ment is exhaustive, lucid and fair; the author avoiding novelties and efforts at contributions, restricting the book to exposition and to argument that grows naturally out of analysis. The appendices contain typical American high school programs, typical German, French, English, and Swedish curricula, manual training high school programs, and commercial high school programs. Inasmuch as the entire field of the principles of secondary education is not covered by a consideration of the high school studies alone, it is the purpose of the author to prepare another work on the aims and processes of teaching them. The literature of pedagogy is substantially enriched by Dr. De Garmo's most excellent book. The Macmillan Company. Beginning Woodwork. By Clinton Sheldon Van Deusen and Edwin Victor Lawrence. This book is intended as a definite statement of steps that may be followed by a beginner in learning the fundamental principles of woodworking. Instead of giving a general discussion of woodworking processes, the book describes and illustrates principles by means of specific examples. Among the topics treated are laying out and sawing, planing, curve sawing and spoke shaving, chiseling and joining and planing, furniture making with keyed and closed mortise and tenon construction, etc. The steps in the development of the work are taken with great deliberation, and only after the fullest explanation. Being essentially a book for beginners at home or school, the exercises are worked out minutely, an abundance of line drawings being employed to illuminate each step. It is an exceedingly practical little book, one distinctly sure to meet the needs and desires of every tool-loving boy. Peoria, Ill., The Manual Arts Press. A German Science Reader. By William H. Wait. Selections treating of chemistry, physics, geology, mineralogy, astronomy and anatomy have been taken from the works of German specialists, and are brought together with the idea of providing a fair amount of German reading in each of the subjects chosen. The sciences represented are those pursued by the greater number of scientific students in our schools, colleges and universities, and they are so related that two or more of them may be read with profit by a specialist in any one of the sciences treated in them. An excellent body of notes accompanies the text, and a specially prepared vocabulary enriches the work. The Roman type is used throughout the book. The Macmillan Company. Outlines of Criminal Law. By Courtney Stanhope Kenny. This standard and scholarly work had its first edition in England in 1902 and many subsequent reprintings. The author, Dr. Kenny, is a barrister-at-law and reader in English law at the University of Cambridge. So valuable is the body of the text that Mr. James H. Webb of the law department of Yale University has revised and adapted it for the use of American scholars. The changes are such as the needs of American students require in using the work as a text-book in the profession of law; a further design was to prepare it for those who are pursuing a course of liberal studies along those branches of learning which concern most directly the social welfare of the community. "The Civil Law attracted the attention of large numbers of students in the universities of the Middle Ages, and it would seem that the law of Public Wrongs, as it has been evolved and developed by the Common Law, ought now to find some place in the curriculum of all our higher institutions of learning." The Macmillan Company. Composition in the Elementary Schools. By Joseph Taylor, Ph.D., District Superintendent of Schools, New York, N. Y. This is an admirable little book of instruction intended to aid young pupils in the difficult task of composition writing. It was evidently written to meet a need that had been felt. It renders service at a point where much harm is done to many children by requiring of them work which they do not know how to do and scolding them if they do not do it. While the book is intended for the teacher, it will help the child because it shows him just where he needs help, and why. There are simple and intelligent suggestions in reference to punctuation, etc. One of the chapters is made up of illustrative compositions, reproduced substantially as written by children, and representing ordinary class work. A. S. Barnes & Co. Life in Ancient Athens. By T. G. Tucker, LL.D. This work treats of the most interesting and important community of a former age—Athens, as it was in the period of its greatest glory. That period extends from the middle of the fifth century B.C. to the conquest by the Macedonians. The aim of the author has been to present the life of the Athenians with clearness and accuracy and his chapters leave an impression that is vivid and distinct. The book is the result of the latest research and presents the conclusions of many years of professional intimacy with the record of Athenian antiquity. Well illustrated and divided into seventeen chapters it covers every phase of cultured Greek life during the time of the city's highest development. It makes excellent supplementary reading for those who are engaged in studying Greek either in colleges or the secondary schools. The Macmillan Company. Price, $1.25 net. Ralph Waldo Emerson. By George Edward Woodberry. This is a scholarly essay on Emerson, his life and achievements. It gives a clear insight into his early experience and training and discusses his "hypocritic" dayɛ, his essays, his poems and the close of his career. The author states that "Emerson was a man who lived wholly within himself and was unapproachable except by his near relatives. Not a scholar, but a writer with a poetic gift, he preached at a time when there was a wane in religious sentiment. His inspiring power has long been recognized as the substance of his influence and fame." His followers are many and all will appreciate this sympathetic study of the personality and work of the greatest philosophical essayist of America. The Macmillan Company. Price, 75 cents net. Mental Development in the Child and in the Race. By Professor James Mark Baldwin, of Johns Hopkins University. This is the third edition revised, and while the general plan of the book is similar to that of the first edition published in 1895, important corrections in statements of detail and in clearness of exposition have been made. The two introductory chapters deal with "Infant and Race Psychology" and a "New Method of Child Study." The remainder of the book is divided into four parts, with the following headings: Experimental Foundations, Biological Genesis, Psychological Genesis and General Synthesis, the latter serving as a conclusion and summary. In part three the chapters on conscious imitation, the origin of volition and the origin of attention are especially valuable. This work has been translated into French and German. Published by the Macmillan Company. Price, $2.25 net. The Economy of Happiness. By James Mackaye. This volume is a profound and voluminous work on sociology. In the introduction the author states the problem of happiness, and takes the optimistic view that the problem is solvable by common sense. Book I is an elaboration of the scope of common sense, with a demonstration of its principles. There are chapters on intelligibility, truth, utility and error. In Books II and III the technology of happiness is considered-first theoretically, and secondly in its actual applications in society. The whole philosophy of production and consumption, including such topics as the social mechanism, competition, public and private monoply and pantocracy, are elaborated. The last chapter is entitled, "The Next Step," and in this chapter the doctrine of free trade is fully discussed. The author stands for the abolition of war, and believes that science is ultimately to solve the problem of happiness. His reasoning is throughout logical and clear, and the hopeful tone of his thought carries conviction in the mind of the reader. The work is a real contribution to a vital subject, and will deeply interest all students of sociological and economic problems. Little, Brown & Co. Price, $2.50. An Alphabetical Cyclopedia of Institutions, Persons, Nations., etc., of Ancient History and Geography. By Dr. Emil Reich. This is a handy little volume in flexible covers giving, in a convenient arrangement, a brief account of the principal persons and nations that are met with by students of the Greek and Roman Classics. It is not burdened with details. It will be a welcome help to those who are fitting for college and who have not at hand the biographical and historical dictionaries. London: Swan Sonnenschein & Co. New York: The Macmillan Company. ' Outline Studies in the Shakespearean Drama, with an index to the characters in Shakespeare's plays. By Mary E. Ferris-Gettemy, M.L. The studies in this volume are worked out from the dramatic standpoint. They are intended to help both teachers and pupils in a systematic study of Shakespeare. The book does not contain the text, but presupposes that the pupil will have the text at hand. It teaches him how to get at the meat in each play, and will be very helpful in enabling him first to comprehend the plot, and secondly to take in many details which otherwise would be missed. There is a portrait of Shakespeare and several full-page illustrations, which add to the attractiveness of the volume. The diagram of the plot of Hamlet is a striking presentation to the eye of the action of the play. A. Flanagan Company, Chicago. Price, 75 cents. Periodical Notes What promises to be another of Everybody's notable series is begun in the April number under the title of "Romances of Success." James J. Hill is the hero of the first romance-a fascinating life-story of the man whose intelligence and driving power have lifted him to the pinnacle of railroad achievement.-In the Delineator is an interesting paper on "The Night Schools of a Great City," by Esther Harlan, showing the rapid development of these invaluable aids to education.-Teachers of young children, everywhere, will be interested in the series of articles now running in St. Nicholas, entitled "Hints and Helps for Mother-Rainy Day Amusements for the Nursery." The articles are endeavoring to show how children may be profitably and happily employed on rainy or dull days by play with such everyday articles as are always on hand, clothes. pins, paper boxes, etc. The articles are all helpfully illustrated-The March Atlantic fittingly observed the centenary of Longfellow by giving the leading position to an eloquent poem upon the well-beloved poet by Thomas Bailey Aldrich. An added value is given to this choice bit of verse by the author's lamented death since the same was published." The Ideal Teacher" is happily described in the April Atlantic Monthly by Professor George H. Palmer, himself an exemplification of what he describes. Devoted to the Science, Art, Philosophy and Literature of Education VOL. XXVII MAY, 1907 No. 9 The Function of the Public School T SUPERINTENDENT GEO. E. GAY, HAVERHILL, MASS. HE public school may be regarded as an institution which parents maintain for their own convenience, hiring teachers to teach their children as they hire other servants to cook their food and sweep their floors. It may be regarded as a state institution by which the social whole is protecting itself from threatening dangers or storing up energy for the future. It may be regarded as the method by which one generation seeks to perform some of its duties to the next. The last is at present the popular and, I believe, the true view. The strong are bound to help the weak. The first claim upon the men and women of to-day is that of the children in their arms. Weakness is the great appeal to strength, ignorance is the great appeal to knowledge, sin is the great appeal to virtue. The strength, the knowledge and the virtue of the community belong first of all to the children. The public school problem may be stated in many ways; let us take this one. Given a child born into an American home, destined to become a member of American social and political life; granted that the kind of member which he will become depends in some part upon the influence which forces outside of himself have upon him, and that the public school is one of these forces-What effect should the public school be expected to produce and what should the school do to produce this effect? We may state it in many other ways, as we see it in different lights and from different points of view. Let us examine our first postulate, "Given a child born into an American home." The home keeps him, cares for him, educates him for five full years. During this time he has learned to speak a language with a good degree of accuracy, has made personal acquaintance with so much of the world of nature as has come within the reach of his senses, has learned to give his attention to the things that interest him and to solve the problems involved in the routine of his daily life,-his food, his games, the courtesies of his home surroundings. He has developed his will, he knows his power to control himself, his pets, his playmates, and sometimes his parents. His memory has begun its work, and recalls the experiences of yesterday in the midst of the occupations of to-day. His imagination has begun to kindle; he sees his block house fall, and hears its crash, before he strikes it; he pictures his mother's displeasure before he does what she forbids, and seeks to avoid it by concealment. His emotions have been aroused. He rejoices, loves, hates, grieves. In brief, all that we call education has gone on with marvelous rapidity and to a high degree of perfection. Our second postulate is that forces outside of the child, of which the public school is one, contribute to his education. We all agree in believing that education is directly the result of the mental activity of the individual; that the most important part of this activity results from the action of his will; that his will is generally the slave of his emotions, and emotions are the reaction of the soul to proper stimuli. The school is one of |