been an administrative division of Cuba under Spain, and after various negotiations a treaty was drawn up in 1903 vesting the title of the island in Cuba. This treaty has never been ratified, but General Wood as Governor-General of Cuba turned the island over to the new republic, and it has been regarded as Cuban territory by the executive branch of our government. This action of the American residents was high-handed and ill-advised. It will undoubtedly, however, lead to a settlement of the question so vigorously argued, if only by the way of a ratification of the treaty by the Senate. That the policy of the administration is distinctly friendly to Cuba is to be seen in the acceptance of the resignation of Minister Squiers, who apparently found it impossible to meet a difficult situation to the satisfaction of Washington.

Education

Disaster

on the Great Lakes

Not for thirty years, the records say, has there been so violent and disastrous a storm as that which broke over the Great Lakes November 27 and 28. As regards the resulting loss of property, it has probably never been equaled. Twenty-nine vessels were wrecked, several being of steel construction. More than half of the total loss, estimated at $2,371,500, was suffered by the United States Steel Corporation, which is said to operate the largest fleet of ships under the American flag. It carries no insurance on its vessels, preferring to assume its own risks. Fortunately the loss of life was proportionately small, most of the crews being saved. For thirty-six men, however, all efforts at rescue were unsuccessful and they perished from cold or by drowning.

The administration of the two educational funds established by Mr. Carnegie The New and Mr. Rockefeller, respectively, is beginning Boards quietly but with the efficiency we should expect from those who have them in charge. The illness of President Harper, of the University of Chicago, is much to be deplored, as he is the only man who is on both boards, and it is very desirable that the two should work in coöperation. The appointment of President Pritchett, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, as the head of the Carnegie foundation, to provide pensions for college professors, assures that

fund careful and efficient control. There are a number of important questions to be decided before either of the two funds can accomplish its best ends. Chief among these are those concerning the general policy to be followed in the choice of those to be aided, the definition to be placed on "sectarian" schools, the grade of institution to be assisted and the length of time and service which shall justify giving a teacher a pension. The General Education board is still grappling with preliminary problems and as yet is without a permanent executive head. effect of these two funds upon higher education can hardly be overestimated.

The

Theaters in

Lovers of foreign comedy and comic opera presented in the original tongues Foreign have been more than delighted with the graceful America presentment of Strauss's "Fruehlingsluft" at the Irving Place theater, in New York. Vivacious little Lena Abarbanell in the chief comedy rôle has established herself as a popular favorite in Manager Conried's chosen company of players. The foreign drama, however, is receiving wider and more sincere attention in Chicago than in any other city on the continent. With two French companies, a Swedish company and a German company giving regular public performances of the best modern plays of their respective nations in the native tongue, the western metropolis is making honest and vigorous strides forward as an independent and artistic dramatic center. Wachsner's company of German players give a weekly performance of the best comedies of the modern French and German school. The Theatre de l'Alliance Française gives a monthly performance of some recent Parisian success. Marguerite Conlon recently scored in Jane Hading's rôle in "Le Fiancé Malgre Lui." The Club Française in its recent monthly performance presented "Le Monde ou l'on s'ennuie," Herman Devries enacting the leading part with credit. The Swedish company, headed by E. H. Behmer, is producing the latest and best of the works of living Swedish dramatists, or such modern comedies of recent years as have lived.

the Month:

David Belasco, as playwright and producer, stands head and shoulders above The Drama of his competitors and commands the situation in New York New York with "The Girl of the Golden West." A bald melodrama dealing with conventional western types, in a conventional setting, its theme abounds in the finer impulses of honest souls. In this play Blanche Bates has created the most satisfactory rôle of her career. In opposition, both artistically and commercially, Pierre Berton's "La Belle Marseillaise" is running a swift race.

Likewise a melodrama of faultless structural skill, it is on the other hand too theatric to be pleasing, too palpably a stage

FAY TEMPLETON Who has been playing in " Forty-five Minutes from Broadway" picture to be convincing. It furnishes, however, a striking rôle for Virginia Harned, with which she has regained lost laurels. Madame Sarah Bernhardt has retrieved her shattered fortune by a farewell appearance in repertory. Each performance was in itself a triumph in which the public fought for seats and paid any price for a final glimpse of the great

actress.

Comic Opera

In "Mlle. Modiste," a superior and entertaining book, graceful lyrics and a grand opera star have combined to create the best operatic entertainment of the season. Fritzi Scheff has scored the most conspicuous triumph of her career since her entrance into light opera, the beautiful, resonant, birdlike quality of her voice placing her without doubt in the front rank of the world's light opera singers. "The Rose of the Alhambra," in which Lillian Blauvelt is starred, is melodious and diverting, but lacks some of the artistic touch of its competitor. In the realm of drama itself, the West has had to be content for the most part with the return engagements of established

successes like Eleanor Robson, in "Merely Mary Ann"; Otis Skinner, in "His Grace

de Grammont," and Dustin Farnum, in "The Virginian."

Football season closed in the East on the Saturday before Thanksgiving with the victory of Yale over Har

Close of the Football

vard, 6 to 0. The game Season showed conclusively the wisdom of Coach Reid's policy. For several years Harvard football policy has been a good illustration of athletic anarchy. With the coming of Mr. Reid its coaching became cumulative. The Harvard team has slowly gained form as well as power. It was hardly more than a fluke which led to the Yale victory. The moral victory is undoubtedly with Harvard. In the West, Chicago in a way duplicated the experience of Harvard and closed a season of unbroken victories with the defeat of Michigan, 2 to 0. The score shows pretty accurately the difference between the two elevens. The surprising element of the game was the defensive play of Chicago. The power of good officials was seen in the prompt disqualifying of a Michigan player for rough tactics, and only a few players forced to withdraw because of injuries.

The Call for Reform

But interest in football has taken a new phase. The country has been aroused to the brutality inherent in the game, and various steps have already been taken looking to the correction of its faults. Columbia University has voted to abolish the game after December 31, 1905. The senate of the University of Chicago has appointed a committee to see what steps can be taken looking to reforming the game. Pacific Coast are planning to reorganize the rules of the game. It is much to be regretted that the Conference Committee of the Middle West declined to take any steps looking toward a change of rules. The committee on rules is holding its meeting at the time we are going to press and the outcome of its deliberations is not as yet known. There has never been a more uniform expression of displeasure with a national sport than that which within the last few weeks has sprung up against the game which has caused be

The universities on the

tween twenty and thirty deaths besides hundreds of serious accidents.

The conference summoned by Chancellor McCracken, of New York University, The Conference included twenty colleges on Football and universities. Twenty

Reform five delegates from these institutions met in New York on December 8 and adopted resolutions favoring the appointment of a rules committee to consist of eleven members elected each year by delegates appointed by the colleges and universities; no one to be eligible as a delegate who has received compensation by reason of his connection with athletics, in any capacity, excepting only a member of a faculty regularly enrolled as such in the college catalogue; this committee to formulate rules which will make the game less dangerous, and will result in the certain detection of foul and brutal play. With this end in view, should be limited. mass plays A further resolution discouraged interscholastic games of football between high schools and preparatory schools because of the strenuous character of the game and the immaturity of the students. It is expected that this rules. committee will meet in New York, December 28. Its success, however, is somewhat uncertain as none of the larger universities, except Columbia, responded to the call of Chancellor McCracken. At the same time it may become a large element in the crystallizing of public opinion, for its members are very much in

earnest.

The self-appointed rules committee which legislates for the game is composed very largely of football players, and is not likely to make radical changes in the rules. Real reform, if it ever is to come, must come from college faculties.

to produce a successful team, and the professional manager whose business it is to see that the funds and the men are provided to win such games are ruining the amateur spirit in our colleges. It is better to have an inferior team than one to all intents and purposes professional, managed by men whose interests are no more educational than those of the trainer of a prize fighter. The conference committee has suggested that the entry charge to football games should be made fifty cents to all students with the expectation that the enormous receipts would be materially diminished. This does not seem to be a legitimate hope. The proportion of students in a crowd of twenty-five thousand is not large enough to affect materially the gate receipts in case such a

reduction were made. A better rule would provide that the number of tickets sold to the general public should be proportioned to the number of those sold to members of the student body and the alumni. Sooner or later we must face this very elementary question: Are collegiate sports to be carried on for the purpose of raising money to build grandstands, stadiums and gymnasiums, of paying high salaries to coaches and trainers, or are they carried on in the interest of education? As they are now conducted, they are more of an amusement for the general public than is consonant with the purpose of educational institutions. College students have no business to maintain an amusement park.

Twenty-eight denominations were represented by five hundred delegates at the Inter-church Federation Conference, which met in

Inter-Church

Federation Carnegie Hall, New York city, November 15-21. The purpose was to foster the fellowship existing among the members of the various denominational bodies and plan for fuller coöperation in the future. It was distinctive from previous interdenominational gatherings in that it was composed of officially appointed delegates. The plan proposed for adoption by the various bodies represented in the federation was, in the main, as follows: (1) A Federation. Council of Protestant churches to meet every four years, the first meeting to be held December 1, 1908. (2) Each denomination to have four members on the council, and one additional member for every fifty thousand church members.

portance. It is to all intents and purposes a reanimation of the Evangelical Alliance which had a far more auspicious beginning more than thirty years ago, but now has no significance worth mentioning. There is no need of a convention or federation of evangelical churches that in one breath says that it is for practical purposes, and in another breath limits itself with theological definitions. Little can be expected of a body that dares not to stand for that which the age needs, namely, a unification of all religious interests on aggressive lines.

Evangelistic Progress

Al

From various parts of the country come reports of increasing interest in evangelistic meetings and consequent large attendance. Minneapolis has had a spiritual experience that has exceeded the expectations even of those who have. worked and prayed in preparation for it. Dr. Wilbur Chapman and his colleagues, twenty in number, with eighteen singers, held a total of 561 meetings in seventeen days. At many of them people could not gain admittance for want of room. though no estimate of converts was made, the good results are already evident in several ways. A similar experience was had in St. Paul. Cincinnati also has had a somewhat sensational evangelistic campaign under Sam Jones. An interesting indication of the deepening interest in spiritual things was shown in a recent meeting held by the Young Men's Presbyterian Union, of Chicago. One thousand invitations were sent to young men, asking them to drop business and devote the hours from four to nine on a given day at the Hyde Park Church to consideration of a higher personal religious experience. To the surprise of the officers, one out of every three came and manifested great interest in the appeal made by Mr. Robert Speer, of New York, for a life of prayer and obedience.

fact that the action of the bishops was legal, though possibly unwise. The board of trustees of the University of Boston, as distinct from the Divinity School, has appointed Professor Mitchell to a chair in the graduate faculty until the close of the present academic year, with full leave of absence. It is to be hoped that this means that Boston University is planning to establish a chair for the study of the Bible independent of the control of the bishops. bishops. Questions of criticism are not precisely questions of theology, and they should be treated with the full freedom of science. A board of bishops can never decide the authorship of an ancient document, however much it may see to it that teachers are chosen who favor this or that view.

of church and state by a vote of 181 against 102. The announcement was received with characteristic French abandon and cries of "Long live the republic," "Long live liberty." The bill passed the Chamber of Deputies last July, and therefore this is the final act, the bill going into effect immediately. It terminates the authority of the Concordat signed by Pope Pius VII. and Napoleon, under which the French churches became government property, the clergy were paid by the state and church administration was controlled by the French cabinet. Now by the provisions of the bill just passed the property of the church will be controlled by civil organizations, the republic will no longer pay the expenses of public worship and the salaries of the clergy, except in the case of chaplains for colleges, hospitals and asylums. There will henceforth be no official recognition of religion or of any religious body. Premier Rouvier stated during the course of the debate, the desire of the government was definitely to affirm the neutrality of the state in religious matters, and to give to all the various faiths the guarantee of liberty of conscience. Such an attitude is the only logical one for a republic.

As