November 26, 1886.] 



SCIElsFGB. 



479 



NOTES AND NEWS. 



The knowledge and appreciation of our edu- 

 cational institutions by European scholars are 

 largely on the increase. M. Buisson, who came to 

 this country as a French commissioner to the 

 New Orleans exposition, made a special study of 

 our advanced educational institutions, and is now 

 contributing a series of articles on the subject to 

 the Revue Internationale de Venseignement. The 

 first of these has already appeared, and, after 

 some introductory paragraphs, describes Columbia 

 and Harvard colleges. M. Buisson has grasped 

 clearly the nature and functions of the board of 

 regents in New York state, and makes plain the 

 relation sustained by that body to the various 

 colleges and academies of the state. He vras 

 particularly impressed with Columbia's great 

 library, and frankly says that it seems to him 

 ' the ideal of what a university library should be,' 

 not because of the number of its volumes, but be- 

 cause of its scope and organization. M. Buisson 

 describes with great minuteness of detail the work- 

 ing of the library, and recommends it to the con- 

 sideration of those having in charge the re-organi- 

 zation of the library of the University of Paris. 



— Below is given the standard time-table for 

 high schools for girls in Germany, drawn up by 

 the commission appointed by the minister of in- 

 struction. It will shortly be adopted throughout 

 Germany. The figures in the various columns 

 represent hours per week. 



Subjects. 



Keligious instruc- 

 tion 



German 



French 



Englisli 



Arithmetic 



History 



Geography 



Physics and physi- 

 ography 



Singing 



Writing 



Drawing 



Gymnastics 



Needlework 



o I o 



— Dr. Schliemann, after a fruitless journey to 

 Crete, has returned to Athens. Before leaving 

 Constantinople, he was informed by the Turkish 

 authorities that he must make such terms with 

 the Cretans as he found possible, but that he must 

 in any case pay down £1,000 as a guaranty that 

 he would take nothing away from such excava- 

 tions as he might make. The conditions under 

 which he had formerly excavated in the Troad, 

 namely, that he should have all the duplicate ob- 



jects exhumed, were considered far from lenient, 

 inasmuch as real duplicates very rarely occur. 

 Taking advantage of the situation, the owners of 

 the ground that he desired in Crete demanded 

 £4,000 for it, and insisted upon his including in 

 the purchase more land than he really wanted. 

 So Dr. Schliemann came away without having 

 dug his spade into the ground, though he saw, 

 peeping out from the hill he desired to excavate, 

 a huge building ; but whether it was a megarm 

 or a temple he could not tell. 



— The professor of archeology at the University 

 of Berlin, Dr, Furtwangler, has arrived at Olym- 

 pia to arrange the objects which have been 

 claimed by Greece from the excavations now con- 

 cluded, in a large nmseum built on the spot by a 

 patriotic Greek for their reception. He is also 

 examining the various objects anew for the large 

 work that is being prepared on Olympia, the Ger- 

 man professor having been himself formerly one 

 of the directors of the excavations. 



— The first meeting of " the international con- 

 gress having for its object technical, commercial, 

 and industrial training," met at Bordeaux a few 

 weeks since. We see no notice of any delegate from 

 the United States being present. The conference 

 brought clearly into view two points : 1", the en- 

 couragement there is in the recognition of the 

 fact that England, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, 

 and Belgium, as well as other countries and de- 

 pendencies, have common ends in view in com- 

 mercial and industrial education ; and, a'', that 

 while this first international congress was merely 

 tentative, yet it has paved the way for future 

 congresses to come to a surer agreement regarding 

 principles, and to develop substantial unanimity 

 in details. In addition to the valuable papers 

 that were read, debates and discussions were held 

 daily dming the session of the congress, and it is 

 believed that they contributed to give the nations 

 of Europe a clearer and sounder knowledge of 

 the aims and methods of technical education. 



— The lord-almoner's professorship of Arabic at 

 Cambridge university, made vacant by the resig- 

 nation of Dr. Robertson Smith, the newly elected 

 university librarian, who has held the post since 

 Prof. Edward H. Palmer was murdered bj the 

 Arabs, has been conferred en Hon. Ion Grant 

 Neville Keith -Falconer, M.A., of Trinity college. 

 The new professor is the second son of the late 

 Earl of Kintore, and, though but thirty years of 

 age, he is very learned in the oriental languages 

 and literature. 



— It is remarked in England that the American 

 historians are very popular there. Almost simul- 

 taneously, new editions of Prescott and of Park- 



