creased attendance at the meetings. An engineer
ing society is a most excellent means of instruc
tion to engineering students, and we hope that
ours will continue in the good work which it . has
started this year. We cannot but regret, though,
that the college authorities have seen fit to no
longer allow them to meet in the College Read
ing Room, and that as a result they are corn •
gelled to hold their meetings promiscuously in the
various recitation rooms. Such a state of affairs,
as this, alone, is sufficient to greatly discourage its
members, as any organization which has no regu
lar and comfortable place of meeting is bound to
have about it an element of unstability. In a
technical institution an engineering society is in
valuable and should receive the hearty support of
both the students and the college. We hope
that our authorities appreciate the value
of the work that our own organization is doing
and will see fit to furnish them with a comfortable
place of meeting, as they formerly did, instead of
allowing them to wander around among the recita
tion and drawing rooms.
THOUGH our college is pre-eminently a tech
nichal school, and makes its special line of
work instruction in the several branches of
most
engineering that deal most closely with the devel
opment of the great natural resourses of our state,
yet there can be no doubt that we have great need of
a classical course. The institution to-day furnishes
instruction in the three leading branches of engin
eering—Civil, Mechanical and Electrical—and
will soon add a fourth—Mining—besides courses in
Chemistry, Latin and general science. Would it
not, then, be wise to further broaden itsfield of use
fulness by adding one more course of study, the
Classics. A number of men are here to-day with
the intention of studying for the professions of la*
or medicine after graduation, to whom an oppor
tunity to perfect themselves in a knowledge of an
cient languages and literature would be invaluable,
and who are, owing 'tO this ADO QIIIISSiQrt in our
THE FRE
!=ril
E LANCE.
curriculum, compelled to confine themselves to
the smaller limits of Latin Science. A latin scien
tific course, in any school, is almost a figureahead.
In our own college tl e few men who take that
course of study would undoubtedly take a classical
if a chance were given ; while many men who now
are preparing for the study of latin and greek in
other colleges, would grasp the opportunities offer
ed here. As a college, we are notably deficient in
literary work, and this is due largely to the absence
of that general scholarly tone which the presence
of higher literary studies gives to any institution.
While the State College is primarily intended to
furnish instruction in the science of engineering,
yet we maintain, and we think that all will agree
with us, that a classical course would be a source
of great benefit both to the institution and
,to the
students. We hope that the Trustees will serious
ly consider the matter, and that they will see fit to
give us, in the course of a short time, a first class
classical course throughout the College and Pre
paratory Department.
('SEVERAL actions were taken by the Board of
Trustees, at their recent meeting, which have
been the cause of general rejoicing among
the students, whom they so closely effect. We re
fer to their decision to close the Spring Term sev
eral weeks earlier, and to the appointing of a regu
lar physical trainer. The need of closing the
college year earlier has long called forth much
comment from all sides and we are pleased to note
that the Board has seen this need and has
decided to take the necessary legal steps toward
changing the charter of the college, so that the
term will in the future close about the middle of
June, instead of in the beginning of July, as in the
past. They decided, hereafter, to have the gradua
tion day on a Wednesday in June, which will
vary from about the r3th to the 23rd of that
month. This will throw the Alumni and Trustee
meetings and drills, on Tuesday, and the . Oratorical
contest on Monday, while the Y. M. C. A. Anni
versary will be held on Sunday evening. This