Towards about 3 a.m. we were taken out of the cell and ranged along a seat by the wall of a large room; at the other end was a desk with a policeman sitting at it. We went up in turn to give our names, ages, etc., that is, about seven or eight other prisoners, all females, and our three selves. It was the turn of Jane Warton. She walked across to the policeman, one shoulder hitched slightly above the other, her hair sticking out straight behind and worn in slick bandeaus on either side of her face, her hat trailing in a melancholy way on her head. The large, grey woollen gloves were drawn up over the too short sleeves of her coat; on the collar of it were worn portraits of Mrs. Pankhurst, Mrs. Lawrence and Christabel, in small china brooches; her hat had a bit of tape with “Votes for Women” written on it, interlaced with the cloth plait that went round it, and eye-glasses were fixed on her nose. Her standing out in the room was the signal for a convulsed titter from the other prisoners. “It’s a shame to laugh at one of your fellow-prisoners,” said the policeman behind the desk, and the tittering was hushed. It was all I could do not to laugh, and I thought to myself “Is the _Punch_ version of a Suffragette overdone?” As I got back to my companions they too were laughing, but I thought it wonderfully kind of the policeman to have spoken on my behalf.
When this process was finished, we three Suffragettes were taken to the policemen’s room, where there was a good fire, to wait for our Black Maria. The other prisoners had disappeared. The police sat round and spoke quite pleasantly; there were two or three of them at times. We discussed the chances of women getting the vote, they seemed quite in favour. Elsie Howey and Mrs. Nugent did most of the talking. I warmed myself and saw the police looking at me from time to time, wondering why I did not talk too.
At about 3.30 a.m. or 4 o’clock, Black Maria came and we were put in. This was different from the prison vans I had hitherto seen; it was not broken up into separate cell-like compartments, but was in the form of a double omnibus, one side for men and the other for women, divided by a thin wooden partition, each side having two seats facing each other and extending the length of the carriage. There were no windows; the light filtered in only through the grated ventilators. When we got into this Black Maria there was no one but us three, but we were told to sit near the door, so Mrs. Nugent sat first, then Elsie Howey, and then myself. The jolting of the van is excessive and suggests a complete absence of springs, the noise of its passage through the streets is terrific, to the point of excluding all other sounds--a noise of thundering wheels, of jolts and jars and bumps. I have not yet made out the reason why 3.30 a.m. was selected, none was given at the time to the prisoners.