Mr. Granville Putnam, of Quincy, said:

When we receive pupils into our schools, if we are faithful, we must resolve to do all we can to give them a complete and generous education; and John Milton has said that they only have a complete and generous education who are stirred up with high resolves to be brave men and worthy patriots, dear to God and famous to all ages. Can this be done? Yes. God has placed in the heart of every child an altar, and it is for us to kindle there a flame which will not go out till the flame of life is extinguished.

Mr. Putnam then spoke of the influence we might have in teaching History. We can do much to implant principles of loyalty and patriotism. I would present something of the cost of the inheritance received from our fathers; the noble struggle of those men who fought and died heroically; the character of the patriots of 1780, and of the rebels of 1863. I would show them how posterity will detest the very names of some who dwell among us, and who in times past have stood upon our platforms. What a field there will be for the teacher, when the history of this war shall be written, from which to gather themes for instruction! In every church-yard throughout the loyal States lie the remains of those who have nobly fallen. The blood of our brothers and sons has reddened the soil of the Old Dominion, and the bones of many are bleaching upon the banks of the Great River. Let us present these scenes to those under our charge.

There may be much done by declamation of the burning words of those who, in times past, have spoken so nobly. Otis, Henry, Webster, Everett, and a host of others. I would lead them to see Patrick Henry as with flashing eye he stood before the House of Burgesses in Virginia; the prostrate form of the elder Adams as on the Fourth of July, 1826, he lay upon his death-bed, and with extended hand exclaimed "Independence forever!"-the expounder of the Constitution as he sat in the Senate Chamber, or at the base of yonder monument; or Mr. Everett as he stood a few days ago at Gettysburg. I would teach them to sing patriotic songs. When the Israelites stood on the shore of the Red Sea they sang a song of triumph and rejoicing. So when the last rebel shot shall be fired, and the last rebel flag shall have been trailed in the dust, then, from every school-house in the land, let there go up a song of thanksgiving to the God of nations.

In discussing the question "What is the next step to be taken by Educators to secure the highest interests of Education in the Commonwealth ?" Hon. Emory Washburn said, among many excellent things:

The great want of our country is in this very matter of a national sentiment and feeling. Our children are trained to be good merchants, and mechanics, and manufacturers, and professional men-but not to be good Americans. They are taught to be quick and sensitive to mercantile honor, and jealous of their character as business or professional men. But they can calmly hear their country reviled, and leave to others to defend her honor or good name. We want to be educated as a people to a true national sensitiveness. We want to have added to what is now taught as an intellectual exercise, an ever present, ever active sentiment of love and devotion to our country. We need something in this country which answers to Loyalty in the governments of the old world. There the people are so much accustomed to look to their rulers for the favors they enjoy, that a feeling of affection and respect grows up in return for the benefits bestowed upon them by a King, or some other personation and embodiment of national sovereignty. But here, our Government is an abstraction-an idea-while its functionaries are changed so often that we have next to nothing by which we naturally attach to it anything like sentiment or feeling.

This nationality of sentiment and feeling is, in my judgment, the thing we want more than anything else in the education of the public mind and heart. To reach it and accomplish it is, as it seems to me, the next great step to be taken by the educators of our land to secure the highest interests of education. It is something which has been

hitherto neglected in our schools. It was not the fault of the teachers, however, that the people have been so intent upon having their children practically and profitably taught. Nor have we a right to expect that the present generation of actors now upon the stage will all at once be endowed with new passions and desires; but the next generation may be educated by their teachers to know and feel the need of this element in our national character.

It is, as I have already said, a thing to be done not by books, not by recitations, but by the frequent and oft-repeated lesson from the full heart and the well stored brain of the teacher. History is full of this kind of influence, and this power of the teacher over the prevailing sentiment of a people. When, after the overthrow of the Athenian democracy, the thirty tyrants were struggling to reduce the people to slavery, the man they most feared was that old schoolmaster-Socrates. They seized him and threatened him for corrupting the youth of Athens, by instilling into their minds a national pride and a hatred to tyranny. We need just such schoolmasters now. The country had been watching for thirty years the gathering of the storm that is now devastating our land. They saw the aggressions of the slave-power step by step in the action of leading politicians who managed our national affairs, and while here and there a voice of alarm was raised the masses were too intent, in the pursuit of their own personal interest, to heed it or to wish it otherwise. Patriotism was asleep until the echo of that gun from Sumter aroused the land. It needed some such violent shock to startle us to the consciousness that we had a country, whose honor had been insulted and her existence threatened.

This, sir, is the step next to be taken in the progress of education. It is to be taken by the educators of the land. Not merely the teachers of our common schools, but by all who share in the education of the people-by parents, by school committees, by the Board of Education, by the pulpit, and by the men of influence in every field and department of business and employment.

And believe me, in conclusion, this process of education has already begun. Every day is having its influence in bringing up the public mind to a healthier tone of feeling. The whole nation has been taught, within the last week, by that noble lesson of eloquence and patriotism pronounced by a Massachusetts scholar on the glorious field of Gettysburg. Every soldier who comes home from this war, to show the scars and marks of skirmish or battle-field which he bears about with him, becomes the educator of the public heart by the simple story of what the brave, loyal men of the Union have done and suffered in the cause of liberty and law. And in many a church-yard, throughout New England, some monument will rise to tell how the young or middle aged man went out from his village home, at the call of his country, and fell in this great struggle for human right; and that monument will itself help to educate the very passer-by to a higher standard of national honor, and to impress with a deeper solemnity that almost divine thought, that has come down to us in the garb of classic learning, " dulce et decorum est pro patria mori."

This, Mr. President, is the next great step to be taken in the progress of the education of a free people; and the country is waiting in this, the hour of her need, to see it taken by every one who cares for her future honor or success.

Such advice is good for this latitude. San Francisco can shake hands with Boston over it, for hav'nt we the same King that they used to have? We hope the Massachusetts Teacher, under its new Board of Resident Editors, will come to us often as full of good things as this first number.

BOOK NOTICES.-The following have been received.

ROUNDABOUT PAPERS. By W. M. Thackeray. New York: Harper & Brothers. San Francisco: H. H. Bancroft & Co. pp. 292.

A republication from the Cornhill Magazine (London) of a half-serious, half

cynic series of editorial effusions. If there were no other reason for our readers to procure the book than that it is the last one we can ever have from Thackeray, it would be sufficient; but the noble tribute paid to our own Irving and to Macaulay in the closing paper, entitled "Nil Nisi Bonum," is itself a gem richly set in choice English, and worthy of a place in every school reader of the land.

LITTELL'S LIVING AGE.-For many years we have been accustomed to the weekly visits of this periodical, and each number of the present volume seems to confirm our opinion of its great value. Without aiming at originality, it occupies a place more important to be filled than any other for the masses, since, by its selections from the European Reviews and newspapers, as well as from the leading periodicals of this country, the reader is made acquainted with the progress of science, literature, and art, all over the world. No. 1,027, the last received, contains selections from McMillan's Magazine, The Reader, Blackwood's Magazine, and shorter articles from a multitude of sources: among them the magnificent hymn of Whittier, written for the dedication of Mr. King's church in this city. The Living Age is published at Boston, at six dollars per year, and is invaluable for all professional teachers, though not dealing directly and exclusively with the work in the school-room. Our arrangements with the publishers are such that for five dollars in coin, remitted to this office, we will supply subscribers with the Living Age and the CALIFORNIA TEACHER for one year, prepaying postage ourselves.

HARPERS' MAGAZINE for January and February has been received, being Nos. 164 and 165. All tastes may find something for enjoyment. The lover of history will turn to the article on the "War of 1812," or to that on the Siege of Louisburg," or to the record of "Four Days at Gettysburg." The novel reader will turn to "The Small House at Arlington," or to "John Heathburn's Title." The theologian will read with interest the article on Renan and his Book," and everybody will turn to the "Editors' Drawer." So Harpers' Magazine still lives, and may it live forever. New York: Harper & Brother. $3 per annum.

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VERY HARD CASH: A Novel. By Charles Reade. New York: Harper & Brothers. San Francisco: H. H. Bancroft & Co. pp. 258.

In the front rank of English novelists Charles Reade has earned a place. His "Never too late to Mend" was enough to establish its author in the good graces of all readers, and now this" Very Hard Cash" receives a welcome in thousands of homes from those who recognized the manly purpose running all through his books to make the world better. This story seems to be directed chiefly against the facilities for wrong doing connected with the management of insane asylums in England. It contains fine descriptions of how students enjoy themselves in the English universities, and also an admirable word-painting of a sea fight. One of the principles developed by the work is the importance of parental instruction, in creating a perfect confidence within the family circle.

these poor advantages by circumstances that I will not undertake to detail here. And to have found not only the means, so abundant, placed before me, but agents so kind and at the same time so able in administering the benefits and advantages of that institution, sustained and supported at public expense, commanded then, as I repeat will always command, my highest admiration and regard. To that school, and to the beneficent people who established it, am I indebted in great part, to say the least, for all that I am, be it little or much, to-day. Hence, sir, when the question of public schools-of free schools-in which the children of all may be educated without price, without distinction of class, of wealth, or of politics or of religious opinions are involved, it is no wonder that I should feel a deep interest in that question. Next to the unity and the continued and happy prosperity of this glorious country that we live in and are all common citizens of next to its continued and prosperous existence, I owe all allegiance, all love, all admiration, and all effort to the public schools of our country. While we denominate our schools public and common schools, let that not, as in the case now in the interior of our State, be a misnomer any longer. Let them be free, and furnish the means of education to the poor of the land. Your future members of the Legislature, Congressmen, Governors, and Presidents are to be found among these classes, for nature has baptized the child of poverty with the blessing of energy. All the history of our country and of every free country conclusively proves this proposition, for the great men of every free land have sprung from the common people. Education is particularly for them—it is due to them from our hands, and the hands of the great body of the people."

The name of John Conness headed the petition of ten thousand signatures for a half mill State tax for the support of public schools. How many "poor boys" will land on the shores of California, be taken into the schools, and grow up an honor to the State and Nation, and defenders of both against all enemies whether domestic or foreign?

HOW A PRESIDENT IS NOMINATED AND ELECTED.

It is of the very first importance that the children in our public schools should be well versed in the history of our country, and that they also be instructed in the fundamental principles of our form of government, and the manner of electing officers, both State and national. We do not intend to ask any questions about who will be made our next President, but shall simply put a few queries concerning the manner in which a President is elected.

Will not all teachers into whose hands this number of THE TEACHER may fall, make use of these questions in the school-room? We are just entering on the preliminary skirmishing of a great

Presidential campaign; let the boys know something about it. If any teachers should find themselves "stumped," let them go at once to some active politician, or address a letter to the legal third of the corps of Resident Editors.

QUESTIONS.

1. Do the people of the United States vote directly for a President?

2. What do you understand by Presidential Electors?

3. How is a President nominated?

4. What do you understand by a delegate to the National Convention ?

5. How are such delegates chosen?

6. How are the delegates to a State Presidential Convention chosen?

7. What is a Primary Election?

8. To how many delegates to the Union National Nominating Convention is California entitled?

9. Where and when will that Convention be held?

10. When and where will the Democratic National Nominating Convention be held ?

11. What is meant by the Platform of a Convention?

12. Who are talked of as candidates for the office of President of the United States?

13. What is the White House ?

14. Who nominate Presidential Electors?

15. When are they nominated?

16. Who vote for Electors?

17. When are Electors appointed?

18. How many Electors meet to choose a President?

19. What is meant by "Electoral College?"

20. To how many Presidential Electors is California entitled?

21. What is meant by "Electors at Large?"

22. Are the Territories represented in the Electoral College?

23. When and where will the Electors meet to cast their ballots

for a President?

24. When is their vote counted and declared ?

25. Where and by whom?