Spirit of God brooded over the primeval void and brought therefrom
order, light, beauty and life, so the spirit of suffering brooded
above the torn and saddened heart of womanhood, till at last the
angel of awakening appeared, and the heart that had dumbly, patiently
endured, stirred to the impulse of defence, and opened to the thought
of freedom. The hour had struck, the call had come. The "arrow had
been hidden in God's quiver," waiting His time. When His ringers
guide to the mark, what can the arrow do but fulfil its mission?




CHAPTER II.

AWAKENING.


In the history of oppressed nations, it has often happened that
years of suffering have but kindled the desire for freedom and kept
it alive, fanned by every fresh act of cruelty and injustice, until,
at last, it has burst forth in a fire, which has destroyed the wrong,
illuminated the right, and the oppressed people have gone free.

In individual lives, there are not wanting those who have come
through the white heat of affliction, purified and made free from the
bitterness and selfishness of earth and crowned with a noble purpose--
to relieve the sufferings of others, to be, in a sense, God's voice,
God's messenger to the helpless, and to be in His hands for the
deliverance of the oppressed and enslaved. So in this temperance
cause. For years women had asked, as Paul had asked, "Lord, what wilt