ility to complete the same curriculum is no longer an experiment,
but an established fact. Even in conservative, staid old England, ladies
are admitted to the examinations at Cambridge. But all are by no means
open. No: there are those, and some of them men of sense in other
respects, who can not come down from the lofty pedestal on which they
have placed themselves, and are not willing to allow their sisters or
daughters to mount, lest they should reach their side. These sneer and
frown, and prophesy evil just as vehemently as did narrow-minded men of
the same class fifty or twenty years ago; and their influence will, for
a time, keep some of the colleges closed to women. But this is a matter
of little consequence now. There are universities now open to them of as
high a literary grade as those which are closed against them; and
consequently they may drink at will at the fountain of knowledge,
despite the sneers and frowns of those who would prevent it if they
could, but happily can not altogether.

Though there is still much fierce opposition to the movement for
granting them equal civil and ecclesiastical rights and privileges, and
for allowing them to compete fairly with men in business transactions or
in the learned professions; and though it may be expected that this
opposition will be continued for some time to come,--yet women have
cause for thankful rejoicing, and may take courage. The long night of
their bitter servitude is nearly over, the dawn of better days is
beginning to tinge the horizon; and hope may now be entertained that
erelong they shall occupy the position to which they are entitled, as
man's compeer--the position of equality with him in all the relations of
life--and enjoy the full rights and privileges of civilized and
Christianized citizenship.

The morning is breaking.

CHAPTER VIII.

Famous Women of Antiquity.

It has been so often asserted that women are incompetent to form any
thing like correct opinions on civil or political questions, or to
govern with discretion, even when by chance the reins are committed to
their control for a brief season; and that they have always been found
so; and, also, that they are naturally incapable of a sufficiently great
degree of mental effort to entitle them to celebrity,--that the
statement has come to be regarded as a fact by the masses, who have
lacked either the ability or the desire to investigate the matter. With
the majority of men, as