“The first and essential object was to determine what kind of physical exercise was required in each case. The normal girl, and the majority of those even with defects, would be sent to go through the usual course. For defects, special treatment by exercise would be ordered, and this given in the afternoon. Three afternoons in the week the gymnasium is occupied by these special gymnastic classes, and the record of physical improvement made is worthy perhaps of even more praise than the roll of examination honours won by the intellectually able. The girls who do best with much rest and little exercise are also found out and dealt with accordingly. The physical character of each is recorded in the medical book, and kept for reference.
“Defects of eyesight are also discovered in many cases, and the parents informed that there is need to consult an oculist. Other physical weaknesses, as they thus come to light, can be dealt with similarly if need be, and the knowledge of them is most valuable in dealing with the girls in their work. The experiment of medical inspection, as Miss Buss tried it in her school, has proved an immense benefit, and the idea lay very near her heart that all schools—especially all girls’ schools—should do likewise. It is one of my regrets that she never knew, she was too ill, that three memoranda on the subject were given in evidence to the Royal Commission on Secondary Education, one of the three being by our medical inspector, Miss Cock, founded on the experience of the North London Collegiate School.
“As regards intellectual education, it was characteristic of her that she had not the slightest tendency to attach more importance to her own than to other subjects. This was not simply—it was partly—the consequence of an all-round logical view; it went with her elasticity of imagination and extraordinary power of entering into and sympathizing with things outside her experience in the ordinary sense. This is the ideal Prime-Minister quality, and it was hers. She was not a musician, she did not know mathematics; but I suppose she has not left the impression more strongly on any two people of understanding their ideals and supporting them with enthusiasm and sympathy than upon Mr. John Farmer, of Balliol College, with reference to music, and upon myself in mathematics. And in itself it is a noteworthy fact that she struck from the very beginning on the idea that science should be an essential part of the school curriculum, and elaborated it to so high a pitch that her school was early described by others as par excellence ‘the science school.’ Her own scholarship was great in History and in French—genuine fine scholarship, with the unrivalled power of graphic description and interesting memory of events which make history-teaching and is so rare, and with delightful freshness and power in handling a language with a class. On this side of her work she was herself the perfect artist. For the study of science there had been little opportunity in her girlhood, but just what had been denied her was just what she most energetically supplied. I think she would have been great in science: her mind was scientific in its ways of work, and she had the practical constructive talent that, added to thinking power, makes the physicist. The concrete sciences would have attracted her intellectually more than the abstract.
“But in her ideal of education she came quite naturally and easily outside her own intellectual tastes and acquirements. So natural was this to her that she has doubtless left the impression on many of the younger generation that she was mainly a great administrator rather than also a great teacher with special tastes and powers of her own.
“Thus it was the more natural to her to realize instinctively, as she did consciously, the doctrine of the harmonious development of all the powers as the aim of the school education.
“Even the casual observer could not fail to have been struck by the ever-growing, ever-assimilating nature of her mind. In this respect she never grew older; never grew as middle-aged as many people are mentally at twenty-five. Like the Athenians, she was always ready to hear some new thing. She was ready to give any reasonable theorist a hearing, though not necessarily to erect new altars to his ideals. Whenever she heard of any idea that promised, she would, in later years, speak of it, and have it discussed at our teachers’ meeting. Then, if it seemed well, we would hear the propagandist in a lecture, and afterwards discuss the subject again. The sequel depended on the opinion formed, but most new ideas, special and general, came our way. The Harrow Music School, the Royal Drawing Society, and Miss Chreimann’s Calisthenics may be mentioned in particular as having received her recognition very early.
“Mr. Farmer writes as follows—
“Oxford.
“Dear Mrs. Bryant,
“It is very difficult for me to write that which I feel about the loss of Miss Buss.