THE FIRST COLLEGES
The revival of women’s education in England has now a record of fifty
years behind it. On the 1st of May this year Queen’s College in Harley
Street celebrated its Jubilee with manifold rejoicings, a celebration in
which all Englishwomen may claim the right to join. Though Girton and
Holloway and other newer institutions have arisen since to throw the
glories of Queen’s into the shade, none can deprive it of its proud
title—the first women’s college in England.
An occasion of this kind provokes reminiscence and the drawing of
contrasts between 1848 and 1898; while the question that naturally
occurs to us is: How did it all begin? Many answers have been suggested.
Some have pressed the significance of 1848 as the year of Revolution,
and hinted that the women’s share in revolt was an attempt to throw off
the shackles of ignorance. This may not be altogether fanciful. Such
social upheavals symbolise the workings of intellectual forces, nor can
we doubt that the attempt to win for women privileges from which they
had hitherto been jealously excluded is a part of the democratic demand
for universal equal opportunity.
Along with the general ferment of ideas and the cry for reform must be
counted the growing influence on the lives of the upper classes
exercised by the Queen and Prince Consort. Following the lead of the
Court the ideals of the nation were changing. A more serious view of
life and its responsibilities was developing, and the time seemed a
propitious one for organised effort. But though various schemes had been
discussed, the immediate impetus to action was an actual and crying
need. In those days girls of the upper classes were, for the most part,
educated at home by governesses, usually foreigners, because
Englishwomen, though glad enough to obtain such posts, when suddenly
thrown upon the world by the death of a parent or other untoward
circumstance, were seldom properly qualified to fill them. Some of
course there were who, by foreign travel or private study, had reached a
fair standard of attainment; but how distinguish these from the herd,
when they lacked even the teacher’s diploma with which their Swiss or
German rivals were equipped? In this dilemma the Governesses’ Benevolent
Institution came to the rescue.
This Institution had been founded in 1843 with a threefold aim:—(1) To
afford temporary relief in cases of great suffering, (2) To cultivate
provident habits in those who could afford to save; (3) To raise
annuities for those past work. This programme seemed to distinguish
governesses as a class specially in need of pity and relief. To attempt
to help them by increasing their competency, and thus indirectly their
wage-earning capacity, was a bold new departure. The first proposal was
to hold examinations for a teacher’s diploma, but it soon appeared that
an attempt to examine the untaught was a useless inversion of the
natural order. To make the undertaking really helpful it became
necessary to institute a system of classes. This scheme was first
discussed in 1846, and a sum of money collected by Miss Murray, one of
the Queen’s Maids of Honour, handed over to the Institution for this
purpose. In 1847 the first certificates were conferred, and arrangements
made for opening classes. Here some of the most distinguished professors
of King’s College stepped in with help. Among them were Maurice, Trench,
and Kingsley, and others no less noted. It was a new and astounding
departure for men of their standing to be willing to lecture to women.
They began with evening classes, but soon added others in the day for
ladies of no special occupation. This led to the taking of 67 Harley
Street, for the purpose of holding classes in ‘all branches of female
learning,’ and permission was received to name the new institution
Queen’s College.
On March 29, 1848, Professor F. D. Maurice, who has been called the
‘parent and founder of the College,’ delivered an inaugural address on
‘Queen’s College, London, its objects and methods.’ After apologising
for the word ‘college’ as somewhat too ambitious for the project in
hand, he thought well to answer in advance the objections of those who
might use Pope’s hackneyed line about ‘a little learning’ as a means of
discrediting the new classes. Even he did not anticipate very deep
draughts from the spring of knowledge. ‘We are aware that our pupils are
not likely to advance far in mathematics, but we believe that if they
learn really what they do learn, they will not have got what is
dangerous but what is safe.... I cannot conceive that a young lady can
feel her mind in a more dangerous state than it was, because she has
gained a truer glimpse into the conditions under which the world in
which it has pleased God to place her actually exists.’
Each of the first courses was preceded by a preliminary lecture, in
which the professor introduced, and almost apologised for his subject.
Latin was to win toleration as ‘one road, and perhaps the shortest, to a
thorough study of English’; in each case it was shown that the evils
anticipated from that particular subject were fanciful. These
explanations strike us quaintly now; it is hard to realise how great was
the terror of learned ladies which in those days it was fashionable to
assume.
Still, in spite of prejudice, the College flourished. There were no less
than two hundred entries the first term. In 1853 it had grown
sufficiently independent to stand on its own feet, and breaking away
from the parent institution, it was incorporated by Royal Charter. Its
objects were declared to be the general education of ladies, and the
granting of certificates of knowledge. Professor Maurice became Chairman
of Committee and Principal; and Queen’s, which loves its old traditions,
has continued the practice of appointing a male Principal, therein
differing from every other women’s college in the United Kingdom. It
feels so keenly the debt it owes its founders, that it cherishes the
idea—mistaken surely—that it can best do them honour by maintaining the
college such as it was in their day. Thus the fate of many a pioneer has
overtaken Queen’s. The vanguard have become the laggards, and useful and
admirable as is its work, it has been outstripped by younger
institutions, and no longer stands in the forefront of the battle. This
is the common fate; it is easier to improve than to originate, but the
debt of gratitude we all owe to Queen’s is none the less because so many
others have harvested where she sowed.
Since Queen’s takes pride in its conservatism and adherence to its
original methods, the latest calendar gives a very fair idea of its work
even in early days. It states that ‘the College provides for the higher
education of women, in the first place by a liberal school training,
and, subsequently, by a four years’ course of College education. The
College education leads to the grade of Associate ... and after a
further course of study to the higher grade of Fellow of the College.’
The school was not part of the original scheme, but became necessary
when the first generation of students, thoughtful women who had already
been trying to improve themselves, and eagerly welcomed the advantages
then for the first time offered them, gave way to a younger generation.
Among the applicants for admission were mere schoolgirls, and instead of
turning them away to seek inefficient preparation elsewhere, it was
resolved to start a preparatory department for their benefit. This
developed into a small school for girls under fourteen, the age at which
pupils are admitted into the College. Here the students belong to two
categories: those who follow a prescribed course laid down by the
authorities, and those who enter for single classes, and arrange their
work themselves. The former class are known as ‘compounders,’ and pay a
composition fee of £8 to £10 per term. They must attend eighteen hours a
week of regular class teaching. The regulations fix the subjects for
twelve hours; parents or guardians for the other six. The prescribed
work includes—(_a_) two languages: English, two hours, and French,
German, Latin, or Greek, two hours; (_b_) two sciences: Mathematics and
Arithmetic, four hours; Geography, one hour, Natural Philosophy, one
hour, when exemption is granted in Mathematics; (_c_) English History,
one hour, Ancient or Modern History, one hour; (_d_) Holy Scripture, one
hour.
Candidates for the Fellowship must have passed the examination for the
Associateship at least one academical year previously to entering for
the Fellowship examination. For this, one principal subject of study
must be chosen, with not fewer than two additional subjects. Since only
three students had, in 1897, concluded this additional course, the
Associateship may be regarded as the ordinary goal of Queen’s College
students. The course for this is excellent, doubtless, for girls from
fourteen to eighteen; but studies of so miscellaneous a character,
leading to a ‘grade’ which can be attained at the age of eighteen,
belong properly to the domain of school work. Queen’s differs, however,
in its organisation from the upper department of a modern High School.
Most of the teaching is given in the form of lectures. This
lecture-system marks a distinct stage in the progress of girls’
education. In the schools of the early part of the century the various
‘professors’ who came to lecture occupied an important place in the
prospectus. They ranged freely over the sciences in a manner that amused
and interested their hearers, without making any undue demand upon their
intelligence or powers of thought. Hence, the lecture-system seems to
have established itself as a first step towards attracting female pupils
to the higher branches of knowledge. The High Schools, too, were to pass
through that stage, and emerge from it. Queen’s still keeps up the
tradition of lectures, and as its discipline and general arrangements
differ from those of a school, without resembling those of a college, it
must be regarded as an institution apart, self-contained, and
unconnected. As such it is of the greatest value in supplementing the
home-teaching of girls, or undertaking the complete education of those
who do not desire to enter the University, or take up any distinct
profession. These would probably get a better practical preparation at a
good high school. Still the others are likely to remain the majority,
and there will always be an important function for an institution that
supplies good teaching without any compulsion to enter for outside
examination. Such, at any rate, is the view of the Council, who have
commemorated their Jubilee by a renewal of the lease, and the general
improvement and partial reconstruction of the premises. In its old home,
with unbroken traditions, gathering in the children and grandchildren of
its earliest students, it is continuing the work with which, fifty years
ago, it inaugurated the revival of women’s education.
Although Queen’s was the first college actually opened, other similar
schemes were being projected at the same time. The foundation in 1826 of
University College had given an impetus to advanced studies in London,
and as a perfectly undenominational institution it served as the model
for Bedford Ladies’ College. The foundress and benefactor of Bedford was
Mrs. Reid. Her wish to help girls took effect in 1847 in the
establishment of classes at her own house. Two years later she took a
house in Bedford Square and gave £1500 towards the initial expenses.
Mrs. Reid and her friends were ambitious. They meant to found a real
place of higher education for women, and in doing so they did not
hesitate to break with the past. Mrs. Reid felt convinced that women
could best understand the needs of girls, and though a committee
consisting chiefly of men might at that time have included more
distinguished names, she probably kept in mind the time to come when the
college would be able to invite its own old pupils on to its committee.
The co-operation of ladies was in the first instance secured by the
institution of lady-visitors, to be present in turn at lectures—a plan
at that time considered indispensable, and adopted also at Queen’s. It
was arranged that the College Board should include the forty
lady-visitors and six gentlemen. This Board annually appointed the
Council of Management, and the Council elected the professors and all
the officers of the college. This plan seemed to answer, and the
college, which was fortunate enough to secure the services of such able
men as De Morgan, F. W. Newman, and Dr. Carpenter, entered on a
successful career. After a while pupils came in from a distance.
Provision had to be made for these, and in 1861 a second house was taken
and the upper floors adapted as a residence, while the lower ones were
used for class-rooms. For a few years Bedford too had to maintain a
school, but this was not part of the promoters’ scheme, and they hailed
the first signs of improved school teaching as a pretext for closing it.
This happened in 1868, at a time when circumstances made a complete
reorganisation of the college necessary with a distinct declaration of
policy.
The change had been hastened by the death of Mrs. Reid. She left a
considerable part of her fortune in the charge of three trustees, Miss
Bostock, Miss J. Martineau, and Miss E. E. Smith, to be utilised for
‘purposes of higher education.’ This seemed a suitable moment to seek
incorporation, and in 1869 Bedford College received its charter. Its
objects were thus described:
‘1. To continue with an improved constitution the College for women
which has been carried on since 1849 in Bedford Square, London, and has
been known since the year 1860 as Bedford College.
‘2. To provide thereby a liberal education for women, such education not
to extend beyond secular subjects.’
Henceforth the management was vested in members of the college, with a
Council elected from the number and a President, to be called the
Visitor. This office has been held successively by Erasmus Darwin, Mark
Pattison, and Miss Anna Swanwick.
Bedford, like Queen’s, was happy in its founders, but to none does it
owe more than to Miss Bostock. After Mrs. Reid’s death she took over the
care of the college as a sacred trust, devoting to it the greater part
of her time, and helping it with money and good counsel. Happily she
lived to see the fruit of her labours, and to know that Bedford College
had won an assured position through its connection with the London
University.
Its beginnings, like that of most women’s institutions, had to be
tentative. The first lectures probably had a more popular character than
those now given; and since they aimed rather at general culture than a
systematic course of study, Literature, History, and Language would draw
the largest audiences. But from the very first Latin, Science, and
Mathematics were taught, and the college remembers with due pride that
George Eliot was a member of its earliest Latin class. At any rate the
promoters were quite sure of their aims. The daring words, ‘a liberal
education for women,’ had been uttered without extenuation or apology.
But in those days Bedford College stood alone, with no academic body to
test its work and direct its curriculum. Nor was public opinion yet
fully ripe for a real University education for women. Bedford had to
wait another ten years before the opening of the London degrees came to
fix its position and define its studies. They were not wasted years. The
college was giving numbers of intelligent and eager girls their first
insight into real knowledge, and teaching them to be dissatisfied with
narrow, cramping instruction. Many of them have gone out into the world
to hand on the impulse and inspiration gained here, and help to
influence that public opinion which alone has made admission to the
Universities possible. In 1874 the college was helped by a move to
better premises. When in 1879 London opened its degrees to women, the
opportunity of Bedford had come, and it was ready to use it. From this
date onward its history belongs to that of Women’s University Education.
These two earliest colleges may be regarded as not only pioneers but
also parent institutions. They drew within the sphere of their influence
many of those women who were to train up the next generation. Among the
earliest pupils of the Queen’s College evening classes was Miss Buss,
who was already teaching in her mother’s private school, and was
destined to found the first public school for girls. She was one of the
first to win the governess diploma. Another was Miss Dorothea Beale, so
well known for her work at Cheltenham. She remained at Queen’s from 1849
to 1856, first teaching Mathematics, then Latin, and afterwards in
charge of the school. In 1858 she became Principal of the Cheltenham
Ladies’ College, which had already been at work for five years.
The Cheltenham College differed in its original idea from Queen’s and
Bedford. Both these had been founded with the purpose of giving women
such advanced education as they were at that time capable of receiving,
and had gradually been compelled by the exigencies of the case to
provide for girls as well. Cheltenham, though called a college in
imitation of the boys’ college in that town and some other public
schools, really aimed in the first instance at providing for girls
similar educational advantages to those which their brothers enjoyed in
the same town. As King’s College had suggested Queen’s, the boys’
college at Cheltenham suggested the girls’. Twelve years elapsed between
the foundation of the two; and Queen’s and Bedford were already pointing
the way when a small committee of enthusiasts met at the house of Mr.
Bellairs, one of H.M. Inspectors, and drew up a prospectus, inviting the
public to take shares in the new undertaking. A day-school was all that
was at first contemplated, and the subjects to be taught there were
described as Holy Scripture and the Liturgy, history, geography,
grammar, arithmetic, French, music, drawing, needlework. German,
Italian, and dancing to be extras. The proposal found favour. Shares to
the amount of about £2000 were taken up, a house hired, and the new
venture started with good auspices, 88 pupils entering the first term,
and the numbers soon going up to 120. It is not quite easy to understand
why this prosperous beginning was not followed up. After a while the
numbers went down, and the college seemed to be losing favour. Probably
it was ahead of local public opinion, not yet abreast of North London,
where Miss Buss was already successfully at work. The first years were
times of struggle, and even the appointment of Miss Beale in 1858 did
not at once turn the scale. After forty years of successful work in the
college, Miss Beale can enjoy the pleasure of contrasting then and now.
Some of her reminiscences throw a curious light on public opinion in the
early fifties. The curriculum, unpretentious as it seems, proved too
advanced. Parents objected to the thoroughness of the teaching, and the
time given to arithmetic and similar subjects. Some disliked the annual
examination, which was held to be unfeminine, and the difficulty of
obtaining good teachers was almost insuperable. In regard to these Miss
Beale suffered through being ahead of her times. She desired especially
two things: that the teachers should be women, for, to quote her own
words, ‘we think it essential to the right moral training of girls that
the whole internal discipline and much of the moral training should be
in the hands of ladies’; and that they should be to some extent
specialists, the only way to abolish the textbook cram and unintelligent
memory work then in vogue in girls’ schools. How she set out again and
again to seek for teachers, and how many a time she was disappointed,
she has herself recorded in her history of the college. Her efforts show
how hard it was to found a school before the reformation of the higher
education had given the necessary impetus from above. It was a case of
making bricks without straw.
Perhaps the practical difficulties in the way of finance were really the
most hampering, for the founders had too little experience of these
matters; and a Mr. Brancker, who as treasurer, by readjusting the whole
system of fees, put the College on a sound financial basis, may almost
count as its second founder.
In 1863, five years after Miss Beale took office, some Oxford examiners
were invited to inspect and report on the school. This was a new
departure; it meant an acknowledgment of the connection which should
exist between girls’ schools and the Universities. A small thing in
itself, but typical of the many changes that the next five-and-twenty
years were to bring.
From this time onward the College was brought into close connection with
every educational reform in England; and its history, like that of the
North London Collegiate, presents in miniature the various changes of
this busy quarter of a century. In 1863 an informal examination was held
for girls in the papers of the Cambridge Local Examination. This was the
beginning of a new departure, and from that time forth preparation for
one or other of the local University examinations formed part of the
work of both schools. In 1866, Miss Beale and Miss Buss were called upon
to give evidence before the Royal Commission, and the plan of these two
schools was thus brought before the notice of the general public. The
interest that resulted in all questions concerning the education of
girls reacted on these first schools. For Miss Buss it won an endowment,
for Cheltenham that recognition which means success. It became possible
to raise the standard and enlarge the curriculum. Mathematics, Science,
Latin and Greek, were added to the prospectus. Applications from pupils
outside the town necessitated the opening of a boarding-house in 1864.
The College was fast outgrowing its first home; then came a fresh
obstacle to overcome. Building had become essential, but prejudice stood
in the way. Although good premises and beautiful surroundings have long
been regarded as essential for boys’ schools and colleges and a really
important factor in the training given there, the prejudice that any
makeshift was good enough for girls has died hard, if indeed it can even
now be called dead. Miss Beale naturally desired to see the now
flourishing College in adequate and beautiful buildings. This seemed to
some of the governors too daring a departure. However, after many
struggles and defeats, the party of progress carried the day. The new
premises, the nucleus of the present beautiful College buildings, were
opened in 1873. Of course they had the effect of attracting additional
numbers; and when three years later, further extension became necessary,
it appeared that the College had not merely outgrown its premises, but
also its constitution. The time had come to put it on a more lasting
basis. At a meeting of shareholders it was decided to renounce all claim
on a profit, and accept instead a right of nomination on each share, as
is done at several boys’ proprietary schools. The whole income became
available for the payment of teachers, the maintenance and improvement
of the buildings, school furniture and apparatus. The government was
placed in the hands of a council of twenty-four persons, six being
representative members chosen by the Bishop of the Diocese, the
Universities of Oxford, Cambridge, and London, the Lady Principal and
the staff of teachers, while the remaining eighteen were elected by the
shareholders. The inclusion of women on this body has proved specially
beneficial to the College.
By this time there were 500 girls in the school, and ten licensed
boarding-houses. Many internal changes had taken place, corresponding to
the changes in the world without. The Cambridge Local Examinations had
proved helpful in the early days, and the establishment in 1868 of the
Cambridge Higher Local supplied a definite aim for the work of the
senior classes. It has always been popular at Cheltenham, and over 500
girls have passed it from the College. Another impetus was given to work
by the institution of the special women’s examination of the University
of London; during the nine years of its existence, one-third of the
successful candidates came from Cheltenham. But it was the formal
opening of the London degrees that led to the present complete
organisation of the College with its system of departments, leading
respectively to the Oxford Senior, Cambridge Higher, and London
University Examinations. By this time Girton, Newnham, and other women’s
colleges had come into existence. Cheltenham could send its pupils to
continue their studies at the older Universities, and the specialist
teachers, for whom Miss Beale had sighed in vain in the early days, were
now forthcoming. Fashion too was beginning to smile on those more
serious studies which the College had so long pursued in the face of
prejudice. The time of struggle was over. Cheltenham was no longer in
advance of the tide, but moving harmoniously with it, giving help and
receiving it.
Cheltenham College, as it now exists, has certain peculiarities which
distinguish it from most of the girls’ schools of the present day.
Firstly, it does not receive all comers, but is distinctly intended for
the ‘daughters of gentlemen,’ and references in regard to social
standing are required before admission. Secondly, it combines the
functions of a day and boarding-school, by a system of boarding-houses
which belong to the Council, and are under the general control and
supervision of the Principal. Thirdly, it is not one large school, but a
system of departments under separate heads, all under the direction of
the Principal. Division I. is under Miss Beale herself. The work is
directed towards: (1) the London Degrees; (2) the Cambridge Higher
Local; (3) the Oxford Senior and Higher Local Examinations. This
division is the College proper, and is organised to some extent on
college lines. Division II. has about 200 pupils between twelve and
sixteen. Division III., the juvenile department, has about 70 pupils
between seven and twelve. Below this comes the Kindergarten. By-students
may attend single courses of lectures as at Queen’s and Bedford.
Cheltenham College is thus enabled from its own resources to take a
child straight from the nursery, and after many years send her forth as
a full-fledged graduate of London University. It is neither to be
expected nor desired that many girls should thus receive the whole of
their education under one roof, but while some attend one department and
some another, the College does in itself comprise the three stages of
education: primary, secondary, higher. It has gone even further, for it
takes an important part in the work of training teachers, which has been
so largely developed of late years. The training department has three
distinct divisions, in which teachers are prepared for Kindergarten,
Secondary, and Public Elementary Schools. The ‘Hall of Residence,’ which
is growing so much in favour now, is also represented at Cheltenham by
St. Hilda’s, a residential college for students over eighteen, and in
particular the twenty foundationers who are intending teachers and are
received at reduced fees. Finally, the Old Girls’ Guild with its eleven
hundred members all over the world, its College Settlement in the East
End of London, and its biennial meetings at Cheltenham, keeps the
College in constant touch with the work, social, philanthropic, and
professional, that is being done by women at the present day.
The Cheltenham College has become a little world of itself. It presents
in miniature each of the developments in women’s education which has
taken place in the last fifty years. The dignity of its beautiful
buildings, the ideals which take visible form in the statues of
representative women, and the stained-glass presentations of Scripture
characters and female virtues, seem to link it to the past; the energy
and enthusiasm of its Principal, and the full tide of life that pulses
through the whole, assure its place in the future of girls’ education.