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Social Questions of To-Day
Edited by H. De B. gibbins, M.A.
WOMEN’S WORK
* * * * * *
SOCIAL QUESTIONS OF TO-DAY.
_Edited by H. de B. GIBBINS, M.A._
Crown 8vo., 2_s._ 6_d._
A series of volumes upon these topics of social, economic, and
industrial interest that are at the present moment foremost in
the public mind. Each volume is written by an author who is an
acknowledged authority upon the subject with which he or she
deals, and who treats the question in a thoroughly sympathetic
but impartial manner, with special reference to the historic
aspect of the subject.
_The following Volumes of the Series are now ready._
=1. TRADE UNIONISM--NEW AND OLD.= G. HOWELL, M.P., Author of
_The Conflicts of Capital and Labour_. Second Edition.
=2. PROBLEMS OF POVERTY=: An Inquiry into the Industrial
Condition of the Poor. J. A. HOBSON, M.A.
=3. THE CO-OPERATIVE MOVEMENT TO-DAY.= G. J. HOLYOAKE, Author
of _The History of Co-operation_.
=4. MUTUAL THRIFT.= Rev. J. FROME WILKINSON, M.A., Author of
_The Friendly Society Movement_.
=5. THE COMMERCE OF NATIONS.= C. E. BASTABLE, LL.D., Professor
of Political Economy in the University of Dublin.
=6. THE ALIEN INVASION.= W. H. WILKINS, B.A., Secretary to the
Association for Preventing the Immigration of Destitute Aliens.
(With an Introductory Note by the Right Reverend the Bishop of
Bedford.)
=7. THE RURAL EXODUS=: Problems of Village Life. P. ANDERSON
GRAHAM.
=8. LAND NATIONALISATION.= HAROLD COX, B.A.
=9. A SHORTER WORKING-DAY.= R. A. HADFIELD, and H. DE B.
GIBBINS, M.A.
=10. BACK TO THE LAND.= HAROLD E. MOORE, F.S.I.
=11. TRUSTS, POOLS, AND CORNERS.= J. STEPHEN JEANS.
=12. FACTORY LEGISLATION.= R. W. COOKE TAYLOR, Author of _The
Modern Factory System_, _etc._
=13. WOMEN’S WORK.= LADY DILKE, AMY BULLEY, and MARGARET
WHITLEY.
=14. THE STATE AND ITS CHILDREN.= GERTRUDE TUCKWELL.
_Other Volumes are in preparation._
METHUEN & CO., 36, ESSEX STREET, W.C.
* * * * * *
WOMEN’S WORK
by
MISS A. AMY BULLEY and MISS MARGARET WHITLEY
With a Preface by Lady Dilke
Methuen & Co.
36 ESSEX STREET, LONDON, W.C.
1894
PREFACE
The writers of the present volume have a purely practical object in
view. They have no desire to discuss, theoretically, the duties,
rights, and responsibilities of women. They consider that it would be
unwise to give prominence to considerations affecting the political
or social position of women, in a work dealing specially with their
industrial situation.
On the other hand, they are fully aware that there is a necessary
connection between the views which appear to be in course of formation
as to the proper position of women in the labour market, and the change
which has taken place in the standpoint from which all questions--even
the most abstract--regarding the condition of women are now discussed.
Various reforms have been forced on us within the last thirty years
through the necessity of recognising, legally and socially, that
development in the relations of women to the state and to society which
has been brought about by the pressure of the altered circumstances of
modern life. Unfortunately, the agitation which has accompanied the
carrying of these reforms has been characterized, in some directions,
by a deplorable lack of self-control and judgment on the part of
certain of those who have put themselves forward as the leaders of
their sex. In the past, it must be confessed that our social system
has not afforded to the majority of women those opportunities for the
acquisition of disciplined habits of mind which are to be found only in
bearing the responsibilities of independent action and self-government.
When we hear the voices of those who have been called the “shrieking
sisterhood” uplifted in frenzied violence against the male oppressor,
when we are tempted to repudiate their follies, we may remember that
crimes against good sense, good taste, and good feeling are, like other
crimes, bred of the bitter resentment of wrong which springs in the
breasts of all who awake to consciousness of the suffering inflicted by
centuries of unjust rule. This being so, we may see some extenuation
even of the ravings of those unhappy “wild women” who appear to hold
the most serious national interests as of no importance, in comparison
with the fascinating amusement of fostering an unwholesome antagonism
of sex.
The clamour raised by those who have taken this line of extreme
reaction has retarded the advance of public opinion in the direction
of practical and needed reform, and has gravely hampered the efforts
of those who have striven to arouse public interest in the attempt
to better the position of women in various fields of labour. People
have, not unnaturally, been alarmed by what seems to many the absurd
suggestion of equality between the sexes, and, shrinking from the
assertion of such principles, have adopted an attitude of hostility
to the just claims of women for consideration in respect of their
labour and wages, their education, the protection of their earnings and
property, the removal of such trade and professional restrictions as
are of an artificial character, and the opening out to them of wider
means of obtaining a livelihood.
In view of the responsibilities and duties which society now imposes
on women, changes in the direction of these reforms are not only
reasonable but necessary in the common interest. To insist, however,
that such reforms shall under no circumstances take account of the
differences of sex is to fight against indisputable facts which must,
in the end, prove too strong for us. There is no danger to society
in the recognition of equal human rights for both sexes, if we are
also ready to recognise the divergence of their capabilities, for the
relations of men and women to each other, their functions in the family
and the state, must ultimately be determined--however ill it may please
the more ardent female reformer--by the operation of natural laws.
If we attempt to ignore these laws we are at once landed in a sea
of difficulties. Take this very question of “Women’s Work.” At the
outset we are brought face to face with facts that show us that all
employments are not equally suitable to men and women. We find that, in
the case of mothers at least, there are many occupations for which they
are wholly unfit, but in which men may engage with impunity. Day after
day we find child-bearing women compelled to labour after a fashion for
which they are temporarily unfit, and which is not only the frequent
cause of permanent injury to their own health, but entails a heritage
of disease, or of that feeble health which falls a ready prey to
disease, on all their offspring.
I have seen many married women who were habitually employed in
handling white lead, and in but two instances has my question as to
the health of their children been satisfactorily answered; whilst in
certain branches of the potters’ trade the employment of the mother
not unfrequently means the death of her children in their early
infancy. Even where the employment is not in itself unhealthy, its
pursuit, regardless of the claims of the family--as in the case where
working mothers leave their little ones at the gate of the factory to
a stranger’s care--has to be paid for by a high percentage of infant
mortality.
It is impossible to look into facts of this class without realising
that natural laws impose severe limitations, and will probably continue
to impose much the same restrictions, as to health and strength on
women workers; and when these marry there arise ties which conflict,
and, as far as one can see, will always conflict, with the efficiency
and regularity of the labour of married women. The violation of these
restrictions on any large scale not only constitutes a danger to the
state by causing the steady deterioration of a large section of the
population, but the intermittent character of the supply of labour from
the ranks of married women greatly heightens the difficulties with
which those who are concerned with the organisation of modern industry
have to deal. It is indeed a commonplace now-a-days, that without
improved organization and regulation of the labour of women there can
be no security for the majority of breadwinners.
The present state of anarchy in the labour world, and the difficulties
of our industrial situation, have been appreciably heightened by the
course of conduct pursued and advised by those who persist in regarding
the interests of women as in themselves separate from the interests of
men. Colossal fortunes are built up in large measure by the enforced
labour of women and children, who are encouraged in their suicidal
rivalry with their husbands and fathers in the labour market by those
who do not realise the retribution which follows on the adoption of
their counsels. I have used the word “enforced” advisedly; unchecked
competition is a force of great power. There are masses of workers in
England who are no more free to choose their work, or to make terms for
it, than were the slaves on a Virginian plantation. The Newcastle woman
in the white lead works of Elswick, who counts seven little ones at her
board, whose man is out of work, is tied and bound as with chains. Her
man, her children, look to her for food, and at her heels are hundreds
of other women in similar distress, whose breadwinners are, perhaps
through no fault of their own, also out of work, or in receipt of wages
wholly inadequate to the maintenance of the family. Those who encourage
our women to treat men as their rivals, to compete with them, and by
their competition to persistently reduce the earnings of men, are doing
their best to aggravate this state of things. The wages of the husband
and father being reduced by the entrance into his trade of the women
who undersell him, the wife and mother needs must turn her back upon
her home, and give her working day to make up the difference. In this
way the homes of our working classes are too often destroyed, and the
health of future generations sacrificed.
Apart from the fact that, in most trades, women have made their
appearance on the scene in the capacity of “blacklegs,” it must be
admitted that there has been, on the side of men, something like
resentment at the intrusion of women into professions or branches
of industry which have been hitherto reserved to themselves. The
expression by the men of this natural feeling--in the case of the
doctors it was something more--has, as naturally, irritated the
friends of those women who are seeking fresh means of employment; it
has enabled them to appeal for sympathy and support from the public
as against the “injustice” of men, and it has strengthened their
determination to treat men, at all costs, as rivals and enemies who
must be driven from their occupations by what I once heard one of these
ladies describe, with more force than elegance, as “the cheaper animal.”
To the onslaught of these shortsighted champions of the working woman’s
cause, the men, with equal unwisdom, have retorted by raising, on every
occasion, possible or impossible, the plea of “unfitness” as a bar to
the treacherous encroachments of the opposite sex, and they have thus,
in their turn, tried to win popular sympathy with their efforts to
prevent the entrance of women into certain coveted employments, or to
expel them from others in which they have already gained a footing.
“Unfit!” Yes, undoubtedly, much labour at present performed by our
women is unfit, if there is any fitness in our old and cherished
ideal of home and of the place of the woman in the family; but, if we
once enter on the line of restricting their employment by artificial
barriers, it seems to me difficult to foresee the number and variety of
the complications which would ensue.
We may, however, freely concede that some interference may be
necessary where, through the helplessness of the employed and the
unscrupulousness of the employer, the health and well-being of future
generations is jeopardised. In other words, certain restrictions on
the labour of children and child-bearing women may be required by
the interests of that society of which they are a part; further than
this it seems scarcely wise to go in our demand for anything like
legislative interference in respect to this matter of “unfitness.” The
true remedy lies in the direction of the better organisation of the
trades themselves. The same too may be said of the disastrous effect
on the market of that increasing supply of cheap labour which is ever
swelling to larger and larger proportions through the influx of our
women. Instead of encouraging them to enter into competition with men,
and by so doing to drag wages down to lower and yet lower levels, the
task before us is to teach them that the interests of labour are one,
and that wherever they enter a trade they must in self-protection
refuse to sell their labour for less than a rate proportional to that
demanded by their men.
Increased and effectual organisation would do away with the causes
which provoke that clamour for prohibitive legislation which, as in
the case of the pit-brow women, calls forth angry protest from those
who see their livelihood endangered, and intensifies that bitter
spirit of rivalry of sex which is a fatal obstacle to the better and
harmonious ordering of the world of industry. The only safe course for
women, the only safe course for the community at large, is to consider
their industrial position as an essential part of the general problem,
not to be dissociated without risk from the organisation of the men.
The cardinal points of the programme of the leaders of labour--the
shortening of hours, the abolition of overtime, the regulation of
wages, the limitation of the number of apprentices in the overcrowded
trades--these are matters of chief importance to all workers, matters
in which the interests of all, whether they be men or women, precisely
coincide. Even where, at first sight, their interests appear to
diverge, it will on further consideration be found that such sacrifice
of personal freedom as the woman may be, on certain points, called upon
to make, she makes for the sake ultimately of her own hearth and of
her own children. Those who prefer to regard the interests of men and
women as opposed must accept a view of their mutual relations which,
involving as it does antagonism of sex, pits the woman against the man
in an unregulated competition for employment, which, if forced to its
extreme, will end by lowering the whole level of English life far more
surely than the immigration of any number of “destitute aliens.”
The difficulties which meet us therefore in adjusting the relations
of the sexes in the great field of labour are not insuperable. Once
our women workers see how much depends on their co-operation, on their
self-restraint, on their standing firm, they will not fail their men,
and the difficulties which beset them and their position in the labour
movement of the day, once solved in the full light of that which is
best for the family, best for our society and best for our national
life, we shall assuredly be far on our way towards the settlement
of those less pressing grievances which are put forward by the idle
classes. The highest interests of women in every sphere of life are
indissolubly bound up with those of men, and any attempt to deal with
either separately is fraught with danger to the State and to the nation.
This principle lies at the bottom of all reasoned Trades Unionism,
which, in so far as it is concerned with the organisation of women’s
work, has for its ultimate object the restoration of as many as
possible to their post of honour as queens of the hearth.
EMILIA F. S. DILKE.
76, SLOANE STREET.
_May, 1894._
CONTENTS
PAGE
CHAPTER I.
WOMEN’S WORK: LITERARY, PROFESSIONAL, AND ARTISTIC 1
CHAPTER II.
WOMEN’S WORK: CLERICAL AND COMMERCIAL 39
CHAPTER III.
WOMEN AND TRADE UNIONS 66
CHAPTER IV.
THE TEXTILE TRADES 93
CHAPTER V.
MISCELLANEOUS TRADES 109
CHAPTER VI.
INFLUENCE OF OCCUPATION ON HEALTH 119
CHAPTER VII.
INFANT MORTALITY 140
CHAPTER VIII.
LEGISLATION 150
CHAPTER I.
_WOMEN’S WORK: LITERARY, PROFESSIONAL, AND ARTISTIC._
General characteristics--Classification--LITERATURE:
Fiction--Journalism--TEACHING: Recent changes--Day
_v._ Resident Posts--High Schools--Advantages and
Disadvantages--Hours and Salaries--Report of Committee
of Enquiry--Fees--Elementary Schools--Table of
Salaries--London School Board--Voluntary _v._ Secondary
Schools--Domestic Economy--Demand for teachers--New
openings--Higher teaching posts--RELIGION and PHILANTHROPY:
Increased employment of women--Women preachers--LAW:
Present position of affairs--Conveyancing--MEDICINE:
Progress made--Prospects--Recent
appointments--India--Pharmacy--Dentistry--Midwifery--NURSING:
Inadequate arrangements--Remuneration--ART:
Music, Painting, Sculpture--Obstacles to
progress--Remuneration--THE STAGE: Prospects--The
Ballet and its remuneration--HANDICRAFTS: Artistic
crafts--Pottery--Jewellery--Lithography--Engraving--GENERAL
CONCLUSIONS: Social hindrances.
In dealing with the more cultured branches of women’s work we have to
do with a department which, except in one or two directions, is as yet
incomplete, being still in process of growth and development. Women are
but slowly working their way into the arts and the learned professions,
and their place cannot yet be definitely estimated. Progress has been
so rapid of late that what is true one year has ceased to hold good in
the next. A writer who attempts to deal with matter that is thus in
a state of flux can only hope to give a tolerably faithful picture
of the moment, acknowledging frankly that present conditions may soon
give place to something very different. A counterbalancing advantage,
however, lies in the fact that in literary and professional work women
are independent units, and their labour is not, as in manufacture and
manual occupations, so mixed up with that of men that it is almost
impossible to treat of it apart. In the occupations with which this
chapter is concerned each woman as a rule is economically independent
of other workers, and is free to make her individual talent and
idiosyncrasy fully felt. There is a satisfaction in noting what women
are able to do when their hands are free, though a careful examination
of the conditions under which their work is carried on may lead to
the conclusion that circumstances are not yet as favourable to the
production of good work as they will eventually become. It should be
premised that work of any kind, literary or other, is here regarded
from a purely industrial point of view, and that the aim of the writer
is not to criticise, but simply to record.
For practical purposes the occupations here treated of may be
classified thus:
(1) Literary work, including journalism.
(2) Teaching.
(3) Other professional work, including medicine and nursing.
(4) Art, including such handicrafts as are practised by women; music,
and the drama.
Various occupations not coming precisely under any of these heads
are followed by a few scattered individuals, but these will receive
merely a passing notice. They are interesting in themselves, but are so
largely experimental that it would be useless to consider them at any
length, since they may disappear at any moment.
=Literature.=--It is only recently that women have entered the field
of literature in any numbers. Until the last thirty years or so
it may almost be said that only a few exceptional women, able to
make their mark as poets or novelists, were occupied to any serious
extent in literary work. Nor when we remember that the pursuit of
literature was considered to “unsex” a woman, and that Mrs. Somerville
had to keep a supply of plain sewing ready to cover her books and
papers if a visitor should call, is the deficiency very difficult
to account for. Only natures in which genius is a compelling force
can burst such iron bonds. Fanny Burney, Jane Austen, Miss Mitford,
Mrs. Somerville, Charlotte Bronté, and Mrs. Browning--to name a few
of the pioneers--first broke down the barriers. Then other quiet
workers crept in, magazines became more numerous, and offered a ready
outlet for literary work; biography, history, and science began to be
handled by women. Harriet Martineau perhaps more than any other woman
typified the modern phase of literary activity, fulfilling in her
single person functions any one of which would content most literary
women, being novelist, essay writer, historian, and journalist in one.
She was the first of her sex to enter upon the routine every-day work
of literature, which has been freely trodden since, and her writings
embody much of the tone of thought and feeling which is characteristic
of the “women’s movement” of to-day.
=Fiction.=--The branch of literature in which women are most successful
at present is undoubtedly fiction. Besides the few novelists whose
names are widely known, there are a multitude of scribblers of lesser
fame who yet make a good living by their profession. There are grades
in these things, and writers whose works are seldom found on the
shelves of the fastidious are yet in good demand at the libraries, and
have a circulation and a public of their own. An immense amount of
second class fiction is written by women, who seem to have a special
gift for producing tales that are readable and brightly written
without ever rising above the level of mediocrity. There is a still
lower literary grade, in which poverty of invention keeps company with
a wretched literary style. Yet books of this class are not always
unsuccessful.
The writing of fiction is usually supposed to be a highly remunerative
occupation, and so indeed it often is. But it does not follow that the
writing of three volume novels pays. The phenomenal success, pecuniary
and literary, of one or two recent novels must not be taken as a sample
of what a writer may expect.[1] Though a good price is generally paid
for a novel if the author has once hit the public taste, only moderate
terms can be secured by less known writers, and beginners must be
content to part with their works for a very small sum. A well-known
novelist may receive £400, £500, or even more for a novel, but a writer
of fair reputation does not as a rule receive more than £100 for a
novel that may have taken many months to write. If the novelist is
wise, however, she will make a varied use of her material. Good prices,
say from £100 to £250, are given for serial stories by publishing
syndicates, who issue the tale simultaneously in half-a-dozen
newspapers; and the regular publishers do not as a rule give any less
for novels which have already appeared in the serial form. Probably
they regard the earlier issue as a good advertisement. Short tales
also pay well to those who can write them, and by the contribution of
occasional miscellaneous papers to magazines and reviews the strain of
prolonged composition may be avoided and the income proportionately
improved. A lady novelist and miscellaneous writer in London has
been making from £600 to £700 a year for some time, and has lately
made as much as £900. Just at present the acknowledged author has an
advantage even in journalism, for there is a great demand for articles
in newspapers signed by writers of repute. As much as £10 a column
is sometimes received for articles not in themselves of an important
character by writers whose names are well known in other fields. It is
an expensive fancy, and whether it will last cannot yet be predicted;
but if one paper indulges in it, the rest are obliged to follow suit.
Outside fiction, a good deal of miscellaneous literary work is done by
women, of which it is impossible to give any detailed account. Each
writer works in her own fashion, and for lack of meeting-places there
has hitherto been little interchange of thought or experience among
literary women. The foundation of the Writers’ Club in London may
perhaps be taken as a sign of change in these matters. The formation of
this institution is instructive, since it was due to the limitation of
the projected “Authors’ Club” to men, on the express ground (endorsed
by Mr. Walter Besant) that women writers could not afford to pay the
subscription. In support of this opinion a lady engaged in literary
work in London estimates that few of the rank and file among her
colleagues are earning more than £200 a year. On the other hand, some
writers have made a competency for old age, and not a few married
women, hard pressed by fate, have contrived to bring up a family upon
their literary earnings. Miss Annie S. Swan recently owned to an income
of about £1,000 a year, and Miss Yonge made a handsome fortune by her
novels. Successful playwrights also make a good deal of money; but it
is doubtful whether any woman comes under this category as yet.
[1] George Eliot received £8,000 for _Middlemarch_, but Mrs.
Humphry Ward is said to have received £18,000 for _David
Grieve_.
=Journalism.=--At the present moment journalism appears to be the
fashionable literary pursuit for women, and their contributions to
the daily and weekly papers have increased enormously during the
last few years. The general lightening of the cargo which has taken
place throughout the periodical press has greatly contributed to this
result; for women writers have usually a light touch, and an apparently
inexhaustible power of turning out bright and readable, though often
flimsy, articles upon social subjects. In the department of dress
they of course reign supreme, and few newspapers can now afford to
despise this erstwhile frivolous subject. The writers who discourse
upon fashion, however, have, as a rule, had little literary training;
and through their efforts a kind of press jargon has been evolved,
wonderful alike in grammar, in phraseology, in similes. But this is
the least creditable form of feminine journalism, and we will not
linger over it. In many of the papers written for women (and to which,
of course, women largely contribute) there is very fair writing upon
a great variety of subjects. Women have occasionally been successful
in the main walks of journalism, but the position of the lady who
represents the _Daily News_ in Paris is probably unique. As a rule
women keep to their special department, chronicling the doings of
London society, and taking charge of the lighter topics generally,
while their _confrères_ are dealing with politics and diplomacy.[2]
This new development of journalism affords an example of the results
which may be expected to follow when women are allowed free play to
their activities in other directions. They will not always simply
duplicate the work of their male predecessors, but will enlarge the
field of operations by striking out a line of their own.
It is impossible to name with any accuracy the income attainable in
the profession. Few of the women whose names are known in connection
with the press are journalists pure and simple, though some of the
younger generation are adopting the profession in all frankness, to
sink or swim as their luck allows. Some few who entered the field
before there were many competitors have achieved a good position, but
their number could easily be counted on the fingers. A woman, however,
who has a fair variety of subjects at command, and can combine purely
literary work with the day-to-day business of a journalist, may make
a very reasonable income from her profession--say £400 a year. But a
journalist beginning at the bottom of the ladder would take long to
mount so high, and would probably be well content, after some years’
work, to be earning £200 a year. It should be noted that journalism
among women is almost confined to London; for though there are women
so engaged in the provinces, it seldom forms their regular means of
livelihood.
[2] Miss Flora Shaw, who writes upon Colonial subjects in the
_Times_ may be mentioned as an exception.
=Teaching.=--The profession most commonly followed by educated women
is of course that of teaching. Until recently it was almost the only
occupation open to the class above shop assistants, and even in
becoming a teacher a lady was held to have lost caste. The opening
of university education to women has given the death blow to such
false sentiment, and women are now free to adopt what calling they
like without loss of social position.[3] The foundation of public
day-schools for girls and the working of the Education Act of 1870
have diverted the channel of women’s activities from private teaching
to public schools. Instead of the governess we have the High School
mistress; instead of the “Dame” in a cottage the Elementary School
teacher. Not that the private governess is in any way abolished, for
many parents prefer, or are obliged by reason of residence in the
country to have their children taught at home. Both the governess’s
status and salary are, however, considerably improved, owing to the
rise in the general level of education. Greater acquirements are
demanded, and payment is higher in return. A resident governess may
earn anything from £20 to £200 a year with board. If not resident she
hardly obtains the full equivalent in money, since her board costs
her employer but little if she lives in the house, and is generally
left out of consideration. But for many reasons resident posts are
unattractive to the majority of teachers, and a bribe in the way of
higher salary has to be offered if a really competent teacher is
desired in a boarding school or a private family. Young women entering
the profession generally prefer posts in High Schools, where the
work, though fatiguing, is kept within fixed hours, and where time out
of school is (nominally at any rate) at the teacher’s own disposal.
There is something stimulating in teaching large classes, and those
who have grown accustomed to it are seldom content afterwards to
devote themselves to one or two children. Payment too is regular, and
employment tolerably certain, whereas in private families either means
or honesty or both may be defective, and in any case the growth of the
children deprives the governess sooner or later of her employment.
For these reasons therefore High Schools as a rule attract the ablest
teachers, unless delicate health or personal predilection happens
to weigh in the other direction. A similar state of things prevails
with regard to private schools, which are obliged either to pay high
salaries in order to attract good teachers, or to put up with the
inefficient ones who cannot easily obtain work in a High School.
[3] The early students of Girton and Newnham, however, were
regarded askance. One of them, now in a position of honour,
related that when her intention of going to college became
known in the country district where she lived, her acquaintance
“could not have spoken worse of her if she had committed a
forgery.” To another who had gained a scholarship her friends
remarked, “You are surely satisfied now, you cannot want to
_make use of it_.”
=High Schools.=--It is doubtful, however, whether High School work
altogether deserves the respect with which it is regarded by aspirants
to the teaching profession. A glamour was thrown around it in the
beginning by the interest with which the foundation of new schools was
regarded, and there is a certain sense of distinction in forming part
of an institution whose working always attracts a good deal of local
attention. Against these attractions, however, must be set decided
disadvantages. In the first place the work is very severe, and it is
made harder than it need be by the bad methods of teachers. To impart
to large classes the stimulus which is the essence of good teaching is
no light task, and the better it is performed the more is taken out of
the teacher. But as the actual class hours are usually short (9 to
1, and 2.30 to 4 on three or four afternoons in the week according to
arrangement) this alone would not be found injurious; and where the
staff is as large as it ought to be, teachers should get an interval
during some at least of the mornings. But the worst part of High School
work is the correction of homework, which in many cases takes up most
of the evenings in the week. Such an expenditure of energy is almost
pure waste, and the mistress comes to school in the mornings tired and
dull, incapable of exerting the magnetism which makes the lesson a
living thing. It is greatly to the discredit of head mistresses that a
greater number of them do not set their faces against this practice.
Instead of consulting with their assistants as to how corrections can
be minimised, they often insist upon a certain amount of homework
being set, and seem to consider that the more of it a teacher does
the greater is her value. In reality the opposite is the case, for a
good teacher will test her class during the lesson, and thus do away
to a great extent with the necessity for homework. Homework cannot be
altogether abolished, but it might and ought to be much diminished,
in the interests of both teachers and taught. Women need to be less
rigidly conscientious in these matters, and more truly enlightened.
=Salaries.=--The salaries to be earned by assistant mistresses in
High Schools can hardly be regarded as satisfactory, though they are
probably higher than anything that could be gained by teaching, except
in a few cases, before the institution of public day schools for girls.
A committee of ladies and gentlemen interested in education recently
investigated this question with great care, and a summary of their
conclusions may be given here. In the first place they estimate that
a change from private teaching to a High School is “mostly attended
by pecuniary loss,” which confirms the statement made above. After
analysing the replies to schedules of questions sent out to schools,
the committee come regretfully to the conclusion that, apart from
head mistresses’ and a few exceptional posts, “something under £160
per annum is the average reward, after twelve or thirteen years’
experience, of the most expensively educated and successful assistant
mistresses.” From my own knowledge of High Schools I can fully endorse
this estimate. Few assistants earn more than £150 a year, and there are
probably--nay, certainly--not half a dozen who receive £200 a year. As
the reward of an expensive education, and, presumably, a fair amount of
talent, these figures can hardly be regarded as satisfactory.
Summing up the general results, “We may say,” proceeds the report,
“that of the teachers who joined their present school more than two
years ago one-fourth are at present receiving an average salary of
£82 for an average week’s work (the average including very large
variations) of 32 hours; half (25 per cent. of whom possess University
degrees) are receiving an average salary of £118 for a week’s work of
about 35 hours; and one-fourth (50 per cent. of whom are University
women) are earning an average of £160 in exchange for a week’s work of
36 to 37 hours.
“These results do not appear unsatisfactory, but it must be remembered
that under the phrase _more than two years_ is covered a length of
service extending in one case to as many as seventeen years, and of
which the average must be taken as very nearly six. Many also of these
teachers have had considerable experience in other schools before
entering the one in which they are at present engaged.”
A further question which the Committee were charged to investigate
was the decline or otherwise of school salaries. Upon this point they
remark, “The schools which have been in existence for some years appear
to be paying within a trifle of what they paid in 1885, but among the
few returns which the Committee have been able to obtain from teachers
in the employment of the recently formed Church schools, are some
salaries so low as appreciably to affect the general average.
“The Committee, however, are obliged to note--and they do so with the
greatest regret--that whereas between three or four years ago the
commonest initial salary of non-graduates was fluctuating between £70
and £80, the preponderance has now been decisively gained by the lower
figure.”
This real though slight retrograde movement in salaries is reinforced
by another factor, of which intending teachers should take note.
“Until recently,” reports the Committee, “when a new assistant-mistress
was engaged in a High School, the agreement then made arranged not
only for an initial salary, but also for a scale of annual or biennial
increment up to a certain maximum. The Committee learn with regret that
in many schools these agreements are no longer being made, and that new
mistresses are therefore obliged to trust for the future entirely to
the liberality of their councils.”
It will be seen therefore that the position of a High School mistress,
though fairly stable and moderately well remunerated as women’s
occupations go, does not present a brilliant prospect. Additional risk
arises from the recent establishment of schools, some of which belong
to the Church Schools Company, others to local companies, with lower
fees than those prevailing in the average High School. These tend
by their competition for pupils to reduce the profits of the better
schools, and therefore to lower teachers’ salaries. The evil is a
serious one, and it is much to be regretted that women, by accepting
posts in such schools, should countenance a movement fraught with
injury to their fellow-workers.
It is exceedingly doubtful whether the public schools for girls which
have sprung up all over the country with such rapidity of late years
have been formed upon a sound footing as regards payment of fees and
salaries.[4] Broadly speaking, the fees are too low to pay salaries
which will allow the recipients to live in any but a very careful
manner. If unhampered by claims of relations, teachers may secure the
necessaries, and, to some extent, the comforts of life; but they can
hardly allow themselves such recreation, change of scene, and general
liberality of living, in the wide sense of the term, as will enable
them to recuperate their stock of health, energy, and intellectual
brightness, so as to retain freshness in teaching and keep abreast of
the times. The right level of teaching cannot be maintained upon any
less terms; and so long as girls’ secondary schools are founded upon a
purely commercial basis, the standard which we have a right to demand
from those who have charge of the education given therein will seldom,
I fear, be reached. The organisation of secondary schools is, however,
too large a matter to be discussed here. The whole question, including
the claims of secondary schools upon the State for support, is rapidly
becoming an affair for national consideration. Legislation cannot be
long deferred, and the preliminary stage of discussion and debate has
already begun.
[4] The average fee in the Girls’ Public Day School Company’s
Schools is £12 12_s._ 0_d._ _per annum_, the same as that
charged by the City of London School for Boys, a richly-endowed
school, which has no dividends to pay, and is backed by the
richest Corporation in the world.
=Elementary Schools.=--The conditions under which employment can
be obtained in the elementary schools may be found in the official
publications of the Education Department, and the general character
of the work is also too well known to need description here.[5] More
women than men are employed in the elementary schools, the number of
certificated masters being 18,611, of mistresses 27,746. I append
tables of salaries drawn up in 1893, by the National Union of Teachers,
classified according to the denominations to which the schools belong.
It should be noted that the tables refer to certificated mistresses
only.
[5] Regulations as to certificates and examinations are
undergoing considerable change, and it is expedient therefore
for candidates to consult the latest publications.
AVERAGE SALARIES OF CERTIFICATED MISTRESSES.
+----------------------------------------+---------------------+--------+
| PRINCIPAL. | ADDITIONAL. | TOTAL. |
+----------------+-----------------------+---------------------+--------+
| |Average salaries, |Average salaries, |Average |
| Denominations |including all |including all |salaries|
| |professional |professional | |
| |sources of income |sources of income | |
| | +-------------+ +-------------+ |
| | |Number on | |Number on | |
| | |which | |which | |
| | |average | |average | |
| | |is taken | |is taken | |
| | | +------+ | +------+ |
| | | |Number| | |Number| |
| | | |pro- | | |pro- | |
| | | |vided | | |vided | |
| | | |with | | |with | |
| | | |house | | |house | |
+----------------+---------+------+------+-------+------+------+--------+
| | £ s. d.| | |£ s. d.| | | £ s. d.|
|Schools | | | | | | | |
|connected | | | | | | | |
|with National | | | | | | | |
|Society or | | | | | | | |
|Church of | | | | | | | |
|England | 72 3 1| 8,982|3,752 |48 15 1| 2,520| 150 |67 0 0|
| | | | | | | | |
|Wesleyan Schools| 83 14 10| 320| 3 |49 6 0| 220| 1 |69 14 3|
| | | | | | | | |
|Roman Catholic | | | | | | | |
|Schools | 64 17 6| 1,350| 304 |50 4 2| 477| 7 |61 0 11|
| | | | | | | | |
|British, | | | | | | | |
|Undenominational| | | | | | | |
|and other | | | | | | | |
|Schools | 78 3 0| 858| 167 |54 10 3| 533| 5 |69 1 11|
| | | | | | | | |
|Board Schools |110 2 6| 4,895| 512 |78 19 8| 7,591| 31 |91 3 10|
+----------------+---------+------+------+-------+------+------+--------+
|Total | 83 8 6|16,405|4,738 |69 6 7|11,341| 194 |77 13 3|
+----------------+---------+------+------+-------+------+------+--------+
NUMBER OF CERTIFICATED TEACHERS IN RECEIPT OF SALARIES OF CERTAIN
SPECIFIED AMOUNTS.
_MISTRESSES._
PRINCIPAL.
+-----------------+--------------------------------------------+
| |Under £40. |
| | +----------------------------------------+
| | |£40 and less than £45. |
| | | +------------------------------------+
| | | |£45 and less than £50. |
| | | | +--------------------------------+
| | | | |£50 and less than £75. |
| | | | | +--------------------------+
| | | | | |£75 and less than £100. |
| | | | | | +--------------------+
| | | | | | |£100 and less |
| Denominations. | | | | | |than £150. |
| | | | | | | +--------------+
| | | | | | | |£150 and less |
| | | | | | | |than £200. |
| | | | | | | | +----------+
| | | | | | | | |£200 and |
| | | | | | | | |over. |
| | | | | | | | | +------+
| | | | | | | | | |Total.|
+-----------------+---+---+---+-----+-----+-----+---+---+------+
|Schools connected| | | | | | | | | |
|with | | | | | | | | | |
|National Society | | | | | | | | | |
|or | | | | | | | | | |
|Church of England|203|320|397|4,626|2,303|1,037| 82| 14| 8,982|
| | | | | | | | | | |
|Wesleyan Schools | 3| 8| 7| 150| 74| 58| 18| 2| 320|
| | | | | | | | | | |
|Roman Catholic | | | | | | | | | |
|Schools | 16| 18| 29|1,013| 230| 43| 1| --| 1,350|
| | | | | | | | | | |
|British, | | | | | | | | | |
|Undenominational | | | | | | | | | |
|and other Schools| 18| 22| 28| 414| 217| 130| 23| 6| 858|
| | | | | | | | | | |
|Board Schools | 35| 56| 93|1,269|1,140|1,296|524|482| 4,895|
+-----------------+---+---+---+-----+-----+-----+---+---+------+
| Total |275|424|554|7,472|3,984|2,564|648|504|16,405|
| |
| ADDITIONAL. |
+-----------------+---+---+---+-----+-----+-----+---+---+------+
|Schools connected| | | | | | | | | |
|with | | | | | | | | | |
|National Society | | | | | | | | | |
|or | | | | | | | | | |
|Church of England|405|483|395|1,152| 70| 15| --| --| 2,520|
| | | | | | | | | | |
|Wesleyan Schools | 25| 45| 34| 107| 8| 1| --| --| 220|
| | | | | | | | | | |
|Roman Catholic | | | | | | | | | |
|Schools | 46| 71| 51| 298| 8| 3| --| --| 477|
| | | | | | | | | | |
|British, | | | | | | | | | |
|Undenominational | | | | | | | | | |
|and other Schools| 41| 76| 76| 288| 41| 10| 1| --| 533|
| | | | | | | | | | |
|Board Schools |146|246|358|2,771|1,956|2,106| 8| --| 7,591|
+-----------------+---+---+---+-----+-----+-----+---+---+------+
|Total |663|921|914|4,616|2,083|2,135| 9| --|11,341|
+-----------------+---+---+---+-----+-----+-----+---+---+------+
These tables show a considerable difference between the salaries paid
in Board and in Voluntary Schools, the Board School average being £91
3_s._ 10_d._ against the highest Voluntary average of £69 14_s._ 3_d._
In rural districts also extra duties of an onerous nature, such as
teaching in the Sunday-school, playing the organ in church, getting up
village concerts, and performing parochial duties generally, are often
imposed by the clerical managers of Voluntary Schools. Small School
Boards also are not wholly guiltless in the matter. Particulars as to
these exactions may be learnt from the publications of the National
Union of Teachers, which is making a determined stand against their
imposition.
The highest salaries are given by the London School Board. Trained
assistants (female) begin at £85 a year, and head mistresses receive
from £200 to £300. Higher salaries are given for special work, and in
the large provincial centres also it may be said without inaccuracy
that the regulation scale is constantly broken in order to secure good
teachers of special subjects. In London pupil teachers’ schools the
salaries of assistant mistresses begin at £125 a year, rising by annual
increments of £5 to £150. Assistant masters in similar posts receive
£140 to £170 per annum. Salaries for both sexes are said to be rising
gradually throughout the country, and although a contrary movement has
recently been initiated in the London School Board, it is hardly likely
that it will be carried out to any great extent.
=Elementary _versus_ Secondary Schools.=--Hitherto elementary schools
have not commended themselves as a field of work for the class
of women who now form the staff of girls’ secondary schools. The
salaries offered outside London have not been high enough to tempt
them; holidays are short in comparison with High Schools (six weeks
in the year instead of thirteen); and, lastly, the conditions as to
training hitherto exacted have been practically prohibitive. Women
who have already received an expensive education are not inclined to
spend two or three years more in a denominational training college.
The relaxation of rules in favour of women who have passed certain
recognised examinations, and the opening of day training classes
in connection with recognised colleges, such as Owen’s College,
Manchester, and several of the local University Colleges, may do much
to open the elementary schools to a more cultured class of women. Such
women would soon obtain the headship of a school, and would then, under
a liberal Board, find a good field for the exercise of talent and
organising power. I fear, however, that the shortness of holidays may
still prove a serious obstacle.
=Domestic Subjects.=--Meanwhile a new field of work is being opened
by the inclusion of domestic subjects in the school course. A teacher
of cookery in elementary schools can earn from £80 to £100 a year in
a fairly agreeable manner, and private and visiting teachers often
earn more. Dressmaking and laundry work are also in great demand,
particularly in evening continuation schools; and if to these subjects
is added a knowledge of sick-nursing and elementary hygiene, the
combination forms an admirable stock-in-trade for a teacher. In some
towns School Boards are training their own teachers, probably with more
haste than thoroughness, to fill the posts for which such a sudden
demand has arisen. Instruction in domestic subjects is also being
carried on under the auspices of the County Councils, for there are few
among their number that have not devoted a share of the funds available
under the Technical Instruction Act, and in towns by the power of
levying a penny rate, to the furtherance of technical education, in
which domestic instruction for girls is almost always included. Thus,
throughout the length and breadth of the land, teachers of these
subjects are eagerly sought; and cookery schools, embryo technical
schools for women, and voluntary agencies, such as the National Health
Society, are busily employed in training teachers and sending them out
to different districts. The Liverpool School of Cookery is particularly
active in this direction.
The misfortune is that in these subjects there is no definite standard,
and each school trains after its own fashion. The money for technical
education was gained by a side wind, and the passing of the Act found
the country unprepared, no organised system of instruction or of
training for teachers being in existence. As experience is gradually
accumulated the different agencies at work will probably make
comparison of methods and adopt to some extent a common system and
standard. In this connection it should be mentioned that though women
have no place upon County Councils, they may be and are appointed upon
the local committees for carrying out the Councils’ schemes, and in
this way they are able to take an active share in educational work.
It cannot at present be foretold what shape this large enterprise
will eventually take, but it seems likely that for some time to
come the teaching of domestic subjects will form an important and
considerable opening for women. It is fortunate that it is so, since
many are thereby enabled to find congenial employment who have no
taste for the purely literary side of education. In time permanent
institutions for domestic instruction will probably be formed in the
large centres of population--indeed such a movement has already begun.
The superintendence of work at these centres, which will also embrace
outlying districts, must give rise to good appointments, and it is
well to bear in mind that these will certainly fall by preference to
women who besides technical knowledge have received a good general
education, and possess powers of organisation and management. Women
so qualified will probably be highly paid. The rank and file may not
impossibly find their earnings diminish as their numbers increase;
at present their services are at a scarcity value. In view of the
certain extension of this branch of teaching work it is worth while for
girls or their parents to consider whether (viewed as a wage-earning
instrument solely) a course at a school of domestic economy, requiring
at most two years, and costing a comparatively small sum (say £15 per
annum), is not more advantageous than three or four years at Oxford or
Cambridge, costing from £70 to £100 a year. In the ordinary branches of
teaching, as I have shown, a woman seldom earns more than £150 a year,
and teaching is almost the only breadwinning occupation followed by
women graduates. I know teachers of domestic economy who make as much
or more in the winter months, and have the summer free for either rest
or self-culture.
=Higher Teaching Posts.=--But few posts of higher teaching or
superintendence are open to women. Even those mentioned above are only
just beginning to take visible shape. Headships of High Schools are of
course important positions, and are often well paid. An initial salary
of £250 a year (sometimes, however, only £150) is offered, generally
with rooms, but not board; capitation fees, varying from 10_s._ to
30_s._ are usually added, but these do not begin until 100 pupils have
been entered. Thus in an unprosperous neighbourhood a mistress may have
all the trouble of organising and managing a school for £150 or £200 a
year; for it is precisely in these districts that the lowest initial
salaries are offered. In some few cases the income rises to £700 or
£800 a year. The headships of colleges and training colleges available
are of course very limited in number, and the same may be said of the
college lectureships at Oxford and Cambridge, with rooms in college.
These are not well paid, and are chiefly attractive for the pleasant
university life they afford. Few women are as yet engaged as University
Extension lecturers, though it is hard to see what impediment, beyond
the prejudice of sex, stands in the way of their employment.
=Religion and Philanthropy.=--Religion and Philanthropy have not
hitherto been reckoned among the avenues leading to remunerative
employment for women; but it is by no means certain that this will be
the case in the future. The Catholic Church has always provided careers
for women in connection with convents and sisterhoods, and institutions
formed upon their pattern are springing up in the Church of England
and even in the Dissenting churches. Since, however, the members are
merely supplied with board, lodging, and clothing, and are content
to find their reward in the satisfaction of their calling, there is
little further to be said about these occupations from the industrial
point of view. The feminine side of religious and philanthropic work,
however, is developing upon much broader lines than heretofore, and
though at present it partakes largely of the character of amateur work,
it can hardly fail in course of time to create remunerative and (if
the term may be allowed) professional occupations for women. To some
extent this is the case already. Even in the Established Church the
propriety of women preaching appears to be regarded to some extent as
an open question, and--with or without formal sanction--the innovation
seems destined to spread. Whatever else women preachers may lack
they at any rate seldom fail of a congregation, an item which no
church can afford to disregard. It can hardly be doubted that in this
field also the labourer will eventually be found worthy of her hire.
For example, philanthropic societies have usually a paid secretary,
besides, in many cases, visitors, lecturers, and propagandists. Most
of the religious bodies have now “Settlements” in the London slums,
with women’s branches. The resident manager is certainly paid in
some instances, and will no doubt soon be in all. Political work may
also in time afford occupation to a limited number of women. It is,
however, in purely religious work that we may expect to see the next
development of women’s activities. In almost all denominations women
are already at work preaching and exhorting, and the desirability of
giving formal sanction to their proceedings is being actively discussed
in Nonconformist churches.
=Law.=--Of the learned professions only one, that of medicine, is open
to women. A combination of law and ancient custom keeps women out of
the legal profession, and it is only in certain of its approaches,
such as conveyancing and accountants’ work, that they are free to
seek a livelihood. A summary of the case by Miss Eliza Orme LL.B.,
gives a clear idea of the situation. “Women can make wills and simple
agreements without qualification. Anything else (_i.e._ deeds) must
be _nominally_ done by a solicitor, and women can only be employed by
them as clerks. Women cannot go into court. If they do chamber practice
(_i.e._ settling difficult deeds for solicitors, or giving counsel’s
opinion), they can only do it through barristers as ‘devils,’ receiving
half fees. If women are to be solicitors the Act will need altering.
To be barristers they must be admitted by the benchers of one of the
four Inns (Inner and Middle Temple, Benchers’ Inn, and Gray’s Inn), and
if a woman applied, probably a joint council of all would sit.
“The Benchers might admit them as certificated conveyancers, which
would not allow them to plead in court; but men themselves have not
used their certificate for many years.
“The University of London law degree is open to women. It is a thorough
practical test, but not a legal qualification to practice.”
From this summary it will be seen that the door of the legal profession
is still fast closed. There is no difficulty however in a lady’s
practising as a conveyancer, and no reason therefore why more women
should not follow the example of Miss Orme in adopting the profession,
which is said to offer a fair prospect of remuneration. There is also
at least one lady accountant in London, and the audit of societies
and public companies, the preparation of balance-sheets and financial
statements, may be freely undertaken by women who are willing to train
for the work.
It should be added that legal work seems likely to become possible for
women in India. Miss Cornelia Sorabji, who recently passed in the law
schools at Oxford, is about to take up a Government appointment in her
own country, and will be occupied with attending to the legal interests
of Hindu women, who are unable to consult lawyers of the opposite sex.
It remains to be seen whether her example is capable of being followed
by others.
=Medicine.=--The profession of medicine has at last, after long
struggles, been thrown open to both sexes, and women doctors are
slowly taking their place in the ranks as recognised practitioners of
the healing art. Their presence will tend in an eminent degree to the
preservation of health as distinct from the cure of disease, at any
rate as far as women patients are concerned; since it is plain that
women, and especially girls, can be more readily induced to complain
of ailments in the initial and manageable stage if they are able
to consult a member of their own sex. This statement is sometimes
questioned, but as far as girls, at least, are concerned, I have no
doubt whatever of its correctness. And since the seeds of illness
are often laid in early life this point is of the very greatest
importance. It is not necessary here to recall the history of the
struggle for medical education, or to give details as to the places
of study open to women.[6] It is more important to enquire what rank
medical women are taking in their profession, and what appointments
they are able to obtain. Upon the first point it is still too soon
to pronounce an opinion. A medical man does not expect to make a
reputation within the time that the majority of women have as yet been
at work. There are about 170 medical women upon the register, and of
these only a dozen qualified before 1880. It is obviously too early,
and the ground covered is too small, to expect conspicuous results as
yet; and if a number of women are filling public posts in India, or
working at private practice in England with adequate success, they
and their friends have every reason to be content. In some respects it
is said to be easier for women to build up a practice than for men.
Dr. Jex-Blake remarks that “in point of fact women are continually
doing what men hardly ever attempt--viz., settling down in a strange
place with no professional introduction to practice by purchase or
otherwise; and if gifted with a moderate degree of patience, tact,
and other qualities needful in every successful practitioner, they do
manage to succeed in a way that certainly goes far to justify their
bold adventure.” It is usually estimated that five years are necessary
to put together a practice that will afford a livelihood. Whether the
standard of “livelihood” here taken is as high as that of man cannot be
exactly known; but it is certain that women who succeed in the medical
profession make much larger incomes than in most other callings.
The appointments which have recently become available are a great
help to medical women at the beginning of their career. A medical
man usually fills minor posts in hospitals, or acts as a _locum
tenens_ for a while before attempting to set up for himself; but
women have hitherto been obliged to take up practice as soon as their
qualification was gained. The New Hospital for Women in Euston Road,
officered entirely by women, now affords young doctors the means of
gaining experience, and a number of other posts are gradually becoming
available. Several medical women hold Government appointments as
physicians to the female staff of the Post-office; a lady officiates
as assistant resident medical officer in a workhouse hospital, another
in the Holloway Sanatorium, others in fever hospitals or as asylum
inspectors. A well-known surgeon in the provinces employs a lady as
an anæsthetist, and a country doctor in good practice has for some
time been in the habit of employing medical women as assistants. A few
middle class girls’ schools have engaged the services of a consulting
lady doctor, and it would be well if the example were more widely
followed; since, apart from cases of illness, there are many questions
of hygiene and school arrangements in which a properly-qualified woman
could give valuable advice.
[6] For the former see Dr. Sophia Jex-Blake’s _Medical Women_
and (_inter alia_) a pamphlet entitled _Women and Medicine_, by
Edith A. Huntley (Lewes: Farncombe and Co., Printers); for the
latter _The Englishwoman’s Year Book_, which gives a list of
medical schools open to women.
=Medical Women in India.=--An important field for medical women is
to be found in India. The Mahommedan races do not allow the presence
of a male physician in the zenana; and the Hindus, who have borrowed
from the conquering race many of their ideas and customs, are also
opposed to the practice. The Countess of Dufferin’s scheme for
supplying medical aid to the women of India--now too well known to
require explanation--was instituted in 1885, and has been warmly
supported by native princes, some of whom have founded hospitals on
their own account. At present thirteen women doctors are working
under the Dufferin Fund, besides assistant surgeons, and over 200
pupils are studying in Indian medical schools. The various missionary
societies also educate and support a number of medical missionaries
in India. It is possible that some day Government may include the
medical profession in the Civil Service, but for the present the work
has to be done by voluntary effort. Eventually too Indian women will
take over the medical care of their own sisters; but for some time to
come the field must continue to be largely occupied by Englishwomen.
Hindu and Mahommedan girls do not study medicine; the native students
in medical schools are drawn from the Parsees, Brahma Somaj (Veda
Hindus), and Eurasians. Englishwomen holding appointments in India are
allowed private practice as well, but the latter alone would never
yield a livelihood, since the natives who make use of the dispensaries
do not expect to pay a fee. If they receive medicine they do not
object to pay for it, and those who send for a lady doctor to attend
them in their houses are also ready to pay for her services; but only
the comparatively rich think of asking for a doctor’s visit. Ladies
employed by the association engage to work for five years in India,
and, besides a free passage out, receive a salary of 300 rupees a
month. Scholarships are attached to some of the women’s medical
schools, but the amount--£25 or £30 per annum during education--seems
very small in relation to the obligations undertaken, which, if not
fulfilled, involve the return of the money.
=Pharmacy.=--One or two ladies have adopted pharmacy as a profession;
and as means of training are now accessible, there seems no reason why
an occupation which is neither arduous nor disagreeable should not be
largely followed by women. Mrs. Clarke Keer has a dispensary in London,
and a few other ladies hold posts in connection with hospitals. It
has been suggested that the work should be taken up by the daughters
of medical men, whose position gives them special opportunities for
training.
=Dentistry.=--Another very suitable profession is dentistry, which
is largely followed by women in America, but only by a few in this
country. There should be excellent openings in this profession. A
dentist once observed to me, that with children a woman dentist would
have it all her own way, and would probably beat all the men, for
children were troublesome patients, and men did not know how to deal
with them.
=Midwifery.=--Women of education are being trained in increasing
numbers as midwives, and there is abundant opening in this direction
for useful and remunerative work. But at present the status of midwives
is uncertain, owing to the lax regulations respecting their practice
and qualifications. The whole profession is undergoing a change,
passing from the ranks of untrained, unskilled, and inefficient work
to that of a skilled profession. The registration of trained midwives
is being urgently demanded, and a Select Committee has reported in
favour of the examination and registration of all who practise as
midwives. The necessity for stricter regulations will be apparent
when it is stated that seven cases of childbirth out of ten in this
country take place without the presence of a medical man, and that the
women (mostly poor) who employ midwives have no means of ascertaining
their fitness for the duty. The Obstetrical Society, London, gives a
midwife’s certificate of acknowledged value, which should be obtained
by every lady intending to practise in midwifery. For those who wish
to undertake benevolent work among the poor, especially in country
districts, a knowledge of midwifery is highly desirable. The Midwives’
Institute in Buckingham Street, Strand, looks after the interests of
midwives, and arranges for their training.
=Nursing.=--The profession of nursing continues to attract numbers of
educated women into its ranks, and facilities for training are said
to be insufficient for the demand. (For details see _Englishwoman’s
Year Book_.) Considering the hardships involved in the profession
its continued popularity is surprising. The work of a trained
nurse, whether employed in a hospital or in private or district
work, is necessarily severe, and it is to be regretted that more
careful provision is not made for the comfort of so useful a class
of workers. Hours are long and holidays short, and work of the most
trying description is expected to be done year after year, with a mere
fraction of the rest and recreation which is considered necessary in
other and not more arduous professions. In Nursing Institutes and
Homes the dietary is often very poor, and in hospitals the state of
things is not much better. It is unfortunately impossible to repeat
in any detail the complaints made by nurses without indicating the
institutions to which they refer; but most persons with acquaintances
among hospital nurses know that abundant dissatisfaction exists in the
profession. Examples could of course be given of institutions that
are well managed in this respect, but they are, it is to be feared,
the exception rather than the rule. Boards of Management are under
constant pressure to increase their accommodation, and, funds being
seldom abundant, they are tempted to work with an insufficient staff.
The consequences are felt most severely by the more educated nurses.
It seems to be forgotten that the superior tact and skill which make
the cultured woman a better nurse than her uneducated colleague are
gained to some extent at the expense of toughness of fibre, and that
hours and dietary need modification accordingly. I am afraid that a
good deal of the mischief arises from mistaken notions as to what the
profession of nursing ought to be. Nurses are supposed to take it up
in a missionary spirit for the good of the community, without regard
to their own comfort or health. Now unfortunately the more “noble” a
profession is considered, the greater is the tendency to neglect the
material well-being of those concerned in it; and nurses have reason
to feel the full force of this misplaced sentiment. The policy followed
in their regard is as foolish as it is unjust. The inevitable fatigues
of a nurse’s life require to be counteracted by the most careful
provisions for her comfort, if full efficiency is to be kept up; and
Hospital Boards would do well to remember that more professions are
now open to women than there were when nursing first became popular.
The supply of capable nurses is already insufficient, as the recent
influenza epidemic showed, and may easily become still more inadequate,
if neither facilities for training nor conditions of employment undergo
any improvement.
=Nurses’ Salaries.=--Except in institutions to which pensions
are attached, the profession of nursing cannot be regarded as a
money-making career. At one large London hospital probationers receive
£12 with uniform the first year, £20 the second, and the “sisters,”
or heads of wards, receive £40 per annum. The Workhouse Training
Association (for replacing pauper attendants by trained nurses in
workhouse infirmaries) gives no salary the first year, £20 the second,
rising to £25. A district nursing association in the provinces gives
trained nurses £24 the first year, and salaries rise to £30--board,
lodging, and washing being also found. From £25 to £30 therefore
generally represents the money payment of a trained nurse. The matron
of a hospital may receive anything from £50 to £100 per annum. In
the large London hospitals the latter sum is often exceeded, with
the addition of house, servant, and handsome fees from probationers.
For heads of hospitals therefore the profession is by no means
unremunerative; but these posts are few and far between. With the
multiplication of cottage hospitals which is certain to take place
minor posts with fair salaries and a not too arduous life will become
available. Private nursing under a medical man is often well paid, but
uncertainty of employment has to be taken into account. Co-operative
associations of nurses are also being formed, and it is possible that
by their means a larger proportion of the fees paid by patients may
find their way into the pockets of those who earn them.
=Art. Painting and Music.=--And now what must be said of the domain
of the arts and of women’s place therein? If women have entered but
timidly into this fair kingdom, it has not been for want of fitness,
as the rapid success of a few among them clearly shows; the hindrance
has lain rather in the prejudices of society and the lack of proper
training. Though rapidly disappearing, the former are not yet extinct;
means of training are not the same for both sexes, nor have women
ceased to suffer from the blasting influence of Puritanism upon art.
Anything that damages the social reputation of a profession bars it
more or less to women; and anything that makes training difficult or
expensive is a more serious hindrance to women than to men, since
parents are not so willing to make sacrifices for a girl as for a boy.
Astonishment is often expressed at the absence of women composers of
merit; but the reason is not really far to seek. Until the foundation
of the London schools of music (to which that of Manchester must now
be added) musical education has been difficult to obtain by either
sex. But the practical part, which involves an acquaintance with
orchestral instruments, the methods of opera, the arrangement of
church music, the management of chorus parts and a hundred other
details, has hitherto been almost unattainable by women. There seems
little _à priori_ reason for supposing that music is an affair of sex.
Fanny Mendelssohn was scarcely, if at all, less gifted than the brother
who so calmly placed her in the background, and was not ashamed to
appropriate the credit of her work. Some of the “Lieder ohne Worte,”
and “O rest in the Lord”--the latter perhaps the most popular of all
Mendelssohn’s melodies--were, as is now generally known, composed by
Fanny.
=Remuneration.=--It is impossible to give any estimate of the value of
either music or painting as a means of livelihood. A music teacher, if
well qualified, may earn a fair living; and a teacher of an instrument
less commonly learnt than the piano--say the violin--may sometimes earn
£150 or £200 a year while quite young. Singers, unless of the first
rank, generally find it profitable to combine private teaching with
public performances. For a concert engagement a beginner may receive
£5 with travelling expenses, rising soon, if successful, to £10 or
£20. Great performers are of course at a “monopoly value,” as the
economists say, and their annual earnings often run into four figures.
As for composing, its pecuniary reward is very uncertain. “It does not
pay to write symphonies,” a popular composer naively remarked, and the
same thing may be said of most of the higher kinds of composition.
Incidental music for stage plays is often well paid, and a popular song
may yield a small income in itself. The budding composer, however, like
the artist or author, must be content to let his first works be sold
for almost nothing for the sake of making a reputation, but this once
made he can command his own terms. A deadening effect is exercised on
musical art in this country by the mischievous system of royalties.
Many singers high in the ranks will not look at a modern song unless
they are paid a handsome royalty for singing it, and thus a valuable
means of advancing the reputation of a young composer is rendered
useless.
Painting and sculpture are so purely an affair of the individual that
it is more difficult to make general statements with regard to them
than with any other artistic profession. Each artist works on his own
lines; there is no general or usual rate of remuneration, and no one
can predict with any certainty the prospects of the profession even to
a painter of talent. Indeed the less the talent, often, the greater
the success. All that can be said is that the woman who means to
live by her brush or her chisel must be prepared for a hard struggle
before she can earn a competence; and very few attain to wealth. The
development of illustration in periodicals has however opened a large
and fairly-well paid outlet for women’s work, and many a rising painter
would be hard put to it but for the aid that comes--only in guineas and
half-guineas it may be, but steadily--from black-and-white drawings for
the press. Many men, though at present few women, earn a fairly good
living entirely by black-and-white work.
=The Stage.=--The stage is, socially speaking, becoming easier of entry
for girls. Those who wish to succeed must begin young, a proviso which
forms a serious disadvantage in a profession involving obstacles to
be surmounted, or awkward corners to be rounded. It is difficult to
obtain entrance to a good London theatre, and novices generally have
to go through a course of probation with a touring company, with the
prospect of hard work, ill quarters, and uncertain pay. The profession
is thus encountered on its roughest side at first, and it is not
surprising that the prospect should daunt intending candidates. Yet
the stage has a fascination of its own, and those who once tread the
boards can seldom find it in their heart to forsake them. If a girl
can by luck or perseverance gain a footing in one of the good London
companies, the life need present no terrors to herself or her friends,
and payment will be fair and regular while it lasts; but outside a
comparatively small circle the stage, though perfectly reputable, is
at best precarious as a means of livelihood. Engagement is almost
always for the run of a single piece only, and there is usually no
payment for rehearsals. Thus, after weeks of rehearsal, if the piece
is unsuccessful, a girl may only earn a fortnight’s salary. In these
matters actors and actresses are not well used, and when they have
learnt the value of united effort they will certainly combine for
securing juster terms. There is less cause for complaint in the _rate_
of payment, which is generally fair, and often very good; while a
successful actress can of course make a very large income. In good
theatres a guinea a week is a common wage for a girl who merely “walks
on,” but with touring companies she is generally expected to serve
an apprenticeship before earning anything. If she obtains a speaking
part she may earn £2 or £3 a week; but an actress would do well to
reckon her salary at half its nominal amount, as she is likely to be
frequently out of work. The institution of regular rates of payment
is hindered by stage-struck amateurs, who are willing to pay, in
some cases large sums, to appear on the boards, even in the smallest
capacity.
There are all ranks and grades in the dramatic profession, and a vast
number of actresses never rise above the position of “extra” ladies
in pageant plays, or the rank and file of performers in pantomimes.
The latter earn from 15_s._ to 20_s._ a week, and their employment
is intermittent. In the case of impecunious or unscrupulous managers
payment also is uncertain. Girls in the humbler ranks of the profession
are subject to all sorts of ill-treatment and swindling. For example,
a number of girls were recently engaged for an “open-air fête” in
the country during some weeks of the summer. The weather turned out
wet, and a friend who visited them found their dressing-tent only
partly covered in, and swimming in water. They had attended thirteen
rehearsals and a few performances without payment, and but for the
intervention of friendly outsiders it is doubtful whether they would
ever have received any payment at all. These girls had left paying
employment as dressmakers and milliners for this thankless work, yet
they endured their unjust treatment without complaint.
Speaking generally, the difficulty of the dramatic profession is,
that while talent is rare, it is overcrowded with candidates of very
moderate abilities. On this account it is very difficult for a girl
to get an opportunity of showing what she can do, and much patience
is necessary to success. If possible, a girl should have some other
means of eking out her income during the first months or years of the
struggle.
Many girls work at dressmaking in the summer months, taking to the
stage regularly when the pantomime season comes on. Then there is the
ballet, which in London alone employs thousands of women. An ordinary
ballet dancer receives £1 to £1 10_s._ a week, and has to work hard
for her money; the best members of the troupe however may earn as much
as 35_s._ a week. The earnings of “solo” dancers are of course much
higher. English principals in pantomimes receive £5 and £9 a week,
but the usual custom is to employ foreigners--French or Italians--who
are paid as much as £12 a week. Popular performers receive fancy
salaries, and a dancer or music-hall singer who has hit the public
taste sometimes makes as much as £70 a week. A lady in this branch of
the profession was recently invited to visit America at a salary of
£250 a week. A “variety artist” sued her manager for £43 6_s._ 8_d._ as
a week’s salary, and gained all but the odd £3 6_s._ 8_d._ Miss Loie
Fuller, the “serpentine” dancer, was engaged, as a subsequent lawsuit
shewed, by a French manager for three years, at a salary of 102,000
francs, or over £4000 a year. If reward went by talent and artistic
culture these figures would be highly satisfactory, but as a rule the
reverse is the case. With regard to dancing, however, public taste
is improving, and both on the stage and in private houses graceful
dancing--dancing worthy of being called an art--is increasingly
appreciated. A really good dancer is highly paid, though not upon the
extravagant scale quoted above.
=Handicrafts.=--A word must be said about the position of women in
artistic crafts and in designing, though it is to be feared that the
account will somewhat resemble the famous chapter on “Reptiles in
Ireland.” Pottery is almost the only field in which women are employed
as designers, and here, as in isolated examples in other trades, what
has happened is rather that an artist has turned trade designer, than
that the trade has educated an artist. For example, a lady now carrying
on business as a jeweller was educated at an art school, and owing to
some accidental circumstance began designing for a jeweller. Eventually
she set up in business for herself, and still designs many of the
articles manufactured in her workshop. Isolated cases of the same
kind might be cited from other trades. Speaking generally, however,
women designers have not shaken themselves free from the trammels of
the art schools, or gained the practical acquaintance with crafts and
manufacture which alone can make their work marketable. It is probably
more difficult for women than for men to gain this practical knowledge,
and those who mean to succeed must bring both courage and perseverance
to the task.
=Artistic Crafts.=--The artistic crafts proper are hardly followed at
all by women. With the decay of domestic industries they lost what
skill and knowledge they once possessed, and technical education has
not yet restored them to their rightful position as skilled workers. If
women are employed as jewellers, potters, or even photographers, it is
only in the least skilled, and consequently worst paid portions of the
work. Thus in the jewellery manufacture they are employed in unskilled
operations, such as stringing pearls; and their earnings do not rise
above £1 a week, while the skilled labour of men brings in from £3 to
£6 a week. At electrotyping, in Birmingham, their wages are not more
than 25_s._ a week, and the same might be said of those engaged in the
electro-plate manufacture in Sheffield.
A few women are employed in chromo-lithography, but not many
lithographers are willing to take women as apprentices. Wood engraving
employs rather larger numbers, and the work is fairly well paid. In an
office in which four women engravers work the wages earned per head
during three months were, on an average, £2 18_s._ 5_d._ weekly, the
highest wage earned being £3 3_s._ 4_d._, and the lowest £2 13_s._
7_d._, representing a payment of 1_s._ 1_d._ an hour. At another office
the average weekly wage is £1 18_s._ 9_d._, the highest being £2
3_s._ 9_d._, and the lowest £1 7_s._ 11_d._, representing an average
payment of 10_d._ an hour. The entrance of women into such crafts has
been materially aided by the Society for the Employment of Women, in
Berners Street, which endeavours to find both means of training and
business openings for its clients. In artistic crafts which require
an apprenticeship women have much opposition to encounter; their
entrance is generally opposed by the workmen employed, who fear, and
not without reason, that the women will undersell them and bring their
wages down. If women hope to gain a footing in skilled occupations they
must conciliate opposition, by showing that they have no intention of
underselling their fellow workmen.
=General Conclusions.=--It will be seen that in almost all the
occupations here considered women have special difficulties to
contend with--imperfect training, amateurish habits, social customs
or prejudices, and the opposition of those who, sometimes from
prejudice and sometimes from a well-grounded fear of injury, oppose the
industrial employment of women. Time and good counsels may be trusted
to diminish these obstacles, if not to do away with them entirely.
Meanwhile it remains to give women the opportunity, by thorough
training, of showing the extent of their capacity for different kinds
of work. Disquisitions as to what women can do, or cannot do, are
irrelevant at the present moment, when facilities for training and
employment have not been open long enough to test their powers in any
direction. In these matters it is safer to prophesy after the event,
and it is certain that competition will eventually drive women out of
any calling for which they prove themselves really unfitted.