WOMEN AT THE UNIVERSITY OF LONDON.

Globe, Volume XXIV, Issue 2685, 15 November 1882, Page 3

WOMEN AT THE UNIVERSITY OF LONDON.

The list of candidates who have obtained honors at the recent examinations of the the metropolitan university has been issued, and its publication enables those interested in the subject to form an estimate of the progress made by women since the means of higher and more extended education in the arts and sciences, as well as languages, have been as freely thrown open to them as to men.

In the list of honours obtained in the intermediate examinations in medicine, no woman’s name appears in either sections of Anatomy, Materia Medica, Chemistry, or Physiology; but, in the examinations in arts and sciences, more particularly in the sections of Modern languages, women are far more successful. The critical study of their mother tongue, however, seems hardly to be so much affected by them as that of i French and German, although Miss Annie Dawe of Bedford College, and Miss Louisa Brown of Cheltenham, are in the second and third classes of honors in English. In Latin, though no feminine name appears in the first class. Miss Louisa Macdonald of University College heads the second; and Miss Helen Pattison of the same college, and Miss H. E. Macklin of Bedford College, are in the third. In French and German, however, the ladies more than bold their own. Miss Marguerite D. M. Goldschild of Bedford College is first of the first division in French, carrying off also the extra prize, and in the third class are the names of Miss H. Pattison, Miss C. Eickett of Bedford College, Miss Adelaide Klem and Miss E. Mackiin, both of Queen’s College, and Miss Ifdith M. Pope. In German again the list is headed by a lady. Miss E. A. S. Dawes, and Miss Macklin of Bedford College is in tbo third class. In the science subjects tbat are not strictly medical, the name of one lady. Miss Elizabeth F. Toone, appears in the third class of honors in inorganic chemistry, whilst in experimental physics. Miss Edith Aitken of Girtcn is in the second class, and Miss Toone and Miss C. M. Pole, of Bedford College, in the third. Honors in botany fall but to the share of two ladies. Miss Aitken, who is in the first class, and Miss Isabel Clare Evans, of Mason College, Birmingham, in the second whilst the zoological honors are all taken by men. The consideration of this record is of considerable interest to those who are concerned in the higher education of women. The doors of the examining Boards and Universities empowered to grant honors and degrees have been opened sufficiently long to allow fair inferences to be drawn regarding the relative success of the students of the two sexes. The rush of middle-aged women, teachers and others, who had been waiting for years to submit themselves for examination, is over, and the present candidates may he taken as fair samples of the average, except in the case of medical subjects, in which the number of female students is too small to allow any correct inference to be drawn.

In the Mathematical Honor list the names of women do not yet appear, nor in that for Zoology. In science generally the female students can hardly be said to he pre-eminently successful, whilst in modern languages other than English they have secured far more than the average proportion of the honors due to their numbers. To the doctrinaires who maintain the absolute identity of the intellectual powers in the two sexes, the publication of these results must be the reverse of gratifying ; whilst to those who recognise the rapid perception and great intellectual acuteness of well-trained girls, the list will not be surprising. That young women should prove better linguists than men of a similar age is what every experienced educator expected. That they should not be equal to them in abstract of practical science will disappoint no one, except these crochety individuals whose conclusions can. hardly he excused, even on the ground of their want of experience.