47 8 



POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



THE GROWTH OF THE STATE UNI- 

 VERSITIES OF THE CEN- 

 TRAL WEST. 



Harvakd was once under the control 

 of the State of Massachusetts; now 

 there is agitation in favor of taxing 

 the university. This change in attitude 

 may not injure the university, but it 

 is unfortunate for the people. In the 

 central and western states the universi- 

 ties are supported with increasing liber- 

 ality. In spite of the vast endowments 

 of Chicago and Stanford, there is rea- 

 son to believe that the state universi- 

 ties of Illinois and California will not 

 be allowed to fall behind. The extra- 

 ordinary growth of the state universi- 

 ties of the central west is shown on the 

 accompanying chart, which was used 

 in connection with the inauguration of 

 President James, at the University of 

 Illinois. The sevenfold increase in the 

 number of students at that university 

 in twelve years is most remarkable, but 

 it is nearly paralleled by Minnesota 

 and Wisconsin. 



The present registration in the larg- 

 est eastern private foundations is as 

 follows: Harvard, 5,283; Columbia, 4,- 

 755; Cornell, 3,871; Yale, 3,477. In 

 the four leading state universities of 

 the middle west it is: Michigan, 4,521; 

 Minnesota, 3,940; Illinois, 3,635; Wis- 

 consin, 3,083. There are 17,386 stu- 

 dents in the one group and 15,179, in 

 the other. The increase last year in 

 the eastern institutions was 320, in the 

 western 554. The future growth of 

 these universities will be a matter of 

 interest. But it must be remembered 

 that the greatness of a university is 

 not measured by its size. The Johns 

 Hopkins with 688 students has on its 

 faculty thirty of our leading men of 

 science; Illinois with 3,635 students 

 has only six. 



THE TOMB OF JAMES SMITH SON. 

 One of the last services of the late 

 Professor Langley, secretary of the 

 Smithsonian Institution, was his share 

 in the removal of the body of Smithson 



from Genoa to Washington, where it 

 now lies in a mortuary chapel at the 

 north end of the Smithsonian Institu- 

 tion. Smithson died at Genoa on 

 June 27, 1S29, and was buried in the 

 little English cemetery on the heights 

 of San Benigno. There was orig- 

 inally no reference on his tomb to his 

 foundation of the Smithsonian Insti- 

 tution, but a tablet was erected some 

 ten years ago by the regents, who also 

 undertook the care of the grave. But 

 it became necessary to move the ceme- 

 tery, and Dr. A. Graham Bell proposed 

 to bring the body of Smithson to 

 America to rest in the great institution 

 of which he was the founder. Dr. Bell 

 offered to defray the expenses, but was 

 commissioned by the regents to under- 

 take this duty on their behalf. He im- 

 mediately proceeded to Genoa, where 

 he arrived on Christmas Day of 1903. 

 With the cooperation of our consul, Dr. 

 Bell was permitted to exhume the body 

 and bring it with him to the" United 

 States, where it was received with 

 naval and military honors. On March 

 6, 1905, the remains were replaced in 

 the original tomb in the chapel of the 

 Smithsonian Institution, where they 

 will rest until congress makes provision 

 for their interment. 



The story of Smithson's life is this: 

 The illegitimate son of the first Duke of 

 Northumberland, he was a gentleman 

 commoner at Pembroke College, Oxford, 

 and was elected fellow of the Royal 

 Society in 1786 at the age of twenty- 

 one. He made contributions to chem- 

 istry of some importance, but suffered 

 from ill health and discouragement. 

 He lived on the continent, and was at 

 one time at least a Jacobinite, regard- 

 ing a king as a ' contemptible encum- 

 brance.' He left his fortune to his 

 nephew with the provision that if he 

 died without heirs it should go ' to 

 the United States of America, to found 

 at Washington under the name of the 

 Smithsonian Institution, an establish- 

 ment for the increase and diffusion of 

 knowledge among men.' The United 



