Page:Life of Octavia Hill as told in her letters.djvu/233

 pupils regularly, if you are able to obtain the privilege for us. But there is a still greater value in these examinations. Some such plan must be adopted before the education of our girls will improve. It is next to impossible for ladies to know what their governesses know; there is no recognised system of examining pupils. I am sure the want is a very great one, and very generally felt. I have had very much to do with finding governesses for people; and I feel the difficulty myself keenly, so keenly that I would not myself undertake pupils here, until I had organised a plan by which their parents might see something of their progress. I provided each girl with a book, in which her answers to the examination questions, each half year, might be written; and then her parents can see her progress. But of course this plan is clumsy. The questions are given by the teachers, who must necessarily know where the pupils are likely to fail, and who examine, in fact, on their own course of instruction; and we want just such a standard as this offers. I write in haste, but hope you will be able to understand, though I have expressed myself so badly.

April 17th, 1864.

As to myself, I can only say that every year adds more and more to the number of blessings I have to be thankful for,—friends, and knowledge, or rather sight, and power, and hope, all increasing steadily; rich and poor, young and old, teachers and taught, forming so bright a band of friends round us here. I don't think anyone can be richer, and all our work opens before us calling for fresh energy and hope, while as I look back over the past years of those I love,