264 WOMAN IN SCIENCE 



France in the wilds of the tropics, with no one to communi- 

 cate with except her half-civilized servants and boatmen, 

 we instinctively hark back to days not long past and esti- 

 mate the enormous progress women have made in social 

 and intellectual freedom within but a few decades. 



Owing to the policy of repression which so long pre- 

 vailed regarding the intellectual efforts of women, and the 

 social obstacles which prevented them from publicly ac- 

 knowledging the offspring of their genius, women like the 

 Bronte sisters, George Sand and George Eliot were com- 

 pelled to conceal their identity under male designations. 

 Because it was considered immodest for a woman to appear 

 before the public as an author, Lady Nairne, after Burns, 

 the most popular song writer in Scotland, felt obliged to 

 keep secret the authorship of her beautiful poems. 



Similarly, family honor made it incumbent on Fanny 

 Mendelssohn to refrain from publishing her musical com- 

 positions under her own name. Accordingly, they ap- 

 peared along with those of her brother Felix, and so similar 

 are they in color and sentiment to his own productions that 

 they are indistinguishable from them, unless the author's 

 signature be attached. To satisfy an inane public opinion, 

 they long contributed * ' to swell the volume of her brother 's 

 fame," and there is reason to believe that some of them 

 still appear under his name at the present day. 



Yes, truly, when one recalls these and similar facts, one 

 cannot help exclaiming : ' ' What a marvelous change in the 

 attitude of the world toward women within the memories 

 of those still living!" Women like Miss Ormerod, Miss 

 Kingsley and Mme. Coudreau would have been ostracized if 

 they had dared to attempt, in the days of Lady Nairne, the 

 Bronte sisters and Fanny Mendelssohn, what they may 

 now do not only without censure but without exciting more 

 than passing comment. The ban has been lifted from 

 what was for ages tabu for women, and the sphere of their 

 intellectual activities is now almost coextensive with that 



