Such was the woman of 1840: in London, among the richer sort, a gentle doll, often good and affectionate, unselfish and devoted, religious, charitable, tender-hearted; sometimes, through the shutting up of all the channels for intellectual activity, snappish, impatient, and shrewish; in the country, in addition to these qualities, a housewife of the very first order. Let us turn to the Englishwoman--the young Englishwoman--of 1897. [Illustration: STATUE OF THE QUEEN IN KENSINGTON PALACE GARDENS. BY PRINCESS LOUISE ] She is educated. Whatsoever things are taught to the young man are taught to the young woman. The keys of knowledge are given to her; she gathers of the famous tree. If she wants to explore the wickedness of the world she can do so, for it is all in the books. The secrets of Nature are not closed to her; she can learn the structure of the body if she wishes. The secrets of science are all open to her if she cares to study them. At school, at college, she studies just as the young man studies, but harder and with greater concentration. She has proved her ability in the Honours Tripos of every branch; she has beaten the Senior Wrangler in mathematics; she has taken a first-class in classics, in history, in science, in languages. She has proved, not that she is man’s equal in intellect, though she claims so much, because she has not yet advanced any branch of learning or science one single step, but she has proved her capacity to take her place beside the young men who are the flower of their generation--the young men who stand in the first class in Honours when they take their degree. It is from such young men that our best statesmen, our judges, our ablest lawyers, our historians, our scholars, our divines, are taken, and among them the young Englishwomen of the day stand _inter pares_. [Illustration: STATUE IN HOUSE OF PARLIAMENT. BY GIBSON ] [Illustration: MICHAEL FARADAY JOHN TYNDALL CHARLES DARWIN HERBERT SPENCER LORD LISTER THOMAS HENRY HUXLEY LORD KELVIN REPRESENTATIVE SCIENTISTS AND PHILOSOPHERS OF THE REIGN]