The General was standing on the rear platform of the last car. At that
time, as you know, he had a great reputation for silence--for it was
before he had made his series of brilliant speeches before the New
England Society. They spoke of his reticence--a quality which New
Englanders admire so much--in others. Suddenly there was a commotion in
the crowd, and as it opened a large, tall, gaunt-looking woman came
rushing toward the car, out of breath. Taking her spectacles off from
the top of her head and putting them on her nose, she put her arms
akimbo, and looking up, said: "Well, I've just come down here a runnin'
nigh onto two mile, right on the clean jump, just to get a look at the
man that lets the women do all the talkin'."

The first regular speaker of the evening (William M. Evarts) touched
upon woman, but only incidentally, only in reference to Mormonism and
that sad land of Utah, where a single death may make a dozen widows.

A speaker at the New England dinner in Brooklyn last night (Henry Ward
Beecher) tried to prove that the Mormons came originally from New
Hampshire and Vermont. I know that a New Englander sometimes in the
course of his life marries several times; but he takes the precaution
to take his wives in their proper order of legal succession. The
difference is that he drives his team of wives tandem, while the Mormon
insists upon driving his abreast.

But even the least serious of us, Mr. President, have some serious
moments in which to contemplate the true nobility of woman's character.
If she were created from a rib, she was made from that part which lies
nearest a man's heart.

It has been beautifully said that man was fashioned out of the dust of