"Ladies," she said to the delegates at the biennial meeting of 1904,
"Dante is dead. He died several centuries ago, and a great many things
have happened since his time. Let us drop the study of his 'Inferno' and
proceed in earnest to contemplate our own social order."

[Illustration: MRS. SARAH PLATT DECKER]

Mostly they took her advice. A few clubs still devote themselves to the
pursuit of pure culture, a few others exist with little motive beyond
congenial association. The great majority of women's clubs are organized
for social service. A glance at their national program shows the
modernity, the liberal character of organized women's ideals. The
General Federation has twelve committees, among them being those on
Industrial Conditions of Women and Children, Civil Service Reform,
Forestry, Pure Food and Public Health, Education, Civics, Legislation,
Arts and Crafts, and Household Economics. Every state federation has
adopted, in the main, the same departments; and the individual clubs
follow as many lines of the work as their strength warrants.

The contribution of the women's clubs to education has been enormous.
There is hardly a State in the Union the public schools of which have
not been beautified, inside and outside; hardly a State where
kindergartens and manual training, domestic science, medical inspection,
stamp savings banks, or other improvements have not been introduced by
the clubs. In almost every case the clubs have purchased the equipment
and paid the salaries until the boards of education and the school
superintendents have been convinced of the value of the innovations. In
the South, where opportunities for the higher education of women are
restricted, the clubs support dozens of scholarships in colleges and