en there, was so nearly that of a boy's
regimen, that it would puzzle a physiologist to determine from that
alone, whether the subject of it were male or female." Of course, these
words are intended to express disapprobation, and carry a doubt as to
the fitness of Vassar College to educate girls. Nothing could be more
unjust or preposterous than the conclusions likely to be deduced from
this statement.

We are told that from fourteen to nineteen, no girl must be encouraged
to persistent effort in study, or anything else. Now, the laws of life
are absolute, and if proper habits of study have not been formed by the
age of nineteen, they never can be formed in this life; the girl who
gives only an intermittent attention to study up to her twentieth year,
is prevented by all the influences about her from "intermitting" the
press of her social duties, so I will not deny that it was the happiest
surprise of my life when the first four years of Vassar College showed
me that there were still hundreds of girls willing to come to
Poughkeepsie, after they were eighteen years old, and shut themselves
out of the world for four years, abandoning gayeties of all sorts, the
German, the opera, and the parade, that they might fit themselves for
the duties of their future life.

The debt of this country to Matthew Vassar's memory can hardly be
exaggerated. In eight years of steady work, the college has contrived to
exert an influence that is felt in all parts of the United States and of
Canada. This is an educational influence in the broadest sense; it
pertains to dress, habits, manners, regularity of life, and sleep; the
proper preparation and serving of food, physical exercise, physiological
care, safe and healthful study, and the highest womanly standards in all
respects.

The college has received delicate pupils, whom she has sent out four
years after, strong and well; and it is the rule, that the health of the
classes steadily improves from the Freshman to the Senior year.

Vassar has been fortunate in retaining its resident physician throughout
the whole eight years of its existence, and if the Faculty were to grow
careless, the parents, educated by what she has been accustomed to give,
would demand the care that their children need.

The pupils of Vassar belong to no special class in society, and are
drawn from varied localities. When the college opened, she had upon her
Faculty three women whose peers it would be hard to find