Our GovernmeNT, how it grew, what it does and how it does it, by Jesse Macy, (Ginn & Co.; 289 pp.), appears in a new and revised edition. It is a very practical school book, and briefly but effectively inducts the young learner into the historical study of institutions. We find its chapters on the origin of our institutions, on local governments and on the administration of justice especially interesting and profitable. It deserves the favor it has won and is sure to retain in the school room. -Tarbell's LESSONS IN LANGUAGE, First Book, by Horace S. Tarbell, (Ginn & Co.; 214 pp.), is designed for third reader pupils, and presents its matter in the order adapted to the child's needs, instead of the logical order of more formal books. It skillfully provides for exercises in all sorts of composition with material suited to interest and profit the learner, and inducts him gradually into the arts of punctuation, capitalization and grammatical analysis. - Selected Letters of M. TULLIUS CICERO, with an introduction and notes, by A. P. Montague, (Philadelphia, Eldredge & Brother; 283 pp.), deserves a hearty welcome from classical teachers. It is thoroughly well edited with useful notes, and arranges the letters chronologically so that they serve as a study, and an excellent one, of the last twenty years of Cicero's life, one of the most important eras of history. -THE NATURal Speller, (American Book Co.; 166 pp.), attracts attention by use of two colors of ink, the black for general purposes and the red to call attention to the word, syllable or letters especially important. It combines dictation exercises, homonyms, synonyms and etymology with spelling, and has more new points of interest and value than any other speller which has come under our notice. -SECOND ANNUAL REPORT ON THE STATISTICS OF RAILWAYS IN THE UNITED STATES to the Inter-state Commerce Commission, (Washington, D. C.; Government printing office; 566 pp.), shows the enormous development of this industry, which now employs 704,743 men. The report studies various phases of railroad business, with the elaborate tables of details necessary to support the conclusions. -RECREATION QUERIES IN UNITED STATES HISTORY, by C. L. Gruber, (Boston: New England Publishing Co.; 136 pp.; 75c.), contains a large range of generally sensible and useful questions on this branch, with historical conundrums, historical expressions, giving author and circumstances connected with each, and a list of popular names of historical persons. It is suggestive, helpful and useful. -We have referred before to the admirable manuals of LANGUAGE WORK BELOW THE HIGH SCHOOL, prepared by Prof. Chas. De Gormo, of the Illinois Normal University, after the plan followed in Germany. These manuals, three in number, each a small pamphlet of about sixty pages, are issued by the Public School Publishing Co., of Bloomington, Ill., at ten cents each. - KINDERGARTEN STORIES AND MORNING TALKS, by Sara E. Wiltse, (Ginn & Co.; 212 pp.; 85c.), contains much entertaining and valuable matter for the instruction of young children. The editor is evidently an adept kindergartner, and teachers of primary schools, as well as kindergartners, will find her volume a valuable and suggestive aid to them in their work. -A HISTORY OF ROME, by P. V. N. Myers, (Ginn & Co.; 230 pp.), contains the revised text of the history of Rome originally published in the author's Manual of Ancient History. It offers a remarkably vigorous and entertaining narrative, supported by abundant maps and illustrations, and will be found an excellent book for school purposes. - A new departure in the excellent "Riverside Literature Series," is the issuing this year of books for very young readers, the first of which is of Mr. Scudder's FABLes and Folk STORIES. Part 1 of this is No. 47 of the Series. No better or more attractive reading for young folks can be found, and the number costs but 15c. -FABLES, Anecdotes and Stories for TEACHING COMPOSITION, (Boston School Supply Co.; 184 pp.), contains a wide range of anecdotes and stories, each accompanied with an analytic outline, to guide the young reader in mastering its structure so that he can reproduce it well. - D. C. Heath & Co. issue in neat pamphlet form with stiff covers three of Moliere's most distinguished plays, LE TORTUFfe, Le Medecin MULGRE LUI, and BOURGEOIs Gentilhomme, edited with English arguments and foot-notes by F. E. A. Gasc. - Common SensE EXERCISES IN GEOGRAPHY, by Seymour Eaton, (Boston: New England Publishing Co.; 50 pp.; 25c.), offers ingenious and suggestive questions on geography for the use of teachers and learners. -The Satires of Juvenal, edited by Thomas B. Lindsay, (American Book Co.; 226 pp.), is beautifully illustrated and provided with notes which are the results of many years' experience in teaching this author. -D. Appleton & Co. issue in a nine page pamphlet Mr. George Iles's very suggestive paper in the Popular Science Monthly for November, entitled My CLASS IN GEOMETRY. -THE MORNING HOUR, by Emerson, Brown & Gay, (Ginn & Co.; 6oc.), is an excellent selection of sacred hymns and tunes, with brief scripture selections. LITERARY ITEMS. -The Christmas Harper's, in a cream colored cover with a design which is a delightful variation upon the old and familiar one, is artistically unsurpassed. There are fifteen full-page engravings, two of which, the frontispiece from As You Like It, and The Blessed Damosel, are upon thick paper and of exquisite finish, and a wealth of smaller pictures. The stories have holiday flavor especially inviting. Mr. Andrew Lang writes of As You Like It; Charles Dudley Warner continues his attractive sketches of southern California under the suggestive title The Winter of our Continent; Mr. Child decribes Dante Rossetti's Pre-Raphaelite Mansion; and Pierre Loti gives us and interesting paper on Japanese Women. -The Popular Science Monthly begins in the December issue a promising series on The Development of American Industries since Columbus. The series is very timely in view of the coming world's fair. The first paper treats of The First Steps in Iron-Making in the colonies. The article by Dr. Henri Hertz, of Heidelberg, The Identity of Light and Electricity, commands attention as an authoritative presentation by its discoverer of the latest views on light which seem to be rapidly gaining acceptance among men of science. The number is rich as usual in interesting articles and miscellany. -Supt. W. B. Powell, of Washington, D. C., has prepared for the schools of the District of Columbia a Teachers' Manual of Manual Training for the seventh and eighth grades. It makes a pamphlet of 88 pages, fully illustrated, and details a systematic and complete course of instruction in this branch. - Messrs. Houghton, Mifflin & Co. have just issued another volume [vol. 34] of their Modern Classics, a Series which Dr. William T. Harris, U. S. Commissioner of Education, has called an "unrivalled list of excellent works." This new volume, entitled "Thackeray's Lighter Hours," contains Dr. Birch and his young Friends, Selections from the Book of Snobs and the Roundabout Papers, and the Curate's Walk. Modern Classics has a very extensive sale as a School Library, for which it is well suited, as it contains many of the best complete Stories, Essays, Sketches, and Poems in modern literature. Each volume is in cloth, 40 cents, net. NEWS AND NOTES. -The list of county superintend- comes principal of the high school at ents shows that the changes exceed but Cassville, succeeding his brother, C. A. little in number those made two Harper, who enters a medical school. years ago. Then there were thir- It is understood that at the commencety-two new superintendents in a list of ment of the next term W. D. Ackerseventy, and this year there are thirty- man assumes charge of the high school six in the same list. It thus comes to at Clintonville. The election of Mr. pass practically that one half of our W. H. Schultz, of Argyle, to the councounty superintendents are changed at ty superintendency makes a change in each election. This constant change the head of another high school, but is of course of great source of weak- we are not advised of the name of the ness in the system. The new list shows successor. that twelve women have been elected to the office and fifty-eight men. -Some changes have taken place in the principalships of high schools. The school at Almond has secured for the present year Mr. Spencer Haven, a graduate of the Iowa Agricultural College. At Arcadia Mr. Stevens leaves and is succeeded by Mr. A. C. Finn. Chas. L. Harper, for so many years superintendent of Grant county, be Vol. XX., No. 12.-4 -This is the last month of the year, and subscribers who are in arrears should bear it in mind and if possible make their accounts square up to the close of this year. It is much easier to keep the account paid up than it is to meet it after it has accumulated for several years. The expense of the JOURNAL is slight, and any intelligent teacher may get from its pages in a year that which is worth many times the price of it. Read it, profit by it, and recognize employed to guide and help such boys its services by paying the subscription as elect the work in various forms of promptly and making it known to your wood-working. The plan is not as yet acquaintances. We shall send out fully matured but the beginning is statements of account to those in ar- shaped towards the slojd instruction rears shortly after the opening of the now so popular in Scandinavia. new year. Can you not save us the necessity of sending you one? Supt. A. J. Smith, of Waukesha County, in his annual report shows that - Menomonie is to have a well- there has been during the past year an equipped manual training school. Mr. increase in attendance upon the public J. H. Stout, of the well known lumber schools of the county of 943, and upon company of Knapp, Stout & Co., has the parochial schools of 156, a total inagreed to erect a suitable building and crease of 1099. This is a remarkable equip it with the needed apparatus at showing in connection with the fact his own expense, and also to hire a that the census shows an increase of competent teacher for the first year, if children of school age during the same the school Board will appropriate $500 period of but 61. The Superintendent for the operating expenses, and assume says he "believes that the introduction charge of the department. His offer of the 'course of study' with the ophas been accepted and the contract for portunity afforded of graduating from the building has been let. Principal these schools, and receiving a diploma Dudgeon says: "The manual train- that admits the pupil to our high ing department is not to be a substitute for, but to be a part of, the regular high school. It is believed that the high school can exact close and thoughtful study with books, and at the same time give valuable instruction in drawing, tool work and domestic economy. this way it is believed that our pupils may se:ure a more liberal, intellectual and moral development—a more symmetrical education. For the manual work there will be two classes of boys and two of girls. One class of each will receive instruction in the forenoon, and another class of each in the afternoon. It is expected that each pupil will spend about forty minutes each day in drawing, and from one to two hours in manual work. The remainder of each school day will be devoted to study and recitation." schools, academies, or to the senior class of the preparatory departments of our normal schools, without further examination, is responsible for this wonderful increase in attendance at public schools. The Bennett law had In its effect in certain localities, but the plan of work we have pursued during the past three years has brought about the most of this result." - In connection with the Madison high school a commencement has been made in manual training. A room has been fitted up in the basement of the high school building and an instructor - The board of regents of normal schools in their fourth biennial report, make the following reasonable appeal to the legislature for an increase of the means at their command for carrying on the institute work of the state: "It will be seen that the law just quoted, is mandatory in limiting the expenditures - it was enacted years ago, when the population of the state was less than 900,000. At that time, it was amply sufficient to meet all expenses. But the population has nearly doubled, and the demand for institutes has increased in far greater ratio. The means at the command of the board for this very -Wisconsin which ranked sixteenth in the population of the United States and territories in 1880, by the recent census has risen to fourteenth. The states above her are New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Ohio, Missouri, Massachusetts, Texas, Indiana, Michigan, Iowa, Kentucky, Georgia and Tennessee, in the order named. important work in our educational sys- butter or cheese makers or the proprietem allows but a limited number of in- tors of factories; a middle course of stitutes to be held. The committee two years, giving systematic instruction having this work in charge, by reason in the science of farming together with of lack of funds, is under the necessity scientific training; a long course of four of refusing institutes in localities where years, giving combined agricultural and they are very much needed. Other general training of a high order; a states are far in advance of Wisconsin, graduate course of indeterminate in giving substantial aid from the gen- length, devoted to research and aderal fund for this class of work. New vanced and expert work. York, with its great number of universities, colleges, academies and high schools of advanced grade, with an institute attendance of but little more than that of Wisconsin, appropriates $25,000 annually for teachers' institutes. This is testimony to the value of this work; and it would seem that Wisconsin ought at least to meet the demand for enrichment and expansion of our institutes by an annual appropriation of $5,000 from the general fund—this sum added to the $5,000 required by law to be expended from the normal school fund income, would enable the regents to meet the demand for institutes in all parts of the state, and afford the means of grading them, so that primary, intermediate and grammar methods (where needed), could be given simultaneously. The attendance at the institutes is often very large, not infrequently reaching two hundred members the town." A few more responses of all grades, from a primary teacher to a high school principal. It can be readily seen that one conductor in such institute cannot do the most efficient work. The largest institutes should have at least three conductors, all others at least two; then with proper division and classification, the special needs of the teachers of our common schools might be fully met." -The college of agriculture at the state university now offers five courses of instruction: A short course; a dairy course, designed more especially for those who intend to become practical - A correspondent from Chat, Wisconsin, sending a list of subscribers to the JOURNAL, writes: "They have each sent $1.50, so that if you enlarge the JOURNAL they will have a year's subscription paid. This is in answer to your question in the October number, What do Wisconsin teachers say about it' (the enlargement). I think I may safely claim the banner town of the state, for you will now have one subscriber for each teacher at work in of this sort would make the enlargement of the JOURNAL a certainty. It is practical help and appreciation, like that of our correspondent, which makes such a move practical and wise. Again we ask, "what do Wisconsin teachers say about it?" Prin. Burch, of the Sixteenth District school Milwaukee, has recently carried out with remarkable success a scheme for providing his building with some of the conveniences which were needed but not supplied by the School Board. A circular was sent out to the patrons of the school setting forth the |