the entrance of the young practitioner to a remunerative practice will
offer less than their usual amount of resistance to you. It commonly
happens that the young physician has to wait long years of probation,
during which much work has to be done for small pay before he begins
to reap the full reward of his labors. Not only is it necessary for
him to acquire a reputation for skill and attention to business, but
a respectable age must be attained before he can hope to be employed
in some of the most profitable departments of practice. With you the
case is very different; there is an existing demand for your services
which none others can so well supply. Each city in this country is
ready to give employment to a large number of female physicians,
each lesser town and country village is waiting for one or more;
numerous applications from various parts of the country have been made
for female physicians. At a moderate computation, we may estimate
the number now in actual demand in this country at not less than
five thousand. You are wanted for a kind of practice that most male
physicians would gladly relinquish to you, whenever they are convinced
that you have been regularly educated, and are competent to perform the
duties of the position you have assumed."
* * * * *
WHILE on this subject, we will give here an original article,
written for our "Book" by a professor in another institution,[C] which
shows that this liberal feeling towards female practitioners is fast
gaining public favor in this city:--
LADIES' MEDICAL EDUCATION.--That it would be very useful and
conducive to the health and happiness of families, if the mothers
of families, and women in general, were familiar with the principal
doctrines of anatomy, physiology, and pathology, so as to understand,
to some degree, the organization, functions, and diseases of the human
system, there cannot be any doubt. But whether it be in accordance
with the natural position of woman in society to take upon herself
the office, labors, and responsibilities of a physician is another
question, which need not here be decided. So much, however, may be
said with propriety, without at all deciding the question alluded
to, that such ladies as are desirous of obtaining a full medical
education, and devoting themselves to the study of the medical sciences
in good earnest, ought not to be refused such an education, but have
as much chance given to them as the other sex enjoy. For, however we
may disagree respecting the propriety of woman practising medicine
as a profession, certainly her _knowledge_ of medicine cannot be
detrimental to the good of society. If a more general diffusion of
medical knowledge among the ladies had no other effect than to enforce
a higher standard of education among the physicians on one side, and to
annihilate the greatest bane of ignorance, quackery, on the other side,
this alone would be a sufficient reason for spreading "more light"
among the ladies, though it be "medical."
We cannot, therefore, see any harm in the establishment of female
medical schools, but would suggest the propriety of organizing them
in such a manner that their teachings should not be confined to the
comparatively few ladies who enter them for a full medical education;
but also be made accessible to the generality of ladies, especially
young ladies, who do not want a "professional" education in medicine,
but who would study some branches, such as anatomy, physiology,
pathology, and perhaps chemistry, natural philosophy, and botany, with
much delight and profit, without asking for a diploma, but to carry the
delightful satisfaction with them that they possess that which may save
themselves and others around them untold disease and suffering, and
protect them against all sorts of knavery and quackery, not to speak of
the accomplishments and intellectual joys such studies are apt to give
to ladies.
* * * * *
A VERY SENSIBLE DOCTOR.--Dr. J. Wilson, of Alabama, proposes, in the
_Southern Medical Journal_, that female classes be formed in our medical
colleges for instruction in anatomy--excluding the surgical and
pathological--human physiology, medical chemistry, materia medica, and
all female diseases. We hope those who have the direction of medical
education will act on this hint. Why should woman be excluded from the
study of medicine? She is the Heaven-appointed guardian of the sick and
of helpless infancy; she should know how to preserve health and how to
restore it.
* * * * *
THE PRACTICAL.--We have lately met with a rather astounding and
extremely practical proposition, well suited to the genius of our
nation. We, the mightiest people on the face of the globe, will not
allow our scenery to remain scenery without some Barnum-like investment
upon it. We do not intend that our natural curiosities shall continue
natural. Jonathan must make his playthings useful, else he may as well
fling them behind him. The Falls of Niagara have been too long exempt
from the common lot; it is time they should be trained to propriety and
productiveness. No doubt it is extremely fine to see them wandering at
their own wild will, plunging madly down the precipice; but will any one
pretend to say that in all this there is anything practical? The fact
is, Niagara is of no use to us, and we can no longer tolerate her as a
drone; she must be forced to work. Let her be made the motive power of
numberless mills and manufactories. Thus would be secured a noble union
of Nature and Art! How much more manly and suggestive than the common
rhymes addressed to her grandeur and magnificence would be some such
invocation as the following:--
Oh, thou that grindest buckwheat on thy way,
Free and unfettered on thy watery wing,
Creation's wonder! How much corn a day
Doth thy sublimity to flour bring?
We wonder what our nation would do with Mont Blanc if they had it?
Place an ice-cream freezing establishment on its summit, perhaps; or
tunnel it, _à la_ Thames, and settle a Yankee colony within. We shall
next expect to hear that Mammoth Cave has been partitioned off into
comfortable apartments, to let to small families. Rooms containing
stalactites extra charge, as in such cases clothes-pins would be
unnecessary.
Imperial Rome folds her mantle grandly around her, and sits in
magnificent sadness at the base of her broken statues and fallen
temples--Niobe weeping for her children. Young America strides along
in broadcloth and beaver, and only sees that the statue might have
been a mantle-piece, or the temple a machine-shop. He forgets whence
the money-changers and sellers of doves were driven, because they made
the Father's house a house of merchandise. He does not see that stars
burn brighter than patent oil, or that earth was intended for another
purpose than a plantation. He is more eager to manufacture the napkin
than to improve the talent within it. His life is practical; his body
is practical; his soul is practical. He would make death and eternity
practical, if he only knew how to do it.
Oh, Niagara! are the clanking of machinery and the noise of the
water-wheel to be thy dirge? Shall a saw-mill be located on Goat
Island, or a stove-foundry near Table Rock? Shall thy rainbow span the
summit of a comb manufactory, or thy spray fall silvery on a button
establishment? Shall we bewail thy beauty and grandeur forever, as we
cry, "Niagara has fallen--has fallen into a mill-dam!"
* * * * *
THE SPRING-TIME COMETH.
The Spring-time cometh with her buds and flowers;
But ah, those buds and flowers I ne'er may see!
The Spring-time cometh with her rosy hours,
But not for me.
The birds will sing, among the vales and highlands,
Sweet as they sang in the glad days of yore,
And lilies fair will circle yonder islands
For me no more.
For me no more the sparkle of the river,
Where droop the willows, fairest of the fair;
For me no more the joys a bounteous Giver
Sends everywhere.
But scatter o'er my grave the buds and flowers--
The buds and flowers that I may never see;
And, as ye see depart those rosy hours,
Think, think of me.
H. L. S.
* * * * *
HERE is a prose sketch on the same ever-fertile subject, the writer
modestly styling her collection, "_Shells from the Shore of Thought:_"--
SPRING.--Would that thoughts on Spring would spring up in my mind
radiant as the gentle flowers which the clarion voice of Spring awakens
from their wintry slumber! Would that I could array these thoughts in
eloquence as glorious as the vesture which she gives the lovely flowers!
She casts around them a mantle of vivid green, lifts their modest
heads beneath a pearly veil of mist, and crowns them with a diadem
of dew-drops, which the morning sunlight transmutes to amethysts and
rubies, emeralds and diamonds.
But, sad to say, my thoughts are less like the flowers, and more like
the seed of that tribe (thistle, &c.) which float through the air on
a silken sail in quest of a place of repose. Some find them bright
homes in lands far away, like the thoughts of the gifted, which become
household words; but others, the silk of whose sail is not fine, float
adrift on the waves, to be lost, like my thoughts, in the ocean of
years.
Spring is the symbol of the resurrection; flowers, of the human race.
In the autumn of life, man falls asleep like the flowers; but the icy
reign of the winter of death is broken by the glorious springtide of
immortality, where the circling seasons are no more, where there is
neither death nor tears.
* * * * *
MEMORY.--Pleasure paints the Present, Memory paints the Past, Hope
paints the Future, and spans its shadowy portals with an arch of light,
radiant as the sunbow o'er the cataract. Memory tortures the wicked and
consoles the righteous. When the sunlight of Hope wanes away from the
landscape of life, then the moonlight of Memory its shadowy lustre sheds
o'er the scene. Memory--a stereotyped edition of the Past. Memory--as
the moonlight is to sunlight, so is Memory unto Hope.
* * * * *
MUSIC.--Sacred music--that which on earth wakes an echo in heaven.
Music, the soother of the sorrowing. Music, the praises of One who loves
us; notes which dwell in the heart, like the lingering perfume of
withering violets, when the voice which created the beautiful music is
silent forever on earth.
* * * * *
LOVE.--Life is a tangled web, but through its woof there runs the golden
thread of Love.
* * * * *
PHILADELPHIA HIGH SCHOOL FOR GIRLS.--When is this institution to be
opened? _The High School for Boys_ has been sustained in the most
liberal manner many years, and now a new and costly edifice for the
school is nearly prepared. Will not the men of Philadelphia add beauty
as well as strength to the recent act of "Consolidation," by founding a
HIGH SCHOOL FOR GIRLS?
* * * * *
A GREAT DUTY WHICH IS IMPOSED UPON MOTHERS.--Listen, good mothers: this
is not a question of one of those idle studies, the only aim of which is
to stock the memory; it concerns an important question, the most
important which can be agitated on the earth; so important, that the
manner in which you resolve it will decide, without appeal of your moral
life and death, of the moral life and death of your children. It is not
only a matter that regards yourselves, but also the flesh of your flesh,
the blood of your blood; those poor little creatures, whom you have
brought into this world, with passions, vices, love, hatred, pain, and
death; for these are, in truth, what they have received from you with
the life of the body; and these will, indeed, be miserable presents, if
you do not also give them the life of the soul; that is to say, arms
wherewith to fight, and a light whereby to direct themselves.
You are mothers according to the laws of our material nature, with all
the love of a hen which watches over its little ones, and covers them
with its wings. I come to ask you to be mothers according to the laws
of our divine nature, with all the love of a soul called upon to form
souls.
Assure yourselves well whether or not you owe to your children only the
milk of your breasts, and the instruction of the intelligence; and if
you interrogate the Gospel and nature, take heed to their answer--"Man
does not live by bread alone, but by the word of truth."
Truth is that which renders man free; it is the voice which calls us to
the love of God and of our neighbor, and to virtue.
Error, on the contrary, is that which renders us slaves to the passions
of others and to our own; it is that which causes us to sacrifice our
conscience to fortune, to honors, to glory, to vice.
Thus, virtue springs from truth; crime from error; whence we may infer
that a good treatise on education can only be in the end the search
after truth.
The destiny of your children depends then on the solicitude with
which you engage in this search. You may open out to them the road to
happiness, and precede them in it. A delightful task, which calls for
all the powers of your soul, and which will place you in the presence
of God, of nature, of your children, and of yourselves.
And mark well all that nature has done towards accomplishing this
difficult work. In the first place, she has brought you near to the
truth which is in her, by detaching your sex from almost all the
ambitions which debase our own; and secondly, she has given your love
to the tenderness of little children, at the same time that she has
filled their hearts with innocence, and their minds with curiosity.
Can you doubt the object of your mission, when you perceive the sweet
harmonies which unite them to you? Nature attaches them to your
bosoms, awakens them by your caresses; she wills that they should owe
everything to you, so that, after having received from you life and
thought, these earthly angels await your inspirations, in order to
believe and to love.--_L. Aimé Martin._
* * * * *
TO CORRESPONDENTS.--The following articles are accepted: "And I heard a
voice saying, Come up hither," "Secret Love," "The Lost Pleiad," "To a
Friend on his Marriage," and "To ----." A number of long articles on
hand have not been examined; will be reported next month.
The following are declined, many of them because we have not room. Our
drawers are "full" of accepted articles, which may have to wait till
the writers suffer greater disappointment than a rejection at first
would have inflicted. So we return a number of the contributions sent
us last month, as their authors request, though we do not usually
comply with such conditions. Those who send articles to us should keep
a copy of the MS.; we cannot answer for its safe return. We decline
"Coming Events," "Her eyes are with her heart," &c., "To Ada, with a
Bouquet," "Our Thoughts," "The Dying Girl's Request," "The Wail of a
Broken Heart," "The Child's Wish," "Lines on the Birth of a Child,"
"The Deserted Lady," "Regina," "Cold Water," "Never say Die," "A Great
Prize," "My Friends," and "Conversation."
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote B: For the encouragement of ladies whose means will not
allow of the usual expenditure, a limited number of students will be
admitted on the payment of twenty dollars per session, exclusive of the
matriculation and graduation fees. Such arrangements will be strictly
confidential, and no distinction in point of courtesy and attention
will be made between the beneficiary and other students.
For further information, or for copies of the Annual Announcement,
application may be made to the Dean, David J. Johnson, 229 Arch Street,
Philadelphia.]
[Footnote C: The Penn Medical University.]
Literary Notices.
BOOKS BY MAIL.--Now that the postage on printed matter is so low, we
offer our services to procure for our subscribers or others any of the
books that we notice. Information touching books will be cheerfully
given by inclosing stamp to pay return postage.
* * * * *
From HARPER & BROTHERS, New York, through LINDSAY & BLAKISTON,
Philadelphia:--
THE U. S. GRINNELL EXPEDITION IN SEARCH OF SIR JOHN FRANKLIN. _A
Personal Narrative._ By Elisha Kent Kane, M. D., U. S. N. As Americans,
we certainly have reason to feel, and may therefore be permitted to
express an honest pride and gratification in the rapid contributions
which our countrymen are continually presenting to the various
departments of literature and science. Among the more recent and most
valuable of these and similar contributions is the beautiful volume
the title of which stands at the head of this article. In 1850, Mr.
Grinnell, an eminent merchant of New York, actuated by a most humane
and liberal spirit, fitted out two of his own vessels and proffered
them gratuitously to the government to be employed in an expedition
to the Arctic region, in search of Sir John Franklin, who had not
been heard from after the 26th of July, 1850. The officers of this
expedition were appointed by the navy department. It was commanded by
Lieut. Edwin J. De Haven, and its first surgeon was Dr. E. K. Kane,
who, at the request of the commander, became the historian of their
perilous and romantic voyage. We say romantic, because the scenes to
which we are introduced by the graphic pen of the doctor seem more
like the creations of the imagination than the realities of sober
observation, or the experience of personal adventure. In addition
to the historical, scientific, and descriptive merits of the work,
it is profusely and beautifully illustrated by fine mezzotints and
wood-engravings.
* * * * *
From D. APPLETON & CO., No. 200 Broadway, New York, through C. G.
HENDERSON & CO., corner of Fifth and Arch Streets, Philadelphia:--
BOYS AT HOME. By C. Adams, author of "Edward Clifton," etc. Illustrated
by John Gilbert. This is an English story, written especially for
the moral instruction and encouragement of young persons in adverse
circumstances. It inculcates the highest principles of duty and honor,
and, at the same time, shows the necessity of perseverance in the
accomplishment of virtuous designs.
THE CHEMISTRY OF COMMON LIFE. By James F. W. Johnson. It should be
read by the million, for it informs us all about the air we breathe,
the water we drink, the soil we cultivate, and the plant we rear. The
dedication is to Sir David Brewster, one of the most eminent scientific
men in England. We shall make some extracts from the work for our June
number.
THE SUNSHINE OF GREYSTONE. _A Story for Girls._ By E. J. May, author
of "Louis's Schoolboy Days." This is a handsome volume, with many
beautiful illustrations. Its greatest beauties, however, will be found
in the good sense, the high moral tone, and in the pure religious
feeling which pervade its printed pages.
* * * * *
From J. S. REDFIELD, 110 and 112 Nassau Street, New York, through W. B.
ZIEBER, Philadelphia:--
THEOLOGICAL ESSAYS. By Frederick Dinison Maurice, M. A., Chaplain of
Lincoln's Inn. From the second London edition. With a new preface and
other additions. The author of this work is a learned clergyman of the
Established Church of England. The volume contains seventeen essays
on subjects intimately connected with the dogma of that church, and
explanatory of the general teachings of Christianity. These essays
were originally a series of discourses delivered before the author's
own congregation, and embraced numerous topics which he desired to
bring under the notice of Unitarians. They therefore partake of a
controversial spirit, but in a mild and charitable form.
THE WORKINGMAN'S WAY IN THE WORLD. _Being the Autobiography of a
Journeyman Printer._ This volume furnishes us with what purports to
be the true, and certainly is the very interesting history of the
struggles of an English journeyman printer.
CLASSIC AND HISTORIC PORTRAITS. By James Bruce. This volume is
devoted to a description of the personal appearance of a long list of
celebrated persons, male and female, ancient and modern, commencing
with Sappho, and ending with Madame de Stael. The peculiarities of
character, which accompany the "descriptive list," render this volume
interesting and instructive in a high degree.
* * * * *
From TICKNOR, REED, & FIELDS, Boston:--
LETTERS TO A YOUNG MAN, AND OTHER PAPERS. By Thomas De Quincey, author
of "Confessions of an English Opium-Eater," etc. etc. Exclusive of the
"Letters," five in number, this volume contains seven essays: 1. Theory
of Greek Tragedy; 2. Conversation; 3. Language; 4. French and English
Language; 5. California and the Gold Mania; 6. Ceylon; 7. Presence of
Mind; in all which the great reputation of the author as an instructive
and philosophical writer is fully sustained.
* * * * *
SECOND INAUGURAL ADDRESS OF HIS EXCELLENCY, JOHN BIGLER, _Governor of
the State of California_. Such is the title of a pamphlet sent us from
the press of George Kerr, State Printer, Benicia, and the address is
worthy of being thus distributed over the whole country. It is a clear
and able exposition of the progress and resources of that wonderful
portion of our Union. Aladdin, with his genii, could hardly have
effected greater changes than gold and the genius of American freedom
have effected in California. We are much obliged to the friend who sent
us this excellent address. The name of Bigler should be highly honored
in Pennsylvania.
* * * * *
WESTERN DEMOCRATIC REVIEW. George P. Buell, Editor and Publisher:
Indianapolis, Jan., 1854. This is a new periodical, whose table of
contents embraces a variety of subjects, social, political, poetical,
biographical, and miscellaneous. We welcome every such manifestation of
the growth, the prosperity, and the mental vigor of the Great West. The
editor is evidently a man of ability and enterprise, and his articles,
varied as they are, are all written with spirit, and show a truly
liberal and patriotic mind.
* * * * *
THE SOUTHERN QUARTERLY REVIEW. C. Mortimer, Publisher: Charleston, S.
C. We have often wondered that, excepting in political matters, the
South has so long been willing to do without a literature of its own.
We are glad to see that, at last, a publication devoted to subjects
of general interest, as well as to politics, seems to meet with the
success it deserves. The articles in it are written evidently with
care and thought, and, although generally of too abstruse a nature
to interest ladies, there are one or two lighter articles, pleasant
chronicles of the olden time, which can hardly fail to please. Rich
as South Carolina is in such themes, both from its old Huguenot
ancestry, and from the characteristic earnestness with which it threw
itself into the Revolutionary struggle, it needs only some one with the
patient and devoted spirit of the antiquary to rescue from oblivion
many scenes and incidents of romantic interest. The political articles,
exclusively Southern as they are in thought and sentiment, yet, by
their earnestness and acumen, justify the boast that the South is the
birth-place of politicians.
* * * * *
From PARRY & MCMILLAN (successors to A. Hart late Carey & Hart), corner
of Fourth and Chestnut Streets, Philadelphia:--
THE PLANTER'S NORTHERN BRIDE. _A Novel._ By Caroline Lee Hentz,
author of "Linda," "Rena," "Eoline," etc. etc. We have not had time
to become acquainted with the true character of this novel. We have
read sufficient, however, to enable us to say that it is an effort to
reconcile the difficulties that are sometimes supposed to exist between
"true" lovers on account of their geographical positions. The name of
the popular author will be the best recommendation we could give of her
work. The volumes sent us are of the cheap edition, with paper covers,
price fifty cents each. We are told that an edition is published with
six engravings, two volumes, cloth gilt, $1 50. We might have been
enabled to speak more confidently of the merits of the work, had we
been favored with the plates.
* * * * *
From HENRY CAREY BAIRD (successor to E. L. Carey), No. 7 Hart's
Buildings, Sixth Street above Chestnut, Philadelphia:--
CORINNE; OR, ITALY. By Madame de Staël. Translated by Isabel Hill;
with metrical versions of the odes by L. E. Landon. This is a new and
very beautifully printed edition of a work which, from its earliest
publication, has continued to be read, admired, and criticised by
persons of literary taste and judgment in all the languages of
civilized Europe. It cannot fail therefore to prove highly interesting
to that portion of our readers who may not have had an opportunity of
perusing it in the original French of the celebrated author.