The seventeenth century was a great period for famous painters, and the presence of numerous excellent foreign artists in England influenced the attitude of society among the higher classes towards art. It might have been thought that, with a professed pedant like James I. following the learned Queen Elizabeth, there would have been a renewed impetus towards the profounder studies. But James I. was deficient in real strength of character, and was not an intellectual force. He might have played a very fair part among a knot of schoolmen disputing over theological points, but as a sovereign his talents did not show to good advantage. Moreover, he was in every way adverse to the progress of women. He treated them as inferiors, with a ponderous levity, and nothing was further from his mind than giving any encouragement to the cultivation of learning among the ladies of the court. Under Charles I. culture would have had a fair chance in England had not political trouble intervened, and during the remainder of the century society underwent a series of changes inimical to learning. Women’s education in the seventeenth century, among those sections of society where learning was cultivated, seems to have taken a more feminine tone. Accomplishments were sought after rather than solid acquirements. There was a leaning to lighter pursuits, to what were quaintly called “virtues,” such as instrumental and vocal music, dancing, and needlework. There was a dash of fine ladyism in it all. At the same time there was a parade of education. It was customary, among the families of the nobility, for the daughters to have tutors for reading and writing (which are specified as distinct subjects, not included, as now, under a general term), French, Latin, and perhaps Italian. Mrs. Hutchinson tells us that she had as many as eight tutors when she was seven years old, but she was exceptionally well instructed. Lucy Aspley, as she was then, was a child of extraordinary abilities, of which her father was very proud. At four years old she could read English perfectly. Her brothers at school, finding she was outstripping them in Latin with her tutor at home, tried to emulate her zeal. She cared for none of the feminine accomplishments, such as needlework and dancing, and always preferred the company and conversation of older people, even as a child. With all her precocity, and in spite of the fact that she was treated as the literary light of the family, she grew up unspoiled by flattery, and developed into one of the noblest women of her age. Lady Anne Halkett, the daughter of Thomas Murray, preceptor to Charles I., was probably better taught than most young women of the time. She herself lays stress on the pains bestowed upon her education by her parents, but there is no mention of any profound study. She had masters for French, for writing, for dancing, and for the practice of the lute and the virginals, and a gentlewoman was employed to teach her needlework.