LONG AGO STORIES

Taranaki Daily News, 13 October 1934, Page 21 (Supplement)

LONG AGO STORIES

OH, CAROLINE, CAROLINE. Caroline lived in the country, and she was eight years old before she went to school. Her three brothers were sent to Harrow School, but Caroline went to a dame school in the village kept by Mrs. Green. Poor Mrs. Green’s farm had been burnt down during the riots, so all she could do to earn a living was to write “SCOOL” on a white card Mrs. Green could not spell—and stick it up in her cottage window. Mrs. Green had no slates nor pencils, so she taught Caroline and the other little girls to make letters with sticks on a flat tray of wet sand, and all were taught to read out of one book, which was Robinson Crusoe. When the words were difficult Mrs. Green passed them over, and Caroline soon found that she could read what she liked, so she made up nice little stories. When Caroline was fourteen she was sent off to Miss Lilywhite’s boarding school in London, and Miss Lilywhite said she had been very badly educated because her back was round and she could not dance. Caroline hoped she would be taught something really hard at Miss Lilywhite’s, but every morning she had to repeat poetry while she stood with a board strapped to her back and fastened round her neck, with a high steel collar. If she did not hold her head well

up, the collar hurt her, and when she sat down her , shoulders ached. She had to hold her book very high when she was reading, otherwise that horrible collar cut into her neck. When she complained Miss Lilywhite told her that a good straight figure was one of the things that Caroline had come to school to acquire. “Oh Caroline, you should not grumble,” said the other girls. “Miss Lilywhite is turning you into an educated young lady.” “But my brothers learn history and geography and languages, and most interesting things, and they play games, and enjoy themselves,” objected Caroline. “Oh, Caroline! Games are so coarse! Remember you are a girl.” “How can I forget it when everything I want to do is forbidden because I am not a boy?” she cried. “Miss Lilywhite now says that I must wear stocks on my fingers to keep them white and elegant and thin, but I think they are quite good enough as they are.” “Oh, Caroline, you will never get a husband if you are not ladylike,” sighed her companions. “I don’t want a husband,” declared Caroline, “I want to learn things' and go to University like a boy.” Then Miss Lilywhite wrote to Caroline’s parents and said she must be taken away from the school. Her mother wept when Caroline said that all she wanted was to go to Oxford like,her brothers. Well, Caroline made up her mind that if she couldn’t learn anything she would try to get better education for other girls. She never married because the young men were afraid of her advanced ideas, but she had the great joy, in 1878, when she was nearly seventy years old, of seeing London University open its doors to girls.