reached the same stage as the corresponding problem in England and in Scotland. So far no measure has been advised for the needed unification and reform of the Irish system, but events indicate speedy action in this respect.

Higher education. The oldest institution for superior instruction in the island is the University of Dublin (Trinity College), chartered by Queen Elizabeth.

Besides the arts faculty, schools of law, divinity, medicine, and engineering are comprised in this foundation. Roman Catholics were not permitted to take degrees in the university until 1793, when the disability was removed by an act of Parliament. Eighty years passed before they were allowed recognition in the election for fellowships or for scholarships on the foundation of the college. Meanwhile, in 1854, a class of nonfoundation scholarships was established which were not restricted to any religious denomination. The final abolition of “tests," excepting in the case of professors and lecturers in the faculty of theology, was accomplished by act of Parliament in 1873, through the direct efforts of Mr. Fawcett, at that time postmaster-general. It is needless to say that Dublin University enjoys a prestige which even those who have suffered from its intolerance in the past recognize with pride.

Until 1850 the University of Dublin was the only body in Ireland authorized by law to confer degrees.

In 1849 three institutions, called Queen's Colleges, were established by the Government at Cork. Belfast, and Galway, respectively, for the avowed purpose of maintaining purely secular instruction. In pursuance of this purpose the colleges were organized with faculties of arts, engineering, law, and medicine, theology being excluded. Parliament voted the money for buildings and equipment, and an annual appropriation of £7,000 ($34,000) for each foundation. In the following year the work was completed by the creation of the Queen's University in Ireland, empowered to conduct degree examinations for the students of the Queen's Colleges. In 1879 this foundation was abolished and the Royal University created in its place. The examinations and degrees of this university are open to all candidates, women included. Alexandra College, founded in 1866 for the higher education of women, prepares women for the degree examinations.

The fellows of the Royal University may be required to teach matriculated students of the university in educational institutions approved by the senate. The following are the approved institutions: Queen's College, Belfast; Queen's College, Cork; Queen's College, Galway; Catholic University College, Dublin (now known as the University College, Dublin); Magee Presbyterian College, Londonderry.

There are two other important institutions concerned with higher education in Ireland, namely, the Roman Catholic Ecclesiastical College of St. Patrick, Maynooth, and the Royal College of Science, in Dublin.

The Catholic majority have for many years complained that the existing university system does not make satisfactory provision for the higher education of Catholics, and a royal commission was recently appointed to inquire into the present condition of the higher, general, and technical education available in Ireland outside Trinity College, Dublin, and to report as to what reforms, if any, are desirable in order to render that education adequate to the needs of the Irish people.

No further action has as yet been taken by the Government, but the report of the commission, which advocated full university advantages for women, gave a new impetus to the efforts for admitting women to Trinity College. These

efforts were brought to successful issue the present year when the board of Trinity College passed a resolution, subsequently sanctioned by the King, which admits women to all degrees of Trinity College in arts and in medicine on the same terms as men.

INVESTIGATIONS RELATING TO PHYSICAL TRAINING AND PHYSICAL DETERIORATION IN GREAT BRITAIN.

Problems of school administration which for more than a decade have absorbed public attention in Great Britain to the neglect of other educational interests having been disposed of for the time at least, questions pertaining to the improvement of the young are now exciting chief interest. Among these questions that of the physical condition of the children of the masses has been uppermost during the current year.

A royal commission on physical training in Scotland, appointed in 1902, produced startling evidence of the low physical condition of school children in the classes where food is scanty and the living conditions generally bad. The report of the commission is convincing on this point because of the extent and thoroughness of its investigations. Not less than 1,200 children (i. e., 600 in Edinburgh and 600 in Aberdeen) were examined by two well-known physiciansDr. Matthew Hay, professor of forensic medicine, University of Aberdeen, medical officer of health, Aberdeen, and Dr. W. Leslie Mackenzie, medical inspector for the local government board of Scotland.

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In order to insure that the children examined should represent fairly the different social grades of the population, schools were selected from the poorest and most crowded districts of each city, from the middle-class districts, and from the better-class districts."

The examinations were undertaken with special reference to the fitness of the children for the physical exercises required in the school and the effects of those exercises upon the children, but incidentally the investigation showed also the relation between the physical condition of the children and their capacity for the ordinary school work. The superior capacity of the well-fed children over the underfed for effort of all kinds was conclusively proved.

The conclusions reached by Doctor Mackenzie are thus summed up: "First. The large number of serious and minor diseases directly and indirectly affecting physical efficiency and mental efficiency constitutes an overwhelming case for a medical inspection of school children.

"Second. The facts as to physical exercise at the various schools demonstrate that a primary condition of any good result from increased physical training is adequate food and adequate clothing.

"Third. No systematic exercise ought to be practiced or enforced without a preliminary medical examination of the vital organs, to insure that irreparable damage shall not result.

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Fourth. That exercises should be organized, not as at present according to the code standard in which the child is studying, but strictly in accordance with health, physical development, and vigor."

As a result of the report of the investigation of the commission on physical training a committee was appointed by the education department of Scotland to investigate the systems of physical training in use in schools and to draw up a "model course of physical exercises" suitable for children of school age.

The outcome of the work of this committee is an extensive report a setting

Report of the interdepartmental committee on the model course of physical exercises, 1904.

forth the general purpose and method of their investigation, together with an extensive syllabus of physical exercises which they offer as capable of adaptation to schools of various classes. The introduction to this syllabus has a universal value because of its lucid and discriminating discussion of the purpose and essential features of a system of physical training adapted to the use of school children.

The report of the Scottish commission on physical training which was published in March, 1903, excited widespread attention and was one of the causes that led to the appointment, in September, 1903, of an interdepartmental committee to inquire into the causes of the alleged deterioration of certain classes of the population in England, “as shown by the large percentage of rejections for physical causes of recruits for the army and by other evidence, especially the report of the royal commission on physical training (Scotland), and to consider in what manner the medical profession can best be consulted on the subject with a view to the appointment of a royal commission, and the terms of reference to such a commission if appointed."

The committee was instructed to determine the steps that should be taken to furnish the Government and the nation at large with periodical data for a comparative estimate of the health and physique of the people; to indicate the causes of such physical deterioration as does exist in certain classes, and to point out the means by which it can be most effectually diminished.

The investigations of this committee had a much wider range than the conditions of school life. They endeavored, indeed, to probe all the influences that tend to degeneracy in any one of its various forms. The public health, as is shown by the investigation, is open to many influences, but by no channel can it be approached so readily or with such wide-reaching effects as by that of the school, and by no other means can the causes of decadence be so successfully attacked. To quote the report: a "In a country without compulsory military service the period of school life offers the State its only opportunity for taking stock of the physique of the whole population and securing to its profit the conditions most favorable to healthy development. It has been shown in the first part of this report how the occasion may be utilized in furtherance of the objects of an anthropometric survey, and it remains to be considered what are the conditions of school life adverse to physical well-being, and how the opportunities which it presents can be made to realize the best results for the rising generation at, perhaps, the most sensitive period of its growth."

The committee were agreed that the general effects of school life are not prejudicial to health. They cite in this connection the testimony of competent witnesses, in particular Doctors Eicholz and Niven as to the civilizing influence exercised by the school during the last thirty years. The untamed savagery characteristic of certain types has disappeared," they say, "but popular opinion required educating on such elementary though important points as the seating of children, the arrangement of light, and the supply of fresh air. Evidence was given of children being kept too long at desks which do not fit them, in an attitude of strained attention, either writing or with their eyes concentrated on a blackboard, which, if the class happens to be a large one, perforce occupies a position in which some have a difficulty in seeing it. Very young children are sometimes observed sleeping in postures calculated to develop curvature, and infant occupations are criticised as often much too fine for their eyesight. It was also alleged that the eyes of scholars often suffered from the effects of a strong cross light and that defective ventilation counted for a great deal among the unfavorable circumstances with which children had to cope."

"Report of the interdepartmental committee on physical deterioration, 1904, p. 9.

With respect to the schools for children of tender years the committee express the opinion that infant schools as conducted in urban districts can no doubt be worked to the great physical advantage of the children attending them, but there is evidence that a handful of small children in a rural school necessarily suffer a good deal from neglect or are taught under conditions from which no advantage can be derived." Several witnesses were quoted as opposing the admission to school of children under 7 years of age. In particular, Sir John Gorst, former chief of the education department, expressed the opinioa that this should be the rule for all country children, and he supported his opinion by the example of Switzerland, which is, he said, “perhaps almost the best educated country in the world. They do not let their children come to school till they are 7. They run about in the villages and mountain sides, and they are often employed in looking after cattle, goats, and so on. They do not go into school at all till they are 7 years old, and therefore when they do go to school they are sturdy and strong and their observation is awakened."

The various schemes proposed for promoting the physical well-being of school children all emphasize the need of medical inspection for schools. On this point the committee consider “that a systematized medical inspection of school children should be imposed as a public duty on every school authority, and they agree with the recommendation of the royal commission on physical training (Scotland) that a contribution toward the cost should be made out of the parliamentary vote." The question of the feeding of school children was thoroughly canvassed by the committee, who present the evidence relating to this subject under the following heads:

"(a) The extent to which underfeeding prevails at present.

"(b) Existing voluntary methods of providing food.

"(c) Proposals in regard to the more systematic feeding of school children.” As regards the first point, the committee were convinced that a large number of children habitually attend school ill fed.

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The alleviation of this evil has been left thus far to private efforts, confined for the most part to the larger cities. On the part of the persons engaged in this work "there was," says the report, “ a general consensus of opinion that the time has come when the State should realize the necessity of insuring adequate nourishment to children in attendance at school; it was said to be the height of cruelty to subject half-starved children to the processes of education, besides being a short-sighted policy, in that the progress of such children is inadequate and disappointing; and it was, further, the subject of general agreement that, as a rule, no purely voluntary association could successfully cope with the full extent of the evil. Even those witnesses who were inclined to think that its magnitude had been much exaggerated did not question the advisability of feeding, by some means or other, those children who are underfed, provided it could be done quietly and without impairing parental responsibility. The only witness who appeared absolutely to dissent from that view was the Bishop of Ross, who, while admitting an enormous number of underfed children in Ireland, deprecated that it would weaken the sense of self-respect and self-reliance both of parent and child."

The following citation from the report summarizes the information presented before the committee as to the existing agencies for supplying food to underfed school children:

"Eristing voluntary methods of providing food.-There has not been a great amount of definite evidence on the voluntary agencies in existence. As regards London, Doctor Eicholz mentioned the following agencies which spend about £6,100 per annum collectively: London Schools Dinner Association, Mr. G. R. Sims, Referee Fund, Destitute Children's Dinner Society, East Lambeth

Teachers' School Dinner Association, Southwark Children's Free Meals Fund. The work of these agencies has been coordinated, so far as the board schools are concerned, by the joint committee on underfed children, which has worked under the ægis of the school board."

The committee express the opinion that:

340. In regard to the sum contributed by the parents, Doctor Eichholz said that it amounted to 5 per cent in the case of the London Schools Dinner Association, and 25 per cent in the case of the Destitute Children's Dinner Society.

341. Mr. Libby, who is secretary to the East Lambeth Teachers' Schools Dinner Association, gave a description of the working of the free-meal fund in connection with the association. The fund has been running about twelve years, and is conducted on business lines; it is worked by the teachers through the attendance officers, and careful inquiries are made as to the circumstances of each family before a child is given a meal. There are breakfast centers and dinner centers. A child can be given a pint of vegetable soup and a piece of brown bread and a piece of cake at the cost of 1d. About 2 per cent of the children pay the full 1d., some pay part of the cost, and the rest nothing; not more than 7 or 8 per cent pay anything at all; but Mr. Libby thought this small percentage was due to the thing not being sufficiently worked. In spite of the fund there are still many underfed children, because there is not sufficient organization; it is difficult to get sufficient organization by voluntary methods. 342. Mr. J. B. Atkins, the London editor of the Manchester Guardian, gave a description of the free feeding system in Manchester. There the funds are derived entirely from voluntary sources; but the school board recognized the charity and the teachers helped in distributing the food, etc. The movement has grown steadily, and in 1902, 139,000 free dinners were given, at the cost of a little over £400. In this case also the circumstances of the family are carefully investigated by the attendance officers, but no attempt is made to recover payment from the parents.

343. In Glasgow Doctor Chalmers said there is an institution called the "Poor Children's Dinner Table," by means of which the condition of every child is inquired into, and meals are given to the underfed; the system is very comprehensive apparently, so that "no child in Glasgow ought ever to go to school starving," but no detailed account was given to the committee. Sir Frederick Maurice, however, referred to the Glasgow system and stated that the difficulty as to parental responsibility had there been solved by means of a very thorough system of investigation, and that the applications for gratuitous food have diminished rather than increased.

344. Free meals are given in Edinburgh to about 2,000 children, but the evidence given by Doctor and Mrs. Mackenzie makes it doubtful whether this number by any means exhausts the number of children who are underfed.

345. The most complete scheme described was started by the late Mr. George Dixon, and has now been in operation for twenty years in Birmingham, with Doctor Airy, H. M. I., as chairman of the organization. In considering the principles on which they would act it was decided in the first place that only those should be helped who could expect practically nothing if it was not given to them; and secondly, that only such a meal should be given as would not compete in any way with the meal which could be provided even in a very poor home. It was next decided that cases for help should be selected with the greatest care. This is done by three different people by the head teacher of the school, by the class teacher in whose class the boy or girl is, and by the visiting officer. The cooperation of these three, Doctor Airy states, has been so successful that he does not believe there has been 5 per cent or anything like it of abuse. The number of children fed in normal times is 2,500 and the plan pursued is thus described:

"We began with ten centers. We had large coppers for soup at ten centers, to which the children came from all outlying schools. The school board allowed us in each of those centers to canvas off some 20 or 30 yards of playground, perhaps 5 yards wide, and the cooking was done at one end. There the soup, a good lentil soup with some animal stock, and the bread and jam, were prepared. The process was simply this. We had to do everything to simplify matters. It had to be a rough business, but it was an effective one. The children come, and form file, and then they walk up, and as they walk up they take a spoon out of a basket and go up to where the voluntary helpers are distributing the soup. They take their bowl of soup and go on to benches on the other side of the canvassed shed and sit down and eat their soup. The moment they have done