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from Phebe A. Hanaford, Daughters of American of Women of the Century [Agusta, Me: True and Company, nd - but it was in the fourth quarter of the nineteenth century] pp. 677-682

      Paulina Kellog was born in Bloomfield, N. Y., Aug. 7, 1816, the very day Capt. Hall delivered up the fort at Detroit. Her father was a volunteer in the army.

      Her grandfather, Saxton, was a colonel in the Revolution, and belonged to Lafayette's staff.

      Her parents were conservative in all their opinions, remarkably fine-looking, and sincerely attached to each other. Paulina, the third of five children, was always thoughtful, sensitive, and delicate. When she was about four years old her grandfather bought a large tract of land at Cambria, fifteen miles from Niagra Falls, where established homes for all his children.

      When seven years old, she was adopted by an aunt, and moved to Le Roy, N. Y., where she was educated.

      With such ancestry and early experiences, we can readily account for Paulina's love of freedom, and courage in attacking the evils and false customs of society.

      At the early age of thirteen Paulina joined the Presbyterian Church. . . . [sic]

      She was a religious enthusiast, and in revival seasons was one of the bright and shining lights in exhortation and prayer. When she was about fifteen, a discussion came up in the church, as to whether women should be permitted to speak and pray. Some of the deacons protested against a practise [sic] in ordinary times that might be tolerated in revival seasons. But the women who had discovered their gifts in these periods of religious excitement were not easily remanded to silence. Thus was the church then as now distracted with the troublesome question of 'women's rights.'

      Sometimes a liberal pastor would accord a latitude denied by the elders and deacons. Sometimes a whole church would be more liberal than neighboring ones; hence individuals and congregations were continually persecuted and arraigned for violations of church discipline, and God's law as men interpreted it.

      On Jan. 12, 1833, being then nineteen years old, she married Frances Wright, a merchant of wealth and position in Utica, N. Y.

      They were the moving spirits in the first anti-slavery convention ever held in Utica, which was broken up by an organized mob, and adjourned to Peterboro, the home of Gerrit Smith. Mr. Wright's house was surrounded, piazzas and fences torn down, and piled up with wood and hay against the house, which they evidently intended to burn down.

      But several ladies who had come to attend the convention were staying there; and, as was their custom, they had family prayers at the usual hour, in the midst of the row.

      The leaders, peeping through the blinds, saw a number of women on the knees, in prayer: the sight seemed to soften their wrath, and change their purposes; for they quietly withdrew, leaving the women in undisturbed possession of the house. The attitude of the church at this time being strongly pro-slavery, they withdrew, as most abolitionists did, from all church organizations, and devoted themselves with renewed zeal to anti-slavery, temperance, moral reform, and the education of women.

      In this way they passed twelve happy years together in mutual improvement, and co-operation in every good work.

      Mr. Wright, having a delicate organization and great executive ability, was constantly taxing his powers of mind and body to the utmost, until at last he fell a victim to dyspepsia, which, after a long, wasting illness of two years, terminated his life.

      Having improved her leisure hours in the study of anatomy and physiology, Mrs. Wright commenced her public work soon after the death of her husband: he having been unfortunate in business, she was thrown on her own resources for support.

      As early as 1844 she began her lectures to women. She imported from Paris the first femme modele that was ever brought to this country, which she recently presented to 'The Homeopathic College for Women' in New York.

      In 1849 she was again married, to Hon. Thomas Davis, a man of wealth, position, sound common sense, and great nobility of character. He was a member of Congress one term, and of the Rhode Island Legislature for seven years.

      For nearly three years Mrs. Davis published 'The Una,' almost at her own expense.

      Though Mrs. Davis had no living children of her own, yet the best elements of motherhood were developed in her character.

      She adopted several sons and daughters, some in early infancy, brought them up with tenderness and care. hers is not the mere selfish animal instinct of loving its own, but a real love of the may pleasing characteristics of childhood, having an unusual sympathy and attraction for young people, and great tenderness for the helpless and innocent. Motherless children, disappointed youth, and unfortunate women have ever found a shelter in her hospitable house.

      In 1859 Mrs. Davis, being in delicate health, visited Europe for the first time, and spent a year traveling in France, Italy, Austria, and Germany, devoting her leisure hours to visiting picture galleries and the study of art. On her return home she entered with renewed zest into her lifelong work, the education and enfranchisement of woman.

      Having decided to celebrate the second decade of the suffrage movement in this country, Mrs. Davis took the entire charge of all the preliminary arrangements, the foreign as well as home correspondence, and published a complete report of all the proceedings of the convention at her own expense.

      She gave at the opening session a comprehensive review of the individual work accomplished, and the many successive steps in progress during the twenty years, which makes a very valuable contribution to our history.

      One of Mrs. Davis' favorite ideas, which she had often proposed, is a 'Woman's Congress,' to discuss all questions relating to our political and social life.

      There have been two attempts made to realize this, both partially successful.

      Her idea is to have a body of wise, mature women meet every year in Washington, at the same time congress convenes, to consider the national questions that occupy popular thought, and demand prompt actions; especially to present them in their moral bearings and relations, while our representatives discuss them from a material and statistical point of view, as men usually do.

      Thus only, she thinks, can we ever have the complete humanitarian ides on theses many important questions. All legislation must necessarily be fragmentary, so long as one-half the race give it no thought whatsoever.

      In 1871, she again visited Europe, in company with her niece and adopted daughter. She spent two years abroad, making extensive travels and many pleasant acquaintances, and again devoted herself quite earnestly to art.

      She took lessons of Carl Marks in Florence, and spent much of her time in Julian's life-school, the only one open to women.

      In Paris she spent hours every day copying in the Louvre and Luxembourg. Her house is decorated with many fine copies of old painting and a few of her own creation.

      Her enthusiasm in both art and reform may seem so some a singular combination; but, with her view of life, it is a natural one.

      On the 29th of may she sailed for America, and reached home in safety; but the disease that had been threatening her for years (rheumatic gout) began to develop itself, until in the autumn she was confined to her room, unable at times even to walk. It was thus I found her in a large arm-chair, quietly making all her preparations for the sunny land, resigned to stay or to go, cheerfully to accept the inevitable, whatever that might be. She rests in the thought that she has done what she could to leave the world better than she found it. Sitting at the twilight hour, hand in hand, after a long silence, she said, 'How petty the ridicule and persecution we have passed through, that seemed so grievous at the time, now appear, compared with the magnitude of the revolution we have inaugurated!'

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