Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 69.djvu/391

Rh placing technical schools alongside of those for law and medicine. This work of expansion was placed in charge of the president, who, under pressure of the new responsibilities, soon ceased to be teacher and became merely administrative officer. The splendid results of this policy are visible everywhere in all departments of our universities. Instead of simple factory-like buildings, imposing fireproof buildings surround the campus, which, in its turn, is no longer a grass plot, mowed two or three times a year, but a beautiful park; the library building is a credit to the architect and the shelves are well filled; the gymnasium is usually a noble building, a proof of anxiety for the physical well-being of students; the laboratories are equipped elegantly and abundantly; the museums are impressive; the mechanical workshops are marvels of completeness; students, in the old as well as in the new courses, formerly counted by scores are counted now by hundreds, and the number of instructors has increased proportionately; in material resources, the unit is no longer tens of thousands, but hundreds of thousands of dollars; the gifts to educational institutions during the last forty years make a sum so vast as to be almost incredible. The history of college growth in material resources during the last four decades is like a leaf from the Arabian Nights and Aladdin's lamp seems no longer a fairy tale. This history tells, too, of devotion and suffering on the part of some college presidents as noble as that of the early martyrs, and deserving a measure of honor which will never be given, as theirs was the day of 'small things.'

But all this is only one side of the picture, that which presents itself to a merely casual observer; it is the purely material side. There is another side, not so patent in some of its aspects, yet so apparent in others that even the newspaper humorist, that most casual of observers, has not failed to detect and to utilize it. The thoughtful observer, familiar in some degree with matters of education, is led soon to doubt if, in this great development, the interests of education have been regarded as paramount. He asks respecting endowments, and learns, not altogether to his amazement, that in the rush they have been overlooked; and he may learn too that by the acquisition of buildings, the available resources of the college have been lessened, as both giver and receiver failed to provide for maintenance; he may discover also that in carrying out plans of one sort or another, obligations were assumed before means were secured to meet them. It is wise to examine the other side somewhat minutely.

Effect on the Trustees.—On one hand, the growth of financial interests has made compulsory the appointment of successful business