upon the duties of the office. Dr. Schurman's election was received among the officers, alumni, students, and friends of the university with a degree of favor which amounted to positive enthusiasm. For seven years he had been connected with the faculty, first as professor of Christian ethics and later as dean of the Susan E. Linn Sage school of philosophy, and during that time had given evidence of the ripest scholarship, the broadest educational ideals, and the highest administrative ability. Moreover, he was a young man, being but 38 years old at the time of his election, and having still before him his best years of usefulness. Everything combined to make him the first choice of all and the fittest man for the place that could have been selected.

President Schurman's policy is clearly outlined in his inaugural address, entitled "Grounds of an appeal to the State for aid to Cornell University," delivered November 11, 1892, upon the occasion of his formal inauguration as president. The policy there announced is based upon the idea that Cornell is the State university of New York, just as, for example, the institutions at Ann Arbor and Berkeley are the State universities of Michigan and California. It proceeds from this premise to the conclusion that New York should support her State university in the same manner that Michigan and California support theirs. Cornell, he argues, educates yearly 512 sons and daughters of New York at an expense of over $150,000, free of charge.1 New York ought, in justice, to bear this burden, appropriating yearly to Cornell not less than that amount. She has, in fact, never appropriated to that purpose one cent from her own treasury. Her sole benefaction has been to turn over to the university the gift of the United States, a gift represented by the land scrip fund, upon which the annual income has been about $20,000 and which will never exceed $30,000. Various urgent needs of the university call for State aid. Especially agriculture and veterinary science, subjects touching most nearly the interests of the State, call for immediate and ample appropriations. In view of these considerations the president announced the policy of calling henceforth on the State for the aid necessary to develop and maintain the university.

The policy thus inaugurated was speedily put to the test. The legislature of 1893 was asked to appropriate money for the erection and equipment of an agricultural building devoted to instruction and experiment in dairy husbandry. The result was an appropriation of $50,000, the first money ever voted directly to the university from the State treasury. With this money the dairy building was erected, and its formal opening in the fall of 1893 was the occasion of the first visit

'Since the adoption of the revised constitution, going into effect January 1, 1895, the number of assembly districts is increased to 150 and the number of free State scholarships may therefore aggregate 600 in all.

to the university of a legislative committee. Another appropriation was asked in 1894, and a like sum of $50,000 was voted for the erection of a veterinary building, to which $100,000 was added the next year. The latter building, however, belongs to the State as a part of the equipment of a State veterinary college, and is administered in behalf of the State by the trustees of Cornell University. Additional appropriations have been asked of the legislature for the maintenance of the college and have been granted. The legislature last year established a State College of Forestry and put it under the management of the university. Thus the policy announced at the inauguration has received recognition in successive legislatures and bids fair to become firmly established.

Another result, due largely to President Schurman's exertions, was the transfer of the land-scrip fund from a special fund, subject to possible loss or impairment, to the general funds of the State, on which the State will pay hereafter 5 per cent interest annually.

Other phases of the policy announced in the inaugural address were, the increase of the salaries of professors; the increase in the number of university fellowships and scholarships; the establishment of publication funds for the printing of contributions in various fields of learning; the establishment of new departments and chairs in fields as yet unoccupied; fuller and more adequate equipment for established departments and building and equipment of dormitories for students. For the accomplishment of many of these ends the president looks to private benefaction and for many he holds that it is the duty of the State to make provision.

The gist of it all may be briefly put. Cornell University was designed for the benefit of the people of this Commonwealth, but in accepting the land grant from Congress New York pledged State aid to the institution receiving the proceeds. This is Cornell University. But the university has now reached a point in its development at which, if it is to furnish liberal and practical education to the largest numbers in all the pursuits and professions of life, it must have support from the public treasury as well as from the bounty of individuals. Thus only can the university fulfill its vocation of furnishing the highest education to all classes at the lowest cost. These ends are the ends of the State. It is dedicated to truth and utility; and between these there is no incompatibility; for, as Plato has well said, "the divinest things are the most serviceable." We are at once realistic and idealistic, and while we cherish the old we are always in quest of something better. The genius of Cornell University stands on the solid earth; and while his eyes front the dawn the ancient heavens are about him, and through all its resounding spaces he hears the noble mother call Excelsior! So may it be! So shall it be; for the people of New York will not suffer either private gifts or public grants to fail us.

During the comparatively brief period that has elapsed since the beginning of the administration several important changes have been made in the educational and govermental policy of the university.

The requirements for admission to the technical courses were mate3176-27

rially raised. Like advances were made in the requirements for admission to the courses leading to B. S. and Ph. B. Finally the course in letters leading to the degree of B. L. was abolished, to take effect in 1896. This left but three general courses, that leading to A. B., that leading to Ph. B., and that leading to B. S. The first two differed mainly in the substitution of modern languages for Greek in the entrance requirements and in the work of the freshman and sophomore years in the course leading to Ph. B. In his report for 1893–94 the president argued for the abolition of the degree of Ph. B., and the conferring of the A. B. degree both in the general course requiring Greek and Latin and in the general course in which the modern languages are substituted for Greek. This would have resulted in the conferring in the general courses of only two degrees, A. B. and B. S., the first in courses in which the major work was in the humanities, and the second in the courses in which the major work is in science. But the faculty went further than this, and decided to grant but the one degree of bachelor of arts and to make all work in the department of arts and sciences (with very slight exceptions) wholly elective.

The requirements for admission to the course in law have also been increased to an equality with those in arts and sciences, and the course has been extended to three years.

The administration of the university has been changed or modified in several particulars. The first is by the abolition of the university senate which has been a body composed of full professors, advisory to the president in matters of educational administration and especially in the appointment of professors. By this change the powers previously vested in the two bodies are now vested in the president. Later the faculties were reorganized with special faculties as explained in Chapter VI. The second change is the increase in the membership of the board of trustees by the addition of fifteen elective members, ten of whom are to be elected by the full board and five by the alumni. A third change had to do with the government of students. There was created in 1893 a student council presided over by the president, and intrusted with all questions pertaining to frauds in examinations. Subsequently the powers of this body were extended so as to include all cases of student offenses of whatever character and the body was designated the student self-government council. It disappeared in 1896.

The increase in the number of students continued down to 1894, when, owing to the charge then first made for tuition for graduate instruction and the increased requirements for admission to the mechanical and electrical engineering courses, there was a falling off. The attendance has been as follows: 1891-92, 1,538; 1892-93, 1,700; 1893-94, 1,801; 1894-95, 1,689; 1895-96, 1,702; 1896-97, 1,808; 1897-98, 1,835. At the commencement exercises in June, 1898, President Schurman stated that during the six years of his presidency he had conferred as

many degrees as President White and President Adams together conferred in the preceding twenty-four years.

During the year just passed a medical college has been established in New York. Thus during President Schurman's administration three new colleges have been added to the university, veterinary science, medicine, and forestry.

The university completed its twenty-fifth year, since the date of its formal opening, on October 7, 1893. Appropriate ceremonies were held on October 6, 7, and 8 in celebration of the event. The oration was delivered on the morning of October 7 by the Hon. Chauncey M. Depew, and addresses were delivered by the Hon. Stewart L. Woodford, the Rev. Anson J. Upson, the Rev. E. N. Potter, Prof. G. C. Caldwell, and the Hon. Joseph C. Hendrix. An interesting feature was the presentation to Dr. Burt G. Wilder of a "Quarter Century Book," made up of original contributions from his former students who have become prominent in various fields of science. A dinner was held at the conclusion of these exercises at which telegrams and letters were received from various friends of the university, including Ex-President White, then minister of the United States at St. Petersburg; Gen. Meredith Read, the only surviving member of the original board of trustees, and Prof. Goldwin Smith, a member of the first faculty. The commemorative sermon was preached by the Right Rev. William Croswell Doane, Bishop of Albany.1

This anniversary occasion recalled to the seat of the university large numbers of former students and served to mark the large results of twenty-five years of progress. The campus, which had been a rough unfinished upland when the first body of students gathered upon it twenty-five years before, spread out in broad and well-kept lawns with winding avenues lined with stately elms. Where then stood a solitary building flanked by a temporary campanile, now rose fourteen noble structures in brick and stone, devoted to the varied activities of the modern Cornell. On the campus thirty-five cottages and five fraternity halls housed professors and students; 145 teachers and over 1,600 students wrought together on that beautiful hillside. Great departments, schools, and colleges have grown up almost unnoticed. A priceless general library of 150,000 volumes was housed in a building acknowledged to be unequaled at any university in the country, while the great law library of 23,000 volumes was housed in a neighboring building devoted to the needs of a flourishing law school. Large equipments, museums, and collections were on every hand. A total income of over $600,000 was available for the maintenance, if not the extension, of this magnificent plant. Above all there rested the spirit of devotion to the foundation principles of true catholic scholarship,

'See Proceedings and Addresses at the Twenty-fifth Anniversary of the opening of Cornell University, Ithaca, 1893,

liberal and practical, planted on that spot twenty-five years before by the founders of the university.

In view of these facts it is no hyperbole to say that the present condition of Cornell University surpasses the most eager hope of its farseeing founder, or of the young and enthusiastic scholar who dreamed aloud his dreams to that sympathic friend of all high ideals over thirty years ago. The hopes and dreams and aspirations of both have been transmuted into realities. The university which they founded has educated a large body of students, affording to each an opportunity to fit himself for such work as his tastes or talents might incline him to. This it has done freely and unstintingly in the broad and catholic spirit of the founder that it might carry out his great purpose of combining practical and liberal education and of fitting "the youth of the country for the professions, the farms, the mines, the manufactories; for the investigation of science, and for mastering all the practical questions of life with success and honor."

This great growth and important work render very pressing the questions of administration and endowment for the future. There is need for the same wisdom and devotion that have characterized the administration of affairs in the past. Of those who founded and built the university many have passed away and others must soon follow, in the course of nature. Of the trustees named in the charter but one, Alonzo B. Cornell, still sits in the board. Of those first elected under its provisions but one, Andrew D. White, remains. Of the early benefactors the founder, Hiram Sibley, John McGraw, Jennie McGraw-Fiske, Alfred S. Barnes have died in the midst of their labors. Of others who have powerfully aided by their counsels in the development of the university many are also dead, including Horace Greeley, Erastus Brooks, George W. Schuyler, Charles J. Folger, Douglas Boardman, and Henry W. Sage. There remain of those who have helped to direct its destiny from the earliest days only Andrew D. White, Alonzo B. Cornell, Stewart L. Woodford, Henry B. Lord, Francis M. Finch, and a few others. In the future the administration of affairs must pass more and more into new hands and these new questions must be solved by new friends and benefactors.

Fortunately all new questions are half solved in advance of any positive action, for there still remains and must always remain, as the unalterable basis of the university, to which all else must be subservient, those foundation ideas laid firm and deep by Ezra Cornell and Andrew D. White; the close union of liberal and practical education, absolute equality among all, even the most diverse courses of studies, and the adaptation and extension of the privileges built upon this foundation to every person who may ask them and to every need of the age. The history of Cornell University has been the history of the development of these ideas and their translation into the highest forms of usefulness and dignity. Its history for the future, if it