第61章 X(5)

Then, after lying in silence for a long time with her cheek on my hand, she murmured: ``They are still passing before me--face after face, hundreds and hundreds of them, representing all the efforts of fifty years. I know how hard they have worked I know the sacrifices they have made. But it has all been worth while!''

Just before she lapsed into unconsciousness she seemed restless and anxious to say something, search- i ng my face with her dimming eyes.

``Do you want me to repeat my promise?'' I a sked, for she had already made me do so several times. She made a sign of assent, and I gave her the assurance she desired. As I did so she raised my hand to her lips and kissed it--her last conscious action. For more than thirty hours after that I k nelt by her side, but though she clung to my hand until her own hand grew cold, she did not speak again.

She had told me over and over how much our long friendship and association had meant to her, and the comfort I had given her. But whatever I may have been to her, it was as nothing compared with what she was to me. Kneeling close to her as she passed away, I knew that I would have given her a dozen lives had I had them, and endured a thousand times more hardship than we had borne together, for the inspiration of her companionship and the joy of her affection. They were the greatest blessings I have had in all my life, and I cherish as my dearest treas- u re the volume of her History of Woman Suffrage on the fly-leaf of which she had written this in- s cription:

REVEREND ANNA HOWARD SHAW:

This huge volume IV I present to you with the love that a mother beareth, and I hope you will find in it the facts about women, for you will find them nowhere else. Your part will be to see that the four volumes are duly placed in the libraries of the country, where every student of history may have access to them.

With unbounded love and faith, SUSAN B. ANTHONY.

That final line is still my greatest comfort. When I am misrepresented or misunderstood, when I am accused of personal ambition or of working for per- s onal ends, I turn to it and to similar lines penned by the same hand, and tell myself that I should not allow anything to interfere with the serenity of my spirit or to disturb me in my work. At the end of eighteen years of the most intimate companionship, the leader of our Cause, the greatest woman I have ever known, still felt for me ``unbounded love and faith.'' Having had that, I have had enough.