94 



POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



partment of philosophy has been dis- 

 missed because his family relations are 

 not approved. It is not alleged that 

 he is immoral, and it is admitted that 

 he is a good teacher and an able in- 

 vestigator, but his conduct and opin- 

 ions are said to be subversive of the 

 family. Whatever may be the merits 

 of the case, the administrative meth- 

 ods do not show to advantage. 



In the new state of Oklahoma " the 

 best constitution in the world " has 

 not provided an ideal educational sys- 

 tem. Indeed the conditions approach 

 opera bouffe too nearly to be taken 

 quite seriously. The head of the state 

 university, the heads of the normal 

 schools and of other institutions have 

 been dismissed and supplanted by 

 southern democrats. At the university 

 the question appears to be not whether 

 a professor is an able teacher and in- 

 vestigator, but whether he is a good 

 southern methodist and democrat, who 

 does not dance. Such conditions are 

 transient. The danger is that methods 

 which can not be approved in politics 

 and business may obtain such footing 

 in our universities that they will no 

 longer be centers of democratic indi- 



vidualism and of 

 moral leadership. 



intellectual and 



THE BOYDEN DEPARTMENT OF 



THE HARVARD COLLEGE 



OBSERVATORY 



Uriah A. Boyden, a Boston inventor 

 and engineer who died in 1879, be- 

 queathed property valued at over 

 $230,000 for "the establishment and 

 maintenance of an astronomical ob- 

 servatory on some mountain peak at 

 such an elevation as to be free, so far 

 as practicable, from the impediments 

 to accurate observations which occur 

 in the observatories now existing, 

 owing to atmospheric influences." 

 The fund was transferred by the trus- 

 tees named in the will to the Harvard 

 College Observatory, which carried out 

 the provisions by the establishment of 

 the Arequippa Observatory in Peru. 

 An illustrated account of this moun- 

 tain observatory and of the researches 

 that have been undertaken there was 

 contributed to a recent volume of the 

 Monthly by the director, Professor 

 Solon I. Bailey. Prior to the founda- 

 tion of the Arequippa Observatory in 

 1891, several expeditions were sent out 

 to determine the conditions that would 

 best fulfil the terms of Mr. Boyden's 

 will, and an account of this prelim- 

 inary work has just been published in 

 " The Annals of the Harvard College 



Station at Pike's Peak. 



