With Christabel at her side, Emmeline spoke at a large WSPU gathering
held at the Albert Hall on 23 March in support of the Second Conciliation Bill.
However, the evening belonged to the Australian suffragist Vida Goldstein,
who spoke about enfranchised women in her own country, and to Ethel Smyth.
Ethel remembered the wonderful experience of processing up the centre aisle in
her beautiful Mus. Doc. robes with Emmeline by her side, and being presented
with a baton by the Union leader in recognition of her services for composing
‘The march of the women’. She then conducted the choir in a performance of
the song, the entire audience joining in.^23
For some months now, the WSPU had been planning to support the Census
boycott organised by the WFL, for the night of 2 April. The ‘No vote No
Census’ campaign appealed to militants and constitutionalists alike, as a form of
passive resistance against the government’s refusal to grant women full citizen-
ship. All-night events were planned throughout the country so that protesters
could leave home during the time the enumerators were taking the Census, a
form of protest that aroused, according to Emmeline, ‘a chorus of horrified
disapproval’ from the conservative public, epitomised in a leading article in The
Ti m e s.^24 Emmeline hastily responded to the editorial, asserting, ‘The Census is a
numbering of the people. Until women count as people for the purpose of repre-
sentation in the councils of the nation as well as for the purposes of taxation
and of obedience to the laws, we advise women to refuse to be numbered.’^25
As no pledge on women’s suffrage had been secured from Asquith by 1 April,
Emmeline, like most protesters, returned her Census form with the words, ‘No
vote no census’ scrawled across it.^26 On Census night, she attended a concert
organised by the WSPU at Queen’s Hall, walked with about 1,000 other suffrag-
ists round and round Trafalgar Square until midnight, and then chaired an
all-night entertainment at the Scala Theatre which ended at three in the
morning. Then she joined other protesters at the Aldwych Skating Rink which
was open from 3 a.m. to 8 a.m. for roller skating. ‘Some skated while others
looked on’, recollected Emmeline, ‘and enjoyed the admirable musical and
theatrical entertainment that helped to pass the hours. ... An all-night restau-
rant near at hand did a big business.’^27
According to Ethel Smyth, she and Emmeline left the Rink early so that
they could both watch the dawn rise over the Thames from the window of
Emmeline’s hotel room where Ethel sometimes occupied the second bed. Ethel
recollected the event as an almost mystical experience:
Our foreheads pressed against the window pane staring silently into the
dawn, gradually we realised that her love for down-trodden women ...
her hope of better things for them ... my music ... our friendship ...
that all this was part of the mystery that was holding our eyes. And
suddenly it came to us that all was well; for a second we were standing
on the spot in a madly spinning world where nothing stirs, where there
is eternal stillness. ... Not a word passed between us, but we looked atTHE TRUCE RENEWED