University of Virginia Library

27. CHAPTER XXVII.
(Sketch by WILL CARLETON, in his Magazine EVERYWHERE.)

Some years ago, the American public—always longing for "something new," was treated to an absolutely unique sensation. A woman armed with a hatchet had gone into a Kansas liquor saloon and smashed up its appurtenances, in a very thorough and unconventional manner. After this, she went into and through another, and another: and it began to took as if all the bibulous paraphernalia of Kansas were about to be sent into the twilight.

When the smoke had somewhat cleared away, and time elapsed sufficient to garner these circumstances into authentic news, it transpired that the woman who had done this was Mrs. Carry A. Nation—utterly obscure and unknown until that week.

This raid among decanters was a very singular and startling act, for

a woman: but, somehow, people found it refreshing. It represented precisely what many had imagined in their minds, what thousands of women had wished they themselves could or dared do, what myraids of confirmed drinkers, even, had wished might be done. News of Mrs. Nation's swift and decided action went all over the country, like a stiff, healthy gale. She was sharply criticised—but there lurked very often a "dry grin" behind the criticism. This smashing was all very direct and unique: and Americans are in general fond of directness and uniqueness. It was, technically, illegal; but, even so, it was remarked that the saloons which Mrs. Nation wrecked, were themselves in brazen defiance of the laws of the state of Kansas—unenforced on account of the fear or venality of public officers.

The work of this determined woman went on with a thoroughness and promptness that made it ultra-interesting. She was imprisoned again and again, and became an inmate, at one time and another, of some nineteen different jails. She had trial after trial—in which was developed the fact that her tongue was as sharp as her hatchet; she often addressing even the judge presiding, as "Your Dishonor," while prosecuting attorneys she treated with supreme scorn. Not much mercy was shown her in the county bastiles: she was often bestowed in cells next to insane people—in the hope, she thinks, that she might become really crazy, as well as reputedly so. One sheriff, finding that the fumes of cigarette-smoking made her ill, treated all her fellow-inmates to the little white cylinders, and set them at work puffing vigorously. Chivalry and humanity seemed, for the time being, to have faded from men's minds.

In these different inurements, she had time to write her friends and even published a paper, called, "The Smasher's Mail." She told how she came to do this work: it was, she claimed, by the direct command of God. She had promised Him that if He would forgive her many sins, she would work for Him in ways no one else would; and He took her at her word—ordering her to go and smash saloons. This, of course, provokes a smile, among most people, but Mrs. Nation is not the first one that has worked under God's command—whether real or supposed.

At last, so many fines were heaped up against her, which must be paid before she could be liberated, that it seemed to her as if she would never get free; but in this dark hour, a lecture agent appeared, and said he would pay the amount if she would give him some "dates." She laughingly says now, that she did not know what he meant: and actually wondered if he thought she was a fruit dealer. But when he explained what he meant by "dates," a chance to go on the platform and give the people a reason for the hatchet that was in her hand, she saw the gates were opened; and enthusiastically went from jail to the lecture platform.

She became immediately a drawing card—in assembly halls in some churches, and even at county fairs. She often made "big money" by selling miniature hatchets as souvenirs. She worked, tirelessly and industriously, to pay back the lecture agent for the sums he had advanced; and after a time found surplus amounts on hand.

She did not hesitate very long as to the purposes for which they were to be applied. Her personal expenses were very small; she dresses plainly; and believes that God is entitled to her financial gains.

"A home for drunkards' wives," was her first thought, after paying the fine money, and she set about it, and is working for it now.

After her platform work had proceeded for a time, it was decided that she should star in the play, "Ten Nights in a Bar-room." As all know, who have witnessed this simple but powerful drama, every act of it is a prohibition lecture, and Mrs. Nation's part, that of the mother of the murdered boy, was a lecture of itself. In one scene, she was represented as smashing a saloon, most thoroughly; and this business was the most popular of anything in the play—even at theatres that drew most of their patronage from habitues of saloons.

Mrs. Nation's reasons for stepping from the churches to the footlights, is not without its logic, in these days. "People go to the theatres more than they do the churches," she says, "and I want to go where there are plenty of people to hear me, and where they need me."

From the regular theatre she passed, and for the same reasons, to the vaudeville, and did her regular "stunts" along with the singers, the dancers, the harlequin's, acrobats, and the burnt cork humorists. The writer of this has seen her in one of these performances, and considers it entirely unique and unmistakably commendable.

It was in one of the most "free and easy" vaudeville shows in Greater New York, and the audience, composed of men and boys, was a hilarious one, and could have even become a turbulent one, if anything had occured that did not please them. Many were half drunk, or nearly so. "Smoke, if you want to," was lettered on a conspicuous sign, and most of this audience wanted to. In the midst of the exercises, an interlude occurred, in which the audience was invited to a saloon down stairs, where they could proceed still farther in the liquid burning out of their bodies. On the same stage of this same vaudeville theatre, John L. Sullivan, the retired prize fighter, had, only a week before, appeared "in monologue," and had sometimes been so drunk that he could not go through with his part.

In the midst of all this, Carry Nation was announced, and she stepped upon the stage, unattended by any glare of colored lights or fanfare of music. A quiet, motherly looking woman, plainly dressed, with a Bible in her hand, she commanded almost immediately the respect of that large crowd—from the men in the orchestra stalls to the gallery gods. One half intoxicated fellow began to scoff at her, but was almost immediately hushed by the scarcely less drunken ones around him. It was a sight that hushed them all into respectful silence, for a respectable, earnest woman, with the Holy Book in her hand, will have a subduing effect upon almost any company of people.

Mrs. Nation announced her text, and preached a sermon, and delivered a temperance lecture, both within the half-hour. (The latter she calls a "prohibition lecture"—hating the word temperance, as applied to drink.)

She said words, such as had probably not been heard by most of those there, for a great many years. She told them what sots they were making of themselves, and made her points so emphatic that they cheered her —almost in spite of themselves. She commenced her speech as an experiment, so far as that day's audience was concerned; she closed a heroine. She did not remain idle during the time between her appearances on the stage, but cultivated the acquaintances of the actors and actresses, and, it is said, to their good.

That is what Mrs. Nation is doing now, on what is called the eastern vaudeville circuit; and it would be hard to see how one woman could do more good in half an hour, than she does; and that among those that need it most.

Mrs. Nation's whole name is Carrie Amelia Nation, but having noticed from old records that her father wrote the first name "Carry," she now does the same, and considers the name portentous as concerns what she is trying and means to do. She believes, she says, that it is her mission to "carry a nation" from the darkness of drunken bestiality into the light of purity and sobriety; and if she can do this, or in any great measure contribute to it, there are millions of people in the world, that will bid her Good speed.