THE wisdom of our action in withdrawing from the Rowing Association of American Colleges was proved conclusively, if any proof was needed, by the course pursued in the late Convention of the Association. Three colleges - Cornell, Columbia, and Princeton - were represented, and the most important action taken was a resolution to row hereafter in four-oared instead of six-oared shells. The fear that this backward step would be taken was one of our strongest reasons for leaving the Association, and now we see that our apprehension was no idle fancy. We shall have next summer three separate intercollegiate contests, and every college, except Harvard and Yale, will row in four-oared boats. At the time of our fall races we said that the action of the Executive Committee of the H. U. B. C. in making the six-oared crews inferior to the four-oared was bad for the rowing interest of the college. The action of the American and New England Associations affects in the same way the rowing interests of the country. The circumstances of the smaller colleges no doubt made the change necessary, as the weak state of our clubs made it necessary with us. We earnestly hope, however, that the change here is only temporary, and that in the spring the former state of affairs will be restored. There is no good reason for the inability of our clubs to turn out first-rate six-oared crews. Whether there are sufficient reasons for the action of the small colleges, they of course know best.