Considering that educational reform or renovation may erelong be looked for at Oxford, in accordance with the recommendations of the University Commission, it behoves other parts of the kingdom to be fully awake to the importance of the subject. 'There is a spreading conviction, that man was made for a higher purpose than to be a beast of burden, or a creature of sense;' and it will not do to stifle this conviction. Comprehensive endeavours must be made to educate and enlighten; to touch the heart as well as to train the intellect. And it must not be forgotten, that education involves very much besides mere book-learning--the mechanical duties, namely, of everyday life. Something of the latter is to be tried in the City Hospice and Soup-kitchen just opened near the foot of Holborn Hill. Though fitted up in an old house, it is a training institute of a new kind, where individuals of both sexes will acquire useful knowledge in a practical way, best explained by a passage from the report of the opening: 'In one portion of the educational department is an ironing-table, provided with the necessary utensils, for the purpose of instructing the women and girls in that necessary portion of domestic science, from the finest description of work down to the very coarsest. Adjoining this is a table laid out _en famille_; this also being considered, and justly so, no unimportant branch of knowledge. In another portion is a table prepared for a large party: every variety of glass likely to be required being properly placed, and every napkin being differently folded, so as to enable the ambitious neophyte to suit the taste of all mistresses. Beyond this is a small closet, with a window resembling those of an ordinary-sized house; and this the men and women are both taught to clean, while the closet itself serves as a cover for the simple operation of polishing boots and shoes. To this succeeds a table, upon which are placed the utensils for cleaning plate, and on another table the instruments for cleaning lamps.' Such an establishment ought to prosper; and perhaps this one will, if the giving away of soup for nothing, which is another part of its functions, does not kill it. There seems something incongruous in encouraging industry and self-reliance with one hand, and helplessness with the other. On the whole, it must be admitted that we are making progress, and those who think so, may very properly talk about it. Among a large number, the Crystal Palace becomes daily a greater subject of importance. Soon the last portions of the famous structure will be removed from Hyde Park, to rise in renewed beauty on the hill-slope at Sydenham; where the restored edifice is to become a permanent object of interest, far transcending all previous achievements in the way of exhibitions.