HOLIDAYS AND VACATIONS

Are not distinctly specified, but include the summer months, church and legal holidays, Easter and Christmas. For the pupils of military schools there are also certain imperial holidays.

COMPULSORY ATTENDANCE.1

Attendance is obligatory upon children between 7 and 12 years of age (8 to 12 in rural districts), but it has not seemed possible to carry out this provision in all provinces. In many of the provinces latitude is left to the zemstvos to act in this matter as they deem it best, and still it may be stated that province after province has endeavored to carry out such regulation, the Baltic provinces taking the lead. The communal

authorities can dispense with the regular attendance of children if they live too remote from a permanent school, and in case of bad weather or famine (as during 1890-91) they may be excused from school attend

ance.

SCHOOL SUPPLY.

The intention of the ministry of public instruction is to have the schools supplied with apparatus and school material, and through the local authorities it furnishes not only text-books, but apparatus to the elementary grades. Each gymnasium is supposed to possess a cabinet of physical apparatus, natural history specimens, geographical atlases, globes, gymnastic apparatus, music books, etc. The progymnasia are also supposed to be similarly equipped, except in the matter of natural history collections and physical apparatus. In the secondary schools for girls, progymnasia, gymnasia, and institutes, every facility for study is to be given, and the same intention is manifested in special schools. Yet the many changes in authorities, local and educational, the change of policy at St. Petersburg under the various ministries, the undercurrent of socialism permeating all classes, the necessity of keeping the country on a military footing, the famine arising from poor harvests, all these things combine to make even the best efforts to improve the schools comparatively futile, except possibly in some of the higher grade

The attempt to bring about compulsory attendance throughout Russia is thus stated: Towards the close of October, 1871, the Zemstvo of the district of Skopine (government of Riazan) resolved, after mature deliberation, to demand that the attendance at elementary schools be made obligatory. In the government of Penza the communal assembly of the village Lvovskaia-Varejka requested that education be made compulsory for all children from 7 years on, the parents being subject to a fine of from 25 copeks to a ruble in case of failure in attendance. Ossa (province of Perm) demanded obligatory instruction for children from 9 to 14 years of age. The provincial assembly of the district of Constantinograd (government of Poltova) voted, in 1866, for the principle of gratuitous obligatory instruction in elementary schools for children between 8 and 14 years of age, with a fine of from 25 copeks to a ruble in case of nonobservance. Thus it is seen that the local authorities were in sympathy with the state authorities as to the need of compulsory education.

institutions and in the most well to do centers. Rules and regulations concerning schools are made from year to year, as occasion warrants, but these decrees remain a dead letter on the statute books, and the lower schools, and sometimes those of higher grade, are often without even the necessities for carrying on instruction.

SUPPLEMENTARY INSTITUTIONS.

LIBRARIES AND MUSEUMS.

In the Imperial library, at St. Petersburg, there is a valuable col lection of manuscripts in Russian, Slavonic, Arabic, and other languages, also valuable historical works, the readers of which numbered 113,562 in 1881. They examined 1,200 MSS. and 174,542 books in 206,645 volumes. Tickets with permission to work in the library were issued to the number of 12,323, and 3,721 visitors were shown the collections.

The public library and museum at Vilna and the central archives in several of the "governments" are frequently visited for purposes of study. The Rumjänzow Museum in Moscow is especially rich in antiquities and ethnographic collections. It has also a public library. The Caucasian Museum in Tiflis, containing a library of 30,000 volumes, has a special collection of topographical and agricultural maps. Its walls and ceilings are rich in decoration, the scenes being emblematic of the Oriental, Armenian, Byzantine, and ancient Grecian styles, representing, as it were, the different epochs of history.

The Imperial Historical Museum was placed under the charge of the minister of public instruction in 1882, and in 1883 was moved into a building of fine architectural proportions. In 1884 it received interesting collections in bronze and gold. The different rooms have typical representations of the stone age, the bronze age, the age of iron, and other world epochs.

The Pedagogical Museum, a recent creation, includes an artistic and pedagogical museum, a library and an establishment for all grades of instruction. Normal courses of four years' duration are arranged for forty students. The necessary tools, the ordinary necessities of life, a tea room, smoking room, etc., are also arranged for the accommodation of the student and reader. The care of the collections is assured by an annual subsidy of $558. In winter the ablest men of science in Russia give courses of lectures at the museum, which are highly appre ciated by the large audiences in attendance.

SOCIETIES.

Connected with the pedagogical museum are the Society for the Encouragement of Education in the Family, which is under the patronage of the Princess Ekatherina Mikhailovna, and the Society for the Study of Hygiene. This museum, it may be added, is a link between

the intellectual element in society and the masses, aiding the different classes, especially soldiers, by courses and conferences. An institution which is not less original is the Permanent Commission for Popular Conferences instituted a few years ago by the Russian Government, and which has for its aim the instruction of the people even while amusing them. For this purpose reunions take place in the most important cities of the Empire and in the barracks where soldiers are stationed. The lectures are usually illustrated by means of views found in the imperial museums and galleries, such views being reproduced on glass, then colored, and finally thrown on screens by a lantern, which presents the view in color to the spectator. These popular conferences deal with subjects which are especially chosen to suit the audience; if soldiers, then a military man talks about Peter the Great, Souvaroff, and indeed all the military glory of Russia. The conferences for the people treat of other subjects-of the liberation of the serfs, of Alexander II— the pictures in both cases serving to impress upon the audience such scenes as bear upon the subjects given. Other lectures are upon popu lar writers, with a description, perhaps, of the life of the writer.

The Society for Popular Education at Kharkof is under the charge of Mlle. Christine Altechevski, who is aided by 60 teachers. The society has charge of Sunday courses of study for women. These courses, found in different parts of Russia, have about 400 persons following them. A library with a class of books especially appropriate for the needs of adults and children is connected with this society. The age of pupils (peasants, working women, and servants) varies from 7 to 45 years. The classes are subdivided in groups, according to the knowledge displayed. School festivals tend to bring into communication the families, the teachers, and the pupils. The teachers, who give their time gratuitously to this work, take part in the educational councils of the society. The school organized at Kharkof by this association has become the model of the Sunday school for the rest of the Empire. Au interesting point in regard to this work among the people was the appointing of a special commission to determine what books were read, or were the best to be read, by the people, and the effect of such books upon the minds of the parents and children. The result of this investigation was to classify about 2,500 works under the title of "what the people should read." A systematic plan of reading books of merit aloud to the people was also undertaken. The influence of this society is felt even in the world of letters, so that several authors have written books for the benefit of the people, or abridged well-known works on Russia and other countries. The schools are taught by ladies from the best classes of society, who volunteer for such purpose.

Other aids to education are the popular publications of the committee of elementary education, of the Society for the Propagation of Good Books, of the Intermediary, a society founded by Tolstoi, which intends to bring the higher and lower classes together on a common

footing.. A new publication is called Russian Thought, the editor of which deems it useless to treat the peasants like children, but feels that they should at least have homeopathic doses of the intellectual culture which dominates the rest of Europe. There is also the school of Yosnaïa Paliana, founded and maintained by Léon Tolstoi, and the journal of the same name, wherein the celebrated writer develops his theories. These essays serve to show the interest which the higher classes of Russian society have for popular education.

Popular lectures were established under ministerial sanction as far back as 1873, a permanent commission being charged with looking out for this work and with elaborating regulations applicable to the organization of lectures which were inaugurated in St. Petersburg the same year.

A Russian society for the diffusion of useful books was early estab lished, for during 1860-70 it had edited 101 books, of which 34,900 copies had been published and 16,000 distributed gratis. This society, which was recruited almost entirely among the nobility and burghers of Moscow, also founded a publishing house which furnished educational literature and popular reading as cheaply as possible. Translations from Pestalozzi, Channing, Bain, Owen, Froebel, Combe, Boehme, Virchow, and others, were also placed before the reading public. Provincial and local associations were also formed on a similar plan to the Society for the Diffusion of Knowledge, but most schools of the prov inces obtain their school material from the depository of the main society. People's libraries were also instituted by this society, and an arrangement was made with the zemstvos to place educational literature gratuitously within reach of the peasantry in the country around Kharkof, if not elsewhere. There are many other societies which serve as a means for carrying on a higher grade of education, even to the continuation of university studies. Learned works on biology, philosophy, and chemistry are often published by them. Classed among these societies is the Society of Physics, an auxiliary of the University of St. Petersburg, and which, through gifts made for that purpose, gives more thought to astronomical observations than to experiments in physics. The Society of Naturalists publishes important works and organizes expeditions to other countries.

The Society of Amateurs for the Study of Anthropology and Ethnography has created a museum of applied sciences. The Society of Naturalists of the University of Kazan, independent of its scientific work, has established twenty-eight or more meteorological stations, a health department, a magnetic observatory at Kazan, and has organized excursions to continue studies in astronomy, botany, geology, and zoology. Then there are the Academy of Sciences, the Mineralogical Society, the Geographical Society, with its Caucasian and Siberian branches, the Moscow Society of Naturalists, the Archæological and Scientific Societies of the Baltic provinces, and various medical and

educational societies. The work accomplished by the learned men of Russia is especially noteworthy in the lines of chemistry, biology, and physiology; women, too, have special courses of lectures in chemistry in the Alexander hospitals in St. Petersburg, and here, as elsewhere, they show themselves apt students, but as they were found to be without special preparation for such study the hospital commission has opened special courses for them in pharmaceutics, botany, and chemistry, anonymous members providing the funds for such study. The Russian Government has also undertaken to give them a solid preparation for the position of pharmacist. Women between 17 and 40 years of age are admitted if the examination requirements are met. During the three years' course they are admitted to university laboratories, so as to obtain practical experience.

SCHOOL SAVINGS BANKS.

It is questionable whether this method of establishing habits of thrift has ever obtained a footing in Russia, as the participants in the first congress for technical and professional instruction held in St. Petersburg in January, 1890, resolved to petition the Imperial Technical Society and the minister of public instruction to establish such banks in connection with the technical schools.

SCHOOLS FOR SPECIAL CLASSES.

The present number of schools for the deaf, blind, and idiots is not known. In 1882 there were 13 schools for the first-mentioned unfortunates, with about 50,000 pupils under instruction; 4 schools for the blind, and 1 for the imbecile population. Later information is not obtainable.

HISTORICAL SKETCH.

The earliest efforts towards culture in Russia may be traced as far back as 988, to the Byzantine Fathers, but it must be noted that the Russia of that period occupied only the center and southern portions of the present European Russia. Cyril and Methodius, two Byzantine Brothers, are accredited with forming the Slavonic charters, by which religious teachings were given to the people, and they and other brothers of the Order helped to disseminate a knowledge of reading and writing. The ravages of the Tartars from the Eastern Steppes soon checked the efforts of the Byzantines, but the invaders were tolerant of other religions, and through their efforts monasteries and convents were established, which were not, however, seats of great learning. The first school, connected with a monastery at Kief, dates from the fifteenth century; the second from 1629 in Moscow, which school had among its teachers some of the monks from the Kief monastery. About this time the Polish influence began to be felt, and the Greek orthodox believers had to contend with the Roman Catholic influence as brought into the