The first service in Appleton Chapel takes place tomorrow night and we trust there is no need of urging a large and earnest attendance. The Sunday evening services have become a source of infinite enjoyment to those of us who do not leave Cambridge for that day and are a fitting exercise for the beginning of the week's work. Prayers begin on the following morning and it is to them that we wish to call special attention.

Prayers since 1886 have undergone a great change and from being a compulsory duty have become a voluntary custom. They form an important side of our college life, being a marked and standing custom since the institution of the University. Because they are voluntary, they should not be cast aside and neglected; they make an excellent and earnest beginning of the day's work, and we are growing nowadays to find too seldom even a few moments for prayer and meditation. Although we shall have regretable losses in the Board of Preachers for this year the new comers are men known for their earnestness in religious work and thoroughly interested in broadening the religious side of the University. That these prayers have important influence is shown when one preacher consents to come from his parish in Ohio to conduct them. Moreover these clergymen do not desire to become merely pulpit preachers here. They have set aside hours when they will be present at Wadsworth House to meet with any student who may wish to call on them for consultation or for social intercourse, and they wish to meet and converse with men and to serve them as advisers and friends. And so we heartily hope that the college will more fully recognize the importance and the influence of prayers and will continue to attend them regularly and give a hearty support to the Board of Preachers, each of whom desires most earnestly to meet us not only in the chapel but also in private.