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 follow-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 immurments, 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.
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