CHAPTER XX
AT LAST
While all this business was pending, Miss M‘Laren, rendered incredulous by her long family experience of parliamentary life, that a Bill introduced so late could really pass—had written glowing descriptions of the advantages offered by Berne, and Miss Pechey had almost resolved to go there for the M.D. As the regulations of the Irish College were exacting in the matter of hospital work, she resolved to carry out this intention in any case as a preliminary measure.
“I shall be very glad,” she writes, “of another _good_ winter’s hospital. I hope you will join me in this, so that we may keep together. I think I should send in the Berne degree here [in Ireland] when I had got it.”
The two friends were most desirous that Mrs. Thorne should join them on this expedition for old sake’s sake; but family claims made this impossible.
Well, it was something to break away, even thus far, and be mere students again. For the moment S. J.-B. and Miss Pechey may almost be said to have been resting on their oars. Nothing more arduous was required of them than preparation for professional examination!
It was on Wednesday, November 1st, that, accompanied by Miss Clark (now Dr. Annie Clark), they entered Switzerland, a white world, as it chanced, for snow had already fallen. The diary begins again almost from the moment of arrival:
“Excellent déjeuner [at Bernerhof] 12.30. Then I lay down. E. P. and A. C. went out exploring. Wonderful energy of youth!”
They all proceeded at once to interview professors (Professor Masson had sent a delightful introduction), and forthwith began to attend lectures and cliniques, and to complete the theses which had been begun in England. S. J.-B. took as her subject Puerperal Fever, she having unhappily experienced an outbreak of that disease at Boston. The thesis was clear and exhaustive at the time, but of little permanent value, as the infective nature of the fever was not yet recognized, and treatment everywhere was mainly on a wrong scent.
She suffered terribly from neuralgia, the result of past and present strain, and work proceeded with difficulty. On December 20th Miss Pechey and Miss Clark went home for Christmas.
The diary has been brief and painful reading, but the writer revives just in time:
“Tuesday [Dec.] 26th. Nearly seven hours’ work. Splendidly well. Accepted for examination Jan. 10th.
Thursday 28th. Slept splendidly. For first time for weeks without anodyne.
Wednesday. N. Schultz called. Very nice. To walk with me before exam. next Wednesday. Rather made me nervous with her pity.
Friday.... Letter from U. D. P., begging me not to hurry—‘if I fail it can’t be kept secret.’ Are they all in league to shake my nerves?
Saturday [Jan.] 6th. E. P. still in London. Glorious day.
Tuesday 9th. From 5 a.m. rather nervous—got better in day—and did 9 hours’ work. Good head all through—thank God!
10 p.m. How very happy or very wretched I shall be this time tomorrow! I really feel as if I ought to be able to pass as far as knowledge goes,—tho’ not brilliantly,—but I am in despair about Langhans, and in less degree about others.—Still they will surely manage not to pluck me for mere want of German! Yesterday I felt almost as if I should fail, tonight I hope I shan’t, but with trembling....
Eh, dear, if I succeed, how I shall (half) laugh at past funk!—if I fail, I feel as if I need never laugh again. (And yet, played patience half an hour just now rather than be beat—‘ill to beat’ not a bad motto!) And, if I’m not beat,—fancy this being my last night without M.D.!
Wed. 10th. Nothing from E. P. or A. C. Wonder if latter has come.
Very curious my sort of duplex feeling, (_a_) If I could only feel sure of passing, I should pass,—i.e. not being nervous. (_b_) _If_ I felt sure—I should be sure to fail, (superstition!) A sort of unworthy Setebos feeling, I think.
Undertake for me!
* * * * *
And He has! Thank God! Every exam. fairly creditable, which is worth twice a scratch.
Now to see how much better an M.D. sleeps than other people!”
“13th Jan. Brighton.
MY DARLING,
Words cannot express my thankfulness at your success, and release from anxiety. I did not fear because I did not see why they should be unjust, but I am more than glad that it is settled.
I ought to have scolded you some days ago for more grapes. I am very forgetful, and I really sleep so well that I do not require them.
Well, dear, I am quite unsettled with the good news. Hoping to meet so soon, and with great congratulations from Tom, and Hetty, and Carry, and more love than a letter will take, ever your loving Mother,
MARIA EMILY JEX-BLAKE.
I heartily echo your ‘Thank God.’ I am so thankful I cannot settle.”
A few weeks later Miss Pechey and Miss Clark also passed the examination.
“You will like to hear,” writes Miss Pechey, “that Professor Hidber told Miss Clark that the Professors were much pleased with your exam. and said it was evident that you had studied well. It is more satisfactory, I think, to hear it indirectly like that than if they had told you so.
Miss Clark says she is very glad you answered better than I did. So am I: I only wish I had answered better for the credit of my countrywomen.”
It still remained to get on the English Register through the newly opened portal of the Irish College. S. J.-B. and Miss Pechey spent some time in London, reading and attending the Brompton Hospital, where Dr. Symes Thompson proved very helpful.
There is a sheaf of blank pages in the diary, and then:
“_Sunday, May 6th. Rugby._
‘One fight more,—the worst and the last!’ Oh, dear, if I pass this Exam. I shall deserve all I may get if I ever go in for another!
Since Nov. 1st.,—indeed one might say since September 1st,—hardly a day of rest and respite, but brain worked at highest pressure—often when almost a blank.
Now it is over and ‘waiting for the verdict.’
Off tonight for Dublin with E. P. Dr. A[tkins] also to join. ‘Omne ignotum pro magnifico.’ The various tests loom vague and large. Diagnosis at bedside,—horrible,—though enormously helped by Brompton experience. Recognition of drugs and things under microscope. 4 written exams. 2 hrs. oral, etc., etc.
I feel as if I really had fairly mastered my subjects and must know more than the average medical practitioner just fledged,—not to say have more sense.
But the stake is so enormous. A pluck would be so perfectly awful after all antecedents.
But in spite of my work, my brain is wonderfully well and clear.”
“_Monday, May 7th. 9.45 p.m._ Books closed after 4½ hours’ reading and examination,—not to be opened probably till all is over!
Be the fates propitious,—as I really think they ought, ... I the most comfortable of the three. ‘Where angels fear...?’ No,—I rather think on the principle of ‘While the child, etc.’
I’ve done my utmost,—and results are God’s.”
One is thankful to record that results were safe in His hands (as indeed S. J.-B. would have said they must have been whatever the examiners had decided). Two or three days later the three women, with a number of men, were solemnly summoned to the Board Room,—“repeated declaration after Registrar, then signed book, and Dr. Hayden, as Vice-President, took the hand of each and ‘admitted’ us!”
“Oh, dear, after long travail, good repose!”
“All dreadfully overwrought and tired. E. P. and I came to fisticuffs over Mrs. A.’s Memorial to London University. Pair of fools!”
A characteristic telegram went off at once to Mrs. Jex-Blake:
“Success just declared for all three of us.”
And within an hour this was followed up by a letter:
“... We are all so happy! The Exam. has been pretty stiff.
Yours lovingly, S. L. J. B. M. D. L. K. Q. C. P. I.”
The waiting Mother sends a mere scrap by return:
“I don’t know how to be thankful enough that all is so well thro’. Nothing will seem a trouble now. God bless you,
Ever your loving Mother.
_All_ going well with Pony, Turk, me, etc.”
And on the heels of this all the other congratulations pour in. “If I could I would ring the bells from Bow to Beersheba,” writes a friend and patient.
One almost feels that, if the bells had known the whole story, they would have rung of their own accord.