“Don’t be frightened, I feel well and even amiable, though I am in a great hurry, and my hand aches.”
Her own deliberate opinion on this matter is expressed in the letter to her colonial correspondent—
“Although I advocate certain teaching being given by men to the elder girls, it does not seem desirable that the head of a girls’ school should be a man. There are many things in the training of a young woman which cannot be enforced by a man, or even by a woman whose position does not carry the weight of authority. Women, also, teach young and ignorant children better than men, their patience and sympathy being greater. On the other hand, it is highly desirable, when girls are beyond the drudgery of school-work, that their minds should be touched by men. A certain fibre seems to be given by this means. At present women’s ignorance prevents them from giving the highest kind of teaching, but a brighter day is dawning for them I trust.”
All through her career, Miss Buss arranged for good lectures from men, as well as from women, and the regular religious instruction was always given by a clergyman. In early days there were courses of lectures by Dr. Hodgson and Mr. Payne. There were lectures on literature from French and German professors, in their own tongues. At one time the girls would be entranced by glimpses of the starry heavens from Mr. Proctor; at another, they were ready, en masse, to follow Captain Wiggins through the perils of the Arctic seas, to Siberia. In brief, these extra lectures included every possible subject that could tend to culture, in history, travels, art, or social matters.
How Miss Bass advanced in educational theory is shown in extracts from her letters in 1872, just after the private school had been made public, and while the work of organization was still going on—
“When we are once fairly started, matters will go on more easily. The anxiety over money will go, for instance. After next year, the public meeting will go, I hope. Then I may devote myself to the inside of the school.
“I want to train up girl-students in science; I want to teach music grandly—thoroughly in classes—making each girl understand what she plays, as well as if she were reading some passage of poetry, teaching her to find out the musician’s thought; his mode of expressing it; other ways of expression of the same thought, viz. words. The grammar of music should be known to every musician.
“Of course, only some girls would fully benefit by this teaching, but all who were taught would get some good. In this last point Miss Maclean, now Mrs. G. Fraser, will help. Indeed, she will carry out my idea thoroughly.[[10]] We must have a room with four pianos to begin with, and increase to six, or eight, if necessary.
“In science Mr. Aveling will help, and Miss Eliza Orme; but as soon as we can get some of our girls quite ready our assistant science teachers must come from them.
“Ah, ah, how I wish we could get a fine building for the Camden School; we do want a lecture hall and gymnasium so much.