them, these schools would be sure of a vastly better class of pupils in every respect, and the country of more worthy and competent officers in time of need.

In most European countries the cadet pays the government large fees for instruction, while in the United States they are not only educated but supported and paid by the government from the day of their admission. And yet statistical tables, published by authority of the government, show that almost fifty per cent. of those who are appointed fail to complete the course of study prescribed.

If in aristocratic England and the other more despotic countries of the Old World they have deemed it essential to the maintenance of high position as military powers that the best endowed and best trained of their youth, the very flower of their young men of genius, should rise to the command of their troops and their marines, and so have resolutely laid the axe at the root of privilege, by offering its highest rewards to such as demonstrate their title to them from whatever class they may come, is it not time that we also, in democratic America, abolish the system of favoritism by which appointments are made to our schools of the army and navy?

CHAPTER IX.

POLYTECHNIC SCHOOLS.

RAPID DEVELOPMENT OF POLYTECHNIC EDUCATION IN ALL COUNTRIES-IMPERIAL POLYTECHNIC SCHOOL OF FRANCE-AUSTRIA, PRAGUE, BRUNN, GRATZ-ROYAL INSTITUTE AT VIENNA-PRUSSIA, ACADEMY AT BERLIN-GRAND DUCHY OF BADEN, SCHOOL AT CARLSRUHE-BAVARIAN SCHOOLS AT MUNICH AND OTHER PLACES— HANOVER-SAXONY-SWISS FEDERAL SCHOOL AT ZURICH-ITALIAN SCHOOLS OF TECHNICAL SCIENCE-SCANDINAVIAN SCHOOLS AT COPENHAGEN AND STOCKHOLM— RUSSIA-ROYAL SCHOOL AT STUTTGART, WURTEMBERG OTHER CONTINENTAL POLYTECHNIC SCHOOLS-GREAT BRITAIN-GENERAL ACCOUNT OF TECHNICAL SCHOOLS IN THE UNITED STATES-MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY.

The estimation in which polytechnic schools are held in Europe is evidenced by the munificence of governments, associations, and individuals in their establishment, equipment, and endowment. Wherever found, whether in France, where they had origin; in Switzerland, where within a very few years they have had their most remarkable development; in Baden, Wurtemberg, and Bavaria, where, next after the primary schools, they are considered the prime necessity; in Italy, where they are beginning to be appreciated and where the way for their establishment has been paved by the scuole tecniche, of which the number is great in that kingdom; in Austria, where at present they hold high rank and are steadily gaining in favor; in Saxony and all portions of enlarged Prussia, where they are making rapid growth and approach more and more nearly, in public estimation, to an equality in rank with the literary institutions; in Scandinavia, where they are recognized as the great desideratum of the present times; in Russia and its dependencies, where instruction in the sciences and their professional applications is deemed the sine qua non of their advancing civilization-in short, wherever this new mighty power we call science has forced its way into recognition, there do we find that the most extensive and most magnificent educational institutions are such as have been erected in the interest of science and the industrial arts. No other class of institutions in the world can boast of such splendid edifices, vieing with, and in some cases even excelling, in extent and architectural beauty, the renowned palaces of kings. None are favored with such vast mineralogical, physical, chemical, philosophical, and even art collections and laboratories for illustration and experiment, and none rejoice in abler faculties or more numerous, intellectual, and enthusiastic bodies of students.

Even in Finland, and within the walls of the Royal University, (at Helsingfors,) I have found the fires of this new enthusiasm for science brightly burning. The already extensive buildings devoted to chemistry, natural history, and natural philosophy are no longer felt to be

adequate, and to-day a new edifice, more extensive than any university building in America, is rising to its third story, for the better accommodation of what is to be the polytechnic department of the flourishing Finnish University.

Naturally, the details of organization are somewhat different in the different countries where schools of this class exist; nevertheless, their main features are everywhere the same, and the title of polytechnic, by which they are almost universally known, is generally expressive of their objects and character, as schools for instruction in many arts, though, in at least one notable instance, (reference is made to the Polytechnic School at Paris,) the correspondence in the general scope of the instruction is nearer to the type of the American scientific schools, to which reference has just been made in another place.

IMPERIAL POLYTECHNIC SCHOOL OF FRANCE.

This famous institution was established by the National Convention of France, in the year 1794, at the instance of Carnot, Foureroy, and other leading men of that time, under the more really descriptive title of Central School of Public Works. The following year the name was changed to Polytechnic School of France. Its present title is Imperial Polytechnic School, (École Impériale Polytechnique.) Its unlikeness to most of the other polytechnic schools of Europe and its resemblance to schools of general science consist in the fact that its courses of instruction are not directly connected with the practical arts, its office being rather to prepare the pupil to enter either the general service of the government, should he desire to do so, or to enter special or professional schools, where the direct applications of general science are taught.

Under the present arrangement for the partition of the public institutions among the imperial ministers, the polytechnic school is under the control of the minister of war, by whose courtesy I was several times privileged to examine into its condition and mode of management.

Its declared object is to prepare pupils for the following public services the artillery service on land and sea, military and maritime engineering, the imperial marine, the corps of hydrographic engineers, the commissariat of the navy, the department of bridges, highways, and mines, the corps of état-major, the manufactures of the state, the department of the telegraph, and, finally, for other public services which demand an extensive acquaintance with the mathematical, physical, and chemical sciences, and which may be added by future decree to the branches of public service above specified.

The organization of the institution is such as to secure efficient management and the admission of such pupils only as are likely to prove valuable acquisitions to the public service.

The institution is wholly under a military régime, and the chief officer of the school is known as the commandant. Subordinate to him, and in immediate charge of all matters of instruction, is the director of studies,

who is appointed by imperial authority, and who, together with the commandant, the professors, a representative of the subordinate teachers, and the secretary, constitute a council of instruction, whose duty it is to have stated meetings for the consideration of matters within their spheres of labor and to refer all matters requiring further attention and decision to the Council of Improvement, consisting of the director, a certain number of examiners, members of the Academy of Sciences, and officers representing the different branches of public service preparation for which is the object of the school.

Admission is granted only after a series of the most rigid examinations, first, in the several districts of the empire to which, on the nomination of the Council of Instruction, four or more competent persons are deputed for that purpose at certain stated times by the minister of war; and, secondly, by a board of examiners at Paris.

In order to be admitted to the examination, candidates are required to show that they are of French birth or have been naturalized; that they have attained the age of sixteen years and were not over twenty on the first of January of the year of the examination; and that they have received the diploma of bachelor of science or of letters. Military candidates from the army corps are admitted exceptionally to the examinations up to the age of twenty-five, on showing that, by the first of January next succeeding, they will have completed two years of service under the flag of the empire. They can only be assigned to the military service, however, on completing their studies.

Civil candidates must enroll themselves as such with the prefect of the department of the empire where they studied; military candidates, at the prefecture of the department in which they are garrisoned. Nonmilitary candidates may be examined either within the district where their families reside or within that which embraces the place of their preliminary study. Military candidates must undergo examination at the places assigned for the examinations in the particular department in which their army corps is in garrison.

The documents necessary for the inscription at the prefecture are, first, proof of requisite age; secondly, a duly legalized declaration, by a physician or surgeon connected with some military or civil hospital, to the effect that the candidate has had the varioloid or that he has been vaccinated, and that he has no contagious disease or physical infirmity that would unfit him for the public service; thirdly, the diploma of bachelor of science or of letters, or a document showing his title to one; fourthly, a written declaration of the place of examination chosen by him or his family.

The examinations for admission are both written and oral, and no candidate can be admitted to the oral examinations unless he has first passed the written examinations in a satisfactory manner. There are also two degrees of oral examination. Examinations of the first degree serve to establish whether the candidate has sufficient qualifications to

entitle him to an examination of the second degree. Examinations of the second degree determine the classification in order of merit of those admitted to the final examinations. Candidates who have been successful at the first general ordeal are admitted in order of rank, according to the registers of the examiners, made with reference to a definite scale, and, from the number of successful candidates reported, the board of final examination, consisting of the commandant, director, and regular examiners of the school, together with the original examiners of the candidates, then select such as, at this competitive trial, prove themselves most competent in all respects to fill the existing vacancies.

The examinations are in arithmetic, geometry, algebra, plane trigonometry, analytical geometry, descriptive geometry, physics, chemistry, French language, and design, conformably to official programmes adopted by the minister. Candidates may also present evidence, by thesis and translation, of an acquaintance with any one of the five following languages, to wit: German, English, Italian, Spanish, or Arabic. The written compositions required of candidates must bear upon each of the scientific branches of which a knowledge is required, and must include, moreover, a French composition, a plan in descriptive geometry, a colored and a crayon design.

The full term of study is two years; price of boarding and lodging, 1,000 francs ($200) per annum; cost of wardrobe about 600 francs. For the benefit of poor young men of merit some twenty or more gratuities (bursaries) and half-gratuities, as well as outfits and half-outfits, or trousseaux, are granted each year by the minister of war, on the recommendation of the two councils of the schools-the council of instruction and the council of administration.

Students of the school are divided into two sections, corresponding to the two years duration of the term of study; and no pupil can pass from the first section into the second until a satisfactory examination has been passed in all the studies of the first year; nor can any pupil remain in the same section more than two years, or in the school more than three.

The courses of instruction belonging to the first year embrace differential and integral calculus, statics and dynamics, problems in physical astronomy, problems in descriptive geometry relating to the right line and plane, tangent planes and normals to plane surfaces, &c.; applications of analysis to geometry, elements of machinery of various kinds, general physics, including the properties of bodies, the principles of equilibrium of fluids, constitution of the atmosphere, &c.; general chemistry, the general principles of architecture, essays and other exercises in the French language, elements of the German language, and topographical drawing.

The second year is devoted to the continuation and completion of mathematical analysis, and the study of forces applied to an invariable system, the principle of virtual velocities, hydrostatics and hydro