Part 6

This has lately been proved, from the census, by a leading New York paper. In that it is shown that, in all our large cities, the male inhabitants, under fifteen and over the usual marriageable age, are greatly in excess of the females, and, consequently, the women at the marriageable age are greatly in excess of the marriageable men. Thus, in New York City, according to the statements of the _New York Times_, there are eleven thousand more females than males, of all ages, while there are one hundred and thirty-two thousand more women of marriageable age than men of that age. This is perhaps a large estimate, but the disproportion is at all events enormous.

And, in the rural districts of New York State, we find a similar state of things; for the excess of females, of all ages, is twenty-one thousand, while the excess of marriageable women, if at the same ratio as that stated in New York City, would be two hundred and sixty-three thousand. A similar state of things will be seen in all our older States.

The most mournful feature in this case is the fact that most of these women have never been trained for any kind of business by which they can earn an independent livelihood. The Working-woman's Protective Union, of New York City, reports that, of thirteen thousand applicants, not one-half were qualified to do any kind of useful work in a proper manner. The societies that are formed to furnish work for poor women report that their greatest impediment is that so few can sew decently, or do any other work properly.

The heads of dress-making establishments report that very few women can be found who can be trusted to complete a dress, and that those who are competent find abundant work and good wages. The demand for really superior mantua-makers is almost universal in country places, and even in many of our cities.

In former days sewing was taught in all schools for girls, but now it is banished from our common schools, and the mothers at home are too neglectful, or too ignorant, or too pressed with labor, to supply the deficiency.

It was reported in the _New York Tribune_, not long since, that there are at least twenty thousand professed prostitutes in New York City alone, while Boston, in proportion to its number of inhabitants, shows a larger number, and all our cities give similar reports. This, it is hoped is an estimate much in excess of the reality; but the truth is mournful enough. Multitudes of these unfortunates have only two alternatives—on the one hand, poor lodgings, shabby dress, poor food, and ceaseless daily toil from eight to ten or fifteen hours; on the other hand, the tempter offers a pleasant home, a servant to do the work, fine dress, the theatre and ball, and kind attentions, with no labor or care. Where is the strength of virtue in those who despise and avoid these outcasts, that might not fall in such perilous assaults?

It is this dreadful state of temptation which accounts for the fact that crime increases faster among women than among men. Thus, in Massachusetts, during the last ten years, among the men of that State, crime _decreased_ at the rate of eight thousand five hundred and seven less than during the ten preceding years, while, among women, crime _increased_ at the rate of three hundred and sixty-eight during the same period; that is, over eight thousand _less_ men, and over three hundred _more_ women, were guilty of crime than in the previous ten years.

But, turning from these to the daughters of the most wealthy class, those who have generous and elevated aspirations also feel that for them, too, there is "no opening—no promotion—no career," except that of marriage, and for this they are trained to feel that it is disgraceful to seek. They have nothing to do but wait to be sought. Trained to believe marriage their highest boon, they are disgraced for seeking it, and must affect indifference.

Meantime, to do any thing to earn their own independence is what father and brothers would deem a disgrace to themselves and their family. For women of high position to work for their livelihood, in most cases custom decrees as disgraceful. And then, if cast down by poverty, they have been trained to nothing that would earn a support, or, if by chance they have some resource, all avenues for its employment are thronged with needy applicants. Ordinarily, and with few exceptions, there are only two employments for such women that do not involve loss of social position, viz., school-teaching and boarding.

But every opening for a school-teacher has scores, and sometimes hundreds, of applicants, while often the protracted toils in unventilated and crowded school rooms destroy health. To keep boarders demands capital to start, and an experience and training in household management and economy rarely taught to the daughters of wealth. In this country housework is dishonorable, and rich men make no attempts to train their daughters to any other business that would be a resort in poverty.

Few can realize the perils which threaten our country from the present condition of women. The grand instrumentality, not only for perpetuating our race, but for its training to eternal blessedness, is the family state, and in this woman is the chief minister. As the general rule, man is the laborer out of the home, to provide for its support, while woman is the daily minister to train its inmates. But there are now many fatal influences that combine to unfit her for these sacred duties. Not the least of these is the decay of female health, engendering irritable nerves in both mother and offspring, and thus greatly increasing the difficulties of physical and still more of moral training.

The factory girls, and many also in shops and stores, must stand eight and ten hours a day, often in a poisonous atmosphere, causing decay of constitution, and forbidding healthful offspring. The sewing-machine lessens the wages of needlewomen, while employers testify that those who use it for steady work become hopelessly diseased, and cannot rear healthy children. In the more wealthy circles, the murderous fashions of dress make terrible havoc with the health of young girls, while impure air, unhealthful food and condiments, lack of exercise, and over-stimulation of brain and nerves, are completing the ruin of health and family hopes.

The state of domestic service is another element that is undermining the family state. Disgraced by the stigma of our late slavery, and by the influx into our kitchens of ignorant and uncleanly foreigners, American women forsake home circles for the unhealthful shops and mills.

Then the thriftless young housekeepers from boarding-school life have no ability either to teach or to control their incompetent assistants, while ceaseless "worries" multiply in parlor, nursery, and kitchen. The husband is discouraged by the waste and extravagance, and wearied with endless complaints, and home becomes any thing but the harbor of comfort and peace.

Add to all this, the now common practice which destroys maternal health and unborn offspring—the loose teachings of free love—the unfortunate influence of spiritualism, so called—the fascinations of the _demi-monde_ for the rich, and of lower haunts for the rest, with the poverty of thousands of women who but for desperate temptations would be pure, and the extent of the malign influences undermining the family state—that chief hope of our race—is appalling.

Woman, in the Protestant world, is educated only _for marriage_, hoping to have some one to work for her support, and, when this is not gained, little else is provided.

The Roman Catholic Church, while it honored the institution of marriage as a sacrament, and upheld its sanctity, yet taught that woman had a still higher ministry; and for this, large endowments, comfortable positions, and honorable distinction, were provided. The women who devoted their time and wealth and labors to orphans, to the sick, and to the poor, were honored above married women as _saints_, who not only laid up treasures in heaven for themselves, but also a stock of _merits_ to supply the deficiencies of others. The idea of self-sacrifice and self-denial in that church was so honored as to run into mischievous extremes, so that rich establishments of celibates of both sexes multiplied all over Christendom till they became burdens and pests.

This drove the Protestant world to the other extreme, so that no provision at all has been made for the single woman. In most cases she must marry, or have no profession that leads to independence, honor, and wealth. To fit young men for their professions, thousands and millions are every year provided, securing by endowments the highest class of teachers, in addition to every advantage of libraries, apparatus, and buildings. But woman's profession has no such provisions made for its elevated duties.

In the Roman Catholic Church the woman of high position, culture, and benevolence, is honored above all others if she remains single and devotes her time and wealth to orphans, to nurse the sick, to reclaim the vicious, and to provide for the destitute. She becomes a lady abbess, or the head of some sisterhood, where high position, influence, and honor, are her reward.

And the priesthood of that Church employ all their personal and official influence to lead women of benevolence and piety to devote time, property, and prayers, to the salvation of their fellow-creatures from diseases of body, ignorance, and sin.

But Protestant women, as yet, have been influenced to endow institutions for _men_, rather than for their own sex. The writer obtained from the treasurers of only six institutions for men the following statement of benefactions from women:

Miss Plummer, to Cambridge University, to endow one professorship, gave $25,000; Mary Townsend, for the same, $25,000; Sarah Jackson, for the same, $10,000; other ladies, in sums over $1,000, to the same, over $30,000. To Andover Professional School of Theology ladies have given over $65,000, and, of this, $30,000 by one lady. In Illinois, Mrs. Garretson has given to one professional school $300,000. In Albany, Mrs. Dudlay has given, for a scientific institution for men, $105,000. To Beloit College, Wisconsin, property has been given, by one lady, valued at $30,000.

Thus half a million has been given by women to these six colleges and professional schools, and all in the present century. The reports of similar institutions for men all over the nation would show similar liberal benefactions of women to endow institutions for the other sex, while for their own no such records appear. Where is there a single endowment from a woman to secure a salary to a woman teaching her own proper profession?

It is the depressed and suffering condition of our sex, here indicated, which is the exciting cause of the agitation to gain woman suffrage. To me, success in this effort appears not as a remedy, but rather as a curse. But there are favorable results involved in this agitation that deserve consideration. One is, the exhibition of the moral power now held by women in our nation. For if women urging measures so contrary to our customs and prejudices—not to say so contrary to common sense and the Bible—with many prominent leaders so destitute of discretion and political foresight, yet can move society so powerfully, what could not be accomplished by the organized influence and action of that vast majority of intelligent women opposed to such innovations?

Another beneficial result it is hoped will be, systematic and concerted measures by judicious and benevolent women to organize agencies to remedy the evils all must lament, and by measures more wise and more practicable. What such measure will probably be, may be indicated by a series of resolutions adopted first by two previous meetings, and afterwards by a large public meeting at Steinway Hall, New York, of ladies invited by the Managers of the American Woman's Educational Association, from all religious denominations in the city, as follows:

"Resolved, That one cause of the depressed condition of woman is the fact that the distinctive profession of her sex, as the nurse of infancy and of the sick, as educator of childhood, and as the chief minister of the family state, has not been duly honored, nor such provision been made for its scientific and practical training as is accorded to the other sex for their professions; and, that it is owing to this neglect that women are driven to seek honor and independence in the institutions and the professions of men.

"Resolved, That woman's distinctive profession, in its various branches, involves more important interests than any other human science; and, that the evils suffered by women would be extensively remedied by establishing institutions for training women for her profession, which shall be as generously endowed as are the institutions of men, many of which have been largely endowed by women.

"Resolved, That the science of domestic economy should be made a study in all institutions for girls; and that certain practical employments of the family state should be made a part of common school education, especially the art of sewing, which is so needful for the poor.

"Resolved, That every young woman should be trained to some business by which she can earn an independent livelihood in case of poverty.

"Resolved, That in addition to the various in-door employments suitable for woman, there are other out-door employments especially favorable to health and equally suitable, such as raising fruits and flowers, the culture of silk and cotton, the raising of bees, and the superintendence of dairy farms and manufactures. All of these offer avenues to wealth and independence for women as properly as men, and schools for imparting to women the science and practice of these employments should be provided, and as liberally endowed as are the agricultural schools for men." These resolutions were adopted unanimously and then published in all the leading secular and religious papers with equally unanimous approval. The following from the _N. Y. Evening Post_, is a fair specimen of the whole.

"These resolutions contain sound sense; and their claim that practical schools for women deserve as much attention as similar schools for men, is undeniably just. If we are to have industrial schools at all, if it is important that anybody should be able to secure systematic and thorough instruction as a preparation for useful industries, girls would be as much benefited by such instruction as boys; and women need it as much as men.

"There is no doubt that the present arrangement of society bears more hardly upon women than upon men; and all wise efforts to make them more independent of the mischances of life deserve encouragement."

Although the plan aimed at is large, this Association commenced with only a small portion. At Milwaukee, where is their first institution, a school already organized was taken as the nucleus. The citizens were to furnish land, and building, and pupils enough to support by tuition fees a given number of teachers. On these conditions the Association agreed to provide endowments to support a certain number of teachers, so long as the plan of the Association was carried out, but if it was relinquished, to remove their patronage to another place. The Lady Agent of the Association is still at the head of this Institution, which has prospered on this plan for more than fifteen years, the Association supporting by their funds a portion of the teachers.

In my former address in this place, I showed how in this and other cities, the more wealthy, and best educated classes, and those who pay the most taxes for public education, provide for their own daughters inferior advantages to those given to the humblest poor. Our own High School in this city compared with this Seminary and all private schools, will illustrate this remarkable fact.

For our High School has a building healthfully and thoroughly warmed and ventilated, as can be said of neither this Seminary, nor any private school of this city; while its apparatus and library are superior to any except those of the College, and the Theological School, to which no girls have access. By reason of subordinate graded schools, only well prepared pupils are admitted, or this is the rule which can be enforced; while all scholars must enter at regular periods. Thus, only four classes are formed and only a small number of studies are pursued at any one time. The teachers are thus allowed time to prepare themselves, and other great advantages for instructing, while their salaries are much higher than can be given to assistant teachers in most private schools. Thus the best class of teachers are tempted to forsake private schools for these superior advantages.

In contrast to these advantages, although this Seminary is warmed and ventilated as well as most private schools, it is necessary to employ much of the time of an intelligent and careful teacher to keep the rooms at proper temperature, well ventilated and free from poisonous gases, and yet with but imperfect success.

Then the pupils enter this and all private schools, at any time and at all grades of advancement, making it necessary to multiply classes and to tax the teachers in order to bring forward the new comers to certain classes. The method of arranging certain studies at one time of the year, and others only at other times, as in colleges and our public high schools, often cannot be enforced without dissatisfying patrons, and thus lessening income. Then the accomplishments, especially Piano music, to which classes must conform, greatly increases the difficulty of classification in this and in all private schools.

The result usually is, a most inferior, desultory, and unsatisfactory course of education. There are cases where by overworking poorly paid assistant teachers, and by small profits to proprietors, some private schools turn out as fine scholars as our best managed High schools. But these are exceptions, and exceptions that bear very severely on the subordinate women teachers.

Thus comes to pass the remarkable fact that the most wealthy and cultivated pay the largest taxes to furnish the poorer classes a gratuitous and a better education than they gain for their own daughters by paying the largest tuition fees, or at expensive boarding schools.

There is great misconception as to the advantages of education for daughters of the more wealthy classes, owing to the fact that the ambitious name of "college" is given to schools that have no proper claim to this appellation. For the distinctive feature of a college heretofore has been its _endowments_, by which a permanent faculty of superior and co-equal teachers are maintained to a great extent independent of tuition fees; and also supporting professors as independent heads of departments, instead of subordinates to a principal, as in High Schools and academies. This being the fact, there is not a single college for women in this country, nor in the whole world.

The only feature of a college in any institutions for women is a similar course of study and graduating diplomas, and these without endowments only increase the branches taught, and decrease the thoroughness of instruction and overwork the teachers.

There is also great misconception as to the influence of woman's domestic duties in developing and training the intellect. A problem in arithmetic or geometry is far more interesting, and therefore more quickening to the intellect, when it is directly applied to some useful, practical purpose. Thus a woman who is daily calculating her butcher's and grocer's accounts, or trading at stores, is cultivating her intellect as much or more than she would by studying arithmetic in college or school without any end but to escape reproof or marks of imperfection. So the planning and cutting garments and the various other calculations and measurements of carpets, curtains, and furniture, are daily exercises in both geometry and arithmetic, while the practical interest and the handicraft involved tend to quicken intellectual vigor.

Then in kitchen affairs, domestic chemistry, though on a small scale, is constantly studied and practically applied. Again in the care of infants and of the sick, the discipline of the physiologist and the physician are united. Then in the government of servants and children, the same mental exertion and principles are employed as are demanded for legislatures, statesmen, and magistrates. Then in the religious training of children, all the most profound questions of the metaphysician and the theologian are daily objects of enquiry and reflection as childhood urges the most difficult problems of mental science, and of natural and revealed religion.

A man in his daily toils, or in the learned professions has only one or two subjects that hold his practical attention and interest, but a woman as mother and housekeeper has a constant succession of employments that tax all her intellectual and her moral powers. These views are remarkably illustrated by some of the women of a former generation whose intellectual training was chiefly in domestic pursuits with little else except the humblest kind of common school, a very small library, and a vigorous pulpit ministry. Let such be compared with multitudes of women who with little domestic training and exercise have graduated from the High Schools and Colleges of the present day, and we shall have occasion for serious reflection as to the diverse results.

I can best illustrate this by an individual case that may fairly represent a large class of women forty or fifty years ago. In early youth I lived in Litchfield, Conn., where a law school was conducted by Judge Reeves, and Judge Gould, two of the most talented and learned jurists of the nation, and gathered from forty to over one hundred law students from the first colleges and the first families of every state in the Union. There were also eight or ten other gentlemen of liberal education and some of more than ordinary talents and culture, in the same circle.

Then of the ladies I met in that circle, were Mrs. Judge Reeve, Mrs. Judge Gould, Miss Sarah Pierce, to whom I owe my school education, Miss Mary Pierce, Miss Amelia Ogden, Miss Lucy Sheldon, my father's sister Esther, my mother's sister Mrs. Mary Hubbard, and my mother. In my own family circle I used to hear my mother and aunts discussing a variety of literary and scientific topics, and especially remember their enthusiastic interest in the new discoveries of chemistry by Lavoisier, and their practical test experiments in the kitchen and study. Aunt Esther was deeply interested in medical science, and probably had read medical works as extensively as most physicians of that day.