"THE EDUCATIONAL OCTOPUS."

The public, or a portion of it, finds it hard to rid itself of an idea once firmly imbedded. In spite of a rain of facts to the contrary, some persons still believe that our endowed universities are out of the reach of any but men of wealth. The writer of a letter to the Transcript, and the author of a tirade against the University, called "The Educational Octopus," makes the accusation that the "intellectuals of Harvard mistakenly believe that the son of the laboring man should not be allowed to aspire to equality, professionally or otherwise, with the young men of more favored parentage. They are engaged in a great conspiracy to prevent it." This is nonsense. An investigation made three years ago showed that one-third of the men in the University were earning all or part of their expenses. Last year 461 men obtained employment during term time through the College Appointment Office alone. Tutoring, waiting on table, and snow-shoveling are among the doubtless "democratic" occupations of these students. And the recent election of marshals strikingly indicated the honor to which self-supporting students may rise in the esteem of their classmates.

Far from trying to prevent the education of men without means, the University, with its host of stipend-bearing scholarships, makes the problem easier than anywhere else in America. Harvard, realizing that maximum influence and virility require universality, wishes to represent all strata and all sections. By no means is it the stronghold of a class. Unfortunately education presupposes standards, and these unpleasantly exclude many; there is the further need of charging tuition to defray about a fourth of a student's academic expenses. Some minds evidently are still so limited as to see class exclusion in these ineradicable necessities.