EDITOR'S TABLE. 



3 6 5 



failing health warned her of overwork, 

 came to me not more than two months be- 

 fore the time when she should have gradu- 

 ated. Hard as the case seemed, I could only 

 say to her that she must leave school at 

 once. Some facts of her history I obtained 

 from her at that time, but the important 

 points I learned later. She had no home to 

 which she could go. She had been left an 

 orphan at an early age, with a family of 

 brothers and sisters dependent upon her 

 for support. To meet this responsibility she 

 went as a teacher into our district schools. 

 She undertook the hardest positions be- 

 cause they gave a trifle more of pay. She 

 boarded herself, and often went dinnerless 

 to school because the children's bread must 

 not be stinted. She went through mud and 

 snow to her school, with wet feet and scanty 

 clothing, purchasing no rubbers, no warm 

 shawls, because she could not spare the 

 money. She had soon decided that, if she 

 ever lifted those she loved so well from utter 

 poverty, she must fit herself for higher po- 

 sitions, and to this end she began laying 

 aside money that she might attend a normal 

 school. 



" So the years passed on, and at last 

 she had saved enough to take her through 

 the two years' course of the normal school 

 at Albany. And now when her classmates 

 were beginning to think of their graduating 

 essays and graduating dresses, her pay-roll 

 was wound up, her summons came, and she 

 turned away from the reward she had sought 

 so tirelessly. The autumn leaves of 1866 

 fell upon the grave where she found rest 

 for the first time in so many years. This is 

 one of Prof. Cochran's twenty. Another, 

 the same year, was accustomed to take an 

 empty dinner-basket with her to school, and 

 at the hour of lunch to steal away from her 

 companions, that they might not suspect 

 she was too poor to buy a dinner 1 In my 

 own experience these have been not iso- 

 lated but representative cases of normal- 

 school invalidism. So familiar have I be- 

 come with them, that I seem to know be- 

 forehand what items I shall obtain in in- 

 vestigating any given case of ill-health. And 

 then the cry arises, ' Co-education does not 

 answer.' It is true we have cases of ill- 

 health among our young ladies which are 

 not to be traced to these causes, but they are 

 so few as hardly to deserve mention. These 

 really make up the bulk of the cases with 

 which we have to deal. 



" We have also young gentlemen whose 

 health fails from overwork, but to them the 

 admonition arises in the shape of weak eyes, 



constant headaches, etc., while with women 

 the more delicately-balanced functions of 

 life are set ajar. 



" The young man goes out to teach, and 

 earns sixty dollars per month, while his sis- 

 ter is earning thirty dollars. In half the 

 cases she is the better scholar. The young 

 man goes home to the farm. He is needed 

 in the field, but he is a man of course he 

 can earn one and a half or two dollars per 

 day ; while with his sister they are so glad 

 she has come home to help mother, but it 

 never occurs to any one that she has earned 

 any money. When both return to school, 

 they pay the same price for board, but with 

 him it means that his bed shall be made, his 

 room swept, water brought in, etc., while 

 his washing arrives from the laundry all 

 right every week. But she the landlady 

 says, ' Of course you will take care of your 

 ownroom, we always expect our lady-board- 

 ers to do that.' She counts over her thirty 

 dollars per month, and says, ' Well, I must 

 do my own washing and ironing if my land- 

 lady will allow me.' And the landlady 

 grudgingly consents. Then ' I must make 

 my own calico dresses 1 could never afford 

 to pay for that.' To her teacher : ' I wish 

 I could be excused from singing, to-day, I 

 am trying to make a dress.' Or, ' No, I 

 cannot go for a walk, my brother has brought 

 me this whole satchel full of clothes to 

 mend.' In the morning he can easily learn 

 his algebra-lesson while she is arranging on 

 the top of her head the steeple of braids 

 which custom says she must wear. And so 

 the parallel runs on." 



From all which, it would seem to 

 be a fair inference that, as the world is 

 at present constituted, co-education is 

 beset with very formidable difficulties. 

 "With their inferior strength, their extra 

 burdens, and their more limited pecu- 

 niary means, the female students can- 

 not compete with the male students, and 

 in the attempt to do so they break 

 down. The implication is that, in 

 point of fact and practically, there are 

 unequal standards of study to which 

 the two sexes can respectively attain ; 

 and, if these standards are to be equal- 

 ized, either the masculine standard 

 must be lowered, so that the male 

 students will not be pressed to their 

 highest capacity of accomplishment, 

 or the feminine standard must be raised, 



