A CENTURY OF PROGRESS FOR WOMEN IN CANADA - AN ADDRESS BY A. M. BLAKELY OF CANADA, REPRESENTATIVE OF THE DOMINION WOMEN'S CHRISTIAN TEMPERANCE UNION.

The previous speaker has given such an eloquent and exhaustive paper on the progress of women in Canada in general that she has not left much for me to say. I shall therefore confine my remarks to the women of my own northwestern province, Manitoba.

We have large numbers of bright, intelligent women, who have come from some of the best homes of our eastern provinces. Many of them are decidedly more conservative than our American sisters, but are gradually coming to the front on the woman question in all its phases.

We have already municipal and school suffrage. We have not yet had a woman elected to a school board, but one school district has a lady serving as secretary and treasurer. The professions of teaching and medicine are open to our women. Our provincial university admits women, and from year to year numbers of them take the degree of B. A.

I am sorry to say the legal profession has not yet opened its doors to our women. The civil service, however, is open to women. In this department we have one bright example. The accountant of the educational department is a woman. She has full charge of the disbursement of the large legislative grant for our public schools throughout the province. She has performed her work in such a way as to reflect credit on her sex, and to show that women are quite as capable as men of filling such positions.

I have already said that the women of Manitoba are more conservative than the women of the United States. This was clearly demonstrated last winter in the city of Winnipeg when I was arranging to hold the woman's mock parliament, to bring the question of full suffrage for women before the

people, just previous to petitioning our local legislature for the same.

The idea was a new one. I met with no little opposition. Some of our women thought it would be placing ourselves in too conspicuous a position to appear before the public as a parliament of women. After much difficulty I secured the coöperation of twenty-four earnest Christian women. We held our mock parliament in the opera house, and conducted it in accordance with the rules and regulations of our local legislature, with the one exception that we opened the session with prayer. We had five clever lady speakers, three on the government side and two on the opposition. Of course our bill for full franchise was made a government measure. The members of our local legislature, which was then in session, omitted their own evening session and came in a body to our parliament, accepting the front seats, which had been reserved for them. They were both surprised and delighted with the strong arguments and eloquence of the lady speakers, and went away thoroughly convinced that our women are quite as well qualified as men to conduct a parliament. This entertainment did more to educate the people of our province on the franchise question than years of ordinary agitation could have done. A few days later, when our resolution came before the house, not one speaker opposed the principle of the resolution. They promised to give us full suffrage as soon as they were convinced that women really wanted it. They did not wish to impose any added responsibility on us that we might not want. Our Canadian legislators are so considerate. I presume you find them. equally so in the United States.

Our province of Manitoba is still young, and our numbers comparatively small, but with the high moral sentiment and the courage of their convictions that many of our women have we expect and intend to take no second place to any province in the Dominion of Canada, or to any state in this grand republic, on the woman question.

DISCUSSION OF THE SAME SUBJECT BY MRS. JOHN HARVIE OF CANADA, REPRESENTATIVE OF THE YOUNG WOMEN'S CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATIONS OF CANADA.

Twenty-five years ago a wonderful change came upon our women, and the first woman's foreign missionary society in Canada was organized in the city of Montreal. That society has grown year by year, and has sent missionaries all over the face of the earth. It was not denominational, and three years ago it died a graceful, natural death because every single denomination in Canada had organized its woman's board of missions. Last year the Woman's Board of Missions in connection with the Methodist church raised thirty-six thousand dollars to send the gospel to China and Japan and the Northwest, and this year the Woman's Board of Missions in connection with the Presbyterian church has raised fifty-eight thousand dollars.

DISCUSSION CONTINUED BY EMILY CUMMINGS OF CANADA.

We have other women in Canada besides white women, and I am going to tell you something about the Indian women. I visited some Indians two years ago who are now in the same condition that the Ontario Indians were one hundred years ago. I visited several tribes of Indians who in dress and habits were thorough savages.

The women are intensely fond of their children, and if a child dies they cut their legs in long gashes, and go around uttering piercing cries of sorrow. To appease the great spirit of the sun they chop off their fingers sometimes. I saw many women with their fingers chopped off for this

purpose.

I saw other Indians who had been in contact with white people only a very few years. Something like ten years

ago they were taken in charge by the government, and others have been in contact with civilization for about forty years. They live in neat homes and have nice little farms. A great many of them can read and write, and they are wonderfully advanced when you think it is only forty years since they were like the others I have spoken of.

Coming down to Ontario, let me tell you with pride that we have there an Indian woman who is a noted poetess, who stands high in literature, whose contributions to literature you have often read, I am sure-Pauline Johnson by name. She is a great elocutionist, and is welcomed by large audiences wherever she may appear. Her sister, also, though not a poetess or an orator, is highly thought of in literature, and has contributed to a great many magazines. To show that these women are not the only ones who are advanced, I might say that at our last year's missionary meeting two delegates came from an Indian woman's missionary society, and although they could not understand a word of what was said, a lady interpreted for them, and they discussed all the questions and voted just as intelligently as any white woman in that audience.

THE PROGRESS OF WOMEN IN NEW SOUTH WALES - ADDRESS BY C. C. MONTEFIORE OF SYDNEY, NEW SOUTH WALES.

It will perhaps not be surprising to those who see the part played by women in the United States to learn that in the Australian colonies also women have for some time past taken a share in the literary, artistic, and university life of our great cities. The principal universities have thrown open their doors to women students, who have not been slow to avail themselves of the advantages thus offered them. There are at present over ninety students at the Sydney University, some studying for medical and others for art degrees. Two women who obtained the

degree of M. A. at the Sydney University were last year appointed tutors to the women students. There are already two women practitioners of medicine in Sydney, who passed all their examinations at the Sydney University in a most creditable manner. One woman who obtained the degree of bachelor in science is now at the head of the Ipswich Girls' Grammar School.

A considerable number of women are now engaged in the active pursuit of journalism as a profession, and from among them and other women of literary tastes has sprung the Women's Literary Society, which, inaugurated in the year 1890 with thirteen members, now numbers over a hundred, and at its bi-monthly meetings debates on various literary and social subjects are held.

At the recent spring exhibition of the Art Society of New South Wales, out of a total of ninety-one exhibitors forty-one were women. In music, toward which there is a strong leaning throughout Australia, the women of New South Wales have not been behindhand. Examinations in connection with Trinity College, London, are held annually in Sydney, a large proportion of women being among the successful candidates. In the Sydney Amateur Orchestral Society there are several women among the first and second violins.

Nor have the women of New South Wales shown themselves behind in their interest in political matters, as is proved by the existence of a womanhood suffrage league, which was established in 1891, and now numbers close upon five hundred members. It may be mentioned that the report of this league for 1893 was printed at an office conducted by women.

There is also a ladies' sanitary association in Sydney which is doing useful work by the dissemination of hygienic principles among the poorer classes.

If this brief record of women's progress in New South Wales should seem small and insignificant it must be borne in mind that these colonies are, comparatively speaking,