i6o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



that such questions are, generally speaking, very few, perhaps one or 

 two in a long paper, and nearly all pertain to the outworks of litera- 

 ture, so to speak. Here is the Latin literature of one paper: In 

 what special branch of literature were the Romans independent of 

 the Greeks ? Mention the principal writers in it, with the peculiar 

 characteristics of each. Who was the first to employ the hexameter 

 in Latin poetry, and in what poem? To what language is Latin most 

 nearly related, and what is the cause of their great resemblance ? 

 The Greek literature of the same examination involves these points : 

 The Aristophanic estimate of Euripides, with criticisms on its taste 

 and justice (for which, however, an historical subject is given as an 

 alternative) ; the Greek chorus, and choric metres. Now, such an ex- 

 amination is, in the first place, a most meagre view of literature : it 

 does not necessarily exercise the faculty of critical discernment. In 

 the next place, it is chiefly a matter of compilation from English 

 sources ; the actual readings of the candidate in Greek and Latin 

 would be of little account in the matter. Of course, the choric me- 

 tres could not be described without some knowledge of Greek, but 

 the matter is of very trifling importance in an educational point of 

 view. Generally speaking, the questions in literature, which in num- 

 ber bear no proportion to histoi'ical questions, are such as might be 

 included under history, as the department of the history of literature. 



The distribution of the 750 marks allotted respectively to Latin 

 and to Greek, in the present scheme, is this : There are three papers 

 two are occupied exclusively with translation. The third is language, 

 literature, and history : the language means purely grammatical ques- 

 tions; so that 583 marks are given for the language proper. The re- 

 maining number, 167, should be allotted equally between literature 

 and history ; but history has always the lion's share, and is, in fact, 

 the only part of the whole examination that has, to my mind, any 

 real worth. It is generally a very searching view of important insti- 

 tutions and events, together with what may be called their philosophy. 

 Now, the reform that seems to me to be wanted is to strike out every- 

 thing else from the examination. At the same time, I should like to 

 see the experiment of a real literary examination, such as did not 

 necessarily imply a knowledge of the originals. 



It is interesting to turn to the examination in modern languages, 

 wdiere the ancient scheme is copied, by appending literature and his- 

 tory. Here the literature is decidedly more prominent and thorough. 

 There is also a fair paper of history questions. What strikes us, how- 

 ever, in this, is a slavish adherence to the form, without the reality, of 

 the ancient situation. We have independent histories of Greece and 

 Rome, but scarcely of Germany, France, and Italy. Instead of par- 

 titioning modern European history among the language-examiners 

 for English, French, German, Italian, it would be better to relieve 

 them of history altogether, and place the subject as a whole in the 



