own. There liveil in the village an old colored
woman whose master had manumitted her and
given her money enouf^h to buy a small house.
Lucy had taught her to read. The girls asked
her if they might have the vise of hei- jiarlor
occasionally for a debating soeiety. At first
she was 'doubtful, fearing that the society
might be a cover for flirtation: but, hen she
found it was to consist of young women exclusively, she thought it must be an innocent affair, and gave her consent. So on the appointed afternoons the girls would assemble, coming
by different routes and in ones and twos at a
time, that the faculty might suspect nothing;
and then, shut u]) in the little parlor, they
"reasoned high" on all sorts of profound and
lofty subjects. Sometimes they held their
meetings in the woods. This was the first de-
bating society ever formed among girls. Later
Antoinette Brown became the first ordained
woman minister. At the end of her course
Lucy was appointed to write an essay to be
read at the connnencement, but was notified
that one of the professors would have to read
it for her, as it woukl not be proper for a woman
to read her own essay in public. Rather than
not read it herself, she declined to write it.
Nearly forty years afterward, when Uberlin
celebrated its semi-centennial, she was invited,
to be one of the speakers at that great gather-
ing. So the world moves.
Lucy had an enthusiastic admiration and re- spect for the leatling abolitionists, and heljied to get up meetings for Abby Kelley, William Lloyd Garrison, and others, when they lectured at Oberlin. Mr. Garrison wrote fi'oni (Jberlin to his wife, August 28, 1847: "Among others with whom I have become acquainted is Mi.ss Lucy Stone, who has just graduatetl, and yes- terday left for her home in Brookfield, Mass. She is a very superior young woman, and has a soul as free as the air, and is preparing to go forth as a lecturer, ]>articularly in vindication of the rights of women. Her coiu-se here has been very firm and independent, and she has caused no small uneasiness to the sjiirit of sec- tarianism in the institution." Yet, in spite of all the uneasiness her progressive ideas caused them, she was a favorite with both faculty and students. As one of the professors said to her. vears after, " You know we always liked you, Lucy."
Lucy Stone was the first woman in Massa- chusetts to take a college degree. She gave her first woman's rights lecture the same year, in the pulpit of her brotheis church at Gard- ner, Mass. Soon after, she was engaged to lecture regularly for the Anti-slavery Society. Public sentiment in New England at that time was intensely pro-slavery, and the idea of equal rights for women was even more unpopular than that of freedom for the slaves. Lucy shared the hard campaign experiences of all the other early apostles. Once she went to lecture at Hinsdale, away up among the hills. Samuel May, the agent of the Anti-slaver>' Society, who made the arrangements for her meetings, had written to the Unitarian minis- ter, a.sking him to give notice of the lecture. When Lucy got there, she found that he was strongly opposed. He had not given the no- tice, and would not give it. So Lucy put up her own posters, as she often had to do, with a little package of tacks and a stone picked up from the street. Then she went from house to house, telling everybody about the meeting and asking them to come. She worked all day without food, not having time to stop to eat; and then, toward evening, toiled up the long hill to the tavern. The tavern-keeper's wife was tired ami overworked, with two or three little children clinging to her skirts. Lucy said to her: "I nuist have some supper before my lecture. Get me whatever you can get most easily, for I am hungiy enough to eat anything; and I will take care of the children for you meanwhile." The children were delighted to come to her, and she told them stories all the while that supper was jneparing. The tavern- keeper's wife chopped up meat and potatoes, and made hash; but in her hurry she forgot to take out of the chopping-bowl the dish-cloth with which she had wiped it, and she chopped u) the cloth with the hash. At the first mouth- ful that Lucy took, she found pieces of .the dish-towef in it. This took away her appetite, and she could not eat any more; so she went to her lecture fasting. "The boys threw paper wads at first," she said, "but it was a good meeting, and I got some subscribers for the
