CRITICISM OP THE CARNEGIE TRUST 217 



the public money provided by the Exchequer, and by the 

 Carnegie Trust. Hitherto the giving of a grant to a 

 department has often meant merely the diminution of its 

 grant from the General Fund. If the departments are all 

 stereotyped as regards the amount of tuition performed, 

 it is obvious that the simultaneous gift of public money 

 and the withdrawal of the same amount of fees would not 

 benefit the department in the slightest, nor lessen its 

 burden of tuition. But if, as is the case with a subject 

 like Chemistry, the fees earned and burden of tuition, of 

 which they are to some extent the measure, are rapidly 

 growing relatively to the rest of the University, each year 

 must increase its burden and lessen its power of original 

 production, its increased earnings all the time going to 

 make up corresponding losses of fees in other departments. 

 This has got to the point with the Chemistry Department 

 of Aberdeen that it has actually become self-supporting, 

 though nominally receiving large grants of public money. 

 It would be better off if it had been left as it was before 

 1889 in possession of its own earnings, and without the 

 sort of assistance it receives from the Carnegie Trust and 

 the Government. Until this matter is looked into, it is 

 useless for the Chancellor of the Exchequer or the 

 Carnegie Trust to grant further moneys to the universities 

 if their object is to foster those departments which are 

 becoming of increasing national importance, and for which 

 there is growing up an increasing demand. 



