Greek is well nigh gone from the high school course. Latin is under indictment. In their stead we are to have such substitutes as biology and chemistry. The exploits of Achilles and the wanderings of Æneas are to be supplanted by the dissection of an oyster and the making of soap. Now oysters and soap are all right in their way, and it is a good thing we have the one to eat and the other to wash with; but when it comes to using them to satisfy the instinct for a fight or for the discovery of a hidden treasure, that is a stupid and brutal forcing of a theory. If progress must come at the price of selling a boy's birthright for a mess of pottage, it is a pity some one cannot smite her with the edge of a sword. The study of the humanities that has been the bone and sinew of generations past cannot give place to the scientific vogue without wrecking the hope and desire of many a romantic youth. To leave out the classics is to proclaim a material age to be bigoted, boastful, and self-sufficient. Yet that is exactly what the scientific educator, who calls himself modern and progressive, is proposing, because business demands it. What claim has a business demand on academic policy, anyhow? Is not vagabondia as much entitled to the floor? "The descent to Avernus is easy." Reformed spelling is not so hard as Greek roots. In fact, the plan is to follow along the line of least resistance. The memory must not be cumbered with dead matter if the boy can reason on experiments for practical business demands. And are not the myths of these Greek and Latin languages too imaginative and impractical, covered with too much of academic dust, to serve a purpose in a practical age? This is heralded from educational convention to educational convention, and whilst the breaking of idols goes merrily on, a few brave teachers who speak Greek are regularly taking a Spartan stand to preserve what yet remains of the classic structure. In a boastful age they are not going to forget. If Homer and Ovid are forced by business demands from the academic halls, what hope is there left in Israel? The one and only one seems to be the myths in translation. Their claim to the attention of teachers can be clearly given from the preface to the best telling of them that has yet appeared, Bulfinch's "Age of Fable; or, Beauties of Mythology," a happy title to such a valuable book: "If no other knowledge deserves to be called useful but that which helps to enlarge our possessions or to raise our station in society, then Mythology has no claims to the appellation. But if that which tends to make us happier and better can be called useful, then we claim that epithet for our subject; for Mythology is the handmaid of literature, and literature is one of the best allies of virtue and promoters of happiness.