i8-4 LETTER TO THE TIMES 



449 



have already been referred to (p. 415). A further discour- 

 agement was her rejection at the Edinburgh examination. 

 Her papers, however, were referred to Huxley, who decided 

 that certain answers were not up to the standard. 



As Miss Jex Blake may possibly think that my decision was 

 influenced by prejudice against her cause, allow me to add that 

 such prejudice as I labour under lies in the opposite direction. 

 Without seeing any reason to believe that women are, on the 

 average, so strong physically, intellectually, or morally, as men, 

 I cannot shut my eyes to the fact that many women are much 

 better endowed in all these respects than many men, and I am 

 at a loss to understand on what grounds of justice or public 

 policy a career which is open to the weakest and most foolish 

 of the male sex should be forcibly closed to women of vigour 

 and capacity. 



We have heard a great deal lately about the physical dis- 

 abilities of women. Some of these alleged impediments, no 

 doubt, are really inherent in their organisation, but nine-tenths 

 of them are artificial — the products of their modes of life. I 

 believe that nothing would tend so effectually to get rid of these 

 creations of idleness, weariness, and that " over stimulation of 

 the emotions " which, in plainer-spoken days, used to be called 

 wantonness, than a fair share of healthy work, directed towards 

 a definite object, combined with an equally fair share of healthy 

 play, during the years of adolescence; and those who are best 

 acquainted with the acquirements of an average medical prac- 

 titioner will find it hardest to believe that the attempt to reach 

 that standard is like to prove exhausting to an ordinarily in- 

 telligent and well-educated young woman. 



The Marine Biological Station at Naples was still strug- 

 gling for existence, and to my father's interest in it is due 

 the following letter, one of several to Dr. Dohrn, whose 

 marriage took place this summer : — 



4 Marlborough Place, June 24, 1874. 

 My dear Dohrn — Are you married yet or are you not ? It 

 is very awkward to congratulate a man upon what may not have 

 happened to him, but I shall assume that you are a benedict, and 

 send my own and my wife's and all the happy family's good 

 wishes accordingly. May you have as good a wife and as much 

 a " happy family " as I have, though I would advise you — the 



