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At this early season of the year we are crowded, overwhelmed with examinations and special written work. No sooner is the forensic brief handed in than there comes a thesis due in Philosophy so and so, and an hour examination in almost every course; in short we are surfeited with work, and so unable to do anything satisfactorily. Of course we cannot object to forensics since they are regularly counted as part of our college work, but a word may be said in reference to theses and hour examinations. Conceive them as best one may, the latter are certainly no more than necessary evils, though they serve a recognized purpose; any feasible plan for their abolition, there fore ought to be welcomed. Now during the present stress of work a thesis and an examination are often due almost simultaneously in the same course, and this it seems to us is distinctly rushing college work. It is the purpose of the examination to test the student's ability, to find out how well his college work has been done thus far. Unfortunately for the fairness of the test, however, the student has been forced in the month just passed to devote much of his time to the production of the thesis. Accordingly if his thesis is not counted he is hardly represented by the hour examinations. Why the thesis cannot take the place of the hour examination we cannot see. The faculty profess the greatest desire to abolish the test system and at the same time they enforce it in courses where better and fairer tests have already been given. The inconsistency is apparent. It is our humble opinion that the examination system, to say nothing of the amount of written outside work required in various courses, is being pushed to an extreme.