BARKING DOGS

In its first issue of the year, the Harkness Hoot, Yale's newest critical publication, devotes itself to an attack on the House Plan as it is here at Harvard, and as it will be at Yale. Save for the educational benefits, which the editors of the Hoot insist on regarding as accidental by-products, the entire system is denounced as a waste of money and a "pandering to the unfit and immature."

All this has been discussed before. Reams of paper have been consumed in attacking and ridiculing the plan, but despite all journalistic comment, it is now an accomplished fact. True, as a Harvard senior has pointed out in his article in the Hoot, the Houses have their disadvantages. Only time will be able to smooth over the present crudities that now afford subjects for Lampoon cartoons.

At its present stage, all criticism of the House Plan seems to be entirely destructive. Sensational undergraduate journalism is not needed to emphasize the faults. If House Plans are to be, more can be done by intelligent suggestions than by idle fault-finding. The Hoot has accomplished nothing; it has expounded no new ideas. Had it brought some constructive criticism in effort to improve on existing conditions, then the Hoot might have something to make a noise about. It cannot be particularly proud of the unoriginal sport of standing in the gutter and slinging mud at houses but recently cleaned of some of the same grime.