‘We have a picture which gives the ideal of a College—the Golden Staircase—whence each should go forth into the great world carrying some beautiful instrument with which to utter the music which is in her heart.’—D. Beale, Guild Address, 1894. Miss Beale’s circle of influence definitely widened beyond the College itself in 1880 when the first number of the Magazine appeared. It opened with a characteristic introduction from the Lady Principal, who up to her death remained the editor.
The Magazine was started, said Miss Beale, in order that past and present members of the College might enrich each other by interchange of thoughts. Mere information concerning the temporary doings of one’s friends was a secondary consideration, the value of which was, however, fortunately seen by sub-editors and others. A column of births, deaths, and marriages became established in the Magazine as early as the second number. This naturally in time developed in interest. The obituary column came to include all who had the slightest connection with the College; newspaper accounts of those who were in any way distinguished were also added.
In 1887 the first Chronicle of passing events belonging to the College and its old members was inserted, though the space for it was grudgingly afforded by the[204] editor, who could not bear to limit her space for the budding ideas she loved to foster. Soon, however, she came to value what was practically a contemporary history of the College, and as her pride in her old pupils increased with years, it became a great pleasure to notice all their doings in varied walks of life. Engaged in philanthropic work, in literature, in art or society, they were all of interest to her, and not among the least dear were those whose homes lay in foreign parts, those closely connected with the diplomatic service and the growth of the British Empire.[55] The Chronicle was a portion of the Magazine sure of finding readers, but there was no page more welcome to all than the brief but pithy preface in which the editor named the chief contents, touched on some matter of note to the readers, or urged forward the lagging subscriber.
As the College interest widened with the ever-increasing number of old pupils, the Chronicle became too limited a record to stand alone. When the Magazine was about seventeen years old ‘Parerga’ appeared for the first time, telling of activities which lay outside the immediate scope of College work, yet were due in part to the influence of the Alma Mater, to ‘the spiritual force, the higher volition and action.’ Miss Beale, who found in the Magazine a strong link with her large scattered family, also in later years freely printed letters she received from various members abroad. She did not care much for articles on travel, writing on one occasion that she received too many descriptions, and would like in their place to have more records of observation in the fields of[205] natural history and other sciences. But she treasured letters, and showed them widely. Indeed, it was sometimes startling for the writer of a private letter to Miss Beale to find whole extracts published in the Magazine for all the world to see.
Almost from the beginning there were reviews of books. These were generally written by the editor. There were also notices of books by old pupils. Of these Miss Beale was proud, and she never failed to mention them, often reprinting portions of reviews by the press; but she would not review them herself, saying, ‘Books by old pupils claim our notice; we must leave criticism to those less interested in the writers.’
Fortunately Miss Beale was not content with merely reviewing and editing. Many a number of the Magazine contained a long contribution from herself, such as an article reprinted from another periodical, an address given at a gathering of old pupils, or at some more general meeting. The first two editions of the History of the College were also printed here. Of her articles which were not of special College interest, the most notable were those upon Browning. One of these, written in spring 1890, shortly after the poet’s death, contains a brief clear statement of the value of his philosophy. The other writers of the Magazine have been chiefly old pupils, some of whose names, as, for example, those of Jane Harrison, Beatrice Harraden, Bertha Synge, May Sinclair, are known in wider fields of literature. But any who made a sincere effort were welcomed, encouraged, and—edited. Present pupils have rarely written, but of late an attempt has been made to secure more contributions from these. Members of the Council, and others connected with the College by the ties of friendship or work, frequently helped the Magazine with papers or[206] verses. For years every number was enriched with a poem or article from the pen of Mrs. James Owen, that friend whose keen intellectual interests and strong sympathy were put so largely at Miss Beale’s service when this literary venture was first made.
To find contributors Miss Beale went even beyond the outer circle of the College. ‘We always hope to have some good writing in our Magazine, thus to maintain a high standard,’ she had said at the beginning. She liked to gain the notice of those who were eminent in literature or science for this dearly loved literary child, and as occasion brought her in contact with any who were distinguished for the things she appreciated she would send them the Magazine, often asking for a paper. Letters from people of widely differing thought and position, acknowledging the receipt of the Magazine, are now in the College archives. They vary in warmth and interest. The late Bishop of Gloucester and Bristol wrote in 1889: ‘However busy I may be, I always find time to read portions of [the Magazine], and I am always thankful to recognise not merely the cultivated, but the wise and—what we men specially value—the womanly tone that characterises it. I read with much interest your article on the Sorbonne gathering.’ Bishop Westcott in 1890 wrote, on receiving the number containing Miss Beale’s ‘In Memoriam’ article on Browning: ‘May I confess that when the copy of the Ladies’ College Magazine came this morning with the letters, my correspondence was at once interrupted? I felt constrained to read your words on Browning, just and wise and helpful and suggestive.’ Some notes are little more than the acknowledgment of a polite friend who had ‘already cut the pages.’ The request for contributions was not always granted;[207] sometimes it was won by a little importunity. It brought about rather an amusing incident with Mr. Ruskin, whose letters on the subject and on some of Miss Beale’s own Magazine articles are too characteristic to be omitted.
Miss Beale sent him the number containing her paper on ‘Britomart.’ He replied at once:—
‘March 12, 1887.
‘Have you not yet to add to your Britomart, at p. 219, due justification of Feminine—may we not rather call it Disguise—than Lie? And, for myself, may I say that I think Britomart should have sung to the Red Knight, not he to Britomart.—Ever faithfully yours,
J. Ruskin.’
Five days later he wrote:—
‘But I much more than like your essay on Britomart.
‘I am most thankful to have found the head of a Girls’ College able to do such a piece of work, and having such convictions and aspirations, and can only assure you how glad I shall be to find myself capable of aiding you in anything.... I trespass no further on you to-day, but have something to say concerning ball-play as a Britomartian exercise, before saying which, however, I will inquire of the Librarian what ground spaces the College commands, being so limited in its bookshelves.—And believe me, ever your faithful servt.,
John Ruskin.’
Miss Beale replied to this by sending her paper on ‘Lear,’ to which came this response:—
‘March 22, 1887.
‘I am entirely glad to hear of the Oxford plan, which seems faultless, and am most happy to get the King Lear, though I hope you have never learned as much of human life as to be able to read him as you can Britomart. What I want to know is whether Cordelia was ever so little in love—with any body, except her Father.’
Two days later came the following:—
‘March 24, 1887.
‘I have been reading your Lear with very great interest. It is one of the subtlest and truest pieces of Shakespeare criticism I ever saw, but just as I guessed—misses the key note. You[208] never enter on the question what it is that drives Lear mad! And throughout you fall into the fault which women nearly always commit if they don’t err on the other side,—of always talking of love as if it had nothing to do with sex.... I am extremely glad to note your interest in and knowledge of music.—Ever faithfully and respectfully yours,
J. Ruskin.’
After this letter there was a pause in a correspondence which had been kept up pretty briskly on various subjects. In June, however, Miss Beale wrote again,—the purport of her letter may be gathered from the answer.
‘June 8, 1887.
‘I never have been ill this year; the reports you heard or saw in papers were variously malicious or interested. But I have been busy, in very painful or sorrowful business—at Oxford or at home—nor even in the usual tenor of spring occupation could I have answered rightly the different questions you sent me. Especially, I could not tell you anything of your paper on Lear, because I think women should never write on Shakespeare, or Homer, or ?schylus, or Dante, or any of the greater powers in literature. Spenser, or Chaucer, or Molière, or any of the second and third order of classics—but not the leaders. And you really had missed much more in Lear than I should like to tell you.
‘I really thought I had given the College my books—but if I haven’t, I won’t—not even if you set the Librarian to ask me; for it does seem to me such a shame that a girl can always give her dentist a guinea for an hour’s work, and her physician for an opinion; and she can’t give me one for what has cost me half my life to learn, and will help her till the end of hers to know.
‘Please go on with your book exactly as you like to have it. I have neither mind nor time for reading just now.—Ever most truly yrs.,
J. Ruskin.’
Mr. Ruskin permitted the reprint of a few extracts from his own writings in the Magazine, on which his criticism as a whole was not very encouraging. One of his letters, indeed, called forth a protest from Miss Beale, to which he replied thus:—
‘June 15, 1887.
‘Dear Miss Beale,—I am grieved very deeply to have[209] written what I did of your dear friend’s verses. If you knew how full my own life has been of sorrow, how every day of it begins with a death-knell, you would bear with me in what I will yet venture to say to you as the head of a noble school of woman’s thought, that no personal feelings should ever be allowed to influence you in what you permit your scholars either to read or to publish.’
And again a few days later:—
‘Brantwood, Coniston, Lancashire, June 19, 1887.
‘Dear Miss Beale,—So many thanks, and again and again I ask your pardon for the pain I gave you. I had no idea of the kind of person you were, I thought you were merely clever and proud.
‘These substituted verses are lovely.—Ever gratefully (1) yrs.,
‘J. R.
‘(1) I mean, for the way you have borne with my letters. You will not think it was because I did not like my own work to have the other with it that I spoke as I did.’
Mr. Shorthouse also once contributed to the Magazine, sending a little story called ‘An Apologue.’
The work entailed by the Magazine was, on the whole, pleasant and interesting to its editor. But she was grieved sometimes if she thought old pupils did not appreciate it, or if contributions fell short. It was not always easy to get enough articles of the kind she desired, and the difficulty was increased by the severe censorship she exercised. ‘About one hour wasted in fretting over Magazine,’ runs the diary of April 2, 1891.
The Magazine was not without its faults. ‘How bad the best of us!’ says Punch, according to Ruskin. But it had the conspicuous merit of offering encouragement to young writers, of promoting a spirit of unity, and fostering sympathetic interest among those whose lives were necessarily far apart. ‘We hope,’ Miss Beale had said in her first preface, ‘that the papers on work may[210] be helpful in suggesting ways of usefulness.’[56] This hope was practically realised. How far the young writers profited by each other’s thoughts can be less easily gauged; but doubtless some learned at least one lesson the Magazine was meant to teach, that if they intended to work, they ‘must not shrink from the hardest and most fruitful work, i.e. thinking.’[57]
Miss Beale’s influence was again extended in manifold and ever-developing ways when, in 1883, the first meeting of former pupils was held in the College.
At this date the number of regular pupils was five hundred. Only six years before a proposal had been made to limit the numbers to three hundred, but each year saw an increase, and a consequent addition to the ranks of those who carried the influence of the College into the larger world outside.
It had been felt for some time by the Principal and others to whom the College was dear, that an association of old pupils should be formed, but of what nature and name could not be determined without a representative meeting. A suitable occasion for this presented itself in 1883, which was a sort of Jubilee year for the College, Miss Beale having then been its Principal for twenty-five years. Many old pupils expressed a wish to mark the great occasion by a personal gift to Miss Beale; she, as was to be expected, asked that it might be given to her ‘husband,’ the College. It was a moment of almost unsullied prosperity, as could be seen by the buildings which were constantly growing more stately and suitable. In the previous year they had been much enlarged, and the whole College life benefited by the addition of the Music and Art wing. The old music-rooms were little better than cupboards, the[211] new ones contained light, air, and space, as well as the necessary pianoforte. The first drawing-room was but an insufficient classroom, in which a cast of any size could not be placed. The new studio was spacious and properly lighted. Both additions at this period spoke of Miss Beale’s method in educational development, also of the order in which her own full mental life unfolded. First she would have the exact, the severe, the discipline of grammar and rule, then the expansion of beauty in thought and symbol.
And the gift of the old pupils could not have been better chosen. It took the form of an organ for what was then the largest hall, the First Division Room. Here the daily prayers of the three divisions took place. Sir Walter Parratt settled the specifications for the organ, which was placed above the Lady Principal’s dais.
The choir, which up to this time had been dependent on the aid of a harmonium, was augmented and improved, and the daily music at the school prayers became a feature of College life in which Miss Beale took delight. Occasionally her directions to the choir were embarrassing. She liked music to be very piano, and required a great deal of expression to bring out the full meaning of the words sung.
Mr. Ruskin was also momentarily interested by it. He was as suggestive and dogmatic on the subject as on any other that he touched. Once he wrote to Miss Beale, ‘All music properly so called is of the Celestial Spheres. It aids and gives law to Joy, or it ennobles and comforts Sorrow.’ On hearing of the organ and ‘girl-organist,’ he hoped ‘to be able to work out some old plans with her,’ and unfolded them thus:—
‘I think you may be willing to help me in the plan chiefly for the last four or five years in my mind, of getting a girls’ choral[212] service well organised in a college chapel. The most beautiful service I have ever heard in any church of any country is that of the Convent of the Trinità at Rome, entirely sung by the sisters, unseen; and quite my primary idea in girl education—peasant or princess, is to get the voice perfectly trained in the simplest music of noblest schools. Finding your organist is a girl, and that she is interested in the book on Plain Chant I sent her, it seems to me my time has come, and I am going to write to Miss Lefevre at Somerville, Miss Gladstone at Newnham, and Miss Welch at Girton, to beg them to consider with you what steps they could take to this end. If you could begin by giving enough time for the training of the younger girls, I think I could, with that foundation, press for a more advanced action in the matter at Cambridge and Oxford.’
Miss Beale obviously replied to this with some questions about the training of the choir, for Mr. Ruskin’s next and rapidly following letter closes thus:—
‘As for the choir, nothing is necessary but a due attention to girls’ singing, as well as their dancing. It ought to be as great a shame for a girl not to be able to sing, up to the faculty of her voice, might I say, as to speak bad grammar. You could never rival the Trinità di Monte, but could always command the chanting of the psalms with sweetness and clearness, and a graceful Te Deum and Magnificat.’
Besides the organ, Miss Beale’s wedding gifts included the first light of a stained-glass window above the new grand staircase. This was drawn by Miss Thompson, and executed by Clayton and Bell. Miss Beale herself chose the subject for the whole—a series of scenes from her beloved story of ‘Britomart.’
Over and above the opening of the new buildings, and the installation of the wedding gifts, there was in the early part of the summer term some excitement and much pleasant sense of preparation for the gathering of old pupils fixed for the 6th and 7th of July.
Then, into the midst of the glad anticipation, came as[213] with transcendent suddenness Mrs. Owen’s death on June 19. Hers was indeed
‘a spirit that went forth
And left upon the mountain-tops of death
A light that made them lovely.’
But for many the happiness of the coming meeting was marred, most of all for her in whose honour it had been largely arranged. Miss Beale made no change, but went through all the proceedings as they had been planned, dwelling never for a moment on her sense of bereavement and loss, but speaking calmly even in public of the life that had passed out of sight.
The first meeting, on the evening of July 6, was a conversazione in the Upper or Second Division Hall. An unexpectedly large number of old pupils were present, and on the next day at the ordinary College prayers Miss Beale gave what was practically the first Guild address. Though made on an occasion of so much personal interest and gratification to herself, this address was remarkable not only for the piercing insight with which she ever penetrated below what was apparent or obvious, but also for what, for want of a better word, must be called its soberness. Touched, emotional as the speaker always was, keenly alive to the sense of union and communion with all lives that in the highest sense had come in contact with her own, happy in recognising the College to be a step by which souls might ascend out of mere material interests, marking with joy its noble work in the progress of the ‘higher education’ of women, she chastened all excess of feeling by the calm sincerity with which she could contemplate ‘Even in the green, the faded tree.’ ‘Schools too,’ she said, ‘like the members of which they are composed, have their period of growth, manhood, and decay.[214] Some tell us the first is over for us, and that we, too, have settled down into vigorous manhood. I am not so sure that we have quite done with growth, even in the outside body; but however that may be, I trust there is that among us, which is not even like the most substantial building, not like the outward form, liable to decay and death.’
Thus quietly she spoke, marking for all that heard her that there was no commonplace elation or poor ambition in her thoughts and feelings for her school. On this really momentous occasion for the College, when its members as a whole were summoned to catch a glimpse of all it could be of help and blessing in a far larger world than its own, the Principal spoke less of work accomplished than of growth, and ‘the silent witness of a beautiful life as a power to bless.’ She said less about the gifts with which the College had been enriched, than of some visible sacraments of Nature with which these gifts should bring them into touch. She dwelt specially on the great meanings of music. ‘In the Psalm of Life each is necessary to the perfection of that glorious music, which we shall hear and understand when the discords of earth have been resolved.’
In conclusion Miss Beale sketched the possibility of an association of old pupils, such as already existed in some boys’ schools, and was not wholly unknown among girls. ‘When I read of meetings of old Etonians, Rugbeians, Marlburians, and of works undertaken by them in common, and know how strong is the tie of affection which binds many of our old pupils to thei............