Miss Emily Davies, in an able and thoughtful letter to
Wed- nesday's Times, deals with the various objections to admitting women to ordinary degrees with very great force. She points out that for the most part these objections apply no less strongly,—in some respects even more strongly,—to what has already been done at Cambridge, than to what is now proposed ; and that as they have not weighed against the former course, they ought not to weigh against the latter. Of the objection that women would be entitled to an influence in the government of the University if they were allowed to take regular degrees, she says that those who advocate opening the degrees to women would be quite content to accept the degrees even if deprived of the electoral and representative influence which the present degrees give ; indeed, her letter covers the whole ground most satisfactorily. We are glad to believe that a much more weighty mass of opinion favours the giving of the ordinary degrees to the women who choose to compete for them and who are able to satisfy the examiners, than that which is in favour of the utterly unmeaning half-and-half course.
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