That settled it, and we waited. That the protest on the outside had been strong enough to precipitate action from the government was the subject of our conversation. Evidently it had not been strong enough to force action on the suffrage amendment, but it was forcing action, and that was important.

Mr. Whittaker returned triumphant.

"Ladies, you are pardoned by the President. You are free to go as soon as you have taken off your prison clothes and put on your own."

It was sad to leave the other prisoners behind. Especially pathetic were the girls who helped us with our clothes. They whispered such eager appeals in our ears, telling us of their drastic sentences for trifling offenses and of the cruel punishments. It was hard to resist digressing into some effort at prison reform. That way lay our instincts. Our reason told us that we must first change the status of women.

As we were leaving the workhouse to return to Washington we had an unexpected revelation of the attitude of officialdom toward our campaign. Addressing Miss Lucy Burns, who had arrived to assist us in getting on our way, Superintendent Whittaker, in an almost unbelievable rage, said, "Now that you women are going away, I have something to say and I want to say it to you. The next lot of women who come here won't be treated with the same consideration that these women were." I will show later on how he made good this terrible threat.

Receiving a Presidential pardon through the Attorney General had its amusing aspect. My comrades shared this amusement when I told them the following incident.

On the day after our arrest, I was having tea at the Chevy

Chase Country Club in Washington. Quite casually a gentleman introduced me to Mr. Gregory, the Attorney General.

"I see you were mixed up with the suffragettes yesterday," was the Attorney General's first remark to the gentleman. And before the latter could explain that he had settled accounts quietly but efficiently with a hoodlum who was attempting to trip the women up on their march, the chief law officer of the United States contributed this important suggestion: "You know what I'd do if I was those policemen. I'd just take a hose out with me and when the women came out with their banners, why I'd just squirt the hose on 'em . . . ."

"But Mr. Gregory . . ."

"Yes, sir! If you can just make what a woman does look ridiculous, you can sure kill it . . . ."

"But, Mr. Attorney General, what right would the police have to assault these or any other women?" the gentleman managed finally to interpolate.

"Hup-hup-"denoting great surprise, came from the Attorney General, as he looked to me for reassurance.

His expectant look vanished when I said, "Mr. Gregory, did it ever occur to you that it might make the government look ridiculous instead of the women?"