There appear, from the first, to have been no discouragements from lack of mental capacity on the part of girls, even in the academies where they were instructed with boys. The “Moravian Brethren” have the honor of founding the first private institution in America designed to give girls better advantages than the common schools. A female seminary was opened by them in Bethlehem, Pa., in 1749. Its service went beyond its own work, for Rev. Mr. Woodbridge records that “after the success of the Moravians in female education, the attention of gentlemen of reputation and influence was turned to the subject. Dr. Morgan, Dr. Rush,—the great advocate of education,—with others, instituted an academy for females in Philadelphia. Their attention and influence and care were successful, and from them sprang all the subsequent and celebrated schools in that city.” It is presumed that it was of the “Philadelphia Female Academy,” which held commencement exercises from as early as 1794, that Mr. Woodbridge says, “In 1780, in Philadelphia, for the first time in my life, I heard a class of young ladies parse English.” The “Penn Charter School” has a long and honorable record and has admitted girls for more than a century. The Penn Charter School was founded in Philadelphia in 1697 as a public school, and has been carried on down to the present day under three charters granted by William Penn in the years 1701, 1708, 1711. These make provision, at the cost of the people called Quakers, for “all Children and Servants, Male and Female ... the rich to be instructed at reasonable rates, the poor to be maintained and schooled for nothing.” Provision is made in the charters for instruction of both sexes in “reading, writing, work, languages, arts, and sciences.” The foundation laid is broad enough for a university for the people. As a matter of fact the girls and boys have always been educated separately, and the curriculum of the girls’ school has always been less advanced than that of the boys. The Latin school has not been opened to them, nor, it is believed, have the ancient languages been taught them. In 1795, “Poor’s Academy for Young Ladies” became “a place of proud distinction to finished females.” The earliest academy for girls in New England was founded in 1763, at Byfield, Mass., by bequest of William Dummer, whose name it took. In 1784, Leicester Academy, open to both sexes, was incorporated. In the same year the “Friends” established a school which offered the higher education to girls at Providence, R. I. This has been of high repute down to the present day. In the same city we find, in 1797, the advertisement of a gentleman who “will conduct a morning school for young ladies in reading, writing, and arithmetic,” and in 1808 Miss Brenton, at South Kingston, R. I., offers instruction which will include “epistolary style, as well as temple work, paper work, fringing, and netting.”