With the exception of Gerrit Smith, all the prominent men, Garrison, Phillips, Channing, May, were bitterly opposed to the short dress and tried to dissuade the women from wearing it by every argument in their power.

The costume, however, was adopted as a matter of principle, and for it they suffered a martyrdom which would have made burning at the stake seem comfortable.

It requires far more heroism to bear jibes and jeers for one's personal appearance than for one's opinions.

No pen can describe what these women endured for the two or three years in which they tried to establish this principle, through such sacrifices as only a woman can understand.

So long as they were upheld by the belief that they were giving strength to the cause they loved, they bravely submitted to the persecution, but when they realized that they were injuring instead of helping it, endurance reached its limit.