmates," when released. They come for money. They come for work. They come for spiritual encouragement to face life after the wrecking experience of imprisonment. Some regard us as "fellow prisoners." Others regard us as "friends at court."

Occasionally we meet a prison associate in the workaday world. Long after Mrs. Lawrence Lewis' imprisonment, when she was working on ratification of the amendment in Delaware, she was greeted warmly by a charming young woman who came forward at a meeting. "Don't you remember me?" she asked, as

Mrs. Lewis struggled to recollect. "Don't you remember me? I met you in Washington."

"I'm sorry but I seem to have forgotten where I met you," said Mrs. Lewis apologetically.

"In jail," came the answer hesitantly, whereupon Mrs. Lewis listened sympathetically while her fellow prisoner told her that she had been in jail at the tipie Mrs. Lewis was, that her crime was bigamy and that she was one of the traveling circus troupe then in Dover.

"She brought up her husband, also a member of the circus," said Mrs. Lewis in telling of the incident, "and they both joined enthusiastically in a warm invitation to come and see them in the circus."

As each group of suffragists was released an enthusiastic welcome was given to them at headquarters and at these times, in the midst of the warmth of approving and appreciative comrades, some of the most beautiful speeches were delivered. I quote a part of Katharine Fisher's speech at a dinner in honor of released prisoners:

Five of us who are with you to-night have recently come out from the workhouse into the world. A great change? Not so much of a change for women, disfranchised women. In prison or out, American women are not free. Our lot of physical freedom simply gives us and the public a new and vivid sense of what our lack of political freedom really means.

Disfranchisement is the prison of women's power and spirit. Women have long been classed with criminals so far as their voting rights are concerned. And how quick the Government is to live up to its classification the minute women determinedly insist upon these rights. Prison life epitomizes all life under undemocratic rule. At Occoquan, as at the Capitol and the White House, we faced hypocrisy, trickery and treachery on the part of those in power. And the constant appeal to us to "cooperate" with the workhouse authorities sounded wonderfully like the exhortation addressed to all women to "support the Government."