But the fact must always be kept in mind that the whole problem of female health is most closely intertwined with that of social conditions.  The Anglo-Saxon organization is being modified not only in America, but also in England, with the changing habits of the people.  In the days of Henry VIII. it was “a wyve’s occupation to winnow all manner of cornes, to make malte, to wash and ironyng, to make hay, shere corne, and in time of nede to help her husband fill the muchpayne, drive the plough, load hay, corne, and such other, and go or ride to the market to sell butter, cheese, egges, chekyns, capons, hens, pigs, geese, and all manner of cornes.”  But now there is everywhere complaint of the growing delicacy and fragility of the English female population, even in rural regions; and the king of sanitary reformers, Edwin Chadwick, has lately made this complaint the subject of a special report before the National Association.  He assumes, as a matter settled by medical authority, that the proportion of mothers who can suckle their children is decidedly diminishing among the upper and middle classes, that deaths from childbirth are eight times as great among these classes as among the peasantry, and that spinal distortion, hysteria, and painful disorders are on the increase.  Nine-tenths of the evil he attributes to the long hours of school study, and to the neglect of physical exercises for girls.

This shows that the symptoms of ill-health among women are not a matter of climate only, but indicate a change in social conditions, producing a change of personal habits.  It is something which reaches all; for the standard of health in the farm-houses is with us no higher than in the cities.  It is something which, unless removed, stands as a bar to any substantial progress in civilization.  It is a mere mockery for the millionnaire to create galleries of Art, bringing from Italy a Venus on canvas or a stone Diana, if meanwhile a lovelier bloom than ever artist painted is fading from his own child’s cheek, and a firmer vigor than that of marble is vanishing from her enfeebled arms.  What use to found colleges for girls whom even the high-school breaks down, or to induct them into new industrial pursuits when they have not strength to stand behind a counter?  How appeal to any woman to enlarge her thoughts beyond the mere drudgery of the household, when she “dies daily” beneath the exhaustion of even that?

And the perplexity lies beyond the disease, in the perils involved even in the remedy.  No person can be long conversant with physical training, without learning to shrink from the responsibility of the health of girls.  The panacea for boyish health is commonly simple, even for delicate cases.  Removal from books, if necessary, and the substitution of farm-life,—­with good food, pure air, dogs, horses, oxen, hens, rabbits,—­and fresh or salt water within walking distance.  Secure these conditions, and then let him alone; he will