GERMAN AND ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 25, 30 January 1912, Page 3

GERMAN AND ENGLISH UNIVERSITIES.

' A COMPARISON. [BX TILEQRAPH — &SOXAL TO THI POST.] CHRISTCHURCH, Tim Day. Dr. C. C. Farr, Professor of Physics afc Canterbury College, who returned to Christchurch. last week from a visit to the United Kingdom and Europe, • spent i some ' time at the German universities, and in an interview yesterday he made eome^ interesting comparisons between the universities there and those in England. He stated that he, thought that the German institutions vrttb superior to those in England, if Oxford and Cambridge, which were 'of a very special character, were left out of the comparison. There were, on the authority of Mr. Runciman, 60,000 students at the German universities, and only 16,000 in the English universities, and that showed clearly that the German universities were more attractive. He believed that the explanation of the position would be found in the fact that at the Zeiss optical works, a staff of sixty scientific men were employed to do nothing but investigate the 'different problems connected with glass. These i men were drawn from the universities, and" were authorities in the ■ special branches of investigation they took in hand. The English houses seemed to be content to go along the old lines ; coneequently they did not offer the same wide field for students of scientific problems. England was at war with Germany already, but it was not a war of battleships and armies, but of brains and investigation, and, as far as he could see, the credit of the first round was with Germany. The German, " perhaps, was not quite so original as the Englishman, but he was a more patient investigator, and was more thorough in his methods. All the .German universities were eupported by the State, but while they drew funds from the State (they were allowed to govern themselves. A German professor told him that the State did not interfere with the work in any way. The high standard of work in Germany was maintained by a certaiß ' rivalry between the institutions, which had a very good effect. In Germany, however, there were 'no men who -were so original or so good in a general wa> in physical science as the two great English investigators, Professor E. Rutherford and Professor J. J. Thomson, who were admitted to be th& leaders. But the average German professor did a great deal more work in research than the average English professor did. . He had ' found Professor Bickerton very well, very hopeful, and very happy. His views in regard to his theories had been published in Knowledge. He had delivered a lecture before the Royal Institution, and the subject was discussed in the *pages • of the English Mechanic. Whether his theories would be accepted or not, he had succeeded in having them published, and that, apparently, was" the immediate object no had in view. . . '