The staid, conservative citizen's queried
of what use to women were Latin, Geometry, and Algebra, and wondered
at a request for six recitation rooms and a study-hall for a school
of nearly a hundred, who had as yet only one room. The appeal was then
made to benevolent, intelligent women, and by their influence all that
was sought was liberally bestowed.
But the course of study then attempted was scarcely half of what is
now pursued in most of our colleges for young women, while there has
been added a round and extent of accomplishments then unknown. Yet
this moderate amount so stimulated brain and nerves, and so excited
competition, that it became needful to enforce a rule, requiring a
daily report, that only two hours a day had been devoted to study out
of school hours. Even this did not avail to save from injured health
both the teacher who projected these improvements and many of her
pupils. This example and that of similar institutions spread all over
the nation, with constantly increasing demand for more studies, and
decreasing value and respect for domestic pursuits and duties.
Ten years of such intellectual excitement exhausted the nervous
fountain, and my profession as a school-teacher was ended.
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