The Education of American Girls Part 21

Fifteen is the minimum age at which any are admitted, even for the preparatory cla.s.ses; but no girl of fifteen has the poise, the _settledness_ of nerve and muscle and brain to enable her to bear uninjured the immense strain that the mere living in such a great family necessitates. It is almost impossible for any one who has not tried it to understand this; and parents listen with a polite, incredulous smile, when I explain why I think it unwise for their bright young daughters to attempt here the not difficult Latin, mathematics, etc., of the preparatory years. We--the parents and I--agree perfectly that the girls can do the work easily enough, but they, the parents, can not see the difference which is so clear to my mind--as, after these eight years, it could hardly help being--the difference that it will make to the girls whether they do the work in the small cla.s.ses of the home school, and surrounded in their leisure hours with the freedom and repose of the accustomed family, or in the large cla.s.ses that are here necessary, and amid the inevitable excitements, outside the recitation room, of a constant residence in a household of five hundred.

Again and again I have seen these young students, for, of course, they enter despite my protestations--everybody wants to see the folly of everything for himself--I have seen them succ.u.mb to the unwonted nervous tax within a few weeks; others bear up for months, many get through the year and go home to spend their summer vacation in bed--"Va.s.sar victims"

all, whose ghosts haunt the clinical records of doctors from Texas to Canada, from Maine to California, and whose influence makes, so far as it is felt, against woman's chances for liberal education; for these failures are counted as natural effects of study, of mental labor which the female organization cannot endure!

I have no doubt that, for a respectable minority of these fifteen-year-old girls, life here, with its absolute regularity of hygienic regimen, is less disadvantageous than the mixture of school and "society," in which they would be permitted to dissipate their energies at home; but that does not alter the fact that the vital needs of immaturity, physical, mental, and moral; cannot be most wholesomely met amid conditions so artificial as must obtain in a great educational establishment.

With those who enter more advanced cla.s.ses at an immature age--fortunately, they are very few--the case is still worse, for, in addition to the nervous tax to which I have alluded above, they attempt woman's work with a child's strength. The result is inevitable--a stunted, unsatisfactory womanhood, the penalty for the violating of Nature's law of slow, symmetrical development, is not to be escaped.

Dr. Clarke's _s.e.x in Education_ puts this point well, and perhaps the little book may be forgiven its coa.r.s.eness and bad logic, if it succeeds in awakening the consciences of parents and teachers with regard to this phase of the school question, a phase which bears with equal pertinency upon a fair chance for boys and for girls.

When women begin at eighteen or twenty the earnest business of a collegiate course, for which they have slowly and thoroughly prepared while their physical organization was maturing in happy freedom, and when they give to this higher intellectual labor the strength and enthusiasm that are at that age of all the life preeminent and most perfectly balanced, then we shall know what educated woman is, and learn her possible capacities in all that makes for the n.o.blest humanity.

I do not undervalue what Oberlin, Antioch, Mt. Holyoke, and other schools have accomplished for woman's higher education. I would not willingly be ranked second to any in according to them the esteem and honor which their work richly merits; and among Va.s.sar's own Alumnae are already many who give gracious promise of what may be hoped for, nay, fulfilled, when the good seed now sowing all over this broad land shall come to glad fruition.

Meanwhile, Va.s.sar is doing what she can to promote the health and usefulness of American women, by giving to her students the wholesome stimulus of regular, organized activity, which has for its definite aim their preparation for the serious duties of life--duties which trained faculties carry with steady poise, growing strong under the burden, but which press with sad and crus.h.i.+ng weight upon unaccustomed powers.

ALIDA C. AVERY.

Poughkeepsie, N. Y.

ANTIOCH COLLEGE.

Of the men graduates of Antioch, 13-1/2 per cent have died; of the women graduates, 9-3/4 per cent. This of course does not include the war mortality or accidental deaths.

Three of the men are confirmed invalids. No woman graduate is such.

Of the woman graduates, three-fourths are married, and four-fifths of those were, two years ago, mothers, the families varying from one to six children. Only one-half of the remaining fourth are graduates of longer standing than 1871.

It is proposed to make out statistics which shall show the comparative health of those women and men who have been here two years and upward, as it has been suggested that possibly only the stronger could bear the strain of the whole college course, and that the weaker ones dropped out by the way. It is perfectly safe now to a.s.sert that this is not the case.

Yellow Springs, Ohio.

LETTER FROM A GERMAN WOMAN.

FEBRUARY 6, 1874.

DEAR MISS BRACKETT:

I gladly comply with your request to give you such information as I possess concerning the education of young girls in Germany. What I have to say is, however, more particularly applicable to the southern portions of that country.

Girls generally attend the public school from the age of six or seven to eleven, where they occupy themselves with the more elementary branches; afterwards they are placed in a seminary or "Inst.i.tut," in which they remain until sixteen or eighteen. The German girl of that age, if not a member of the t.i.tled aristocracy, is seldom taught at home, except in music, and perhaps in drawing; private instruction being indeed too expensive even for the best families; neither is she sent to a boarding-school, if a moderately good day-school is at all accessible.

In my school days neither Latin nor Greek were taught, and only the elementary branches of science; from reliable sources I hear that the present curriculum is nearly the same. But in all schools the girls were thoroughly drilled in German, French, Rhetoric, Composition, Arithmetic, History, and in the History of Literature. English and Italian were optional. The hours extended from nine till twelve, and from two to four or five, no other intermission being allowed--which seemed often rather hard. One and frequently two hours were spent in needlework, which time was utilized in the practice of French and English conversation with an experienced teacher. The girls prepared their lessons at home, and recited sitting. Their attendance was expected to be _uninterrupted_, and was usually so, even through the critical period of development, except in cases of suffering and trouble, and these were not frequent. I remember but little complaint of headache and weariness--back-ache seemed unknown. And yet these girls worked hard, many of them very hard.

Some began to teach when only sixteen, or even younger, and while still pursuing their own studies. They went out generally in every weather, and at all times, month in and month out.

Now, why did they not break down? Why do we find comparatively few invalids among the educated German girls and women? Are there no other causes at work than a somewhat different climate and, occasionally, a more phlegmatic temperament; or is it because the studies of the modern languages and history, the endless practising of _etudes_ and sonatas, the stooping wearily over some delicate embroidery, is less taxing to the nervous system than Latin and Greek, and the working out of algebraic problems? I am not prepared to say. But grant that a small part of the solution can be found in this difference, there are yet other and deeper causes at work. One of them is that the young German girl, while at school, makes study her sole business. She goes to no parties, visits no b.a.l.l.s. She does not waste her hours of sleep or leisure in putting numberless ruffles on her garments, so as to surpa.s.s her mother in elegance, nor does she promenade up and down the avenues and flirt with young gentlemen. Her amus.e.m.e.nts are of the simplest. A walk, or an hour spent in a public garden in her mother's company; occasionally a concert or an opera, which never lasts later than nine or half-past nine; some holiday afternoon, a little gathering of young school-friends, to which gentlemen are not admitted; once or twice a year, perhaps, after she is fifteen, private theatricals or a _soiree_; where she appears in a simple dress, dances under her mother's care, and returns home at eleven o'clock. In this way she manages her strength and husbands her forces for study.

Another cause of her better health is the great physical care taken at the critical periods of the month; although, as I have previously said, she continues her studies during these days, if without suffering; I must add, that on the other hand she abstains from all physical exercise like gymnastics or dancing-lessons, protects herself most carefully against cold and wet, sleeps perhaps a little longer in the morning, and instead of taking a walk, lies down for an hour through the day. A party or ball at such a time would be looked upon by the mother with horror, and considered by the girl herself as a great impropriety. The care of her health is at all times, of importance to German women. I have, for instance, very rarely seen them walk in bitter-cold winter weather in a so-called cloak, which left the abdomen entirely unprotected.

A third cause of the German girl's being better able to work with impunity than her American sister during the years of development, which in South Germany begin at the age of fourteen, may be found in the simpler and much more sensible way in which she is brought up while still in early childhood. A German mother does not bedeck her little daughter of four or eight years with flounces and sashes half as heavy as herself, and then show her off in a parlor full of admiring friends; nor send her to a children's ball, where, with a young prodigy of the other s.e.x, she imitates her elders in flirtation. Instead of coaxing the wilful darling into obedience by the promise of candy, utterly disregardful of future dyspepsia, she brings her to reason by more efficient, if less agreeable expedients. The child is encouraged to play with her dolls, and to find pleasure in flowers and child-like amus.e.m.e.nts, as long as possible. Thus she grows up with simple tastes, although a little awkward and shy.

And, on the other hand, the mother herself finds her chief pleasure at home, and does not dream of planning amus.e.m.e.nts for each night of the week, but keeps comparatively early hours, even in the city; takes a great deal of exercise in the open air, and thus remains generally strong and healthy after her nursery is well filled.

Now I do not say that the German education comes up to the ideal. Far from it, indeed! The German girl might, with profit, go more deeply into the wonderful mysteries of science, just as her American sister is supposed to do; counterbalance her somewhat too poetical tendencies by the severer pursuit of mathematics, and find delight in the beauties of Latin and Greek authors, if such should be her sincere desire. Nor can I see any objection to the pursuit of medical, and other higher intellectual studies, by the few whose enthusiasm and natural gifts fit them for it.

All this the German woman will safely accomplish, if she retains the simplicity of her manners and tastes, a quiet, undisturbed mind during the years of early youth, the while not forgetting to preserve the priceless gift of health.

That this desirable consummation will be better and more safely reached by an adequate separate education, which can take into account woman's peculiar physical organization when necessary, rather than by co-education, no one, I think, can predict. Thus far, the idea of co-education has not penetrated the German brain, and the German woman is too shy and modest to think of downright, decided compet.i.tion with man.

Whether the radical changes in education now progressing in this country, and still in the future for Germany, will yield valuable fruit, and conduce to better the condition of women, it seems to me, experiment rather than theory, must show.

I am with sincere respect, yours truly,

MRS. OGDEN N. ROOD.

341 East 15th Street, N. Y.

s.e.x IN EDUCATION.

There has recently appeared a collection of essays on the subject of girls' education, which, for the reason that it has excited so much attention, cannot here be pa.s.sed by without special notice. It is seldom that any book arouses so much criticism, and, withal, so much earnest opposition as this has provoked, and seldom do the newspapers so generously open their columns to discussions so extended on the merits and demerits of any publication. The author is a physician of high repute in the city of Boston, Dr. E. H. Clarke. With regard to the criticisms on it, the general observation may be made, that where the writer is a man, praise is more generally bestowed than in those cases where a woman is the author, though there are very marked exceptions, the bitterest criticism of a large number in my possession being written by a man. Women, from their stand-point of women, very generally unite in disagreeing with its premises, and from their stand-point as reasoning beings, they are unable to accept its conclusions, the premises being granted. And these adverse criticisms, these indignant protests, are not solely from teachers, but also from mothers, from those who have never taught, and the most candid and dispa.s.sionate one of all, from a woman in no wise connected with schools, either public or private.

But even supposing that they were all from teachers, does that fact, except under a very narrow view of human nature, render them any the less valuable? Does one profession blind the eyes more than the other?

Even in the narrowest view possible to the teacher, is it not for her interest that her pupils should be healthy? How can mental work be satisfactorily done without physical vigor? If it be objected here that some teachers are interested only in present results, unmindful of future consequences, I enter a counter statement that the same is true of some physicians, and bar the line of argument which would compare the poorest teachers with the best physicians.

The profession of teaching is not thus narrow in its views; is not so led by present and temporary motives. Its members are not working for glitter and show in the few years of school life; they do not aim at showy displays at the risk of permanent injury. They work not for to-day, but for all time and for eternity. Their greatest reward is in seeing the development of mind, the correction of false habits, the strengthening grasp of thought, and the growth of character. Are they any less desirous than the physician that the delicate instrument which puts the soul in communication with the external world, and by means of which it must be developed, be in perfect tune? Do they desire any less earnestly than he, that they may a.s.sist in forming from the effervescent girl-life of America a gracious womanhood, fully able to bear any strain which active life may bring, rejoicing to become in due time true wives and real mothers? Is the future of American women any less dear to the teaching profession than to the medical profession? Do they "care less for human suffering and human life than the success of their theories?"

Are not the teachers seeking truth as well as the physicians? Are not they, to use the simile of one able critic, also attentive at their watch-towers of science and experience? A woman who has been teaching for many years, and has been all the time a.s.sociated with large numbers of growing girls; who has been intimately acquainted with their habits and their health; has held their confidence, and has watched them carefully day after day, not infrequently being called on for direct medical advice as well--has had an opportunity for acquiring a fund of practical knowledge on the subject which is available to no man, even though he be physician. It were well to be just. Let the teachers have credit at least for intelligence and honesty as well as the physicians.

Does any one a.s.sert that Dr. Clarke does not blame the teachers? We answer, as we shall show more fully in another place, that any reflection on what is known in technical language as the school "system"

of any country, is a reflection on the teachers of those schools. If any one doubts the power of the teachers as a body to mould the internal arrangements and details of the schools, the school records of more than one city will furnish him with cases where the teachers have forced upon the committee and the schools, measures by them judged necessary, text-books of which they approved, and their candidates for vacant places, till their power and influence will appear no longer doubtful.

The book does not ostensibly on its t.i.tle-page claim to be a work on co-education, but none the less is that the subject considered from first to last. In the preface, the author remarks in an apology for plainness of speech: "The nature of the subject which the Essay discusses, the general misapprehension both of the strong and weak points of the woman question, _and the ignorance displayed by many, of what the co-education of the s.e.xes really means_, all forbid that ambiguity of language or euphemism of expression should be employed in the discussion." The italics are ours, but the words are Dr. Clarke's; and unmistakably show that the main drift of the book is to stem and if possible to turn the tide of popular conviction which is opening our colleges, new and old, to students, without regard to s.e.x.[54]

Again, the volume is divided into five parts, as follows, to quote the table of contents:

I. Introductory.

II. Chiefly Physiological.