Medical College in Philadelphia, was one of the original members of this association.

The professions, claims, and efforts above indicated, probably show the high-water mark of educational aspiration of women in the West in and before the middle of this century.

The college drew students from all parts of the country, and from Canada; and, at one time, according to one of its historians, there were in attendance upon it "representatives from every State in the Union, excepting New Hampshire, Delaware, North Carolina, and Florida.'

At one time this college enrolled nearly five hundred students; but, as seminaries and colleges for women have multiplied throughout the region from which it drew its patronage, and especially as more richly endowed colleges which were established for men have opened their doors to women, its numbers have diminished and its influence has waned. But such a past should compel its alumnæ and its friends to give it an endowment, a course of study, and a corps of instructors that shall make it the peer of its strongest young sisters.*

There is a function for the true woman's college which the co-educational college does not and as yet cannot perform.

*As the Cincinnati Wesleyan College is an example of the best that Methodism has done for the separate education of women, so Albert Lea College in Minnesota, founded and controlled by the synod of that State, would appear to be the most ambitious attempt of the Presbyterian Church to aid the separate higher education of women in the West. This college was founded in 1882, and opened to students in 1885. Its president makes for it, with relation to the country west of the Alleghanies, the same claim that the president of the Wesleyan made in its behalf with relation to the entire country, forty-eight years ago. Its president, Dr. R. B. Abbott, writes: "This is the only real college for women west of the Alleghany Mountains. There are female seminaries in abundance, some of which are named college, but are without a full college curriculum and without authority to confer the degrees of Bachelor and Master of Arts. Albert Lea is a college in fact as well as in name.”

Albert Lea is now in only its fifth year. I have not been able to obtain its latest catalogue. The above quotation from its president's letter indicates its promise. Should it redeem this promise in its spirit and word, it would be a great blessing to the West; not so much young because women in this part of the country need another college within their easy reach, but because the entire community needs to have the difference between the nominal and the real college continually emphasized.

If Albert Lea draws sharp and visible lines between its standards and tests of scholarship, between its quality and methods of instruction and those of the majority of institutions in the above list, its influence will be potent in securing greater harmony between names and things in matters pertaining to education.

To get one's college education in an institution which admits only women, and to enjoy some years of post-graduate work in a co-educational university, is the ideal of opportunity now cherished by some most careful and intelligent parents and by some ambitious young women. It is possible that provision for satisfying the first half of this ideal is held in germ by some or all of the thirty colleges for women only, now existing in the West.

CO-EDUCATION IN THE WEST.

That in the Western States and Territories, the higher edu cation of women is generally identical with co-education is indicated, as has been previously suggested, by the following facts:

1. Of 212 institutions in the West, exclusive of colleges of agriculture and the mechanic arts, which afford the higher culture to women, 165 are co-educational.

2. Of the 5563 women reported to the Bureau of Education in 1887-88 as students in the collegiate courses of these institutions, 4392 were in the co-educational colleges.

3. In the twenty-one States and Territories which boast 165 co-educational colleges and 47 colleges for the separate education of women, 30 of which are authorized to confer regular degrees, there are but 25 colleges devoted to the exclusive education of men.

4. Of these 25 (devoted to the exclusive education of men,) not one is non-sectarian, and they are all supported by the Roman Catholic, the Protestant Episcopal, the Lutheran, or the Presbyterian denomination. In several of the States most conspicuous for zeal in the cause of the higher education, as in Michigan, Iowa, and Kansas, not one college for the exclusive education of men exists.

These facts support the statement that the West is committed to co-education, excepting only the Roman Catholic, the Lutheran, and the Protestant Episcopal sects, which are not yet, as sects, committed to the collegiate education of women at all, and the Presbyterian sect, whose support, in the West, of 14 co-educational colleges against 4 for the separate education of young men, almost commits it to the co-educational idea.

How has this triumph of the higher co-education been achieved? How is the system regarded by the community in which it is established? What are its social effects and tendencies? What are its defects and limitations? These are the inquiries which next present themselves.

Of the 165 co-educational colleges under consideration, a few, like Ripon College, Wisconsin, were founded for women and subsequently admitted young men ; a larger number have admitted both men and women from the date of their opening; these, with a few notable exceptions, like Oberlin College in Ohio, and Lawrence University in Wisconsin, are of recent origin, with charters dating from periods since 1860. The great proportion of the entire number were founded for the exclusive education of men, and have, one after another, yielded a participation in their benefits to women since 1860.*

cases been the same.

To tell in detail the story of the struggles which have ended in the admission of women into each of these institutions would be quite impossible; if possible, it would, for general purposes, be quite unprofitable, since the principles involved have in all The same arguments, pro and con, have been advanced in every contest, the illustrations and modes of application being modified in each by local conditions and circumstances. Local history should preserve a record of such modifications of the argument and its application, together with the names of those persons who were conspicuous in the contest; but the purposes of general history do not require this, and the discrepancy between the extent of territory and the number of pages assigned to this chapter does not permit it.

In Ohio, the oldest of the Western States, the higher education of women first became a question; and in connection with its various institutions every aspect of the question has been exhibited. Moreover, as the oldest of the group, the example of Ohio has exerted a marked influence upon the other Western States. These facts justify the discussion of co-education in connection with Ohio colleges.

No institution has been more frequently cited in discussions of co-education than Oberlin; and perhaps the attitude of no other has been so persistently misunderstood. In reading numerous discussions incident to opening men's colleges in other States to women, one finds it implied and asserted that Oberlin was founded to give to women the same educational advantages enjoyed by men.'

Sketches and histories of Oberlin College, sermons, addresses, and letters, explanatory of its aims and policy, are numerous and accessible; and if these authoritative documents agree upon any one point it is in showing that Oberlin was not

* Appendix B, Table II., gives a table by which is shown when each of these colleges was founded, when opened, and when opened to women.

"founded to give to women the same educational advantages enjoyed by men"; that at the outset the intention to do this was not entertained by her founders; that such form of collegiate co-education as Oberlin now offers has been developed gradually; and, finally, that co-education at Oberlin to-day differs in many essential respects from the co-education to be found in our State Universities.

Let the following facts sustain these statements :

1. It was as Oberlin Collegiate Institute" that Oberlin began its work in 1833, and the name of "Oberlin College" was not taken until 1850.

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2. The original plan included a "female department, under the supervision of a lady, where "instruction in the useful branches taught in the best female seminaries" could be obtained; the circular setting forth the plan also says: The higher classes of the female department will also be permitted. to enjoy the privileges of such professorships in the teachers', collegiate and theological departments as shall best suit their sex and prospective employment."

3. This "female department" contemplated a separate building, and separate classes in which women should pursue merely academic studies. But this department was never formed, according to the original plan, because at first poverty prevented the erection of a separate school building; and because, in the beginning, there were only high school classes, into which, for economy and convenience, young men and women were together admitted with no thought whatever of their ultimately entering collegiate classes together.

4. In lieu of the anticipated "female department," a "ladies' course," was provided and maintained until 1875. This course demanded no Greek and but two years of Latin, and, according to its present president, required only "a year more time than is devoted to study in the best female seminaries."

5. Separate classes were organized for ladies in essay-writing until the commencement of the junior year, when they were admitted to the regular college class; their work was still limited to writing and reading, none of the ladies having any practice in speaking.

6. At the present time the "literary course," under the department of philosophy and arts, takes the place of the former ladies' course."

7. In 1837, four ladies, having prepared themselves to enter the freshman class of the collegiate department, were admitted

on their own petition; since then ladies have been received into all the college classes excepting those of the theological department, which has never been open to ladies as regular members, though at one time two ladies "attended all the exercises of this department through a three years' course, and were entered upon the annual catalogue as resident graduates pursuing the theological course."" So long as the "ladies' course continued, the apparent expectation of the college was that a majority of ladies would take that course.

The influence of the college was apparently exerted in that direction, and with such effect that the number of ladies graduating from the "ladies' course was, to the number graduating from the "college course," nearly as five to one.

8. That the present "literary course" in the department of philosophy and arts is practically the same as the original "ladies' course," will be seen by comparing the lists of subjects upon which candidates for entrance into each must be examined, and also by considering the scheme of study followed in the "literary course," as presented in the catalogue, for 1888-89. This view is further sustained by the fact that in 1888-89, 175 ladies and 3 gentlemen were registered in this

course.

9. The latest catalogue states that: "Young women in all the departments of study are under the supervision of the principal of the ladies' department and the care of the ladies' board. They are required to be in their rooms after eight o'clock in the evening during the spring and summer months, and after half past seven during the fall and winter months.

"Every young woman is required to present, once in two weeks, a written report of her observance and her failure in the observance of the regulations of the department, signed by the matron of the family in which she boards."

The catalogue in another connection says: "In addition to lectures announced in the course of study, practical lectures on general habits, methods of study, and other important subjects, are delivered once in two weeks to the young women by the principal of the ladies' department, and to the young men of the preparatory schools (the italics are my own), by the principals of these schools."

The regulations here cited may be admirable, and highly advantageous to those whom they affect. It may be matter of regret that the young men are not given similar supervision, and that the "practical lectures on general habits," etc., to which women in all departments are required to listen, are, in