idents, had turned from the appointment of a
woman, especially when a highly capable successor was at hand,
the decision would have meant... the adoption of the principle
of the ineligibility of women for the college presidency.... It is
an anomaly that women should be permitted to enter upon an
intellectual career and should not be permitted to look forward
to the natural rewards of successful labor.'"

Professor Calkins's personal tribute to Miss Pendleton's power
and personality is especially gracious and deserving of quotation,
coming as it does from a distinguished alumna of a sister college.
She writes:

"Miss Pendleton unites a detailed and thorough knowledge of the
history, the specific excellences, and the definite needs of
Wellesley College, with openness of mind, breadth of outlook and
the endowment for constructive leadership. No college procedure
seems to her to be justified by precedent merely; no curriculum
or legislation is, in her view, too sacred to be subject to revision.
Her wide acquaintance with the policies of other colleges and
with modern tendencies in education prompts her to constant
enlargement and modification, while her accurate knowledge of
Wellesley's conditions and her large patience are a check on the
too exuberant spirit of innovation. With Miss Pendleton as
president, the college is sure to advance with dignity and with
safety. She will do better than 'build up' the college, for she
will quicken and guide its growth from within.

"Fundamental to the professional is the personal equipment for
office. Miss Pendleton is unswervingly just, undauntedly generous,
and completely devoted to the college. Not every one realizes
that her reserve hides a sympathy as keen as it is deep, though
no one doubts this who has ever appealed to her for help. Finally,
all those who really know her are well aware that she is utterly
self-forgetful, or rather, that it does not occur to her to consider
any decision in its bearing on her own position or popularity.
This inability to take the narrowly personal point of view is,
perhaps, her most distinguishing characteristic....

"Miss Pendleton unquestionably conceives the office of college
president not as that of absolute monarch but as that of constitutional
ruler; not as that of master, but as that of leader. Readers of
the dean's report for the Sabbatical year of Miss Hazard's absence,
in which Miss Pendleton was acting president, will not h