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anything in the way of patronage and nepotism, to provide for promotion by merit as against mere seniority, and to ensure, as far as possible, a fair remuneration to all employees for services rendered. A survey of the subject generally indicates that the trend of legislation dealing with Public Service administration in nearly all English-speaking countries during recent years has been in the direction of embodying these principles. The New Zealand Public Service Act was placed on the statute-book in 1912 : hence it may now be said that in this country the system has long passed the experimental stage. Indeed, despite the captious criticism of a few people who are motivated by interests other than those of efficiency in public administration, and the occasional disgruntled murmurings of certain individual, officers, there is abundant evidence that the system has stood the test of time. It has proved advantageous from the point of view of effective administration, and at the same time it has produced beneficial results to the officers of the Service. The following extract from a recent article dealing with this subject indicates the trend of thought in public administration :— In the absence of a duties classification one generally finds many cases in which the salary paid the employee bears no close relationship to the value of the work he does. In some instances specially privileged employees will receive fairly large salaries for the performance of the simplest, most routine duties ; in others an employee performing difficult and responsible work will be receiving the same small salary at which he entered the Service years before. He has tended to his duties instead of cultivating his influence, or he has been in an out-of-the-way corner where he did not come in contact with the powers that be. Such instances furnish the extreme illustrations. In a large Public Service considerable variation results simply from the absence of any unifying agency. Some governmental agencies are popular and get appropriations easily ; others are more or less starved. Some administrators work for high salaries ; some for low. The result is wide variation in pay for like duties. A duties classification largely eliminates such cases, because positions are allocated to classes, and salaries are fixed for classes on the basis of the duties and responsibilities of the class, regardless of organization units and the personal views of administrators. No formula exists for determining precisely what salaries should be fixed for the several classes of positions, but classification permits one to tackle the problem on the basis of facts. Proper classification furnishes the basis for getting the two most essential bodies of data —namely, statistics showing the distribution of the employees in each of the several classes of positions according to salary rates, organization units, and possibly by localities of employment, and figures regarding what other employers, public and private, pay for typical classes of positions that are comparable with those in the service being classified. The aims sought are frequently expressed in two slogans, " Equal pay for equal work," and " Salaries fair alike to the employees and the taxpayers." In a big Public Service these ideals are not achieved by chance ; they must be secured through system. When the class specifications descriptive of the positions and the significant statistical data are available, tho agency responsible for salary-fixing generally finds it possible to do a very respectable job in approximating the ideal. For each, class of positions several rates of pay should generally be established, so that recognition may be given for length of service and increased efficiency. Under ordinary circumstances the new employee in the class should begin at the minimum rate for the class and should be advanced according to some definitely understood, clearly-worked-out plan. Classification permits of the development of a definite plan, and the introduction of a clear-cut distinction between salary advancement due to length of service, increased efficiency, or a combination of the two, and a real promotion which involves selection to perform new duties or to carry materially heavier responsibilities. Classification should introduce into the Public Service the maximum possible incentive to efficiency, both by furnishing definite rewards for efficient performance of unchanged duties and by the maximum development of opportunities for advancement. In dealing with the basis and method of the classification system, the duties and responsibilities appertaining to a position should be the criteria upon which to determine the grading of a position. The various positions are grouped into classes, which classes disregard departmental lines but bring together in a common group all positions involving duties and responsibilities that are substantially the same. With some classification systems it is contended that, as it is the position that is classified, the question of the efficiency of the individual occupying the position, or any special personal qualifications possessed by him, should not be taken into consideration ; but as a matter of practice it is almost impossible to dissociate the personal equation, as frequently the possession or the lack of certain essential qualifications either makes or mars a given position. That the personal qualifications of the officer should be taken into consideration is supported by the words of the statute, which specially refers to " fitness," and