Januakt 28, 1910] 



SCIENCE 



137 



that is the one which I have already em- 

 phasized—the education of the public. To 

 one who has had occasion to interview our 

 legislators, both national and state, in be- 

 half of public health affairs, the situation 

 often becomes most depressing. The task 

 seems hopeless and one is inclined to forego 

 all effort. Men high in the councils of the 

 nation say without hesitation that this talk 

 about stamping out tuberculosis is only a 

 doctor's fad. As one listens to such talk, 

 as I have, from high sources, his national 

 pride hides its face in shame and he won- 

 ders to what destination his country is 

 drifting with such colossal ignorance guid- 

 ing its course. But, as medical educators 

 our duty is clear, and it has fallen to us to 

 prepare the next generation of those who 

 will be able to render a far greater service 

 to human progress than the world has yet 

 seen. With the race freed from disease, 

 both inherited and acquired, the better man 

 will be born and will dominate the earth. 

 I am not enough of a prophet to predict 

 anything concerning the nationality of the 

 superman who is to come and possess the 

 earth, but he will not come to a disease- 

 ridden people, for the intellectuality and 

 morality of a nation depend upon its phys- 

 ical health, and the historian of the future 

 will have no difficulty in convincing his 

 readers that we who lived in the early part 

 of the twentieth century were not so wise 

 as we believed ourselves to be, as he points 

 out our high mortality rate from prevent- 

 able diseases, and shows what feeble efforts 

 were made to prevent them. 



Victor C. Vaughan 



TEE NUMBER OF STUDENTS IN GERMAN 

 UNIVERSITIES 

 Some statistics regarding the number of 

 students in the twenty-one German universi- 

 ties, which have lately appeared in the Frank- 

 furter Zeitung, may be of interest to the read- 

 ers of Science. 



The number of students matriculated in the 

 summer semester of 1909 reached the total 

 of 51,510, as compared with 48,Y17 in the 

 winter of 1908-09, and 47,799 in the preceding 

 summer. 



In thirty years the increase has been as 

 follows : 



The relative increase in the principal sub- 

 divisions may be shown in the following table : 



Per 100,000 

 Number Population 

 1879 1909 1879 U0» 

 Philological and his- 

 torical studies . . 2,724 7,690 10.6 20.6 

 Mathematics and 



natural science . . 1,563 3,503 6.1 9.4 



Law 3,179 7,259 12.3 19.5 



Medicine 2,061 4,879 8.0 13.1 



Theology (evangel- 

 ical) 1,036 1,211 5.9 5.6 



Theology (catholic) 330 1,014 3.5 8.4 



Pharmacy 301 896 1.2 2.4 



It will be noted that the percentage increase 

 in medicine has about kept pace with the in- 

 crease in law, while the proportion of students 

 in mathematics and natural science has not 

 increased so rapidly as that in philological 

 and historical studies. The number of stu- 

 dents of evangelical theology shows a relative 

 falling off (although a slight absolute in- 

 crease), but catholic theology records a greater 

 relative increase than any other subject. 



Some interesting facts are also given re- 

 specting the extent and nature of inter-uni- 

 versity migration. In the summer months of 

 1909, 28.6 per cent, of the Prussian students 

 were registered in the German universities 

 outside of Prussia, for the most part (18.7 per 

 cent.) in the South German universities of 

 Bavaria, Baden (Heidelberg and Preiburg) 

 and Wiirttemberg (Tiibingen). On the other 

 hand, only 5.8 per cent, of the Bavarian, 8.4 

 per cent, of the Baden and 10.7 per cent, of 



