FOUR AMERICAN UNIVERSITIES.*

WE hear so much now-a-days of the false and exotic America —the America of " boodling and bull-dozing," of tyrannical millionaires, and a frenzied proletariat, in a word of the America of Chicago—that it is a comfort to hear a little of the true and natural America—the America of New England, of Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and Columbia—the America where the sane and wholesome traditions of the English race exist in as perfect health as on this side of the water, and where honest living, high thinking, and sound learning flourish and abound. The wild and whirling words of hysterical agitators, spiritual and political, must not persuade people into thinking that Chicago with its strange and feverish crowd of Bohemians, Italians, Polish Jews, Hungarians, and Germans, is the normal American city, or that it represents the permanent and conquering element in American life. It is an ugly enough boil on the body politic, and doubt- has far from healthful, but we have no sort of doubt that it will pass away and be absorbed into the healthier tissues of the Union. Meantime, let us learn to look on the nobler and far more real, if less sensational, side of American life. Mr. Birkbeck Hill, in his able and sugges- tive study of one of the greatest glories of American life, Harvard College—lately noticed in these columns—helped us to forget the angry tumour of the West, and to see something which is worth the attention of every Englishman. The work before us enlarges the field of vision still farther, and reminds the reader on this side of the water that there are no less than four seats of learning in the States which would be venerable even here. It would be difficult to find any institutions whose founding and maintenance does more credit to our race than the great Universities which are seated at Cambridge, at New Haven, at Princeton, and in New York. American civilisation has been called materialistic by those who have not troubled themselves to look below the surface. That it is not really so, these four Universities, and the deep sense of loyalty they • Four American Iri,ivereities: Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Culumbia. Illae- rated. New York : Harper Brothers. 1895.

kindle in their sons, have proved a hundredfold. Not only has the true lamp of learning been kept alight in their elm- shaded precincts, but these teachers of honour, virtue, and piety, have shown in word and deed that men do not live by bread alone, and that man's spiritual needs are really greater, though they may seem less, instant than the needs of the body.

Many people will doubtless hear, with Aomething akin to wonder, of the long and dignified academic traditions of the New England Colleges, and of their well preserved and lovingly cherished forms and ceremonies,—forms and ceremonies which do not yield in interest and picturesqueness to those of our own Universities. The fact is, we are far too apt, when we think of America, to consider it a new place. We forget that the coast-fringe of the New England States had flourishing settlements two hundred and fifty years ago. We regard things that date from Cromwellian times as sufficiently venerable when we find them in England. Why should we make any distinction in the case of America ? Bat in truth it is rather the Americans who are to blame than we. It is they who have so greatly overdone the talk about the absence of memories and traditions in America. It has become a conventional enthusiasm with them to go to Oxford or Cambridge, and to deolare indiscriminately, and in regard to anything and everything, "Alas ! we have nothing at all of this sort in America." We in England have caught the parrot-cry till at last it is a sort of unchailengeable dogma that everything is brand-new in America. The old brick halls which inclose two aides of the yard at Harvard, the stately façade of Nassau Hall at Princeton, or the older blocks at Yale, may not be architecturally as magnificent as Wolsey's work at Christ Church. They belong to an austerer epoch and a less artistic society. Unless, however, the pictures in the work before us give a strangely false impression, they must have a charm of no mean kind. Bat in any case, and that matters more than any bricks and mortar, the American Universities are seats of learning, alma matres, that men can and do love. Witness the yearly benefactions which their sons, and not merely those who are millionaires, provide for their greater glory. And the American University can do more than make her sons loyal to her. She can do what is the chief aim of every civic institution that is worthy of existence. She can inspire her children with a love of their country, and a willingness to sacrifice themselves for the welfare of the State. It was no accident that sent twelve hundred Harvard men to fight for their country on the battle-fields of Virginia, and to beat down armed rebellion ; nor was it

any idle fancy that raised to the ninety-five who fell in the good fight a monument at the very centre of the life of the University. On the walls of the Memorial Hall are inscribed with the utmost simplicity the names of the men who died for the Union, the dates of birth and death, and the name of the battle. That is all. But even the perfect good taste and simplicity of the inscriptions is not without its significance.

A University does not succeed unless it puts "breeding " and gentlemanly feeling, in the truest sense, into the characters of those to whom it is a nursing mother. "Manners makeyth

man" is not the monopoly of the Wykhamists, but belongs to every seat of true learning. Harvard gave "the free and

gentle spirit" of the true knight, both to those who fell and to those who raised so worthy and so touching a monument. Let us hope and trust, if ever our unity as a free people were endangered, as was that of the English beyond sea, the sons of our Universities would prove themselves to have learned as worthily the greatest lesson that man, the citizen, can learn,— the lesson of patriotism and of self-sacrifice to a just and worthy end.

We must not, however, dwell too long on Harvard. The sister Universities deserve indeed greater attention on the present occasion, since Harvard has been lately so fully described by an English observer. Yale was nominally founded as a Congregational college, but in reality the Episcopalians seem to have had nearly as much to do with its early development. They were among its largest bene- factors; and the work before us mentions that during the last century it is by no means uncommon to find notices of Episcopalian ministers preaching in its chapel as guests of the University. It is claimed for Yale that it was always more national in character than Harvard, and drew support not merely from one State, but from all. Here is an account contained in the book before us of thg spirit which inspires

Yale :- "Another characteristic of Yale which has brought her closer to the nation a life than Harvard has been her relative poverty. Professors and students have both had to work for a living. There has been, unfortunately, no opportunity to cultivate, as Harvard has done, the literary tastes and graces. Yale has not been able to number among her professors names like those of Lowell, Longfellow, and Holmes. The Yale professors have been men engaged in actual teaching-work, and unfortunately too often overworked in their teaching. It would have been a great thing for Yale could she have strengthened the literary side of her life. Yet there were advantages in the universal necessity of hard work without the graces. It created an esprit de corps which would otherwise have been unattainable. It fostered a democratic spirit among the students. Poor and rich were associated together in their work and in their play. Men were judged by their strength and efficiency as men rather than by their social or pecuniary standing in the outside world. This democratic standard of judgment was an important element both in bringing Yale into closer contact and fuller sympathy with the nation as a whole, and in educating the students themselves in moral standards. At Yale, to a greater extent than at Harvard, the value of the education is due to the college life even more than the college instruction. In this respect, as in many others, the history of Yale has been like that of some of the English public schools. Even where the course and the methods of teaching have been most open to criticism, there has been an influence in college life that could not be weighed or measured, and that sometimes could hardly be understood by those who felt it, which made men of those who came under its influence, and which caused graduates to look back upon their years of Yale life with an almost unreasoning affection."

We would gladly dwell upon the interesting description of Yale in its external aspects which is to be found in the present book ; but we must pass on to Yale's rival, the stately Princeton, set midway between the great cities of New York and Philadelphia. Here is a pleasant picture of the University where the spirit of learning rises like a lark from the furrows :

" The village lies on the first swell of the foot-hills which develop into the Appalachian range. The university buildings stand in a commanding line along the crest of this ridge, over- looking to the southward the farmsteads, orchards, and fertile fields which fill the horizon as it stretches away in green billows to the sea. The soil of the township is loam underlaid by sand and gravel, and thus the inhabitants enjoy good natural drainage, ample water supply, a fruitful husbandry, and a mild and genial climate The nearer view caught by the approaching traveller, and the more distant one from the windows of the express trains which hurry by three miles to the south, alike display a scene of rural beauty and rich landscape which recalls Gray's familiar lines on a distant view of Eton."

Columbia University differs widely from the other three

Universities of the Eastern States. It is not either in the country, or merely near a great town. It is actually in New York, and though it has already moved to the outskirts of the town, and is about to move again, it will always be a University in a great city. The physical reconstruction of Columbia University, which is destined to be accomplished before long, is a very interesting event, from the architectural point of view. An ample site has been secured, and the University authorities, fully alive to the value of noble

architecture as an educational influence, intend, if they can,

to make their buildings "beautiful in design, and related one to another harmoniously and effectively." The ground-plan, showing the grouping of the several buildings, strikes us as excellent ; but we confess to a feeling of disappointment at the proposed designs for the library, the façade of which is shown. It is too heavily Classical. There is something too material, too unidealistic, in Classical architecture of the strict kind. It might do for the bath, the gymnasium, or the theatre, but not for the library, the chapel, the hall, or the schools and lecture-rooms.

We can only say, in conclusion, that the present work has interested us greatly, and that we trust it will introduce many English readers to a charming phase of American life. Our only regret is that the information should not have been a little more detailed and specific. The account of each University should have bad an appendix giving the number

of the students on the books and the names of the Professors and Presidents, and a list of their salaries. One would have liked also to see an exact statement of the income and expendi- ture of each University and a statement of its endowments. Unfortunately these are the sort of details which people who

write and publish books for some unaccountable reason con- sider "too dry" for the public. They should remember that facts clearly stated are never really dry, or, at any rate, not half so dry as haziness.