Produced by Bryan Ness, Marcia Brooks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from scanned images of public domain material from the Google Print project.) THE EDUCATION OF AMERICAN GIRLS. CONSIDERED IN A SERIES OF ESSAYS. EDITED BY ANNA C. BRACKETT. "The time has arrived, when like huntsmen, we should surround the cover, and look sharp that justice does not slip away and pass out of sight and get lost; for there can be no doubt that we are in the right direction. Only try and get a sight of her, and if you come within view first, let me know."--PLATO REP. BOOK IV. [Illustration] NEW YORK: G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS, FOURTH AVENUE AND TWENTY-THIRD STREET. 1874. Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1874, by G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS, In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C. LANGE, LITTLE & CO., PRINTERS, ELECTROTYPERS AND STEREOTYPERS, 108 TO 114 WOOSTER STREET, N. Y. TO THE SCHOOL-GIRLS AND COLLEGE-GIRLS OF AMERICA, BECAUSE WE BELIEVE THAT THEIR IDEALS ARE HIGH AND THAT THEY HAVE STRENGTH TO MAKE THEM REAL, This Book is Dedicated BY THE WOMEN WHO, IN THE INTERVALS SNATCHED FROM DAILY LABOR, HAVE WRITTEN IT FOR THEIR SAKES. PREFACE. The Table of Contents sufficiently indicates the purpose and aim of this book. The essays are the thoughts of American women, of wide and varied experience, both professional and otherwise; no one writer being responsible for the work of another. The connecting link is the common interest. Some of the names need no introduction. The author of Essay IV. has had an unusually long and varied experience in the education and care of Western girls, in schools and colleges. The author of the essay on English Girls is a graduate of Antioch, has taught for many years in different sections of this country, and has had unusual opportunities, for several years, of observing English methods and results. The essays on the first four institutions, whose names they bear, come with the official sanction of the presiding officers of those institutions, who vouch for the correctness of the statements. Of these, VII. is by a member of the present Senior Class of the University, who has instituted very exact personal inquiries among the women-students. The author of VIII. is the librarian of Mt. Holyoke Seminary. The writer of the report from Oberlin is a graduate--a teacher of wide experience, and has been for three or four years the Principal of the Ladies' Department of the college. The resident physician at Vassar is too well known as such, to need any introduction. There are many other institutions whose statistics would be equally valuable, such, for instance, as the Northwestern University of Illinois, which has not only opened its doors to girl-students, but has placed women on the Board of Trustees, and in the Faculty.