406 ELIZABETH GARY AGASSIZ 



first report as President of Radcliffe well show her 

 appreciation of what had already been done, and of 

 the wider and brighter prospect which our incorpora- 

 tion as a college offered for the future: 



"I wish it were possible for me to make, in broad 

 and simple language, a statement of the force and 

 efficiency of the instruction given here from the be- 

 ginning. The standard has always been high and in- 

 spiring, and it has told upon the whole character of 

 the institution. It has enabled us to accomplish the 

 purpose with which we started, — that of making a 

 large and liberal provision for the education of women 

 according to their tastes and pursuits, and according 

 also to their necessities, should it be needful for them 

 to use their education as a means of support. With 

 this hope we started; and the position of Radcliffe 

 College today may well assure us of its final fulfil- 

 ment, even in a larger sense than the present. The 

 University has taken us under her charge, has made 

 herself responsible for the validity of our degrees by 

 the strongest official guarantees, while the liberal in- 

 terpretation she puts upon her own pledges shows 

 that they include more than they promise. Even in 

 this first year she opens to us a greatly enlarged 

 field of study, including a far larger number of ad- 

 vanced courses than we had hoped for. We may well 

 say that, since the opening of the institution fifteen 

 years ago, no year of its history has been so important 

 as the present, for it gives us what we most needed, 

 security and a certain and safe future under the 

 guardianship of Harvard University." 



