University ultimately at Clifton, the country seat of the founder. But the erection, from time to time, of buildings rendered necessary by the growth of the institution, made removal difficult, and the advantages of a site so central and accessible became apparent. Accordingly the provisional home gradually transformed itself into a permanent one.

The University was fortunate in the time of its founding. The decade following the civil war witnessed an unexampled development of educational resources in the United States. The rapid expansion of the business of the country created a demand for industrial and technical training which was met by the establishment of many schools of this kind. The Morrill bill provided each State with an agricultural college. The State universities of the Northwest came forward into prominence. Additional facilities were provided, at all the leading institutions, for instruction in the physical and natural sciences, in the modern languages and literatures, in the historical and political sciences. Large sums of money were given to educational endowments; many important changes of method were introduced. It is doubtful if in the history of the world there has ever been a period of such intense and fruitful activity in matters pertaining to education. This was an opportune time for the founding of an institution which should undertake to do a relatively new work. When the Baltimore experiment was entered upon, a dozen years of earnest discussion and of instructive experience had prepared the way.

Generous resources were at the disposal of the new institution. Johns Hopkins, a merchant of Baltimore, by will devoted the bulk of his property to the founding of a university and a hospital. Under the terms of the will the share of each was about $3,500,000. This was a larger sum than had ever been given in this country, by an individual, in a single gift, to an educational purpose. No conditions were attached to the bequest. The only approach to a restriction was the testator's recommendation, in his will, to the future University, "not to dispose of the stock

PROFESSOR BASIL L. GILDERSLEEVE

of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company, but to keep the said stock as an investment." The sequel proved this to be unfortunate counsel. The twelve Baltimore gentlemen selected by the founder as trustees were men of intelligence, enterprise, and public spirit, keenly appreciative of their opportunity; the fact that they were without experience in educational affairs was probably an advantage rather than a disqualification. On the 30th of December, 1874, the trustees took the decisive step which may be said to have determined the fortunes of the undertaking, in electing Daniel C. Gilman, at that time President of the University of California, and formerly a professor in Yale College, to be President of the Johns Hopkins University.

What kind of an institution should be established? Local opinion largely favored a college of the ordinary type, for the education of the youth of Baltimore. Mr. Hopkins had indicated his wish that a medical school should ultimately be established, of which the hospital should form

study under the philosophical faculty. Provision in their own country for the young men of scholarly ambitions who were constantly led, in such large numbers, to cross the ocean, seemed to those entrusted with the Hopkins bequest the most urgent educational need, and the plans of the new institution were accordingly formed with primary reference to this.

It is noteworthy that the first professors appointed were Basil L. Gildersleeve and J. J. Sylvester. The selection of an eminent Greek scholar and an eminent mathematician as the first appointees was not accidental; it was significant of the purpose to which the University has steadily adhered that of carrying forward, pari passu, the study of the humanities and the study of the sciences of nature. Four other professors were appointed at the beginning-Ira Remsen, Henry A. Rowland, and H. Newell Martin, to the chairs, respectively, of chemistry, physics, and biology, and Charles D. Morris, Collegiate

Professor of Latin and Greek. The lamented death of Professor Morris occurred in 1886. Professor Martin, after a brilliant career, retired, broken in health, in 1893. Professor Sylvester returned to England, after a few years, to become Savilian Professor of Geometry at Oxford. Three of the six members of the original staff have continued in the service of the institution until the present time, and no one familiar with its history needs to be told how much they have contributed to make it what it The entertaining and largely apocryphal legends connected with the eccentric and forceful personality of Sylvester are familiar to all Baltimoreans; these piquant anecdotes turn largely upon the absentmindedness popularly supposed to be characteristic of mathematical genius. At the recent presentation of Professor Sylvester's portrait to the University, Professor Newcomb dwelt with emphasis upon his power of inspiring enthusiasm, declaring that if, twenty-five years ago, a list had been drawn up of the fifty leading mathematicians of the world, America would have had scarcely a single representative, while now no such list could be made without including a creditable proportion of American names; this change he attributed mainly to Sylvester's residence in this country. A similar estimate of the influence of this great man upon mathematical science in England appeared in "Nature," shortly after his death, from the pen of a well-known English man of sci

ence:

"The revival of the mathematical reputation of England, dating from the Queen's accession, is to a large degree due to his genius; and those who were present at the simple yet impressive ceremony at the Jewish cemetery at Dalston must have realized that one of the giants of the Victorian era had been laid to

rest. »

"The beginning of the Johns Hopkins University was a dawn wherein 't was bliss to be alive.'» The ardor and elation thus described by one of the first little company of students - Professor Royce, of Harvard University-are not difficult to understand. The distinction, now so familiar, between collegiate and advanced instruction was at that time comparatively novel, and the opportunity of concentration upon one's chosen field, the scope allowed to personal initiative, the absence of disciplinary and didactic methods, were peculiarly exhilarating and inspiring.

The establishment of twenty fellowships, to which the inost promising applicants from all parts of the country were appointed, brought together a select company of ambitious and active-minded young men. Something of the zest of adventure and discovery attached to the first serious attempt in the United States to provide facilities for higher non-professional studies.

The inaugural address of President Gilman, delivered on the 22d of February, 1876, defined the aims of the University in a few carefully considered and significant phrases:

"An enduring foundation; a slow development; first local, then regional, then national influence; the most liberal promotion of all useful knowledge; the special provision of such departments as are elsewhere neglected in the country; a generous affiliation with all other institutions, avoiding interferences and engaging in no rivalry; the encouragement of research; the promotion of young men, and the advancement of individual scholars, who by their excellence will advance the sciences they pursue and the society where they dwell.»

The leading features of the policy which has been followed are outlined in these words.

The development of the University has been gradual. The staff of teachers, at the first, was twenty-nine; it is now one hundred and twenty-three, including about forty whose work lies wholly in the Medical School. No large addition has been made, however, at any one time. After five years the number had increased only to forty-three. Departments of instruction were organized with deliberation, and appointments were made with care, with the design of securing homogeneity and efficient coöperation. To this prudent restraint are due in large measure the harmony and good understanding which have prevailed among the members of the teaching force. "A slow development," in virtue of which the institution should be a growth rather than an offhand creation, was a wise mode of procedure.

An even balance has been maintained between the various branches of learning. The Johns Hopkins is occasionally spoken of as a distinctively "scientific" university, but no precedence has been given to mathematical and physical sciences over philology, history, and literature. The seminaries and special libraries for in

struction in Semitic languages, Sanskrit and comparative philology, Greek and Latin, Romance and Germanic languages, English, history, political science, economics, have been as liberally maintained and as efficiently administered as the laboratories devoted to chemistry, physics, biology, and geology. The obligation resting upon an institution of learning to promote, according to its means, "all useful knowledge," independently of merely commercial considerations, has been fully recognized, and the principle of "special provision of such departments as are elsewhere neglected in the country" has been, as far as possible, kept in view. The policy of generous affiliation" between institutions admits of many applications; it would be advantageous, for example, if, in the case of subjects for which there is little public demand, to which few students are attracted, an understanding might be reached that would prevent wasteful duplications.

The extent to which the University has contributed to the enlargement of know

PROFESSOR SIMON NEWCOMB

"Studies in Historical and Political Science," "Contributions to Assyriology and Comparative Semitic Philology," "Modern Language Notes," the "University Circulars," the "Hospital Bulletin," the " "Journal of Experimental Medicine," are regularly issued from the Johns Hopkins Press. Several of them have reached their twentieth volume. Many separate works have been issued under the auspices or with the aid of the University,-such as the "Photographs of the Solar Spectrum," by Professor Rowland; the New Critical Edition of the Hebrew Text of the Old Testament," under the editorial supervision of Professor Haupt; Professor Brooks's elaborate "Memoir on Salpa: " Professor Gildersleeve's "Essays in Literature and Philology;" the volumes of the Maryland Geological Survey, under the direction of Professor Clark, etc. More than two hundred theses of persons who have been graduated as Doctors of Philosophy have been printed. The published works of individual members of the academic staff add largely to this aggregate of productive activity.

A gratifying result of the work of Johns Hopkins University is found in the large.

number of important educational positions filled by its graduates. A list prepared, two or three years ago, of institutions at which three or more men from Baltimore had been engaged, includes nearly every college and university of consequence in the United States. At some of these institutions the Johns Hopkins representation is very large, numbering a score or more. Up to 1896 more than eight hundred persons, formerly students at Baltimore, had become teachers, at least five hundred of them in institutions of collegiate rank. From a patriotic point of view this fact is not without significance. The bringing together, at this natural meeting-place of the North and the South, of young men from all parts of the country, and the distributing of them, after prolonged academic residence, far and near, in places of dignity and usefulness, has been a unifying influence of no small moment, tending not only to elevate standards of scholarship, but to abate sectional jealousies and to promote a common understanding between diverse communities. A tabular statement of the States from which the students have been drawn, and of the respective numbers furnished by each, and a list of the various colleges in which those graduates who became teachers have been employed, would show that Johns Hopkins University stands in broader and more impartial relations to the country as a whole than any other institution.

That the problems connected with the organization of a system of graduate studies have been solved at Baltimore with a good measure of success may be inferred from the fact that the plans adopted have been followed, in the main. at every American institution where such studies have been introduced. The mode of procedure on the part of a candidate for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy is so generally familiar that is is not worth while to describe it in detail. One principal subject is chosen, and two subordinate subjects. These are studied during a period of not less than three years, private study not being accepted in place of residence. Many students remain longer

than the requisite three years; of thirtysix persons upon whom the degree was conferred in 1898, fourteen had been resident longer than three years. The methods of instruction vary greatly in different departments, and are more diversified than those employed in the teaching of undergraduates. A special subject of investigation must be selected, and a dissertation, embodying the results of independent research, must be presented, and approved as suitable for publication, before the candidate can be admitted to his final examinations. These examinations are chiefly written, but, as a final test, an oral examination must be passed before the Board of University Studies. This long and arduous discipline proves too exacting for some of those who enter the lists, and those who persist to the end well earn the honors which they win. The hard and faithful work represented by the degree of Doctor of Philosophy makes the cheapening of the title by giving it for "correspondence" courses, or as a merely honorary degree, a distinct injustice.

One of the questions most carefully considered when the University was organized was the arrangement of the studies leading to the degree of Bachelor of Arts, and the solution given to the problem of elective and required subjects in the undergraduate curriculum was an important contribution to practical pedagogy. The "group" system of studies is nothing new, but in the plans adopted at Baltimore an old idea received a new and interesting development. Seven distinct and parallel courses of instruction are open to candidates for the degree of Bachelor of Arts. Each of these contains certain prescribed subjects-rhetoric, English literature, history, economics, philosophy, French, German, and a science-physics, chemistry, or biology - with one year of laboratory practice; also drawing, and physical and vocal culture. In addition each group contains two principal studies- both extending through two years of instruction - which constitute its characteristic feature. The seven groups are the Classical,

the Mathematical-Physical, the ChemicalBiological, the Geological-Biological, the Latin-Mathematical, the Historical-Political, the Modern Language. The Classical group corresponds in the main to the traditional college course, the requisite mathematics having been secured before matriculation. The Mathematical-Physical affords a good basis for the subsequent study of electricity, engineering, astronomy, and other subjects largely dependent on the science of mathematics. The Chemical-Biological is preliminary to the study of medicine, or to the professional study of natural history. The Geological

PROFESSOR PAUL HAUPT

Biological furnishes a good fundamental training in the sciences, with special reference to subsequent advanced courses in geology. The Latin-Mathematical differs from the Classical group only in substituting mathematics for Greek. The HistoricalPolitical is adapted to the needs of those who look forward to the legal profession.