9° The Higher Education of Women. 



the Norman ended new national characteristics arose out of the 

 welding of the two races, and as one result they saw a different 

 attitude towards women. What more immediately concerned 

 them, however, was the education of the women of that period. 

 At the convent schools, such as the Abbey, Barking, the priories 

 of Clerkenwell, Halliwell, Kilburn, &c., female education was 

 given not only to the nuns, or those destined to be nuns, but 

 to all women of the noble houses and to those of the middle 

 classes who desired it. It was a fact not generally known that 

 in the middle ages women were not cut off from the higher 

 education so much as they were after the Reformation. The 

 records that survived of the educational methods employed at 

 the close of the mediaeval period and the commencement of the 

 modern were very fragmentary. Some had supposed that in 

 the sixteenth century a classical education was within the reach 

 of English girls. It was true that there were some highly 

 educated women in England then, but such instances as those of 

 Lady Jane Grey and the Countess of Pembroke, for example, 

 were instances of quite exceptional women exceptionally trained. 

 After enumerating some works which had been written by 

 learned women of the eighteenth century, the lecturer went on 

 to deal with the question of education in America in the 

 beginning of the nineteenth century, and of the number of 

 colleges which had been opened for the conjoint education of 

 man and woman. He then alluded to the opening of several 

 schools of science in Ireland, and dealt with the question of the 

 admission of women into these schools. In 1878 the University 

 of London took the very momentous and decisive step of opening 

 up all its examinations and degrees to women. It was a most 

 significant act, and had been fruitful of good in many ways, 

 reacting even on the educational institutions of America. In 

 the following year Dr. Barnard, the president of Columbia 

 College, N.Y,, in his annual report to the College, advocated a 

 similar opening up both of the classes and examinations of his 

 College. But the question was left open, however, whether the 

 students of both sexes should be admitted to the same lectures, 



