WOMEN IN MATHEMATICS 149 



world, she lived in her own home, a part of which she had 

 converted into a hospital. During the last fifteen years of 

 her life she had charge of the Pio Albergo Trivulzio a 

 large institution founded by Prince Trivulzio for the aged 

 poor who were without home or assistance. 



She had devoted ten years of the flower of her life to 

 the writing of her Instituzioni Analitiche prepared pri- 

 marily for the benefit of one of her brothers who had a 

 taste for mathematics and, after it was finished, she en- 

 tered upon that long career of heroic charity which was 

 terminated only at her death at the advanced age of 

 eighty-one. 



One loves to speculate regarding Maria Gaetana 's pos- 

 sible achievements if she had continued during the rest of 

 her life that science in which, during a few short years, 

 she had won such distinction. She had made her own the 

 discoveries of Newton, Leibnitz, Roberval, Fermat, Des- 

 cartes, Riccati, Euler, the brothers Bernouilli, and had 

 mastered the entire science of mathematics then known. 

 Her pinions were trimmed for essaying loftier flights than 

 Thus, the writer of the article in the Edinburgh Eeview, above 

 quoted, declares that "she retired to a convent of blue nuns," a 

 statement that has frequently been repeated in many of our most 

 noted encyclopaedias. 



In a Prospetto Biografico delle Donne Italiane, written by G. C. 

 Facchini and published in Venice in 1824, it is stated that Maria 

 Gaetana was selected by the Pope to occupy "the chair of mathe- 

 matics which had been left vacant by the death of her father, ' ' while 

 Cavazza in his work "Le Scuole dell," Antico Studio Bolognese, 

 pp. 289-290, published in Milan in 1896, assures us that Gaetana 

 Agnesi taught analytical geometry in the University of Bologna for 

 full forty-eight years. The facts are that neither the father nor the 

 daughter ever taught even a single hour either in this or in any other 

 university. Cf. Maria Gaetana Agnesi, p. 273 et seq., by Luisa Anzo- 

 letti, Milano, 1900. This is far the best life of Milan's illustrious 

 daughter that has yet appeared. The reader may also consult with 

 profit the Elogio Storico di Maria Gaetana Agnesi, by Antonio 

 Frisi, Milano, 1799, and Gli Scrttori d' Italia, of G. Mazzuchelli, 

 Tom. I, Par. I, p. 198 et seq., Brescia, 1795. 



