104 WOMAN IN SCIENCE 



and limited. I detect the woman of 1840 in the character 

 of Mrs. Clive Newcome, and, indeed, in Mrs. George Os- 

 borne, and in other familiar characters of Thackeray." 



Then Sir Walter, turning to the young Englishwoman 

 of 1897, thus describes her: 



"She is educated. Whatsoever things are taught to the 

 young man are taught to the young woman; the keys of 

 knowledge are given to her; she gathers of the famous 

 tree; if she wants to explore the wickedness of the world 

 she can do so, for it is all in the books. The secrets of 

 nature are not closed to her; she can learn the structure 

 of the body if she wishes. The secrets of science are all 

 open to her if she cares to study them. 



"At school, at college, she studies just as the young man 

 studies, but harder and with greater concentration. She 

 has proved her ability in the Honors Tripos of every 

 branch ; she has beaten the senior wrangler in mathematics ; 

 she has taken a l first-class' in classics, in history, in sci- 

 ence, in languages. She has proved, not that she is a man's 

 equal in intellect, though she claims so much, because she 

 has not yet advanced any branch of learning, of science, 

 one single step, but she has proved her capacity to take her 

 place beside the young men who are the flower of their 

 generation the young men who stand in the first class of 

 honors when they take their degree. . . . 



1 1 Personal independence that is the keynote of the situ- 

 ation. Mothers no longer attempt the old control over 

 their daughters; they would find it impossible. The girls 

 go off by themselves on their bicycles; they go about as 

 they please; they neither compromise themselves nor get 

 talked about; for the first time in man's history it is re- 

 garded as a right and proper thing to trust a girl as a 

 boy insists upon being trusted. Out of this personal free- 

 dom will come, I dare say, a change in the old feelings of 

 young man to maiden. He will not see in her a frail, 

 tender plant which must be protected from cold winds; 



