The Henson Journals

[6]

Wednesday, October 1st, 1913.

We spent the day in attending the Congress.

The general subject at all three sessions was "The Kingdom & the Sexes". In the forenoon Bishop Welldon led off with a vigorous paper on the Ideal of Manhood. He was followed by three ladies, of whom two were suffragists: the third, Miss Soulsby, spoke excellent good sense of the now antiquated type. The discussion, if such it could be called, was poor enough. A succession of young women bleated the suffragist–nonsense in variant degrees of absurdity. Even so the "debate" waned, & flickered out before the appointed time for it to close.

The afternoon was literally a fiasco. The speakers were slips of silly girls, & the most wonderful parsons. Everybody was conscious of the grotesque unreality of the "discussion".

We dined together pleasantly at "The Star", & then attended the evening session. The Bishop of Southampton led off with a fanatical paper. I followed & was very fairly listened to. Then the discussion began, but we came away to catch the train: & so heard little of it.

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Issues and controversies: female suffrage