The method adopted by the Harvard Union last evening for selecting men to speak in the coming Yale debate was a great improvement over that taken to secure speakers for the debate in Sanders Theatre. It will be remembered that for the first debate one speaker was chosen by competition and the other two were chosen by members of the Union from their own number. Last night the competition for all three places was thrown open to the university. This free competition greatly increased the chances of drawing out the best talent in the college. It was a commendable step on the part of the Union.

The debate itself brought out with a good deal of emphasis the point that the oratorical powers of the average Harvard man are far from wonderful or even creditable. The men who spoke last evening had fairly good ideas, but most of them were unable to air them intelligently and forcibly. Lack of practice has doubtless much to do with this condition of things. The want of self-confidence exhibited by many of the speakers was largely due to this lack of practice. There is no reason why, with the opportunities at hand, speaking should not be more widely cultivated and why there should not be at Harvard a debating club in which the college would take a live interest, the meetings of which would be occasions of general discussions where the speaker would be recognized by the rest of the college as holding a place of some distinction. With two such men as Mr. Hayes and Dr. Curry who are always ready to give men advice and aid, oratory ought to have a better position at Harvard than it now holds.