This little comedy appeared in Gripsack for 1882, and was written at the request of the editor of Grip, who was, and is, in full sympathy with all efforts to secure the rights of women. At that date the Council of University College had refused to entertain the application of ladies to be admitted to the lectures of University College, and that such an adventure with its denouement did not become a fact is only to be credited to the wisdom that, on further consideration, withdrew the objection, for history affords many instances of woman's use of a disguise in order to attain her wishes, and the annals of co-education furnish numerous proofs of her equality with, and not unfrequently her superiority to, her rivals of the other sex in competitive examinations.
NOTE 2, [page 127].
To think that down in Canterbury, girls.
The circumstance here so mournfully quoted by Kate was a fact. The University of Canterbury, New Zealand, was open alike to men and women. The examination papers used were prepared by Cambridge University (England) on the same standing as their own, and were returned to Cambridge for adjudication thereon. In 1881 a lady took the degree of B.A., the first in the world, and was invested with the hood with some eclat.
NOTE 3, [page 136].
Who in this city form a ladies' club.
The Toronto Women's Literary Club, incepted by Dr. Emily H. Stowe, of Toronto, and meeting at her house from 1876 until its resolution into the Canadian Women's Suffrage Association in 1883, was responsible for the public agitation of the right of women to admission to University College; and also for the circulation of the petition to that end, which, by the kind help of many of members of the Legislature, won from the Provincial Parliament a recommendation to the Senate of the University that women should be admitted. Several of the leading fourth year men of 1882 offered their assistance in circulating the petition among the students; and the greatest sympathy was shown by educators in every part of the Dominion.