“I have read Mary Lyon’s ‘Training School.’ In the past I have often had visions of such, or similar work, but as life has grown out upon me I have seen these higher hopes and aspirations fade a good deal. Still, I recognize many blessings and some usefulness in my life. It has not been a wasted or misused one. One must do what one can, and leave the issue to Him who guides all things right.
“Yours affectionately,
“Frances M. Buss.”
From this modest self-appraisement I turn now to the thick volumes—six of them, almost all in her own handwriting—notes of the addresses she gave in school and at Myra, embracing every topic—moral and religious—that touches a girl’s life.[[11]] How they affected the girls who heard them letter after letter tells; and we, not so favoured, may imagine what they must have been, given in that clear impressive voice, as the results of most careful thought, and brightened by anecdote and illustration, gathered in these note-books, from everyday life and from past history. What is most striking in these notes is not merely an observation which let nothing slip, but the wise selection of a varied culture and extensive reading amounting to high scholarship. And as we remember that this work was all done amid the pressure of daily teaching, through all the long struggle of the establishment of the new schools, and then amidst the whirl of public life, we scarcely can tell where lies the greatest wonder—in the work itself, or in the humility which could include it all in those simple words: “but one must do what one can!”
[11]. A selection from these “Notes” is being prepared for the use of teachers by Miss Toplis, and will shortly be published by Messrs. Macmillan and Co.
It is easy, after going through these notes, to be sure of the secret of her great influence. It is teaching that goes straight to the point because it comes straight from the heart of the teacher, whose happy pupils had good reason to say, “What before may have been only words to us then became facts. She was not so much a teacher as an inspiration!”
How these earlier ideals stood the test of time we may read in a record given a quarter of a century later by the colleague who best knew her work of “Education as known in the North London Collegiate School for Girls.”
NORTH LONDON COLLEGIATE SCHOOL FOR GIRLS.