In spite of the inauspicious outcome of the freshman debate with Yale last year, this year's club has started in with zeal and enthusiasm. The standard of debating has been generally good, and the members are earnest and sincere in their efforts to do well, and to return the defeat of last year. When it was first proposed to hold an intercollegiate debating contest, we looked upon the plan with disfavor, and it must be confessed that the first debate did not tend to lessen this feeling materially, though considering their inexperience, the Harvard speakers did themselves credit. It seemed to us then as it seems to us now that intercollegiate debate demands too great maturity and experience on the part of the participants to be undertaken by freshmen with thorough success. The Freshman Debating Club has a distinct sphere within the University in training men for the great debates with Yale and Princeton, and it should confine itself to this task, which would certainly give it enough to occupy all its time.

This opinion was not taken through prejudice, nor is it held through obstinacy. We are very willing to be convinced, and now that a debate with the Yale freshman seems a certainty, we will be glad to do all that lies in our power to add interest to the event and to bring about a successful result.