"Because here," he added, "I have been reading for ten years or more
the things Mr. Riis writes in his newspaper and in the magazines,
and by which he makes a living, and for the life of me I never
was able to understand how any one could be found to pay for such
stuff."
So there you have my measure as a reformer. The meeting nodded
gravely. I was apparently the only one there who took it as a joke.
I spoke of the women's share in the progress we made. A good big
one it was. We should have been floundering yet in the educational
mud-puddle we were in, had it not been for the women of New York
who went to Albany and literally held up the Legislature, compelling
it to pass our reform bill. And not once but a dozen times, during
Mayor Strong's administration, when they had wearied of me at the
City Hall--I was not always _persona grata_ there with the reform
administration--did I find it the part of wisdom to send committees
of women instead to plead with the Mayor over his five o'clock
tea. They could worm a playground or a small park out of him when
I should have met with a curt refusal and a virtual invitation to
be gone.
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