students are not really what we mean by Special Students; besides, it would not have been fair to throw upon that department the burden and responsibility of such a charge, especially if, as may well happen, this instruction should come to include other practical arts not specially related to the work of that department, and involving the fitting up of instruction-shops with which its own students would have nothing to do. We cannot but regret that the Corporation did not establish the new work at once on a more independent footing, giving it a position so distinct from the professional training previously undertaken that we should not appear to be changing our policy or lowering our standard, while the new work should clearly appear to be a new one. If the Corporation should, even now, see fit to revise their action, and, instead of establishing a new department in this school, create a separate school, of a subsidiary character, though under the management and direction of the same Faculty, it would seem to your Committee to be the best statement of what they have in fact already done. If this view should commend itself to the Faculty, we would recommend that the President be requested to signify the same to the Corporation. This would not necessarily involve any increase of the work beyond its present dimensions, while it would put it on a juster footing, and one more favorable to its natural development. But whatever extension may ultimately be in store for it, the character of the work done in the instruction-shops must, for some time to come, be fixed by the requirements of the several professional departments, as it is at present by those of the Department of Mechanical Engineering; and any other instruction-shop that may hereafter be added must be, as the filing-shop is now, primarily a professional laboratory. What experience has been already gained would seem to show that such work, being absolutely new to all, is equally well adapted to all classes of students. IV. As to the serviceableness of such studies to young men proposing afterwards to enter the Institute as Regular Students, we do not see that it can well be made to answer the general demand for such preparatory schooling. Such a school would differ too much from the High Schools and Academies from which our students come for us to expect from it the same class of students; and even the High Schools and Academies hardly meet our demands. But special cases may constantly arise of students ready or nearly ready to enter our classes, to whom a year of practical instruction would be of great service; and this may prove the best practicable course for some of those who apply for admission to the Institute, but are not quite prepared to pass our entrance examinations. Besides, it does not seem to us desirable that the Institute should be understood to maintain a Preparatory Department. WILLIAM R. WARE. BOSTON, Feb. 21, 1877. - After considerable discussion, it was voted that this instruction be given in separate rooms-that the department be known as the "School of Mechanic Arts " - that it be not regarded as preparatory to the regular school of the Institute and that it be under the control of the Committee on the School as are all other departments of instruction in the Institute. DEGREES CONFERRED. At the meeting of June 5, it was voted that the Degree of Bachelor of Science be conferred on the following students, who had fulfilled all the requirements for the Degree, and who had been recommended by the Faculty and the Committee on the School: The subjects of the Theses and the abstracts of the same will be found in subsequent pages. The progress and present condition of the school in its various departments, will be stated in the reports of the President and Professors. SAMUEL KNEELAND, Secretary. Boston, Sept. 29, 1877. DEPARTMENT OF PHILOSOPHY. To the President: The programme, as now established and printed in the catalogue for the current year, has been duly carried out. The work assigned for all regulars has been accomplished by them in a satisfactory manner. In the Department proper of philosophy, there have been no regular students this year; but the opening of special courses to persons of either sex, in accordance with the Government's vote of May 10, 1876, resulted in the entrance of a number of young women (seven) upon the Introductory Course in Philosophy, that laid down for the Second-year students in the Department. Their work proved to be a signal success, and four of them will continue in the Department the coming year, to take a course upon Hume and Kant. In June last, as the contribution of the Department to the general exhibition (then contemplated, but afterwards given up) of the Institute's School of Industrial Science, an "Account of the Department of Philosophy in the Massachusetts Institute of Technology" was printed, making a pamphlet of 72 pages. It included (I) an account of our various doings from 1872 to the date of publication, fully illustrated by specimen examination-papers, (II) the theses by the men who were graduated in 1876, and (III) the verbatim examinationpapers produced at the last Annual by the young women mentioned above. The Government are respectfully referred to this "Account" for full details of our operations during the year just closed. Respectfully submitted, GEO. H. HOWISON. DEPARTMENT OF MILITARY SCIENCE AND TACTICS. President J. D. Runkle: SIR, I have the honor to submit herewith my report of the Department of Military Science and Tactics for the School year ending September 30th, 1877. I assumed charge of the Department at the beginning of the year, and finding the status of the Military Course to have been the result of careful deliberation and experiment on the part of the Corporation, the Faculty and my predecessor Lieut. Zalinski, I instituted no changes and have none to recommend. A new element however, has been added to the School during the past year, viz. ; the Department of Mechanic Arts, and I respectfully recommend that the students attending this Department be required in their first year to attend drills. I think the exercise so obtained would be of benefit to them in counteracting any injurious tendency of their confined shop work, which necessitates more or less labor while in a stooping posture. These students, should they subsequently enter the regular first year's course, would be able to pass the required examination in tactics and so omit drill for that year, while some of them, as volunteers, would be useful as officers and non-commissioned officers. The small size of the First year class during the past year, averaging about forty for drill, made it inexpedient to form a battalion. I therefore organized the Corps as a Company, retaining, however, the offices of Adjutant and Quartermaster, the duties of which were mainly clerical. During the regular drill hours instruction was given in Infantry drill, including skirmishing, and during recreation hours, volun |