And that our opinion is not formed from the smoke of straw, and lightly, is proved by the numerous lists of matriculations which accompany the conscientious and well written memorials by trustworthy Dominican fathers, especially those which were published in the years 1883 and 1887, because of the expositions of Amsterdam and Filipinas, in Madrid. We cannot resist the temptation to transcribe here a valuable paragraph, which wonderfully meets our purpose. It is taken from the writing signed by the excellent Dominican, Father Buitrago, for the last-mentioned exposition. It is as follows: "The first thing which offers itself to the consideration of the reader, is the multitude of the inscriptions of matriculation, and the small proportionate number of approvals. On this point, the first thing that offers is to investigate the causes of that disproportion, which is a great surprise to those who are ignorant of the special conditions under which secondary teaching in this country is found. Many of the young men who matriculate for it, have scarcely any or no desire to obtain a passing mark in their courses, their only object being to learn the Castilian language, and to know, in order that they may afterward occupy a more important position in their villages, some of the customs of the Spaniards. Those who come to Manila with the decided intention of terminating a literary career are relatively very few. In this matter their families exact but little also. And then there is added the method of living in this place, crowded together in their greatest part in private houses under the nominal vigilance of their landlords or landladies, as they call the owners of the houses in which they are lodged. Consequently, not few in this capital are reared in idleness and learn the vices of Europeans without taking on their good qualities. The rector of the university can do nothing on this point, for the rules allow students to matriculate two or three times or even more often, in the same course, in spite of their not passing in it." Before such an inundation of wise men, whose scholastic modesty suffers with a serene mind and with immovable resignation [resignación de estuco] three and more failures in one study, there is no other means, since the lash cannot be legally used, or the oak rod of the oldtime dominie, than to put in practice a salutary strictness in the examinations of the secondary education, and to revise the regulations more strictly, in order thereby to free the provinces of that inundation of learning which parches the fields for lack of arms to work them, uses up the savings of the wealthy families, fills the villages with vampires who suck the sweat of the poor or careless with impunity, increases the lawsuits and ill feeling in the villages, makes of the municipalities and offices a workshop of intrigue, and gives a numerous contingent to the lodges and to separatism.