In reply to an editorial published yesterday, the CRIMSON is asked: "How is a lecturer, or the person who manages the lecture for him, to know beforehand whether there will be a sufficient number of students present to justify the reservation of a portion, small or large, of the hall for their special accommodation?"

It is usually possible to foretell with something near accuracy whether a lecture will be meagrely attended, well-attended, or crowded. From the success of Professor Moore's exhibitions last year, one certainly might have supposed that a like series this winter would not fail to draw large audiences. If it is likely that a lecture will be meagrely attended of course no seats need be reserved. If it is thought that a lecture will be either well attended or crowded such a proportion of good seats as the lecturer thinks adequate, should be reserved for students. If it is wholly impossible to foretell whether the attendance will be large or small it would be little trouble to set apart a few seats so that if the lecture proves to be crowded students will not have to stand or be turned away.

In no case should seats be reserved after the lecture begins however. A plan, frequently tried with success, is to reserve a certain portion of the seats until five or ten minutes before the lecture begins.

It is further asked: "Why should seats be reserved for one portion of the audience and not for another, at lectures specifically advertised as 'open to the public' and to which the public is officially invited through the University Calendar?" The custom of reserving seats for members of the University at the Sunday evening services in Appleton Chapel, which are "open to the public," is at once an answer to the question and an example of a successful plan of reserving seats for students most of whom, unlike Cambridge citizens, do not feel that they have the time to go to lectures half an hour early and waste the time between their arrival and the beginning of the lectures for the sake of securing from outsiders seats at exercises intended primarily for themselves.