ions and conditions,” and pledged “ the faith of the State to carry the same into effect.” This was in substance an agreement to ac cept the grant of lands made by Congress, and to provide such buildings, equipment and other facilities as might be required for the proper use and application of such fund. During the twenty years, from 1866 to 1887, following the appropriation of this grant to the State College, not a dollar was given by the State for the fulfilment of its pledge to the Nation. The current impression doubt less was what the Gazette indicates, that the annual income of the College came from ap propriations by the State Legislature; but such was not the fact. Its only income was that derived from the fund accruing from the sale of the United States lands, with the slight addition originally made by the State to compensate in part for the low price at which its officials had sold the scrip. Mean while, in spite of every disadvantage, the in stitution has in recent years been rapidly increasing in numbers and influence, and in the scope of its work, until 1887, the Legis lature found that it had far outgrown its room and equipment. After a full personal examination by a Committee of the Senate, an appropriation of $112,000 was made, with specific directions as to the objects for which it was to be expended. During the present session of the Legislature, two committees, one from each House, visited the College to ascertain whether the former appropriation had been judiciously used, and after a full and thorough examination and a favorable report from them, the Legislature appropriated an additional $127,000, Of this amount of $239,000, only $4,000 was given for current expenses, the remainder being appropriated exclusively and specifically to the qrection and equipment of new buildings, and the re arrangement of old ones, in order to meet the rapidly growing needs of the College, The result has been to supply facilities which were absolutely indispensable to meet THE FREE LANCE. the requirements which the large increase of students and courses of study had forced upon the College, and to put the State of Pennsylvania in this respect somewhat upon a footing equal to that of our sister states. Other States have for many years been doing what Pennsylvania has only just begun to do. The State of Illinois, for example, has ap propriated over $550,000 to carry out the act of 1862; the State of lowa, $400,000; the State of Kansas, $308,000; the State of Maine, $507,000; the State of Michigan, $614,000; the State of Texas, $310,000, and so on. It should be noted, also, that Cornell University is based upon precisely the same foundation as The Pennsylvania State Col lege, the principal difference being that the National land-grant, under the wise manage ment of Mr. Cornell, has resulted in a fund of over four and one-half millions, of dollars, (aside from the large benefactions it has re ceived from individuals) while that of Penn sylvania aggregated less than five hundred thousand. This line of statement might be indefinitely extended, but enough has been said to show that the State of Pennsylvania has done but very little for the State College, compared with what it ought to have done, and with what has been done by other States. 2. The slur upon the “present methods” of the College is, to say the least, equally un founded with the former statements of the articles quoted. VVe venture to say that that is a subject upon which the writer of that ar ticle is absolute,y uninformed. Not more than a dozen colleges in the country require a greater amount of preparation for admis sion, or give a more careful and thorough course of training. To compare its results with those of any “academy” in the United States is the sheerest absurdity, Not a dozen such in the whole country could carry their students so far as through the work of the first (or Freshman) year of the college course
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