the senior Medallist in 1840 came from King's College, London.

The expense of a University education in England is certainly startling at first sight. That a student spending $750 a year should be called decidedly economical, and one spending $1,500 not extravagant, gives a great shock to the accustomed ideas of an American, German, or Frenchman. But we must remember that England is one of the very dearest countries in the world. All the necessaries of life (except some kinds of clothing) cost about twice as much, not merely at Cambridge but in English country towns, as they do at New Haven; and the comparison with a University town of Continental Europe would probably show a greater difference. Making the proper deductions on this account, the necessary expenses of a Cantab will, with the exception of private tuition, be brought very nearly on a par with those of a Yalensian. And the items which oblige me to add the qualifications very nearly are such as I would gladly see added to the American student's account. If, for instance, there were better arrangements for cleaning the men's rooms (every Graduate of Yale College will understand what I allude to), the civilization accruing therefrom would be cheaply purchased by the addition of a few dollars to each term-bill.*

The expenses for private tuition, which will not be exaggerated if set down at $175 per annum for three years and a half, or above $600 for the whole course, form a large item, one which many of our students

* One of the grievances of the Trinity Under-graduates used to be that they had not baths and a water-closet in every staircase (every entry, as our students call it), and their complaints actually found their way into the Quarterly Review. This may seem ex. travagant, but it surely is a failing that leans to virtue's side.

would not be able or willing to pay, so that supposing the requisite sort of persons ready to make private tutors, it is very improbable that the system could be established amongst us so as to become at all general, for a long while at least. Here, then, we come directly to the question, whether the peculiar advantages which we have attributed to the Cambridge system of education are inseparable from private tuition? In treating of the private tutors it has been stated that some distinguished members of the University, including the Master of Trinity himself, wished to put them down entirely, or confine them within such limits as would be equivalent to their extinction; but that, in the opinion of the majority (wherein I heartily coincide from personal experience), such a step would be very injurious. I certainly do think that the private tutors are an important feature of the University; that they enable a badly-prepared but industrious student to make up his deficiencies in a way that no other mode can, and at the same time prevent the best men from being kept back by the others, thus saving time to all classes of students. But I would not affirm or admit that they are essential to the University, or that no improvements from it could be transplanted into any other institution unless they were included in the improvements; nor do I think any one would go so far as to say this. They contribute to the accurate and systematic training of the men, but are not indispensable to it.

The rich endowments of the colleges enable them to offer the highest rewards for learning-solid rewards as well as distinctions. Putting out of the question those who come up with school "exhibitions," and also the Sizars, who receive their commons for nothing, and their instruction, public and private, at half price, a tolerably

forward student, such a one as is first in a small college and turns out a respectable wrangler or a good double second, will make, by his college scholarship, two fifths or three fifths of his expenses during two thirds of the time he passes at the University. A Trinity Scholar wishing to continue in residence for a year or two as a Bachelor, either with the intention of pursuing his theological studies or of carrying out any other branch, has about a third of his necessary expenditure supplied from a similar source. The student of superior abilities and industry who gains a Fellowship, is provided for during the remainder of his bachelor existence, having an income of about a thousand dollars to depend upon.

Here it must be confessed is our great difficulty. Our colleges want wealth, in the form of specific endowments, foundations to support as well as encourage learning. Very promising young men are often compelled to quit college in the middle of their course, or to be temporarily absent teaching school or raising money in some similar way, to the great detriment of their immediate studies. As for resident Graduates wishing to pursue some literary or philosophical faculty beyond the college course, there is scarcely any provision or opening for them. It is the want of funds, and those funds specifically appropriated to these purposes, that prevents, more than anything else, our Colleges and Universities from having such teachers (both in number and quality), giving such systematic instruction, and diffusing about themselves such a classical atmosphere as will in a considerable measure correct the effects of bad previous instruction.

This, then, is the point to which all persons taking an interest in the advancement of our Colleges and Universities should turn their attention. We want endow

ments.

For the furtherance of this object public assistance is not to be thought of. The recent act of our own State Legislature in endorsing Noah Webster's barbarous innovations on English orthography is a fair specimen of the capability of such gentry to decide on matters of scholarship and high learning. We must look to private liberality. Many of the College Scholarships and Fellowships, and the majority of the prizes, College and University, at Cambridge, are owing to gifts or legacies from individuals. The generous spirit of our countrymen in such matters is too well known to require enlarging upon; and I feel persuaded that were the subject once definitely brought before them and explained to them, there are many men of substance who would give their $1,000 or $2,000 apiece, each to his respective Alma Mater, for the foundation of a Scholarship, and some who would be much more liberal. The first thing to aim at is, to direct their attention clearly to it and show how such gifts have a certain tendency to promote learning, and can scarcely by any possibility be misapplied, as vague and general bequests for educational purposes or establishments of independent departments.

All this, however, looks only to the future, and is the work of much time. Does nothing admit of being done at once to improve the standard of scholarship and of education generally in our colleges? I think there is much which might be done, and shall now proceed to show how I would set about it, supposing myself in the place of a president, professor, or other influential member of the "Faculty" of a large college or university.

[I am very happy to say that nearly all the rest of this chapter, as originally written, has become an ana

chronism. Several of the most important changes recommended, such as the introduction of written examinations, the examination of students in passages and authors not forming a part of the regular course, and even the abolition of those fearful six o'clock New Eng land winter-morning chapels have been adopted by several of our principal colleges. Other suggestions have been rendered unnecessary or impossible by the progress of events. I shall merely say, therefore, in a general way that I would abolish the Junior Exhibition if it could be done without raising a mutiny, that I would continue the serious study of Greek and Latin up to the very end of the four years, that I would put the Seniors through a thorough course of Logic and that I would make the final standing of the students more dependent on the examinations and less on the daily recitations than it still is in most of our institutions. I also hold to my original opinion that when the "Beneficiaries" form a numerous class (as at Yale) they should not be mixed up with the younger students, but should be made into a special separate department preparatory to the Theological.]

The suggested changes not only recognize the principle of emulation as a legitimate one, but encourage it to its full extent. This may seem to call for some remark, as the doctrine is frequently put forth (though the general practice of our institutions is against it) that all rewards for excellence in college studies are based on an unsound principle and tend to harm, that they excite illfeeling and envy, and bribe students to do that to which a sense of duty should be a sufficient inducement.

Any endowment for the encouragement of classical, mathematical, or other learning, necessitates the idea of competition, otherwise you abolish the only test of what