capital, assembled to read and discuss John Stuart Mill's "The Subjection of Women." The following year, in the May of 1884, this little circle constituted itself into Finsk Qvinnoforening, whose first president was Mrs. Elizabeth Lofgren.

Its platform ran thus:

I. The same right for women as for men to higher and professional education.

2. Right for women to pass the examinations in the university.

3. Right to same salary without regard to sex.

4. Right of married as well as unmarried women to majority at twentyone years of age.

5. Right of married women to hold property.

6.

7. Right of women who have the municipal vote to hold municipal office.

8. Right of women to political suffrage on the same principles as men. 9. The legal age of marriage raised to beyond fifteen years, which is the prevailing custom in Finland.

10.

Unfaithfulness, ill-treatment, or a high degree of drunkenness constituted by law a cause for divorce.

II. The same moral restrictions in law and custom for men as those which now prevail for women. Also, as a part of the platform, the meeting passed resolutions in support of the federation.

The platform is almost literally the same as that accepted by the first women's rights meeting in Seneca Falls, 1848, although this was not known by the founders of our little association. Thus great ideas scatter their seeds in different countries, as the summer wind scatters the pollen of flowers. I will not detain you by an account of the difficulties which met our young association. They have most truly been about the same everywhere. I will say only a few words about the work done by Finsk Qvinnoforening.

Of course it has a different character from that of the women's associations in America. Where freedom is the foundation for the development of the people, there the work for the enfranchisement of women usually is concentrated upon suffrage work. But in countries which do not enjoy political liberty, and where even men's suffrage is

limited, one must concentrate the work upon questions concerning higher education, professional training, and general enlightenment for women. Thus Finsk Qvinnoforening has been able to show its sympathies for women's suffrage rather than to work for it. We have, on the other hand, taken initiative petitions to the Diet, which in Finland assembles every third year, asking that women may enter the university without special permission; that married women's majority, as well as that of unmarried women, be fixed at twenty-one years of age, without special request; that women may be elected poor law guardians; and that regulated vice shall be abolished.

We have in lectures and newspaper articles urged married women's right to hold property; and by circulars to women who have the municipal vote, suggested to them to use this right. But the association has worked chiefly for the information and education of women of the so-called lower classes, by lectures, elementary classes, summer homes, by a cooking-school and an office for promoting the employment of women. In connection with this I must mention a circumstance peculiar to our association. Besides the central association, we have six branch unions, of which three are in the country, counting chiefly peasant women as their members. This, I think, is rather exceptional. I believe that you, ladies and gentlemen, would feel it a revelation if you could be present at a meeting some chilly winter evening in one of those little country associations, and see the rows of simple women in the Finnish peasantwoman's coarse, dark-blue dress-some of them having, perhaps, walked several miles in the snow to come to the meeting - see their tough, resigned faces lightened by interest and their eyes expectantly fastened on the speaker's lips. These branch unions mostly work for the instruction of poor girls in needlework and trades; they also have lectures, reading-circles, and meetings for their own members; some of them have started cooking and weaving schools.

It is interesting to see how simply and naturally many of these unlearned women embrace an idea which many of their educated sisters in all countries still regard only as a whim or a passing freak of our time. Finsk Qvinnoforening can not do much for the improvement of women's legal position in Finland; but the leading thought, the red thread in our work, is our effort to raise the women of the working-classes. We believe, and nothing can make us alter our belief, that only in this way will our cause get firmly rooted and have a future in our country. In January, 1892, Finsk Qvinnoforening had its first meeting with its branch unions. This meeting was called to discuss questions concerning the position of our sex. At present we are preparing for an exhibition of women's work in the spring of 1894, when our association will celebrate the first decade of its existence. Finsk Qvinnoforening has a stipendium, called "Elizabeth Lofgren's stipendium," in honor of its first president. The association, including its branch unions, counts at present four hundred members.

As you see, the life of Finsk Qvinnoforening has not been long. She is a baby compared with the National American Woman's Suffrage Association. Still, you must follow this baby with kindness. She is, with her feeble forces, as attached to our common cause as large associations; and then, she is one of your extreme outguards in the north. Our great national poet, Zacharias Toppelius, says about Finland, that its culture exhibits one of humanity's most patient and most energetic victories over the natural powers, and its history is an evidence of what a people is able to endure without losing itself.

"This country can not be buried in the snow; this people can not be blotted out from the list of nations without leaving an empty place in the north of Europe and a vacancy in the reflexes of its civilization." I venture in a certain way to apply these words to us, your little sister association. If we yield to the difficulties, if we cease to be

then, in spite of our insignificance, there will be a

vacancy, here in the far north, in the reflexes of the work done in the great countries for the enfranchisement of

women.

THE ASSOCIATION FOR MARRIED WOMEN'S PROPERTY RIGHTS-ADDRESS BY BARONESS THORBORG-RAPPE OF

SWEDEN.

Numerous legislative reforms were effected in the middle of this century, and particularly during the sixties and the early part of the seventies, with a view to improve the position of woman socially and intellectually. Thus in 1858 it was by several enactments fixed that unmarried women should be of age at twenty-five years, if making an application, and later (1863), without such an application; in 1872 she was, if of age, released from the requirements of having the consent of her nearest kinsman to her marriage; in 1859 colleges were established for the education of lady teachers in rudimentary schools, and women were admitted as teachers in the public schools, and in 1860 into high schools for educating lady teachers of a higher grade; in 1863 women were employed in post offices, in the telegraphic service, and as clerks in the administrative bureaus of the railways; in 1870 women were admitted to the universities and ailowed to become practicing physicians.

However, all of these reforms tended to benefit only the unmarried woman. For the married woman nothing had been done since the royal statute of 1845 had granted a wife equal matrimonial rights with her husband. She was still ruled by the unaltered provisions of the statutes of 1734, investing her husband with a right of full guardianship and a full management over herself and whatever property she might have inherited or obtained before or after her marriage, with the exception of landed estate, wherein the husband had no share, and which he was not

allowed to sell, to mortgage, or to transfer without the consent of his wife.

Ever since L. J. Hierta, in the Riksdag of 1862, introduced a bill relative to the rights of married people, the attention of the legislators had from time to time been drawn to the position of the married woman; and bills asking that she should have protection against the unbounded sovereignty of her husband were introduced by the same mover in the Riksdag every year, but without success.

A daughter of Mr. L. J. Hierta, Miss A. Hierta, in consort with some other persons living in the capital, and warmly interested in the movement, decided in the early part of the seventies to form a society, the chief aim of which was to make known the injustice of the laws concerning the married woman, and to enlist sympathy for reform on this subject in and out of the Riksdag.

Their efforts were regarded favorably, and February 6, 1873, the "Association for the Married Woman's Property Rights" was founded, the earliest society in Sweden for the support of woman's rights. The invitation to join the society was signed by Mr. L. J. Hierta, the director-general, G. Fr. Almquist, Mrs. E. Anharsuard, Miss A. Hierta, Mr. and Mrs. Limnell, Mrs. H. Sohlman, and Mrs. A. Wallenberg. Before the first meeting of the association, however, Mr. L. J. Hierta had died. All the other signers of the invitation were elected members of the board of directors, and also Mrs. E. Lind of Hageby (born Hierta), and Baron O. Stackelberg, Mr. Almquist was elected president and Mrs. Anharsuard secretary of the association.

The first paragraph of the rules of the association contained: The aim of the association will be to effect such legislative measures that a married woman shall be recog nized as possessing the right to have the management of the property she may have inherited or obtained before or after marriage, and consequently also of the income she may derive from her work."

The newly formed association commenced very actively,