398 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



one else to dispute what she has to say. The lady to whom I refer is 

 Mrs. Sidgwick, and this is what she says : 



The students tliat I have known have shown no inclination to adopt mascu- 

 line sentiments or habits in any unnecessary or unseemly degree ; they are dis- 

 posed to imitate the methods of life and work of industrious undergraduates just 

 as far as these appear to be means approved by experience to the end which 

 both sets of students have in common, and nothing that I have seen of them, 

 either at the university or afterward, has tended in the smallest degree to sup- 

 port the view that the adaptation of women to domestic life is so artificial and 

 conventional a thing that a few years of free, unhampered study and varied com- 

 panionship at the university has a tendency to impair it. 



So far as I am aware, only one other argument has been, or can 

 be, adduced on the opposite side. This argument is that the physique 

 of young women as a class is not sufficiently robust to stand the strain 

 of severe study, and therefore that many are likely to impair their 

 health more or less seriously under the protracted effort and acute 

 excitement which are necessarily incidental to our system of school 

 and university examinations. Now, I may begin by remarking that 

 with this argument I am in the fullest possible sympathy. Indeed, so 

 much is this the case that I have taken the trouble to collect evidence 

 from young girls of my own acquaintance who are now studying at 

 various high-schools with a view to subsequently competing for first 

 classes in the Cambridge triposes. "What I have found is that in some 

 of these high-schools carefully observe, only in some absolutely no 

 check is put upon the ambition of young girls to distinguish them- 

 selves and to bring credit upon their establishments. The conse- 

 quence is that in these schools the more promising pupils habitually 

 undertake an amount of intellectual work which it is sheer madness to 

 attempt. A single quotation from one of my correspondents whom 

 I have known from a child will be enough to prove this statement : 



I never begin work later than six o'clock, and never work less than ten or 

 eleven hours a day. But within a fortnight or so of my examinations I work 

 fifteen or sixteen hours. Most girls, however, stop at fourteen or fifteen hours, 

 but some of them go on to eighteen hours. Of course, according to the school 

 time-tables, none of us should work more than eight hours ; but it is quite im- 

 possible for any one to get through the work in that time. For instance, in the 

 time-tables ten minutes is put down for botany, whereas it takes the quickest 

 girl an hour and a half to answer the questions set by the school lecturer. 



These facts speak for themselves, and therefore I will only add 

 that in many of those high-schools for girls which are situated in 

 large towns no adequate provision is made for bodily exercise, and 

 this, of course, greatly aggravates the danger of overwork. In such 

 a school there is probably no play-ground ; the gymnasium, if there is 

 one, is not attended by any of the harder students ; drill is never 

 thought of ; and the only walking exercise is to and from the school. 

 Let it not be supposed that I am attacking the high-school system. 



