32 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXIII. No. 836 



we have two constants sustaining a constant 

 relation to each other. They are not so far 

 apart, too, in the matter of age, but that each 

 may understand the other. The relation is 

 essentially that of parent and child. The 

 student body may be regarded as of a healthily 

 radical temper of mind, and the faculty as 

 healthily conservative. Sociologists maintain 

 that both radicals and conservatives need to be 

 united in a community, with the center of 

 gravity slightly on the radical side, if that 

 community is to be healthily progressive. 

 With the faculty and students viewed as above, 

 the conditions are right for a sanely progres- 

 sive institution, since we may, perhaps, assume 

 that the larger size of the student' body would 

 give the desired overplus of radicalness. At 

 any rate, there would be a steadiness of con- 

 trol and of purpose, and a sufficiency of sym- 

 pathy to insure hearty cooperation and splen- 

 did scholarly results. 



When, however, we consider the matter from 

 the side of the one-man power, whether that 

 man be president, or some other official with 

 the bit in his teeth, the conditions do not seem 

 to be so favorable for desirable results. If 

 the president be young — we will say thirty 

 years of age, as sometimes happens— the center 

 of gravity is too much upon the radical side; 

 when the same man gets to be sixty-five or 

 seventy, provided he stays that long, or has 

 an elderly successor, the balance shifts too 

 much in the other direction. It is true, of 

 course, that there are conservative young men 

 and progressive old men, but, none the less, 

 the fluctuations in the age of the controlling 

 official constitute a variable more likely than 

 not to be a disturbing factor in the otherwise 

 constant and harmonious relation between fac- 

 ulty and students. In the case of the elderly 

 man being in supreme control, the relation of 

 parent to child will be superseded by that of 

 grandparent to grandchild, with consequent 

 ready indulgence or excessive rigor. The lat- 

 ter is, perhaps, the more likely, since the 

 nervous strain develops irritability and the 

 exercise of power breeds arbitrariness. 



When the problem is viewed from this angle, 

 the wise policy would seem to be to have fac- 



ulty control in an educational institution, 

 rather than that any one man should reign 

 supreme. 



Gregory D. Walcott 

 Hamuni: Univeesity, 

 St. Paui,, Minn. 



THE matter of university FELLOWSHIPS 



To THE Editor of Science: The address of 

 Dr. Jordan as retiring president of the Amer- 

 ican Association for the Advancement of 

 Science, printed in your issue for December 

 30, contains many things that will appeal to 

 every one as both true and timely ; there is the 

 more reason to regret that some things are 

 said against which, I think, protest should be 

 made. I do not believe it is true, as he seems 

 to think, that the system of university fel- 

 lowships is a powerful influence working 

 against our best university ideals. Dr. Jor- 

 dan seems to me to have lost sight of some 

 very important facts when he stigmatizes the 

 fellowship system as one " whereby men are 

 hired to work under men they do not care for 

 and along lines which lead not to the truth 

 they love, but to a degree and a career." I 

 am sure he does injustice when he asserts that 

 " The embryo professor asks for his training 

 not the man of genius who will make him over 

 after his kind, but the university which will 

 pay his expenses while he goes on to qualify 

 for an instructor's position." 



All vsdll admit that the fellowship system 

 has not always been wisely administered; that 

 evils have crept into the practise of some in- 

 stitutions ; that these ought to be (I think can 

 be) corrected. We have all had experience of 

 the man whose letter expresses a desire to 

 work at our particular university and in- 

 quires, " What inducements can you offer me 

 to come ? " Undeniably, universities are them- 

 selves responsible in some measure for making 

 possible such an attitude; but it would seem 

 that only a particularly unlucky experience 

 could make one regard this as typical of the 

 graduate student in general. 



Dr. Jordan's ideal university is one where 

 advanced students are " gathered around a 

 man they love, and from whose methods and 



