16 APRIL 1870, Page 3

The Senatus of the University .of Edinburgh have decided on

appeal against Miss Pechey's title to the Chemical scholarship, earned under the circumstances which we explained last week. And the oddest part of the matter is that in the very same session they came to the resolution that the women students are entitled to exactly the same certificates of attendance and merit granted to the other students. The excuse for the decision appears to be, as we infer, that the scholarship, if granted, would entitle Miss Pechey to gratuitous teaching in the laboratory of the chemical professor, to which the objection is, not the trifling money grant, butthe permission for any youngwomanto consort with the young men in the study of practical chemistry. The Professor and the Senatus grant the medal which does not involve this con- sequence, but they have not permitted any united study even in the theoretical classes, and will not confer a scholarship which would imply united study ; and as, of course, the laboratory work is going on at almost all hours, no separate class for women in practical chemistry would confer a tenth part of the advantages of general access to the laboratory. We confess the scruple strikes us as a contemptible bit of squeamishness on the part of the Senatus. Do they suppose that Miss Peohey will be actively radiating elective affinities while she is studying them, and that young women and men must be as sedulously kept apart as dis- tinct gases, if the laws of " endasinose and exosmose" are not to affect them? The truth is, genuine study is an antidote to flirta- tion while it lasts.