EUROPE 289 



I pick up the thread here. I was telling you about my 

 first visit to Lily Motley. Her husband was very cor- 

 dial and extremely amusing. He came in when lunch 

 was half through from his office, bringing with him a 

 very pleasant man who works with him. They were 

 making up that mysterious package called "The 

 Budget," so Lily said, and were fearfully busy. Sir 

 William, though a Liberal, seemed by no means in 

 sympathy with modern reforms; bicycles and higher 

 education for women were equally under his ban, and 

 he said the nineteenth century had become intolera- 

 ble and the twentieth would be worse, and he was 

 glad to think how soon he should bid good-bye to 

 both. He and his party are very unpopular. *'I am 

 old and likely to go out of office soon." It is curious 

 how one gets interested in the local political talk 

 when one is on the spot. 



. . . My next will be from Oxford, and I shall not 

 be sorry. Pleasant as it all is, I shall be very glad to 

 drop social and educational responsibilities and be off 

 with Mollie to Italy and Venice. 



Mrs. Agassiz's visits to Cambridge and Oxford had a 

 direct influence upon her policy in regard to the establish- 

 ment of halls of residence at Radcliffe. In 1897 she gave an 

 account of some of her experiences at the English colleges 

 for women to the Emmanuel Club at Radcliffe, from which 

 the following extracts are made. 



When you first arrive in Cambridge, if you stay, as 

 we did, in the old tavern. The Bull, your first outlook 

 upon the street will give you the sense of antiquity, 



