CHAPTER VIII.WORK OF LOVE.
“The fellowship we long for is one in which men shall be themselves as well as fellows to each other, in which each shall know his own desire, and there shall be a harmony among them because of a holy concord in their desires.”—Clutton Brock.
“The fellowship we long for is one in which men shall be themselves as well as fellows to each other, in which each shall know his own desire, and there shall be a harmony among them because of a holy concord in their desires.”—Clutton Brock.
In the year 1880, the College Magazine was started under the editorship of Dorothea Beale, who remained its editor until her death in 1906. Nor was she only the editor, but a very frequent contributor: many of her articles which may be seen collected in book form first appeared in the Cheltenham Ladies’ College Magazine. The contributors were chiefly old pupils, though Dorothea Beale sometimes sought contributions from writers outside College circles. Shortly after the magazine was started it became a vehicle for news of old pupils, and was a means of binding past and present students together. It is interesting to see in old College Magazines the names of those who are now well-known in the literary world—Beatrice Harraden and others.
The year 1883 was what the pupils called Miss Beale’s “Silver Wedding”: as she had then been twenty-five years at the College. The Old Girls were anxious to give her a present on that occasion, and the Principal asked that they should give something to the College. The gift took the form of a beautiful organ, to be placed in the First Division Room—the largest hall at that time—above the Principal’s daïs.
The meeting of Old Girls was fixed for July 6 and 7. Less than a month before it, Dorothea Beale had the sorrow of losing her great friend, Mrs. Owen. She went on, as was her wont, with the preparations for the “silver wedding” assembly, quietly and calmly, not letting her own private griefs intrude on her public duties.
The Principal received her guests at eight o’clock on Friday evening. About a thousand old pupils werepresent. To many of them the building was quite new, and they were charmed with the beauty of it, decorated for the occasion by flowers and plants everywhere.
On the Saturday morning she had a large breakfast party, and prayers were held in the great hall. It must have been a thrilling experience for Dorothea Beale to hear for the first time so many of her Old Girls sing, “O God, our help in ages past,” to the accompaniment of the new organ. After prayers she gave an address, chiefly on music. She spoke first of the different kinds of music, the noble and the ignoble, the lofty and the base: the music which, like the song of the lotus-eaters, lulls us to forget all sense of duty, and obligation to home and kindred, and that which arouses all our highest powers. She spoke then of the different music of life, of nature, of faith, of every human soul.
The end of this speech expressed an idea that had been in her mind for a long time, that of forming a guild of former pupils. The fundamental aims of the Guild would be to bind old students to their Alma Mater: to keep them, by means of the magazine and Old Girls’ meetings, in touch with one another: to enable them to help one another: and perhaps by and by to take up some corporate work.
This suggestion of an Old Pupils’ Association was taken up at once, and a meeting was fixed for the following year.
A year later the Guild was established. The daisy had been chosen as the emblem of the Guild and a brooch had been devised, the design combining the flower and the monogram of the College. The guests were welcomed on Tuesday evening, July 8, 1884, and on Wednesday morning after prayers Dorothea Beale gave the inaugural address of the Guild. Her outlook on life was essentially that of the devout poet, who sees in the visible world the signs and symbols of spiritual truths. To her, the daisy, the emblem of the Guild, was full ofsuggestion. She dealt with allusions to the daisy in our poets, explaining why they loved this little humble flower. She spoke of its sturdy independence—“You never see it turning towards other flowers: it can only look up”. She took the independence of the daisy as a symbol of the friendship of middle and later life, the friendship which means little direct intercourse, only the consciousness of a union in spirit and a looking towards the same ends.
“We have chosen the daisy as our emblem, the single eye, the true sunflower, the real heliotrope that stands ever gazing upward. It is changed into an image of the sun himself: it is like a censer ever burning towards heaven, a speck of heavenly beauty, a star come down to brighten the dark places of the earth.”
The Guild meetings were held every second year, and were a source of great pleasure, interest, and inspiration to those who had known Dorothea Beale as Principal.
“She had a wonderful memory,” writes one of her former pupils, “for her Old Girls, especially for those who, like me, belonged to the old days of Cambray House, and could remember the excitement and delight of going into the new building. I shall never forget the warmth of her greeting at that last Guild or how at the ‘At Home’ in the evening she stopped me in the corridor to say, ‘I was told that all five C——’s were here, and I have only seen four. Where is M——?’ I believe that there were about 1200 Old Girls there, and to think of her keeping count like that of those whom she had seen was simply amazing.”
Pupils of a later date, who thought Dorothea Beale had hardly known them at College, were often astonished to find that their old Principal not only knew them, but remembered incidents of their College days, or events which happened afterwards.
An older girl and her sister were both sent to College and the latter left from the third division because herpeople left Cheltenham; but her elder sister, Gertrude, stayed on and eventually joined the Guild. Years after the younger one met the Principal and went up to speak to her and, never thinking that she could possibly remember her, meant to explain who she was. But before she could do so Miss Beale, on seeing her, began without any preliminaries: “Why has your sister left the Guild?”
In the year 1876 Miss Margaret Newman had made an offer to Dorothea Beale that she would start a boarding-house for students who wished to become teachers and found it difficult to obtain the necessary training. She offered to pay £75 a year towards expenses, and in addition to give her time and services. This involved a good deal of strain and work, as it meant living in a small house with only one maid, and having in addition the responsibility of the girl students. At the end of one year Miss Newman became ill and died after a short illness. Those who knew her felt that death had been hastened by the devoted work for which she had hardly had sufficient strength. Her work, however, was not ended. In the brief space of one year Miss Newman had won such love and affection for herself and such sympathy with her noble object that people felt her work must go on. It was this strong feeling which made Dorothea Beale depart from her usual plan of not asking for money. As soon as she asked, £1200 was immediately given, half of it by the College staff.
“She had left,” said Dorothea Beale, “a legacy of £100 to carry it on, and, as has been mentioned, further sums were given by friends, and about £600 by the College staff. The number of students had steadily increased, and it was determined by the trustees in whom the management was vested to build a residential college and trust to the small profits each year gradually to pay off the debt thereby incurred. They therefore purchased the site on Bayshill, and arrangements weremade for the erection of the building to designs prepared byMr.Middleton. Cheltenham was one of the first colleges to establish training for Secondary Teachers. After much thought it was decided to call the new hall of residenceSt.Hilda’s.
“St.Hilda’s,” said she, “seemed a particularly appropriate ideal for our students. She was consecrated by Bishop Aidan and made Head of the most important house of education of her day. She had, Bede tells us, been diligently instructed by learned men and she was the patron of our earliest poet, Caedmon. She insisted much that those under her direction should attend to the reading of the Holy Scriptures. She taught the strict observance of justice and other virtues, particularly of peace and charity.”
On November 27, 1885, the building was formally opened. A beautiful statue ofSt.Hilda was presented by a brother of some old pupils. She holds in her hand the Vulgate open at the words “Videmus nunc per speculum in aenigmate: tune autem facie ad faciem. Nunc cognosco ex parte: tunc autem cognoscam sicut et cognitus sum” (1 Cor. xiii. 12). Over the door are the words of Plato, χαλεπὰ τὰ καλά. On the study walls are these texts—“Shew Thy servants Thy work and their children Thy glory”: “Knowledge puffeth up, charity buildeth up”: “Let nothing be done through strife or vain-glory”.
Seven years later another Saint Hilda’s was established, this time at Oxford.
Dorothea Beale had for long years realised the enormous advantage to students of living for a time in the atmosphere of the older Universities. She thought that a time at Oxford or Cambridge could give to a student, who had already begun her teaching career, inspiration and mental stimulus that nothing else could give. Her idea was that they should have a year for general reading, rather than for examination work, though those whowished to take examinations should be allowed to do so.
In 1892, Miss Beale purchased fromDr.Child, Cowley House, Oxford, a beautifully situated house, overlooking Christ Church meadows. The work was begun in October, 1893, there being at that time seven students with Mrs. Burrows as Principal. It was formally opened on November 6, the mid-term holiday of Cheltenham Ladies’ College, and many of the staff and pupils went to the opening ceremony.
St.Hilda’s work was soon extended in another direction, not indeed along Dorothea Beale’s lines, though she was too wise to offer any opposition. In the year 1888 a meeting of the Guild was held, and the proposal was made that it should take up some definite outside work. There were several proposals, but an overwhelming majority of the Guild decided on the plan of starting a settlement in the East End of London. As a result of this decision Mayfield House, close to Bethnal Green, was taken by the Committee. Dorothea Beale was greatly disappointed and did not conceal the fact. At a General Guild Meeting in alluding to this subject she said:—
“I trust we shall be able to try to win harmony out of notes not altogether concordant. Some of us come with a feeling of disappointment that the scheme we desired has been rejected—I am one of these. I not only accept my defeat, I feel sure that you have sought guidance of that inward oracle which must ever be our supreme rule, you have done what conscience bade and so it is right. As regards my own scheme, I only allude to it to say that, having now to continue it single-handed, I cannot help you as much as I could wish, and I just refer to it to-day in the hope that you will remember it when I am no longer here.”
After some years of work at Mayfield House a house was built specially for the Guild settlement close to ShoreditchChurch. The latter was opened in 1895. The Guild took up this task in the East End with great enthusiasm, and many of the members were willing to sacrifice time and money to help on the work they had undertaken.
Dorothea Beale seems never to have taken kindly to charitable work. She had a great horror of the demoralisation caused by the giving of “doles”. Many of her friends thought that she realised little of the suffering and demoralisation caused by extreme poverty. After a time she became much more interested in the Guild settlement, realising what a valuable centre it formed for training young workers. It was this aspect of the work rather than its charitable purpose that appealed to her most strongly. All through her life she touched with a very doubtful hand enterprises connected with giving to individuals. She felt very strongly that the effect was in almost every case demoralising. When free meals for necessitous school children were introduced, she was very much concerned about them, dreading the weakening of parental responsibility. She knew little of the poor, however, and of the evil effects of poverty itself, and was in consequence less harassed by doubts than those of us who see these social problems following one another in an endless vicious circle. In this connection one might mention that she never cared much for scholarships, though as time went on she accepted one or two for the College, and she herself founded one at Casterton School. She preferred to lend money to those who wished for training which they could not afford. During her time at Cheltenham she lent money to many students: it had to be returned when the student began to earn money, and in hardly any cases did the student fail to do so. She felt very strongly that people value much more highly that for which they have to struggle, and had an almost morbid dread of the demoralising effect of charity on character.