ten by them. A year or two ago a number of university women formed a settlement at Southwark, in the southeast of London. Here they endeavor to provide teaching and amusement for the poor children of the district. But it is not necessary that a woman graduate should enter upon public duties in order to make the most of the advantages she has enjoyed. There is a wide field for quiet, unobtrusive work at home; a capable woman, trained to habits of self-control and self-reliance, must always be a useful member of society. A great deal is said about the overstrain of college life, and about the ill-health which the higher education of women engenders. During a residence of four years at Newnham College I was particularly struck with the average good health enjoyed by the students. Since then a most careful census has been taken of students past and present, which goes far to prove that the higher education is not detrimental to health; and, indeed, the arrangements at the large colleges provide such opportunities for recreation that it is only very exceptional students who are likely to overwork. And surely, all will agree that a regular life, with plenty of occupation and good healthy pursuits, must be an enviable one; and that it must be more beneficial than otherwise for once in a lifetime to have to work steadily on towards one goal, to reach which all the best energies must be concentrated in one honest effort. Eleanor Field. THE NOTE ON THE HEALTH OF WOMEN STUDENTS. HE Sixteenth Report of the Massachusetts Bureau of Statistics of Labor contained some interesting data, furnished by the Association of Collegiate Alumnæ, in regard to the health of American female college graduates. Mr. Carroll D. Wright, the Superintendent of the Bureau, summed up the statistics in these conservative words: “It is sufficient to say that the female graduates of our colleges and universities do not seem to show as the result of their college studies and duties any marked difference in general health from the average health likely to be reported by an equal number of women engaged in other kinds of work." At that time the only data relating to the health of a distinct class of women, that were available for purposes of comparison, were a report on the working women of Boston. Five years have passed since this report appeared, and we are now presented with some English statistics on the same subject, which in some respects are more valuable than the American report which suggested them. "Health Statistics of Women Students of Cambridge and Oxford, and their Sisters,” is the title of a pamphlet issued by the University Press, Cambridge, 1890, and edited by Mrs. Henry Sidgwick, the secretary of a special committee which undertook to secure scientific data as to the "effect of a university course of study on the health of women." For good reasons, not in any way detracting from the results, the inquiries were confined to students of Newnham and Girton Colleges at Cambridge, and of Lady Margaret and Somerville Halls at Oxford. These students fall into four classes: first, and most important those who have resided in college three or more years, and have read for Tripos Examinations at Cambridge, and for Final Examination Schools at Oxford; these "honor students" may fairly be compared to those who were put down in the American report as having "studied severely "; second, students who resided for three years or more, but did not try for honors; third, students who resided for two years; fourth, students who resided for one year. There are three terms in a year at the English universities, and students who took less than three terms were omitted altogether. To these picked women, the majority of them devoted both before and after college life to intellectual work of a more or less laborious nature, schedules were sent containing, besides the direct query, "Has your health been a excellent, b good, c fair, d poor, e bad, between the ages of three and eight years, eight and fourteen years, fourteen and eighteen years, at the time of entering college, during college life, and since leaving college," tabulated queries as to family health, as to individual history before going to college, as to conditions of college life, and as to history after leaving college. The object of these questions was mainly to throw light on all causes other than study that might have affected health. An identical schedule of questions (omitting those about college life) was also sent to each student to be filled up by, or for, the sister (or lacking a sister, a first cousin) nearest her in age, who had attained the age of twenty-one and had not been to college. In this way was obtained "a parallel series of statistics, with which to compare those about the students—a feature in our inquiry which we think greatly adds to its value." Elaborate and detailed tables (41 in number) have been carefully made up from the 562 answers received to the 663 schedules sent out. The answers received in the United States amounted to a little over half of those solicited, so that our English sisters have shown a commendable willingness to have the question looked into as thoroughly as possible. Indeed, of the 136 women honor students from Newnham, 130 answered; furthermore, in order to show that the percentage of answers withheld would not have materially affected the average, the Secretary was able, from her personal knowledge of the six women who made no answer, to give the missing health facts in their special cases. The following condensed and representative table, showing the percentage who have enjoyed different degrees of health at different periods, will, we believe, sufficiently indicate the character of the investigation, and illustrate the comparative position which college training may be claimed to hold among influences that affect the health of women: It appears from this table that throughout life the students in the aggregate maintain a higher standard of health than their sisters. Of this fact, two possible explanations are suggested, that a higher average of physical vigor is implied in the desire to go to college, and that the healthier members of a family are, on the average, expected to obtain remunerative work, and accordingly to prepare themselves for it. But how are we to account for the temporary depression of average health at college? For although the health of students is better than that of their non-college sisters, it shows a deterioration from their own standard, both before and after the period of college life. There seems little doubt that a large part of this loss must be ascribed to the effect of "worry over personal and family affairs." A similar connection between health and worry was indicated in the American Statistics. No part of the report is more interesting than that portion dealing with the occupations of both the students and their sisters. It does not seem unreasonable to assert that a very positive relation exists between congenial intellectual occupation and good health, and that there is an equally direct although subtle one between desultory and untrained (even when ardent) efforts and much of the indifferent health of women of the upper and middle classes. The tables prove that 77 per cent. of all the students and 83 per cent. of the honor students have engaged in educational work since leaving college, while less than one-half the proportional number of their sisters have done so, and "for a much larger number of sisters than of students no regular occupation at all is reported." The difference in the rate of marriage of students and of their sisters is unimportant, if we take the end of the college life of the former as the starting-point for the comparison, as a certain number of the sisters marry while the students are at college. Taking the students and the sisters together, as a fairly representative group of women from the English professional classes, we must face the serious conclusion that a large proportion of these women do not marry at all. We find, however, that there are fewer childless marriages among the students than among the sisters, that there is a slightly larger proportion of still-born children among both than among the average population, but," on the other hand, that the proportion of deaths among children born alive is smaller than ordinary, especially in the case of the children of students." Of the married students nearly 78 per cent. enjoy excellent or good health, whereas but 62 per cent. of their married sisters are equally fortunate, and the students' children are healthier than those of the sisters. Although such a statement may seem superfluous in this age of physical culture, the report reveals the fact that among the women of both divisions, those who during their school life enjoyed much out-of-door exercise and amusements showed the benefit of such robust physical preparation for the stress and strain of mature life, by a better standard of health. Of course broad and certain conclusions cannot be drawn from tentative and numerically small statistics. Nevertheless, such are the facts so far collated. That any serious alarm as to the effect of University education on the health of women is groundless, is clearly shown by the fact that the net amount of increase in good present health, as compared with health between fourteen and eighteen years of age, is greater in the health of students than of their sisters. A final word of comparison between the English and American statistics: The average health of the American college student seems to be higher than that of her English compeer (probably accounted for by certain college physical conditions), but the American student who has "studied severely" does not appear to recover as high a tone after leaving college as the English woman. The proportion of Americans who report bad health on entering college is 25 per cent., of English women only 8 per cent. Such figures throw a side-light on the ordinary hygienic condition of American well-to-do homes. While a large proportion of American college graduates marry, a larger proportion are childless. A smaller proportion of them are engaged in educational work in other words, more American college-bred women are absorbed in the home and philanthropic work of the nation, and so act as an invaluable leaven. A SPRING ROMANCE. HE yellow March sun lay powerfully on the bare Iowa prairie, where the plowed fields were already turning warm and brown, and only here and there in a corner or on the north side of the fence did the sullen drifts remain, and they were so dark and low that they hardly appeared to break the mellow brown of the fields. There passed also an occasional flock of geese, cheerful harbingers of spring, and the prairie-chickens had set up their morning symphony, wide-swelling, wonderful with its prophecy of the new birth of grass and grain and the springing life of all breathing things. The crow passed now and then, uttering his resonant croak, but the crane had not yet sent forth his bugle note. Lyman Gilman rested on his ax-helve at the wood-pile of farmer Bacon to listen to the music around him. In a vague way he was powerfully moved by it. He heard the hens singing their weird, raucous, monotonous song, and saw them burrowing in the dry chip-dust near him. He saw the young colts and cattle frisking in the sunny space around the strawstacks, absorbed through his bare arms and uncovered head the heat of the sun, and felt the soft wooing of the air so much that he broke into an unwonted exclamation: 99 "Glory! we 'll be seeding by Friday, sure." This short and disappointing soliloquy was, after all, an expression of deep emotion. To the western farmer the very word "seeding" is a poem. And these few words, coming from Lyman Gilman, meant more and expressed more than many a large and ambitious springtime song. But the glory of all the slumbrous landscape, the stately beauty of the sky with its masses of fleecy vapor, were swept away by the sound of a girl's voice humming "Come to the Savior," while she bustled about the kitchen near by. The windows were open. Ah! what suggestion to these dwellers in a rigorous climate was in the first unsealing of the windows! How sweet it was to the pale and weary women after their long imprisonment! As Lyman sat down on his maple log to hear better, a plump face appeared at the window, and a clear girl-voice said: "Smell anything, Lyme?" horn spoons!" he yelled, leaping up. "Bring me some, an' see me eat; it'll do ye good." "Come an' get 'm," laughed the face at the window. "Oh, it's nicer out here, Merry Etty. What's the rush? Bring me out some, an' set down on this log." With a nod Marietta disappeared, and soon came out with a plate of cookies in one hand and a cup of milk in the other. "Poor little man, he's all tired out, ain't he?" Lyme, taking the cue, collapsed in a heap, and said feebly, "Bread, bread! "Won't milk an' cookies do as well? " He brushed off the log and motioned her to sit down beside him, but she hesitated a little and colored a little. "OLyme, s'pose somebody should see us?" "Let 'em. What in thunder do we care? Sit down an' gimme a holt o' them cakes. I'm just about done up. I could n't 'a' stood it another minute." She sat down beside him with a laugh and a pretty blush. She was in her apron, and the sleeves of her dress were rolled to her elbows, displaying the strong, round arms. Wholesome and sweet she looked and smelled, the scent of the cooking round her. Lyman munched a couple of the cookies and gulped a pint of milk before he spoke. "Whadda we care who sees us sittin' side b' side? Ain't we goin' t' be married soon?" "Oh, them cookies in the oven!" she shrieked, leaping up and running to the house, looking back as she reached the kitchen door, however, and smiling with a flushed face. Lyme slapped his knee and roared with laughter at his bold stroke. "Ho! ho! haar-whoop! did n't I do it slick? Ain't nothin' green in my eye, I guess." In an intense and pleasurable abstraction he finished the cookies and the milk. Then he yelled: "Hey! Merry-Merry Etty!" "Whadda ye want?" sang the girl from the window, her face still rosy with confusion. "Come out here and git these things." The girl shook her head, with a laugh. "Come out an' git 'm, 'r by jingo I'll throw 'em at ye! Come on, now!" The girl looked at the huge, handsome fellow, the sun falling on his golden hair and beard, and came slowly out to him- came creeping along with her hand outstretched for He snuffed the air. " Cookies, by the great the plate which Lyme, with a laugh in his sunny blue eyes, extended at the full length of his bare arm. The girl made a snatch at it, but the giant's left hand caught her by the wrist, and away went cup and plate as he drew her to him and kissed her in spite of her struggles. "My! ain't you strong!" she said half-ruefully and half-admiringly as she shrugged her shoulders. "If you 'd use a little more o' that choppin' wood, dad would n't 'a' lost s' much money by yeh." "About our gitt'n' married this spring." "I guess you'd better find out what I'm a-goin' t' say, Lyme Gilman, 'fore you pitch into dad." "I know what you 're a-goin' t' say." "No, y' don't." "Yes, but I do, though." "Well, ask me and see, if you think you 're so smart. Jest as like 's not you 'll slip up." "All right; here goes. Marietty Bacon, ain't you an' Lyme Gilman goin' t' be married?" "No, sir, we ain't," laughed the girl, snatching up the plate and darting away to the house, where she struck up "Weevily Wheat," and went busily on about her cooking. Lyme threw a kiss at her, and fell to work on his log with startling energy. William Bacon was one of the richest farmers in Cedar County, and held half a dozen farms in Dry Run township. He was a giant in strength even now when his hair was getting grizzled, and his voice, like that of Jephthah, would quell a lion. Lyman, therefore, looked forward to his interview with the "old man" with as much trepidation as he had ever known, though commonly he had little fear of anything. Marietta was not only the old man's only child but his housekeeper, his wife having long ago succumbed to the ferocious toil of the farm. It was reasonable to suppose, therefore, that he would surrender his claim on the girl reluctantly. Rough as he was, he loved Marietta strongly, and would find it exceedingly hard to get along without her. Lyman mused on these things as he drove the gleaming ax into the huge maple logs. He was something more than the usual hired man, being a lumberman from the Wisconsin pineries, where he had sold out his interest in a camp not three weeks before the day he began work for Bacon. He had a nice "little wad o' money" when he left the camp and started for La Crosse, but he had been robbed in his hotel the first night in the city, and was left nearly penniless. It was a great blow to VOL. XLII.—39. him, for, as he said, every cent of that money "stood fer hard knocks an' poor feed. When I smelt of it I could jest see the cold frosty mornin's and the late nights. I could feel the hot sun on my back like it was when I worked in the harvest-field. By jingo! It kind o' made my toes curl up." But like the brave fellow that he was he went out to work again, and here he was chopping wood in old man Bacon's wood-yard, thinking busily on the scene which had just passed between him and Marietta. "By jingo!" he said all at once, stopping short, with the ax on his shoulder. "If I had n't 'a' been robbed I would n't 'a' come hereI never 'd met Merry. Thunder and jimson root! Was n't that a narrow 'scape?" And then he laughed so heartily that the girl looked out of the window again to see what in the world he was doing. He had his hat in his hand and was whacking his thigh with it. "Lyman Gilman, what in the world ails you to-day? It's perfectly ridiculous the way you yell and talk t' y'rself out there on the chips. You beat the hens, I declare if you don't." Lyme put on his hat and walked up to the window, and, resting his great bare arms on the sill, and his chin on his arms, said: "Merry, I'm goin' t' tackle dad this afternoon. He 'll be settin' up the new seeder, and I'm goin' t' climb right on the back of his neck. He's jest gut t' give me a chance." Marietta looked sober in sympathy. "Well. P'raps it 's best t' have it over with, Lyme, but someway I feel kind o' scarey about it." Lyme stood for a long time looking in at the window, watching the light-footed girl as she set the table in the middle of the sun-lighted kitchen floor. The kettle hissed, the meat sizzled, sending up a delicious odor, a hen stood in the open door and sang a sort of cheery half-human song, while to and fro moved the sweet-faced, lithe, and powerful girl, followed by the smiling eyes at the window. "Merry, you look purty as a picture. You look just like the wife I be'n a-huntin' for all these years, sure 's shootin'." Marietta colored with pleasure. "Does dad pay you t' stand an' look at me an' say pretty things t' the cook?" "No, he don't. But I'm willin' t' do it without pay. I could jest stand here till kingdom come an' look at you- Hello! I hear a wagon. I guess I better hump into that wood-pile." "I think so too. Dinner 's most ready, and pap 'll be here soon." Lyme was driving away furiously at a tough elm log when farmer Bacon drove into the yard with a new seeder in his wagon. Lyme whacked away busily while Bacon stabled the team, and in a short time Marietta called in long-drawn, If he wanted more, I'd let him have an eighty musical fashion "Dinner-r-r!" After sozzling their faces at the well the two men went in and sat down at the table. Bacon was not much of a talker at any time, and at meal-time, in seeding, eating was the main business in hand; therefore the meal was a silent one, Marietta and Lyme not caring to talk on general topics. The hour was an anxious one for her and an important one for him. "Wal, now, Lyme, seedin''s the nex' thing," said Bacon as he shoved back his chair and glared around from under his bushy eyebrows. "We can't do too much this afternoon. That seeder's got t' be set up an' a lot o' seed wheat cleaned up. You unload the machine while I feed the pigs." Lyme sat still till the old man was heard outside calling" Poo-ee, poo-ee" to the pigs in the yard, then he smiled at Marietta, but she said: "He's got on one of his fits, Lyme; I don't b'lieve you 'd better tackle him t'-day." "Don't you worry; I'll fix him. Come, now, give me a kiss.” 'Why, you great thing! You- took—" "I know, but I want you to give me 'em. Jest walk right up to me an' give me a smack t' bind the bargain we 've made." "I ain't made no bargain," laughed the girl. Then feeling the force of his tender tone, "Will you behave, and go right off to your work?" 'Jest like a little man-hope t' die!" 66 "Lyme!" roared the old man from the barn. "Hello!"replied Lyme, grinning joyously and winking at the girl, as much as to say, "This would paralyze the old man if he saw it." He went out to the shed where Bacon was busy as serene as if he had not a fearful task on hand. He was apprehensive that the father would "gig back "unless rightly approached, and so he waited a good opportunity. The right opening seemed to present itself along about the middle of the afternoon. Bacon was down on the ground under the machine tightening some burs. This was a good chance for two reasons. In the first place the keen, almost savage, eyes of Bacon were no longer where they could glare on him, and in spite of his cool exterior Lyme had “jest as soon not " have the old man looking at him. Then, besides, the old farmer had been telling about his "river eighty," which was with out a tenant; the man who had taken it, having lost his wife, had grown disheartened and had given it up. "It's an almighty good chance for a man with a small family. Good house an' barn, good land. A likely young feller with a team an' a woman could do tiptop on that eighty. j'inin'—" "I'd like t' try that m'self," said Lyme, as a feeler. The old fellow said nothing in reply for a moment. "Ef you had a team an' tools an' a woman I'd jest as leef you 'd have it as anybody." "Sell me your blacks, and I'll pay half down, the balance in the fall. I can pick up some tools, and as fur a woman, Merry Etty an' me have talked that over to-day. She 's ready to-ready to marry me whenever you say, now." There was an ominous silence under the seeder, as if the man could not believe his ears. "What 's-what 's that?" he stuttered. "Who'd you say? What about Merry Etty?" "She 's agreed to marry me." "The you say!" roared the old bear as the truth burst upon him. "So that's what you do when I go off to town and leave you to chop wood. So you 're goin' to get married, hey?" He was now where he could see Lyme, glaring up into his smiling blue eyes. Lyme stood his ground. - "Yes, sir. That 's the calculation." "Well, I guess I'll have somethin' t' say about that," nodding his head violently. "I rather expected y' would. Blaze away. Your privilege -my bad luck. Sail in ol' man. What's y'r objection to me fer a son-in-law?" "Don't you worry, young feller. I'll come at it soon enough," went on Bacon as he turned up another bur in a very awkward corner. In his nervous excitement the wrench slipped, banging his knuckle. "Ouch! Thunder-m-m-m!" howled and snarled the wounded man. "What's the matter? Bark yer knuckle ?" queried Lyme, feeling a mighty impulse to laugh. But when he saw the old savage straighten up and glare at him he sobered. Bacon was now in a frightful temper. The veins in his great, bare, weather-beaten neck swelled dangerously. "Jest let me say right here that I 've had enough o' you. You can't live on the same acre with my girl another day." "What makes ye think I can't?" It was now the young man's turn to draw himself up, and as he faced the old man, his arms folded and each vast hand grasping an elbow, he looked like a statue of red granite, and the hands resembled the paws of a crouching lion; but his eyes smiled. "I don't think, I know ye won't." "What's the objection to me?" "Objection? What's the inducement? My hired man, an' not three shirts to yer back!" |