“As regards the stumbling-block of compulsory Greek, it may be worth while to say a word here which should tend to dispel the fear that the requirement of Greek at the Universities will make Greek a necessary class-subject in the first-grade schools. It has not had this effect so far, I believe, in any of the schools supplying students to Girton. Only the small band of girls destined for a University course make it a study. In our practice at the North London Collegiate School, it is alternative with French, as Latin is with German; and it always comes late in the course. We see, however, that it is taught well, very well, when it comes. “On May 15, 1878, on the occasion of the presentation of degrees at the University of London, the Chancellor, Lord Granville made the great announcement that henceforth women should be eligible for all the degrees and honours of the University. I was with Miss Buss in the gallery; it was a thrilling moment. The concession was unexpected, and it was so perfectly complete. There were no reservations in it, no locked doors, no exclusion from rights in the government of the University, or from eligibility for any of its posts. The time for experiment was over, and the test had been approved; the time for half-measures was over too. There never was a concession more freely or more graciously made, and with a largeness of wisdom and sympathy which cannot be honoured too much. “At the same time, it was announced that the University would institute a diploma for teachers, and thus another much-desired end was also fulfilled. ‘I care for that almost as much,’ she said. But the prime interest centred in the grant of the degrees. How overjoyed she was! ‘What will _you_ do?’ she said to me. ‘I will learn Latin,’ I said; ‘matriculate in January, and go on for the Doctor of Science degree in Philosophy.’ “In later years we did not sit in the gallery, however late we came, but in the front row. She never failed to come, not even last year, when, indeed, she found the effort trying. It was such a pleasure to her, year by year, to see the number of girl-graduates grow; and she rejoiced as much in the success of others as in that of her own flock. It was characteristic of her selflessness, her magnanimity, that, instead of presenting her distinguished pupils herself, she handed over to me from the first that honourable duty. ‘She liked it better so,’ she said. But thus it was in all things: wherever there was honour, she put me forward to share it. For herself she sought nothing.” ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [Illustration: _Photo. by Elliott and Fry._ MISS BUSS AND DR. SOPHIE BRYANT. ] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER XII.