THE QUESTION OF RELATIVE SCHOLARSHIP.

In the article on the relative scholarship of men from private and public schools, originally written for the Harvard Graduates' Magazine, and printed in another column, Mr. Addison has pointed out an important argument which has escaped many previous writers. This article should be brought to the notice of those who are interested in the subject, for it shows that mere statistics are misleading. We agree with the writer that the theory is obsolete which claims that "the proof of the intellectual superiority of the public to the private school men is to be found in the undoubted fact that in college a large percentage of public school men get first and second group honors, whereas a small percentage of private school men are similarly honored," and we believe the argument advanced by him is a logical one that "undergraduates from public schools are intellectually a picked lot, and the undergraduates from private schools have been subject to no selective process."

An additional fact which seems to us significant is that more private school students take an active interest in outside college affairs, due largely, no doubt, to the training in this line which they receive at school. This probably accounts for the fact that they do not receive as many scholarship honors as the public school men.