4 io 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



CORRESPONDENCE. 



AN AUTHOR'S PROTEST. 

 Editor Popular Science Monthly : 



MY attention has just been called to the 

 notice you have given, in the May 

 number of The Popular Science Monthly, of 

 the second volume of the report upon which I 

 am engaged (see pages 131 and 132 of the May 

 number). I am gratified by the approval ex- 

 pressed of the " report proper," " five hun- 

 dred pages of well-digested matter," etc., as 

 that is in an especial sense my own work ; but 

 it seems to me the writer would have been 

 more just if he had stated that the work was 

 avowedly largely a work of reference, and 

 also that every device had been availed of 

 to facilitate such reference. 



This book is made for the use of educa- 

 tors and teachers, and its purpose is to record 

 what has already been done in this country 

 in introducing " Manual Training in Public 

 Schools," and also to furnish those con- 

 sidering the wisdom of making any changes 

 in this direction, with the experience, opin- 

 ions, and plans of educators who have seri- 

 ously considered or undertaken the work. All 

 the literature on these topics is ephemeral and 

 not within reach of the ordinary teacher nor 

 to be found in ordinary libraries. It largely 

 consists of speeches, papers, addresses, and 

 local reports. The movement is a live one, 

 progressing by rapid strides, and the material 

 grows rapidly. My purpose has been to get 

 together and put in the hands of the teach- 

 ers all the material and the latest material 

 possible. Now, the work of planning, collat- 

 ing, preparing, arranging, proof-reading^ and 

 indexing this big book falls upon myself alone, 

 with aid, part of the time, of a single copy- 

 ist. As fast as the matter is proof-read it is 

 stereotyped ; so the only way in which I could 

 add later matter was to turn the " Introduc- 

 tion " into an extra appendix. I know, as 

 well as the wise reviewer, that if I could have 

 had all the material in those appendices spread 

 before me in clean printed pages as he finds 

 it in this volume, I also could have made a 

 smaller and a better-proportioned book ; but 

 my aim was to be of most use to the educa- 

 tors and teachers, and my reward has been, 

 much as it may surprise our critical friend, to 

 meet with the hearty approval of all classes 

 of educators, including the Presidents of Yale, 

 The Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 

 Johns Hopkins, Tulane ; the superintendents 

 of education throughout the country, educa- 

 tional authorities like Newell and MacAlister, 

 and countless teachers ; while the National 

 Education Association in convention at Sara- 

 toga last summer took occasion to pass a spe- 

 cial resolution of approval. 



Now to consider the special features criti- 



cised for a moment. The contemptuous 

 treatment given to my first volume by The 

 Popular Science Monthly, and especially by 

 the New York Nation and the Evening Post, 

 was such as to lead me to think that it might 

 be well for me to put on record the approv- 

 ing judgment of such educational and liter- 

 ary authorities as the veteran educators Henry 

 Barnard and George Bancroft, the poet Whit- 

 tier for his appreciation of Philbrick, and 

 John Sparkes, the head of the Kensington 

 Art Schools. The press of the United States 

 and also of Great Britain and France gave 

 generous and intelligent approval of the first 

 volume of this report ; but in the Cosmos Club, 

 of this city, of which I chance to be one of 

 the founder members, The Popular Science 

 Monthly, and the twin sheets over which Mr. 

 Godkin presides, are largely read ; and, of 

 course, my standing, in the opinion of those 

 who accept these as divine oracles, suffered ! 

 I proposed that this abuse for the Nation- 

 Post article was largely abuse should be off- 

 set, so that in case any of the Cosmos follow- 

 ers of Godkin chanced to open my second vol- 

 ume, they might find that there were other 

 views ! 



Your reviewer criticises the fact that the 

 tributes were paid to Philbrick, Smith, and 

 Perkins ; but surely, if anywhere it was prop- 

 er to have printed tributes to these three great 

 teachers, it was in this report, the first vol- 

 ume of which was but a record of their great 

 experiment, as this second volume is a his- 

 tory of what has been the immediate outcome 

 of their endeavor. I should have felt con- 

 demned had I failed to pay such poor tribute 

 to them as was in my power. Those three 

 citizens did more for their country than 

 hundreds of ordinary citizens are enabled 

 to do. 



One hundred pages of the " Introduction " 

 it was plainly stated were made use of as an 

 extra " appendix," since that part of the book 

 is printed last; but your reviewer suppresses 

 that fact, and implies that this " Introduc- 

 tion " is all a mere mass of useless verbiage. 



It is the easiest of all things to sneer, as 

 your reviewer has done ; but is it very manly 

 in a journal, professing to be respectable and 

 scientific, to treat a serious work in such a 

 flippant vein ? If other books are reviewed 

 with as little of the spirit of fairness, or with 

 the effect of so plainly seeking to belittle 

 them, as is shown by the treatment accorded 

 to this volume, I shall hardly look to the 

 Monthly as giving any very valuable informa- 

 tion about the works it assumes to notice. I 

 have thought it due to the work to write this 

 much of protest against the attitude assumed 

 toward it by the writer in the Monthly ; but 



