The particular subject was not vital, since
it was never the subject, but her own desire to talk, that furnished
the necessary inspiration. While she was beginning, 'Ladies and
gentlemen,' in her clear, pheasant voice, her convictions, opinions,
views, prejudices, feelings, experiences, all flew from the different
corners of what she was pleased to call her brain, and focussed
themselves on the point in question.
If the discussion were in a field in which she had made no excursions
whatever, that trifling detail did not impose silence upon her. She
simply rose, and said:
'Ladies and gentlemen, though a stranger in your midst, I feel I must
say a word of sympathy to you, and a word of encouragement for your
cause. It is a good and worthy movement, and I honour you for
upholding it. Often and often have I said to my classes, it matters
not what face of truth is revealed to you so long as you get a vision
that will help you to bless your fellow-men. To bless your fellow-
men is the great task before each and every one of us, and I feel to
urge this specially upon occasions like this, when I see a large and
influential audience before me. Says Rudyard Kipling, "I saw a
hundred men on the road to Delhi, and they were all my brothers.
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