Although the cost of the new capitol far exceeds the sum fixed in the act for its construction, yet nothing has been done and no money has been spent that has not been fully authorized by the legislature. With a laudably ambitious purpose to erect a building of the most stately and impressive dignity, the Commissioners at the same time have been true to the law under which they acted. They are now prepared to acquit themselves of their trust, with a consciousness of work well and faithfully done. That the people of the state have accepted the result of their labors with the most justifiable pride and the greatest satisfaction, there can be no doubt. It would be a most graceful and meritorious act on the part of the state, if the legislature in its wisdom should recognize the valuable labors of the commissioners by an appropriation for their services, more in keeping with their value than the meager compensation allowed them in the original act.

There yet remain two things for the state to do, in order to round out the completeness of the work already done:

First, to purchase the property adjoining the capitol grounds and convert it into a grand park-like approach to the capitol, as already proposed in the plans submitted by Mr. Gilbert; and

Second, to provide a state mansion on or near the capitol grounds, for the residence of the governor during his term of office, while absent from his own home, so that he will not be compelled to find an abiding place, as best he can, in some hotel or boarding house.

In conclusion, to another must be committed the pleasant duty of some time placing on the records of this Society a minute and critical description of the wealth of artistic beauty to be found illustrated in this royal home of our commonwealth. The spendid conception of Gilbert, the architect, realized in the building itself, the sculptures of French, the decorations of Garnsey, the mural paintings of La Farge, Blashfield, Simmons, Walker, Cox, Millet, Volk, Pyle, and Zogbaum, never will cease to delight our people and educate them to a better appreciation of the true and beautiful in art.

HISTORY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA.*

BY HON. JOHN B. GILFILLAN.

SCHOOLS AND COLLEGES IN THE AMERICAN COLONIES.

Seeing may be knowing, but only the superficial mind can accept the "dead result" of our laws or institutions as knowledge of them. The leaven of "know thyself" must ever work through the individual to the conditions which are his opportunity of vivid, progressing life. So more and more we seek to understand the historical origin of institutions peculiar to us as a nation, whether they have sprung from necessity, the great mother of invention, or whether we brought the nucleus across the Atlantic, whether they are American or Americanized. Nothing, of our many valued possessions, has been more generally conceded our own, than our system of education. For the sake of a clear understanding of its growth and the laws protecting it, and that our appreciation of results may be the outcome of basic, historical information, not superficial observation, we will venture to trace the derivative and American elements in a system which by its form of support has become, before the world, our own.

While Frederick II. was warring for Jaffa and Jerusalem, and Edward I. was fighting for the Stone of Scone, the Dutch were establishing at Dordrecht, ten miles from Rotterdam, a Latin School, which was the beginning of State School systems (founded in 1290). This school became one of the most famous in northwestern Europe, having frequently six hundred pupils, coming from all parts of the continent. Of the first colonists landing in Massachusetts, one-thirtieth were graduates of Cambridge. number those who had been voluntary exiles in Holland must have

1905.

Read at the monthly meeting of the Executive Council, December 11, This Address has been published also by the University in a pamphlet (46 pages, 1906), with the following dedication: "To its two presidents, Dr. William W. Folwell and Dr. Cyrus Northrop, whose life work has made the University what it is, this paper is respectfully dedicated by the Author."

known the Dordrecht School and the laws controlling it. England had no provision for general education, for two hundred years after it was thoroughly established in Holland.

Martin Luther in 1524 wrote in a letter to magistrates:

If there were no soul, no heaven, no future after this life, and temporal affairs were to be administered solely with a view to the present, it would yet be sufficient reason for establishing in every place the best schools, both for boys and girls, that the world merely to maintain its outward prosperity has need of shrewd and accomplished men and women.

At this time, on this basis, the parochial schools of Germany were established. About the same time, John Calvin at Geneva gave a similar system to the Cantons of Switzerland. John Knox, learning from these men, introduced a system of schools in Scotland. This was in the last half of the sixteenth century, fully a hundred years before definite free schools had been established in the American Colonies, Virginia, New York and Massachusetts each claiming a priority in this.

In 1619, three years after the death of William Shakespeare, Sir Edwin Sandys, President of the Virginia Company in England, moved in Parliament the grant of 15.000 acres of land for the establishment of a University in Virginia, 10.000 of this to be set aside for an Indian College, the remainder "for the foundation of a seminary of learning for the English." The same year the Bishops of England raised £1,500 for the education of the children of the barbarians in the colony of Virginia. Tenants were sent to occupy the lands, and Mr. George Thorpe, of His Majesty's Private. Chamber, came over to be superintendent of the University. This was in 1621, and in 1622 came the Indian massacres. From that time, though efforts were constantly made, moneys raised, and lands granted, nothing was done for sixty years, except on paper, towards the public establishment of schools in Virginia. In 1688 £2.500 ($12.500) were subscribed, by wealthy gentlemen in the colony and their English friends, towards an institution of higher education. Rev. James Blair was sent to England in its interests, and appealed directly to Queen Mary. King William was interested. through her, in the aspiration of the Colony, and they allowed "£2.000 out of the quitrents of Virginia." for building the college,