The work must be done by women, and by well-educated women; and, when it

is said that in Massachusetts alone we need the services of six
thousand such persons, the magnitude of the work of providing teachers
may be appreciated
The work must be done by women, and by well-educated women; and, when it
is said that in Massachusetts alone we need the services of six
thousand such persons, the magnitude of the work of providing teachers
may be appreciated. Have we not enough in this field for every female
school and academy, where high schools are not required, or cannot
exist, and for every high school and normal school in the commonwealth?
If it is asserted that the supply of female teachers is already greater
than the demand, it must be stated, in reply, that there are persons
enough engaged in teaching, but that the number of competent teachers
is, and ever has been, too small. It is something, my friends, it is
often a great deal, to send into a town a well-qualified female teacher.
She is not only a blessing to those who are under her tuition, but her
example and influence are often such as to change the local sentiment
concerning teachers and schools. When may we expect a supply of such
persons? The hope is not a delusion, though its realization may be many
years postponed. How are competent persons to be selected and qualified?
The change will be gradual, and it is to be made in the public opinion
as well as in the character of teachers and schools. And is it not
possible, even in view of all that has been accomplished, that we are
yet groping in a dark passage, with only the hope that it leads to an
outward-opening door, where, in marvellous but genial light we shall
perceive new truths concerning the philosophy of the human mind, and
the means of its development? At this moment we are compelled to admit
that practical teachers and theorists in educational matters are alike
uncertain in regard to the true method of teaching the alphabet, and
divided and subdivided in opinion concerning the order of succession of
the various studies in the primary and grammar schools. Perfect
agreement on these points is not probable; it may not be desirable. I am
satisfied that no greater contribution can be made to the cause of
learning than a presentation of these topics and their elucidation, so
that the teacher shall feel that what he does is philosophical, and
therefore wise.

The principal organs of elimination, common to both sexes, are the

bowels, kidneys, lungs, and skin
The principal organs of elimination, common to both sexes, are the
bowels, kidneys, lungs, and skin. A neglect of their functions is
punished in each alike. To woman is intrusted the exclusive management
of another process of elimination, viz., the catamenial function.
This, using the blood for its channel of operation, performs, like the
blood, double duty. It is necessary to ovulation, and to the integrity
of every part of the reproductive apparatus; it also serves as a means
of elimination for the blood itself. A careless management of this
function, at any period of life during its existence, is apt to be
followed by consequences that may be serious; but a neglect of it
during the epoch of development, that is, from the age of fourteen to
eighteen or twenty, not only produces great evil at the time of the
neglect, but leaves a large legacy of evil to the future. The system
is then peculiarly susceptible; and disturbances of the delicate
mechanism we are considering, induced during the catamenial weeks of
that critical age by constrained positions, muscular effort, brain
work, and all forms of mental and physical excitement, germinate a
host of ills. Sometimes these causes, which pervade more or less the
methods of instruction in our public and private schools, which our
social customs ignore, and to which operatives of all sorts pay little
heed, produce an excessive performance of the catamenial function; and
this is equivalent to a periodical hemorrhage. Sometimes they produce
an insufficient performance of it; and this, by closing an avenue of
elimination, poisons the blood, and depraves the organization. The
host of ills thus induced are known to physicians and to the sufferers
as amenorrhoea, menorrhagia, dysmenorrhoea, hysteria, anemia, chorea,
and the like. Some of these fasten themselves on their victim for a
lifetime, and some are shaken off. Now and then they lead to an
abortion of the function, and consequent sterility. Fortunate is the
girls" school or college that does not furnish abundant examples of
these sad cases. The more completely any such school or college
succeeds, while adopting every detail and method of a boy"s school,
in ignoring and neglecting the physiological conditions of sexual
development, the larger will be the number of these pathological cases
among its graduates. Clinical illustrations of these statements will
be given in another place.