‘Shall I touch in conclusion upon the mythical elements in St. Hilda’s story? Myths are truths expressed in poetry. You see the ammonite at her feet, one of the serpents that she, like St. Patrick, is fabled to have turned into stone. There mayhave been, once, at Whitby, serpents who, with the poisoned tooth of calumny and evil-speaking, wounded and slew. I think she turned them into stone with her look of sorrow. We have not represented the wild geese, whom she is said to have destroyed because they wasted her lands. I half believe that story too; I feel sure that all these disappeared from her abbey lands, but perhaps they were turned into swans.’
‘Shall I touch in conclusion upon the mythical elements in St. Hilda’s story? Myths are truths expressed in poetry. You see the ammonite at her feet, one of the serpents that she, like St. Patrick, is fabled to have turned into stone. There mayhave been, once, at Whitby, serpents who, with the poisoned tooth of calumny and evil-speaking, wounded and slew. I think she turned them into stone with her look of sorrow. We have not represented the wild geese, whom she is said to have destroyed because they wasted her lands. I half believe that story too; I feel sure that all these disappeared from her abbey lands, but perhaps they were turned into swans.’
St. Hilda’s College was scarcely built and opened before it was necessary to enlarge it by adding a new wing. It was not until this had been done that Miss Beale felt free to devote herself to another foundation, which also was to bear the name of the sainted Abbess.
As early as the year 1882 Miss Beale, attracted by the increasing facilities offered to women by the elder universities, had purchased three acres of land in north Oxford. These she retained for building uses should the right moment or a definite reason for such a purpose occur. But no one showed much sympathy with the scheme, there was no offer of money, and for long much of her own capital was absorbed in St. Hilda’s, Cheltenham. Impulsive to a fault as she often was, Miss Beale could school herself to wait. After five years came an opportunity of purchasing a ready-made college in Dr. Child’s beautiful house on the Cherwell. It seemed well to accept this, and begin there the new house of education.
There were many reasons why Miss Beale allowed so long a time to elapse between her purpose and her act. Her own ideas and her aims for her Hall at Oxford shaped themselves but gradually. Somerville College[64]and Lady Margaret Hall were still in their first youth. Miss Beale’s scheme seemed uncalled for where there were already so many workers for the cause of women’seducation in the field. Her educational experience had been different from that of those whose minds had developed among university surroundings; her methods were unacademic, unconventional. Consequently there were some to warn her as she prepared to take her new step: ‘The University may easily receive a shock from which it will take long to recover.’
It may well be asked even now, as it was often asked at the time, why Miss Beale wanted to come to Oxford at all, and particularly while she was uncertain of the value of University Examinations for women. But she valued even more than the certificate gained by taking schools the atmosphere of Oxford. She saw that the students of St. Hilda’s, Cheltenham, missed this. When she founded that institution she had written of it, that she hoped it ‘would be a Hall similar to the Halls at Oxford and Cambridge.’ Now she felt the need of what only the older universities could give. She hoped her new house might become a place of intellectual enlargement and refreshment such as Oxford could best supply to some who had already begun their work of teaching, and who needed new thoughts and inspiration, more time for thought, a higher intellectual standard. She thought that a year at Oxford could supply that feature in education which is sometimes more developed at home.
‘I have often felt ... that a year in which they should be allowed to expatiate in intellectual pastures in a way that we older women used to do before examinations for women existed, would be of great value. And they can do this best in some University town, where they can have libraries and museums and such lectures and private help as they most require—both hearing and asking questions, rather than being asked and answering.... Many could take one year who could not take three.... The students of St. Hilda’s (Oxford) will have the same opportunities of attending lectures and offering themselves for examinations as at the other Ladies’ Colleges—but weshould not press examination upon any who can do better work without. Of course we must be assured that those who come to us will work seriously.’
‘I have often felt ... that a year in which they should be allowed to expatiate in intellectual pastures in a way that we older women used to do before examinations for women existed, would be of great value. And they can do this best in some University town, where they can have libraries and museums and such lectures and private help as they most require—both hearing and asking questions, rather than being asked and answering.... Many could take one year who could not take three.... The students of St. Hilda’s (Oxford) will have the same opportunities of attending lectures and offering themselves for examinations as at the other Ladies’ Colleges—but weshould not press examination upon any who can do better work without. Of course we must be assured that those who come to us will work seriously.’
Yet these reasons were secondary. The purchase of three acres of ground at Oxford was a definite result of her own suffering of mind in 1882. As she emerged from that she at once began to build in vision a house where teachers should be established in the faith, where they should learn to feel that their calling was not to do mere journeyman work, but to deal with the deep problems of life.
Finally, it may be added that, whether conscious of it or not, she could not keep herself out of the great movement which was enabling women to share with men many of the incomparable advantages of University life, she had also her own conception of what University life might do for women, and by means of a College at Oxford for her own College at Cheltenham. For Cheltenham the connection would be of great value. Seeing all that might be won by a well-placed move, she planned that move, waited, then made it at the right moment. ‘I bewail your news,’ wrote an Oxford friend to whom she communicated the fact that St. Hilda’s was about to be opened, ‘and disclaim all responsibility for your mistake.’ Miss Beale opened her Hall and begged the students to accept the wordsNon frustra vixias their motto, that being the thought which the ammonite at the feet of St. Hilda’s statue now suggested to her.
In October 1893 seven students took up their residence at St. Hilda’s. Mrs. Burrows, who had had a College boarding-house at Cheltenham, came to be head of the new Hall, assisted by her daughter, who had been a student at Lady Margaret Hall. The house wasformally but quietly opened on November 6 by the Bishop of the diocese, Dr. Stubbs, who placed himself at Miss Beale’s disposal for all arrangements. ‘I will keep,’ he wrote, ‘November 6 free for Miss Beale, but she must let me hear what, when, and how what is to be done’; and to Miss Beale, ‘You do not want me to bring robes on the 6th, do you? A line to reassure me would be grateful.’
On the occasion of the opening, after the little service conducted by the Dean of Winchester, the Bishop of Oxford spoke a few ‘grave and weighty words’ on the duty of ‘self-culture of the whole mind, soul, and spirit.’ The Dean, who thanked him for his address, said that ‘the new venture of the Cheltenham Ladies’ College was by no means so ambitious as the Bishop seemed to think.’ He spoke of the way in which it might prepare women to be of real service in their generation, and added: ‘One cannot think of this opening day for the Oxford St. Hilda’s without strong emotions of gratitude and hope. This is the crown and highest result of all that work for women’s education which has been carried on under Miss Beale’s wise rule at Cheltenham these many years past; the College, with its varieties of activity, and its eight hundred students, justly claims to be represented here in the home of highest education.’
Photo. W. H. RogersS. Hilda’s Hall, Oxford.
Photo. W. H. Rogers
S. Hilda’s Hall, Oxford.
Among the friends gathered for this opening ceremony was the founder of the Ladies’ College, Cheltenham, Canon Bellairs. He welcomed this house in Oxford, though he would have named it differently.
‘I am very glad to hear,’ he had written a month before, ‘that you are starting what will no doubt become a veritable College. You should christen it at once. St. Clare would be appropriate. She founded an Order, and your College will bethe foundation of an order. I do hope the G. W. R. will alter its time-table to suit your convenience. It would do so if it had as high an opinion of your excellence as the Father of your College, and your Pupils and all that know you have. Fancy, thirty-five years since we first met! What a period for evolution.... I should like very much to have a chat with you to see where you are now.’
‘I am very glad to hear,’ he had written a month before, ‘that you are starting what will no doubt become a veritable College. You should christen it at once. St. Clare would be appropriate. She founded an Order, and your College will bethe foundation of an order. I do hope the G. W. R. will alter its time-table to suit your convenience. It would do so if it had as high an opinion of your excellence as the Father of your College, and your Pupils and all that know you have. Fancy, thirty-five years since we first met! What a period for evolution.... I should like very much to have a chat with you to see where you are now.’
After five years, St. Hilda’s, Oxford, was recognised by the Association for the Education of Women in Oxford as St. Hilda’s Hall. Miss Beale finally, in 1900, connected it with St. Hilda’s, Cheltenham, by presenting it to the Association of that College.
That Miss Beale was fully alive to changes that must come in the course of time to such an institution as St. Hilda’s Hall, and could be content to see her own personal wishes set aside in everything that did not affect the essential life of the place, is clear from the following letter to Mrs. Wells in January 1903:—
‘Thanks for your nice letter and the suggestions. I think with you that the giving of scholarships will have to be reconsidered, and some clear rules made. I am, however, no less strongly opposed to the modern slave trade than before, and should be much grieved if we entered upon it. I see you would limit the giving to those who need help. Of course I see that I can no longer have the freedom I had in choosing scholars when the house was mine, and I alone was responsible for all expenses, and Mrs. Hay allowed me to dispose of her gifts, but I do hope we shall go on somewhat the same lines.‘1. That we shall not ask for money.‘2. That we shall not advertise in order to get scholars.‘3. That we shall not pledge ourselves to choose merely by intellectual pre-eminence.‘4. I think we are justified in giving the preference to Cheltenham girls.‘Might we not say that a scholarship should be offered on certain fixed conditions to certain girls, say to associates and to those who, not having been long enough to gain this, should have taken a high rank in the Cambridge room.’
‘Thanks for your nice letter and the suggestions. I think with you that the giving of scholarships will have to be reconsidered, and some clear rules made. I am, however, no less strongly opposed to the modern slave trade than before, and should be much grieved if we entered upon it. I see you would limit the giving to those who need help. Of course I see that I can no longer have the freedom I had in choosing scholars when the house was mine, and I alone was responsible for all expenses, and Mrs. Hay allowed me to dispose of her gifts, but I do hope we shall go on somewhat the same lines.
‘1. That we shall not ask for money.
‘2. That we shall not advertise in order to get scholars.
‘3. That we shall not pledge ourselves to choose merely by intellectual pre-eminence.
‘4. I think we are justified in giving the preference to Cheltenham girls.
‘Might we not say that a scholarship should be offered on certain fixed conditions to certain girls, say to associates and to those who, not having been long enough to gain this, should have taken a high rank in the Cambridge room.’
The year marked by this crown and result of labour was saddened by the death of Miss Catherine Newman at Mayfield House. It was a death which caused not only personal sorrow, but extreme perplexity and loss to all connected with the Mission. They found themselves at the end of four years’ trial of their scheme without a head, with a scattered band of workers, and an insanitary house. No one felt the sorrow of it all more than Miss Beale; no one was more courageous in meeting it. The necessary, difficult, and toilsome work which was the result of the crisis did not indeed fall to her share, but to that of some members of the committee on whom the responsibility specially pressed. But such difficulties to be met, such a death for a cause, were exactly what roused Miss Beale to feel the worth of it as she had never done before.
A small untiring sub-committee was formed, with Mrs. Batten as secretary, to re-arrange the work. The cost of efficient drainage operations was so heavy that at first it seemed better to seek a new house for the Settlement than to undertake such a great expense. A long search in the neighbourhood for such a house proved fruitless. It therefore became a question whether the Guild members should move their work from the place they had deliberately chosen at a large general meeting, or go to the expense required for making Mayfield House fit for habitation. However, an appeal to the surveyor resulted in the cost of the drainage work being thrown upon the landlord, who consequently made harder terms for his tenants. The question whether to stay or go came before the Guild in 1894, and a vote for continuing the work at Mayfield House was passed by a large majority. After an interval of some months the house was re-opened under a newLady Warden, Miss Corbett,—no Cheltenham worker having been found to undertake it.
In her first report Miss Corbett was able to show a full complement of workers. There was no falling off, but in less than two years it became evident that a more complete change must be made. The Oxford workers, who by a temporary arrangement lived at first in Mayfield House, had now a prosperous Settlement of their own—St. Margaret’s—in the very same square as Mayfield House. This Settlement of the Ladies’ Branch of the Oxford House could not well be in any other neighbourhood. It was seen to be ludicrous that two large communities of women workers should concentrate their energies on one small corner of the vast field of London work. Added to this, the high rent and rates of Mayfield House pointed to the need of a change, and at the Guild meeting of 1896 it was definitely proposed to move either to East Ham or Lambeth. Finally, however, Shoreditch was chosen, a district having sore needs, and near enough to Bethnal Green to enable those members of the Settlement engaged there in Board School management, charity organisation, and other extra parochial work still to carry it on.
Then came the question of a house. There was none. It was clearly necessary to build, but for so large an undertaking the reserve fund was insufficient. Miss Beale, always averse to begging for money, refused to make any definite appeal for charity, but as a happy inspiration, the idea came to her that the Guild should meet the difficulty with the same kind of means used by Mrs. Grey in starting high schools in 1874. This idea took shape in February 1897. Miss Verrall, who had been Treasurer of the Settlement from the beginning, sent out notices to members of the Guild to inquirewhether shares for £3000 would be taken up, and a ready response was given, all the shares being quickly appropriated within a fortnight. This, which seems to be a mere business transaction, was really a great deal more. It was rather a channel for interest and help which had been so far unable to force their way freely. The money was subscribed in the form of debenture stock at three per cent., repayable at the end of eighty years. £3800 was subscribed within a fortnight by 310 subscribers. A large part came from women to whom the sacrifice of control or recovery of the capital made it practically a gift. To most the yearly-paid few shillings of interest meant little in comparison with a few pounds available for immediate expenditure. Of the money subscribed, over £400 has now been released by gift from the holders. Other holders have authorised the Council of St. Hilda’s East to retain their interest. This brings in about £30 a year. The transaction was a fine example of Miss Beale’s use of this world’s goods, as means to great ends, and a fine instance of the response she could command from those she had led to her own point of view. Generous aid came also from Mr. Dutton, whose sister was an old Cheltonian,[65]and who undertook all the legal business gratuitously; also from the honorary architect, Mr. Philip Day, the husband of an old pupil, who volunteered his services for the new house. The workers found temporary quarters during the building, which took less than a year; and on April 26, 1898, the house was opened by Dr. Creighton, the Bishop of London, under the name of St. Hilda’s, Shoreditch. For Miss Beale remained faithful to the name and all the ideas it implied for her. On the letterof a friend who wrote, ‘Could not the new house be called Cheltenham House or some such, binding it to the College? It would be better than a picturesque saint’—she wrote, ‘I disagree.’ Mrs. Reynolds, an old pupil, became head of the Settlement during the busy time of furnishing and organisation of work in a new centre. A year later she was succeeded by another old pupil, Miss Bruce, the present Lady Warden, who had worked in the Settlement from the first. Since that time the house has twice been enlarged. The growth of the Settlement, as its beginning had been, was marked by the loss through death of an enthusiastic worker when Mrs. Moyle, who was for a time its secretary, died in July 1899.
As the permanence of the Settlement became assured, and the interest of both past and present pupils increased, being augmented by the organisation of shares, and by the formation of St. Hilda’s Association, Miss Beale’s own interest in the work grew. She regarded St. Hilda’s East less as a centre of help for the poor than as a place of training for workers. In this aspect it appealed to her as rightly an integral part of the work of the College. In the year 1898, which she said might be called for the College anannus mirabilis, she was able to point to the three institutions bearing the name of St. Hilda, each firmly established, flourishing, and full of promise of future usefulness.
‘This year St. Hilda’s, enlarged from six to sixty students, is full and free from debt.‘This year the link with the University of Oxford, so early formed, has been made permanent by St. Hilda’s, Oxford, becoming a Hall of the University.‘Above all, this year St. Hilda’s East has been built by the spontaneous co-operation of past and present girls, and this has specially cheered us, that those who have left us for other spheres, the Heads of other great Schools, still stretch out their hands tous, work with us in the Guild and the Mission, and the old ties are not broken.’
‘This year St. Hilda’s, enlarged from six to sixty students, is full and free from debt.
‘This year the link with the University of Oxford, so early formed, has been made permanent by St. Hilda’s, Oxford, becoming a Hall of the University.
‘Above all, this year St. Hilda’s East has been built by the spontaneous co-operation of past and present girls, and this has specially cheered us, that those who have left us for other spheres, the Heads of other great Schools, still stretch out their hands tous, work with us in the Guild and the Mission, and the old ties are not broken.’
But the three great institutions bearing the name of St. Hilda by no means included all that thought-training work which was what Miss Beale specially associated with it.
The existence of St. Hilda’s College at Cheltenham made it convenient, if not imperative, to find exercise for the energy there inspired and directed, and to supply classes for practice. To keep this stream of energy within her own guidance for a longer period than the time of training involved, it was necessary to have scope for it at hand. Even the great and growing College was not large enough to employ all the workers it trained, and the Principal was ever alive to the necessity of having a certain number of teachers from outside, bringing with them fresh ideas and methods.
The Kindergarten was the first addition to the Ladies’ College proper to need such young helpers as Miss Beale now had at her disposal. It began, like Miss Beale’s other creations, without a local habitation of its own in 1876. The College, owing to the quick perception of its Lady Principal, who was sensitive to each fresh tendency in education, was one of the first schools in England to avail itself of the Kindergarten mistresses trained by Madame Michaelis, who began her work in her own house at Croydon as early as 1874.
Miss Beale at once secured a mistress, and on her arrival a number of little boys and girls were immediately found to constitute a Kindergarten in Miss Beale’s own drawing-room. ‘The’ drawing-room, as she always called it, did not well bear out its title. As a baby-class room it looked well. Morris’s daisy and columbine paper, then a new thing, was on the walls, to suggest thethought, which was probably correct, that in first choosing it Miss Beale had already an intention of beginning a Kindergarten, though she did not find it advisable to mention it then to the Council. Some of the younger teachers in College helped a little with this baby-class. The system and organisation, the carefully trained head, all seemed rather alarming in those days when Froebelian ideas and German methods were little known in England.
As early as 1876 there were twenty-five children in the Kindergarten, for which a classroom had to be found in the College. In 1881 Miss Welldon came to Cheltenham as head of the Kindergarten. Hers was one of the first appointments made by the Croydon Kindergarten Company, which had been founded in 1876, with Madame Michaelis as Principal.
In 1882 the new room, purposely built and fitted for a Kindergarten, was opened. It was much enlarged in 1887. But soon again more scope was needed for the large number of students who now flocked to Cheltenham. Miss Beale could not bear to let one of these escape her. She recognised their needs, she saw their possible value. There were then very few places in England where they could be trained; the demand for Kindergarten mistresses daily increased. The immediate difficulty was met in 1889 by the establishment of a Kindergarten school in connection with St. Stephen’s Church in Cheltenham, supported by the vicar of the parish and a few voluntary contributors. This was staffed by Kindergarten students of the Ladies’ College. Fifty-seven children actually appeared in the school the first day, and the numbers rapidly increased in spite of the fact that each child paid twopence weekly. Five years later College students penetrated into a still poorer school at Naunton, a hamlet adjoining the town of Cheltenham. In 1896 theinfant school of the parish of Holy Trinity in the town invited teachers from the College.
In 1889 Cambray House was offered for sale. Miss Beale, who had a strong lingering affection for this first home of her school, had with regret seen it ‘alienated to barbarian boys,’ the trees cut down, and the garden turned into an asphalted playground. The building was well fitted for the school purposes for which it had been adapted and long used. There was enough space in the part which had not been altered, and which was not wanted for a day-school, to be utilised as a boarding-house. Miss Beale seized the chance she saw of opening a school which should serve the double purpose of taking overflow pupils or others for whom, for many reasons, the Ladies’ College was not suited, and of affording an opening under her own eye for some of the teachers she was training. The rules for admission, discipline, etc., were identical with those of the College. By this time, too, she saw the use of the racquet-courts and tennis-grounds. It was a great satisfaction to get back this house. She wrote of it to Miss Arnold:—
‘I dare not take any extra fatigue, as I have so much on my hands—I must try to be alone for a while. I have just bought back the old Cambray House in which I began thirty-one years ago. I want a second Miss Wilderspin, I have got to put it in order and furnish by May.... I heard Canon Body at All Saints, Margaret Street, last Friday. It was a very good sermon, and seemed to fit in well with the thoughts that came to me, as I had just got my offer for Cambray accepted, rather to my surprise.’
‘I dare not take any extra fatigue, as I have so much on my hands—I must try to be alone for a while. I have just bought back the old Cambray House in which I began thirty-one years ago. I want a second Miss Wilderspin, I have got to put it in order and furnish by May.... I heard Canon Body at All Saints, Margaret Street, last Friday. It was a very good sermon, and seemed to fit in well with the thoughts that came to me, as I had just got my offer for Cambray accepted, rather to my surprise.’
In 1895 Cambray was enlarged at a cost of about £2000, and in October 1897 Miss Beale, by deed of gift, made over the property to the Ladies’ College, though it was arranged that she should still continuethere the school and boarding-house. Miss Beale marked this return of Cambray House, ‘enlarged and alive again with girls,’ into the possession of the College, as another notable event of theannus mirabilis.
Cambray House, on its acquisition by the College through the gift of Miss Beale, was leased to her for a nominal rent; the school and boarding-house being carried on as a private venture until 1906, when their existence was recognised in the College prospectus for the first time. Miss Beale spent another £2000 out of her own income upon additions and improvements after she had made over the house to the College. This was a large sum, but even from a financial point of view by no means wasted. In five years the profits of school and boarding-house amounted to £1000, for which Miss Beale planned further fruitful use.
Cambray School, or, to give it its true title, Cheltenham Ladies’ College School, and Cambray boarding-house, which took pupils belonging to both the new school and the College, was not the only undertaking for which Miss Beale made herself personally responsible. She also started, and placed in a good financial position, two cheap boarding-houses, St. Helen’s and St. Austin’s, and in course of time presented them to the College. Her position in regard to all these institutions was surely very unusual, not to say unique. The foundation of a school of over one hundred pupils, and of houses containing the same number of boarders, would be a respectable life’s work for many a woman. This work appears to have been only one of the many occupations Miss Beale found for the little leisure left her by the cares of the great College and its ever-multiplying interests.
It was perhaps primarily interest in young teachers which led Miss Beale to join a movement made in 1897to induce ladies to take up work in elementary schools. Miss Beale was present at a large meeting held that year in Westminster Town Hall, when the need and importance of this work were set forth in speeches by the Bishop of Stepney,[66]Sir Joshua Fitch, and others. As a result a Government Training Department was at once formed at the Ladies’ College, and work began with seven students, who in the same year were encouraged by addresses from Sir H. E. Oakeley, H.M.I., and Sir Joshua Fitch. The field of practice for these students was found in All Saints’ Schools, where there were four departments all supplied with the best apparatus. Other schools in the town were also glad at different times to receive these teachers. Miss Beale became much interested in the work, and proposed to build a practising school of her own for the elementary department of the College, engaged a head-mistress, and bought land for building. Then in 1901 came the regulations for local education committees, which would have put Miss Beale’s school under local control. She therefore gave up the idea of building and sold her land. Later regulations made her find it impossible to continue the elementary work on the lines she wished. The Government demands proved a fetter to one who felt she should be free to work towards her ideal. To her mind the real progress of elementary education in the country depended, not on the ‘introduction of new subjects of instruction, which must impose new and burdensome labour on teachers and children. It should be gained by the better training of teachers, by the adoption of better methods, by a wiser economy of time, and by showing teachers how to put more knowledge, more skill, more thought, more love, and more enthusiasminto their work.’ The legislation of 1901 made her feel that ‘My Lords’ did not recognise these principles as all-important; that they undervalued such an effort as she was making at Cheltenham; that they were unjust to voluntary schools. She felt as if she were playing an unfair game, and declined any longer to help forward a movement of which she could not see the goal. It may be marked also that she could never feel full sympathy forfreeeducation. From this time she again limited herself to training secondary teachers. Conditions which made elementary training the one serious work which Miss Beale took up only to abandon it, are indeed to be regretted. The magnificent plant, the fine opportunities for learning and practising, such as the Ladies’ College could supply, above all the large-minded teaching, the sense of real education which the Lady Principal would give, were thus lost to a cause which affects the wellbeing of the whole nation.
The Secondary Training Department became a recognised division of the College in 1885. So high a value did Miss Beale put upon this that she wrote of the work of the mistress in whose charge it was, as ‘only second in importance to that of the Head.’
St. Hilda’s work, using the term which Miss Beale herself would have used, meant much more than teaching definite subjects and preparing for examinations: it meant inspiration and the leading out of minds. It demanded unlimited devotion to a cause. It is probable that Miss Beale had for long cherished, and had only gradually relinquished a hope, though she never formed any definite plan, of seeing arise out of her work for education a body of women willing to form a teaching order. Opposed to sisterhood schools as she was, chiefly because her ideal of education was so high and apart,that she could not bear to see it receive in any way a secondary place, she recognised the immense value that some kind of rule would have, if voluntarily imposedfor the sake of education. In other words, while she did not like to see people taking up teachers’ work because they were Sisters, she would have liked to see those she inspired and trained voluntarily take upon themselves some of the restrictions of a Sister’s life because they were teachers. The thought may have come to her first when, in 1856 and 1858, Mrs. Lancaster pressed her to undertake penitentiary work under rule. It was this which led to the severity of her dress and grave demeanour at Casterton, this which was echoed in a half-expressed wish that her staff at Cheltenham should wear black. When, after long years of waiting, it became her part to train women for the work of education, the aim of inducing them to adopt a separate devoted life, with or without visible signs of it, was ever before her.
Now that St. Hilda’s work may be witnessed in the three great institutions bearing this name, it is of no common interest to trace Miss Beale’s own plan for its development. The plan itself and the noble ideal behind it are not more remarkable than the ability with which she waited, resigned her individual fancy, and became an agent rather than an author. The following extract (circa1884) states her first design:—
‘It is thought that a protest in act is specially needed in these days, now that teachers are so highly paid, and that an association of teachers who should be ready to take up any work required, whether it was paid or not, would be able to carry on work more effectively and continuously than an unorganised body of women.‘It is proposed, therefore, that after three years,—ten of those who agree in this general principle should unite together as members of the Society of St. Hilda,—that they should pay, if young, into the funds of the Society whatever they earn fromthat time (but keeping complete control over any invested property), the Society providing them a fixed salary, a home when disengaged or out of health, but holding a right to send them out to any work which seems needed. The community may, if two-thirds agree, reject any member on returning to her what she has paid in, minus a fair sum for her maintenance. A member may withdraw with half any calculated surplus of earnings over expenditure, on giving one year’s notice. Some members might reside permanently and assist in various ways as writers and editors.‘It is proposed that the members contributing the money should form the governing body,—elect a Superior,—that the votes should be in proportion to the money contributed. That all the money should, after paying maintenance, be expended, after leaving a moderate reserve fund, on providing some charitable work, and that the members should, at the will of the Superior, be assigned to any post she may think fit.‘The work should be primarily teaching or assisting in some way in educational work amongst rich or poor, specially religious teaching, to which, it is hoped, some members will chiefly devote themselves,e.g.by lectures, by corresponding with those who need advice or help in religious matters, opening the house to receive as visitors any who need a time of quiet and retreat doing mission work at home and abroad. There should be only a very simple rule to be signed by the workers. Prayer at morning, evening, and midday; and such special rules as seem desirable. A holiday in proportion to the character of the work. The dress should be simple, but not conspicuous, and some badge should be worn by the members.’
‘It is thought that a protest in act is specially needed in these days, now that teachers are so highly paid, and that an association of teachers who should be ready to take up any work required, whether it was paid or not, would be able to carry on work more effectively and continuously than an unorganised body of women.
‘It is proposed, therefore, that after three years,—ten of those who agree in this general principle should unite together as members of the Society of St. Hilda,—that they should pay, if young, into the funds of the Society whatever they earn fromthat time (but keeping complete control over any invested property), the Society providing them a fixed salary, a home when disengaged or out of health, but holding a right to send them out to any work which seems needed. The community may, if two-thirds agree, reject any member on returning to her what she has paid in, minus a fair sum for her maintenance. A member may withdraw with half any calculated surplus of earnings over expenditure, on giving one year’s notice. Some members might reside permanently and assist in various ways as writers and editors.
‘It is proposed that the members contributing the money should form the governing body,—elect a Superior,—that the votes should be in proportion to the money contributed. That all the money should, after paying maintenance, be expended, after leaving a moderate reserve fund, on providing some charitable work, and that the members should, at the will of the Superior, be assigned to any post she may think fit.
‘The work should be primarily teaching or assisting in some way in educational work amongst rich or poor, specially religious teaching, to which, it is hoped, some members will chiefly devote themselves,e.g.by lectures, by corresponding with those who need advice or help in religious matters, opening the house to receive as visitors any who need a time of quiet and retreat doing mission work at home and abroad. There should be only a very simple rule to be signed by the workers. Prayer at morning, evening, and midday; and such special rules as seem desirable. A holiday in proportion to the character of the work. The dress should be simple, but not conspicuous, and some badge should be worn by the members.’
In this connection it is interesting to read this extract from a letter written to a teacher who was unsettled as to her vocation, and was contemplating entering a sisterhood:—
‘April 89.‘I was much interested in your letter. I feel strongly that when in God’s Providence we have been trained for one work, we should not lightly turn to another. As you say, there is more scope in a large sisterhood. Miss —— is very happy at Clewer. Still, I think the rules of an ordinary sisterhood are difficult to combine with the life of a teacher. I cannot help thinking that out of the Society of the Holy Name may grow up a somewhatfreer teaching sisterhood.... I hold strongly that there ought to be some women, whose energies should be devoted to sending out young teachers, with a true sense of their vocation. You have gifts as a teacher; you ought not, it seems to me, to bury them....’
‘April 89.
‘I was much interested in your letter. I feel strongly that when in God’s Providence we have been trained for one work, we should not lightly turn to another. As you say, there is more scope in a large sisterhood. Miss —— is very happy at Clewer. Still, I think the rules of an ordinary sisterhood are difficult to combine with the life of a teacher. I cannot help thinking that out of the Society of the Holy Name may grow up a somewhatfreer teaching sisterhood.... I hold strongly that there ought to be some women, whose energies should be devoted to sending out young teachers, with a true sense of their vocation. You have gifts as a teacher; you ought not, it seems to me, to bury them....’
Among the women whose saintly lives were a source of inspiration to Dorothea Beale, there was one whose acquaintance (so to speak) she did not make until herself in mature life. None the less did the name of Mary Astell become a thought of encouragement and hope to one whose heart was ever fresh. When in 1890, after various unsuccessful experiments, a properly managed house was opened for the regular teachers in the College, Miss Beale named it Astell House, after the lady who, in the reign of Anne, put forth ‘a plan of a College for the higher education of woman, which should be at the same time a religious house. The ladies were to spend some time in study as well as prayer, Mrs. Astell holding that they had as much right as men to improve their minds.... Their special work was to be the education of girls of the higher class, and also, if their means would admit, of the daughters of poor gentlemen, who must otherwise remain untaught.... Mrs. Astell’s scheme aroused considerable interest, and an unnamed lady (supposed to be the Queen) was ready to give £10,000 for the foundation of such an institution; but Bishop Burnet, who seems to have been consulted in the matter, put an end to the plan, saying it would be too much like a nunnery.’ Miss Beale certainly wanted a nunnery no more than did the timorous Bishop. As time went on she cared less for the outward shape the spirit she strove to foster might adopt; but she grew more and more earnest and active in seeking to influence young teachersto become serious and high-minded and self-sacrificing. The Quiet Days, which were instituted chiefly to this end, affected many wholly outside the College. They are therefore better mentioned in connection with those other interests which, to borrow her own nomenclature in the Magazine, may be included under the title of ‘Parerga.’
‘Languor is not in your heart,Weakness is not in your word,Weariness not on your brow.’M. Arnold, ‘Rugby Chapel.’
‘Languor is not in your heart,Weakness is not in your word,Weariness not on your brow.’M. Arnold, ‘Rugby Chapel.’
‘Languor is not in your heart,Weakness is not in your word,Weariness not on your brow.’M. Arnold, ‘Rugby Chapel.’
‘Languor is not in your heart,Weakness is not in your word,Weariness not on your brow.’
‘Languor is not in your heart,
Weakness is not in your word,
Weariness not on your brow.’
M. Arnold, ‘Rugby Chapel.’
M. Arnold, ‘Rugby Chapel.’
A true history of the Cheltenham Ladies’ College would not be merely a faithful record of dated events, of building, enlargement, expansion, of the introduction of examinations, of distinctions gained; it must also suggest, if only in outline, the working of the spirit which informed the whole, that by which it grew and became, in spite of its size and the different elements it embraced, homogeneous in itself and full of force.
Photo. G. H. Martyn & Sons.Ladies’ College and Garden 1908.
Photo. G. H. Martyn & Sons.
Ladies’ College and Garden 1908.
That she was but one worker among many, that she was only part of an ‘order’ which must be temporary, were facts ever before Miss Beale’s eyes. Those who remember their school-days at Cheltenham with love and gratitude think not only of the Principal, but of many others, some of whom passed out of sight before her, some of whom are still faithfully carrying out the ideas she inspired, but whose influence, like her own, left an abiding impression. One spirit, one aim, an equal strenuous effort were what she strove before all things to gain for her fellow-labourers, and did undoubtedly to a marvellous extent produce throughout the College. Though Miss Beale did occasionally make mistakes in her choice of workers, expecting too much, or perhaps taking too much for granted, this was very rarely thecase where class-teachers were concerned. These, who had the responsibility of forming character as well as of giving instruction, were always teachers whom she thoroughly knew and trusted, and had generally trained herself. By these, the thought and inspiration of the Head were handed on. But beyond this, all who passed through the College, even if they did not have the opportunity of knowing Miss Beale personally, came in contact with her in one way or another. Even the youngest heard her Scripture lessons; all the pupils in Division I. had their marks read by her, and thus came individually before her. Those who were confirmed while at school were brought into closer touch with her, and many through some incident in their school career, or through peculiar circumstances of home life, learned to know her as a friend. The highest class in College, and the pupils who were hopefully named B.A.’s, saw a good deal of her even to the end. And from first to last in her long headship, it was possible for any child, big or little, in any part of the College, to know the Principal,—by herself taking notice of her. Miss Beale’s fastidious honesty, which led her to dread even the least appearance of stealing hearts away from home, largely held her back from making personal friends among the girls still at College. ‘Yearned to be loved,’ she wrote once in her diary; but consistently brought to her work a special gift of self-sacrifice in never seeking affection for herself personally. She had, moreover, a horror of the unhealthy attachments which are often a source of danger in girls’ schools. In this connection may be read one of her many letters to Miss Clara Arnold:[67]—
‘Yes, you are right, that does point to a fatal error. If we make our children lean on us (broken reeds), they will not stand long. If they make an idol of any human being, when the idolis broken their faith goes too. We must try to bid them fly upwards into the sunlight; they must not tumble about on the ground like those poor birds whose wings are clipped. They must look up, not to us, but with us, to our common Lord. What miserable, weak, sickly creatures many women are, who must always have a Pope. The children should give you respect and esteem, and you can give them sympathy and affection too, and as they are children they may have a helping hand, but make them give up, if possible, sentimental worship. They must not do right for love of you, but because it is right.‘How fight against this? Well, tell the children some of these things, and talk it over with Miss —— and the other teachers. There must be harmony of action. I speak strongly, because I have seen this spirit eat away the higher life of one large school. I have such a dread of its getting in here.‘I know there must be a certain amount of hero-worship in the young. They need help from parents and teacher, but we must train them out of dependence. This sort of thing, too, leads to injustice to those who are not worshipped. They are “puffed upforone, against another.” They waste time and strength in day-dreams about their idol. When a little older they are always fancying themselves in love, because they have got used to an excitement of feeling.‘I feel inclined to say I wish I could help you more; always ask me if you think I can. But I advise you chiefly to make this a subject of prayer. I say daily that Collect for Whitsunday, about a “right judgment in all things.” Then I think I should see where the evil is most apparent, not speak to the whole class but to some few. Very likely, if you try to prevent this wrong worship, you will create an antagonism which will give you much trouble; such affection easily turns to hatred.... This sort of thing does make homes so unhappy because the wife takes “tiffs.” Try earnestly to brace them, my dear child.’
‘Yes, you are right, that does point to a fatal error. If we make our children lean on us (broken reeds), they will not stand long. If they make an idol of any human being, when the idolis broken their faith goes too. We must try to bid them fly upwards into the sunlight; they must not tumble about on the ground like those poor birds whose wings are clipped. They must look up, not to us, but with us, to our common Lord. What miserable, weak, sickly creatures many women are, who must always have a Pope. The children should give you respect and esteem, and you can give them sympathy and affection too, and as they are children they may have a helping hand, but make them give up, if possible, sentimental worship. They must not do right for love of you, but because it is right.
‘How fight against this? Well, tell the children some of these things, and talk it over with Miss —— and the other teachers. There must be harmony of action. I speak strongly, because I have seen this spirit eat away the higher life of one large school. I have such a dread of its getting in here.
‘I know there must be a certain amount of hero-worship in the young. They need help from parents and teacher, but we must train them out of dependence. This sort of thing, too, leads to injustice to those who are not worshipped. They are “puffed upforone, against another.” They waste time and strength in day-dreams about their idol. When a little older they are always fancying themselves in love, because they have got used to an excitement of feeling.
‘I feel inclined to say I wish I could help you more; always ask me if you think I can. But I advise you chiefly to make this a subject of prayer. I say daily that Collect for Whitsunday, about a “right judgment in all things.” Then I think I should see where the evil is most apparent, not speak to the whole class but to some few. Very likely, if you try to prevent this wrong worship, you will create an antagonism which will give you much trouble; such affection easily turns to hatred.... This sort of thing does make homes so unhappy because the wife takes “tiffs.” Try earnestly to brace them, my dear child.’
Miss Beale’s own shyness also stood in the way of her personal intimacy with her pupils. She liked to be met more than half-way. She liked the birthday-book brought to her to sign,[68]the rare wild-flower foundand gathered for her, the little note of sympathy or inquiry or thanks. A hundred reasons would keep most girls back from taking the simple steps which would have led them early to find a friend in Miss Beale. While they were reverencing in silence and at a distance there would come along some bright thing of quick perception, accustomed to society and to be welcome everywhere, untroubled by self-consciousness, who would approach the throne with no ‘unaccustomed awe,’ but stand, and chat, and smile, and be obviously acceptable to the lonely sovereign. ‘You know, A.,’ she said once to an old girl, ‘it was your freedom from shyness with me that first drew me to you.’ And, as a matter of fact, Miss Beale was really the most accessible of sovereigns. She longed to know all her children, and to help each personally. It was only a girl whose career was very short or wholly uneventful, and led in the lower classes of the school, who could remain wholly unacquainted with her. Even then, it would be found that the ten minutes’ individual talk which the Principal had with each as she left the College finally, impressed itself on the mind of the hearer. Her sympathies were ever most readily drawn out by those likely in after years to exercise influence—in some prominent, possibly Imperial position, or as teachers.
At all times a silent, strong, unconscious impression was produced upon most by Miss Beale’s rare absence from her post, her minute attention to her own share of the work of the College, her obvious self-devotion. ‘I can’t picture the College without her, she always seemed to be everywhere,’ one wrote after her death. Another said, ‘Although she might never speak to you, still the fact that she was not there on any day always made the College feel strange and empty.’
Her memory for all who had passed through the College was simply extraordinary. A married pupil, visiting Cheltenham after many years’ interval, writes of her amazement at finding that Miss Beale could tell her of every girl she had been with in class, and in many cases by whom she had sat, whom she had liked, and so on. Another, who was for two years at the College, only spoke twice to the Principal during that period, and left without the least idea that Miss Beale could know her as an individual. Two years after leaving the first great sorrow of her life came, in the death of her class-teacher, Miss Aitken. ‘That friendship,’ she writes, ‘had never degenerated into any foolish or selfish attachment. I still count it as one of the strongest motives of my life.’ In the deep grief over her friend’s death came a letter from Miss Beale: ‘Just the fact that she remembered and understood was like a revelation. It was through that that I first realised the possibility of the individual love and care of God.’
Naturally, it was in the earliest days, when the first class was small and Miss Beale taught many subjects herself, that an intimate tie between the head and the pupil was most easily formed. But Miss Beale’s wonderful freshness of mind and heart enabled her to continue not only the old friendships so made, but yearly to make new ones. She had a wonderful way, too, of maintaining friendship. A girl might pass through the school knowing her but a little, but loyalty to College fostered by the Guild meetings would each year bring her into closer touch with the Principal. ‘I hope we may meet again,’ she wrote in 1876 to one who had had a deep love and reverence for her, but not much more than a slight acquaintance with her in College. Twenty years after, when events drew them together again, a closemutual friendship which greatly brightened Miss Beale’s declining years grew out of the seed sown so long before.
Miss Beale herself held that the influence of the Principal on the school should be through the teachers. ‘She can do more with five hundred if she has a staff thoroughly in sympathy with her than if she brought direct personal influence to bear upon a school of a hundred. “If you want a thing done, do not do it yourself,” should be the motto of a ruler for everyday use. Act through others, educate them thereby to independence, and reserve your strength for things that none but a Head can do.’
In teaching, Miss Beale’s definite aim was to inspire. She sought but little to inform, but much to kindle a thirst for knowledge, a love of good and beautiful things, and to awaken thinking power. This she undoubtedly did, though the process was slow; working itself out quietly in the mind and character of those she taught, in nobler views of life, more refined appreciations, improved sense of proportion. When there was a question of preparation for examination, or of the definite knowledge such as was required in mathematical subjects, it was necessary to supplement the lessons of the Principal. Yet her teaching of the exact sciences was hardly less illuminative than of those which make a more direct appeal to the imagination. She would interest the class in a mathematical problem, induce the mind to work, leave it at the end of a lesson impressed and roused, but at the same time not clear about the subject she had been putting before it. Then afterwards the explanation up to which she had been leading would often come like a flash to the puzzling brain.
Naturally the teaching of history was a great opportunityto one who could so clothe her subject with life. In this she was more than merely picturesque and vivid, she would allow her own delighted interest to show itself. Who that heard them could forget her lectures on the reign of George the Third, in which she and her whole class were transported to the old Parliament House, listening, it might be, to the younger Pitt’s maiden speech, or to some stirring debate between him and his rival, hearing the applause, the dissentient murmurs, even a joke under the breath of some listener? She would lead up to a climax with dramatic force. With what astonishment did her audience hear, as if it were a startling piece of political news of their own day, of the Coalition Ministry![69]
The study of history has now become organised and scientific. Miss Beale’s own methods were out of date long before her death; she ceased indeed to teach the subject herself about 1874, but she never lost the enthusiasm with which she first entered upon it. As an example she was always anxious that those who were lecturing on history should adopt the views she considered just about certain personages. Once, when the Tudor period was being studied in the College, she summoned the teachers, as the school hours ended at one o’clock, into a classroom to hear what she believed to be the truth about Cranmer—with a few words making a terrible picture of time-serving and cowardice. On the other hand, she was always anxious that what was great in Elizabeth should be recognised; that every possible excuse should be made for her faults.
But if Miss Beale’s methods of teaching history have been to some extent superseded, it should be rememberedthat she was among the first to insist on the importance of general history. Though assured of the value of detailed and special knowledge, she was not content to let one period stand alone unlinked with its context. She would not cut off the history of England as a thing by itself, but showed its place in the stream of time, in the lives of the nations. So almost every class was obliged to learn something of outline and general history, and here it was that theChartandTextbookplayed so important a part.
Miss Beale’s English literature lessons may, more than any others she gave, be described assui generis. ‘Miss Beale gives literature lessons of a peculiar kind,’ was the appreciation of a new pupil who had studied the subject before coming to Cheltenham. Her literature lesson, indeed, had many functions. The subject became the vehicle of much teaching that it was not convenient to give in a Bible lesson. She sought to interest her class in books, in reading, in noble thoughts, in fine prose and poetry. But this was by no means all. She sought primarily to give views of life, conduct, and character such as would enable her hearers to go from school into a larger world, already prepared to know what to find. Under the names of friend and friendship much was said which might apply equally to the choice of a husband and to marriage. Knowledge of character, she would often say, is so important for women. Hence she liked, if possible, once a year to read and lecture upon one of Shakspere’s great plays to the first class. Though ever fresh and interesting, and herself as interested as ever in these readings, though the lectures were constantly brightened and enriched by new books and thoughts brought to bear upon them, there was very little variation in the treatment of the main theme. Atcertain crises in the story, over certain characters, hearers of long standing knew what to expect. Ophelia, to take an instance, was for all the generations of girls who readHamletat Cheltenham the woman who failed a man because she could not dare to be true. A matter like this was vital to Miss Beale. Could any class-teacher in the College have represented Ophelia in any other light, the Lady Principal would have spared no pains to point out the error of the treatment, both to her and to those she had misled. Desdemona, again, was always marked as the wife who not unnaturally roused the suspicions of a jealous-minded husband, because he knew that in marrying him she had deceived her father. The misery that may follow a secret wilful marriage was always hinted at when this story was told.
But there were other and less weighty considerations than influence and marriage in these lectures. They supplied opportunity for suggestions on simple affairs such as the choice of books, ways of spending time and money, manners, conversation, and the like. Often questions of the day, politics in a very general sense, and social problems were led up to.
Miss Beale might be unacademic to a fault in these lectures, but she had that power of inspiration which made every poem she prized, every character she admired, live immortally for those who heard her speak of them. The actual reading—specially of poetry—was a delight to both reader and hearers. Miss Beale had a strong dramatic instinct, a keen enjoyment of poetry and the right use of words. She had also a wonderful voice, which she managed well, and though always quiet and restrained in manner carried her audience with her unweariedly. The literature lesson was long, specially in the early days when, owing toshort distances and small numbers, no time was occupied by arrangements for prayers. For thirty or forty minutes corrected notes were returned and criticised, then the lecture proper would begin and go on for a full hour. Sometimes the whole time, an hour and a half, was taken up by the lecture. It was certainly very unusual for any one to find it too long.
A further interest in these lectures lay in an effort to make them language lessons. As a matter of fact, though much interested in language herself, Miss Beale did little more than inspire a wish to study it further. Perhaps this was her aim in touching upon it at all. She would often bring to her lesson a table of Grimm’s Law, explain it very rapidly, and appear to expect that it should be as rapidly remembered.
Miss Beale’s literature was by no means confined to Shakspere’s plays. All the greatest and many lesser works in the English tongue were taken in their turn. But she would seldom take the works of any whose thought seemed to her inferior; would have little, for instance, to do with Dryden and Pope. Style in itself had no attraction, and the growth of literary form, unless accompanied by the development of noble thought, was of little interest. No subject, perhaps, was more after her own choice than the poems of Spenser. She would dwell with unfailing delight on the complicated allegories of theFaëry Queene, or on the Hymns to ‘Heavenly Love’ and ‘Heavenly Beauty.’ Nor was a school year ever allowed to pass without her introducing the higher classes in the College to some of Browning’s works. How many must have learned to know his greater short poems by hearing her read them.[70]
But the subject with which the name of Dorothea Beale as a teacher will ever be associated is that of Holy Scripture. For this her greatest force was reserved. This was the soul of her work, as any who listened to her lessons with a hearing ear, or who marked the deep reverence prevailing in her class, could not fail to observe. Trammelled she was in many ways, at first by the narrowness which had almost prevented her coming to Cheltenham; increasingly, as time went on, by the numbers of her hearers who held opposing views on religion or who had no views at all; much always by her own dread of ‘offending’ or of hindering an earnest seeker for truth by a positive assertion. These causes made it inevitable that her teaching should seem to many vague or insufficient, since she could not bear to miss putting herself beside those who were as babes, unable to venture a step into the untried. An old pupil has well described this attitude:—