try of this, or a similar system, in place of the incongruous weights and measures in use. In case of such an adoption by the Government, the necessary inconvenience, attending the change, to the people, will be very largely diminished, if the metrical system shall have been previously taught in the schools. 5. This system is, however, left out from many of our best arithmetics, and in most of the remainder, if not in all of them, it is very imperfectly developed. We therefore respectfully urge: 1. That to the arithmetics now published an appendix be at once added, that shall contain a full explanation of the metrical system of weights and measures, and of their relation to the weights and measures now in common use, and that the whole be illustrated by suitable and numerous examples. 2. That in every revised edition of arithmetics now used, and in every new arithmetic, a proper development of this system have aplace in the body of the work, and that in examples for practice occurring thereafter there be frequent reference to these weights and measures. The metrical system of weights and measures is in exclusive use in France, Holland, and Belgium. Italy, Spain, Portugal, Greece, Mexico, and most, if not all, of the South American States have adopted it. In some of these countries, however, its use by the people is not compulsory. Parliament has legalized its use in the United Kingdom. Austria, Prussia, and the other German States have signed a convention agreeing to adopt systems of which the metre is the base. There is reason to believe that Russia, Sweden, and Denmark will follow the example of the other European States. The legislature of the State of Connecticut, in June, 1864, recommended to school officers that this system be taught in the schools of the State. EDUCATIONAL INTELLIGENCE. NEW ENGLAND. MASSACHUSETTS.-Hon. H. F. French, President of the Massachusetts Agricultural College, has just made his report for the last year to the legislature. Of the 860,000 acres of land granted to the State by Congress, for the benefit of agriculture and the mechanic arts, 136,480 acres have been sold for $110,864. By act of the legislature, one-tenth of the income of the fund derived from the sale of the land scrip was allotted to the Agricultural College in payment of its farm; and one-third of the fund derived from the remaining nine-tenths was assigned the Institute of Technology, at Boston. From the tenth appropriated to the College, $27,318 have been realized, and 3,680 acres remain unsold. $5,129,have been received from the town of Amherst, which subscribed $50,000 as a building fund. There may be dimsubscription, as several taxpayers of that culty in obtaining the rest of the Amherst town have petitioned for an injunction upon the town authorities to restrain them from issuing town-bonds for the amount. -The work of increasing teachers' salaries goes on well in this State. Lowell and Charlestown have added a large percentage to the salaries given last year. -During the past year Harvard College received $166,929, and expended $154.240. The donations during the year includo Tyler Bigelow, and $3,000 from Dr. Alex$50,000 from Samuel Hooper, $10,000 from ander Thomas. The present library building is stated to be much too small, and the librarian, in his report, asks for an appropriation of $200,000 for a new building. CONNECTICUT.-The new library build ing of the Wesleyan University, at Middletown, will be built next suminer, and will probably cost about $40,000. RHODE ISLAND.-The citizens of Providence are about to establish a Musical Conservatory after the general model of the Institutions in Europe. The institution is in operation under Professor Tourjee, and $40,000 have been subscribed for the erection of a proper building, which will be begun as soon as $50,000 have been raised. MIDDLE STATES. NEW JERSEY.-A new college building, in place of the one recently destroyed by fire, is to be erected at Seton Hall, South Orange, to cost $50,000. Toward this sum there are $19,000 insurance, and $4,000 of materials on hand. Bishop Bailey will order a general collection of $10,000 throughout the diocese. The balance, it is hoped, will be raised from the friends of the institution. The grand jury of Mercer County have presented the students of Princeton College for their lawless conduct. NEW YORK. The report of the Superintendent is at hand. In the State there are 11,618 school-houses, valued at $9.945,923. During the year, $799,000 were expended on buildings. In the school libraries there are 1,278,218 volumes, whose reported value is $624,000, which the Superintendent thinks far too low. The whole number of teachers employed in the State is 26,469, and the number of pupils, 1,007,787, of whom 916,617 attend the common-school. The statistics tell a sad story of the average attendance; while 916,000 children are on the rolls, only about 400,000, or nearly 45 per cent. are in regular attendance. The report refers to the matter thus: "The time may come when compulsory attendance may be necessary, but this should be the last resort. The schools should be made attractive, and the methods and results of instruction so desirable, that truants and absentees will voluntarily seek the school-room." In New York city compulsory attendance has been in a measure introduced. During the year the whole amount of money raised for support of common-schools was $6,252,242, of which the actual expenditure was, $5,785,460, being an increase of $1,185,589 over the preceding year. The Superintendent strongly recommends abolishing the "rate-bill," and making the schools absolutely free; supporting them by taxation. -At a late meeting of the Board of Education of New York city, a report was received from the Finance Committee, embodying the following resolutions: Resolved, That the sum of $2,406,921.69 of the school-moneys for the year 1866 be, and the same is hereby appropriated for the moveral purposes herein named, and paid as may be required, subject to the bylaws, rules, and regulations of the board governing payments-viz. : For overdraft on the city chamberlain, 1865 For payments on special appropriations for amount of liabilities on appropriations for 1865 For salaries of teachers in ward-schools For salaries of janitors in ward-schools For incidental expenses of ward-schools, including For incidental expenses of For support of Free Academy, pository... For rents of school premises. For salaries, superintendents, clerks, etc. For incidental expenses of the Board of Education, printing, rent of stable and storehouse, horse feed, fuel and gas for ward and evening schools, etc.............., For apportionment to corpo rate schools... For support of normal-school, Fer pianos for ward-schools. Total ..... $79,480.11 178,941.59 1,865,000.00 65,000.00 150,000.00 2,500.00 100,000.00 5,000,00 93,000.00 10,000.00 175,000.00 25,000.00 50,000.00 60,000.00 88,000.00 8,000.00 5,000.00 .$2,406,921.69 Resolved, That the sum of $47,405.85, being the balance of the school-moneys for the year 1866 unappropriated, be reserved and set apart, and paid, as may be required upon appropriations previously made for all purposes for which the school-moneys of the year have not been appropriated. The report was received, and resolutions adopted. A resolution was adopted requesting the comptroller to place to the credit of the board the sum of $500,000, for school purposes for the current year. PENNSYLVANIA. By the report of the State Superintendent for last year, it ap pears that the whole number of children in attendance in the common-schools of the State, is 29,587, a decrease of 8,000, as compared with the year before. The percentage of uttendance is only .628. In other words, nearly four out of every ten pupils, whose names were on the roll for 1865, were constantly at home. The percentage of attendance is much better than that in New York. Mr. A. Pardee, of Hazleton, Luzerne County, has offered $100,000 to endow a scientific department in Lafayette College, on condition that the small balance of the original endowment fund of the college be secured, and suitable buildings be erected for the new department and its students. It is believed that both will be accomplished or secured within a short time. -The Rev. John E. Graeff, of Philadelphia, has presented to Pennsylvania Colfege a fine telescope made by Merz & Son, Munich. It is of nine feet focal length. WESTERN STATES. MISSOURI.-A free-school bill, making equal endowment, but separate schools, for white and colored children, has passed the House of Representatives. INDIANA.-The "Congressional Townnow amounts to ship School-fund" 82,128,227, with 84,892 acres of land yet unsold. The revenue from this, distributed in 1865, was $147,988. TENNESSEE.-At a late teacher's convention, the Superintendent of Schools stated, that over 80,000 white people in the State can neither read nor write. MINNESOTA. A bill, appropriating $10,000 for the erection of a State normalschool building at Winona, has passed the legislature. CALIFORNIA. The amount of money accruing to the school fund on January first, and subject to apportionment, was $182,774. The amount per child, was $1.39, there being 95,137 children entitled to apportionment. SOUTHERN STATES. VIRGINIA.-Mr. McCormick, inventor of the reaper and mower, has sent General Lee $10,000 to establish a McCormick professorship of Practical Mechanics. EUROPE. ENGLAND.-There is one instance of a person holding a college presidency even longer than the late Dr. Nott, of Union College. The Rev. Martin Joseph Routh, D.D., was elected President of Magdalen College, Oxford, in 1791, and so continued until 1854, when he died, aged ninety nine. FRANCE.-The following passage occurs in the Emperor's opening address: "The Budget of the Public Works, and that of Education, have not undergone any diminution. It was of use to preserve to the grand enterprises of the State their fertile activity, and to maintain the energetic impulse of public instruction." ITALY.-The Italian finances are in a wretched condition. Reductions are made in every department, extending even to the Ministry of Public Instruction, where 5,000,000 francs are to be saved, although every patriot desires to spend more for educational purposes. The nineteen universities are to be reduced to six, at Turin, Pavia, Pisa, Bologna, Naples, and Palermo. The remaining thirteen, even those of Genoa, Cagliari, and Catania may continue as municipal universities, if the municipal and provisional councils are ready to support them, but the Government subvention for them ceases in future, and academical degrees conferred by them will be void, all the students being hereafter obliged to graduate at one of the six government universities. RUSSIA. The Czar has addressed a rescript to the governor of Warsaw, promulgating a series of educational measures to be carried out in Poland. Superior and elementary schools are to be established for Poles, Greeks, and Russians, and separate schools for Germans and Lithuanians. All scholars will be taught the Polish and Russian history and languages. The religious instruction will be intrusted to the secular clergy of each respective denomination. CURRENT PUBLICATIONS. of circulation, which places the cause of the movement in the capillaries, and regards it as capillary attraction. This theory is based upon the facts that the heart does not exert sufficient force to drive the blood through the veins and capillaries; that the portal circulation is carried on without a heart, and upon the existence of acardiac monsters. It has been received with great favor by the leading English and German physiologists, but has been little countenanced by American investigators. There are many objections to it, but the explana tions afforded of the portal circulation and exceptional cases give a force to Dr. Draper's theory altogether wanting in the old hypothesis. Prof. Draper rather belongs to the conservative school of physiologists, and is not ready to admit innovations. He holds that the red corpuscles of the blood are originally the nuclei of the leucocytes, and, therefore, developed from them, although Longet has shown that the disks exist at the earliest period of life, before the leucocytes make their appearance. He also maintains that the disks die and are disintegrated by the spleen; in this agreeing with Kölliker and Carpenter. The more modern school of investigators, represented in this country by Drs. Dalton and Flint, look upon the blooddisks as regularly organized anatomical ele ments, which are subject to the same laws of molecular waste and repair as other portions of the body. The researches of Dr. Henry Draper, quoted by our author, throw much light on this obscure point, and tend to confirm the observations of Kölliker. Prof. Draper adheres to the theory of Liebig and Draper, Sr., that the fats and sugars are merely respiratory elements, combustibles, to be employed in the production of animal heat. Until very recently, this hypothesis was universally received, but the investigations of Robin and Verdeil, Dutrochet and others have thrown discredit upon it. Although we think Prof. Draper is somewhat too conservative, yet, as physiology is only in its infancy, his opinion may eventually prove to be right. He has certainly shown that his judgment is worthy of respect. His researches upon insensible perspiration, respiration, and urea, all of which are given in this work, justly entitle him to a high position among experimental physiologists. The division devoted to hygiene is far superior to any thing we have ever seen in similar works. Instead of superfluous matter, useful only for filling up, we have here a well-digested mass of valuable information. The author is caustic in his animadversions upon the present method of cramming children with indigestible food, when they "should be in the nursery partaking of pap, with a little bread and meat, if it is desired to have them grow up into healthy adults." He is especially pointed with reference to ventilation, and gives much the same advice as that offered in the MONTHLY some time since. The remarks about plagues and prophylactics are valuable in view of the near approach of cholera. As a text-book for students, or as a book for the general reader, Prof. Draper's work has few equals; indeed, we know of no work now before the public so desirable for popularity of style combined with scientific precision. In his new work, Dr. Flint intends to treat of pure human physiology. The first volume, just issued, embraces the subjects, blood, circulation, and respiration. The introduction is a comprehensive statement of physiological chemistry, discussing the nature and characteristics of the proximate principles with great clearness, and giving the various analytical processes more carefully than is usual. The chapters on blood and circulation contain much matter rarely found in works of this size. The effects of transfusion, and the merits of different investigations, concerning the amount of blood in the body, are detailed in an attractive manner. A simple method of estimating quantitatively the organic princi ples of the blood, is given in Chapter II., and will readily recommend itself to all. Dr. Flint adheres to the theory, that circulation in the capillaries is produced principally by action of the heart. This seems hardly to meet the case, as the walls of the smaller blood-vessels can scarcely sustain the pressure. Dr. Draper's theory, which has been adopted by Carpenter and other leading physiologists of Europe, refers the force in great measure to capillary attraction. This theory is open to no serious objection, and is better able to explain many local phenomena. Liebig's hypothesis, that the sugars and fats are merely respiratory elements, is quietly refuted by Dr. Flint in the discussion of those principles. In publishing this work, it is Dr. Flint's purpose to give a practical treatise, which shall present only what is actually known. He therefore usually avoids the discussion of purely theoretical or historical questions as unnecessary and embarrassing. He has been at pains to verify by experiment the statements of other physiologists, and thus (2) THE PHYSIOLOGY OF MAN. BY AUSTIN FLINT, Jr., M.D., Prof. Phys. and Microsc. in the Bellevue Hosp. Med. Coll., etc. New York: D. Appleton & Co. 8vo, pp. 502. $4.50. The has rendered his work authoritative. language is concise and accurate, the style reminding one of Dr. Dulton's work. The text is singularly free from egotism, the author's numerous investigations being modestly referred to in foot-notes. The work is to be issued in four annual instalments, each of which will embrace certain topies, and will be complete in itself. The amount of matter in the part now published is comparatively small, as the type is large and the margin wide. The price is, therefore, in our judgment, excessive, and will tend to keep the book from students, for whose use it is especially adapted. THE Graham lectures, like the "Boyle Lectures" and the Bridgewater Treatises," are designed to show the "Power, Wisdom, and Goodness of God" by proofs drawn directly from nature. The fourth volumes contains six lectures, by Prof. Agassiz, on the structure of animals. In a popular manner the lecturer discusses the different plans of structure, the gradation among animals, the remote antiquity of animal life, together with the triple coincidence in the succession, gradation, and growth of animals, and concludes the course by giving the evidences of an intelligent and creative mind in the plans and variations of structure. The especial feature of these lectures is the effective, yet inoffensive, method of refuting scientific errors. Thus, in lecture third, the immense antiquity of animal life is distinctly proved, yet the whole argument is so devoid of bitterness, that the stanchest advocate for a literal interpreta tion of Genesis, chap. i., can hardly take offence. Those philosophers who maintain that the line of development from the monad to man is unbroken, will find food for reflection in the second lecture. The exceedingly pompous preface by the officers of the Brooklyn Institute, under whose auspices these lectures are delivered, in no way enhances the value of the book. It might be well to omit it in future editions. The work is elegantly printed on tinted paper, but the illustrations are after a very primitive model. SIR WILLIAM BLACKSTONE assures us, with 3) THE STRUCTURE OF ANIMAL LIFE. Six Lectures. By LOUIS AGASSIZ. New York: C. Scribner & Co. 8vo, pp. 128. $2.50. all the weight of his great name and learn ing, that "a competent knowledge of the laws of the society in which we live, is the proper accomplishment of every gentleman and scholar." But this opinion was given more than a hundred years ago. Since that time a great empire, abounding in every thing that is calculated to make a nation prosperous and powerful, and teeming with a population of refugees, exiles, and emigrants from other countries, and their descendants, has deemed it expedient to try the experiment of intrusting all its hopes to its people-all its people-and not exclusively to "gentlemen and scholars." Such is our government, and, consequently, every citizen in it has a holy trust and a sacred duty to perform. The humblest elector among us has more or less to do with making and altering the laws by which our rights are enforced and our wrongs redressed. Consequently, it is more than "the proper accomplishment of every gentleman and scholar," it is the clear duty of every citizen to acquire "a competent knowledge" of our laws and government. If there ever was a government which deserved to be studied and understood, that government is ours. It is not too much to say that the prosperity, safety, and glory of our country, as well as our own individual happiness, depend upon the intelligence of the masses. Ignorant electors will often choose bad legisla tors and suffer from hurtful laws; it can not, in the nature of things, be otherwise. To bring home, therefore, to the under standing of all, such information as they should possess, ought to be and is an object worthy of the greatest minds. Dr. Wedgwood's work seems to have been prepared with great care and discrimination, and is, in our judgment, precisely what has long been needed in every American home. He has presented with singular success a complete and comprehensive view of the governments of the several States, as well as of the General Government, to gether, with a summary of all the general principles of law, now in force in the sev eral States, and applicable to, and usefulin, the ordinary transactions and business affairs of life. (4) THE GOVERNMENT AND LAWS OF THE UNITED STATES. By Prof. Wm. B. WEDGWOOD, IL. D. New York and Philadelphia: Schermerhorn, Ban eroft & Co. Svo, pp. 477. Leather, Price $5. |