"The fourth point of contrast is in regard to church and state. On no point is the divergence of the two nations more apparent. England approached the subject of popular education with societies representing religious bodies or formed with reference to religious questions already partly in possession of the field. They could not be ignored, and the completed system had to be dovetailed around their creations, which occupied but did not cover the ground. In every English school, therefore, was given religious instruction.

"In Pennsylvania in seven-eighths of the public schools the Bible is read by the teacher, and this usually constitutes the sum of religious instruction given. In many states this is omitted and the tendencies are to bring our schools to the condition where every form of religious instruction is excluded. The logic of our position, which implies the absolute separation of church and state, is rapidly driving up to this place.

"We cannot consistently with our general theory levy taxes to force teaching down children's throats against which their consciences protest, and while I believe it is a good thing to give even the weak ideas of religion usually gained by reading of the New Testament, I should give it up in the face of any respectable protest, if we are to maintain our present theory of public schools.

"And yet this is not a satisfactory result to come to. The American nation needs more rather than less religion. The home, the church and the Sunday school combined do not give nearly sufficient to many children, nor at all to many others, and if we are to rule it out of the schools absolutely we will also largely rule it out of the life of the nation."

After the conclusion of Professor Sharpless's address the subject was discussed by several Philadelphia educators.

The meeting was a great success. The audience was very large and showed a remarkable interest in the very entertaining address.

This is a subject of very great importance and one which is becoming daily more prominent. The academy has done a good work for education by having such a meeting as this and thereby bringing this great subject to the attention of its members and the general public. Professor Sharpless's address will be printed in full in the May number of the Annals, the official journal of the American Academy of Political and Social Science.

THEORY AND PRACTICE.

economy in eduCATION.

The popular idea of the cost of a school is wholly inadequate. Ask the average village resident what it costs to maintain the public school. "Well," he says, "we have a building that cost $50,000: the cost of that for interest and repairs is probably $3,000 a year. We pay our principal $1500, and eight others an average of $400 apiece-say $5,000 for salaries of teachers and janitor. The school cost us, say $8,000 a year, with 400 pupils in attendance, or $20 a year per pupil."

"But you have too many pupils to a teacher: and besides you ought to have assistants worth more than $400 a year. Why not put in two more teachers, and make the salaries of the assistants average $500? Then you could get a great deal better work,"

"Why, that would make salaries amount to $7,000 and the school would cost $25 a year for every pupil. We never could stand that."

"Then you would rather have a poor school at $20 a pupil than a good one at $25. What do you think it costs a year to educate your pupils ?"

"Why $20 of course."

"Twenty dollars? That isn't a circumstance. Aren't you feeding and clothing your boys all these years? If you send a boy to boardingschool; his education would cost you $400 a year; not only the $100 for tuition, but the $300 for board. You are paying his board just the same now, only instead of to the boarding-school. principal it goes to the

grocer.

"Every pupil of your 400 is costing his parents from $150 to $500 a year, and that while he does nothing but go to school is part of the cost of his education.

"The question between a poor school and a good school is not between $20 and $25, but between $220 and $225-a percentage too small to be worth considering. And when you think that this little difference is paid mostly by the state and by railroad and other corporations, so that the tax payer's share of the increased cost is infinitesimal, it seems strange there should be any other purpose in running a school except to make it the best possible.

Every supervising officer knows that a good teacher will accomplish more in a term than a poor teacher in a year. Nay, the poor teacher is often an obstacle. She gives her pupils wrong habits of study, false ideas of schoolwork, a disposition to idleness and deceit. may take half the good teacher's year to eradi

It

cate the mischief the poor teacher in the grade has wrought.

If you are buying a horse, and can get for $225 a clean, bright, gentle, spirited, trustworthy animal who will stand without tying, and trot without whipping, you won't pay $220 for a spavined, knock-kneed, ugly, worn-out brute, or an untried colt. And yet this is just the choice a school makes when it insists upon paying for assistants the lowest price that will command a certificated teacher. It will happen upon some good teachers, but it defrauds them while they remain, and will lose them as soon as they find a better opening. The best is always the cheapest; but never more so than in the hiring of good teachers.-Sch. Bulletin.

COLUMBUS CARAVELS AT THE WORLD'S FAIR. The new Santa Maria, and the Pinta and Niña, have been built in Spain for the Fair. The Santa Maria was built in Cadiz by the Spanish government, and is now manned by Spanish naval officers and sailors. They are going to sail her over almost the same route which Columbus sailed, until they reach Havana, but a Spanish gunboat will go along to look out for her. The Pinta and Niña were built at Barcelona by the Spaniards, but the United States paid for them, and when they were finished they were put in commission as United States men-of-war, and each was manned by two naval officers and eight sailors. from the United States steamer "Bennington." The Bennington towed them to Huelva. Then, during the celebration of the landing of Columbus in America on the 12th of October (which the Queen Regent of Spain and the little boyking attended), all three of the caravels were anchored near the convent of La Rabida, just where their originals had ridden at anchor on the morning Columbus went on board to sail away on his voyage of discovery. After the celebration they were all three taken to Cadiz, to await a favorable month for going across the Atlantic. The Pinta and Niña will be towed across by the United States steamer Bennington, going over the route of Columbus's voyage. At Havana both will be presented to the Spanish government. Then, in charge of the Spaniards, all three will be taken from Havana to the St. Lawrence river, up the St. Lawrence, and through the canals to the World's Fair.

Do not fail to see these strange ships if you go to the Fair, for you will never get a true idea of the courage and daring of Columbus or of the almost superhuman greatness of his effort until you see with your own eyes how clumsy and fragile were the ships in which he crossed the stormiest of all oceans.—St. Nicholas.

BOOK TABLE.

from

-LITERARY CRITICISM FOR STUDENTS, selected English essays and edited with an introduction and notes, by Edward T. McLaughlin, (Henry Holt & Co., N. Y.; 236 pp.; $1.25) makes appreciation rather than erudition the proper aim of literary study. Erudition is, however, much simpler, easier to come by and more definite, so that text book makers and teachers are lured into the pursuit of it. Rules of rhetoric, canons of criticism, linguistic lore and allusions present definite tasks to be worked out ploddingly; but who can define or teach that finer spirit of true art, which is a revelation, an inspiration? Thus the question has come to be seriously asked; Can English literature be taught? The author's answer is that something can be done to foster this result, by keeping close to finished literary products, and further by taking as guides and helps the insights of the finest critics. They may help us to see what, but for them, had escaped our view; and the editor has gathered into this volume a very choice collection of criticisms for the stimulation and guidance of young students. Here are represented sixteen authors beginning with Sir Philip Sidney and ending with Walter Pater. The selections present broad insights rather than special critiques, and will be found rich in fruitful suggestions, quickening the sympathies as well as opening the eyes to the deeper meaning of literary art. It is a book to be read and re-read, until the mind is steeped in its teachings. The editor has added introductory notes to each of the selec

tions, pointing out the characteristics and relations of each of the critics, and in the appendix a list of the principal topics in each piece, designed as a guiding thread to younger readers who have not yet learned how to gather for themselves and hold well in hand the main outlines of what they

read.

The book, it will be seen, follows a new, and we believe the true, plan of literary study, and therefore we heartily commend it to teachers and students of literature.

-RepresentatTIVE ENGLISH LITERATURE, from Chaucer to Tennyson, selected and supplemented with historical connections and a map, by Henry S. Pancoast (Henry Holt & Co., N. Y.; 514 pp.; $2.00), combines history of literature, specimens and criticism in a single volume. This statement, however, gives but a poor idea of the author's plan. He aims to provide for the study of literature in its organic connections. To take the history alone was the first error in the effort to teach literature; to take the literature alone is the second and lesser error, but still an error to be avoided. He has accordingly marked the great periods of English literature, and treated each historically, selecting a few only of its greatest authors to be represented by selections and studied in detail. Thus the work is brought within a reasonable compass. Guides and helps for further study are, however, furnished in abundance. Each period has a "literary table" at the close of the section treating of it, and in the table are shown in parallel columns the sovereigns, the chief writers, the principal events of English history, and contemporary European events and personages. Then the notes and references which follow guide to a sufficient range of authorities for further study, while the foot notes accompanying the text give still further aids and references. Thus the book furnishes guidance for far more extensive studies than its text, and this may be used in a

variety of ways, according to the capacity of the class and

the time at its disposal. The book has unity and clearness to a surprising degree, in view of the range and variety of its matter, and will be found exceedingly serviceable as a class manual, because it will develop in the student a sense of the continuity of the literary development of England and of the relations of this growth to the general life of the nation.

-To D. C. Heath & Co.'s Modern Language Series have lately been added, DER NEFFE ALS ONKEL, Schiller's charming rendering into German of a little French comedy by Picord, now edited with notes and vocabulary, by H. S. Beresford-Webb, (121 pp.; 30c.); and Jules Verne's short story of arctic adventure L'EXPEDITION DE LA JEUNL HARDIE, edited with abundant notes, a vocabulary, and grammatical appendices, by W. S. Lynn, (96 pp.; 25c.)

-HUME'S TREATISE OF MORALS; and selections from the treatise of the Passions, with an introduction by James H. Hyslop, (Ginn & Co; 275 pp; $1.10) is the first volume in the new ethical series announced by the publishers. Their aim is, in accordance with modern methods, to put in the hands of students a series of the more important works in the field of study that he may become familiar with the great original thinkers, and thus with the problems and progress of ethical inquiry, by his own study instead of hearing about themfrom his instructor. This work of Hume is especially interesting to the student of English ethics because it represents a transition. In psychology Hume was a sceptic, aiming mainly to show the defects of the systems which had preceded him. But in ethics he was constructive, and in general in sympathy with the thought of his time. Yet the spirit of empiricism was strong in him, and thus the new tendencies which characterized his psychology worked half unperceived in his ethics, which Prof. Hyslop says: "Show all the instability and incompleteness of analysis which characterizes a transition period." The long introduction by the editor gives some account of Hume's scepticism and then a general exposition and criticism of his ethical theory. The work is further equipped with a biographical sketch of Hume, and a bibliography of his works and criticisms upon them. The books of the series are handy in form and so cheap as to place them within easy reach of students.

-ROBINSON'S NEW ARITHMETICS, (American Book Co.) appear in a three book series. More valuable text books than the original series were not to be found when they appeared, and several generations of pupils have grown up on the sound, progressive, instructive methods of these books. The old plans are still followed, but the books considerably modified by additions, adjustments to present views and practices, and new explanations and examples. The NEW PRIMARY ARITHMETIC, (80 pp; 18c.) forms a brief practical introduction to number work, which in the NEW RUDIMENTS OF ARITHMETIC, (224 pp; 30c.) is carried on to such a knowledge of all the elements, as every child must have a book that can be completed in the sixth year of the school course. The NEW PRACTICAL ARITHMETIC, (416 pp: 65c.) furnishes abundant material for all the training desirable in this branch. The new series are arranged in chapters and divisions numbered like the old so that the two editions can be easily used together.

-THE SECRET OF CHARACTER BUILDING, by John B. De Motte, (S. C. Griggs & Co., Chicago; 130 pp.; $1.00) creates surprise at the first glance by the illustrations, which relate to sound and light. The first half of the book is devoted to a rather miscellaneous discussion of some modern discoveries in these fields, the aim of which is to show the relation of the physicial organism to its surroundings and the dependence of the higher life upon the organism. The main thesis is that the body grows to the way in which it is used, and, where an evil course of life has adjusted the organism to itself change is exceedingly difficult. The moral of course is that "sowing wild oats,' is not a trifling matter but entails consequences from which the life can with the utmost difficulty disengage itself. Therefore let the innocence of youth be as carefully guarded in boys as it is in girls. The book is interesting, and the teaching sound, but the incongruity of the first and second parts remains a surprise which careful reading fails to remove.

-To their English classics for schools the American Book Company have recently added Scott's MARMION, A TALE OF FLODDEN FIELD, (247 pp. 10c.) It is well prepared as a school text. The introduction discusses the relation of historic romance to history, and narrates the events with which this tale is connected. A map, foot notes, and a glossary provide needed helps. The introductions to the

different cantos are removed to the end of the volume that they may not interrupt the young reader's enjoyment of the narrative.

-The Addresses and ProceeDINGS of the National Educational Association at Saratoga in 1892 have been distributed to members. The volume is a little smaller than the last, (848 pp.). The papers seem to us of more value than those of any previous session with which we are acquainted, and we gladly accept this as an augury of the deepening of thought and practical usefulness of this important organization.

LITERARY ITEMS.

-D. C. Heath & Co. will soon issue Methods of Teaching Modern Languages, a collection of papers by different teachers of wide reputation.

-Ginn & Co. announce The Principles of History, translated from the German of Prof. Droysen, by Pres. E. B. Andrews. Also Die Erhebung Europas gegen Napoleon I, by Heinrich von Sybel, an important addition to available German historical texts for school use. It will be edited by Prof. A. B. Nichols.

-In the Popular Science Monthly for March Mr. Spencer's article on The Inadequacy of Natural Selection will naturally attract most attention. Maud Wilder Goodwin writes a very suggestive article on education of our colored citizens; Prof. Wright and his critics will interest those Wisconsin people who know who the unmentioned critics are. Pres. Jordan's Science and Colleges is rather severe on denominational colleges. The number in short is of more than usual interest.

-The Quarterly Register of Current History is always a welcome visitor to our table. It is thoroughly well edited presenting systematically a conspectus of the history of the world for the last three months of last year. This period is long enough to allow of definite and accurate details such as give to events their proper significance, and make the account of them not mere jottings of items but a connected narrative of causes and results. In addition to the history of politics, discovery and invention, there are special articles on science, literature, art and religion, and a necrology for the quarter. The Quarterly is attractively printed and abundantly illustrated. Current History Publishing Co., Detroit, Mich. $1.50 per year.

-A new edition of 5000 copies of the February Century is now printing. The demand for the magazine this season has been very great. The publishers were for a time entirely out of the January number; and they are now printing this new edition of February which has been for some time out of print. The March edition, which had already been increased proves still inadequate, and a yet larger supply is in preparation for April. Among the recent attractions in The Century have been Mrs. Burton Harrison's story "Sweet Bells Out of Tune," Mark Twain's "Million Pound Bank-Note," the reply of the Russian Secretary of Legation to George Kennan, Gen. Sherman's Correspondence with his brother, Senator Sherman, the remarkable Reminiscence of Napoleon at Elba, etc., etc. The April number will contain an important article on the Trial of the Chicago Anarchists by the Judge who presided.

How

-The Review of Reviews is emphatically the busy man's magazine. It briefly puts him in relation with the best thought and life of the world for the past month. this is done will be seen from the following statement of the contents of the March number. It opens with a review of the progress of the world touching all the chief occurrences of the past month. This is followed by a record of current events, and current history in caricature. American Politics, a study of four careers, takes a retrospect of the careers of Mr. Blaine, Justice Lamar, Ex-President Hayes, and Gen. Butler. Phillips Brooks is treated in two articles. America in Hawaii, and England in Egypt are two timely topics. A Royal Road to Learn Languages gives an account by Mr. Stead of results of teaching French in his family on M. Gouin's system. The feature which gives name to the monthly follows: A summary of the most important articles in the reviews and magazines of the month, well prepared so as to give a good outline of their contents. Brief reviews of the chief periodicals and of new books complete the number. $2.50 per year. New York.

Vol. XXIII.

No. 5

FALL institute work in this state is preparing much earlier than usual this year on account of its relation to the summer schools. In many instances the institute is fixed so as to follow immediately upon the summer schools and in the same town, so that it becomes a sort of professional appendix to the schools. This is a first step towards co-operation, and others are likely to follow if the results are encouraging.

THE veto of the bill for a school for weakminded children is hard to explain. The sum appropriated was not large, and the plea of expense sounds strangely in the case of a great state with an overflowing treasury. That the money is needed for the education of capable children is an empty excuse. We

feel that the veto was uncalled for, checks a work of charity which the state ought to maintain for its own credit, and brings bitter disappointment to those who have labored long and disinterestedly for a public cause.

We devote considerable space in this number to literature in elementary schools. The list of books recommended to the Wisconsin Teachers' Association deserves to be carefully studied in this connection, and the suggestions given in The School Room compared with the language work from the primary work in the Oshkosh Normal School which we published last month. Our schools are already moving in the direction pointed out in these articles, and many teachers will find them exceedingly helpful in furthering it.

WHAT of your school premises? We do not mean to suggest that the building may be old and poorly contrived. This is a misfortune, but it may not be in the power of the teacher to remedy it. Some things, however, are in his power, and if the yard abounds in rank weeds and litter; if the halls are hung with cobwebs and otherwise dirty and the windows are uncleanly the inference is not favorable to him. One of the surest tests of school supervision is the condition of the outhouses. Some teachers give no attention to these, and they are therefore loathsome appendages of, it may be, a fine school building. What the moral effect of such places is it would be in vain to try to tell. An intelligent visitor is sometimes inclined to ask, Does this community prize in its children knowledge of geography and grammar more than it prizes purity and decency? What sort of a school is such a place?

THERE is reason to believe that some superintendents consider the railway maps of Wisconsin which are sent them from the office of the State Superintendent as personal property, to be used as they think best-left to gather dust in the office or distributed to gain personal favor and make friends for a coming campaign. These are provided for the schools of the county, and are sent to the superintendent or other officer for distribution to the institutions entitled to them. He has no

more right to appropriate them than the state treasurer has to appropriate the funds placed in his charge. Yet it sometimes appears that after maps enough to supply all the districts have been sent out several of them make direct application to the State office for maps, affirming that none has ever been furnished them. These things ought not to be.

SCHOOL Commencements are approaching, and it therefore seems well to urge simplicity and honesty in preparation for these occasions. What sort of moral training is it, when the teacher in fact prepares, or almost wholly prepares, compositions or addresses for several of his pupils, which they afterwards present upon the stage as their own productions! The temptation to this arises from attempting too ambitious work. If the pupils are not able to prepare fairly creditable original productions substitute recitations and dialogues. commencement is an exhibition of pupils' work, and may be made interesting and attractive without imposing tasks for which pupils are inadequate, if the teacher considers well their training and ability in making his plans. A simple and honest commencement is everyway better than an elaborate and false

one.

The

EDUCATIONAL LEGISLATION OF THE SESSION.

Important measures affecting the educational interests of the state are perhaps less in number than usual this year among the results of a legislative session. The foremost place must be assigned among measures of this class to the law appropriating $70,000 for the erection of two new normal schools in the northern part of the state, and providing an annual tax of one twentieth of a mill for their support. As the existing normal schools are all but one located in the southern half of the state, the demand that some provision be made for the rapidly developing north was practically irresistible. The normal school fund has met the expenses of the existing schools except the small annual appropriation of $10,000 for that at Milwaukee, but is wholly inadequate to the support of more institutions. Hence a resort to taxation seemed inevitable. The action renders still more significant the problems relating to normal schools which have already engaged attention, and will perhaps give rise to other problems. Shall they be like the existing schools, carrying an advanced as well as an elementary course? Preparatory courses they will probably have to maintain for a time, and will this strengthen the preparatories of existing schools? Can they be made more directly helpful to the district schools?

The second place in importance must be assigned to the measure affecting graduates' diplomas. This makes those diplomas which become state certificates when contersigned a legal license to teach anywhere in the state from the period of their issuance to that when they may be countersigned. Graduates of colleges and normal schools may thus engage in teaching immediately after graduation without going through the formality of a county ex

This

our

amination in order to secure a license. will prove a useful measure provided higher institutions are sufficiently exacting in their entrance requirements. Any one holding a degree from a college or university ought to have such culture as would make him easily master of third grade branches; but it is quite possible, unless entrance requirements are carefully administered, that his early training may

have been so defective as to make serious re

view of elementary branches necessary for him before attempting to teach them. Such matters as spelling, penmanship and the power to write correct English are sometimes deplorably neglected by those who prove themselves good students in advanced work.

It is not

the task of the college to teach these things, and hence good graduates sometimes make a poor showing in them. The measure takes down one of the barriers which have kept graduates from taking up teaching temporarily, because they looked upon the examination as an annoyance and in some sort an indignity.

We must attach considerable importance also to the measure appropriating a sum to Superintendent Wells for the revision of the school laws of the state. It is well understood that this measure arose in part from the wish to make up to the superintendent a salary somewhat adequate to the responsibilities of his office, inasmuch as an antiquated provision of the Constitution makes the direct payment of such a salary impossible. The legislature took the first step towards an amendment of the Constitution in this particular. We understand that Superintendent Wells will make a careful and serious study of the school legislation of other states, and hold conferences with leading educators, with a view to making the proposed revision of the code as thorough and valuable as possible, thus fully justifying the action by its practical results to our educational interests.

Generous appropriations were made for the state university, looking to the enlargement of the chemical building and the shops, and the erection of a new horticultural building, as well as providing an increase of revenue for the next two years to meet expenses of in