674 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



COLLEGE WOMEN AXD THE NEW SCIENCE. 



By CHAKLOTTE SMITH ANGSTMAN. 



IT is only after many years of earnest work on tlie part of com- 

 paratively few that it is beginning to be understood that domes- 

 tic science is something definite, reducible to forms, capable of being 

 studied comprehensively, and worthy of a place beside the other sci- 

 ences in the curriculum of important universities and colleges. 



Women have gone to college and heard lectures on physiology in 

 an atmosphere of eighty-five degrees, heavy with carbonic-acid gas, 

 and then passed to others where the thermometer read sixty-five de- 

 grees and the chill air from without blew ujDon their heads, wonder- 

 ing that such things could be side by side with perfect theoretical 

 instruction. 



They have gone from new knowledge of bacteria to a certainty 

 of the existence of unwholesome germs in the improperly-cared-for 

 furnishings of their student apartments. 



They have learned the composition of the blood, bone, and muscle 

 of human beings, and what substances contain their chemical ele- 

 ments, and then have asked what better use could be made of this 

 knowledge than in securing diets which should perfectly nourish. 



They have studied political economy and sociology, and have 

 returned to reflect and observe that their principles are applicable to 

 the social and domestic problems which are now before their eyes. 



In the study of mathematics they have learned that nothing 

 wrong can be righted without going to its root, and so have naturally 

 turned their minds to the causes of the complications in domestic 

 machinery which are apparent on every hand. 



The study of history has made them realize that any plan for im- 

 provement in any condition of things, in order to rest upon a sure 

 foundation, must be based upon a knowledge of the past. 



Returned to find herself face to face with practical problems and 

 having her logic still in mind, the college woman asks why such a 

 foundation as she finds has been laid by Miss Juliet Corson in a 

 knowledge of toothsome cookery should not be utilized as a founda- 

 tion for scientific cookery. 



In a four-years' contact with professors and students, she has 

 learned the value of definite knowledge, and now sees as few else 

 could its necessity in order to make any headway with the vexed 

 questions lying nearest her, for to her especially belongs the solution 

 of home problems through daily contact with their minute details, 

 through her woman's nature which nothing can efface, and on ac- 

 count of her special opportunities. 



