20 PRESIDENT’S ADDRESS. 
provision for instruction in science, although many of the arrange- 
ments are still of a very meagre and imperfect character, and more 
or less unworthy of the boasted greatness and richness of the 
“oldest and richest Australian Colony.” The accommodation and 
appliances are by no means equal to those of many schools for 
boys at Home, on the Continent, and in America, and certainly 
not to colleges in Japan. 
Of late we have been told by the newspapers that the University 
is richly endowed. This is very far from the case. If the income 
of the Sydney University be compared with that of other Univer- 
sities (not Australasian, for none of these have yet been placed 
upon a proper footing), it will be seen that proportionately it is 
very poor, and in a more or less starved condition. To properly 
equip the University in all the various departments of science, 
literature, art, medicine, law, engineering &ec., would require very 
much more than its present income. 
In connection with the subject of the education of ourfuture scien- 
tific investigators, perhaps I may be allowed to refer to some recent 
expressions of opinion on this. Professor Huxley, in his Presi- 
dential Address to the Royal Society in November last, in speak- 
ing of scientific education, says:—“There is no reason in the nature 
_ of things why the student who is destined for a scientific career 
should not in the first place go through a course of instruction such 
as would ensure him a real, that is to say, a practical acquaint- 
ance with the elements of each of the great divisions of mathemati- 
cal and physical science ; nor why this instruction in what (if I 
may borrow a phrase from medicine) I may call the institutes of 
science, should not be followed up by more special instruction, 
covering the whole field of that particular division in which 
the student eventually proposes to become a specialist. r 
say not only that there is no reason why this should not : 
be done ; but, on the ground of practical experience, I venture 
to add there is no difficulty in doing it.” * * * He 
then refers to the success of the Royal School of Mines. * * 
“Nothing would help the man of science of the future to rise to 
- E 
a a a 
ee 2 
ae : 
Nese ee 
