It is lamentable to see how few undergraduates are able to give an inquiring outsider true and concise knowledge of the working system of our universisy. Most of us are able to explain the nature of the various courses of instruction, and to make clear the requirements for a degree. Beyond this the knowledge of only a very few men extends. That spirit of harmony of interests, whose loss is being so much deplored at Harvard, would be in great measure revived if men turned their attention toward the true nature of the advance and development of the institution that is doing so much to shape their minds and their characters. The same duty that drives the citizen of the United States to study the history of his country, should urge the college student to learn the history of his college.

No better documents can be resorted to for this purpose than the annual president's reports; they are replete with information of the concisest and most valuable kind. A history of Harvard compiled solely on the basis of these publications would be in itself a very excellent book. President Eliot's report for the past year is in no way inferior to its predecessors; on the contrary it again records many momentous changes, wrought and to be wrought in the government of the university.

The suggestion that the Lawrence scientific school be abandoned as a separate institution, (that lack of space prevents our printing) and that its functions be wholly undertaken by the university seems to us to be a very timely one, and, as the writer in "Science" says, one in which no way deprecates the good work done by the school.

The president's report should be a part of every college man's library, and not be placed among those books whose leaves remain uncut.