“We feel sure that the ladies will forgive joking about a very absurd matter. Ladies should surely understand the power of ridicule. We think that the ‘_reductio ad absurdum_’ in this matter is the proper line of argument. The facts of the case seem to be simply these:--After protracted delays and much discussion, the University authorities last autumn vouchsafed to ladies the permission to enter the College as matriculated medical students, with the single restriction that their instruction should be conducted in separate classes. On referring to the minutes of the University Court, we find the following definition of the position to be taken by the new students:--‘All women attending such classes shall be subject to all the regulations now, or at any future time, in force in the University as to the matriculation of students, their attendance on classes, examination, or otherwise.’ We turn to the Calendar to see what are the ‘regulations in force in the University’ as to examination in chemistry, and we find at page 84 the following:--‘The class honours are determined by means of written examinations held during the session. The four students who have received the highest marks _are entitled to have the Hope Scholarships_ to the laboratory of the University.’ The ladies accepted in good faith the regulations of the University, and, fired by a laudable ambition to prove themselves worthy of the privileges now accorded for the first time to women, worked with an assiduity that may be guessed when it is found that one of them, Miss Pechey, actually gained the highest number of marks awarded during the session to any student attending chemistry for the first time, though she was excelled (by one and two marks respectively) by two gentlemen who had gone through a previous course of lectures. But when the day arrived which was to reward all this work, the Professor announced, without, as it seemed to us, a shadow of justification, that the four scholarships would be given, _not_ according to the University regulations to the four students ‘_entitled to them_,’ but to the three gentlemen who had won the first, second, and fourth places, and to the one who stood fifth on the list, this last having earned a most honourable place by his talents and industry, but _not_ the Hope Scholarship, though now he has, of course, the right to claim free admission to the laboratory as it has been promised to him. This, then, is a University episode. Six students are admitted on the distinct understanding that, with one exception (dictated, as we think, by a whimsical propriety), they are to be ‘subject to the regulations of the University;’ no hint is given to them that this statement is analogous to the one which pithily describes women’s political condition in England--‘_He_ means _she_ when it’s a question of hanging; _he_ doesn’t mean _she_ when it’s a