Huntsville gazette., 1890-09-13
IN WOMAN'S BEHALF.
A CONSERVATIVE VIEW.

Surprising, After All.
Echoes OF the rapturous applause,
with which the success of lady students
In recent university examinations was
greeted in England, have reached US on
ers know how brilliant that success was.
Miss Fawcett, daughter of the celebrat-
ed professor Of political economy, Sc
cured the highest place in the mathe-
matical tripos at Cambridge, outstrip-
ping the senior wrangler by considera.
BILE percentage of marks. This victory,
notable under any circumstances, was
rendered all the more notable by the
fact that it was won in an exceptionally
good year. Of mathematical scholars.
Hard after Miss Fawcett in the race for
glory came Miss Afford, of Girton, who
stood in the first division of the first
class in classics. She, too, belongs to a
family honored in literary circles. Her
father is an eminent London clergyman,
and her uncle was the Dean Afford, who
contributed some works of permanent
value to English literature.
Both these young ladies showed ex-
ceptional powers Of acquisition and as
similation. but they have scarcely done
enough to justify the ecstatic eulogies
which have been paid them. Some Of
their admirers 60 the length Of declar-
ing, that they have already done more
for their sex than all the women who
preceded them. Rhapsodies in similar
vein fill columns in newspapers and
magazines. John Bull is usually sedate
enough, but when any thing powerful
enough to excite him happens, he shouts
with whoopS of delight which would put
an Indian on the war-path to shame
That lady should snatch the blue rib
bon of Mathematical scholarship from
the favored sex, seems to him almost
a miracle. 1t opens up possibilities for
women which makes him intoxicated
with wonder. He sees dim visions of
women delivering speeches in Parlia-
ment, lecturing in university class
rooms, and sitting on the bench clothed
are to be wrought by the phenomenal
success Of phenomenally gifted girl!
The wise gentlemen, who wag their
heads in editorial chairs and enlighten
the world through editorial columns,
gravely announce that Mrs. Poyser's OBJ
servation as to the capacity Of her sex
has in these latter days received a new
meaning and veritable fulfilment. 1t
will be remembered that the observa-
tion was to this effect-''God Almighty
had made 'em to match the men," We
thought such a truism would by this
time have been shelved in the closet of
commonplaces, but we find it trotted out
in laudatory articles as sentiment now
invested with striking significance.
Thrashing out thoroughly thrashed out
straw is less needless task than at
tempting, in our day, to explode the
notion Of inferiority Of the female to
the male intellect. An age which
boasts of George Eliot, Elizabeth Bar
rett Browning and Harriet Beecher
Stowe, can not be in ignorance OF the
range of woman's mental power.
Attention is also called to the zeal
displayed by English girls in classical
studies, as if that zeal were something
unheard Of before. 1t is not so strangely
new. 1t Is but revival of what OBJ
tanned in the good old days of Queen
Bess. "History repeats ITSELF" and cer-
tainly the Victorian period is in this re-
spect the Elizabethan period. A knowl-
edge of Latin and Greek was counted an
essential part of lady's education, dur
ing the reign of Elizabeth. Sir Anthony
Cooke, who enjoyed the distinction of
being tutor to Edward vi, had four
learned daughters. Their accomplish
ments were shared, though in smaller
degree, by their companions OF similar
social standing. Katherine wrote Latin
hexameters and with the ease Of prac-
ticed knowledge. Mildred, who became
the wife of Lord Burleigh, is described
by Roger Ascham as, with the single
exception of Lady Jane Grey, the best
Greek scholar among the young women
of England. A third daughter, Anne,
was the cleverest Of the four She was
equally at home in theology and classics.
She carried on long and interesting
correspondence with Bishop Jewell in
Greek. and translated one of his books
written in Latin, so accurately that he
was unable to suggest a single altera-
ton. Such woman was worthy of the
honor of being Lord Bacon's mother.
We advise the journalists, who write Of
devotion to classical studies as some
thing new for English women, to learn
little about the studies of ladies in the
Elizabethan period.
Mathematics is generally supposed to
require more mental power than clas-
sics and SO to be beyond the range Of
woman's capacity. Here again history
may be summoned to administer need
ed rebuke. Within the last century, at
least three women won renown through
their mathematical ability. Maria
Getania Agnesi was professor of mathe-
matics at the famous University of Bo-
logna. She was so beautiful that she
had to draw a curtain between herself
and her students, and so learned that
her commentary on comic sections and
her analysis of finite quantities and of
infnitesmals became standard treatlses
on the subjects they discussed. Her