As an illustration of these notable facts, I may state that having been selected by the United States Bureau of Education to act as one of the seven international educational jurors, at the New Orleans Exhibition in 1885, it was, during six weeks, my duty with others, to examine into and report upon the condition and results of the various state systems of education in the Union, and in other countries. CHARACTER OF SYSTEMS OF EDUCATION ABROAD, AND LESSONS THEREFROM. I need not more than state, what you likely anticipate, that France, by her enlightened educational legislation of 1881--providing for manual, or industrial, training in all of her schools--and Germany, by her earlier and more systematized educational legislation, stand at the head of European States, as does Japan at the head of the whole Eastern World. But, in this connection, the interest to us should be to note the fact that the educational centre in the United States has within the last few years been gradually shifted from the east to the west. As an illustration, I may say that the highest award for the extent, variety and completeness of its educational system in all its details, was unanimously made by the jurors to Minnesota, while Massachusetts and other New England States, with New York, Pennsylvania, etc., were entitled to only second and third class honors. France and Japan justly received first-class honors, while England and other countries (omitting Germany) had to be placed in the second and third class ranks as educating countries. A revelation of these and other suggestive facts in regard to the progress of education in countries outside of our own, more than ever convinced me of the wisdom of Dr. Ryerson's policy of observation while head of the Education Department. He laid it down, not so much an educational axiom, as a wise dictum--the result of his educational experience, that-- "There is no department of civil government in which careful preparation, varied study and observation, and independent and uniform action, are so important to success and efficiency, as in founding, maturing and developing a system of public instruction." He, therefore, wisely devoted a large portion of his time to this "careful preparation," as well as to "varied study and observation" of systems of education in Europe and America. And this fact largely accounts for the "success and efficiency" of his efforts in "founding, maturing and developing" our system of public instruction. In a reply to a resolution from the Council of the County of Norfolk, in 1851, Dr. Ryerson thus referred to this subject:--