BELMONT CO. INSTITUTE.-W. D. Henkle and Prof. Schuyler conducted a fine institute at Morristown the third week in August. Over one hundred teachers were in attendance. The success of the institute was mainly due to the examiners, Gen. G. W. Hoge, R. H. Cochran, Esq., and John Dunham, who devoted an hour each morning before the regular exercises to the examination of teachers, one branch being taken each day. This plan is worthy of imitation, especially in those counties in which teachers manifest little interest in institute efforts.

CHANGES.-Warren McClintock, of the Covington (Ky.) High School, takes charge of the public schools of London, O.-L. O. Foose, late superintendent of the schools of Lima, takes charge of the schools of Miamisburg.-J. W. Ewing has resigned the superintendency of the schools of Perrysburg, O., to take charge of the schools of Saginaw, Mich.-cause, an increase of salary.-R. C. Mitchell, who left the school room two or three years since to accept a county office, has been elected superintendent of the schools of Ripley, O. We welcome him back to the profession.—Franklin Eddy, of Lima, has been licensed as a minister of the gospel by the Presbytery of Findlay, and has located at Perrysville, O.—Maj. M. D. L. Buell has resigned the principalship of the Wauseon schools to take charge of the Winterset Academy, Iowaa large increase of salary the inducement.-Hamilton S. McRae, a prominent teacher of Indiana, has taken charge of the schools of Muncie.-Miss Jennie Parsons, of Zanesville, has been appointed superintendent of the schools of Putnam, 0.

COLLEGE ASSOCIATION.-Brief meetings of college officers and professors were held between the sessions of the State Teachers' Association at Springfield. A constitution was adopted, and a permanent organization effected, with the following officers : President-Dr. S. Sprecher, Wittemberg College. Vice President-Dr. S. Howard, Ohio University. Treasurer-Prof. J. B. Weston, Antioch College.

Corresponding Secretary-Dr. O. N. Hartshorn, Mt. Union College.

Recording Secretary-Dr. I. W. Andrews, Marietta College.

Executive Committee-Dr. R. L. Stanton, Miami University; Dr. F. Merrick, Ohio Wesleyan University; and Rev. J. H. Fairchild, Oberlin College.

The next meeting is to be held at Dayton, the day before the meeting of the Teachers' Association.

NORTH CAROLINA.-A capital letter from Joseph Moore, of Randolph county, announces the close of a successful normal institute of eight weeks' session. We are also assured that "there is something of a growing disposition in the 'Old North State' to wake up on the subject of education," and this assurance is backed up by a list of thirty subscribers to the MONTHLY. We never question such evidence. It is proof positive.

SALEM.-The annual report of the public schools is a pamphlet of only sixteen pages, and yet it presents a complete exhibit of their condition. It is truly multum in parvo. Supt. Henkle is doing an excellent work, and the people know and appreciate it. They feel a laudable pride in the progress of their schools.

COL. JOHN EATON, formerly superintendent of the public schools of Toledo, O., and now editor of the Memphis Post, has been elected State Superintendent of Public Instruction of Tennessee. Col. Eaton is well qualified for the task of organizing the new school system.

KENYON COLLEGE.-Prof. James Kent Stone succeeds Charles Short, Esq., as President of this institution, and Mr. F. M. Hall, of Akron, has taken charge of Milnor Hall. The next Freshman class is expected to number not less than fifty.

FARMERS' COLLEGE.-We are requested to announce to the sixteen hundred scholarship owners of this institution, that their scholarships entitle a student to tuition as formerly, and that the fall term begins September 5th.

THE METRIC SYSTEM OF WEIGHTS AND MEASURES. Prepared for Robinson's Progressive Arithmetics. By MALCOM MCVICAR, A.M. New York: Ivison, Phinney, Blakeman & Co.

This treatise presents the " Metric System" in a very clear and satisfactory manner. It also contains several original and important improvements including an abbreviated nomenclature which shortens the French names without sacrificing their expressive and universal character. The most serious objection to the use of the metric system in this country would be largely removed by the general adoption of the improvement here recommended. The author's notation is simple and scientific, and his method of exhibiting the measurement of surfaces, solids, and angles, full and suggestive. An article on "Stocks" is added, including several pages on the different kinds of U. S. Securities, Bonds, etc., with practical examples.

CESAR'S DE BELLO GALLICO. With Explanatory Notes. By GEORGE STUART, A.M., Prof. of Latin in Philadelphia High School. Philadelphia: Eldredge & Brother. 1867.

If it be right to make a learner wade through the bloody stream of Cæsar's Gallic war waged for the double purpose of crushing the liberties of an independent nation and paving the way to his own usurpation of power in Rome, no better edition could be put into his hands. But we think that a few extracts from the most interesting portions of the work might suffice, so as to allow a wider range of authors, subjects and styles within the limited time allotted to Latin; in which case it would be needless to subject the scholar to the expense of buying the whole work, as, very probably, he will never look into it again after he leaves school. With that reservation, this text-book is worthy of unqualified praise. The typographical execution is excellent; the notes, which we have carefully examined, are clear, short and to the purpose, telling no more than seems needed to enable the young reader to work his own way along. Points of antiquity and history are succinctly and tersely explained, whenever necessary for the clear understanding of the passage. A prominent feature of these notes is the care taken to explain instances of the subjunctive mood in "Narratio Obliqua '—a beautiful example of which occurs page 111, 20: "qui appropinquarent." In page 11, 5, we do not quite agree with the editor's constructive analysis; we have no room to explain, but merely call attention to it. Page 225, carcassone should be written with two s's; Cevennes, with a c, page 88, 20." "Sui liberandi," -we are glad to see that the editor, unawed by the majesty of sacred antiquity, is not afraid to point out an instance of careless construction, such as we are apt to meet with in the best models of our own literature; for why should even Latin or Greek writers claim exemption from the common lot of humanity-liability to err? S.

OUTLINE OF MATHEMATICAL SCIENCE for the School-Room. By CHARLES DAVIES, LL.D., Author of a Full Course of Mathematics. New York: A. S. Barnes & Co. 1867.

This little work is an abridgement, with some changes, of the author's larger work, entitled "Logic and Utility of Mathematics "—a work which ought to be in every professional teacher's library. The design of the smaller book is to place the elementary principles of mathematical instruction within the reach of the great body of American teachers. It contains six sections. The first discusses the logic of mathematics; the second presents an outline of the science; the third treats of number, including the Metric System; the fourth, of geometry; the fifth, of analysis; and the sixth, of algebra. The author's treatment of these several topics can but prove of great assistance to the teacher of elementary mathematics.

At a meeting of the Association of New England Colleges held in Providence, R. I., October, 1865, the presidents of Yale College and of Brown and Harvard Universities were requested to prepare a brief statement of the views which, from the discussions of that meeting and the meeting held in 1864, it was evident that the majority of the association held concerning the ordinary mode of teaching both ancient and modern languages.

The modes of teaching should undoubtedly vary to some extent with the age of the pupil, with the nearness of the relationship between the language taught and the pupil's vernacular, and with the object in view in learning.

The objects in view may be classified under two heads, the uses to be made of the knowledge when acquired, and the usefulness of the process of acquisition.

Again, the uses of the knowledge may be classified under three heads, arising first from the ability to read the language, and interpret the thoughts of those who use it; secondly, from the ability to speak and write the language, and express our thoughts to those who understand it; thirdly, from the light which the grammar and vocabulary of the language may throw upon our vernacular, or upon some other tongue which we may be studying, or upon the history of the nation using it. It is evident that

for the second use a much greater familiarity with the tongue is required, than for the first or third.

Still further, the uses of the process of acquisition may be classified under various heads, in the cultivation of memory, of the ear, of judgment and reasoning power,—and if the writings studied be classical, in the cultivation of taste and imagination, and in increased power to use our own language with elegance and force.

The processes of acquisition involve seven different kinds of labor, and each of these seven kinds is divisible into two degrees of nicety, the one for those who would simply learn to read, the other for those who would learn to speak the language. For the ordinary purposes of liberal education, the first degree is sufficient. These seven kinds are as follows:

First. Orthoëpy, in which the degrees are the correct, and the elegant, pronunciation of the vowels and consonants in combination. For example, a sufficient reading knowledge of German may be obtained without the ability to give the softened vowels in an elegant and easy manner, but not without knowing their approximate value.

Secondly. Prosody and the laws of accent, first as they affect the pronunciation of prose, afterward as they affect the melody of verse. For examples of the first degree, compare the English words holy and wholly, boot and foot, stone as pronounced in New England and as pronounced in New York.

Thirdly. The inflections of declinable words, first of the regular and the frequently recurring irregular words, afterward of the rarer anomalies.

Fourthly. The Vocabulary, first of the current words, afterward those more rarely met with.

Fifthly. The derivation of words and the laws of etymologic changes, first in the most general and extensive laws, afterward in the more anomalous cases.

Sixthly. The syntax in its ordinary laws and usages, afterward in the rarer idioms.

Seventhly. The genius of the tongue and the spirit of its liter

ature.

The tools or instruments used in learning a language are usually a manual of grammar, a book of exercises in reading and writing, a dictionary, and a work written in the tongue. These works are put into the learner's hands in the order in which they are here named, but this is almost a complete inversion of the

true order of study. Grammar is an analysis of the usages of a language, and can not be profitably and intelligently studied without some previous familiarity with those usages. Reading ought, therefore, to precede the study of grammar, and the study of grammar be entered upon gradually, only as fast as the needs of the reading require it. The boy fitting for college should learn only so much of the grammar as may be required to enable him to construe intelligently the books on which he is to be examined; and this can be comprised in a very few pages of paradigms and rules. It would be hard to overstate the mischief wrought by forcing children to commit to memory several hundred pages of Greek and Latin grammar before they can read the simplest books written in those tongues. A thorough analysis of the syntactical arrangement and etymological forms of words actually found in reading, is of vastly more intellectual value to the beginner than the committing of rules to memory can be; and of more permanent value, as the grammatical principles developed in studying a passage in which the pupil is interested are fastened in his memory by a natural mnemonic aid.

In regard to a dictionary, there is an apparent saving of time in using a brief vocabulary prepared for the special book which the student is reading; but the apparent gain will be a loss if the meanings given to each word are not full and various, and arranged in the natural order of their development.

The learner should be taught to free himself as much as possible from dependence on the lexicon. Reading by its aid is like swimming with bladders, or like reading with an interlinear translation. The meaning found in a dictionary slips from your memory to-morrow, but the meaning discovered by a patient consideration of the context is never forgotten. The more remote the tongue which we are studying is from our vernacular, the more we must depend upon our lexicon. But let a student master Latin and know one Teutonic tongue, and he can learn any language of western or central Europe almost without dictionary or grammar. Thus German, English, Danish, Swedish, Italian, French and Spanish people can learn each others' languages from classic writers almost without the aid of grammarians or lexicographers, by simply reading incessantly and attentively standard works in the tongue which they wish to learn.

Of course this habit of reading does not absolutely dispense with the need of referring occasionally to a lexicon, nor with the need of studying text-books on grammar, but it prepares the.