The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1888-01-01
HEALTH AND EDUCATION.
An Interesting Interview With DR..
Lucy M. Hall.

Velu tndu Tue spectre OF uue lued OLeib uno
health of the future mothers of the country
is being ruined by the modern demands of
education. Volleys of statistics have no
appreciable effect upon the wrath, ghosts
being, as is well-lxnown, invulnerable to |
bullets and Indifferent to figures.
If the danger in this direction were any |
thing more than an imaginary one, the |
women physicians, whose practice lies |
almost entirely among women and among |
growing girls, would be the first to notice it
and to cry out against it, and it was with
the view of getting a trustworthy medical
opinion on the subject that | asked for a
little information from DR.. Lucy M. Hall a
few days ago.
There is no trained observer in the country
who has given more attention to the health
conditions of women than DR.. Hall, who, as
resident physician and Assistant Professor of
Physiology at Nassar College, was in a
position to follow from day to day and from
year to year the effects Of continued mental
effort on girl students, and whose experience,
based on a comparison of private practice
with college practice, is therefore, of
especial value Dir. Hall, whose home is in
Brooklyn, is one of the best known and most
successful women physicians of that city or
of New York. She is not given to talking
for publication, but feels an especial interest
in the topics on which Questioned her. The
first query which put was:
Have you found that the girl who
wishes to study is, as a rule, physically
injured by the strain of the so-called higher
educationP'
Rules are hard TO formulate. because every
| thing depends on che individual; but in
| general it is safe to say that the health of
college girls averages better than that of
| girls out of school and without occupation.
| College work is often good physical tonic"
| How do you account for benefit to health
| from increased mental effort"
| son elementary principles. If one could
| give the same definite direction to the lives
of young women with which young men
grow up, invalidism would be diminished
| among them one-half. Aimlessness and
! idleness-stagnatio in physical as
well as mental dege leration. Given
worthy aim, something to work for and to
live for, and the strength to pursue it will
| often come OF its own accord. The President
| of college for women once told me that
many girls were admitted to its classes in
| poor health, sometimes also mentally de-
pressed. Fairly started in their college life
they improved rapidly in health and spirits.
! have seen the same thing so often myself
| that it has come to seem a matter of
course A young girl is sent from home
| reluctantly, with many cautions to teachers
| and physician to regard her delicate
physique. She gains in weight, she gains in
| strength, she is roster as a sophomore than
n
attention as a fine healthy looking young
woman by the time she arrives at the
dignity of a senior. She has proited in
mind and body by the blessed gospel of
| work"
DO you mean that study is per Sc beRe-
ficialm
81 mean that a definite interest in life of
any worthy kind is beneficial. Here is
good illustration: The head of a large dry
goods house gave me, at my request, COM
| parative health statistics of the men and
women in his employ. In years time the
number of excuses for absence on account
of sickness offered by the women was nine
times relatively the number given by the
men. Many of the women lived at home
and had not quite the sense of responsibility
| felt by man with a family to support, so
| that the figures do not mean that the health
| of the women was one-ninth as good as that
of the men. The proportion of absences
among the women occasioneG by illness
sufficiently serious to have kept a man at
home-was as two to one. But here is the
significant part of his statement where the
| average woman lost two days to the male
clerks one, the exceptionally intelligent
women who held responsible positions, Aho
were heads of departments and earned la ge
salaries, enioved unusually good health, and
lost less time by reason of illness than any
man in his employ. Those were women
with an object in life, living for something
definite, ambitious women, If you choose to
call them such, and, partly for that reason,
well women. The head of the training
school for nurses at Bellevue Hospital says
that it is a general experience for the young
women entering there to gain steadily in
| health. The work is hard, the nervous
strain sometimes severe, and there is much
study required; but the girls go there
because they want a worthy occupation,
and finding something which satisfies them
in that respect, they are helped i'll other re-
spects. too 1t is the same with college girls
Their course Of study, their associations and
| surroundings change the whole current of
their lives, and for the better not for the
worse. The higher the grade of work done
by women the fewer Interruptions to health
are likely to be found in consequence"
How will the health of young women in
school compare with that of young men"
1.-The records are very favorable to the
girls. The tables of excuses for absence on
account of illness for three consecutive days
and upwards which | kept at Vassar for a
year gave an average to each student of
10 DAYS. The corresponding tables at
Amherst gave 2 IS days to each of the young
men there. The VaSsar tables for the last
school year are not yet complete, but they
show results equally good. Smith College
claims a lower percentage of illness than
Amherst, and Wellesley's figures, allowing
for all days of illness, gave an average of
two days only TO each student. The Principal
of Swarthmore College, a co-educational
school, told me that much more anxiety was
there felt for the health of the young men
than of the young women. There are no
figures for Michigan University, but the
health of girl students certainly does not
fall below that of the men, When President
Bascom, of the University of Wisconsin,
kept the health records of that school for
1877, without the'knowledge Of the Students
the ratio of excuses was one woman to three
men, President Bascom has written more
recently that, other things being equal, the
young women bear the mental strain and
sedentary life involved in a college course,
as well, If not better than the young men.
1t is an easy matter by injudicious eating
aud dressing to injure ones health and call
it over-study, but with good habits in these
respects, with regular exercise, out of doors
and in the gymnasium, mental stimulus
will contribute to physical stimulus. A
woman runs fewer dangers in college than
man, because she is less liable to be led into
dissipation Her health will bear comparison
with her brothers, if they entered college
on anything like equal terms and sue stands
in all probability a better chance for a
heatbful wonanhood than the sister who
stays at home, especially if the sister does
not find herself anything in particular to