7 JULY 1984, Page 22

One hundred years ago

Miss Muller has allowed a writing- table and an escritoire to be carried away from Cadogan Place, by way of distraint, in place of the taxes which she refuses to pay until she is allowed a vote. She held a meeting on the occasion last Wednesday, at which she ventured on the somewhat doubtful proposition that if fifty other women would do the same, the women's franchise would be carried at once ... Miss Muller did not mend her case by speaking of the agricultural labourers as 'ignorant and besotted men, who had been behind the plough for ages.' It is the men who have been behind the plough for ages who really need representation. As for Miss Muller, there are hundreds in the House of Com- mons already who adequately represent her views both as regards the women's franchise and as regards the contempt with which she views the `ignorant and besotted men who have been behind the plough for ages.'

Spectator, 5 July 1884