into office at Tulane; this month on Jefferson's birthday, April 13, President Alderman is being inaugurated as the first formal head of Jefferson's notable foundation, the University of Virginia. Each of these gentlemen, in seeing clearly and emphasizing frankly particular features of work his institution is called to do, is consciously facing great responsibilities and opportunities. An institution ought to have, and when true to itself and the privileges of its environment and conditions, must have as definite a personality as a man. Every successful institution, like every successful man, specializes in the line of its genius and its interests. No institution can be a dragnet for everybody and every whim and caprice, and prosper. It is a wise man that learns the nature of his particular gifts; and it is a great institution that discerns the strongest points in its own work and develops these into a special character, while not neglecting anything reasonable to a fuller and more rounded development, which, however, is always subsidiary to the main character. Even to the ordinary intelligence the mention of the names Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Princeton, Pennsylvania, Johns Hopkins, Cornell, Michigan, connote a set of very definite ideas which are in no two instances alike. And it is a good thing that each of our best institutions, South as East and West, has this favored personality.

The determination on the part of the trustees of the Peabody fund to give a million dollars to the Peabody Normal College in Nashville with accompanying conditions offers a great opportunity for the display of wisdom in using the income of this amount to the best advantage and a corresponding responsibility for its successful discharge. The purpose is for developing further a great Teachers' College for the Southern States. It has been a long felt want; and here is the opportunity for realizing this ideal and filling this want. One may assume that the easy temptation to give the South and Tennessee and the city of Nashville still another "University" will be successfully and promptly withstood. The sum-notable as it is-is not large enough for that; and there is, unquestionably, not room enough for two

"universities" in the same town, one in the east and another in the west end. Indeed, with the example before us of the proposed co-operation, though not union, of Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, it might be well worth making the trial of correlating most of the educational work and interest in the same place, as far as may be, so as to get the greatest momentum available: the College for Teachers; the Carnegie Library; the classical training and certain specializations of Vanderbilt University-each independent in its corporation and work and at the same time each acting in perfect accord and sympathy in a right educational correlation. What good might not thus come to the teachers and the school system of the South, of Tennessee, and even of Nashville!

The Conference on Uniform College Entrance Requirements in English, which met on Washington's Birthday at the Teachers' College in New York City, at least opened the way for some radical changes which may bring with them salutary results. The Conference consisted of twelve delegates, three each from the Associations of Schools and Colleges in the New England States, the Middle States, the North Central States, and the Southern States. Instead of the usual prescribed ten books for reading, forty books were named, representing various periods and sorts of literature and divided into six groups, one or two books to be chosen from each group so as to make up ten. This gives both pupil and teacher a much wider choice in literature. An effort to introduce certain books of the English Bible failed, but a special committee was appointed to consider the matter and report at the next Conference. In the books for study, Shakespeare and Milton were retained because they were regarded as the great poets of English literature. The Milton developed sturdy opposition, which, in time, yielded. In the prose, however, there was again permitted a choice: the selection of Washington and Webster over against Burke and of Carlyle against Macaulay. Doubtless no course of study likely to be agreed upon will be thought ideal; nevertheless the great ad

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vantage of uniformity throughout the country is obvious. pils preparing for college whether in Massachusetts or Wisconsin, Texas or Tennessee, can go over similar courses in English and in theory ought to get enough of the same training to be able to enter the Freshman Class of any college in the country. The schools thus become united in one organized educational system for the nation, the Association of each section acting independently but concurrently and in essential agreement.

The German Kaiser, who is always interesting, has proposed an exchange of visits between Professors of the German and the American Universities; and forthwith the University of Pennsylvania presented both the Kaiser and the President of the United States with a Doctor's degree, without intimating, however, a courteous temporary interchange of chairs on the part of these two learned Doctors. This proposed interchange is almost of necessity limited to the large universities with very specialized graduate courses. The professors would enjoy the holiday—it will be a sort of Sabbatical year for them, with the additional opportunity of preaching in some one else's pulpit. It would give some of them the chance of playing the lion, as Professor Barrett Wendell has been doing in France, or as happened to the foreign delegates to the Congress of Arts and Sciences in St. Louis last autumn. The plan would probably do more to educate the professors than the pupils in the respective countries and as such is to be welcomed.

The proceedings of the Conference for Education in the South which met in Birmingham, Alabama, in April, 1904, appeared during the winter, edited by the Secretary, Mr. Edgar Gardner Murphy. This year's meeting, again in April, will be held at Columbia, South Carolina. The proceedings represent a campaign of education in that the greatest benefit resulting is the bringing together of representative men of different sections of our country. The reports from the field by the several Superintendents of Education form probably the most valuable and en

couraging part of the present document. To bring a half dozen State Superintendents together under one roof to hear each tell his tale, to induce a generous rivalry among them and see each make the best showing he can-this alone is to do a good deal. It is making public education both popular and a source of pride. If the benefits of this movement can only become addressed to the crying needs of the country districts and sparsely settled sections, the real good will be attained. The present pamphlet also contains Bishop Galloway's pronunciamento on the negro, and Mr. Walter H. Page's utterance on the effectiveness of the industrially trained man-two noteworthy addresses for any gathering.

NOTES

How rapid a process journalism and modern book-making have become was evidenced by Frederick Palmer's "With Kuroki in Manchuria" (Scribner's), which appeared in the early winter. The narrative abruptly begins with the outbreak of hostilities between Japan and Russia and the departure of the Russian ambassador from Tokyo, tells of the passage of Kuroki's army to Korea, the crossing of the Yalu, the writer's observations and experiences with the army in Manchuria until after the battle of Liaoyang. The book has all the freshness and many of the limitations of the journalist for the papers were originally sent to Collier's Weekly-and there is displayed a keen observation united with shrewd judgment. The Japanese character, the way in which the natives and the people set about doing things, their scientific skill and readiness, their precautions, their quietness, their perennial good-nature, their perseverance, their mastery, are emphasized and have but been confirmed by the events around Port Arthur and Mukden. While others were pining for sensations and complaining of hindrances set in their way, because they were not aware of Japanese intentions and could not forecast the details of far-reaching plans, Mr. Palmer found a plenty to see and to say merely in observing the people and the army. The spirit of the volume is well characterized by its dedication: "To the Japanese infantry, smiling, brave, tireless; and no less to the daring gunners who dragged their guns close to the enemy's line over night, this book written by one who was with you for five months in the field is admiringly dedicated." The illustrations, which bring the scenes of the war very near to us—we seem almost to recognize some of the faces-are from photographs by James H. Hare. Three maps show the actions on the Yalu and around Liaoyang and the routes of march and principal engagements of the four Japanese armies.

Until about the year 1860, Vienna was a medieval city with fortifications and bastions surrounding it. Then it was suddenly modernized under the Austrian Emperor, Franz Josef I, and