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the University Schools of English have coöperated so inadequately in the work.

In this unsparing exposé of the shortcomings of the English Universities in the study of the native tongue, I have preferred to allow Professor Wyld to state the case in his own words. The English are at times refreshingly frank in their selfcriticism and permit themselves to utter what, if it came from a stranger, would be hotly resented. From this point the lecture proceeds to offer practical suggestions of work that might be attempted in the universities, and, in particular, at Oxford.

Too much of the philological work in the English universities hitherto has been a glorified process of cramming, but, says Wyld, "Is it putting it too high to say that a successful course of instruction is one that is felt to be a perpetual voyage of discovery, in which indeed the teacher is the leader, but in which all share? In such a scheme the dogmatic lecture plays but a very small part after the initial stages, and dependence upon the text-book wellnigh vanishes altogether.

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Thought of in this way, English Philology has indeed “an intensely human interest"; "human history, human thought and passion flash and tingle through every fibre of human speech. . . . The student should feel, very early in his studies, that he is not a mere passive onlooker, but is to become an active participant in the game of discovery and inquiry. . . . When once the beginner understands that he too may make discoveries, and that to do so is vastly more interesting than to adopt an attitude of passive receptivity to the lore of the text-book, then he becomes a real student. He comes gradually to grasp the aims and methods of true learning."

An essential part of the equipment for such work is obviously what in Germany and in America is called the seminary library and what Professor Wyld calls a Teaching Library. "In this Class Library or Teaching Library, . . . the experiments, the first tentative efforts at independent work will be made. Under the direction of his teacher the student will begin the work of research-the solution of simple problems, the searching out of facts not too hard of discovery-it matters not whether they have been discovered before or not; the main thing. is that the young student should carry out the operation for himself, and should thus put into practice the scientific methods in which he is being trained. . .

These laboratory classes should begin as soon as a candidate enters the English School. . . . The sooner the pupil can escape from leading-strings and from an atmosphere too closely resembling that of his Secondary School, the better use he will make of his time at the University. . . . It is futile for a man who has always trusted to others for his information,

whether in text-books or lectures, to say suddenly, 'Go to, I will now carry out some research.' Unless he has learnt how to research. . . . he will be incapable of research. He does not know what questions to investigate nor how to set about the business. Some part at least of the necessary training must," I think, be undergone before graduating. Failing thus, the period of actual production must be considerably postponed."

In all this is much that is already familiar to teachers in progressive American universities, but as striking a new note in the routine of English university work the program outlined by Professor Wyld is of the highest significance. He goes on to suggest specific problems, mainly linguistic, not beyond the powers of keen young students, and points out some of the questions already touched upon in the History of Colloquial English.

The entire address arouses high hopes for the future of advanced English Study at Oxford and inclines one to think that at the oldest of the English universities the American student wishing to learn philological method so as to do independent work may most profitably stay.

WILLIAM E. MEAD

Wesleyan University

ERRATA

Instead of 'translations' in last line of third footnote on page 406 read 'Translators,' and insert the words 'of the important' after 'most' in the same

line.

The author of "Goethe's Lyric Poems in English Translation prior to 1860" wishes to call attention to the fact that her monograph was completed and, as a doctoral thesis, deposited in the Library of the University of Wisconsin in June 1913, two years before Dr. E. G. Jaeck's book appeared and that owing to the exigencies of the war the printing of her monograph was delayed until 1919, with the result that the bibliography makes reference only to publications available up to June 1913.

European Agent of the Journal of English and Germanic Philology

ADOLF WEIGEL

NEW AND SECONDHAND BOOKSELLER LEIPZIG, GERMANY, WINTERGARTENSTR. 4, I

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"Die Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie"

The German Dictionary of National Biography 26,300 Biographies, 1850 Collaborators of great reputation

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ORDERS TO BE ADDBEsoph

ADOLF WEIGEL

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SHAKSPERE'S SOURCES

Published in English and German
by the

Deutsche Shakespeare

Gesellschaft

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Volume 2: Sources of "Hamlet" and "Othello" by Max Förster, Professor at the University of Leipzig.

Volume 3: Sources of "Romeo and Juliet” by Rudolf Fischer, Professor of the University of Innsbruck.

A. MARCUS & E. WEBER'S VERLAG

Bonn

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