Mr. Vassar's magnificent donation is drawing interest at last; and,
though I do not feel as much confidence in any institution founded for
women alone as I do in mixed colleges, we ought all to be grateful for
the advanced standard lifted at Poughkeepsie.
Malt has always been a beneficent agent in the civilization of mankind.
Ever since Mr. Thrale looked kindly on old Sam Johnson, brewers have
seemed to have a generous pride in conquering human selfishness, and
leaving something better than a family of children to interest
posterity. Mr. John Guy, of Liverpool, a wealthy brewer without
children, founded there the great "Guy's Hospital." He was the
great-uncle of Matthew Vassar, also a great brewer in Poughkeepsie,
N.Y. By and by, Matthew Vassar found his property close upon a million;
and, as he had no children, he began to think what he should do with it.
He had a good many poor relations, and those who were industrious and
deserving he did not forget. One of them, a young niece, supported
herself by school-teaching. He built her a schoolhouse, and did what he
thought right to ease her way. At last, sinking in a decline, she came
home to die. As she lay on the sofa, day after day, she watched him
walking back and forth, and talking over his plans. Now and then she
would say gently, "Uncle Matthew, do something for women." After she was
gone, Matthew Vassar went to see Guy's Hospital. His connections advised
him not to give away his money. His Baptist friends in Edinburgh and
Liverpool laughed at the idea of a college for women, which had already
entered his mind. He came home, and tried to plan a hospital; he got up,
and went to bed with the idea uppermost; but all the time he seemed to
hear the voice of his niece, "Do something for women, Uncle Matthew."
Mr. Vassar has two houses: one, in the heart of Poughkeepsie, which is
opposite the brewery, and, with a long range of comfortable
outbuildings, looks as steadfast and English as ever Mr. Thrale's own
house could do; the other, a modest little country box, set on a hill
among extensive grounds, and commanding, from various points, lovely
views of the town and river. The peculiarity of this place is, that it
is ornamented with all manner of punchinellos cut in dull gray
limestone, and leering or grinning from every corner of the park. I did
not find out who was responsible for this grim joke. In 1860, Mr.
Vassar, with the humility and common sense which belong to his
character, obtained a charter, and called together thirty trustees. To
them he transferred more than half his actual property. When the opening
of the war occasioned the failure of the contractors, he did not draw
back, but gladly gave the additional $150,000 which the increased
expense demanded.
The building is planned after the palace of the Tuilleries, having at
each end the chateau roof and mansard windows. It is 500 feet long, and
170 deep. The only drawback to its architectural effect is the entrance,
which should have been a magnificent double stairway, but is, for the
present, only an ordinary private door. This building stands in the
midst of two hundred acres of lovely sloping and swelling land. To the
right, and quite visible at the porter's lodge, is the gymnasium and
hippodrome under one roof; to the left, the graceful observatory, which
is also the home of Miss Mitchell and her father.
In the two wings of the building with chateau roofs are five private
dwellings, rented for a moderate sum to the resident professors. In the
centre, just behind the entrance, are the dining-hall, the chapel, the
art-gallery, and the library; also the large drawing-rooms, where pupils
and teachers receive their friends, and the parlor and office of
president and principal. Connecting this centre with each wing, on four
floors, run long corridors with sunshine and bright windows on one side,
and clusters of students' rooms and recitation-rooms on the other. The
rooms are in pretty groups of four. Three bedrooms open into one study,
the latter made pleasant and home-like by the united treasures of the
occupants. The music-rooms are "deadened," so that the noise hardly
strays beyond the walls; and the cabinet, where the students in natural
history prepare specimens, is full of cases to preserve the work. The
best that I can say of the building will hardly do justice to the
intention of the founder, which no one can comprehend who has seen only
such institutions as Harvard and Yale. There is no occasion here to wish
for any thing which may perhaps come when the college is rich enough.
Mr. Vassar's intention was and is to have the endowment perfect. The
building is fire-proof, every partition wall being of solid brick. There
are four pairs of fire-walls, into which iron doors run on rollers; and
between these are fire-proof stairways, always safe, even if the wood
work should catch fire. There is the physiological cabinet, with every
thing for the use of the professor, including various manikins and wax
preparations. The library, chiefly of books of reference, holds three
thousand volumes, to be increased at the rate of five hundred per annum,
and is also used as a reading-room, where newspapers and reviews may
always be found. The art-gallery, purchased at an extra cost of $20,000,
is such as no college in the country possesses. It consists of good
copies in oil, fine water-colors, including six real Turners, large
portfolios of original sketches, and a perfect library of works on art
and engravings,--in all, about a thousand volumes. Besides the five
hundred pictures, this gallery contains a few busts and casts; among
them, Palmer's Sappho in marble, an ancient wrought brazen shield, and
specimens of ancient stained glass. The chapel seats seven hundred
persons, and might hold a thousand. Over the altar is a beautiful copy
of the Dresden Madonna, by Miss Church, of New York. There is also a
fine organ.
The music-rooms accommodate a "conservatory" on the Charles Auchester
plan, as well as separate pupils. Thirty-two pianos are in use.
The building on the outside is laid with brick in black cement, and has
dark stone trimmings, which prevent its glaring on the eye like a new
brick building. To the right is the riding-school, one hundred feet by
sixty, where thirty horses are kept; and, in the same building, a
gymnastic hall, thirty feet by seventy.
The observatory, eighty feet long and fifty high, rests on the rock, as
well as the great pier. It contains a telescope made by Fitz, whose
focal length is seventeen feet, and its object-glass is twelve and a
half inches. There is also a smaller instrument, for the constant use of
pupils, and, on the roof, a good comet-seeker. There is a beautiful
transit circle, made by James, of Philadelphia, which Miss Mitchell
considers invaluable of its kind; and a very perfect sidereal clock and
chronograph, from the Bonds of Boston.
Between the observatory and the riding-school, four hundred feet from
the main building, is the gas and boiler building, from which the
college is lighted and warmed. Beside these, twenty miles of water-pipe
travel up and down the corridors to supply culinary and domestic needs.
Let us follow them into the kitchen, and we shall find there every
possible convenience of a good hotel, to the steam-filled table on which
the food is carved.
And now, the building once ready for its inmates, was Mr. Vassar
rewarded for the sacrifice he had made? for all the time and thought
bestowed on the outfit? No one had supposed that the school would be
full when it opened in September, 1865; but there were 353 pupils on
hand the first day, and the work of organizing was no trifle. When I
looked at the teachers and principals in this institution, many of whom
I had known before visiting it, it seemed to me that each one had been
providentially fitting for the very work Mr. Vassar now offered. Of the
thirty persons employed, I saw no one that I should have desired to
change. Maria Mitchell, Hannah Lyman, and the admirable resident
physician, Alida Avery, are now too well known to need any praise of
mine. These persons are all of the faculty; and their names indicate how
liberal all the decisions of the faculty must be. I visited the
institution at the beginning of the second year, in October, 1866. It
had already outrun its bounds. There was talk of still another
dormitory. Four hundred pupils, well born, well bred, in good health,
with more than ordinary education (for the tests are severe), and with
ample means, had come to meet those teachers. They had come, between the
ages of seventeen and twenty-two, at the very time when society holds
out every attraction. Vassar is no charity school. Its necessary fees
amount to four hundred dollars; and a girl should have six hundred to
feel happy and at ease. It paid every bill the first year, but had
nothing left for repairs and additions. To create a fund for this
purpose, the fees have been increased to the above-named sum. When the
first rush of pupils occurred, Mr. Vassar was almost dismayed. "God
sometimes gives great thoughts to very little men," he said, and
trembled; but, when the year came to a close, he lifted his hands in
serene gratitude. I arrived at night; and the procession filing past me
to enter the handsome dining-hall, supported by light pillars, about
which were circular stands for the urns, occupied seven minutes. When I
saw more than four hundred young women seated in groups of twenty, saw
them bow their handsome heads in silent grace,--a suggestion which came,
I think, from Miss Mitchell's Quaker father,--I felt excited with
happiness. After tea, I walked round and through the groups of tables;
and the bright faces smiled back at me either consciousness or question.
When they left the dining-hall, they went to the chapel, where Miss
Lyman offers an evening prayer, and, no gentlemen being present, talks
to the ladies in reference to all matters of decorum; a practice I hope
to see followed at Antioch. After breakfast the next morning, I went to
President Raymond's short matin service, and then walked over to the
observatory. There I saw the graceful figures of the girls bending to
the instrument, as they recorded the spots on the sun. I saw the daily
diagrams in which they had recorded the position of these spots for the
last year, and other diagrams of lunar eclipses. "Women make better
observers than men," said old Mr. Mitchell. "They have more patience,
more accuracy. I had been observing thirty years, when Maria took it up,
and I thought, mebbe, 'twas only Maria; but it is just the same with
these girls. They do better than I did." I don't wonder Miss Mitchell is
proud of her seventeen mathematical astronomers. She is a tender
daughter, as well as a capable "observer;" and she would not come to
Vassar without her father. All the girls come to the white-haired old
man with their joys and troubles; and I saw a letter from an old pupil
to Miss Mitchell when I was there, which contained this audacious
sentence, left to tell its own story: "Was it not good of God to put it
into Mr. Vassar's heart to spend his whole fortune in making your
father's last years perfectly happy?" In the art gallery I found, one
morning, twenty-five pupils copying; and, in the musical conservatory,
one hundred and seventy-five. The gymnasium was not quite ready for use;
so I went down to see the girls rowing on the pretty lake. After school
hours, the floral clubs were busy in the grounds. I cannot say any thing
better of Professor Tenney's pupils, than that they work over their
specimens as enthusiastically as boys. In chemical analysis, under
Professor Farrar, the girls are greatly interested. The curriculum is
such as we find adopted at all colleges, except that far more time is
devoted to science than is usual at Yale or Harvard, and room is left
for music. Riding, driving, rowing, &c., are extras, only allowed in the
time allotted to out-door exercise. The resident physician, Dr. Avery,
in whom the college is conscious that it possesses a great treasure,
gives a regular course of physiological lectures.
Matthew Vassar was seventy-six years old on the 29th of April, and that
day is a perpetual festival for the pupils. Could you see him meet the
scholars in the grounds, you would think them all his children. I had
interviews with the president, trustees, and the teachers; but was most
attracted toward this noble old man. He told me that he meant to go on
endowing the college until he died. "Then," he said, "I shall leave
nothing for executors to quarrel about: money will be safe in brick and
stone." He asked me to talk with him about a culinary and household
college for the proper training of housewives, which he still wishes to
erect. His last gift to the college was its magnificent cabinet of
stones and fossils; one of the best, Professor Dana thinks, that he ever
saw. Beside the beautiful specimens shown under glass, there are, in
drawers beneath the glass cases, similar specimens which may be handled.
In furnishing Vassar College, no one has had to think what any thing
would cost. When shall we have an institution for wealthy persons, of
both sexes, with an outfit as splendid? It is a sight which Oberlin has
earned the right to see.