direct aid is less than $1.25 per student. Students not only pay for their own board and books, but also for their rooms, and an incidental fee for current expenses. This throwing of the student body upon their own support is developing a spirit of self-reliance and self-respect that will make them fitting examples to the people among whom they shall go forth as teachers, physicians, and civic, moral, and industrial leaders.

EQUIPMENT AND ENLARGED LABORATORY WORK IN THE SCIENCES.

The opening of Science Hall for regular work last September, and the notable occasion of its dedication on December 13, marked a new era in the expanding life of the university. The occasion was signalized by the presence of distinguished educators and men of science, and the addresses were by educators of world-wide fame.

Dr. Henry S. Pritchett, president of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, said:

The occasion is one of significance for the reason that this is the most complete modern building ever prepared for the instruction of the Negro race, in the sciences which have been the inspiration of the world in the last half century, and whose application will in the next half century afford the greatest stepping-stones for progress which any race can find.

Dr. William H. Welch, of Johns Hopkins University, president of the American Association of Medical Colleges, said:

I know enough of the work and of the purpose and of the hopes of Howard University to feel that here is an exceptional institution, serving a most useful and exceptional purpose in the life of the Nation, and with the greatest promise of future usefulness. I confess, also, that my interest has been aroused by the words of commendation in that very interesting report from the Carnegie Foundation, of the character and work of the medical department of this university. I think I am not wrong in saying that that was, to a very considerable extent, a revelation to those interested in medical education. This university is indeed to be heartily congratulated on the extension of its usefulness through this new foundation, the opening of your Science Hall. President Pritchett has already indicated in what broad ways the larger opportunities for study and investigation in the branches of science here, representing the natural and physical sciences-biology, chemistry, physics-in what broad ways these opportunities would contribute to the advancement of liberal training. It is indeed true that science contributes to the formation of character, that it makes better men. It contributes to the search and appreciation of truth. It is therefore as much a part of a liberal training to-day as the study of the so-called humanities. You stand to-day among the relatively few medical colleges which demand a thorough training, a college training in these sciences, before the student is eligible for the study of medicine. This would hardly have been, I think, a justifiable demand without the provision of such a new Science Hall as is now available— the first which is available in any large way, I believe, to the members of your race.

Dr. Booker T. Washington, principal of Tuskegee Institute, said:

I congratulate Howard University in behalf of my fellow members of the board of trustees for the generosity of our Government in providing this magnificent and beautiful hall of science, and I congratulate our Government on its wisdom and generosity in using the opportunity to provide this fine building for the scientific education of my race. This is a tremendous step forward in our education. It is not enough to get scientific knowledge, but equally important to see that the scientific knowledge be applied to the life of the race. With this great scientific equipment, Howard University is for the first time in the history of this country placed in a position to be the mother and the guide in connection with this great work. Through the work that Howard University is doing in this new Science Hall, we are saying to all the men who follow us and suffer for us, that their faith in us has not been misplaced. The Science Hall is well equipped for efficient work in the several departments of physics, chemistry, and biology. The eager response

of the student body to the new facilities offered is seen in the fact that more than 600 students are regularly instructed in these several branches, with practical laboratory work offered in each department of study. Instead of one professor and one instructor who gave their entire time to the sciences, the work now requires three professors, one assistant professor, three regular instructors, and seven student assistants giving their time to the work of scientific instruction.

It has been often said that while colored students were proficient in the languages, history, etc., they showed no adaptation to the exact sciences. But the eager response of this great body of colored students to the opportunities here for the first time offered in any large way for advanced laboratory work in the exact sciences, marks an era in the educational life of the Negro race. The possible application of the practical instruction here received must have an important bearing on the future welfare of the race.

MANUAL ARTS AND THE APPLIED SCIENCES.

The new Hall of Manual Arts and Applied Sciences is now completed. Spaulding Hall, which is 80 feet in length and three stories high, had been found wholly inadequate to meet the requirements of enlarging work in this department of instruction. The new building is of brick with reinforced concrete floors, is 100 by 40 feet, and three stories high. The basement is occupied by the university printing press and engineering laboratories; the second floor by the department of woodworking; the third floor is given up to two large lecture rooms, domestic arts department, and a drafting room. This will give an opportunity for much-needed extension of the domestic science department, which will occupy the entire third floor of Spaulding Hall, the basement of which will be used for engineering laboratories, forge shop, laundry, storage, etc.

This hall, with the facilities now made available, will enable the institution to meet the increasing demand for the skilled mechanic and engineer through the courses of study authorized in civil, mechanical, and electrical engineering, leading to the degrees of C. E., M. E., and E. E., respectively. The outline of courses includes plain surveying, highway and railroad location, engines and boilers, hydraulics, roof and bridge engineering, masonry and reenforced concrete construction, architectural design, etc. During the first two years emphasis is laid upon those courses which will give the student the necessary mathematical equipment; during the junior and senior years particular prominence is given to the more technical courses, with especial emphasis placed on machine and architectural design and laboratory work.

The colored people are making rapid progress in the acquirement of land, building of towns, and the establishment of manufacturing plants. A body of skilled and capable mechanics and engineers is essential to the equipment of a race for growth and permanent success. HEATING, ELECTRIC LIGHTING, AND POWER PLANT.

The present administration found the buildings on the main campus inadequately heated by six or seven small steam outfits that were worn out and inadequate. This was true also of the plant of the school of medicine. The latter was replaced by new boilers and an

appropriation was secured for an addition to the heating plant of the Freedmen's Hospital that in the fall of 1908 gave ample heat to all the buildings.

The rapid expansion of the institution in the building of the Science Hall and Manual Arts Building has now rendered this plant inadequate. Through the cooperation of the Secretary of the Interior an appropriation was secured for the building of an enlarged addition to the heating plant, including equipment for electric lighting and

power.

The plant will give adequate heat, light, and power at the minimum of expense, making a large annual saving in electric lighting and power alone.

SALARIES.

Attention is especially directed to the action of the executive committee, looking to the enlarged appropriations for the increase of salaries, especially in the school of liberal arts. While the salaries now paid are equal to those available in many institutions of like character, yet the increased expense of living in Washington and the example set by the District in paying more liberal salaries to heads of departments in the public schools doing similar work, enforce the arguments for an increase in salaries, to be paid as soon as the appropriation can ⚫ be made available.

NEEDS.

Dormitory for young men.-An estimate of $100,000 for a new dormitory for young men was included in the original estimates which had the approval of the President and the Secretary of the Interior, but the exigencies of the situation and the cutting down of appropriations for proposed buildings and improvements in other departments under the Secretary of the Interior seemed to require that this proposed appropriation be eliminated, which was done.

There has been no increase in dormitory accommodations since the original buildings were erected, over 40 years ago. Of the nearly fifteen hundred students in attendance, four-fifths of whom are men, only one in five can be accommodated in present dormitories. It is unfortunate that the young men who are in training as the intellectual, moral, religious, and industrial leaders of their race are thus forced out into the miscellaneous lodging places of the city, and are not kept under the direct supervision, control, and uplifting influence of the dormitory life of the institution.

Assembly hall. One of the pressing needs of the institution is an assembly hall large enough to at least seat the student body. The only assembly hall of the university, with fifteen hundred students, is the Rankin Memorial Chapel, which was built especially for religious services, and seats only 600. The increase in collegiate and academic and industrial students so crowded the chapel last year that a large body of students could not be seated, interfering with the best discipline and order. On special occasions there is no assembly hall for seating the people, although Howard University is becoming more and more a center for the broader education of an entire race in educational, civic, and moral life. A plain and commodious assembly hall can be built in the natural amphitheater on the west side of the campus at moderate cost. The board of trustees regard these proposed buildings as indispensable.

SCHOOL OF AGRICULTURE.

Permit me again to emphasize the vital importance of practical instruction in the science of agriculture. It is unfortunate that the cutting down of appropriations several years ago led to the enforced dropping of regular instruction in agriculture. With a view to the possible opening of such a department, the lot north of Clark Hall has now been secured, which gives to the university a half block, in addition to space on the adjoining campus, for practical instruction in agriculture. The need of such a department is emphasized by the following facts:

Nearly 85 per cent of the colored people are engaged in agricultural pursuits. Coming out from slavery, where initiative and intelligence in agricultural work could be little cultivated, the marvel is that the Negro farmer has made even such progress as he has. If he could have had systematic supervision and intelligent direction by teachers trained in the modern science of agriculture, he would have added untold millions to the resources of the South and of the Nation.

The great need of agricultural teaching in the common schools and academies of the South, in farmers' institutes, and through simple literature adapted to the needs of the people is now recognized as never before. If as the result of increased instruction in agriculture there could be a small percentage of increase in the production of cotton and diversified crops, tens of millions would be added to the wealth of the South.

In view of these facts, it is anomalous that there is not a single agricultural school of college grade for colored people in the Nation. Under the Morrill Act a number of schools of normal and preparatory grade have been established. An imperative need is a high-grade agricultural school where the best-equipped and broad-minded young men of the Negro race can be trained as teachers and leaders of their people in agricultural work. Such men are needed to teach agriculture in the numerous colored schools of the South. As lecturers and demonstators at farmers' institutes, their work would be of untold value. The improvement already made in sections that have had this supervision and instruction emphasizes the value and importance of such training. An agricultural department in connection with Howard University would turn the thought and plans of a large number of the best-equipped young colored men toward agriculture as a life work. With our well-equipped science and manual-training departments a limited appropriation would provide for effective training in agriculture.

In view of the urgent need of an agricultural department, it is hoped that some provision, either under the Morrill Act or through special appropriation, shall be made for thorough-going instruction in agriculture in the university. The proximity of the Department of Agriculture and the sympathy of these officers with such work would make adequate provision for such work at limited cost.

LOSS OF PROFESSORS.

During the last year the university has been singularly bereaved in the death of three members of its faculties, a loss perhaps unprecedented in the history of the institution.

L

We have first to record the death of Dr. William H. Seamans, for more than 35 years a member of the faculty of the school of medicine. Dr. Seamans was a member of the "senior faculty," who in the early beginnings of the work threw himself, with his high scholarship, broad scientific knowledge, and fine humanitarian spirit, into the work of building up a high-grade school of medicine. He is one of the nine faithful and devoted men who built an aggregate of more than 265 years of service into the school. Their high standing as scholars and scientific experts in their several chairs made possible the ranking of the school of medicine among the best schools of the country. The loss of Dr. Seamans from the chair of chemistry is irreparable. He gave himself with a high sense of consecration to the work of his department until the very last. Three days before his demise he attended a faculty meeting and gave in his resignation from his chair, with evident premonition of his coming demise.

On August 21, 1910, Prof. C. C. Cook, professor of English in the college of arts and sciences, met a sudden and tragic death by drowning off the New Jersey shore. He was the son of the lamented John F. Cook, for so many years a member of the board of trustees. Prof. Cook was a graduate of Howard and also of Cornell University, where he made preparation for the large efficiency he developed as head of the English department of the university. He gave himself with entire devotion to the work of his chair, and the quality of his work may be estimated from the fact that during the last year of his service four debating teams sent out by the university, trained in his department, won signal victories over the leading colored institutions of the country. He was a man of high character, and to his wife and children has left a stainless and noble record, and to the university the memory of long and able service.

On January 26, 1911, Mr. Thomas P. Woodward, lecturer on the law of real property in the school of law, was suddenly stricken and died within a few hours. He had brought to his chair large ability in this important department, and had given himself for eight years with efficiency and success to the school of law. At the semiannual meeting of the board a committee was appointed to draft resolutions on the death of these faithful servants of the university.

THE SCHOOL OF MEDICINE.

(Medical, dental, and pharmaceutic colleges.)

The importance of a thoroughly well-equipped school of medicine for the training of colored physicians is strongly emphasized in the report of the committee on medical education presented at the annual meeting of the Louisiana State Medical Society, of which Dr. L. C. Le Beuf is chairman, on May 4, 1909, as follows:

The committee suggests that instead of the several smaller colored schools now struggling against insurmountable odds, some one or two central locations should be selected where prejudice is not so extreme and all means and energy be concentrated in building up one or two large well-equipped universities, which, with ampler means could obtain sufficient hospital advantages and better laboratory equipment. Medical education for colored students could then not only comply with the letter of the law, but also with the requirements of modern medicine. Negro education should be encouraged in medicine, as the 9,000,000 negroes of the South have a right to have physicians of their own race treat them if they so desire. But they also have the right to expect that such physicians shall have had a thorough training in high-grade medical colleges.