There appears to have been expectation

in some quarters that the recent meeting of the trustees would be followed by the announcement of a new president for Dartmouth. Now it is quite thoroughly understood that no action will be taken until constructive alumni opinion has had time to express itself.

Such a policy is eminently fair to the alumni, but it has its difficulties of fulfilment. The alumni must, some time or other, be satisfied with the president of the College. If they are not, the institution is pretty sure to suffer. But it does not, by any means; follow that the man whose selection pleases them at first will maintain his hold upon them, or that they will fail in eventual enthusiasm over some one whose choice they regarded at first with an arctic calm. The first thought of the alumni is, quite naturally, that the new president shall have achieved a distinctive reputation that will fill much impressive space in the newspapers at the announcing of his appointment. They want the College decorated by its leader. The desire is perfectly explicable. But, fortunately or unfortunately, Dartmouth can not afford an ornamental figure head. Its president must be a worker.

A good deal will depend upon his ability to meet the alumni individually or in groups and to bring them a clear, strong, and inspiring message from the College. A good deal more will depend upon his ability to stay at home, there to develop and carry through policies which in the success of their operation will commend themselves to the world. The organization and the traditions of Dartmouth make its president a more than ordinarily important figure. As THE MAGAZINE has previously suggested, he symbolizes, or is expected to symbolize, in his person all the things for which the institution strives.

To find a man, out of hand, competent immediately to fulfil such a requirement is, of course, impossible. He will reach full stature only in the exercise of his duties. He can adequately symbolize only those characteristics which he has himself either created or revitalized. It is in this fact that lies the chief danger of selecting a man who has elsewhere made his reputation as an educator, or who, in any field of endeavor, has his future largely behind him. The glamor of his past performance will have worn thin in six months; in a year it will have completely disappeared. He will then be influential solely as he exhibits presidential capabilities.

THE MAGAZINE is not particularly concerned that the next president of Dartmouth should be reputed a scholar. Intellectual power, however, he must possess; and must, in some measure, have proved in word and deed. President Nichols came to Dartmouth notable as a discovering scientist. He leaves it notable as an administrator and organizer. His reputation as a scholar has, to be sure, given larger authority to his demand for thorough work, but his great task has been that of coordinating the work of scholarly men to the end of achieving the education of youth. That will remain the great task of Dartmouth presidents for generations to come. They, and those whom they choose to labor with them, will be charged with the destinies of young men, and, through them, with the destiny of the nation. The nature of the responsibility is not to be analyzed solely, or even primarily, in terms of scholarship.

Fortunately for everybody, and particularly for the College, the final choice lies only with the trustees. They have shown an almost saintly willingness to listen to all kinds of opinion. When they act, they will, of necessity, have to disregard most of it. There will be some consequent grief in many quarters. But the outcome of the action will lie eventually with the new president.

In voting to allow academic credit to undergraduates who take summer military training at Plattsburg, the Dartmouth faculty has taken a most commendably un-academic step. THE MAGAZINE has not favored military training as part of the local curriculum of the College, nor has it favored academic credit for routine drill during the College year. Neither of these things allows of the application of the proper standards to insure thoroughness. There can be no question of the thoroughness of the work at Plattsburg. It ought to weigh as heavily as the same number of weeks devoted to the art of the pageant. Both have their place in preparation for citizenship: the one for its responsibilities; the other, perhaps, for its amenities. But the latter can amount to little where the former are not generously undertaken. Viewed from this standpoint a course at Plattsburg may be more worthy of academic consideration than at first it seemed.

In addition to this, THE MAGAZINE would be much pleased to see the Dartmouth trustees and faculty place themselves on record as favoring general compulsory military training, and as offering to the United States government every facility of the College plant which might aid in giving such training to men of college age. Such action, followed similarly by educational institutions throughout the country, might have a profound effect in arousing the sluggish governmental mind to a realization of things to which it has thus far apparently been impervious.

THE REGISTER OF LIVING ALUMNI OF DARTMOUTH COLLEGE, giving names and addresses of living alumni from the class of 1846 to that of 1915 is now issued by The Bureau of Publications of the College. It is a book of 233 pages uniform in size with the 1910 "GENERAL CATALOGUE". Besides the names and addresses of living graduates, listed under their class captions, the book contains a geographical index and a general index. Printing of the publication was done by the Vermont Printing Company of Brattleboro, Vermont, of which E. H. Crane '98 is the proprietor and manager. Copies of the REGISTER may be procured at $1.25 each on application to the Bureau of Publications, Hanover, N. H.

In offering a trophy annually to the preparatory school whose pupils show the highest scholastic standing during the first semester of freshman year the Trustees show real appreciation of the need of cooperation between school and college. Cups and medals given by college authorities for athletic prowess are often exhibited by high school and academy boys, but with the exception of debating, the intellectual activities of prospective students have rarely been distinguished by any tangible reward. The policy just adopted" should prove a welcome corrective in the mind of the preparatory school student against the belief sometimes held that the most important activity, because the one with the most immediate and visible rewards, is carried on at the athletic field. A plaque hung in a conspicuous place in corridor or assembly room will be a constant reminder that scholarship has the place of honor in college and that a student has also a certain responsibility toward the school where he prepares for further work. The first school to be awarded this trophy is the Central High School of Springfield, Massachusetts, and the distinction is doubly impressive because the same school was recognized this year for a similar reason by Harvard. Of the four schools next in order two are high schools and two are academies in northern New England. In this connection it is a pleasure to note that although in numbers the proportion of students from New Hampshire and Vermont has not kept pace with the recent growth of the College the quality has not fallen behind if we may judge by this year's freshman competition in scholarship.