The Russian women medical students shared the vicissitudes of Russian university life for women. After 1862 they studied in Switzerland, where Miss Suslowa, in 1867, was the first woman to be given the doctor's degree in Zurich. However, since the lack of doctors is very marked on the vast Russian plains, the government in 1872 opened special courses for women medical students in St. Petersburg. (In another institution courses were given for midwives and for women regimental surgeons.) The women completing the courses in St. Petersburg were not granted the doctor's degree, however. The Russian women earned the doctor's degree in the Russo-Turkish War (1877-1878); for ten years after this war women graduates of the St. Petersburg medical courses were granted degrees. Then these courses were closed in 1887. They were opened again in 1898. Under these difficult circumstances the Russian women secured their higher education. In the elementary schools, for every 1000 women inhabitants there are only 13.1 women public school teachers. Of the 2,000,000 public school children, only 650,000 are girls. The number of illiterates in Russia varies from 70 to 80 per cent. The elementary school course in the country is only three years (it is five years in the cities). The number of women public school teachers is 27,000 (as compared with 40,000 men teachers). An attempt has been made by the women village school teachers to arouse the women agricultural laborers from their stupor. Organization of women laborers has been attempted in the cities. For the present the task seems superhuman.[99] When graduating from the lyceum the young girl is given her _teaching diploma_, which permits her to teach in the four lower classes in the girls' lyceums. Those wishing to teach in the higher classes must take a special examination in a university. The higher classes in the girls' lyceums are taught chiefly by men teachers. When a Russian woman teacher marries she need not relinquish her position. In Russia the women doctors have a vast field of work. For every 200,000 inhabitants there is only one doctor! However, in St. Petersburg there is one doctor for every 10,000 inhabitants. According to the most recent statistics there are 545 women doctors in Russia. Of these, 8 have ceased to practice, 245 have official positions, and 292 have a private practice. Of the 132 women doctors in St. Petersburg, 35 are employed in hospitals, 14 in the sanitary department of the city; 7 are school physicians, 5 are assistants in clinics and laboratories, 2 are superintendents of maternity hospitals, 2 have charge of foundling asylums, 5 have private hospitals, and the rest engage in private practice. Of the 413 women doctors not in St. Petersburg, 173 have official positions, the others have a private practice.