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curriculum that in some classes as much as thirteen hours a week are devoted to them. The students have to choose English and German, or English and French or German and French. The chief aim is to train the students to fully understand foreign literature rather than to render them fluent conversationalists.
The course of study extends over three years, and is divided into three departments. The first is intended to give the necessary instruction to those aspiring to enter the institutions of law or literature in the Imperial Universities; the second department is for candidates of the Colleges of Engineering, Science, and Agriculture; and the third department for candidates for the College of Medicine. It has been stated that the curricula in secondary schools are uniform throughout Japan, but we find in the higher schools three different departments, or courses, and the higher schools form the connecting link between secondary schools and Universities. The higher schools may therefore be considered the continuation of, or, rather, the supplementary instruction to, the secondary schools; and secondary education in Japan may be said to be common to all students for the first five years, while it is divided into three courses for the last three years.
Candidates for admission must be over seventeen years of age, and must have completed the secondary school course, or have the same degree of proficiency. Some of the students board in the school, while others live outside. The directors and instructors are officials of the State. Among the instructors of foreign languages are more than twenty foreigners who are teaching their own tongue. In 1903 there were 4,781 students, 875 graduates, and 301 instructors. The expenses amounted to £106,090.
The Imperial University consists of the University Hall and the colleges. The University Hall is established for the purpose of facilitating original investigation in arts and sciences, and the colleges for that of instruction, both theoretical and practical, in the special branches of study. There are two Universities maintained by the State—one at Tokyo, called the Imperial University of Tokyo; and the other at Kyoto, the Imperial University of Kyoto.
The Imperial University of Tokyo comprises six colleges—namely, law, medicine, engineering, literature, science, and agriculture; that at Kyoto comprises four—namely, law, medicine, literature, science and engineering. Twenty years ago the majority of the professors were invited from Europe and America, but nowadays the Japanese instructors are in the majority, the number of foreign professors being less than ten. The native professors are chiefly those who, after graduating at