the University, to appoint the professors, tutors, and ministerial officers, and remove them when they judge proper; and generally to exercise the corporate powers of the institution. It is their duty, together with the superintendent of public instruction, to establish such branches of the University in different parts of the State as may be authorized by the Legislature; and to establish all needful rules for their government. It is their duty to proceed to the erection of necessary buildings for the University, as soon as the State provides funds for the purpose; and to faithfully expend all moneys appropriated for the use of the University; and to make an annual report, to the board of visiters, on the condition of the University. The immediate government of the several departments is intrusted to their respective faculties; but the regents have power to regulate the course of instruction.

The initiation fee is in no case to exceed ten dollars, and the course of instruction, in all the departments, is to be open to all the inhabitants of the State without charge, under regulations to be established by the regents. Students from other States are to be admitted on such conditions as the regents may prescribe. The money accruing from the initiation and tuition fees is to be applied to the repair of the University buildings, and the increase of the library.

Connected with each branch of the University, there is required to be an institution for the education of females, in the higher branches of knowledge; a department especially appropriated to the education of teachers for the primary schools; a department of agriculture, with competent instructors in the theory of agriculture, including vegetable physiology, agricultural chemistry, and experimental and practical farming; and such other departments as the regents shall judge necessary to promote the public welfare; but no branch of the University shall have the right of conferring degrees.

The superintendent of public instruction is required to appoint annually a board of visiters to consist of five persons, whose duty it is to made a personal examination into the state of the University, in all its departments, and report the result to the superintendent, suggesting such improvements as they may deem important; which report the superintendent is required to lay before the legislature.

Such is a condensed view of the leading features of a system, in which, as it appears to us, good use has been made of whatever experience of older States has proved to be judicious.

The University is located on a square of forty acres, forming part of an elevated plain, and joining the village of Ann Arbor, on the east; the lot was granted by a company of gentlemen of Ann Arbor, to secure the location of the University at that place. It is the purpose of the regents to erect a part of the buildings in the course

of the ensuing summer; and the institution will probably be ready for the reception of students at the beginning of winter.

Branches have been established at Detroit, Monroe, Pontiac, and in one of the western counties; at least two of these have commenced operations. All the branches are to be placed on the footing, and to answer the purposes, of academies of the higher order in other States. In framing the Constitution of the State they were called "branches" of the University in order to connect them in such a manner with it that a portion of the income from the seventy-five sections of land, granted by Congress for the support of that institution, might be legally applied to their use also.

The superintendent of public instruction devotes a considerable portion of his second report to the question of the expediency of chartering private colleges with the right of conferring degrees. His opinions are adverse to the multiplication of such institutions, in which he is sustained by the testimony of distinguished scholars in different parts of the United States. His discussion of the question leads him to the conclusion that charters should be granted only on condition that the association applying shall have secured, for the use of the institution, the sum of two hundred thousand dollars. We are unable to discern in this question the importance which the superintendent attributes to it. The State University could receive no harm from the stimulus of private competition; a proper spirit in its administration, added to its ample means, cannot fail to make it the peculiar favorite-the pride of the State. This position it cannot fail to maintain, if those intrusted with its administration are true to their trust, whatever number of private institutions assume the privilege of conferring degrees. For surely we are approaching the time, if we have not already reached it, when the standard of literary ability and scholarship must and will depend on other tests than the diplomas of learned corporations. Titles to literary distinction are now conferred by a more august tribunal— the reading world. Of what avail were college honors to Scott, Byron, Bulwer, Irving? Yet, a course of sound academical instruction may, to the majority of those who have instructed and delighted their race, have been of the highest value. It must be admitted, however, that these considerations render the privilege of conferring the customary degrees of little moment to private col

* We are informed by Mr. Lyon, one of the Senators in Congress, from the State of Michigan, and a member of the board of regents, that the board ordained the establishment of branches at the following places, viz: Detroit, Monroe, Pontiac, Palmer, Mackinac, Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, Centreville, and Jacksonburg, the four first in the east, the four last in the west, and the other in the north part of the State; that a system of laws for the government of the branches was adopted, teachers selected for the branches at Detroit, Pontiac, Monroe, and Kalamazoo, and that preparations were made, some months since, for putting those branches into immediate operation.

leges. The public will look more to the amount of instruction dispensed, the ability and character of the professors, and the scholars, eminent for acquirements and abilities, sent forth from their walls.

In concluding this survey, we owe our testimony to the ability and the just appreciation of the noble duties of his office, which have distinguished the administration of the present superintendent of public instruction, the Rev. JOHN D. PIERCE. The acts for the organization of the University and common schools, and for the disposition of the University and school lands and their proceeds, were adopted with little alteration, from the plans digested in his first annual report. The system he has had the honor to prepare meets the sentiments and wants of a young and enterprising people, whose first political acts have anticipated the experience and the efforts of the older members of the American Union.

We think a good augury for the success of this system of public instruction may be seen in its decided popularity. Nothing could be more fatal to the success of any candidate for the suffrages of the people of Michigan than the suspicion of unfriendliness, or even indifference, to the cause of popular education.

A QUIET MEDITATION.

Oh! tell me not of worldly woes,
Of cares that never know repose,
Of blighted hopes and joyless hours,
Of clouded skies and withered flowers!
—The cloud before the west-wind flies,
The flowers at summer's breath arise,
And hope, before the Christian eye,
May fade, but never wholly die.
Although at times my spirit burns,
And with seraphic ardor yearns,
To look upon the realms that lie
Beyond the reach of mortal eye,
To burst its clogging bonds of clay,
And freely mount and soar away

Beyond the clouds-the stars-the skies

To search creation's mysteries,

To be all Mind-all chainless Mind

Embracing all that God design'd,

To dwell with those my childhood lov'd
And lost-in wisdom soon remov'd-
To bow with them the dazzled eye
Before our God, the Bright, the High!
Oh! though my spirit often flees
Away from earth in dreams like these,
It sinks again-it lingers here-
Earth still is fair-life still is dear!

We look abroad on Nature's face,
One changeless lesson there we trace;
When calm and beautiful she lies
Beneath the smile of cloudless skies,
When winds but crisp the sleeping lake,
Or 'mid the leaves soft music make,
The charms she wears by Him were given,
The peace she whispers is of Heaven!
When clouds shut out the face of day
And tempests howl and lightnings play,
Still, still, we hear a soft sweet voice
That whispers -"Spirit! yet rejoice!
"Thou seest the majesty-the might
"Of Him who dwells beyond thy sight!"

We turn from Nature's face to Man,
Lord of the earth since earth began;
And looking not on sin and shame,
He knew not till the Tempter came,
We gaze upon the great, the good,
'Mid those of ancient days who stood
Like high and distant stars by night,
Shedding their soft and lasting light
Upon our upward gazing eyes,
As if to lure us to the skies.

We look on those we fondly love,
On Woman-gentle as the dove-
Winning the husband's heart away
From earthly pelf and passion's sway,-
Or hovering round the couch of pain,
With love that cannot sooth in vain,-
Or o'er the sleeping infant fair
Murm'ring the mother's silent prayer.

We gaze on Age-on pious Age,
Descending calmly from the stage,
Content with life, yet glad to die,
And looking with a tranquil eye
Back on its long and well-spent years;
And round upon the young, whose tears
Mourn that the old man's hour is come;
And down upon the silent tomb,

Where soon the silver locks shall rest,
A fair name carved above his breast.

We gaze on Childhood! blessed sight!
No-not alone the roses bright

Upon the smooth and rounded cheek,
The sunny curls at Zephyr's freak
Thick clust'ring round the sparkling eyes,

Where ever-ready Frolic lies,

Oh! these alone win not the gaze

That raptur'd o'er sweet Childhood strays! The dawning intellect within,

The soul without one stain of sin,

The mind that thirsts for knowledge new,
The frank, warm heart to nature true,
The bound of joyous consciousness,
When each free motion seems to bless,
And bare existence is a bliss,-
The love that's in a child's pure kiss,
The music in its laughing voice,
Its song, as when the birds rejoice,
Warbled by snatches wild and sweet,

And e'en the clouds that sometimes fleet
Across its mind's transparent sky,

Dimming with April tears its eye!

All these make up the wondrous charm

That earthly sorrow can disarm;

Which steals the soul from care and strife,

To seek the hopes and joys of life,

To linger round each sunny spot,
To hear the storm, yet heed it not,
To look on Earth and call it fair,
And calmly, gladly, tarry there,
Blessing the home that God hath given,
Until the summons come for Heaven!