New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1879-07-28

DIR. Oliver Wendell Holiness life of study, of re-
Election, and of literary production gives to Ills opin-
ions on Reading peculiar value. His answer to the
question "How shall we readp is brief. lie
believes in reading in large proportion by subjects
rather than by authors-and certainly for syste-
matte accurate culture there can be no better plan
While such method gives to the mind plentiful
stores of fact and argument, it also inseD-
siblv leads it to arrangement, combination,
reflection and discussion; and it, no doubt, ex-
cludes much trash which unsystematlc reading
ignoranty admits. Some books" says the Doe
tor, "must be read tasting, as it were every word
y But once become familiar with a subject so as
to know what you wish to learn about it, and you
can read page as a fash of lightning reads it,
Learn a lesson from Houdin and his sons
practice OF looking in at a shop-window and
remembering all they saw. Learn to read
n page in the shortest possible time, and
TO stand a thorough examination on its
contentsn There could be no wiser injunction in
regard to reading than is contained in this last
sentence The number of books that are devoured
leaving mot wrack behind" is almost incredible;
perhaps TO five persons in fifty the reading of a
fresh volume is something more than temporary
excitement and amusement. Assimilation in the
matter of reading is not taught in the schools Of
any country DR.. Holmes has but small patience
with the habit of novel-reading and of those
Young women who do most perslstently pursue IT,
he saws: "What are they doing but pouring
wafer into buckets whose bottoms are as full of
holes as colander, and which would have nothing
10 show if Niagara had been emptied into them %
We are glad to see that determined effort to
put stop to hazing at West Point is being made by
the officers. Every attempt to harass the "plebes
by the lads who serve as corpOrals Is punished
promptly Ii is high time that this was done. The
Young fellows collected at West Point are
from every class of society, some of them
probably untitled by their former training
to conduct themselves as officers aud gen.
tlemen, however anxious they may be to do so.
Naturally too, being young, the effect of a little
brief authority over boys year behind them
makes them featherheaded and insoent In a civil
college this matter is of less Importance. The pub
lie simply withholds patronage from a school where
the officials cannot restrain such gross yulgarity
and ill-breedlng But West Point belongs to the
public. Ii has a right to expect the young men
whose education it pays for to stand not only as
brave and honest order, but as one of gentle
men. Unfortunately, Judging from the haz-
ing as practised there and from the
treatment of the colored cadets, there seems to
have been an unusually deficient apprehension of
the principles of good sense and good breeding
among the lads. In other colleges some originality
WAS shown in the matter Of hazing, but at West
Point the same sillH brutal tricks have been re-
peated year after year; they never grew stale or
yapid to the vitless boys. We are glad that the
officers at least have discovered that they are
tedious as we'll as vulgar.