VI. THE HOPE SCHOLARSHIP
The month of August brought some rest and refreshment, though S. J.-B. remained in Edinburgh to “coach” for the Matriculation Examination. Mrs. Burn Murdoch put her spacious and comfortable house for a little time at the solitary student’s disposal, and, to S. J.-B.’s great joy, Miss Du Pre came to visit her.
There were delightful excursions up the Forth, through the Trossachs, and even farther afield, and S. J.-B. spent what is now known as a week- end, at his country-place, with Mr. Findlay of the Scotsman, and his wife. One realizes by many little indications how her views on the whole question of women were becoming explicit. In the course of her visit, her host showed her letters he had received from a clever American woman—a journalist of sorts, apparently—in the course of which she asked him to “help the little woman,” “the wee bit thing.” “When will women learn,” says S. J.-B., “if they claim to stand on common ground at all, to ‘stand upright,’ to ask only ‘fair field and no favour’!”
On October 10th she moved into No. 15 Buccleuch Place, “the house nice, airy, wholesome, roomy,—rent, taxes and all probably £45,” and, on the following day Miss Pechey lunched with her. A week later S. J.-B. sums the new comrade up:
“I think her strong, ready-handed, with ‘faculty,’ great ability, resolution, judgment; great calmness and quiet of manner and action, and probably strength of feeling; good taste, good manner; very pleasant face; rather good feet and hands; considerable sense of humour; lots of energy and interest in things,—witness dissecting the slugs, keeping caterpillars, etc. In fine, as good an ally and companion as could well be had.”
She had occasion to add considerably to this estimate as life went on, but in no wise to subtract from it.
Meanwhile Mrs. Evans had resolved to throw in her lot with the little band, and S. J.-B. was coaching her in Arithmetic. Miss Chaplin (afterwards the wife of Professor Ayrton) had also joined their ranks, and it was a gallant and creditable little phalanx that made its way up to the University on October 19th to undergo the Matriculation Examination.
Of course they all passed, and passed far above the average, though there was one “narrow squeak” in Arithmetic. They were all cultivated women, all on their mettle, and the result was scarcely more than might reasonably have been anticipated. “We believe,—” as a local paper had occasion to say, after a similar result some ten months later,
“We believe that these results prove, not that women’s capacities are better than those of men,—a thing that few people would assert,—but that these women who are devoting themselves to obtain, in spite of all difficulties, a thorough knowledge of their profession, are far more thoroughly in earnest than most of the men are, and that their ultimate success is certain in proportion. Nor would we omit the inference that, this being so, those who wantonly throw obstacles in the way of this gallant little band, incur a proportionately heavy responsibility, as wanting not only in the spirit of chivalry, but even in the love of fair play, which we should be sorry to think wanting in any Briton.”[56]
Footnote 56:
Daily Review, Aug. 5, 1870.
It was natural, however, that friends and well-wishers should be not a little elated. Here is one of many delightful letters:
“Oct. 22, 1869.
MY DEAR MISS JEX-BLAKE,
This is just one word of warmest congratulation from us both to you and the other ladies. We are rejoicing more than I can tell you over the results of the examination. I have been a prisoner today with a severe cold, or I should have been unable to rest until I had shaken hands with you. Shall you be at home any time tomorrow after one o’clock? If so, I shall like to come and see you and Miss Pechey.
Do send me a line to tell me if you are as happy as I fancy you.
Yours faithfully, E. ROSALINE MASSON.
Mr. Masson was very much gratified by the papers of the ladies. They fully justified his highest hopes.”
From diary:
“Tuesday, Nov. 2nd. ‘The deed—of life—was done!’—This morning, 11.30 a.m., I, S. L. J.-B., first of all women, matriculated as ‘Civis Academiae Edinensis!’—Tonight for the first time 5 women are undergraduates!—Hurrah!
‘With exactness grinds He all.’”
“I do indeed congratulate you undergraduates with all my heart,” wrote Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell, who had now settled in London. “It seems to me the grandest success that women have yet achieved in England; it is the great broad principle established that conducts to every noble progress.
I feel as if I must come up to Edinburgh in the course of the winter, to see and bless the class! Perhaps towards the close of the term would be best,—advise me.”
So began a winter’s work that for most, if not all, of the women students, was an experience of extraordinary interest and happiness. S. J.-B. and Edith Pechey had settled together in Buccleuch Place, and the house was a rendezvous for a choice little circle. It would be difficult to say which of the two proved the greater attraction to their friends. Miss Pechey was younger, more adaptable, less obviously alarming, though possibly more critical really, in proportion as she had seen less of life. The reader is already aware that S. J.-B., though a most interesting person to live with, was not by any means always an easy person to live with, particularly when she was overworked and overstrained. For her friends as well as herself it was sometimes a question—in her own significant words—of, “Ware crash!” Moreover, although she often gave to others the advice,—“Glissez, mortels: n’appuyez pas!”, she not infrequently failed to act on it herself: she still, as when a child, staked her happiness too readily on matters that might better have been regarded as trifles: and this is a characteristic that becomes a more serious factor in domestic and social life as the years go on. On the other hand, when she really “let herself go” in her most intimate circle, there was no one like her. The diary and the letters give scarcely an indication of the sense of humour and fun that were so ready to bubble over into real whole-hearted laughter. The eyes so familiar with sorrow could still sparkle with merriment like a child’s, and, when anything struck her as irresistibly preposterous or comical, she had a way of “tossing them up to the ceiling and catching them again” that was a joy to behold. Increasingly as life went on, she was a touchstone on which to test the things that might be said, the stories that might be told. She could enjoy a joke that would have shocked many women of her generation; but, as her Mother had said long before, “anything impure ran off her mind like quicksilver,” and she was a past master in the art of calling home a conversation that was lingering too long in permissible bye-ways.
More than this,—even at the time of which we are writing, she was one of those with whom people know instinctively that it is safe to speak, not only of the great things of life, but of the disgraceful things, or the small disconcerting things that want to be looked at in an atmosphere of greatness. She was a Mother Confessor to many. “Now straight into the fire!” she says in her diary of certain letters she had received; and the smoke of that sacrifice meant something, for—born chronicler as she was—it was pain and grief to her to destroy a letter at any time.
She was particularly happy that winter term. On the last night of the year she writes in her diary:
“11.30 p.m. The long tangle of accounts unravelled at last!—‘after long travail, good repose!’
In more senses than one.
Nine years since that look from the window,—‘And may the New Year cherish.’
Since then I suppose no such (visibly) important year in my life. One very dear friend won,—one strong ally,—Edinburgh opened!—What if one is a little tired? ‘After long travail good repose!’
I see that a year ago I thought there were no hopes ‘now bright,’—and ‘an hour of joy I knew not was winging its silent flight.’ Indeed the next six months did cut out their own work.
The year has been glorious in many ways.
The chief point of pain....”
The chief point of pain was the fear that she was fickle,—that the new interests and friendships were making her disloyal to the strange unearthly friendship for Octavia Hill. Whether this would have been blameworthy is a question that it is unnecessary to discuss, as the contingency never arose. The flame may have flickered and sunk low, but it continued to burn for another forty years. Then “after long travail good repose.”
And in any case she was very happy that winter term. Strangely enough,[57] her family were thoroughly sympathetic with her aims. Discussing the volume of Essays to which she had contributed, her brother wrote:
“Miss Cobbe was very vigorous and suggestive: might have been longer. So might yours without any risk of the interest flagging; and more details of fact would (I think) have driven the nail deeper in the Philistine’s understanding.... I should say that Mrs. Butler’s and yours will hit the public hardest; most dissimilar as they are.... On the main question, for you personally, I am very glad that you are on the medical rails. They are real and solid and really lead somewhere. There is more specialty about them than in the somewhat vague educational line. They belong to an old strong well-paid profession. They tend to the alleviation of intense human misery; and that for a large class of delicate cases women when properly trained are the right physicians I have felt for years and feel increasingly. Stick to them head and hands and feet. Don’t be drawn aside into tempting but irrelevant bye-ways. You will be very useful and very happy in your work: and to have helped to bring about the result that for the years to come girls shall not be without the pale of professional and University education,—shall not waste their best years in chafing at want of elbow room at home—will be a great and additional satisfaction. Nothing succeeds like success, and what you have got to do is to prove that a Lady Physician can be trustworthy and a success. Do nothing but your work, and you will do your work well. Of course get hold of the widest and deepest Professional education within reach.
Your aff. brother, T. W. J.-B.”
Footnote 57:
“Strangely” when compared with the families of her contemporaries. “When I told Mamma I had got my certificate,” said a former fellow- student, “she said ‘Have you?’ When I told Uncle, he said ‘What good is it?’ When I told Emily, she said, ‘I am very glad to hear it, but I am very much surprised.’”
This last point, on which the writer touches so lightly, was precisely the rub.
“Everything is just as we would have it,” wrote S. J.-B. at this time to Dr. Sewall, “but that Professors are not compelled to lecture to us. We have already arranged for two courses for this winter,—5 lectures a week each,—Physiology and Chemistry; and we are now arranging for Anatomy, both in lectures and dissecting.
As we have to make entirely separate arrangements, the Anatomy will be very expensive,—about £100 probably for us five,—and of this I shall pay about one-third, as two of the students are not at all rich.
Still it is worth any money to get the thing done, and I am only thankful that I can spend the money. Of course I borrow it from my Mother.[58] My fees for this year will be about £55 or £60,—about $400,—for the 6 months.
I have made up my mind to spend if needful £1000 on this business. I feel sure that one does more good in thus concentrating one’s energies and one’s funds to get one thing done thoroughly, than in frittering away lots of small sums in charity,—Don’t you think so? It is a grand thing to enter the very first British University ever opened to women, isn’t it?
My darling, you must come and see us this summer, for, as I tell the other students here, the whole thing is due to you primarily;—when they say that they feel grateful to me for having worked for this, I say, ‘Thank Dr. Sewall,—she made me care for Medicine, and resolve that a thorough education should be open to Englishwomen.’ So I told Dr. Blackwell too when she said something pretty to me. She is very pleased about Edinburgh.
Well, dear child, I have settled down now for the winter in my little new house. It amuses me to hear of your expenses in furnishing. The whole I have spent is under £35,—about $200,—and yet we are very comfortable!
Miss Pechey is very nice and very clever,—you will like her very much, and she is excellent company....
Our classes begin on Nov. 3rd. I am very busy till then.
Your very aff. S. L. J.-B.”
Footnote 58:
Money borrowed from Mrs. Jex-Blake was refunded as strictly as if it had been borrowed from a banker.
Busy indeed she was with the great task of finding lecturers. The University of Edinburgh still stood foursquare, and the Professors sat in their comfortable chairs, lecturing to enormous classes of male students. Looking at the question as a sheer matter of business, one asks what inducement had these men to lecture to a handful of women students? S. J.-B., Mrs. Thorne and the others might struggle and pinch to raise the fees of a dozen or more, but what was that to men of assured wealth and position?—men who looked upon a Scots professorship as the topmost rung on the ladder of comfortable success,—men to whom leisure and peace seemed almost a matter of right, an essential part of the prize they had drawn in the lottery of life? Why should they double their work for the sake of this paltry pittance? It was not to be expected that they should have a great enthusiasm for the cause. How could they? They might, it is true, have been possessed of a high sense of the trust conferred on them by their position: but is such a sense in any sphere of life the possession of more than the choicest few?
As regarded the class in Chemistry, everything had gone with delightful smoothness. On July 10th, S. J.-B. had written in her diary, “Dr. Crum Brown agrees,—not a word of demur as to fees,—good fellow,” and a few days later she had received a letter from Dresden in which he said:
“I am convinced that the experiment must be made, and do not wish to place any unnecessary obstacles in the way. I therefore cordially agree to your proposal, on the understanding that the consent of the University Court is obtained, and that the course be conducted in the Chemical Class-room of the University, and be in all respects the same as the ordinary course of Chemistry.”
So far as the work was concerned, one is glad to think that his generosity met with its reward. All the teacher in him must have rejoiced in the mettle of the new students. Miss Pechey, in particular, simply fell upon Chemistry and proceeded to make it her own. In the house of which the furnishing had cost £35, she and S. J.-B. rigged up some kind of laboratory, and carried on experiments with a keenness that to the stern advocate of “limited liability” might well have endangered their success in class examinations.
When the winter session came to an end in March, however, it was found that Miss Pechey stood third in the entire list, and was really first of the first-year students,—two of the men having attended the class before. There would have been nothing calamitous in this state of affairs, had it not chanced that there were certain small scholarships involved. A previous Professor of Chemistry in the University—Dr. Hope— had made the experiment of delivering a course of lectures to ladies, and had devoted the proceeds—amounting to about £1000—to the founding of four Hope Scholarships, which entitled the winners to the free use of the College Laboratory. What this privilege would have meant to a born student like Miss Pechey one can easily imagine, but, as mixed classes were forbidden, there might have been a difficulty—scarcely insurmountable—about her making full use of it.
Hitherto, as we have seen, the Professor had treated the women generously. We know that he bore them no grudge; and it is absurd to suppose that he had any wish to be unjust to an engaging, deft-handed girl, with a calm strong face, and a brain which he must have already seen to be far above the average in either sex,—a girl, moreover, who was frankly appreciative of her good fortune in having so able a man as her teacher.
One can only conjecture the motives and the advice that must have influenced him in the decision to withhold even the name of Hope Scholar from this woman, and to give it to the man who stood beneath her on the list. In explaining his position, the Professor said that, having studied at a different hour, she was not a member of the Chemistry Class; but at the same time he awarded to her the official bronze medal of the University, to which she could only lay claim as a member of that class; and, in the published list of honours, he put her name and those of the other women in the place to which their marks entitled them.
It was a clumsy though well-meaning compromise, and only led to greater difficulties farther on. Having said that the women were not members of the Chemistry Class, how could he give them certificates of attendance on that class? It was obviously impossible, so he offered them written certificates of having attended “a ladies’ class in the University,”— certificates absolutely worthless from the point of view of professional examination. One is reminded of the strawberry jam labels which Mark Twain offered to the conductor of a continental railway when his ticket was worn out; but, unfortunately, the Registrar of a great University is not to be appeased with strawberry jam labels.
In truth the Professor had done the cause an incalculable service. A howl of indignation went up over the whole country. The Times, the Spectator,—a faithful supporter from the first,—even the British Medical Journal, were genuinely roused. The Universities and the Profession had been governed by a spirit of Conservatism, of Trades- unionism, of which this was but a mild example; but now at last that spirit had become explicit: here was the priceless desideratum of the tangible grievance: and it was just like life—just the irony of fate— that the man who provoked the outburst, the man who had to suffer, was not one of the bitter opponents: he was, in his own way, the friend and helper of the struggling cause. He had taught the women Chemistry, and he had taught them well; and that was the main thing, even though a bronze medal, and a few “strawberry jam labels” were—for five people in deadly earnest—to be the only outward and visible signs of six months’ hard work.
The matter was referred to the Senatus, who decided by a majority of one that Miss Pechey was not entitled to the Hope Scholarship, and (on the motion of Professor P. G. Tait) also by a majority of one, that the women should have the ordinary class certificates. So the women grasped the substance, if they did lose the shadow.
“I agree with you that the one vote stultifies the other,” wrote Professor Masson, “and I think people are seeing this. At the time I made up my mind that the first vote must carry the other unfavourably with it; but it was not for me to keep the Senatus consistent, and, when Tait announced his view, I grasped at the unexpected accident and seconded his motion.”
But the outcry was not stilled. In those days the general public knew little of the difference between one certificate and another; but they had some idea of what was meant by the losing of a scholarship, and Miss Pechey became the recipient of an amount of condolence that was positively embarrassing when compared with the extent of the injury inflicted. The skilled appreciation of the situation, however, was delightful. This was the tribute of the British Medical Journal:
“Whatever may be our views regarding the desirability of ladies studying medicine, the University of Edinburgh professed to open its gates to them on equal terms with the other students; and, unless some better excuse be forthcoming in explanation of the decision of the Senatus, we cannot help thinking that the University has done no less an injustice to itself than to one of its most distinguished students.”[59]
One can imagine the effect of criticism such as this on some of the professors. Here was a tiresome muddle from which it was difficult to see a dignified exit. What wonder if many took the cheap and obvious course of exclaiming, “The woman that Thou gavest me!—she is at the bottom of it all?” So far as the explanation went, it was perfectly true: and of course only a few of the pundits saw today with the eyes of tomorrow; only a few realized that the difficulty that was worrying them was a part of a world-wide upheaval involving the whole human race.
Of course there were those who, without taking any extreme view, were admirably sane and dignified. Instance the following letter from Professor Fleeming Jenkin:
“April 5th, 1870.
DEAR MADAM,
I regret that I shall be unavoidably absent on Saturday next, or, as far as might have been possible, I should have supported Miss Pechey’s claims.
I regret my absence the less, however, as it seems to me that the legal question of a particular reward is of far less consequence than the fact of the position which you and Miss Pechey have taken in the class.
Accept my very hearty congratulations and
Believe me, Yours truly, FLEEMING JENKIN.
Miss Jex-Blake.”
Footnote 59:
Brit. Med. Journal, April 16th, 1870.
There was a question of referring the matter to the University Court, but one is glad to think that wiser counsels prevailed. Miss Pechey had gone to her home in the country, and was listening to the nightingales.
“Thank you for Masson’s letter,” she writes to S. J.-B. “He is a grand fellow. Wilson has sent me the minutes of the Senatus meeting about the scholarship. I suppose I ought to write to him. I wish you were here to tell me what to do.
You understand that I leave you to do as is thought best about the scholarship,—only remember that my own judgment—apart from personal feeling—is against appealing, and that I do not wish to do so unless our friends are very decisively of opinion that we ought to.”
Well might Miss Pechey say, “He is a grand fellow.” Professor Masson had taken up the cause of the woman as wholeheartedly as if it had been a matter of vital import to himself. At the next meeting of the General Council of the University, he moved (seconded by Professor Balfour) that, instead of having separate instruction, women should be admitted to the ordinary classes of the University. The original draft of the motion was as follows:
“That, as the present arrangements for the medical instruction of women in the University impose great and unnecessary inconveniences on the women who are students, and also on Professors, and may, if continued, even nullify the resolution of the University admitting women to the study of medicine [and as it will not be to the credit of the University that it should pretend to do a thing and not do it],[60] the General Council recommend to the University Court that women desiring to study medicine be admitted to the medical classes as other students are, and on the same terms, except in cases where the Court may see special reasons why the instruction should be separate.”
“The motion is longish,” he says, “but I thought it well to have something which, when printed, would explain itself and attract attention of members of Council.... I am the more convinced that we do right in moving the General Council as above, even if we should lose, because I distinctly perceive a relapse on the part of those who had merely acquiesced, and a kind of exulting feeling on the part of others that the experience of the session may be pleaded in proof that the University perpetrated a troublous blunder when it admitted Eve’s sex at all. This state of feeling will be but temporary; but it is time that the opposed forces should meet in full conflict on the mixed-classes question.”
Footnote 60:
The words in brackets were omitted from the resolution, but introduced in the speech supporting it.
“Full conflict,” indeed, it proved. The opponents brought forward arguments that called forth an indignant interruption from the Professor of Moral Philosophy (Dr. Calderwood); and the Times, while disapproving of mixed classes, stated in a leading article:
“We cannot sufficiently express the indignation with which we read such language, and we must say that it is the strongest argument against the admission of young ladies to the Edinburgh medical classes, that they would attend the lectures of Professors capable of talking in this strain.”[61]
The motion was lost by 47 votes to 58.
“No speaking on our side could have changed the vote,” wrote Professor Masson, “those present were all predetermined. Crum Brown did well, and administered a proper reproof to L. Struthers was present and voted with us; so did Nicolson (who was quite in earnest when the time came), and Dr. Craufurd, who avows himself a convert. On the other hand, Wilson, Bennett, Charteris and Tait, of our side, were absent, reducing our number somewhat. People today are consoling me—for I was really downcast—by saying the result was a success in its kind, and an omen of final success when the thing comes up again, as it must. All very well; but how shall I console you? What are you to do this year? The only thing I disliked in Crum Brown’s speech was his opening statement that he thought the motion perhaps premature, the time not having elapsed for the experiment of the other method. Premature! This in face of his own refusal to continue, and in face of his subsequent declaration that the existing method is impracticable! Still he said and did well. What shall I say but that my heart is sore for your immediate discomfiture? Time—a year or two—will rectify the thing generally, here and elsewhere; but how you are to get on with us is the question. Christison, who draws Turner, Lister, and Sanders (L. is nothing) with him, seems determined to get rid of you, and trusts to effecting this by mere continuance of the present arrangement. Whether you can wriggle on with us by any ingenuity in the hope of beating him is for your consideration. Would it might be so!
Ever yours truly, DAVID MASSON.”
Footnote 61:
The Times, April 25th, 1870.
The view that the result of the motion was a success in its kind proved to be a general one, and the matter was discussed at great length by newspapers, lay, medical and religious.
“There is no possible reason,” said the Guardian,[62] “why a very large proportion of instruction may not be given with perfect propriety to men and women together; but there are clearly some parts in a medical course which cannot be so treated, and there ought to be no difficulty whatever in making arrangements for these. To provide separate lectures for a few special occasions is a very different thing, both in the matter of convenience and expense, from insisting on having two distinct and separate courses throughout in every department.... Professor Masson’s motion was defeated, but by a majority so small—eleven in a meeting of a hundred and five—that its success at some future time seems certain. Let the ladies only add to the exercise of one quality, with which the world credits them, that of patience, another, which is supposed to be a less common attribute of their sex, perseverance, and they will assuredly gain their point.”
“The female students almost deserve this rebuff,” said the Spectator,[63] “for making the concessions they have done to English prudery, concessions not made either in France, Austria, or the United States. The only safe ground for them to stand on is that science is of no sex, and cannot be indelicate unless made so of malice prepense, and that by the very conditions of the profession the modesty of ignorance must be replaced by the modesty of pure intent.”
Footnote 62:
April 27th, 1870.
Footnote 63:
April 23rd, 1870.
It is not to be supposed that the women students were fortified by a unanimous chorus of journalistic support: far from it: some six or seven months later the Spectator strove to understand “the bitter and, so far as we know, the unprecedented malignity with which women who aspire to be Doctors are pursued by the literary class.”
One does not wish to dwell on this. It was simply bound to be. As Sir James Stansfeld said seven years later in reviewing the whole movement:
“It is one of the lessons of human progress that when the time for a reform has come you cannot resist it, though, if you make the attempt, what you may do is to widen its character or precipitate its advent. Opponents, when the time has come, are not merely dragged at the chariot wheels of progress—they help to turn them. The strongest force, whichever way it seem to work, does most to aid.”
It is the more pleasing, however, to record the sane and wholesome view taken from the first by the leading responsible papers, including Punch.
“I am very vexed about the General Council,” wrote Miss Pechey from her home; “but it’s no use worrying,—at least so the nightingale tells me. She sang two hours at my bedroom window last night, and said all sorts of pretty things. I wish I could bring her to Edinburgh with me, but she wouldn’t like it; besides they are a very old family, and have lived in the place from the time of the Britons, so she wouldn’t like to move.
Papa did not write to the Scotsman. I knew he wouldn’t unless someone told him what to say; and I believe, if the truth were told, he still has some lurking prejudice against mixed classes. He isn’t a bit scientific, never notices the butterflies and beetles in a walk unless I point them out to him, and there are lovely ones now, peacocks and brimstones and tortoiseshells.”
It is clear that just then Miss Pechey was having a very good time. She was the woman of the moment, a lion abroad as well as in her country home, and she had the courage and the sense to enjoy the position quietly and without making a fuss. Moreover both she and S.J.-B. were human enough to appreciate the situation all the more because, from the ordinary point of view, the heroine was a truly pretty girl, as disarming as heroine well could be.
VII. PRACTICAL DIFFICULTIES
Perseverance—“wriggling on”—was thus the course recommended to the women by stranger and friend alike.
The Professor of Botany (Dr. Balfour, formerly Dean of the Faculty of Medicine) who had wished to admit them to his ordinary class, made arrangements to teach them separately. Professor Allmann also had declared his willingness to admit S. J.-B. to his class of Natural History (see p. 234) but he did not feel able to follow the generous example of his colleague in devoting special time and energy to the purpose. Fortunately the women had a second string to their bow in the person of Dr. Alleyne Nicholson, lecturer in the Extra-Mural School,[64] and their application to him called forth a letter which shows what the difficulties were which even a kindly and open-minded man had to face.
Footnote 64:
Appendix D.
“April 26th. 1870.
DEAR MISS BLAKE,
I have not as yet succeeded in obtaining a positive assurance as to the legality of my admitting you to my ordinary class, though I no longer entertain any doubt as to my perfect freedom in the matter, so far as the University is concerned. I have, however, consulted several of my colleagues, and they are tolerably unanimous in advising me to submit the question to my class.... They advise me, namely, not to commence abruptly on Monday without any warning, but to give my opening lecture separately, to my ordinary class at one o’clock, and to you at 2 p.m. At the conclusion of the hour I should explain to the students how matters stand, and should ask their permission to make over to you a bench in the general class. This is the advice which is given me, and I have no doubt as to its wisdom.
I am fully aware that this will not be nearly so satisfactory to you as unconditional permission on my part; and I must beg you to believe that it is in many respects far from being so satisfactory to my own feelings in the matter. If I were a thoroughly independent man I can assure you that I should not be deterred from doing what I thought right in this question by any fear of the consequences. As things really stand, however, I do not feel justified in running the risk of losing my ordinary class in whole or in part, as I am assured I should do if I were to attempt to introduce this innovation wholly without warning. If I knew my class, if I had the opportunity of even two or three days’ acquaintance with them, I think I should have little to apprehend as to their behaviour on any such question as this. You will remember, however, that I am dealing with an unknown quantity in making up my mind as to the course I shall adopt; and that I am wholly without adequate data to guide me in my determination.... My present opinion is that whilst I have every wish to admit you to my general class, it will be safest for me to submit the question to my class and to abide by a decision of the majority.”
Apparently S. J.-B. obtained a verbal, but satisfactory, modification of this programme by suggesting that the class should be asked “to unite with the lecturer in inviting” the women to join them, but that was a mere matter of detail. Everything depended on the way in which Dr. Nicholson stated the case, and one is not surprised to hear that the favourable reply came not from a majority, but from the entire class. “So,” says S. J.-B., “the first ‘mixed-class’ was inaugurated and continued throughout the summer without the slightest inconvenience.”
“The course of lectures on Zoology which I am now delivering to a mixed class,” wrote Dr. Nicholson later in answer to a mistaken statement in a medical paper, “is identically the same as the course which I delivered last winter to my ordinary class of male students. I have not hitherto emasculated my lectures in any way whatever, nor have I the smallest intention of so doing. In so acting, I am guided by the firm conviction that little stress is to be laid on the purity and modesty of those who find themselves able to extract food for improper feelings from such a purely scientific subject as Zoology, however freely handled.”
This was all very well, but the classes so far obtained were mere outposts. The real Giant Difficulty lay with Anatomy and Clinical teaching, and that session’s work was complicated, for S. J.-B. in particular, by a constant undercurrent of effort to obtain the necessary teaching. It was essential that the teacher, if not a Professor, should at least be recognized by the University, and there were representatives of the University who were not desirous to make the matter easy. Over and over again hopes were raised, only to be disappointed: on one occasion the lecturer, after much parleying, had actually agreed to do the work and had accepted his fee; but, even at that late stage, he backed out and returned the fee with an apology. (“How vexed I was!” says S. J.-B., “thoroughly upset and nervous.”) It happened repeatedly, too, that the men who would have liked to help had already on some other question taken up a position unpopular with their more conservative confrères, and simply dared not espouse another fighting cause.
S. J.-B. was urged to go to Zürich and fit herself to teach Anatomy; but what assurance had she—what encouragement had she even to hope—that the University would recognize her teaching on her return? And what were the other students—a growing number—to do in the meantime? Try their fortune elsewhere?—and brave the inevitable, “Lo, these who have turned the world upside down are come hither also”?
Once and again some chivalrous man took up their cause, refusing to believe that the difficulty was real; but little by little he was apt to find that the intangible mist of opposition was as impervious as an iron wall.
It was due to Dr. Arthur Gamgee that Dr. Handyside finally agreed to admit the women to his ordinary Anatomy class and dissecting-room at Surgeons’ Hall, provided the other lecturers made no objection: and, so far the arrangements for the following winter session were made.
“Saturday, [June] 25th. Called on Dr. Watson[65] (Surgery). He signed my petition readily. Thought if we made no difficulty, no one ought to about mixed classes,—anyone in earnest in his subject should be able to teach all students. Of course the teacher should put his foot down,—the students followed a beck,—and, if invited, would of course make a row, etc....
Saw Keiller too.... Was quite favourable as to Handyside and mixed classes;—he himself having had students and midwives....”
Footnote 65:
Afterwards Sir Patrick Heron Watson.
The question of these mixed classes in the Extra-Mural School was technically an infringement of Regulation 2 in the Calendar (see p. 260), and in this connection it was duly brought before the Senatus of the University, with the proposal to refer the matter to the University Court; but Professor Bennett moved, seconded by Professor Tait, “that the Senatus see no reason to interfere.” This amendment appears to have been carried by the casting vote of the Principal.
“So that’s settled,” says S. J.-B.
“How fast events go! I really hope for mixed classes in the University before 1871.”
She forgot to allow sufficiently for the fighting force of a large minority, led by an angry few.
Meanwhile that wonderful Mother was following the struggle, not indeed with the minute study Miss Du Pre was giving to the question, but with the old unfailing sympathy. Like Miss Pechey’s father, she had been rather staggered at first at the thought of mixed classes, but shortly after this she writes:
“DARLING,
I don’t now at all object to mixed classes. As the teaching must at present be given by men, I don’t see why there should not be mixed classes to listen: and I feel confident if you continue to have such a nice set of women, the tone of the young men generally will be greatly raised. If mixed classes answer so well at Zurich and Paris, why not here?—but I confess to great ignorance.”
Intellectually, the supply of women showed no sign of falling short. With the advice and coöperation of Miss Garrett, Lady Amberley had offered a scholarship for competition at the October Matriculation Examination, and S. J.-B. proudly jots down the verdict of the examiners on their work:
“‘Miss Barker’s Logic paper best ever had from medical students.’
‘Miss Bovell’s French best in University except one Frenchman’s.’
‘Miss Walker had the only 100 per cent. in Mathematics.’
Classical examiner wrote,—‘I was very much struck with the accuracy as well as elegance of some papers.‘”
Of course a woman—or a man for that matter—may pass a brilliant examination in Mathematics or Chemistry, and yet be unable to keep her head at a difficult midwifery case; and it was perfectly right and fitting that men doctors should recognize and even emphasize this fact. One would not have wished them to do otherwise. It was fortunate for the women, however, that their opponents were apt to state their case with a conspicuous want of any sense of humour, as the following letter from the Lancet[66] sufficiently exemplifies:
“SIR,—In all popular movements, however one-sided and irrational they may seem, there is some foundation of truth, the grain of common sense in the bushel of chaff. And so it is with the movement that is now taking place with respect to the admission of women into the rank of medical practitioners. I believe most conscientiously and thoroughly that as a body they are sexually, constitutionally, and mentally unfitted for the hard and incessant toil, and for the heavy responsibilities of general medical and surgical practice. At the same time I believe as thoroughly, that there is a branch of our profession—midwifery—to which they might and ought to be admitted in a subordinate position as a rule.
In France, and in many other parts of the Continent, this division of labour in Midwifery is fully carried out, and with great advantage to both parties—to the regular practitioner, who is relieved of part of his most arduous, most wearing and most unremunerative duties, and to the women who have a vocation for medicine, who are able, thus, in large numbers, to gain a respectable living in the profession they wish to practise.
I think I may safely say that there are very few medical men who have been ten years in practice, who would not gladly, thankfully, hand over to a body of well-educated and friendly midwifes their half- guinea or guinea midwifery cases. To a young practitioner there is the charm of novelty, and the desire to improve, which make remuneration altogether a secondary consideration. But after ten years‘ practice, often long before, a very decided change comes over the spirit of the dream.”
Footnote 66:
June 18th, 1870.
The part of the letter that follows is perhaps too technical for quotation; but the writer continues on the general question:
“I would add in conclusion that, given women of exceptional energy, capacity, and intelligence, nothing would be easier than for them, if deserving, to rise out of the midwifery ranks into a wider sphere of activity and worldly success. Let them show by their energy, by their writing, by their contributions to the progress of medical science, that they had exceptional powers of observation and intellect, and fame would soon reach them. It has reached the very few women, who, like Mrs. Somerville, have given evidence not only of mere ability and talent, but higher powers, the power to grasp the more recondite and abstruse teachings of science. But even this power—the power to master and understand the existing state of science—does not constitute the characteristic feature of the male mind in the Caucasian race. The principal feature which appears to me to characterise the Caucasian race, to raise it immeasurably above all other races, is the power that many of its male members have of advancing the horizon of science, of penetrating beyond the existing limits of knowledge—in a word, the power of scientific discovery. I am not aware that the female members of our race participate in this power, in this supreme development of the human mind; at least I know of no great discovery changing the surface of science that owes its existence to a woman of our or of any race. What right then have women to claim mental equality with men?
That woman may attain an honourable social position and pecuniary independence in our ranks in the position I point out, is proved by a case that came under my observation last year. A German lady M.D. in a German University, called on me on her way home from San Francisco. She told me that she had been practising there as an accoucheur and a ladies‘ and child’s doctor for twenty years, had gained a small fortune, and was returning to Germany to live and die in quiet. Her history was this: Early in married life her husband lost his fortune and became a confirmed invalid. She had thus her husband and two children to support. She studied midwifery and medicine, took a degree, and then went to America, settling at San Francisco. There she placed herself in a subordinate position to the medical men, acting with them, under them, and consequently supported by them. She had thus lived harmoniously with her professional brethren, and had had a career of uninterrupted professional success.
I remain, Sir, your obedient servant, HENRY BENNET, M.D.”[67]
Footnote 67:
Not to be confused with Dr. Hughes Bennett, who had lectured to the women on Physiology.
One can imagine the somewhat grim smile with which this lucubration was passed round the little band in Edinburgh: and it is only fair to say that many of their opponents would have been glad to cry:—“Non tali auxilio, nec defensoribus istis!” The Lancet was not the advocate of the women students in those days, and one is glad to record that the Editor allowed S. J.-B. the opportunity to reply. Her letter is a fair sample of the style of writing that was becoming habitual to her,— translucently clear, concise and businesslike,—absolutely shorn of the picturesqueness that had characterized the writing of her youth.
“SIR,—I see in your columns of June 1st, 1870, a letter on ‘Women as Practitioners of Midwifery,’ and appeal to your sense of fairness to allow me a fourth part of the space it occupied for a few words in reply.
It is hardly worth while to discuss the early part of the letter, as the second paragraph sufficiently disposes of the first. After saying that women are ‘sexually, constitutionally, and mentally unfitted for hard and incessant toil,’ Dr. Bennet goes on to propose to make over to them as their sole share of the medical profession what he himself well describes as its ‘most arduous, most wearing and most unremunerative duties.’ In the last adjective seems to lie the whole suitability of the division of labour according to the writer’s view. He evidently thinks that women’s capabilities are nicely graduated to fit half-guinea or guinea midwifery cases,‘ and that all patients paying a larger sum of necessity need the superior powers of the ‘male mind of the Caucasian race.’ Let whatever is well paid be left to the man; then chivalrously abandon the ‘badly remunerated’ work to the women. This is the genuine view of a trades-unionist. It is well for once to see it candidly stated. As I trust the majority of medical men would be ashamed of avowing such a principle, and as I am sure it would be indignantly disallowed by the general public, I do not care to say more on this point.
But when Dr. Bennet proceeds to dogmatise about what he calls our claim to ‘mental equality,’ he comes to a different and much more important question. I for one do not care in the least either to claim or disown such equality, nor do I see that it is at all essential to the real question at issue. Allow me to state in a few words the position that I and, as I believe, most of my fellow-students take. We say to the authorities of the medical profession,—‘State clearly what attainments you consider necessary for a medical practitioner; fix your standard where you please, but define it plainly; put no obstacles in our way; either afford us access to the ordinary means of medical education, or do not exact that we shall use your special methods; in either case subject us ultimately to exactly the ordinary examinations and tests, and, if we fail to acquit ourselves as well as your average students, reject us; if, on the contrary, in spite of all difficulties, we reach your standard, and fulfil all your requirements, the question of ‘mental equality’ is practically settled, so far as it concerns our case; give us then the ordinary medical licence or diploma, and leave the question of our ultimate success or failure in practice to be decided by ourselves and the public.’ This is our position, and I appeal, not to the chivalry, but to the justice of the medical profession, to show us that it is untenable, or else to concede it at once.
I am, Sir, your obedient servant, SOPHIA JEX-BLAKE.
Edinburgh, June 21st.”[68]
Footnote 68:
Lancet, July 9, 1870.
Nothing conciliatory here: no appeal for help for “the wee bit thing,”— the appeal that some men in those days used to find so disarming: nothing even in the spirit of the “Now remember, Daddy dear,” of those delightful controversial letters of her girlhood. It is a fair field and no favour with a vengeance now.
Possibly she might have shortened the battle if she had adopted a more conciliatory attitude. One might say the same of many of the martyrs. Had she done so, it would have meant a smaller battle,—a victory far more limited in its results. If a new move is being effectively made, it is almost always overdone. That is in the scheme of things. If there were not faults on both sides, there would be no dramatic action,—no “story”; and the world would go on its sleepy way, and pay no attention. “Individuals, feeling strongly, while on the one hand they are incidentally faulty in mode or language, are still peculiarly effective.... The very faults of an individual excite attention; he loses, but his cause (if good, and he powerful-minded) gains. This is the way of things; we promote truth by a self-sacrifice.”
* * * * *
Here then were the opposing forces, duly ranged against each other. One can almost imagine the move and countermove that were bound to ensue. And we must not forget the element furnished by the great mass of the students—though there were “individuals” here, too, of course—on the look out for mischief and fun, rejoicing in a row, ready “to follow a beck” as that wise Heron Watson had said.
VIII. THE RIOT AT SURGEONS’ HALL
S. J.-B.’s medical experience in America had consisted mainly of practical hospital work, and that chiefly in connection with the special diseases of women. She had done a little dissecting in a rough and ready way, and the privilege of what she then considered “real teaching” had just been put within her reach when she was called home by the illness of her father. She had this advantage, however, over her fellow- students,—she knew that the “horrors” of the dissecting-room have only to be faced in a spirit of serious intention in order to be dispelled. She knew by experience that one must pull oneself together in the first instance for fear of doing irreparable damage to the dainty structures that lie almost as cunningly hidden in surrounding tissue as the future statue lies in the block of marble; and she knew that, little by little, the privilege of laying bare that marvellous “handiwork” becomes so enthralling as to make the earnest student oblivious to everything else.
The Anatomy Class began formally in November, but the rooms were open and teachers present from the beginning of October, for those who cared to attend; so the women had the advantage of meeting in the first instance only the keener of the students, or at least those who were working with a special object in view. The women would gladly have had a separate room, had this been available, but in their quiet corner they worked away steadily, forgetful of all beyond. And everything went well. Never, the lecturer said, had better work been done in his class-rooms.
Meanwhile influential friends were doing what in them lay to forward the interests of the women in other quarters; for it must be remembered that, as matriculated students of the University they ought not to have been compelled to study in Extra-Mural classes, and indeed it was only a limited number of such classes that would be accepted for the University degree. On October 28th a motion was brought forward in the General Council of the University in favour of affording farther facilities to the lady students. The motion was met by a direct negative, Professor Christison asserting in the course of his speech that Her Majesty Queen Victoria had expressed her concurrence in the views that had been put forth on a previous occasion by Dr. Laycock and himself. If there was any truth in this, one can only speculate as to the form in which the story had reached Her Majesty’s ears,—certainly not through the medium of a leading article in the Times. What weight her reported opinion may have carried it is impossible to say, but, in any case, when put to the vote, the negative was carried by 47 to 46.
(“Well, try again next year!” says S. J.-B.)
In reading the whole story, one is struck over and over again by the narrowness of the majority by which things were turned. Great is the responsibility of the weak and cowardly, the lazy and double-minded,—the “unstable” who call themselves impartial.
At this stage, wisely or not, the women were advised to apply for permission to work in the wards of the Royal Infirmary. This was the only hospital in Edinburgh large enough to fulfil the requirements of the General Medical Council for registration as a medical practitioner, and the women were entitled to the privilege in virtue of their Matriculation tickets. They knew that some of the doctors were in their favour. Here are two of the “thumb-nail sketches” from the diary:
“Saturday, Oct. 29th. Dr. Watson,—most friendly. Only too happy to have us as pupils. Could not anticipate difficulty about Infirmary, etc....
Dr. Littlejohn foresaw the ruin of his son by women doctors, but ‘would drink the bitter cup to its dregs,’ and vote for us.”
Their request, however, was met by a curt refusal.
“Monday, October 31st. Refused us dead.
Gordon says, ‘Try a written memorial!’ Wood says he believes their charter compels them to admit all medical students.
Qui vivra verra.”
It is obvious that they had approached the very stronghold of the enemy. Might is right and possession nine points of the law. The matter lay in the hands of a body of Managers who were obviously judging the case as represented to them by the medical party in power; so now the duty fell upon the women of explaining their position as far as possible to those in whose hands the decision lay.
“Friday, Nov. 4th. Just put down this day’s work for a specimen! Studying and canvassing at once,—
8.45. Started for Surgeons’ Hall.
9-10. Tutorial class, bones.
10-11. Surgery lecture.
11-1. Dissecting.
1-2. Anatomy Lecture.
2.10 Reached home and found a letter from Mr. Blyth (Manager) telling me to meet him at 2 p.m.!! Got there (after bolting beef-tea and wine) at 2.45. Talked at him for nearly an hour with good results, I believe. Got back home 3.40. Bolted some food, and went
4 p.m. Demonstration exam. Didn’t know the Acromion but got 13/20 marks.
Home to dinner.
7 p.m. Started on round of calls.
Home at 10 p.m. Not tired,—oh, dear no!”
“I don’t like you to be a perpetual battering ram,” writes Miss Du Pre, “for I suppose battering rams do wear out after a good many sieges; but still I thoroughly like and admire your ‘never say die’ feeling, and it is a fight with something worth fighting for to be got at the end, which is a great thing.
If only I could be with you!”
One must read the following letters, which were laid before the subsequent meetings of the Board, in order to realize how strong and sane the position of the women was:
“November 5, 1870.
MY LORD AND GENTLEMEN,—As lecturers in the Edinburgh Medical School we beg most respectfully to approach your honourable Board, on behalf of the eight female students of this school whom, we understand, you object to admit to the practice of the Royal Infirmary. On their behalf we beg to state:—
1. That they are regularly registered students of medicine in this school.
2. That they are at present attending, along with the other students, our courses of anatomy, practical anatomy, demonstrations of anatomy, and systematic surgery, in the school at Surgeons’ Hall.
3. That as teachers of anatomy and surgery respectively, we find no difficulty in conducting our courses to such mixed classes composed of male and female students sitting together on the same benches; and that the presence of those eight female students has not led us to alter or modify our course of instruction in any way.
4. That the presence of the female students, so far from diminishing the numbers entering our classes, we find both the attendance and the actual numbers already enrolled are larger than in previous sessions.
5. That in our experience in these mixed classes the demeanour of the students is more orderly and quiet, and their application to study more diligent and earnest, than during former sessions when male students alone were present.
6. That, in our opinion, if practical bedside instruction in the examination and treatment of cases is withheld from the female pupils by the refusal to them of access as medical students to the practice of the Infirmary, we must regard the value of any systematic surgical course thus rendered devoid of daily practical illustration, as infinitely less than the same course attended by male pupils, who have the additional advantage of the hospital instruction under the same teacher.
7. That the surgical instruction, being deprived of its practical aspect by the exclusion of the female pupils from the Infirmary, and therefore from the wards of their systematic surgical teacher, the knowledge of these female students may very reasonably be expected to suffer, not only in class-room examinations, but in their capacity to practise their profession in after life.
8. That our experience of mixed classes leads us to the conviction that the attendance of the female students at the ordinary hospital visit, along with the male students, cannot certainly be more objectionable to the male students and the male patients than the presence of the ward nurses, or to the female patients than the presence of the male students.
9. That the class of society to which these eight female students belong, together with the reserve of manner, and the serious and reverent spirit in which they devote themselves to the study of medicine, make it impossible that any impropriety could arise out of their attendance upon the wards as regards either patients or male pupils.
In conclusion, we trust that your honourable Board may see fit, on considering these statements, to resolve not to exclude these female students from the practice of, at all events, those physicians and surgeons who do not object to their presence at the ordinary visit along with the other students.
Such an absolute exclusion of female pupils from the wards of the Royal Infirmary as such a decision of your honourable Board would determine, we could not but regard as an act of practical injustice to pupils who, having been admitted to the study of the medical profession, must have their further progress in their studies barred if hospital attendance is refused them.—We are, my Lord and Gentlemen, your obedient servants,
P. D. HANDYSIDE, PATRICK HERON WATSON.”
The second letter was a petition signed by the lady students, the famous “Septem contra Edinam,” as they were called, enclosing Paper A and Paper B. It may be well to give the names of the gallant seven once for all: Sophia Jex-Blake, Mary Edith Pechey (Mrs. Pechey Phipson), Isabel Thorne, Matilda Chaplin (Mrs. Ayrton), Helen Evans (Mrs. Russel), Mary Anderson (Mrs. Marshall), Emily Bovell (Mrs. Sturge).
“November 5, 1870.
Paper A.—We, the undersigned physicians and surgeons of the Royal Infirmary desire to signify our willingness to allow female students of medicine to attend the practice of our wards, and to express our opinion that such attendance would in no way interfere with the full discharge of our duties towards our patients and other students.
J. HUGHES BENNETT, GEORGE W. BALFOUR, PATRICK HERON WATSON.”
In paper B, two other medical men expressed their readiness, if suitable arrangements could be made, to teach the female students in the wards separately.
“15 Buccleuch Place, Nov. 13, 1870.
MY LORDS AND GENTLEMEN,—To prevent any possible misconception, I beg leave, in the name of my fellow-students and myself, to state distinctly that, while urgently requesting your honourable Board to issue to us the ordinary students’ tickets for the Infirmary (as they alone will ‘qualify’ for graduation), we have, in the event of their being granted, no intention whatever of attending in the wards of those physicians and surgeons who object to our presence there, both as a matter of courtesy, and because we shall be already provided with sufficient means of instruction in attending the wards of those gentlemen who have expressed their perfect willingness to receive us.— I beg, my Lord and Gentlemen, to subscribe myself your obedient servant,
SOPHIA JEX-BLAKE.
To the Honourable the Managers of the Royal Infirmary.”
Now the managers of the Infirmary were worthy folk as human nature goes, “several” of them, says S.J.-B., known to the women as “just and liberal-minded men,” so it is not surprising that a majority were sufficiently moved by these arguments to desire that the request of the women be granted. On the ground of want of notice, however, the party in power got the matter deferred for a week.
And now, clearly, the moment had come when every effort must be made to turn the women out altogether. If they carried their point at the next meeting, all might well be lost.
It was at this juncture that, for the first time, some of the students began to make themselves unpleasant, “shutting doors in our faces, ostentatiously crowding into the seats we usually occupied, bursting into horse laughs and howls when we approached,—as if a conspiracy had been formed to make our position as uncomfortable as might be.” A students’ petition against the admission of women to the Infirmary was handed about, and 500 students signed it.
So the majority gained their point, and the party in power won an easy victory.
“Follow it up,” said someone. “Don’t stop there. While you are at it, why not get rid of the women altogether?”[69]
Footnote 69:
This is a neutral and harmless paraphrase of the arguments some of the professors actually used in talking to the students, but one does not want to perpetuate the memory of words used in an angry conflict.
It was not a surprising suggestion; the presence of the women was making some people very uncomfortable; but those who made the suggestion must have had a pretty good idea of how the students would proceed to carry it out, and what class of student would take the lead.
For a day or two a feeble and cowardly effort was made to obstruct the entrance of women into the class-room, but S. J.-B., followed by her companions, simply failed to see the students who half-heartedly stood in her way, and walked through them.
And then came about the “riot at Surgeons’ Hall”, of which so much has since been said, and of which Charles Reade made picturesque use in his novel, The Woman Hater.
In order to get a plain, unvarnished account of what took place, we cannot do better than quote the Courant[70] (the only Edinburgh morning paper which was unfavourable to the women) and the very brief record in S. J.-B.’s diary:
“A disturbance of a very unbecoming nature took place yesterday afternoon in front of the Royal College of Surgeons, caused by the entrance of the lady ‘medicals’ to the class-rooms. However ungallant it may appear, there is no doubt that many of the students look upon the admission of the ladies to the classes with no friendly eye; but, unfortunately for their own credit, some have adopted a very undignified mode of signifying their displeasure. Shortly before four o’clock, the hour when the ladies arrive at the College, nearly two hundred students assembled in front of the gate leading to the building. As may be readily supposed, there was no lack of animation amongst the students; and, with other popular melodies, ‘The Whale’ and ‘John Brown’s Body’ were sung with more spirit than good taste by at least a hundred voices. Such a noisy demonstration speedily attracted a large crowd, and greatly interfered with the public traffic. Shortly before four o’clock those on the outlook descried the approach of the ladies, and immediately their appearance was greeted with a howl which might have made those who are supposed to be possessed of more temerity, quail, but it seemingly had no effect upon the ladies, for they most unconcernedly advanced towards the gate, the students opening up their ranks to allow them to pass. On reaching the gate it was closed in their face. Amidst the derisive laughter which followed this very questionable action, it must be said to their credit that a number of students cried ‘shame.’ In a short time the janitor succeeded in opening one leaf of the gate, and the ladies were admitted to the precincts, but not before some of them had been considerably jostled.
The anatomical class-room to which they proceeded was crowded to the door, and, in consequence of the noise and interruption, Dr. Handyside found it utterly impossible to begin his demonstrations. With much difficulty, he singled out those students belonging to his class, and, turning the others out of the room, he was about to proceed, when the pet sheep which grazes at the College was introduced to the room, a student jocularly remarking that it would be a good subject for anatomical purposes. Poor ‘Mailie’ was kept a prisoner, and the lecturer was allowed to proceed.”
Footnote 70:
The Courant, Nov. 19, 1870.
“Let it remain,” Dr. Handyside had said, “it has more sense than those who sent it here.”
“When the class broke up, a number of the students seemed determined to accompany the ladies home; but the result was that several of them were apprehended by the police.”
The writer of the diary naturally saw things from a different point of view:
“Friday, 18th. On getting in sight of S(urgeons’) H(all), found mob of students and mixed multitude.
Had to go down to P.O. and to Houlden’s for Mrs. Evans [a most characteristic touch this! in later life S. J.-B. often spoke of herself as ‘a sheep dog grown old.’] Then crossed road, ... Mrs. T[horne] and I in front, then Mrs. K[ingsley] and others.
Reaching pavement, way cleft for us by one or two, till gate reached and clashed in our face, by smokers inside. I placidly leant on it outside, mid cries of ‘Shame,’ ‘Let them in,’ etc., till Sanderson sprang forward and forced it open and in we went,—Mrs. K. not, [she] remaining outside to hear ‘very bad language, in which I didn’t join.’ (To S. M. M.’s great amusement.)
Then we went in and had demonstration,—some rushed in after us.
Dr. Handyside went out and remonstrated, etc. Then sheep introduced.
We passed rather good examination. Then at end H. asked if we would go out by back door. ‘Oh, no,’ I said, ‘I am sure there are enough gentlemen here to prevent any harm to us.’ And so we went, Hoggan and Sanderson pioneering,—S. M. M. said she got hit,—Wilson came up and took Mrs. K.’s arm (to our momentary fright), then we proceeded home, escorted by
a. gallant cavaliers, b. police, c. general mob, d. all boys and girls of the town.
“Monday, 21st. Had warning of a ‘more serious demonstration’, so Wilson swore in the Irish Brigade. I asked Professor Wilson about it, and he requested Turner to keep his class till past five,—they were let out at 4.45![71]
Footnote 71:
One hopes this fact was incorrectly reported; it has never been contradicted. Possibly the Professor was annoyed at being asked to effect that by force which could safely be confided to the gentlemanly feeling of his students.
However, it being rainy, there was almost no crowd.
“Tuesday 22nd.... The Irish Brigade filed in to demonstration, and then escorted us home,—some 30 or 40 in all. One woman hissed. W. as we came to crossing regretted it ‘hadn’t been swept,’ etc.—otherwise all quiet. The O’Halloran squired E. P., called her ‘ma belle,’ declared ‘a loife wasn’t much, but all the Irishmen would lay down theirs before we came to harm,’ etc.
And in the passage, the same mighty chief shook my hand nearly off, vowing the pleasure it would give him and his to be any service to us, etc., etc.
They gave us a great cheer when they got to the door.
In the crowd B. heard,—‘You know they’d never do it if they could get married.’ ‘Eh, you‘re wrong there, there are some very good-looking ones among them.‘ ‘Eh, now, see the students escorting them home,— isn’t it pretty?’
And O‘Halloran’s troubles with his men. ‘For God’s sake, look after X.! It’s his first night out, and he’ll be wanting to distinguish himself,—he’ll be hitting a policeman!’
Altogether great ‘demonstration in favour,’ as Daily Review says.
“Wednesday, 23rd. Same escort, though little necessary.”
The Wilson who swore in the Irish Brigade, has, of course, no connection with Professor Wilson. He was a student, and remained throughout life a loyal supporter of the cause.[72] His letter, written on the Sunday following the riot, is interesting:
“DEAR MISS PECHEY,—I wish to warn you, and, through you, your friends, that you are to be mobbed again on Monday. A regular conspiracy has been, I fear, set on foot for that purpose. I wish you to tell your friends that, although the projected demonstration against you on Monday is intended to be much more serious than the one on Friday, and to frighten you all away, you need not in the least fear it. I have made what I hope to be efficient arrangements for your protection. I have passed the word round amongst a lot of my friends—not wholly inexperienced in the kind of work—and you will be all right.
I had a meeting with my friend, Micky O’Halloran who is leader of a formidable band, known in College as the ‘Irish Brigade,’ and he has consented to tell off a detachment of his set for duty on Monday. Micky was the formidable hero with the big red moustache who stood by us on Friday and whose presence with us rather disappointed the rioters who, I think, calculated on the aid both of himself and his set. I have taken care of that, and I believe the mere demonstration of the fact that you have men on your side able and willing to protect you, will deter the mob from even an attempt at a row.
They are a cowardly lot, nearly all very young, and I don’t think they have even one amongst them, who has had experience of the days when street-rioting was one of the accomplishments Edinburgh students were acquainted with, so they are not likely to be very troublesome. I believe they’ll ‘cave in’ if you only show a brave front. I have considerable influence also with the Highlanders in College, and expect to get a good deal of help from them, when I pass the word round tomorrow.
May I venture to hint my belief that the real cause of the riots is the way some of the professors run you down in their lectures. They never lose a chance of stirring up hatred against you. For all I know they may have more knowledge of the riotous conspiracy than most people fancy. However, as I tell you, you and your friends need not fear, as far as Monday is concerned. You will be taken good care of.
Yours faithfully, ROBERT WILSON.
P.S. I would have sent this communication through Mrs. Kingsley, but as I have no chance of seeing her tomorrow, and as you are her friend, I send it to you.”
Footnote 72:
In January, 1886, Mr. Robert Wilson had an article, “Æsculapia Victrix,” in the Fortnightly Review.
Mr. Henry Kingsley was at this time editor of the Daily Review, and almost as redoubtable a champion of the cause as Alexander Russel himself. Of Mrs. Henry Kingsley’s loyalty it is impossible to speak in exaggerated terms. In the drawing-room, in the columns of a newspaper, and on the platform, she was equally ready to defend a fighting cause, and to correct the numerous misapprehensions that sprang up in connection with it. She attended the scientific classes without any idea of qualifying as a doctor, mainly for the purpose of identifying herself with the movement, and with people who had her wholehearted sympathy and admiration.
The news of the “Riot” went forth over the whole world, and the indignation roused by the matter of the Hope Scholarship was as nothing compared to that called forth by this escapade. “We trust the authorities of the medical school at Edinburgh will visit exemplary chastisement on the cowardly cads—we have no milder name for them—who could so conduct themselves towards the ladies who paid them the compliment of supposing they could act like gentlemen. Edinburgh has ceased to be so attractive as she was as a centre of education.” This was a fair specimen of the indignant criticism called forth, and one is glad to record that none were more prompt to disown the delinquents than the more reputable of the students themselves. Some few papers, even of some standing, espoused the cause of the rioters; and, in order to do this, it was perhaps almost necessary to represent the women and their doings in a way that disgusted all decent-minded men,—“a brutality,” said the Spectator, with reference to a given article, “of which a costermonger quarrelling with a fishwife would be ashamed.”[73]
Footnote 73:
Spectator, December 3, 1870.
Some of us can imagine, too, the style of anonymous letter which the women received, and such letters were rather terrible to the women of those days.
“‘Well!—we are about in the deepest waters now,—that’s one comfort,’ says S. J.-B.”
“‘What do you think your constitution is made of that it will stand such overwork?’ writes Miss Du Pre at this time. ‘You will be a real martyr to the cause, if you don’t take care. Yet I know you never needlessly use up one atom of strength, so I get a fearful idea of what the amount of work must be. I do wish you could just sit down to your lessons quietly as the men students can.
The two newspaper articles made me nicely angry! I think the —— is the lowest, but, when you get to such a depth it is not easy to measure degrees of lowness. I should think such attacks must make you feel as if all people on the other side were low and mean and wicked,—don’t they? It’s always so hard to believe that one’s opponents may be good and honest and even sensible; but when any of them write such letters as those, I think it must be well nigh impossible.’”
A new Act came into operation at this time, and all the Managers of the Royal Infirmary had to retire from the Board unless re-elected. Now was the time to get in members favourable to the admission of the women, if this could be done. One can imagine the canvassing that took place on both sides.
Here are some characteristic “thumb-nails” from the diary:
“Littlejohn at Police Court,—very uncomfortable talk; he so very candid and honest, but believing he ought to vote against us in Infirmary, because ‘by hook or by crook’ they’d got up such a spirit among the students (L. was ‘ashamed of his sex’) that he was afraid persistence would injure the School.
M.,—£1000 subscriber. Quiet, simple, not narrow or hard,—only not interested previously. Said he ‘must think of it now,’ though his prejudices were against women doctors. I showed him that that was only a detail,—the question of justice lay beyond.
L. R.,—Had nothing to do with it, etc.,—but thought it all improper.
‘The young men in female wards?’... ‘Oh, it was their business’!!”
At the Annual Meeting of Contributors on January 2nd, 1871, the hall at the Council Chambers was crowded long before the advertised hour, though that hour was one o’clock. Proceedings began with a hot dispute among the civic magnates as to the propriety of adjourning to the High Church (St. Giles’ Cathedral) which would seat a larger number of people,—the representative of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners declaring that the Police Court would be a more suitable place, but allowing himself to be over-ruled on a point of law by Mr. Duncan M‘Laren, M.P. for Edinburgh. By the time the move to the church had been effected, everyone was “rubbed up the wrong way,” and there was a good deal of squabbling and noisy interruption before the main question at issue came on at all.
The Lord Provost himself proposed the election of six men known to be in favour of the women students, and an amended list was proposed by one of the Infirmary Medical Staff. Warm language was used on both sides, and interruptions were frequent. This was the atmosphere in which S. J.-B.— in the capacity of a subscriber—asked leave to speak.[74]
Footnote 74:
Someone has pointed out that she was the first woman to speak in St. Giles’ Church since Jenny Geddes threw her stool at the minister.
She was, as has been said, one of the finest women speakers of her time; but, even in her maturity, she was wont to suffer beforehand from an access of nervousness, of which, happily, no trace was obvious when the crucial moment arrived. What she must have suffered on this first occasion in Edinburgh we can imagine. We know that she was over-worked and tired, and that her honest resentment had been raised to the highest pitch by the way in which some of those in authority were inciting the students to make trouble. It was deliberately said later by certain grave and responsible Edinburgh citizens that she had suffered “unexampled provocation.” She wished the contributors to know the real truth of the situation, and she was resolved that the presence of her adversaries should not deter her from giving a plain, unvarnished account of what had taken place. She had realized the danger of failing from cowardice; but, in her inexperience, she had not realized the danger of going to the other extreme: and that was what she did. Part of her speech might quite justly be described as a direct personal attack on one or two individuals.
She spoke well, of course, but she owed her gift to Nature, in no way to Art: and she was confronted by those—double her age and more—who had learned the full value of outward calmness and urbanity in debate.
She had many friends in that church, and most of them must have suffered acutely: not because they did not agree with her, but because they did. Some whose allegiance was of little value, or who had come with “an open mind,” probably went over to the enemy. One is almost surprised to hear that it was only by the usual narrow majority—94 to 88 in this instance— that her cause was defeated.
And yet, perhaps, one ought not to be surprised: for courage and honesty make their own appeal; and the sore heart-burnings of generous adherents are a fire in which great things are kindled.
Of course hostile papers jeered. The Church Review went out of its way to take up the matter. As it began by severely criticising on literary grounds the speaker’s use of the words “realize” and “emanate,” one wonders that it ever came to the end of its indictment at all.[75]
Footnote 75:
At a later date (1872) the Church Review became definitely friendly.
We quote the part of the speech that was destined to lead to farther proceedings:[76]
“I want to point out that it was certain of these same men, who had (so to speak) pledged themselves from the first to defeat our hopes of education and render all our efforts abortive—who, sitting in their places on the Infirmary Board, took advantage of the almost irresponsible power with which they were temporarily invested, to thwart and nullify our efforts. I believe that a majority of the managers desired to act justly in this matter; but the presence of those bitter partisans, and the overwhelming influence of every kind brought to bear by them, prevailed to carry the day—to refuse us not only admission on the ordinary terms, but also to refuse us every opportunity which could answer our purpose. I know of the noble protests made against this injury by some of the most respected and most learned members of the Board, but all their efforts were in vain, because strings were pulled and weapons brought into play of which they either did not know or could not expose the character. Till then, during a period of five weeks, the conduct of the students with whom we had been associated in Surgeons’ Hall, in the most trying of all our studies, that of Practical Anatomy, had been quiet, respectful, and in every way inoffensive. They had evidently accepted our presence there, in earnest silent work, as a matter of course, and Dr. Handyside, in answer to a question of mine after the speeches at the meeting of the General Council, assured me that, in the course of some twenty sessions, he had never had a month of such quiet earnest work as since we entered his rooms. But at a certain meeting of the managers when our memorial was presented, a majority of those present were, I understand, in favour of immediately admitting us to the Infirmary. The minority alleged want of due notice of the question, and succeeded in obtaining an adjournment.
What means were used in the interim I cannot say, or what influence was brought to bear; but I do know that from that day the conduct of the students was utterly changed, that those who had hitherto been quiet and courteous became impertinent and offensive; and at last came the day of that disgraceful riot, when the college gates were shut in our faces and our little band bespattered with mud from head to foot. (“Shame.”) It is true that other students who were too manly to dance as puppets on such ignoble strings, came indignantly to our rescue, that by them the gates were wrenched open and we protected in our return to our homes. But none the less it was evident that some new influence (wholly distinct from any intrinsic facts) had been at work. I will not say that the rioters were acting under orders, but neither can I disbelieve what I was told by indignant gentlemen in the medical class—that this disgraceful scene would never have happened, nor would the petition have been got up at the same time, had it not been clearly understood that our opponents needed a weapon at the Infirmary Board. This I do know, that the riot was not wholly or mainly due to the students at Surgeons’ Hall. I know that Dr. Christison’s class assistant was one of the leading rioters—(hisses and order)—and the foul language he used could only be excused on the supposition I heard that he was intoxicated. I do not say that Dr. Christison knew of or sanctioned his presence, but I do say that I think he would not have been there, had he thought the doctor would have strongly objected to his presence.
Dr. Christison—‘I must again appeal to you, my Lord. I think the language used regarding my assistant is language that no one is entitled to use at such an assembly as this—(hear)—where a gentleman is not here to defend himself, and to say whether it be true or not. I do not know whether it is true or not, but I do know my assistant is a thorough gentleman, otherwise he never would have been my assistant; and I appeal to you again, my Lord, whether language such as this is to be allowed in the mouth of any person. I am perfectly sure there is not one gentleman in the whole assembly who would have used such language in regard to an absentee.’
Miss Jex-Blake—‘If Dr. Christison prefers——’
Dr. Christison—‘I wish nothing but that this foul language shall be put an end to.’
The Lord Provost—‘I do not know what the foul language is. She merely said that in her opinion——’
Dr. Christison—‘In her opinion the gentleman was intoxicated.’
Miss Jex-Blake—‘I did not say he was intoxicated. I said I was told he was.’
The Lord Provost—‘Withdraw the word “intoxicated.”’
Miss Jex-Blake—‘I said it was the only excuse for his conduct. If Dr. Christison prefers that I should say he used the language when sober, I will withdraw the other supposition’ (laughter).”
Footnote 76:
Scotsman, January 3, 1871.
The Pall Mall,[77] chuckling sympathetically over this and another repartee, wisely concluded:
“It is sincerely to be hoped that these unhappy little differences will soon come to an end. It cannot be to the advantage of anyone that lady students should be pelted with mud, or that they should use the power of retaliation displayed by their champion at the Royal Infirmary meeting on Monday.”
Footnote 77:
January 5, 1871.
So the conflict deepened, and it would have been small wonder if all but the very brave had taken fright.
But Edinburgh did contain some very brave people besides the women students.
At the meeting on January 2nd, the Revd. Professor Charteris had been ruled out of order in some matter, but, at the earliest opportunity he returned to his point, and brought forward a motion, expressing the desire of the contributors that immediate arrangement should be made for the admission of the ladies to the Infirmary. This motion, seconded by Sir James Coxe, M.D., was lost by a small majority.
Several things happened at that meeting, however, which were of more value to the cause than a formal victory would have been:
A petition was read, signed by 956 women of Edinburgh, expressing “our great interest in the issues involved, and our earnest hope that full facilities for hospital study will be afforded by the Managers to all women who desire to enter the Medical Profession.”
More important still was the appearance of Mrs. Nichol, a well-known and most gracious elderly lady, endowed with the very fragrance of early Victorian womanhood, who came forward to ask a question,—“not,” she said, “in the interests of the lady students, but on behalf of those women who looked forward to see what kind of men were they who were to be the sole medical attendants of the next generation, if women doctors were not allowed.”
“If the students studying at present in the Infirmary cannot contemplate with equanimity the presence of ladies as fellow-students, how is it possible that they can possess either the scientific spirit, or the personal purity of mind, which alone could justify their presence in the female wards during the most delicate operations on, and examinations of, female patients.”
Yes, there were very brave people in Edinburgh besides the women students.
This question was received with “laughter, hisses and applause,” and no one ventured on a reply. No one except the rougher of the students who were assembled in the gallery on the look-out for a lark. They howled their appreciation of the question; but it was only when S. J.-B. rose to speak—and of course she had to pay the penalty of having rashly described them as “puppets”—that they really let themselves go,—shouting and yelling and pelting her with peas.
“Well,” said Professor Blackie, “ye can now say ye’ve fought with beasts at Ephesus.”
As a matter of fact she had not meant to speak again, but one of the professors had left her no alternative. In the course of a long speech he had asserted that, in consequence of mixed education, a college in America “had become so degraded that a woman who respected herself shrank from the contamination, and preferred to renounce the benefit of years of study rather than don the academic robe of one of its graduates.”
“Name the college,” said S. J.-B., and other voices took up the cry of “Name!”
“He spoke on authority.” (A voice—“What authority?”) “On the authority of Miss Blake herself, who ... when asked why she had not pursued her studies instead of coming here, told him that the character of female medical students in America had so deteriorated that she could not consent to stay.”
It cannot be easy to speak when one has awaited one’s opportunity through a storm of hooting and pea-throwing; but now indeed S. J.-B.’s fine courage and truthfulness shone out like the sun:
“She wished merely to give an absolute, unqualified denial to Professor X.’s statement respecting her. She never made the statement he asserted she had made. During her whole visit to America she had never spent one whole session in any medical college whatever.... It was true she had studied two years in a woman’s hospital, and every day’s experience there had made her long more and more to see women in charge of their own sex—(Great interruption and cries of ‘Order’)—and it was her experience in that hospital and her knowledge of the ladies connected with it [One can almost hear her inward cry, ‘Oh, Lucy!’] that made her devote her life to getting medical education for herself and also for other women.... Some of the friends she was proudest of were women doctors in America who had been educated there entirely, and in regard to whom she scarcely knew any equals and certainly no superiors.”
It was only in answer to repeated calls that Professor X. rose and said, “He was sure there was not an individual in that meeting who would not give him credit for having given what he believed to be the correct version of what occurred according to his recollection two years ago— (Hisses and cheers)—between Miss Jex-Blake and himself. If he had misconceived what had been said, or if his memory had failed him and he had stated what was not correct, he begged to apologise, as it was purely unintentional.” (Applause and hisses.)
A somewhat disappointing outcome this, of a long course of training in scientific exactness.
It was now that the Professor of Moral Philosophy (Calderwood) rose, profoundly stirred beneath the calm and judicial demeanour that seldom failed him, and pointed out that Professor X., while speaking to the amendment “that the question (of the women students) be left to the unbiassed decision of the Managers,” had voluntarily given them a fair average specimen of an unbiassed opinion!
There are worse adversaries, in fact, than the honest beasts at Ephesus.
A sore heart lay behind that jest of Professor Blackie’s if one may judge by the following letter:
“24 Hill Street, Edinburgh. 20th January, 1871.
MY DEAR MISS BLAKE,
It is of no consequence to you, my poor sympathy with you all at present, and my utter horror of the conduct of your enemies; but I wish to tell you how saddened my husband was by all he saw and heard at the Infirmary meeting last week. He sat at tea-time shading his eyes, and saying quietly from time to time, ‘I am ashamed of my sex.’ I never saw him so hurt before. I am sure the unmanly and indecent conduct of these poor ill-led young men, and the untruthfulness of their leaders will ultimately do you good. If men lose our respect and confidence, let them look to themselves. Your admirable letters must do great good.
Pardon this intrusion, and believe me always your true friend,
E. H. S. BLACKIE.”
No less welcome, we may be sure, was this:
Huntly Lodge, Monday Evening.
MY DEAR MISS JEX-BLAKE,
I am feeling inexpressibly for you and your friends this evening, and cannot resist the inclination that has come over me to tell you how deeply grateful everyone who has the welfare of the next generation at heart must feel to you who are so nobly fighting the battle which must soon be gained—the results of which will bear precious fruit, I fully believe, long, long after even your heads are laid in the grave.
You and the struggle you are carrying on remind me so forcibly of the contest which the band of women in America so nobly waged with the demon of Slavery. Your struggle will end much sooner, I trust, than did theirs, but, whilst sympathising with you, I cannot help feeling that the discussion is doing so much to educate people’s minds, that it is better for the cause than if you had met with no opposition; and in the end it may be better for you also, for by the time you are ready to practise, persons will have become accustomed to the idea and ready for you.
Meanwhile tell us if there is aught we outsiders can do for you, and believe me, with love to dear Miss Pechey,
Your affectionate, E. P. NICHOL.
I am sure you will like to know that I don’t feel a bit the worse for this day’s work.
You will excuse haste and some little weariness.”
Once more we are tempted to quote from a delightful budget:
“13 Sussex Square, Brighton, Jan. 19th. 1871.
MY DEAR SOPHY,
One line to wish you many happy returns of the 21st, and most of them quieter than this birthday seems likely to be.
I feel sure you will carry your point eventually, and should recommend you to stick to Edinburgh where you have already so very nearly won.
It must be very harassing at times, and need a great deal of patience: for half the enemy seem wily and half seem roughs.
The speech you last made, when the gallery ought to have been earlier cleared of its noisy occupants, seemed to me excellent: and I thought Maclaren showed great judgment in dealing with the adversary that same day. I should not be drawn much into newspaper correspondence, if I were you; and I doubt if ... was worth powder and shot. But he may be, from personal or local reasons unknown to me.
I feel no doubt whatever of the ultimate victory, but the delay is very fatiguing to the combatant.... Take it easy, and don’t let the enemy make you angry. They are sure to try.
Your affectionate brother, T. W. J.-B.”
Very soon, too, a long letter arrived from women in London,—“to the Lady Students in Edinburgh:
“DEAR LADY STUDENTS,
Let us entreat you to persevere—” and so on.
Here then were both parties firmly entrenched, with no prospect of an end to the combat; but that fire in the hearts of generous adherents was burning steadily. The Lord Provost declined to accept his defeat. He proceeded to call a meeting of citizens, and in a very short time a committee was formed to share a burden that had become far too heavy for the shoulders of a handful of women. The list of sympathizers grew like a snowball, attracting many of the most honoured names in the country, till it became a rallying cry for weaker folk the wide world over. One can best describe the significance of all this in S. J.-B.’s own words, written some fifteen years later:
“To the Committee thus inaugurated, we owe a debt of gratitude which I hardly know how to describe adequately. From that time forward to the close of our battle in Edinburgh, they stood by us with a fidelity and chivalrous readiness to help which was never marred by officiousness or needless interference. In a very short time they lifted from our shoulders the whole burden of pecuniary risk and responsibility, and, by personal and public help of every kind, made it possible for us to continue the struggle in which, without such aid, we should have been hopelessly outnumbered. Where so many gave us such invaluable assistance, it is almost invidious to single out any for special thanks; and yet I cannot refrain from putting on record our extreme debt of gratitude to three men, of whom two have already passed away from among us, viz., the Lord Provost of Edinburgh (William Law), who gave us continually the support of his official countenance and assistance; Mr. Alexander Russel, Editor of the Scotsman, whose advocacy was literally beyond all price in those days, when our one hope and our great difficulty was to get the real truth laid fully and fearlessly before the public; and our still invaluable friend, Professor Masson, whose championship of the weak and oppressed was then, and always has been, worthy of the noblest days of chivalry.”
IX. THE ACTION FOR LIBEL
It is not to be supposed, however, that the dark days were at an end. Far from it. The next act in the drama was an action for libel brought against S. J.-B. by Professor Christison’s assistant.
Of course she took the lawyer’s letter smiling, but it must have seemed well-nigh the last straw, for she was sorely overstrained by the public meetings and all the criticism they called forth; and her entire Christmas holiday had been spent in calling on Infirmary managers. These were naturally of all sorts, from the big bustling prosperous brewer to the refined gentlewoman of equally restricted outlook; and the strain of adaptation to such divers personalities must have been very great.
Even on Christmas Day[78] (a Sunday!) she had been at the Scotsman office, arranging with the Editor for the alteration and publication of various entries on the following day. Things were not made easier by the fact that a heavy fall of snow had been followed by alternating spells of slush and ice. All the other students had gone out of town, and in many ways it would have been better all round if she had gone too. But her supporters simply could not get on without her. She might on occasion be difficult and trying, expecting more of people than they were prepared to give; but no one else could even compare with her in knowledge of all the facts and arguments that might at any moment be called for by the emergencies of a big public controversy. There was no need for professors, editors and others to charge their memories with endless minutiae when S. J.-B. was at hand, clear and concise, as a book of handy reference.
Footnote 78:
“God bless the Massons,” writes Mrs. Jex-Blake, “for cheering my darling on Christmas Day.”
Life was too full this year for the accustomed backward survey at midnight on December 31st; there was no quotation of “May the New Year cherish—” This is the entry:
“Less utterly hopeless tonight,—only so tired. E. P. just back, bless her!”
Well, in any case, here was the lawyer’s letter, and it just had to be faced. There is no reference to it in the diary till long after—indeed, except as a register of facts that have now lost all interest, the diary becomes almost non-existent—but, in a day or two, the news was all over the country. It was more than could be expected of human nature that some of the women students should not have felt aggrieved that the situation had been complicated by their leader’s impulsiveness. On the whole they were loyal, especially the three first recruits, Mrs. Thorne, Mrs. Evans, and “E. P.,—bless her!”
But, as ever, faithful friends gathered round, and, if the postman’s visit had become a thing to be dreaded, he also brought much good cheer. Here is a letter from the wife of a leading minister of religion:
“DEAR MRS. EVANS,
The opposition have ‘crowned the edifice’ by bringing that action of Damages against Miss Jex-Blake,—how unspeakably low and unmanly it all is. I never knew before that saying a man was drunk was actionable; if it is we must be very careful how we speak even of our nearest and dearest. I think a subscription ought to be set on foot at once to pay Miss Jex-Blake’s expenses, and I shall be delighted to contribute my mite.”
One can only quote one or two out of many:
“The Athenaeum, Jan. 23, 1871.
MY DEAR SOPHY,
I will gladly pay half expenses of your action for libel brought by Dr. Christison’s assistant.
I think it vital that you should have the best legal assistance, and win. Be careful, and don’t let them ‘draw’ you into indiscretions that are most forgiveable morally, but damaging to the cause practically.
I don’t the least want to lecture you or assume the Mentor. I only want you to win all along the line.
Your aff. brother, T. W. J.-B.”
The next is written in a clear and clerkly hand:
“Miss Jex-Blake, Ph.D. Edinburgh.
Kinbuck, 7 February, 1871.
MADAM,
We the undersigned desire to express our most sincere sympathy with your cause and earnest hopes for your success.
I am, Your obedient Servants,—”
Follows a list of four names, apparently of young business men. One wonders which of them conceived the bold idea of the “Ph.D.” How gladly they would have made it “M.D.” if they could!
The letter was addressed to “Miss Jex-Blake, Royal Infirmary, Edinburgh,” and is grimly endorsed, “Not for Royal Infirmary.”
One more letter we are tempted to quote with very mingled feelings:
“19 Inverleith Row, Edinburgh. 27 January 1871.
MY DEAR MISS JEX-BLAKE,
I see that Mr. C. has raised an action against you. If you have not already fixed on a counsel to defend you, will you allow me to propose that you should employ my son-in-law, Mr. Trayner. I propose this, not for his advantage but your own, as I am quite sure from the great interest he would take in your case, and also that I know you would find in him, not only an able advocate, but a kind friend, that you would have no cause to regret the choice.
Believe me, dear Miss Jex-Blake, Very truly yours, MARGARET WYLD.”
From another source one learns that Mr. Trayner [now Lord Trayner], if employed, would have done the work without fee, from sheer sympathy with the cause.
The pity of it! One cannot help feeling how differently things might have gone, if S. J.-B. had availed herself of this suggestion. “The best legal advice” is an expression capable of varied interpretation, and of course S. J.-B.—young and inexperienced—was guided by her solicitors. It is possible, too, of course, that the advice was good.
Young and inexperienced she was in matters of this kind,—full of hope that she, who had nothing to hide and everything to gain from full publicity, would see herself substantially justified in an open court of law.
On the whole, public opinion was against her. All sorts of stories were rife, many of them entirely false, some with just that grain of truth that makes a lie so deadly. When the Winter Session came to an end in March, the President of the College of Physicians and the President of the College of Surgeons both announced that they would not preside at the prize-giving if lady students were to be present and to receive their prizes on this occasion.
On the other hand S. J.-B. was, of course, much sought after by outsiders who admired her talent and courage. In April she was urged by the leading women suffragists of the day to speak at a Suffrage meeting in London, and, after consulting Professor Masson and other friends in Edinburgh as to the probable effect on her own “Cause,” she agreed.
“Darling,” writes her sorely-tried Mother, “speaking at a public meeting will be anything but restful. You positively require rest to go on with the real work and worrying work before you. May you be guided aright.”
The speech took place, however, and was a great success. Her “pathetic voice” and clear exposition of the argument deduced from her own trying experience are referred to repeatedly. This was her first public association with a cause of which, throughout life, she was one of the sanest and most practical exponents.
It was in the course of this visit to London, too, that she made the acquaintance of Mr. (afterwards Sir James) Stansfeld, whose influence was to prove so priceless in the farther development of the movement.
Meanwhile the law ran its slow and expensive course.
“Monday, May 22nd.... White Millar wants to know if I will say C. ‘wasn’t drunk’ if he on his side allows that I ‘had been told so.’
I don’t want to be too obstinately pugnacious, but I hate the idea of giving a handle to people to say I ‘ate my words’. Calderwood wisely says it should be a sine qua non that the public should know the overture came from them, and I should like also to make C. own he was ‘Foremost among the rioters’.
“Tuesday May 23rd. I have just accepted Lord Advocate at fee of £200, so now it shall go on unless they pay costs....
“May 26th, Friday 10 p.m. ‘Where the wicked cease from troubling and the weary are at rest.’
How inclined one feels to turn one’s face to the wall and say with Elijah, ‘Lord, take away my life, I am not better than my fathers’.
The obstinate lying of these students in preference to giving any information possibly useful to us;—the constant hisses and rudeness even in the streets,—J’s insolent civility, especially to Miss B.,— those two scamps shouting ‘Whore’ after S. M. M., as she crossed the George Square Gardens yesterday evening, etc.
Oh, dear, I hope Tuesday at least will end one worry satisfactorily. I think it must clear me morally at any rate!—and yet I have that nervous quiver through me as when one wakes with nightmare. I wonder if any such hysterical wretch ever had to do such work as mine!
And yet what good friends and helpers! Gilbert’s ever ready kindness, Wilson’s hearty interest, ‘Well, if you lose on Tuesday, even you will not be more vexed than I shall’.”
The case came on for trial on May 31st. On the morning of the day, S. J.-B. received the following letter from her Mother:
“God’s protection and blessing be with you, my own precious child. I will not harass and plague you by writing further than to assure you I am in spirit present with you.
Your loving, M. E. J.-B.
I am quite well, and picturing how calm and collected you are, and how many many are thinking of you with friendly thoughts.”
The case lasted two days. It was reported verbally in the Scotsman and other daily papers. “Throughout the day the Court-room was densely crowded, many ladies being among the audience.” For many, of course, this was the first opportunity of seeing these amazing women, and for some time the provincial and weekly papers ran riot in impressions of this kind:
“Mrs. Thorne succeeded as witness, and the assembled public thought it very hard that she should be neither odd nor eccentric. Why was she married? She was a medical student and ought not to be married. Sedate, quiet and ladylike-looking, and dressed in an unobtrusive fashion, and yet fairly within the pale of orthodoxy, Mrs. Thorne confused the minds of many.”
“Miss Pechey was the sole remaining witness, and created a good deal of fresh interest. A tall figure and a classically shaped head with dark hair, are generally supposed to be the attributes of young ladies who keep to their ‘sphere.’ That female medical students should dare to be good-looking, dare to be married, dare to be dressed in good taste, is, of course, an unpardonable crime.”
“Great interest of course was manifested in [Miss Jex-Blake’s] appearance in the witness box. Plainly dressed in black, with white round her neck and wrists, she presented the appearance of a tall and well formed, handsome and determined woman, with dark hair and eyes. She was perfectly cool and collected, and her manner was a great contrast to the nervousness of Dr. Christison and the ‘smartness’ of Dr. Bell.”
So much for the “hysterical wretch”!
In truth the women had learned their lesson. There was no bitter, impulsive speaking now. They said what they meant to say, and they said it well and with restraint. “These customers are composed!” a man in the back of the Court was heard to exclaim.
As has been said, S. J.-B. had everything to gain from publicity, from a full exposure of the facts. The worst she had done had been to state her case in public without fear of persons, without much tact and discretion, though with no exaggeration of the actual truth. The public had already passed judgment on her. She was now on her defence, desirous only of asking her opponents, under cross-examination, to deny the truth of what she had said.
But the law of libel is an intricate and parlous thing. S. J.-B. had been told by several people of standing—including her teacher and his assistant—that Professor Christison’s assistant had been a ringleader in the riot; but she did not know of her own knowledge that he had been so.
“I wished,” she says, “to plead the substantial truth of my statement; but, being, of course, ignorant of Scotch law, I was overruled by my Counsel, among whom was the Lord Advocate of Scotland (Young), on the ground that I could not personally prove the truth of what I had said, as indeed I did not know the young man by sight, and it would be held an aggravation of the injury to plead ‘Veritas’ in a matter which was, after all, only one of hearsay. I was assured that, if the case came to trial, abundant opportunity would be given to prove the young man’s real conduct in the matter.”
This opportunity, however, was relentlessly withheld.
The case for the defence was one to rejoice the heart of a brilliant counsel, being full of technical opportunity,—and to a brilliant counsel it fell. So entirely did Mr. Shand (afterwards Lord Shand) rely on his own bow and spear to win the day,—and it must be admitted that there was nothing else to rely on—that he dared to risk the conclusions which must inevitably be drawn from his omission to call the pursuer as a witness on his own side; he dared to provoke a laugh by saying that Mr. C. “was not so fond of public appearances as the defendant.” He laid down in his opening statement the law that must govern the case, and with dogged tenacity, he brought the Judge and everyone else in Court to heel. Lord Mure, as it chanced, was easily led. The choice of a Judge in Scotland lies with the pursuer, and in any case it might not have been easy to find one in those days who had a prejudice in favour of women doctors.
One is glad to know that the protagonist appeared “cool and collected” to the indifferent observer, but she must have been on the rack much of the time, for the “substantial truth and right” for which she longed, got no chance at all, or rather they saved their lives only by losing them, so to speak; and that is one of time’s revenges that youth cannot foresee.
The full report of the case appeared in the Scotsman of May 31st and June 1st. The following extracts are taken mainly from the Edinburgh Evening Courant, because they are slightly abbreviated, and because they appeared in a paper unfriendly to the cause of the women.
“There could be no doubt,” said the advocate for the pursuer, “that, however injurious the arguments she used might be, if they were justified by facts, it was perfectly open to Miss Jex-Blake to maintain that her statements were true, and to take what is called an ‘issue in justification,’ for the purpose of establishing upon her own issue, as counter to the present one, what she said. But she had not chosen to do that: it was not pretended that the statements were true; and therefore the only question the jury had to try was, practically, whether those statements were to the pursuer’s loss, injury, and damage.[79]”
Footnote 79:
Scotsman, May 31, 1871.
This argument, fair enough as coming from an advocate, represents to all intents and purposes, the attitude adopted by the Judge. The case positively bristled with arguments, but the humblest appearance of a really relevant fact brought Mr. Shand to his feet with a taboo.
“Thomas Sanderson deponed in answer to Mr. M‘Laren—I am a student of medicine and last winter I attended Dr. Laycock’s class. On the 18th November I was at the gate leading to Surgeons’ Hall. There was a large crowd of students and a larger crowd of other people at the gate. The students were both inside and outside the gate. The majority were University students. I assisted the ladies to pass through the College gate. I was pulled about a little by the students. The students were hooting, and oaths and offensive expressions were used.
Among the students inside the gate did you recognize Mr. C.?
Mr. Shand (to witness)—Don’t answer that question.
Lord Mure sustained the objection.
Mr. M‘Laren—Did you see Mr. C. at any time on the 18th November?
Witness—Yes.
Where did you see him?—At the Surgeons’ Hall.
At what time of the day did you see him?—A few minutes after four o’clock.
How was Mr. C. conducting himself?
Lord Mure disallowed the question.
E. C. C., examined by the Lord Advocate, deponed—I am the pursuer in this action. I was twenty-one years of age last August.
You remember the riot at Surgeons’ Hall on the 18th of November?—I do.
Where were you?
Mr. Shand objected to this question. His Lordship had already ruled that no evidence could be led as to whether the witness took part in these proceedings; and it seemed as if the Lord Advocate was attempting to evade his Lordship’s decision.
Lord Mure said this was a general question and he allowed it to be put to the witness.
The Lord Advocate—Where were you at the time? Witness—At what time?
At the time of the riot?—I was at the College of Surgeons during part of the time.
When did you go there?—Three o’clock.
When did the riot begin? Shortly after four.
What were you doing between three and four?—I was in the class for practising physic.
When did it come out?—A few minutes before four.
Was there a mob of students at the gate?
Mr. Shand—Your lordship will understand that I am objecting to all these questions.
The Lord Advocate—Were you present during the whole of the riot?
Mr. Shand—I object to that question.
Lord Mure sustained the objection.”
In addressing the jury, Mr. Shand said,
“A slander had been committed and was unrepented, and only by a verdict from the jury could the calumny be wiped off. A nominal sum, however, would be an injury instead of an assistance. Excessive damages[80] he did not ask, but only such a reasonable sum as would mark their sense of the injury inflicted on the pursuer by the statements made in his absence.”
Footnote 80:
The amount claimed—£1000—was only specified when the case came into Court, having been inadvertently omitted from the issue.
The Lord Advocate’s summing up was humorous in the extreme, and called forth peals of laughter at the pursuer’s expense; indeed in the end he almost went so far as to produce a counter-wave of sympathy for the victim of his brilliant raillery. But, indeed, nothing could be made of the case as it stood.
In the final summing-up, Lord Mure said:
“He had not allowed any evidence to prove that the pursuer had been a leader in the riot, because, according to his view of the authorities on the subject, it was incompetent to allow such evidence in the absence of an issue of justification. The jury had heard the evidence of Dr. Christison and others as to the injury which a man’s character was calculated to sustain from such a statement as had been made use of by the defender; and it was for the jury to judge whether that charge was one which was likely, without retractation or apology, to injure the pursuer’s character.
The jury retired at five o’clock, and at half-past six they returned to Court, and gave a unanimous verdict in favour of the pursuer, assessing the damages at a farthing.”[81]
Footnote 81:
Edinburgh Evening Courant, June 1, 1871.
On the following day a leading article in the Glasgow Herald made the following comment:
“Miss Blake has not pled or proved the substantial truth of her accusations. She has preferred to challenge Mr. C. to prove their falsehood. We are altogether unable to understand why he should not have accepted the challenge, and why he omitted to deny the charges levelled against him. We cannot see how he could have expected a jury to give him substantial damages for his injured reputation when he refused to allow any enquiry into the circumstances in which he stood. The witnesses who were present on the occasion of the riot were not allowed to say whether they saw Mr. C. present at the riot, whether he took part in it, or what he said or did on the occasion if he was present. Miss Jex-Blake is accordingly very properly fined one farthing for her rash and libellous statements, and the public is left to wonder for what earthly reason Mr. C. brought his action. It has only one compensation for the loss of time involved in reading the evidence in a trial which has established nothing. Miss Jex-Blake has completely vindicated the title of her sex to aspire to the highest honours not merely in medicine but in law. She has shown herself a perfect mistress of the art of self defence. In no cricket field this season have there been so many dangerous balls admirably stopped, and so many badly bowled ones dexterously played. If the witness and the counsel could have interchanged positions, the change might possibly have had considerable effect upon the fortunes of Mr. C.”[82]
Footnote 82:
“Of course, as you know, I daresay,” writes Professor Jack to S. J.-B. about this time, “all the articles that appear in the Herald are mine, and especially the good ones.”
But the end was not yet. It was still possible for the Bench to make S. J.-B. responsible for the entire costs of the case, and in due time she was called upon to pay—in addition to the farthing damages—a bill of £915 11s. 1d.
Let it be recorded at once that her brother promptly redeemed his promise, and sent a cheque for half the amount.
As soon as the decision of the Court was made known, one of the jurymen expressed his feelings in a letter to the Scotsman:
“Edinburgh, July 1871.
SIR,—As one of the jurymen before whom this case was tried, I am extremely disappointed to observe from the papers that the Court have found the pursuer entitled to his expenses.
I have been anxiously looking forward to the determination of the case, in the hope that the verdict of the jury would be so applied as to receive the effect which they intended by it.
The jury were of the opinion that the pursuer should have submitted some evidence to them of his non-participation in the disgraceful riot, of which Miss Jex-Blake had so much reason to complain, to have entitled him to a verdict; and they would have made some representation to the presiding Judge on the subject had it been possible to do so.
After retiring, the first thing done was to appoint a foreman. This gentleman turned out to be in favour of a verdict for the defender. With the view of ascertaining the mind of the rest of the jury, he asked us individually to write down on pieces of paper whether we were for ‘libel’ or ‘no libel’. The result was an equal division—six for finding that there was a libel, and six for no libel. This was done a second time with the same result. In this predicament, and after considerable discussion as to the amount of damages, in the course of which I don’t think a larger sum than one shilling was even mentioned, even by those who thought there had been a libel, it was proposed to ask the Court whether the foreman had a casting-vote. This was done, and the Clerk came back and told us he had not. We then asked the Clerk whether we were entitled to find for the pursuer without giving any damages, and he told us we were not. Shortly after, we again sent for the Clerk, and enquired whether a farthing of damages would carry expenses against the defender. He stood a while, and said there was some new Act which provided that a farthing of damages would not carry expenses.
He went out to consult the Judge; but, having got this information from him, we agreed upon our verdict, and rung the bell for the macer at once. I had no doubt of the soundness of the Clerk’s opinion, and in that belief I concurred in the verdict finding the pursuer entitled to one farthing of damages. I certainly would not have done so, had I for a moment anticipated the result which has happened. I think the case a very hard one for the defender, more especially when, but for the opinion given by the Clerk, the verdict might have been in her favour. I think it is due to her that the public should be informed of the circumstances under which the verdict was given, for it seems a very illogical result to affirm that the pursuer had suffered no damage by the alleged slander, or, at least damage of only one farthing, and at the same time to compel the defender to pay a large sum for expenses, especially when the origin of the whole matter was a riot in which the ladies were so badly used.—I am, etc.
A JURYMAN.”
This letter was followed by one from a lawyer:
“Edinburgh, July 12, 1871.
SIR,—I am not surprised at the letter in your publication of to-day, of a ‘A Juryman’ in the above case. The Clerk of Court was in substance correct in his statement to the jury that by a recent Act of Parliament the pursuer in an action of damages is not entitled to expenses if the verdict is for less than £5, but he was wrong in not at the same time informing them of the discretion still left to the Court....
But the thing that strikes me most forcibly in the juryman’s statement is how came it that a Clerk of Court was allowed to speak to the jury at all on such a matter. The public are indebted to the juryman for making this known, because it at once explains what was intended by the verdict. I do not think in the circumstances the verdict is worth anything, and I would strongly advise Miss Jex-Blake to appeal the case, and have the verdict set aside on the ground either of the Clerk’s interference, or that the decision of the Judges is wrong. Certainly the decision on the matter of expenses is very unsatisfactory to the legal profession, especially as it was given without the usual statement of the grounds of judgment.
I am, etc., A LAWYER.”
It remained for Miss Pechey to give her views on the practical outcome of the case. Poor little Hope Scholar! She had travelled far since the days when she had refused to “appeal” because she was better employed in listening to the nightingales.
“Edinburgh, July 13th.
SIR,—I see that a juryman has written to you to say how very ill the recent decision as to the costs agrees with the intentions of the jury, and a lawyer has made clear how extraordinary it is in point of law. Will you allow me to say a few words, from personal experience, on the practical results?
The medical students of Edinburgh have received a hint by which some of them seem well inclined to profit. They have been told pretty plainly that it is possible that there should be a riot got up for the express purpose of insulting women, for one of the very women insulted to be accused of libel when she complains of such conduct, and then for the insulters to escape scot-free, and the complainer to be mulcted in expenses. In fact the moral seems to be that, unless a woman is willing to be saddled with costs to the amount of several hundred pounds, she had better resolve to submit to every kind of insult, without even allowing herself to mention the facts.
I say that some of the students appear to have taken the hint so given; for to this I must think is due the treatment received by myself and some of my friends if we happen to meet students on our way home in the evening. It will possibly strike some people as sufficiently extraordinary that a knot of young men should find pleasure in following a woman through the streets, and should take advantage of her being alone to shout after her all the foulest epithets in their voluminous vocabulary of abuse; yet such is the case. I am quite aware that it would be useless to represent to those students the injury they do to the University and to the medical profession in the eyes of the public, because neither of these considerations would weigh with them for a moment; but it may make some impression on them to be told that the effect of their conduct is really such as they would least desire. Dr. Christison is reported to have said during his examination in Court, that he considered the riot of November to be ‘a great misfortune,’ and from his point of view he was undoubtedly right. If the wish of these students is to bar our progress, and frighten us from the prosecution of the work we have taken in hand, I venture to say never was a greater mistake made. Each fresh insult is an additional incentive to finish the work begun. I began the study of medicine merely from personal motives; now I am also impelled by the desire to remove women from the care of such young ruffians. I am quite aware that respectable students will say, and say truly, that these are the dregs of the profession, and that they will never take a high place as respectable practitioners. Such is doubtless the case; but what then? Simply that, instead of having the medical charge of ladies with rich husbands and fathers, to whom, from self-interest, they would be respectful, they will have the treatment of unprotected servants and shop-girls. I should be very sorry to see any poor girl under the care (!) of such men as those, for instance, who the other night followed me through the street, using medical terms to make the disgusting purport of their language more intelligible to me. When a man can put his scientific knowledge to such degraded use, it seems to me he cannot sink much lower.
How far the recent decisions are calculated to arrest or discourage such conduct, I leave the public to judge.—I am, etc.
MARY EDITH PECHEY.”
One is glad to note that the Lancet now took fire:
“Common candour must compel any unprejudiced person to admit that the fight has been pursued by the orthodox party per fas et nefas, and that the ill-advised conduct of grave and learned seniors in the profession has offered only too plausible an excuse to the heated blood of younger partisans to indulge in coarse excesses.”
It would be wrong to make too much of this ebullition of wickedness from the hearts of “ill-led” boys; but we must not forget that the women were scarcely more than girls, unable to view these things as calmly as we view them now; and all these experiences went to make them the thing they became.
For the iron entered into their souls.
Thirty years later one of their number—a married woman and a physician of standing—was heard to say that on her occasional visits to Edinburgh, she would make a détour of miles rather than pass the gates of Surgeons’ Hall.
“Would you really?” said S. J.-B.
X. SOME FRIENDSHIPS AND HOLIDAYS
Of course S. J.-B. was not allowed to pay one penny of her expenses. The amount was subscribed, and more than subscribed, by sympathizers all over the United Kingdom in the course of a few weeks; and her brother’s cheque was duly returned. It would almost seem as if nothing had done so much to excite public interest and fellow-feeling as that unfortunate speech and the lawsuit to which it led. The very names of those who undertook to receive subscriptions gave a striking indication of the challenge of popular sympathy.[83]
Footnote 83:
Mrs. Hill Burton, Rev. Professor Calderwood, Treasurer Colston, J. R. Findlay, Esq., David Greig, Esq., Mrs. Hope of Drylaw, Miss Agnes M‘Laren, Mrs. Nichol, Admiral Sir W. Ramsay, K.C.B., Miss L. Stevenson, and R. S. Wyld, Esq.
There was no lack of criticism and condemnation, of course; the move and countermove went on; but hundreds of letters poured in, bearing witness, not only to the width, but to the depth, of the feeling called forth. Miss Frances Power Cobbe’s impulsive beginning,—“I want words to express my indignation,—” was typical of many. Harriet Martineau, too, was a subscriber and a cordial sympathizer.[84]
Footnote 84:
“If you, as the honoured and trusted representative of us working women, are insulted for us all, the grosser the insult, the more secure you must be of sympathy and gratitude from increasing multitudes of individuals, and of the adoption of our cause as a practical aim by the best part of society in our day.”
A number of subscriptions were returned after the full amount was raised, and many people expressed their disappointment at hearing of the fund only through the announcement that it was closed. “I wish it would open again,” wrote the Revd. Professor Charteris, “even if it were only a little chink.”
Here are two very different letters that one is glad to put on record:
“Inverness, Aug. 3/71.
DEAR MISS STEVENSON,[85]
Assuredly no man could calmly read Miss Jex-Blake’s case, out of or in Court. And, could I do so publicly, I would cast from me with loathing all my once valued connexions with the Edinr. Colleges of Physicians and Surgeons; to show my utter disgust at (with a few honourable exceptions) their unmanly brutal conduct towards Miss Blake and her friends.
On the 9th (D.V.) I shall be in Edinburgh, when I shall call for or write to you. On that day, I hope to get some help from absent friends to add to the mite of
Yours faithfully, J. MACKENZIE, M.D.”
Footnote 85:
Miss Louisa Stevenson and Mrs. Henry Kingsley had kindly undertaken to be Hon. Treasurers of the fund.
“33 Richmond Place, Edinburgh, 24th Aug. 1871.
MADAM,
I beg to enclose a P.O.O. for eight shillings. This small sum is subscribed by a few working men in aid of the fund for defraying the Law expences so unjustly thrust upon Miss Jex-Blake for simply speaking the truth in her own defence in a Straightforward Manner. They deeply sympathise with this lady in the noble struggle she is making for Womens right to a liberal education and remunerative employment. May she be of good cheer, of good courage, and continue steadfast unto the end.
I am, Madam, Your obedient Servant, JAMES GRAY.
P.S. If this subscription be advertised please put it, A few working men—8s. It is payable at the Nicholson Street Post Office.
Miss A. M‘Laren.”
There was almost always an element of comic relief, too, about these tragic and moving situations. The following letter was one of those which provided it in this case:
“58 Altom Street, Blackburn, 15 Aug./71.
MISS JEX-BLAKE,
DEAR MADAM,
Although a complete stranger to you I have long been familiar with your name, and also with your efforts to open the Edinburgh University to Ladies. I understand that you have been in America, you will therefore be familiar with many of the Colleges and Universities there. My wife who is in full practice here has studied Medicine in the Hygeio-Therapeutic Medical College and has obtained her M.D. Degree from the same College. As I am able to influence the Degree of M.D. to either Ladies or Gentlemen who are able to satisfy me as to their fitness to practise Medicine, I thought I would communicate with you, as probably an American degree would answer your purpose until it is possible to procure one from an English or Scotch University.
After all, it is not the degree but the ability of a Medical practitioner that should be appreciated....”
Truly: but the law has something to say about the signing of death certificates, the registration of lunatics, the recovery of fees, and other incidental details. More strawberry jam labels!
The cheque, for over £1000, was presented to S. J.-B. at a public meeting, when there was a large gathering of influential citizens, the faithful Lord Provost occupying the chair. When all expenses were fully paid, a balance remained of over £100, which S. J.-B. asked leave to add to an already existing “nest-egg” for the purpose of founding a future hospital for women officered by women.
The immediate struggle with the University was not made any easier, however, though the “Cause” was gaining ground by strides all over the rest of the world. The Scotsman continued to give a wholesome lead to the press: indeed no woman gained scholastic or other honours anywhere without having her name and achievement duly registered with an implicit Verb. sap. at the end of the paragraph.
One is glad to record, too, that one or two delightful holidays relieved the strain of this year’s work. Mrs. Thorne was proving herself a most valuable representative, not comparably so well versed as S. J.-B. in all the minutiae of the conflict, but certainly less exacting and easier to work with.
Considering the stem from which she sprang—a Tory family of landed gentry—S. J.-B. as prophetess had a surprising amount of honour in her own house. Her conservative old friend, Lady Waldegrave, had written a quite touching letter of appreciation in April of this year; and her Norfolk uncle and aunt, the Revd. Thomas and Mrs. Gunton actually subscribed to the cause and allowed their names to be put on her Committee, though Mrs. Gunton had postponed reading the papers bearing on the subject for some time, from fear that she and her husband would be constrained to refuse.
“How ANY WOMAN can have a desire for the Medical Profession is indeed WONDERFUL,” she writes, “but of course only very talented ones could go through the stiff examinations that are required.”
She remarks too, with complacence, that men doctors will be kept up to the mark when they have to compete against women.
In some remote part of Norfolk, Mrs. Jex-Blake gave her name in a shop, whereupon “a lady stepped forward and said what good work you were doing, but, if we were English, we must think very ill of the Scotch. I said No, you had received far more kindness than unkindness, having had a great many real and warm friends.”
This incident leads one to note that the present year, 1871, saw the ripening into lifelong friendship of S. J.-B.’s acquaintance with Miss Agnes M‘Laren, daughter of the Member for Edinburgh,—a lady who adds one more to the gallery of truly noble women with whom we are brought into contact when reviewing S. J.-B.’s life. At the time of “the Edinburgh Fight,” Miss M‘Laren was engaged in Suffrage work with Miss Taylour, acting as Hon. Secretary to the Association (with no paid subordinate to do the drudgery), travelling on occasion all over Scotland in serious propagation of her principles.[86] She was perhaps the most public- spirited member of a public-spirited family, for the reason that in her the strong purpose, shrewd judgment and liberal sympathies that characterized all, were combined with an instinctive aloofness and even shyness, with a spirit almost of quietism, with a real old-world grace of womanhood.
Footnote 86:
It is interesting to note that at this time almost all public-spirited women thought the suffrage would be granted before the right to a medical education. They had so nearly got it more than once! “You will accomplish nothing,” S. J-B. was sometimes told, “until we get the vote.” And one is grimly amused to find her expressing a serious fear that the suffrage may be granted before she has had an opportunity of hearing her friend, Miss M‘Laren, speak in support of it. She need have entertained no undue apprehension on this score.
She was hailed with something like reverence by the work-worn, hard- driven students at 15 Buccleuch Place, and almost from the first they spoke of her among themselves as “St. Agnes,” a name to which she characteristically took exception as soon as it reached her ears.
“DEAR MISS M‘LAREN,” writes S. J.-B. in this connection,—
“You can’t seriously suppose that anybody in this house,—least of all that I,—should really laugh at you!—though I don’t doubt that you are a great deal too humble-minded to understand in the least the sort of light in which most of us working women do regard you. However we’ll keep our pet name for you to ourselves if you don’t like it.”
And again a few weeks later:
“15 Buccleuch Place, Edinburgh. June 7th.
DEAR MISS M‘LAREN,
Though we all miss you here almost daily, I am unselfish enough to be heartily glad that you are going to Germany. I am sure the change of air and scene must do you good, and the chestnut trees at Heidelberg must be simply lovely now.
When you get to the top and sit and look down at the valley of the Neckar, you may picture me (as a lonely English teacher at Mannheim) going over there on Sundays to church, and climbing to that brow to enjoy the setting sun and the infinite peacefulness and beauty of the whole scene.
I only wish I could be there with you!—If you stay at all at Mannheim, do go and see my old school, the ‘Grossherzogliches Institut’—I think they will still remember my name there,—and I should like so much to hear news of them. They would be electrified to hear of me as a doctor.
I finished up by having scarlet fever there, and shocked them all by refusing to submit to the stupid old German regimen of starvation and shut windows!...
I do most heartily wish you a pleasant journey and great rest and refreshment in it. Do you know that when I got your letter such a longing came over me to see the Rhine again that for a moment I almost thought of asking if you would take me with you, but five minutes reflection showed me how wrong and foolish it would be for me to leave home just now in the midst of term, and with these ‘appeals’ still undecided, and with my petition to the Senatus coming on! But it was a huge temptation all the same!”
This brings us back to the diary:
“Monday June 5th. The trial over at last. ‘Farthing damages’ satisfactory, I suppose.
But I so weary! If I could but get a month’s real rest! I wake feeling driven,—I get through nothing all day, and I lie down tired out at night.
Wednesday, June 7th. Sur ces entrefaites (as my present neighbours would say) came a letter from St. Agnes saying she was to go to Heidelberg on Saturday for three weeks. Instantly—Why shouldn’t I go with her, quoth the Infantine.
Fifty reasons, quoth the Estimable,—law, money, study, Senatus, etc., etc.
Telling Pussy[87] of the temptation overcome, came a proposal to ‘treat Resolution,’ urged by her, E.P., and even Mrs. Thorne.
Footnote 87:
The name by which Miss Louisa Stevenson was affectionately known in the little circle.
Millar [lawyer] said I could be spared.
So Thursday went to London with L. and F. Stevenson,... Good journey. Slept at Hampstead.
Sunday 11th. Morning Stopford Brooke, St. James Chapel, York Street. Stood till sermon, then pulpit stairs....
It might almost have been predicted that S. J.-B. would not pass through Paris in a time of peace. The visit was destined to prove exciting enough. She just dashes down a few polyglot jottings in her diary to serve as stepping-stones for memory later on:
Tuesday 13th. Reached Paris about 6.30. No cabs, no apparent chance of any. At length in streets 2-seated fiacre, drove to [Hotel] Folkestone, was deposited, C. M‘L.[88] returning for others.
Footnote 88:
Mr. Charles M‘Laren (now Lord Aberconway) and Mr. Walter M‘Laren were of the party.
Friday 16th. Writing all above (from 7th. onwards) by open window of Hotel F.—rain falling on market outside. They not back from Versailles, where gone in hope of hearing Assemblé, etc.
Wednesday. After long trudge found ‘voiture de grande remise’ 4 frs. the hour, drove by Luxembourg, Notre Dame, Sainte Chapelle, etc. (Not allowed to lift written scrap from street from heap of ruins by side of Palais de Justice.) Great order and quiet everywhere and civility.
Pantheon dinted with ‘obus’. Hotel de Ville gutted, (with all registers, etc.)—Tuileries, and Palais de Justice Ditto. Ministère de Finances even more utterly in ruins, and houses here and there,—e.g. in Rue Royale by Madeleine and elsewhere.
Hotel de Clugny incendie but unhurt. All along streets notice holes to cellars stopped up with plaster for fear of petroleum.
Thursday. Drove by Champs Elysées, to Champ de Mars, Porte de Neuilly (where such destruction from bombs, etc., vault of railway crashed in,—trees in splinters, etc.) Then by Quaies, into Place de Carrousel between Tuileries and Louvre to Bastille Column and (through bad parts of town ...) to Père la Chaise, with its horrible trenches filled with hundreds of bodies and soaked black with petroleum (clothes, etc., burnt over them?).
Then that ghastly corner where 250 and 140 (‘4, 5 femmes,’) were shot ‘en pleine vigueur’ crying ‘Vive la République!’ as a keen young fossier told with evident sympathy, he having had to stand by,—see the firing, and bury the results.
Today Friday, 16th. The Petit Moniteur gives a horrible circular (torn down last night in the Rue Rochechouard) inciting ‘Travailleurs from every country to join against priests, soldiers and tyrants, and succeed, or nous nous ensevelirons sous les ruines de Paris!’
Fancy crying for fresh bloodshed when steeped in it to the lips now!
Some Frenchwomen at table curiously indignant at our small care about English ‘communists’,—quite unable to understand how the solidarity of national sentiment made such as these late events impossible in England, and then, when I mildly said so, shooting at me:—‘Pourtant, la Révolution où on a tué votre roi!’!!”
“Monday 20th. Went to Versailles to see the Chambre;—unpunctual sitting, I only present during some minutes of debate. Given ticket in ‘D’ by President Grévy.
6.30. Left Paris via Dieppe. 8 hours roughish sea.
Tuesday. Brighton.”
So there was no Heidelberg after all,—no sitting on the brow of the hill to look down on the valley of the Neckar, and recall ces jours heureux où nous étions si misérables. We are not told why S.J.-B.’s holiday was cut so short: perhaps railway communication was broken for the moment, and it proved impossible to proceed: but in any case it may be that the intense and unexpected picture of carnage and strife served to take her more completely out of herself and her worries than the more peaceful experience she would have chosen.
Moreover a real holiday was in store that Autumn, a holiday brightened by a visit from Dr. Lucy Sewall. How much this meant to her one gathers from the following letter, written about this date:
“MY DARLING,
I am so sorry for your loss of poor little Scamper,—I have got a splendid big ‘Collie’ for you here,—the handsomest I ever saw,—if you can take him back with you. If, that is, you must go back; but, oh, Lucy, I do so wish you would stay with us here for a few years.
People are getting wild for women doctors here,—and you might make almost any income, and do quite incalculable good by living here for the next five years.
We have eleven women studying here now, and absolutely no one to give them [adequate] uterine teaching!
This morning I had a quite spontaneous offer of £200 to help found a Women’s Hospital here, and I believe that in a week I could get ten times that amount promised.
You should organize everything exactly as you liked, and, republican wretch as you are, you would be a sort of Queen among us,—and, what you would care for much more, would do quite infinite good to everybody concerned,—ladies, poor women, students, and all.
However, you shan’t be bothered or worried. I think the strongest argument of all will be when you see for yourself how sorely we need you.
I shall not make any definite plans for you till after you come. If you like to stay quietly in Scotland all the time, we will do so, or I will go with you to Zurich or Paris or anywhere you like.... Send me early word of the steamer by which you expect to come, and, if at all possible, I will meet you at Liverpool....
I send you another copy of my Suffrage speech, and hope you have received the newspapers about the trial.
Your very aff. S. L. J.-B.
Turk has put on mourning for Scamper,—crape round his left arm, as they do in the army. He evidently quite understands, for he doesn’t try to get it off....”
The reader will not need to be told that S. J.-B. went out on the tender to meet her friend at Liverpool,—“after awful rush previous day with Surgeons’ Hall, leader, etc.”
Dr. Sewall’s choice of a holiday, happily, was a quiet time, mainly in Perthshire; but, straight from Liverpool, the two fellow-workers went to Shipley to see Mrs. Unwin, whose health had been failing for some time.
The friendship between S. J.-B. and her fellow student had never flagged. S. J.-B. had paid repeated visits to the Yorkshire home, where husband and wife vied with each other in the warmth of their welcome, and where both had proved most loyal advocates and upholders of the new Cause. More than once when a petition was being got ready for Parliament on the subject of the medical education of women, Mrs. Unwin had proved herself a keen and successful canvasser for signatures in her neighbourhood, throwing into the scale that weight of personal popularity which is so important a factor in the achievement of any aim. She had even paid a visit to the beehive at 15 Buccleuch Place, to be made much of by the workers, and to be not a little impressed by the sight of such divers and strenuous activities.
And now she was ill, and S. J.-B. was perfectly sure that, if anyone could bring healing, it was “the little doctor.”
Fresh courage they brought indeed, a little fresh lease of life in which the sufferer recovered strength and proved a renewed source of comfort to husband and children before she was called hence out of their sight; but healing in this world was not to be. Dis aliter visum.
* * * * *
In other respects the holiday was a refreshing one. It included attendance at a meeting of the British Association—great joy for Dr. Sewall—and a stay at an old Perthshire farmhouse, which, to many other attractions in S. J.-B.’s eyes, added the crowning one of a ghost,—a ghost which was visible to the dogs, and abundantly audible to herself and Miss Du Pre, though it failed subsequently to make any impression on the representatives of the Society for Psychical Research.
From the farmhouse as a centre they made delightful excursions, the germ of many subsequent driving-tours in Perthshire, and it was on this occasion that the roadside inn at Fortingal was discovered, with its restful surroundings, cosy interior, and omelettes that constituted a positive object in life to the healthy holiday-maker!
After a farewell visit to Mrs. Unwin, Dr. Sewall sailed for Boston in September, parting from S. J.-B. on the tender at Liverpool. Her “log” was a lengthy one, full of wise observations and reflection, and every word of it was written for S. J.-B....
“MY DEAR ONE,
... I have been thinking last night that if you and I could ever practise together, we ought to do better than either alone, for you have many qualities in which I am wanting. I think if we were together, you would write a valuable book, and so give the world a higher idea of women doctors. I know I shall never succeed in writing a good book by myself.
It hardly seems worth while to make you read all my fancies, but it seems to bring you nearer to me while I am writing, and the days are so long and lonely here.”
“When I lie awake nights and think of you wanting me to help you in Edinburgh, it seems to me as if I must break off from all my ties, and come back to you at once; but then my New England conscience wakes up and tells me that my life must be duty and not pleasure, and I try to be contented with doing the work that God gives me, and trust that when I am really at work it will be all right.
I do hope that you are having a nice quiet time with Miss Du Pre, and getting rested.”
“It is just a week now since I said Goodbye to you, but it seems almost like a month to me. Last night for the first time since I left, I dreamed of having patients instead of dreaming of you.”
XI. THE QUESTION OF PROFESSIONAL EXAMINATION
Apart from the ghost—which was a pure joy, though a very exciting one—S. J.-B.’s holiday was broken in upon by very disturbing rumours.
It was whispered by some of those who might have been supposed to know, that—notwithstanding the paragraphs that still stood in the University Calendar (see p. 260)—an effort would be made to prevent any new women candidates from undergoing the Preliminary Examination, and from matriculating. Worse than this, it was hinted that a similar effort would be made to prevent the women who had been studying for that express purpose for two years, from presenting themselves for the First Professional Examination.
There were positive difficulties apart from these vague rumours. In a previous chapter we saw that the President of the Royal College of Physicians and the President of the Royal College of Surgeons had refused to preside at the prize-giving “if lady students were to be present and to receive their prizes on that occasion.” This announcement was followed by a decision on the part of the lecturers at Surgeons’ Hall “to rescind the permission given last summer to those lecturers who desired to admit ladies to their classes,”—“it being, however, understood that the prohibition should not extend to the instructions by Dr. Keiller [in Midwifery] and others, of women who were not registered students of medicine.”
It was still open to the women, of course, to get Extra-Mural lecturers to teach them elsewhere, if rooms could be found and the necessary arrangements made; but, as regarded the original students, an automatic deadlock arose at this point of which certain Professors unhappily elected to avail themselves:
By the rules of the University only four classes might be taken from Extra-Mural (non-professorial) teachers, and the original students had already taken these four. Professor Christison’s class was one of those that came next in turn, and it would, perhaps, have been expecting too much of human nature that he should have chosen this moment in which to lay down his arms. In any case, he refused point blank.
In this dilemma, the women appealed to the Senatus,—(1) to appoint special University lecturers (assistants to the Professors or others) whose payment the women would guarantee; or (2) alternatively, to relax, in the case of the women, the ordinary regulations, so that they might take an increased number of Extra-Mural classes.
Counsel’s opinion was taken by the Senatus as to the powers of the University in this respect, and, an opinion adverse to the wishes of the women having been received, the Senatus decided by a majority of one to take no action in the matter.
Promptly S. J.-B. and her Committee submitted the facts to other counsel (the Lord Advocate and Sheriff Fraser) and received the opinion (1) that it was quite competent to the University authorities to make any necessary provision for the completion of the ladies’ education: and (2) that the Medical Faculty were bound to admit the ladies to professional examination on the subjects in which they were already qualified to pass.
This latter point was included with special reference to the incredible rumours referred to above.
As the day of the examinations drew near and nothing happened, the leaders among the women began to feel reassured. The following letters, however, show how well-founded their fears were:
“Private.
Oct. 2. 71.
MY DEAR MISS JEX-BLAKE,
I shall be at the Senatus any day you like, unless prevented by something of which I have no present prospect.
I was glad to hear, from my wife, ... that Mr. Fraser has given you a favourable opinion. His view that the Professors are bound to teach all persons who present Matriculation tickets to them, is what I have always held, and I believe often expressed to you. In the same way I should say, they are bound to examine them. What you must do now, then, I fancy, is to present your Mat: tickets and class fees and demand class tickets, and present your Certificates, etc., and demand Examination, and, on either or both being refused, claim a legal remedy. If possible you ought to go to the Court of Session and not to the University Court; and to the 2nd Division, if you have to go beyond the Lord Ordinary. Moncrieff will be much influenced by Fraser’s opinion, whereas Inglis will be influenced, if at all, in the wrong direction. As Chancellor, however, I should think he would himself decline to sit as a Judge in a case which may come before him in the former capacity.
With kind regards from Mrs. Lorimer, believe me,
Yours very truly, J. LORIMER.”
“16 Charlotte Square, Edinburgh. Friday, Oct. 13th. 1871.
DEAR MISS JEX-BLAKE,
... I should very much like to see the legal opinion you have obtained upon the point of legal responsibility as incurred by the University Court in their pragmatic sanction of the lady students matriculating and passing their preliminary examination.
A legal opinion depends so entirely upon the manner in which the matter is laid before counsel, and usually leaves so many loopholes for escape unperceived by a non-professional eye, that I am always jealous of such opinions unless the interpretation thereof is given by someone of good common sense and legal experience....
I shall be at home tomorrow (Saturday) evening at 7.40 p.m. when it will give me the greatest pleasure to see you, if that will suit your convenience.
Is it true that Mrs. de Lacy Evans is engaged to Mr. Russel of the Scotsman?!!!
Most faithfully yours, PATRICK HERON WATSON.”
Here is a significant little letter, too, from the Secretary to the University:
“Inveresk. Oct. 13.
DEAR MISS JEX-BLAKE,
I have instructed Mr. Gilbert[89] to receive the money [for the First Professional Examn.] and give the customary acknowledgments, so that you may be all right with the Dean.
I am bound to call a meeting of Senatus upon a requisition signed by 3 Professors. Secure a day likely to suit your friends. Saturday is not a good day generally, and on Friday 2 or 3 are coming down here to dine,—at least they are asked to do so.
How would Thursday or Monday do?
Yours truly, JOHN WILSON.”
Footnote 89:
Clerk of the University.
That afternoon, we are told, there was a “furious row” in the Medical Faculty, and a day or two later each of the women candidates for the First Professional Examination received a copy of the following letter:
“University of Edinburgh, October 14th, 1871.
MADAM,
I am instructed by the Medical Faculty to inform you that your name and your fees have been received in error by the Clerk of the University as a candidate for the first professional examination during the present month, but that the Faculty cannot receive you for such examination without the sanction of the Senatus Academicus.
I am, Madam, Your obedient servant, J. H. BALFOUR, Dean of the Medical Faculty.”
Two days later S. J.-B. received the following letter with reference to the Preliminary Examination:
“University of Edinburgh, Oct. 16. 1871.
MADAM,
I am desired by the Dean of the Medical Faculty to inform you that he has been interdicted by the Faculty from giving examination papers to ladies on the 17th and 18th curt.
Kindly communicate this fact to the ladies whose names you some time ago handed in to me for this examination.
I am, etc., THOMAS GILBERT.”
It will be noticed that the letter was dated on the day previous to that on which the examination was to take place. Three ladies had come—or were on their way—from various parts of the kingdom to submit to it. If they were not allowed to enter, they would be thrown back in their professional studies for a whole year.
Most women—and men—would have sat down under this blow. S. J.-B. went straight to her solicitor and took him with her to see the advocate (Mr. Fraser). The following is a copy of the letter that was sent by them to the Dean of the Medical Faculty:
“Chambers, 8 Bank Street, Edinburgh. Oct. 16th. 1871.
DEAR SIR,
We have been instructed to obtain the opinion of counsel with reference to the legality of your refusal to admit ladies to the Preliminary Examination in Arts, which will take place tomorrow.
We beg now to enclose the memorial submitted, and the opinion given thereon by Mr. Patrick Fraser, for your perusal, and request that you will, at your earliest convenience, return them to us.
We beg to point out that you are individually responsible if the refusal is persisted in, and that we have been instructed, in that case, to raise actions for damages against you at the instance of each of the memorialists. You will also observe that the instructions of the Medical Faculty, being in themselves illegal, will be no defence against such actions.
We trust that you will, in these circumstances, reconsider the matter, and see fit to retract the refusal, and prevent the necessity of further proceedings.
We are, etc., MILLAR, ALLARDICE & ROBSON, W.S.
Professor Balfour, M.D., Dean of the Medical Faculty.”
There was no loss of time in receiving the reply:
“University of Edinburgh, Oct. 16th., 1871.[90]
DEAR MISS JEX-BLAKE,
I have received the legal notice from your solicitor. Under these circumstances I shall not take the responsibility of refusing the ladies admission to the preliminary examination as heretofore. But I must inform you that I admit them provisionally until the matter is decided by the proper authorities, and without prejudice as regards myself.
I am, etc., J. H. BALFOUR.”
Footnote 90:
The dates of these three letters are correctly given. They were all delivered by hand.
So the ladies were duly examined in the ordinary course.
On applying for Matriculation tickets, however, they were informed by the clerk that the Principal of the University had written him word that, in consequence of representations made to him by Professor Christison, no ladies were at present to be allowed to matriculate. “Of course,” said a friendly professor, “the Principal had no more authority to issue this decree than had the janitor.”
In this case, fortunately, there was time to call a meeting of Senatus, as referred to by Professor Wilson above (letter of October 13), and the necessary requisition was signed by Professors Crum Brown, Tait, and Liston.
[Diary.] “Tuesday 17th. Preliminary examination all right,—Mundy, Dahms, and Miller. Dr. Alex. Wood takes Motion in General Council.
Thursday, 19th. Leader written yesterday, in proof today. I, oh, so tired! Settled about motions in Senatus. Med. Fac. want Lord Advocate’s opinion,—seem shaking in their shoes.
Ah, we will win,—but the price!”
Poor little Despotic Emperor! Where was her Sackermena?
“It may be that the gulphs will bear us down, It may be we shall reach the happy isles....”
“How these worries must increase the difficulties of study in the case of each one of you;” wrote a faithful friend, the Dowager Countess of Buchan, next day. “But then the certainty of success somehow, as the dear Newman used to say, when he meant that there were benedictions in the air; and that you will surely have worked out the greatest possible benefit for womankind for all generations, even if hostilities are prolonged, must be a support now and an abundant recompense, I hope, for all your toils when they are happily concluded.”
About the same time another “honourable woman” was writing:
“SIR,
I venture to trouble you with a post office Order for £2,— payable from me to yourself,—as my small contribution to the Fund needed by the General Committee for securing a Complete Medical Education for Women in Edinburgh.
The question is so important, and the Lady-students have manifested so fine a spirit and temper under the harassing trials, that a large proportion of their countrymen will, I trust, feel the obligation of sustaining them during their conflict with jealousies and prejudices which will scarcely be credited by a future generation.
Permit me to offer you my thanks for the service you render to a good cause by managing the financial concerns of the movement, and believe me, Sir, with much respect.
Yours, HARRIET MARTINEAU.
W. L. Reid, Esq.”
At the Senatus meeting on Oct. 21st., the question of admitting women to the First Professional Examination was discussed, and the Medical Faculty was instructed to examine them. It is interesting to know that all the candidates passed.
But S. J.-B. was not one of them. All her strength was being spent in carving out the way.
It was matter for congratulation, of course, that the schemes of the enemy had been foiled; but the friends of the women in the University were now more anxious than ever to raise the whole question on to a level above these harassing obstacles. At a meeting of the University Council Dr. Alexander Wood moved that “the University is bound in honour and justice to render it possible for these women who have already commenced their studies, to complete them.”
“This,” said the Lancet, “is precisely the ground we have always taken up about the matter; and we hope the General Council of the University will, by the adoption of Dr. Alexander Wood’s motion, put an end to the controversy which has redounded so little to the credit of that school.”
Dr. Wood made a brave and telling little speech, and was ably seconded by Mr. Alexander Nicolson. In moving the amendment, Professor Turner, with great shrewdness, quoted S. J.-B.’s letter to the Dean of the Medical Faculty of two years before (see p. 235), a letter which, at a superficial glance, looked like the weakest point in her case—the letter in which she had signified her willingness “to withdraw my application altogether if, after due and sufficient trial, it should be found impracticable to grant me a continuance of the favour which I now request”; and of course no one present knew enough of the facts to reply. It was only after Dr. Wood’s motion had been lost by 107 votes to 97, that S. J.-B. had an opportunity of pointing out—in the hospitable columns of the Scotsman—that the letter quoted had reference only to the tentative proposal that she, alone and without matriculation, should attend Professor Balfour’s and Professor Allman’s summer courses. This proposal the University had refused, “deferring the whole question till a permanent plan could be arranged and formally sanctioned by all the necessary authorities,—which was finally accomplished after eight months of consideration and delay.”
This is one instance—out of hundreds—of S. J.-B.’s extraordinary ability to refute statements that looked true, that might have been true, that were nearly true,—by a precise quotation of facts. It was an ability that made for her more enemies than friends as life went on. Let it be noted, too, that, but for the generosity of the press, she never could have corrected such statements at all.
“To sum up the whole matter in one word,” she wrote, “I will venture to say, that, instead of the daily trials of the past two years and the apparent deadlock at which we have now arrived, we should have found nothing but smooth paths for our feet, and no difficulties from either students or professors, had Dr. Christison but kept to the promise he voluntarily made to me at the close of my single interview— of two minutes—with him 2 years ago—‘I shall vote against you, but I shall take no measures to oppose you.’”
Once more the Lancet made dignified protest:
“The Edinburgh school has come badly out of its imbroglio with the lady students. The motion of Dr. Alexander Wood, to which we made reference last week, was negatived by a majority of ten. As we then pointed out, the issue before the General Council was neither more nor less than this,—to keep faith with the female students whom the University had allowed to proceed two years in their medical curriculum. The Council was not asked to commit itself in the slightest degree to any opinion, favourable or unfavourable, to the admission of ladies to a medical career. It had only to concede, in common courtesy, not to say common fairness, the right to which the best legal advice had clearly shown the female students to be entitled,—the right to carry on the studies they had been allowed to prosecute half way towards graduation. Will it be believed? An amendment postponing the settlement of the difficulty till it had been duly considered by the authorities of the University, was put and carried; as if there was any more room for ‘consideration’ in the matter! Thus Edinburgh stands convicted of having acted unfairly towards seven ladies, whom she first accepted as pupils, and then stopped half-way in their career.”[91]
Footnote 91:
Lancet, November 4, 1871.
Move and countermove follow with bewildering rapidity at this time. Within a fortnight Professor Muirhead is urging the Senatus to rescind the regulations for the admission of women to the University, reserving the rights of those already entered; and this is passed by a majority of one,—14 to 13.
Eighteen Professors, however, rose up in wrath to protest against this decision, and—as only fifteen, out of a total of thirty-five, could be got to support it,—the regulations of Nov. 1869, were confirmed by the University Court, and everything was left in statu quo![92]
Footnote 92:
“The Court find it inexpedient at present to rescind the said resolutions and regulations, and therefore decline to give effect to the decision of the Senatus. The Court must not be understood as indicating by this deliverance any opinion as to the claims of women to proceed to graduation, or as to the power of the University to confer on women degrees in the Faculty of Medicine.” Commd. by direction of the University Court. J. Christison, W.S., Sec.
* * * * *
Meanwhile—in addition to classes for the seniors—arrangements had to be made for the three new students who had entered. It was probably in connection with these that S. J.-B. received the following letter:
“17 Drummond Place, December 23rd. /71.
DEAR MADAM,
As you will probably be aware before you receive this, I have been utterly unsuccessful in my attempts to bring my Colleague to my own way of looking at the matter in question.
I may mention to you that my own impression, derived from various conversations with several of the most prominent of your opponents, is that they would have but little objection to give you, or at least to make arrangements for giving you, the instruction you seek—provided it were sought as a favor and not claimed as a right—in other words I think many of them are anxious to avoid making what might be called a precedent. This I give you confidentially and merely as an impression, but I have little doubt of its being at least nearly a correct one.
Believe me, dear Madam, Yours truly, P. G. TAIT.”
This was the letter of a wise man, and it might, perhaps, have been better for the cause in the immediate future if S. J.-B. had acted on the advice it contained. Her reply is not forthcoming, but we know quite well that she was not prepared to run the risk involved in acting on the advice. Two women had already secured registration “by a postern gate,” and that was not her aim. She longed—no one more—to write M.D. after her name; but she would, as a matter of course, have foregone that right forever, if, by so doing, she could have opened the gate for all.
XII. THE ROYAL INFIRMARY
A year previously to the date we have reached, Robert Louis Stevenson had written in a letter to his cousin:
“You will probably know how nicely woman’s rights were received by some of my fellow students the other day. The female medicals were hooted, hissed and jostled till the police interfered. My views are very neutral. I quite believe that Miss Jex-Blake and the rest of our fellow studentesses are the first of a noble army, pioneers, Columbuses and all that sort of thing. But at the same time, Miss Jex- Blake is playing for the esteem of posterity. Soit, I give her posterity, but I won’t marry either her, or her fellows. Let posterity marry them. If posterity gets hold of this letter I shall probably be burnt in effigy by some Royal Female College of Surgeons of the future.”
It was many years before this letter was brought to S. J.-B.’s notice, and when it was, she received it with a hearty laugh of genuine appreciation. She enjoyed R. L. S. much more than he enjoyed her, but she had never had the smallest wish to marry him!
He was entirely wrong, moreover, in the assumption that the women students would have to wait for posterity to marry them. This very autumn of 1871—to the profound sorrow and discomfiture of many upholders of the movement—saw the engagement of no less than three of them. Mrs. Evans’ engagement has been already noted in a letter from Dr. Patrick Heron Watson. In a characteristic passage, we learn how the news of it came to S. J.-B.’s ears:
“After my business over with R., I rose to go.
‘Oh, sit down a minute. So your class is thinning?’ [Miss Anderson had been married a month before].
‘Yes,’ quoth I dolorously. ‘We’ve lost one.’
‘And I hear you’re going to lose another!’
‘Oh, no,’ protestingly. ‘I hope not.’
‘But I think so.’
‘Do you? Well, have you heard who?’
‘Mrs. Evans.’
‘Oh, no,—I don’t believe it.’
‘Well, she told me so herself.’
‘Did she?—and who on earth to?’
R. got red up to top of bald crown. ‘Have you no idea?’
‘No,’ (a fib by this time).
‘Really no idea?’
‘How should I?’
‘Well,—she asked me to tell you about it,—does that give you an idea?’
‘Mr. R.!—you don’t mean to say it’s you?’
Great redness, and ‘Yes, I do.’
‘Well!!!—I hope your treachery will go between you and your sleep!’
‘Now don’t you be hard upon her! Will you go and see her?’
‘No, certainly not. The most she can expect is that I don’t send a policeman after her.’
‘And brand her with D?’
‘Yes. You may tell her I won’t do that,—and that’s the utmost she can expect!’
And leaving,—‘Well, I think you’re an uncommonly lucky man, but I hope your conscience will prevent your sleeping!’”
This was all very well, but the blow was a severe one, especially as Miss Chaplin was married—to Professor Ayrton—a month or two later.
“I do hope you and Miss Pechey will remain firm to the end,” writes Miss M‘Laren plaintively, “for really three marriages within six months is quite alarming.”
How many times Miss Pechey was urged to forsake the good fight one cannot even roughly conjecture. Certainly very often.[93]
Footnote 93:
The following scrap has been inadvertently preserved. There is not even any certain indication to whom it is addressed:
“When I came into the Anatomical room and saw you sitting there dissecting, I was overpowered,—utterly conquered. When I spoke to you and you looked up at me to answer, the look you gave me was the coup de mort!—I determined then in my own mind to seek you for my wife....
But to see you as you were then with your superlative beauty, working so bravely, so sensibly,—all fashion, frivolity and folly cast aside,— was to me so new, so strange and so admirable a sight, that on considering and re-considering it, I don’t wonder at myself for flinging aside ordinary prudence to make a snatch at a jewel of such unusual brilliancy.”
It is almost disappointing to reflect that the recipient of this tribute was not equally prepared to “fling aside ordinary prudence.”
There was no time, however, to weep over fallen comrades. One must just give them decent burial, so to speak, and pass on. From this time forth the work in hand must take a two-fold direction:
1. The struggle in Edinburgh must be carried on with unabated energy, as if success were a matter of course.
2. Every enquiry must be made, with the utmost secrecy and discretion, as to a more hopeful solution of the problem elsewhere.
The following letters indicate some of the influences at work:
“13 Sussex Square, Brighton. 1. November.
DARLING,
You must not think I don’t sympathize with you, but I am so vexed and perplexed really I don’t know what to say. I always hope you can see the next step in a clearer and brighter light than I do, and,— you are sure you have my best wishes. I am rather uneasy about you, being sure you must be worn and harassed, and can hardly know what to do next.
I am very glad the examinations were successfully passed....
Your loving, M. E. J.-B.”
“Trinity College, Cambridge, Oct. 18. 1871.
DEAR MISS JEX-BLAKE,
Mr. Sidgwick has shown me in “the Scotsman” a notice to the effect that they are attempting to exclude you from paying the fees at Edinburgh.
Are they making a final effort to reject you? Will it be successful? If so, have you any plan of action.
Please let us know, for Mr. Sidgwick and I have been consulting together, and have made up our minds that we will try all that we can now for your admission to this university, and we are ready to begin, if you feel that this is your best place to turn to, and if you need it. Let us know then.
We feel quite sure of ultimate success here in the matter of full admission of women to the whole benefits of the university.
Still we do not know how distant ‘Ultimate’ may be. We are not sanguine of success at present in your cause. Still we think it worth while trying, if it would materially help you.
I am, Yours truly, JAMES STUART.”
So there were very brave people in Cambridge as well as in Edinburgh: for Mr. Stuart as well as Mr. Sidgwick knew all about that unfortunate speech and the lawsuit to which it led. S. J.-B. had scrupulously sent them the records; and, as a matter of fact, Mr. Sidgwick had been one of the many distinguished people who subscribed to the Fund for defraying the expenses of the lawsuit.
If only the struggle had ended here: if only the University had consented to give the women the little ledge they coveted on its precipitous wall: or, failing that, if some young, enlightened university had said, “Come to us!”—the story would be in all ways a pleasanter one to tell. But that is not how things happen in life. Removal to another university at this stage would simply have meant beginning the fight all over again; and Edinburgh—blundering old Edinburgh—was so kind, so homelike, with its great army of friends, many of them convinced that victory lay within sight, that the inducement to stay in spite of all was great. The very next turn of the wheel might revolutionize all things.
Meanwhile the protagonist had been on the strain for nearly three years, and she was growing very weary of the struggle: she was losing a little of the verve that had carried her on hitherto. The incessant canvassing, organizing and writing had developed her inherent business capacity to the last point, and was making her a little intolerant of unbusinesslike ways in other people. It was more difficult than formerly in journalism and in verbal argument to show herself all things to all men as she had done so finely in those first calls on the Professors. But she had not the smallest idea of giving in: like a strong man lost in the snow, she was conscious mainly of a resolute determination to keep going on somehow.
“Your cause is sure to win,” Dr. Guthrie said to her about this time; “but a cause may be won at the cost of a life.”
“I know,” she replied, “I am prepared to give it mine.”
But she did not mean to die if she could help it until the work was done.
In any case the next move was fairly clear. The Annual Meeting of Contributors to the Royal Infirmary was coming round once more, and again the election turned on the question of the admission of the women to the wards. S. J.-B. went doggedly on with her canvassing, but the outer public was getting a little bored with the whole subject, and she herself had no longer the attraction of freshness and novelty. In those days perseverance was not reckoned a special virtue in a woman, and persistence was a positive vice. She received one nasty snub (conveyed through the office-boy) from one who had been almost a friend, and, in order to understand what this meant to her, we must remember that family tradition was strong in her still. Pelted with peas or pursued by a mud- throwing mob, she never for a moment forgot that she was, in her own way, grande dame. And now she was too tired to brush the little insult off. “I was fool enough to go out with eyes so full of tears that I doubted being fit for my next call.”
But the moral thews and sinews were in fine fighting form, and the ideals of youth were as fresh as ever. The very words of the old inspiring quotations rose to her mind. How surprised the old managers would have been if they had heard them! They thought it was only that weary question of Miss Jex-Blake and the Infirmary.
Kindly folk were many, however, and every now and then she met an unexpected tribute of appreciation or respect; and sufficient votes were gained to make the dreary proceeding worth while.[94]
Footnote 94:
It was at this Christmas season that Miss Miranda Hill sent to her old friend, in the form of a brooch, a “winged Victory,”—meaning, she said, “many things,”—“the victory of a stedfast noble purpose over outward obstacles, of love over time.”
Sometimes she would return from these missions to find herself called out to a slum maternity case undertaken through the mediation of a friendly doctor. Then,—
“Home after 10 p.m. Then to write leader for Monday. Done about 12.15. Then to relight fire and get warm,—then bed!”
“Sunday, [Dec.] 31st. Wrote paragraphs and finished article. Went down to Scotsman Office....
Oh, dear, I hope the things will be in right tomorrow,—and oh, how I hope we may win!
We have 296 votes more or less promised. We ought.
Now,—‘ring out the old, ring in the new’—Ah, that it may be so in some things,—‘Ring out the care that frets the mind’[95]—Ring in quiet and peace and liberty,—‘leave to toil’.”
Footnote 95:
“Ring out the grief that saps the mind,” is Tennyson’s line. S. J.- B.’s version needs no explanation.
Next day the great meeting took place, and this time a large hall had been taken for the purpose.
As before, six candidates were proposed by those in power, and six by those in favour of the women. The task of the latter was made easier by the fact that the suggestion of mixed classes had been given up some two or three months before, the Committee for Securing a Complete Medical Education for Women in Edinburgh having undertaken to guarantee the payment of teachers, and to provide suitable rooms and accommodation for the classes, if the University should find this latter an insoluble problem.
Professor Christison pointed out incidentally that 80 beds at £40 a bed would be one item in the reckoning.
When the votes were counted there were:
For the Women, 177 For the Powers, 168
“The result was received with great cheering and waving of handkerchiefs from the ladies’ party.”
Professor Masson then proceeded to move:
“That henceforward all registered students of Medicine shall be admitted to the educational advantages of the Infirmary without distinction of sex,—all details of arrangements, however, being left to the discretion of the managers.”
The hostile party raised an objection to this on the ground of want of adequate notice—though Professor Masson had, as a matter of fact, advertised it in the public papers as required—and, through an indescribable hubbub, the proposer stood his ground, ably supported by Professor Calderwood and by Mr. M‘Laren, M.P. When it became clear that they were going to carry their point, the opposing party rose and left the hall almost en masse; and it was then that Dr. Guthrie made what proved to be his last public speech, in support of Professor Masson’s motion. At the close of his peroration, with a wave of his hand towards the door through which the great retreat had taken place, he concluded with the lines S. J.-B. had quoted in her diary the night before,
“Ring out the old, ring in the new, ... Ring out the false, ring in the true!”
The motion was then put to the meeting and carried unanimously.
“I, oh so tired!” says S. J.-B.,—“hearing voices round me in a sort of swoon.”
Her letter-bag for the next few days was enough to put new life into anyone.
“24 Hill Street, Edinburgh.
“My dear Miss Blake, and all your brave sisterhood, Three cheers for you and one cheer more! My husband has just come back and told me of your victory.
May this be an augury of future success in every direction.
Ever very truly yours, E. H. S. BLACKIE.”
A lawyer who had strenuously opposed the idea of mixed classes writes,
“For your sake, I shall make my first charity this year £5 to the Infirmary.”
And no one was more enthusiastic than the young man who was demonstrator of Anatomy at the time of the riot:
“It would be almost a mockery to wish you all a Happy New Year after such success. It is enough to turn one’s head, but only, I suppose, the heads which hammered on so hard in defeat, or rather repulse, are not to be turned with victory.”
It would have been almost a mockery, certainly, though not in the sense he meant.
“Sunday, Jan. 7th. Hear that the doctors are going about getting their patients to sign papers,—exact tenor unknown.”
True enough, here were already the first mutterings of a fresh storm, and indeed, most people must have been rather uneasy at so terrifying a victory.
“Dear Miss Jex-Blake,” writes Dr. Heron Watson on January 5th, “See to it that there is a full representation on behalf of the ladies on Monday week at the adjourned meeting, as I expect foul play!...”
And another lawyer writes:
“DEAR MISS JEX-BLAKE,
I don’t know whether you are taking any means to secure a muster of your friends at the Infirmary meeting on Monday week; but I think it would be worth while to do so. I am afraid our opponents may attempt a surprise for the purpose of rescinding the Statute passed at last meeting as to the admission of Lady Students. I have not heard that they have any such plan on foot; but as no notice requires to be given of any such motion, they may not improbably try it, trusting to our being off our guard.
Yours truly, WILLIAM ROBSON.”
A fortnight after the Annual Meeting, the Contributors met to hear the result of a scrutiny of the votes, and it was then that the following unexpected issue—quite distinct, of course, from the immediate object of the scrutiny—was thrust upon them:
On the side of the women had voted,
28 firms, 31 ladies, 7 doctors.
On the side of the powers,
14 firms, 2 ladies, 37 doctors.
It was now claimed that the votes of firms were incompetent, at the majority really lay on the other side.
“It mattered nothing,” said the Scotsman,[96] “that firms had voted ever since the Infirmary was founded; that contributors qualified only as members of firms had, as has now been ascertained, sat over and over again on the Board of Management, and on the Committee of Contributors. It was of equally slight importance that the firms whom it was now sought to disqualify had been among the most generous benefactors of the charity, and that, with the imminent prospect before them of great pecuniary necessity, it would probably be impossible, without their aid, to carry out even the plans for the new building. The firms had voted in favour of the ladies, and the firms must go, if at least the law would (as it probably will not) bear out the medical men in their reckless endeavour to expel them.”
Footnote 96:
January 29, 1872.
An appeal to law, however, is a slow affair, and on this occasion there was obviously no inducement for the law to bestir itself unduly. It was not till July 23rd that Lord Jerviswoode pronounced the votes of firms to be perfectly valid.
The case was appealed to a higher court, where it did not come on for trial till the end of October: it was then again postponed and judgment was not given till December.
“Dec. 7th. Saturday. Judgment from Second Division in our favour on all points.”
The Annual Meeting was now once more at hand, however, when new managers might be elected who were unfriendly to the women. Needless to say the woman’s party lost no time. A Contributors’ meeting was called for December 16th, and another for December 23rd, when a vote was passed admitting the women to the Infirmary on condition that their visits were to be separate from those of the men, and that they were to go only to those wards where their presence was invited by the physicians.
So at last they got their tickets, and began an attendance which was to “qualify” for graduation.
“Qualify” in the technical sense; assuredly not in any other. What the girl graduate of the present day would say to such qualification, one need scarcely ask. Here is S. J.-B.’s account of it:
“Dr. Balfour gave us a separate hour in his wards three times a week, and such chances of practical study as could be arranged from time to time. Dr. Watson’s very large practice, as the most eminent surgeon in Scotland, made it impossible for him, at whatever inconvenience, to repeat his visit in this manner, and our enemies would have gained their point, had he not, with a kindness which I find myself even now quite unable to acknowledge duly, given up for the two whole winter sessions his Sunday mornings (his one day of rest) to our instruction, while steadily refusing to accept any fees whatever for this great sacrifice of his time and strength. Few more chivalrous acts were ever done, and I only hope he found his reward in the lifelong gratitude of a dozen women, who were not at that time too much accustomed to such kindness and courtesy as his.”
To the end of her life, S. J.-B. looked upon these two men as “the shadow of a great rock in a weary land,” and another name she would have added with (in one sense) even better reason—that of Dr. Peel Ritchie, who, a strong Conservative, absolutely and avowedly at that time without sympathy for the “cause,” from a sheer sense of fair play, gave up his class of men at the Royal Dispensary in order to teach a class of women instead.
* * * * *
Of course S. J.-B. was a “celebrity” by this time. Here is an amusing letter from a distinguished man who had been asked to meet her and her friends at dinner:
[Letter undated.]
“MY DEAR EDITOR,
Wae’s me that I am engaged on Saturday! If I could on any decent pretence get off I would do it aftsoons, for apart from the pleasure of meeting yourself and Mrs. R., I would like fine to meet the other ladies in such company, especially some of them. I won’t say which!
But I accepted an invitation the other day from —— to meet a Mr. —— a very nice Irishman that’s working at our Celtic MSS., and I promised to show the Milesian the way. So though I would go far for the sake of the ladies and of you, I feel that it would be rather too flagrant a breach of faith to tell old —— that I have another engagement which I had forgotten. I wish he or his wife would take some harmless disease for a day or two and put off their dinner.
I needn’t say that I appreciate immensely the distinction of being asked as the one man in Edinburgh worthy of admission to that select company! It’s equal to the Cross of the Legion of Honour and a great deal better. There’s something in the idea too that piques the imagination. It’s as if—but far better—a favoured mortal got a special card per Ganymede, to sup quietly in Olympus with Mr. and Mrs. Jupiter and the Misses Minerva, Diana and Urania: or like being asked by a Flamen and his wife to meet three of the Vestal Virgins over a jar of Falernian; or again like an invitation from the grand Lama to have a little jollification with a few Buddhist lady abbesses in the innermost shrine of the great temple at Lassa, or from a chief of Carbonari to take a glass and pipe with Mazzini, Garibaldi, etc. There’s no end of the things it suggests.
As to your unworthy fears, fie upon them! You are more to be envied than the Sultan, the Pope or Brigham Young.
Hoping to have a chance some other time of doing homage to the Trinity, and to have the pleasure soon of calling upon Mrs. Russel.
I rest, Ever Yours, ——.”
And her fame—or notoriety—extended to the most unexpected classes of society. “Miss Jex-Blake had that house last year,” the driver of a Highland coach would say, pointing with his whip in the direction of the farm where she had stayed. Her name occurred repeatedly in that year’s pantomime, and Harlequin and Columbine had called to ask if she had any objection to this,—an incident which she always recalled with amusement and appreciation. The main reference, as it happened, was quite complimentary. A game was played on the stage in which various Edinburgh dignitaries were the cards; but “Miss Jex-Blake” took the trick.
Her dislike of publicity was great, but she had long since hardened herself to endure it in so far as was necessary for her work’s sake. Beyond that she drew the line absolutely. The press rang with her name for a few years, but she steadily refused to be interviewed. It was nothing to her that the public had not the smallest idea of the more human side of her character. “Nothing,” she wrote in response to many requests, “would induce her to consent to the sale of her photograph.” Her holidays were spent in absolute retirement, and intimate friends will never forget how, on the first day in the country, the words would rise to her lips,—
“The pulse of dew upon the grass kept his within its number, And silent shadows from the trees refreshed him like a slumber.”
A memorandum of this period directs that, in case of her death, the funeral shall be as simple and inexpensive as possible, and that the headstone—if headstone there be—shall bear only her name, the dates, and the words,—“Then are they glad because they be quiet.”
“Partly you see, I am so tired,” she had written half to herself and half to Miss Du Pre in February,—“not physically or even mentally exactly. I could come up to any given exertion of either kind for the time being; but my whole nature is strained and wearied. I can get up energy for nothing,—can but just get through the day’s work in the day and long for rest!
‘Hades must rest us for ages, Ere we can glory see.’
No, my glory is rest!...
How strange lives are! Miss Anderson’s husband—married Oct. 5th (?), died on Monday, November 12th,—love enough to change a life for, and it,—no, not it, the marriage,—ends in 4 months!”
It was about this time that her friend Mrs. Unwin died. Up to the last she had followed the Edinburgh campaign with intense interest and sympathy. S. J.-B. had promised that, whatever the claims of her work might be, she would pay a last visit to the Yorkshire home in case of “utter need”; but Mrs. Unwin refused to make this plea. Resolutely she bore her own cross: and, with a last message of “deepest love and regard,” she passed away.
XIII. THE ACTION AGAINST THE SENATUS
“MADAM,
... I never read or heard of such a hard case as yours—and so peculiar. It might be worth while to seek the advice of a Solicitor— who would consult counsel—to find out whether you and your disappointed friends have no case at Law. I would (if it be possible) just like to know what the Court of Session would have to say, touching—not only the arbitrariness, but the gross injustice, if not absolute illegality, of the whole affair. You matriculate—get through with about half of your classes—great loss of time—money— disappointment—even exasperation or half ruin—all incurred: and are then summarily brought to—made to fairly stick—and yet no legal remedy! I can’t believe it. I would try and find out,—but yet, it is an awful prospect. The length of time, and expense that would have to be borne, ere any decision could be come to. You seem to me like one who took a leap, without seeing from the first,[97] where the leap was to land you. For surely, had you foreseen all this,—you never would have set foot in Edinburgh....
Footnote 97:
“Believe and venture! as for pledges, The gods give none.”
The tide is coming in and nothing can retard it,—nothing worth speaking of. And these views will be realised and acted upon some day. Depend upon it.
The day will come when women will sit cheek by jowl with men through a six months’ course of Anatomy, Physiology, Midwifery, etc., etc., right cheerfully, and neither jeering nor sneering there—nor winks nor any other impertinences—singularly misplaced and out of time—if certain important personages could only see matters rightly. Yes, and walk the Hospitals—surgical and medical—and the lying-in Hospital also, the Eye Infirmary, the Cancer one and the Consumptive one, and the Lock into the bargain. And then all these important obstructives will be dead, buried, rotten—forgotten—and their writings selling at three halfpence per lb.”
The above is quoted from the letter of a complete stranger,—the so- called “man in the street” apparently, and is a sample of many that came pouring in upon S. J.-B. during those troublous years. “Has the University any right to act like this?” friends kept asking constantly; and we know that more than one of the Professors had advised an appeal to a Court of Law.
Towards the close of 1871, S. J.-B. seems to have consulted her brother on the subject, drawing from him the following letters:
“The College, Cheltenham. Nov. 18. 1871.
MY DEAR SOPHY,
I do not think you can gain anything by sueing the Professors or by going to Law with the University in any other shape.
It may be too late now to persuade, but it would be at all times hopeless to compel, a great University to open its doors to ladies.
I return the Queries and Opinions: and should distrust legal opinions that advised further law-suits.
It is most provoking, and your treatment has been unjust: but it comes to my mind to this, When they persecute you in one city, flee ye to another.
You can make better use of your time by getting University instruction elsewhere, than by throwing legal pebbles at the University gates of Auld Reekie: and life being short you had better gather up the net result of your Scotch experience, and go to Zürich or Paris, or wherever your own knowledge and judgment lead you.
I am exceedingly sorry for you; but I see nothing else to be done, so far as I understand the facts.
It is very tantalizing that the majorities have always been so narrow: and that there has been so much to justify sanguine friends in their advice.
I shall be glad to hear your decision, and both Hetty and I are very sorry for you.
Your affect. brother, T. W. J.-B.”
“The College, Cheltenham, Nov. 21. 1871.
MY DEAR SOPHY,
There is more to be said for legal action than I knew of: for I thought Paris or Zürich degree was legal qualification in England: though of course to go abroad for degree is objectionable in several ways, and the language must slightly increase the difficulties.
Still there is nothing to be said for legal action unless it is likely to succeed: and of that your Scotch lawyers are the best judges: though their expectations hitherto have been more sanguine than accurate in your case.
I am sorry I cannot be of much use, and very sorry the Trades Union is so strong and so well organized.
It must be very annoying, and is certainly a horrible waste of time: but half of most people’s time is spent in untying the foolish knots of blind opponents.
Hetty joins in love.
Your affect. brother, T. W. J.-B.”
“13 Sussex Square, Brighton. Jan. 21. 1872.
MY DEAR SOPHY,
One line to wish you many happy returns of the day, and to tell you that all is going on very well here....
We were very glad that you crept into such a haven of rest as Mrs. Nichol has to offer you: and I am quite sure the strain of so much fighting and organizing must be very great.
It seems hardly possible that you should get on with your own Medical education while there is so much polemical business on hand; but if you carry the point for all women, it will be cheaply bought at the sacrifice of two or three years of individual training in books and bones.”
“When they persecute you in one city, flee ye to another.”
This was advice which S. J.-B. had always kept well in mind, though not with regard to Paris and Zürich; and enquiries as to other British Universities had been diligently prosecuted. St. Andrews was the one that most naturally suggested itself, “as a comparatively rural University, without male students of medicine, and yet with the power to grant degrees.” It is true that the Medical Curriculum at St. Andrews was—and is—very incomplete; but the deficiency might be made good by some teaching-school unable—or unwilling—to grant degrees. Professor Lewis Campbell and Mrs. Campbell had taken a deep interest in the project of making their University the Alma Mater of the women students; S. J.-B. had visited them at St. Andrews in the autumn of 1871, with Miss Massingberd Mundy[98]; and there are a number of cordial letters witnessing to the genuine desire of both the Professor and his wife for the success of the scheme.
Footnote 98:
Miss Massingberd Mundy was one of the junior students who did not go on to graduation, but her gaiety and humour made her a real acquisition to the little circle in the trying days.
Their enthusiasm was not typical of the University, however, though Principal Tulloch “seemed friendly in a vague way”; and all hope in this direction had, for the moment, to be given up.
Meanwhile S. J.-B., on behalf of herself and her fellow-students, had made a final appeal to the University Court of Edinburgh to provide them with the means of completing their education, and she had also forwarded to them a farther legal opinion from the Lord Advocate and Sheriff Fraser to the effect that the University authorities had full power to permit the matriculation of women in 1869; that the resolutions then passed amounted to a permission to women to “study Medicine” in the University, and that therefore the women concerned were entitled to demand the means of doing so; and finally, that if such means were persistently refused, the legal mode of redress lay in an Action of Declarator.
On January 8th the University Court resolved that it was not in their power to comply with the requirements of the women as regarded teaching: the whole question, they said, had been “complicated by the introduction of the subject of graduation, which is not essential to the completion of a medical or other education”: if the ladies would altogether give up the question of graduation, and be content with certificates of proficiency, the Court would try to meet their views.
“They forgot,” says S. J.-B., “that though a degree is ‘not essential’ to a medical education, it is absolutely indispensable to any practical use of it,—that is to any lawful practice of the medical profession.”
She offered, however, to waive the question of graduation,—pending an authoritative decision as to the powers and duties of the University,—if arrangements might meanwhile be made for the women to continue their education. To this the Court agreed. Farther correspondence, however, elicited the fact that the Court had no intention of coming to any decision with regard to its own powers, and that it did not mean to take any active steps in the matter.
“On the other hand,” says S. J.-B., “we had no less authority than that of the Lord Advocate of Scotland for believing that we were absolutely entitled to what we had so humbly solicited, and that a Court of Law would quietly award to us what seemed unattainable by any other means; we had the very widely spread and daily increasing sympathy of the community at large, and received constant offers of help from friends of every kind.... Under these circumstances we did the one thing that remained for us to do, we brought an Action of Declarator against the Senatus of the University,—praying to have it declared that the Senatus was bound, in some way or other, to enable us to complete our education and to proceed to the medical degree which would entitle us to take place on the Medical Register among the legally-qualified practitioners of medicine.”
Of course the news of this daring step was forthwith noised abroad, and S. J.-B. received a protesting letter from Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell, urging her not to waste on an uncertain lawsuit, money that might be so much more profitably spent in some other way.
The following is S. J.-B.’s reply:
“DEAR DR. BLACKWELL,
I suppose rumour very seldom does report things correctly, so I do not wonder that you have been misinformed about the action which we are on the point of bringing against the Senatus. It is not one for breach of promise (what fun Punch would make of it if it were!) but simply an Action of Declarator whereby we pray one of the Judges of Session to declare that the Senatus is bound to complete our education, according to the decided opinion given by the Lord Advocate of Scotland.
In the brief space of a letter it would be impossible for me to submit to you all the facts and grounds on which our intention is based, tho’ I should be glad to explain them in detail if you were on the spot, but you will be glad to hear that not only are the whole of the students here of the same mind as myself on this point, but our determination is strengthened by the advice and concurrence of some of the wisest heads in Edinburgh, including those of friendly Professors. I hope therefore that you will believe that, though you find a difficulty at a distance from the field of action in concurring in our present step, you would probably do so if all the facts of the case were as thoroughly before you as they are before us and our counsellors.
It is just because I find that London friends are so little au courant of the facts that I am hoping to give an explanatory lecture when in town next month, and I need not say how doubly glad I shall be to give every explanation and information to you to whom [all] of us medical women owe so much gratitude and respect as our pioneer and forerunner.
Believe me, Yours truly, S. JEX-BLAKE.”
Now that there was something definite to be done, S. J.-B. was in her element once more and the following letters make it very clear that her “counsellors” were working con amore.
“University Club, Edinburgh. 18 March, 72.
DEAR MISS JEX-BLAKE,
Under the dread of bringing disgrace on the whole masculine race, I applied myself today during all the time I could command to the framing of the great Summons, and I brought it up to a point at which I think nothing of importance remains to be added except the historical statement and the pleas in law, both of which you may take for granted will be made right. If I can get them done this evening I’ll send them to you.
I thought as you were in a hurry to see the thing I had better let you have what I had done at once, and so I took it to White Millar and left it with him to send you. There must be a distinction drawn between you and the other ladies who are ready for the first professional exam., and the others who are not. So you will please note on the margin of the M.S. who those are that occupy these respective positions and the exact stage at which the less advanced ones have arrived. I must also have the dates and exact terms of the several resolutions and letters referred to in the last article, so as to make the chronological statement complete and accurate. I would like before the thing is finally adjusted to consult all the available sources of information on the subject of graduation and the original constitution of the University, and also I think if Bologna was our model, as seems to be taken for granted, that it would be worth while to communicate with some one there, such as the Secretary of the Senatus, if they have one, or the Librarian, to get authoritative statistics on the subject.
I have not heard from the Dean of Faculty yet in reply to my inquiry on the point of professional punctilio involved in my undertaking the case, but another eminent legal friend whose advice I highly value thinks on the whole that I ought not to undertake it. This did not prevent me, however, from doing the Summons! Meantime you needn’t mention that I am doing it, in case of my not going on with the case, which might lead to unfavourable remarks, if it were supposed that I had begun and afterwards backed out of it. I’ll be very sorry to do so, if that is the Dean’s opinion.
Believe me, Yours very truly, ALEX. NICOLSON.”
Apparently the decision of the Dean was adverse to Mr. Nicolson, for the case was taken up, and very ably argued, by Sheriff Fraser and Mr. M‘Laren (afterwards Lord M‘Laren), who had been junior counsel in the libel case.
“I am quite certain,” writes Mr. Fraser to S. J.-B., “that upon a more thorough investigation it will be found that women did attend the Universities and graduated.... When you are up in London just now perhaps you would refer to some of the books in the British Museum, mentioned by Watts, which are not in the Advocates’ Library. You need not trouble yourself with the University of Edinburgh, as I have gone over the whole Records of the Council and of the Professors since the institution of the University, and I cannot find a single case of a woman being a student. The same I fear will be the result of an examination of the records of the other universities. This was natural, for, until recently, both the law and the social customs of Scotland, like those of other barbarous countries, regarded women as nothing else but domestic drudges and field hands.”
It was useless, of course, to suggest the British Museum. S. J.-B. had long since exhausted that mine. And she had no great faith in the information to be derived from correspondence with foreign secretaries and librarians. She had worked that vein too. It still remained to send an emissary to examine the archives of the Italian Universities at first hand, and this was what she now resolved to do. Someone had commended to her interest about this time an able and well-educated young lady whose health was causing her friends some anxiety, and, after watching and tending her for some time S. J.-B. despatched her on the mission, duly armed with the following dossier:
“1. At each University get access, if possible, to the official archives and lists of students, and make a complete list of every woman who studied there, with date, Faculty, and other particulars.
2. If you cannot get access yourself, get the lists made by some official, and, if possible, compare it with originals or other authorities.
3. If possible get the Secretary or Librarian, or some Professor to attest the list with his signature, as truly extracted from the records.
4. Pay any necessary fees, having as far as possible arranged for these beforehand.
5. Make copies in one book of every list obtained, of name and address of each person making or attesting such lists, and of all additional information likely to be of value.
6. Send off attested lists to me in registered letters as soon as obtained, marking in your M.S. book the exact duplicate in case of loss and sending a separate letter to Miss P. to announce dispatch.
7. Do not let your own M.S. book out of your hands for any purpose.
8. Send all lists on foolscap and not on foreign paper.”
The ambassador seems to have carried through her mission most efficiently, and an imposing array of names was the result. At any rate that vein was now worked out.
In the meantime “the great Summons” was duly delivered, and on March 27th the Senatus met to consider what action they should take with regard to it. We get the following informal account of what took place from Miss Pechey:
“I could not get particulars of the Senatus meeting ... till too late to write last night, but it appears that it was first moved to defend the action; then Fleeming Jenkin proposed that an attempt should be made to have an amicable lawsuit. This was negatived by 17 to 10, and then the other motion not to defend the action being put against the first, was negatived by 22 to 5. Many of our friends voted to defend,— Wilson amongst others. He says he feels sure that the thing will never be fairly settled without a legal decision. I saw him today in his office. He is very anxious you should get some member to ask a question when the Parliamentary grant is being arranged.[99] He told me the enemy were dreadfully angry at the suit, from which he concluded that our Summons is well drawn up.”
“This was the great argument for assenting to the corporate defence,” writes Professor Masson, “i.e. that the Senatus could not possibly let judgment go by default, which would yield all your demands (compulsion of Professors, etc.) and yet not really settle the thing, inasmuch as the Professors or anyone might afterwards reopen the whole judgment. On the same ground it is that friends don’t seem to want to stir individually. They say the defence is corporately by the Senatus and everybody will understand that, and hence that individual secession is superfluous. Tait, however, said he would consult his lawyer, and Craufurd and Jenkin meditated something of the same.”
Footnote 99:
S. J.-B. appealed to Sir Robert Anstruther; and there is a businesslike note from Lady Anstruther, asking for a very brief summary of all the main events,—just the thing that only S. J.-B. could supply.
The matter was brought forward in Aug. 1872, on Sir Robert Anstruther’s behalf, by Sir D. Wedderburn, see below.
On the other hand, six members of the Senatus—anxious though they well might be to have the weary question settled one way or the other—simply could not allow the resolution to pass without protest, and the following minute is duly recorded in the books of the University:
“We dissent from and protest against the resolution of the Senatus of March 27, 1872, to undertake the defence of the action. This we do for the following reasons:—(1.) Because we see no just cause for opposing the admission of women to the study and practice of medicine; but, on the contrary, consider that women who have honourably marked out such a course of life for themselves, ought to be forwarded and aided in their laudable endeavour as much as possible, by all who have the means, and especially by those having authority in any University or other institution for education; (2.) Because, in particular, we feel such aid and encouragement, rather than opposition and discouragement, to be due from us to those women who have enrolled themselves in the University of Edinburgh, and we entirely concur, with respect to them, in the desire expressed by Sir William Stirling-Maxwell, the Rector of the University, that they should obtain what they ask—namely, a complete medical education, crowned by a degree; (3.) Because we have seen no sufficient reason to doubt the legal and constitutional powers of our University to make arrangements that would be perfectly adequate for the purpose, and we consider the public questioning of such powers, in present circumstances, by the University itself, or any of its component bodies, unnecessary, impolitic, and capable of being construed as a surrender of permanent rights and privileges of the University, in order to evade a temporary difficulty; (4.) Because, without pronouncing an opinion on the question now raised, as to the legal rights which the pursuers have acquired by matriculation in the University, admission already to certain examinations, or otherwise, to demand from the University continued medical instruction and the degree on due qualification, we yet believe that they have thereby, and by the general tenor of the proceedings, both of the Senatus and of the University Court in their case hitherto, acquired a moral right, and created a public expectation, which the University is bound to meet by the full exercise of its powers in their behalf, even should it be with some trouble; (5.) Because, with these convictions, and notwithstanding our utmost respect for those of our colleagues from whom we may have the misfortune to differ on the subject, we should individually feel ashamed of appearing as defenders in such an action, and should account any such public appearance by us in the character of opponents to women desiring to enter an honoured and useful profession, a matter to our discredit.”
The following are the names of the six[100] Professors who felt bound thus to stand out against the arguments of their colleagues.
Footnote 100:
In addition to these six, Professor Fleeming Jenkin and Professor Cosmo Innes removed their names from the list of defenders.
John Hughes Bennett, M.D., Professor of the Institutes of Medicine,
David Masson, M.A., Professor of Rhetoric and English Literature,
Henry Calderwood, LL.D., Professor of Moral Philosophy,
James Lorimer, M.A., Professor of Public Law,
Archibald H. Charteris, D.D., Professor of Biblical Criticism and Biblical Antiquities,
William Ballantyne Hodgson, LL.D.,[101] Professor of Political Economy.
Footnote 101:
Professor Hodgson was a recent addition to the professorial staff, and a great asset to the women’s cause.