The fundamental idea of this movement, as described to me by its originator, is to create an organic body, independent of political changes, which shall endeavour little by little to promote contact between the teachers of all grades in Spain and their foreign colleagues, and to form within the country small nuclei of workers to diffuse in Spain the ideas brought from abroad, and to create an atmosphere of sympathy and enthusiasm, without which scientific work cannot flourish. On these lines two Committees were formed by Royal Decree in January, 1907. One of these was charged with reforms in elementary teaching, to be carried out by the establishment of classes for teachers, by school inspection on modern lines, by sending selected teachers abroad (the Government gives a grant for this purpose, the administration of which was entrusted to the committee) and by grouping and grading the schools, and encouraging and supervising holiday resorts for teachers, school games, &c.--the whole of the reforms to be introduced gradually, as circumstances might permit. To the other body then created, a “Committee for the development of studies and scientific research,” was entrusted the gradual formation of a staff of competent teachers and professors for higher education generally and for scientific studies. But the work of these Committees, which, if steadily pursued, offers the best hope for the intellectual regeneration of Spain, was paralysed in the first year by Government interference. Between the formation of the Committees and the issue of their first Annual Report a change of Government took place, and the Ministry of Señor Maura, true to the traditions of Clericalism, did their best to bring all effective work to an end. They suppressed altogether the Committee charged with reforms in elementary education, and set up in its place a mere official bureau, powerless and useless. And though they did not actually abolish the Committee for Higher Education, they succeeded in putting an end to all effective work, by overriding its statutory constitution and curtailing its freedom of action, by stopping supplies, and by delaying or refusing the necessary official consent to measures proposed by the Committee. For instance, whereas the Committee had made arrangements with the French Ministry of Public Instruction for the disposal of the teachers who held grants for study abroad, the Government refused to recognise these arrangements unless they were made officially through the ambassadors, with the result that in the year 1908 none of these teachers were sent abroad. In the Budget for that year the sum set aside for foreign study was reduced by 110,000 pesetas (about £4,400), although in the previous year a quite exceptional number of applicants for these grants had come forward. These instances are sufficient to show the attitude of the Clericalists towards education, but the whole Report of the Committee shows how at every turn their work was checked