the university site proper, one is required as a boarding house for young ladies, and two as dormitories for male students, while the fourth but temporarily supplies the want of offices, library-rooms, society halls and daily recitation rooms. Even for these limited purposes, three of the buildings in question are ill constructed, and by no means adapted to the exegencies of the future. The theory upon which the university is organized is not realized in this architectural squalor and paucity of accommodations. There is scarcely a city in our flourishing State which cannot boast of a more provident and therefore more costly care for the means of education under its immediate control.

In this age, an astronomical observatory is one of the characteristic and essential features of every educational institution of this order. It is scarcely possible to conceive of a university worthy of the title, where professors and attendants are denied this necessary instrumentality in the promotion of the interesting and progressive study of astronomical science. The cost of such an addition to our present facilities of education, including all the requisite equipment, is insignificant in comparison with the advantages that would be conferred upon the State by its possession.

It

Another fact deeply humiliating to those charged with the interests of this department of public instruction is the absence of any assembly hall in connection with the university; a fact manifestly inconsistent with the healthful progress of the institution, and especially, with the efficient administration of its internal affairs. is unnecessary to repeat in this communication the arguments so forcibly presented at various times by the president of the faculty in support of this view. The deficiency is so obvious that no appeal to meet it ought to be required beyond a plain statement of the fact of its existence.

The legislature of last winter transferred to the regents of the university the custody of the property known as the Soldiers' Orphans' Home, located at Madison; and, by the same act, authorized said regents" to establish a medical college, or course of lectures, upon all the branches usually taught in such colleges," and to occupy said property for such purpose. The board accordingly assumed the custody of the property in question, and soon after appointed a special committee to consult with the State Medical Society and prominent members of the medical profession, as to

the practicability of organizing a medical college in conformity with the purposes of the act. The investigation thus initiated demonstrates that the organization of such a college, in immediate connection with the asylum property, is impracticable at the present time. It is not the conclusion of the board, however, that the establishment of a medical college under other conditions would be either impracticable, expensive or inexpedient. This branch of professional education is clearly and specifically included among the objects for which the university was established, and no judicious effort should be ommitted for its early recognition as a department of university study. Under present circumstances, therefore, it is suggested that the board of regents be authorized by the legislature to make such disposal of the asylum property as will most effectively contribute to supply the present deficiency of buildings on the university grounds, with the understanding that a medical college will be organized in connection with the university, as soon as circumstances, not within the control of the board, will warrant the undertaking.

THE UNIVERSITY INCOME.

Another matter which emphatically demands legislative consideration at the present time, is the question of university income.

The university fund proper consists of the proceeds of sales of land granted by Congress. The whole amount of this fund productive, for the fiscal year ending the 30th day of September, 1875, was but $222,255.80, and the entire income therefrom for the past year was but $15,403.48.

In addition to the university fund proper, we have the avails of the agricultural college fund, also consisting of the proceeds of sales of land granted by Congress. The whole productive amount of this fund the past year was $236,133.90, and the whole income thereupon amounted to $16,148.41.

From these two funds, constituting the only original and permanent resources of the university for its annual support, the entire income the past year amounted to but $31,551.91. The total of university lands now remaining unsold is about 4,400 acres only. The total amount of agricultural lands remaining unsold is about 52,400 acres, and the price of these agricultural college lands is limited by law to $1.25 per acre. The aggregate increase in the 10 SUPT.

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principal of both these productive funds the past year scarcely exceeds $1,400, and the amount of lands remaining unsold affords no promise of any considerable increase of annual income from this source in the future. Should all the lands now remaining on hand be sold hereafter at the most favorable prices permitted by law, the total average annual income from both funds would not be likely to exceed about the sum of $36,000.

Meanwhile, the necessary current expenses of the university for the year ending September 30, 1874, were nearly $60,000. For the past year, these expenses have been reduced a considerable amount, but the average annual expenses of the institution, under existing ciscumstances, and with the most economical management, cannot fall far short of the sum expended in 1874. The moderate salaries paid the instructional force consumes the total amount derived from the university and agricultural college funds. For the balance of the money necessary to meet current obligations, the board is dependent upon incidental charges to students, upon the limited products of the University Farm, and upon legislative bounty. Thus, while the annual increase of the university and agricultural college funds is practically arrested by the exhaustion of the lands, the expenditure and consequent dependence of the university upon other sources of support are annually increasing, and must continue to increase in a degree proportionate to the patronage of the institution and its capacity for usefulness. While the board, therefore, has been enabled heretofore to provide for current expenses in a stinted and economical way, it now finds itself compelled to give serious consideration to the question of future resources. This question is pressed upon us at the present time, especially, by the erection of Science Hall and the necessity for its future care and equipment; also by various exigencies arising from present and prospective attendance upon the higher departments; but more emphatically, by the expiration the ensuing year of the provisions of law enacted for the support of the university by the legislature of 1867.

The legal relations of the university to the State should not be misunderstood. The framers of our constitution enacted that provision should be made by law for its establishment. Successive legisatures have recognized the binding and imperative character of the obligation to provide for its support; and it has been frankly

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and definitely conceded, by at least one legislature of the State, that "the university fund has suffered serious loss and impairment by reason of the settled policy of the State of Wisconsin to offer for sale, and dispose of its lands, granted by Congress to the State for educational purposes, at such a low price per acre as would induce immigration and location thereon by actual settlers." The original obligation imposed by the fundamental law is thus fortified and enforced, under existing circumstances, by the additional obligations of equity, and of the trust imposed upon the State by the Federal Government. No room remains for reasonable doubt, therefore, that the university is as much a legitimate object of State protection and care, as the common schools, or the State courts.

The practical wisdom of providing for the organization and maintenance of this department of public education is amply confirmed in the enlightening influences which the university palpably exerts upon the general character of our people; in the exalted standard of education it tends to promote; in the ambition for nobler achievements in scientific research its presence incites; in the more elevated character of the learned professions which it serves to secure, and in the unity and vitality it necessarily imparts to all the subordinate departments of public and private instruction within the range of its influence. In its distinctive province of educational labor, it alone is divested by law of the proscriptive influences of sectarian and political creeds. Its doors alone are open to all our children, with prejudice to none. It alone is capable of furnishing the accomplishments of an advanced education to all who aspire thereto, without superfluous restriction or burdensome cost. In the future, it is most capable of combining, harmonizing and elevating those diverse elements of character which peculiarly distinguish the population of our State. Perfected according to the plan of organization, it necessarily loses its character as a rival of similar institutions of inferior scope and degree, and becomes their natural and permanent patron and ally.

In its purely economic aspect, the question presented is worthy of special consideration. Already hundreds of our young men have been sent abroad to obtain those educational advantages which seemed to be denied them within the limits of the State. A positive and continuous encouragement of the effort to develop the

university plan of education established by our State laws would now remove all deficiencies, real or imaginary, and save for the State a larger sum than the cost imposed. An example of the profitable results of enlightened legislation in this direction, in a pecuniary point of view, is found in the university of Virginia, which is officially stated, in a recent report, to have brought into and retained in that State nearly $4,500,000 as an offset for about $1,000,000 expended by the State in its support.

But the practical utility of wholesome investment in this department of education is but feebly exemplified by calculations upon this limited basis. The modern university is something more than a school for instruction in abstruse mathematics and classic languages. In the march of events, Europe, and especially Germany, is furnishing us examples of practical progress in matter and methods of instruction, which the American people have not been slow to imitate and adopt. The theory of our own university, as now organized, contemplates courses of instruction in the mathematical, physical and natural sciences, with their applications to the industrial arts. These courses of instruction, properly developed and applied, are by no means limited in their object to a merely theoretical education, or to the development of a merely mental energy and discipline. They refer as well to the practical and economic pursuits of daily life, and relate to the development of those mineral, agricultural and manufacturing industries which constitute the main sources of our material wealth. Our university is already contributing much to the prosperity of the State in this direction. No frugal government can prudently ignore these vital sources of material progress. It is conceded to be a wise public policy to encourage immigration, and thus enlarge the number of our population. Clearly, it is equally wise to enable that population to multiply its capacities for happiness and usefulness, and to employ its labor and skill to the highest purpose and the largest advantage.

The plan of university instruction has been prescribed by the State itself. The precise manner in which the State shall provide for the expanding wants of the university under the plan prescribed, is wholly a matter of legislative discretion. The circumstances do not seem to require any considerable appropriation, payable from the treasury the present year. Good policy, however, as well as