Page:History of Oregon Literature.djvu/297

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So out of the stainful dusk of the grave,
The hues of a Promise I see.
SALEM, OREGON, SEPT. 8, 1871.


Miss Anthony's Lectures—Orserveranda

From the New Northwest, September 29, 1871
By Mrs. M. M. Miller

This sketch, which consists of about the first third of the complete report, shows the freshness, cleverness and wit that must indeed have characterized her when she first appealed to Joaquin Miller and caused their common friends to rate her almost his equal as a writer.

The first night of Mrs. Anthony's lecture my attention was entirely taken up with watching the speaker, for, be it known, the first, last and only time I ever heard a woman speak in public was in the "meetin'-house", lang syne, when Aunt Tribulation Fear-the-Lord arose and through her tears, nose and handkerchief told her "experience".

So the first evening I had eyes and ears only for Miss A.

The following evening I gave her my ears, but managed to bestow my eyes furtively upon her audience.

What I took most interest in observing was the countenances of the gentlemen, who had lain aside that evening their important business matters and come to Miss Anthony's lecture like lambs to the slaughter. That my attention should have been bestowed almost exclusively upon the gentlemen may not seem natural; but when I tell you that I had never yet beheld a set of faces so mobile and expressive, so beaming, smiling and scowling, with all the variable and intense emotions of wrought-up manhood, you will not wonder.

The women were as coolly radiant as though the Suttee had never been performed. They were as serene and unruffled as a Quaker's night-gown. It was not their funeral.

But the men!

Here sat one along-side of his wife. She had towed him in. He was a very reluctant-looking man. It seemed as