194 ELIZABETH CARY AGASSIZ 
offers men and get the Harvard professors to give 
theinstruction.” I therefore arranged a list of teachers 
based on the present year. 
November 26. Yesterday I asked Professor [James 
B.] Greenough to spend the evening in my library. 
He came with his wife. We discussed the plan. He 
approved and made out a list of teachers. We... 
separated, promising to consider the subject of its 
practicability. 
Within a month Mr. Gilman sent the following letter to 
President Eliot of Harvard University. 
TO PRESIDENT CHARLES W. ELIOT 
Cambridge, December 23, 1878 
Dear Sir: I am engaged in perfecting a plan which 
shall afford to women opportunities for carrying 
their studies systematically forward further than it 
is possible for them to do it in this country (except 
possibly at Smith College). 
My plan obliges me to obtain the services of some 
of the professors, and I address you before approach- 
ing them, in order to assure myself that I am correct 
in supposing that their relations to the University 
are such as to permit of their giving instruction to 
those who are not connected with it. 
I propose to bring here such women as are able 
to pass an examination not less rigid than that now 
established for the admission of young men and to 
offer them a course of instruction which shall be a 
counterpart of that pursued by the men. It is prob- 
