In the number of the Advocate out today the stories, as usual, outrank the verse. The poems, with the exception of "It Hath No Thorns" by Lyon Ives, seem decidedly forced and labored. Most aim too high, but an unsigned quatrain sets too low a goal and reaches it. The best of the stories are "From Mount Auburn to Exeter Street," an amusing piece of imagination, and "Endicott and the Janitor," by H. W. Eliot, an excellent character study. The editorial is sensible and well pointed but it interests the Advocate writers more than the readers of the paper. The other stories in the number are "The Captain," by John Cary, "The Spirit of the Spanish Main," by S. A. W., "The Beginning and the End," by C. G. L., Jr., and "Across Kansas," by L. L. The other verses are "The Lake of the Setting Sun," by R. Pier, "To Shelley," by A. D. Ficke, and the quatrain entitled "June."

The Advocate still keeps up the custom of frequently printing stories signed only with the initials of the authors. If a story is of such nature that no name should be signed to it, it should not be printed. Otherwise the full names of the authors should be given instead of the present initials, which puzzle but do not really disguise.