The educational record of the province of Quebec, 1 avril 1883, Avril

[" THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD OF THE PROVINCE OF QUEBEC.No.2.APRIL, 1883.Vou.IIL PROCEEDINGS OF THE PROTESTANT COMMITTEE OF THE COUNCIL OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION.(Special Meeting.) EDUCATION OFFICE, QUEBEC, 2nd February, 1883.Which day a special meeting of the Protestant Committee of the Council of Public Instruction was held on the call of the Government of the Province of Quebec, through the Hon.the Superintendent of Public Instruction, for the consideration of the Teachers\u2019 Pension Act, and other proposed Acts on Education.Present: The Lord Bishop of Quebec, Chairman; Dr.Dawson, Dr.Mathews, Dr.Heneker, the Hon.James Ferrier, and the Rev.Elson I.Rexford, Protestant Secretary of the Department, to represent the Superintendent of Public Instruction.A letter from the Hon J.Wurtele, Provincial Treasurer, was read by Mr.Rexford, intimating that is was the intention of the Government to abrogate an Act passed in 1880 establishing a Pension and Benovolent Fund in favour of officers of Primary Instruction, and intimating further that it was the intention of the Government to provide for the payment of pensions to Inspectors of Schools, and to Professors of Normal Schools, and that before doing so the Government desire to consult and take the advice of the two Committees of the Council of Public Instruction.The Hon.the Provincial Treasurer also expressed his willingness to meet the Committees for the purpose of giving 5 54 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.any information and explanations which the Committees may : desire.The Hon.Messrs.Mousseau, Wurtele and Lynch had an I interview with the Committee.4 The Hon.Messrs.Wurtele and Liynch explained the views of a the Government in regard to the matters referred to above, and after some discussion it was unanimously Resolved, on the motion of R.W.Heneker Esq., D.C.L., seconded by Dr.Dawson : « Whereas this Gommittee has learned from the Government: 1.That they desire to introduce a Bill into Parliament for the abrogation of the Pension Act, 43, 44 Vic., Cap.22, and that before doing so they wish for the opinion of this Committee on the subject; 2.But that in order to protect existing interests they propose to revert to the old Pension Act passed 22nd December, 1856, under which School Teachers may by voluntary contributions take advantage of the said Act ; 3.And that they propose to increase the maximum of $8,000 stipulated under the said Act of 1856 by a further contribution of at least $1,000, (the said sum of $1,000 being the amount of Government contribution under Sec.12, Sub-Sec.3 of the Act of 1880) ; 4.That provision will be made for School Inspectors and Professors in, and Teachers of, Normal Schools, appointed by the Government, by placing them on the Civil Service Pension List ; 5.That the sums kept back from the Educational Grants, and from School Teachers, in anticipation of the present Act going into operation, will be ; paid over to the Committee of Public Instruction and to the Teachers through the School Boards ; This Committee expresses its approval of the proposed abrogation of the Act 43-44 Vic, Cap.22, subject to the provisions of articles 2, 3, 4, 5 above mentioned, but earnestly recommends the Government so to amend the provisions of the old Pension Act of 1856 as to induce a greater desire on the part of Teachers to take advantage of the same.That a copy of the above be immediately communicated to the Government with a request that permission be granted to publish the same without delay.\u201d The Chairman asked leave to give in the report of the Sub- Committee upon the petition of certain inhabitants of the School Municipality of Cox.The Secretary was instructed to hand the said report of said Sub-Committee to the Superintendent of Public Instruction.Dr.Dawson reported from the Sub-Committee on EDUCATIONAL Recorp that the publishers of the RECORD are willing to issue it once in two months, beginning February 1st, at the rate of $500 per annum for the copies required, and increase the number of pages in each number in proportion, improving also the quality of the paper.The suggestions made as to the contents of the journal will be attended to in the volume of 1883. EDUCATIONAL COUNCIL.55 The balance of account, $253.33, due the GAZETTE Printing Company was ordered to be paid as soon as the state of the Contingent Fund will permit.It was unanimously Resolved : \u201cThat the Superintendent of Public Instruction be requested to furnish, for the information of the Committee, a summary of the Grand Statistical Tables of Inspectors in reference to Protestant and mixed schools in the di¥- ferent districts of Inspection.\u201d The following letter addressed by Dr.Heneker to William White, Esq., as Batonnier of the Quebec Bar, in regard to the preliminary examinations for the admission to the study of the professions, having been laid before the Committee, it was unanimously Resolved : «That the letter read by Dr.Heneker be adopted by this Committee as expressing its views, and be printed in the Recorp and for general circulation.\u201d (Copy.) SHERBROOKE, 29th January, 1883.WILLIAM WurTE, Esq., Sherbrooke.My DEAR Sir, I am not about to address you officially, for I am not authorised to do so, yet I know you are so much interested in the question of education in this Province, that I cannot but feel (occupying as you do the highly honourable and important position of Batonnier of the Quebec Bar) that you ought to be made aware of the desires of the Protestant Committee of the Council of Public Instruction in the matter of the examination of candidates for admission to study the professions in this Province.I wish at once to state that the Protestant Committee do not in any way desire to interfere with the education of Roman Catholics.The two Committees of the Council of Public Instruction have the same object in view but they work on different lines.The Protestant educational system may be classified into three grades, viz., Common Schools, High Schools and Universities.With the limited means at the disposal of the Committee, they are endeavouring gradually to raise the tone of the High Schools.The Common Schools demand a great deal of thoughtful care in their administration, but hitherto they have been almost exclusively under the control of the Superintendent of Public Instruction; and the Universities, although receiving grants of public money, lie beyond the inspecting power of the Committee.Regular returns of their work and numbers are sent periodically to the Government, and they are worthy of the great confidence reposed in them by the public.But the High Schools, or Academies, as they are called in country parts, have been in a 56 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.most unsatisfactory condition.The Committee have laboured earnestly to raise their tone and to fit them for the work which the country demands of them.I do not wish to trouble you with an account of their short-comings and of the efforts of the Protestant Committee to improve them\u2014suffice it to say that the aim of the Committee is to make the Academies the means whereby young men may prepare themselves for the study of the professions and for entering the Universities, by giving them the ground work of a liberal education, such as may qualify them for public life, no matter what a man\u2019s special calling may be.One of the most serious difficulties the Committee have had to encounter arises from the powers possessed by the several professional bodies to examine candidates for the permission to enter on professional study.Thisis a very different thing from the professional examination itself for admission to practice.With this latter the Committee have no wish to interfere; it is entirely outside of their province.But, as to the admission to study, they feel that the best preparation a young man can have is a broad, liberal education without \u201c cram,\u201d such as will draw out the faculties and cultivate thought and observation.This style of training is equally applicable and useful to the intending student of Law, of Medicine, of Engineering and other professions, including even Divinity.Under the present system there is no uniformity of plan or subject, no trained body of Examiners, and in the uncertainty which prevails, students are led to search previous sets of questions and to prepare themselves by a system of \u201c cram.\u201d But further there is a great practical difficulty in the fact that no Academy teacher can give attention to students preparing for different professions, and at the same time attend to ordinary school work.Under such a demand any educational system will break down.The plan of the Committee is to have an Examining Board of trained teachers of experience, who may be appointed by the Government on the recommendation of the Committee with, if necessary, the concurrence of the professional bodies.Some such plan would meet the requirements of the case, provided the subjects taught in the Academies and High Schools formed the ground work of the examinations, and it would be of course open at any time to the professional bodies to recommend certain objects of study.The co-operation of the professional bodies would be welcomed by the Committee and would greatly strengthen their hands.The adoption of some such system would give a higher tone to education and secure a higher class of teachers, and the evils of the \u201c cram \u201d system would be avoided.The Committee moreover insist very strongly on the absolute necessity of recognizing the University Degree as in itself a qualification for the entrance on the study of a profession.The two Protestant Universities, MCGILL UNIVERSITY REPORT.b7 McGill and Bishop\u2019s College, are working to increase the quality of the degree.They are united on the subjects for matriculation in Arts, and although there are subsequent differences, so as to satisfy different classes of minds, yet both are earnest to require good work from their students.If the professional bodies will not accept men who have devoted three or four years of their strength to the study of Arts and Science, not in technicalities but on broad fundamental grounds, there would scem to be very little room for Universities at all in the Province of Quebec.Commending these (few observations to your kind notice and attention, I am, my dear Sir, very truly yours, (Signed) R.W.HENEKER.GEORGE WEIR, Secretary.ANNUAL REPORT OF McGILL UNIVERSITY, MONTREAL, For THE YEAR 1882.(Printed by permission of His Excellency the Governor-General, Visitor of the University.) To His Excellency the Most Noble the Marquis of Lorne, K.1., G.CM.G., &c., Governor-General of Canada.May IT PLEASE Your ExCELLENCY :\u2014 The following Report on the condition and progress of McGill University, Montreal, and its affiliated Colleges and Schools, for the year ending December, 31st, 1882, is respectfully presented to Your Excellency, as Visitor of the University, by the Governors, Principal and Fellows.In the present Session, the number of Students in McGill College is as follows :\u2014 Students in Law.200000 20000 coin ieee cian ann 39 Students in Medicine.vo vivian rn iii iene.185 Students in Arts, Undergraduates.1.93 \u201c « Partial and Occasional ,.49 Students in Applied Science.c.ccovvrivinnn nn.54 Total.00.000004 PAPA aan aan a 420 Or, deducting 5 students entered in more than one Faculty, in all 415.The students in Morrin College, Quebec, are 13 in the Undergraduate course, and 19 Occasional. RE 58 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.The Students in St.Francis College, Richmond, are 4 in the Undergraduate course, and 1 Occasional.It is to be observed that St.Francis College still suffers from the effects of the calamitous fire which destroyed its building last year.But it is hoped that under its new Principal, and with a new building now in progress, it will soon be enabled to surpass its former usefulness.The teachers in training in the McGill Normal School are 135./ The pupils in the Model School of McGill Normal School are 340.The total number of persons thus receiving educational benefits from the University is 927.Of the students and teachers in training in McGill College and the Normal School, above three hundred and fifty are persons not residing in Montreal, but attracted to it by the educational advantages offered by the University and its affiliated institutions.At the meetings of Convocation, held in March and May last, the following degrees were conferred :\u2014 Doctor of Civil Law.0\u2026en0c0cca cu 0000 000000 1 Doctors of Medicine.\u2026.\u2026\u2026.\u2026.jorca ss acces 00e 010000 27 Masters of Arts.22200000 000000 sa na 0000 ane vs 008 Sees 4 Master of Applied Science.0.a\u2026eresssaeu era 00000 1 Bachelors of Civil Law.00.02000000 een ane na 00 200000 17 Bachelors of Arts eee vee ste 00800 60000 202008 + 600000 0008 .ww.2.The Gold and Silver Medals offered by Your Excellency were awarded to deserving candidates: the Gold Medal for an Honor Course in Modern Languages, the Silver Medal for the highest standing in the examination for the degree in Applied Science.The Elizabeth Torrance, Holmes, Chapman, Shakespeare, Logan, Prince of Wales, and Sutherland Gold Medals were awarded in the Faculties of Law, Medicine and Arts.There being no candidate for the Anne Molson Gold Medal, a prize of equivalent value was given in the third year.The income of the Hannah Willard Lyman Endowment Fund was, as usual, given in prizes in the examinations of the Ladies\u2019 Educational Association of Montreal.At the close of the Session of the McGill Normal School, in July, the following diplomas were granted by the Hon.the Superintendent of Education :\u2014 . MCGILL UNIVERSITY REPORT.59 \\ For Academies.2.000004 0000 ane 0e aa 8 aa ana asc sea va 0 9 « Model Schools.220008 02s a care eue a ana en 0 aa e 29 « Elementary Schools.0.054000 000000 aan a 00000 52 90 making a total of 1,496 diplomas given by the School since its commencement.The Silver Medal given by your Excellency, the Prince of Wales\u2019 Bronze Medal and Prize, and the Charles Wilson Prize were awarded to deserving candidates.In the School Examinations of June last, 52 candidates were successful ; of whom 48 passed as Associates in Arts, and 4 for the Junior Certificate.Nineteen of the successful candidates were young women, and the candidates were sent up from eight schools, three of them in the city of Montreal.The increase in the number of candidates for these examinations is a gratifying feature of the year.Ten Scholarships and Exhibitions, of the value of $100 to $125, were awarded in the examinations held in September last.Of these, seven were the gift of W.C.McDonald, Esq., one of Mrs.Redpath, one of Charles Alexander, Esq., and one of George Hague, Esq.The whole number of Scholarships and Exhibitions, including those held for two years, was thus fourteen.The Scott Exhibition of $66, the gift of the Caledonian Society of Montreal, as well as a Prize of $50, contributed by A.T.Drummond, Esq., and prizes of $25 each contributed by Leslie Skelton, Hsq., S.Greenshields, B.A., and W.W.Watson, Esq., were awarded in the Faculty of Applied Science.An Exhibition of $100 contributed by J.H.Burland, B.A.Sc., was awarded in the Course of Practical Chemistry in the Faculty of Applied Science.In the Faculty of Arts 87 exemptions from fees were granted on Benefactors\u2019 Scholarships.The University has sustained in the past year a serious loss by the death of Dr.George W.Campbell, Dean of the Faculty of Medicine.It is unnecessary here to refer to the long and very eminent services of Dr.Campbell to the University and to the cause of professional education in Canada.Both by the Medical Faculty and by the University in general, his departure from among us is severely felt and greatly lamented, and his virtues and public services have been commemorated by this University, not only in resolutions entered on its records, but in the tribute paid 60 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.to his memory in connection with the fiftieth anniversary of the establishment of the Medical Faculty.Another loss-to our teaching staff is the removal by death of the Rev.Dr.DeSola, who occupied the position of Professor of Hebrew and Oriental Literature in the Faculty of Arts since its re-organization under the New Charter, and whose great learning and devotion to his subject gave the highest character and reputation to the work of that important chair.In the Faculty of Medicine Dr.Robert P.Howard, Professor of the Theory and Practice of Medicine, has been appointed to the office of Dean.The chair of Hebrew has not yet been filled, the Governors being desirous in the first instance to secure an adequate endowment for it, and having made an appeal on its behalf to the friends of education, and especially to those interested in the Affiliated Theological Colleges.In the meantime they have fortunately been able to secure the valuable services of Rev.Professor Daniel Coussirat as Lecturer.The New Regulations respecting Degrees in Arts, referred to in last report, have been passed by the Corporation and are now in operation.The Peter Redpath Museum, which was approaching completion at the date of last report, was ready for the reception of specimens early in June, and the most strenuous efforts were made to have the collections transferred to, and arranged in it, before the meeting of the American Association.This object was happily attained, and we were able to open the Museum to the public on the occasion of the meeting of the Association, and to accommodate three of its Sections in the class-rooms.The report of the Museum Committee, containing notices of these proceedings and other matters of interest, will be published for the information of the public.The new Museum proves to be in every way admirably suited to the objects for which it has been established, and the rooms vacated by the classes in Natural History, and by the collections, have been at once applied to other important University uses.A number of gentlemen of this city, desirous to testify their sense of the munificence of Mr.Redpath, have subscribed toward a portrait to be placed in the Museum, and this is now being executed by an eminent London artist. MCGILL UNIVERSITY REPORT.61 The number of volumes in the Library has risen to 19,374, and an important addition has recently been made by the liberality of the Hon.Justice McKay, a member of the Board of Governors, who has presented his Library, with thè\u2018cases in which it is contained, to the University.The fire-proof room previously occupied by the Carpenter Collection of Shells, is now fitted up for the reception of this most valuable donation.In the past session Professor Markgraf, who has for more than twenty years discharged the duties of Librarian, in addition to those of his chair, has been relieved of this portion of his work.and W.McLennan, B.C.L., has been appointed Honorary Librarian, with Mr.M.Williams Taylor, as Assistant.It is much to be desired that an adequate salary should be provided for the important office of Librarian.In order to secure a more systematic supervision of the affairs of the Library, a permanent Committee of Corporation was appointed for this purpose last year, and has entered on its duties.The extreme pressure of the financial difficulties referred to in last Report was happily removed for the time by the liberal subscriptions of the citizens of Montreal, though these were not sufficient to avert certain reductions and economies which have much {hindered the progress of our work.These subscriptions have amounted to $28,500 for the general endowment, $27,500 for special funds, and $18,445 distributed over three to five years in aid of current expenses, being $74,445 in all.In addition to these donations, we have to record, with gratitude, the generous bequests of the late Major Hiram Mills, amounting in all to $43,000, and that of the late David Green- shields, Hsq., of $40,000.Both of these are now bearing interest for the University, and it is proposed that both sums shall, as far as is consistent with the wishes of the donors, be invested as endowments of chairs to bear their names.We are also happy to state that the litigation with reference to the will of the late Miss Barbara Scott, has terminated in favor of the University, and that we may soon hope to receive from this source $30,000 for endowment of the chair of Civil Engineering, and $2000 for a Classical Scholarship.It is a creditable evidence of the liberality of the citizens of Montreal that there has thus been contributed within two years in aid of the University a sum of more than $180,000. 62 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.The proposal made by the Dean of the Faculty of Medicine on occasion of the fiftieth Anniversary of that Faculty, with reference to a memorial to the late Dr.Campbell, has been warmly taken ho.A sum of $50,000 has been offered on condition that an equal sum shall be subscribed ; and there are fair prospects that this condition will be fulfilled.It should be added that the building and collections of the University have, in the erection of the Peter Redpath Museum, and the specimens placed in it, been increased in value by a sum of at least $130,000.Nor should it be forgotten that in the course of last year very large contributions have been made towards the buildings and endowments of several of our affiliated Colleges.At the meeting of the Corporation in January, 1882, the subject of the approaching Transit of Venus was introduced to the notice of the Corporation by Dr.Johnson, and a Committee was appointed with power to memorialize the Government on the subject, and to correspond with the Astronomer Royal and others.Arrangements to render available our observatory and telescopes were finally concerted with Mr.Carpmael, the head of the Meteorological Service of the Dominion, and while the Blackman 6 inch telescope and two others were to be used at Montreal, one telescope was sent to Ottawa, and one with other instruments to Winnipeg, the latter in charge of Professor McLeod of this University.As only a small portion of the grant given by the Dominion Government could be made available here, in consequence of the less perfect appliances existing in other cities, N.S.Whitney, Hsq.kindly consented to solicit subscriptions in aid of the work, and obtained the sum of $175, while the Board of Governors in the meantime advanced the sums necessary to make the preparations required.The day was unfortunately unfavorable at Montreal, but good observations were secured by our telescopes at Ottawa and Winnipeg.The building and outhouses of the Normal School have received some necessary repairs and improvements carried out by the Local Government ; but we have still to express regret, as in last report, that the Government has been unable to restore the annual grant of the School to its former amount, and that we have in consequence been under the necessity of abstaining from any addition to the work or its appliances, and of reducing as far as possible MCGILL UNIVERSITY REPORT.63 the expenditure.Notwithstanding these disadvantages, the number of students is still maintained, and the work is continued, it is hoped, with its usual efficiency.The number of diplomas granted at the close of last session was greater than in any previous year.The Meteorological work of the Observatory, in connection with the Meteorological service of the Dominion, and the time service to the city and other parts of Canada, with the instruction in Meteorological observations to students, have been continued as formerly, and the Report of the Superintendent has been sent to the Hon.the Minister of Marine and Fisheries.At the urgent request of the representatives of this University and that of Bishop\u2019s College, and in compliance with the known wishes of the heads of Academies and High Schools, a clause has been prepared by the Protestant Committee of the Council of Public Instruction, for submission to the Legislature, providing for the recognition of University degrees in Arts as qualification for entrance on the study of the learned professions, and it is hoped, in the interest of the higher schools, that provision will also be made for greater uniformity in the standard of examinations exacted from those who are not graduates.While it is probable that the financial embarrassments which marked the close ot the last educational year, and the consequent reduction of expenditure in many directions, have somewhat diminished the usefulness and prestige of the University in the present session, and may have tended to arrest the increase of its students, we have, on the other hand, many additions and improvements to record, and it is a matter calling for profound gratitude that our necessities have called forth so much of the sympathy and substantial aid of the community in which our work is best known.On behalf of the Corporation, (Signed,) J.W.DAWSON, C.M.G., LL.D, Vice-Chancellor. STATEMENT of RECEIPTS and EXPENDITURE of the ROYAL INSTITUTION for the ADVANCEMENT of LEARNING, from Ist July, 1881, to the 30th June, 1882.RECEIPTS.N FXPENDITURE.GOVERNMENT GRANTS :\u2014 Provincial .Superior Education Fund Dom.Gov\u2019t Grant,Observatory, $500,0bservers, $500 ASTRONOMICAL OBSERVATORY :\u2014 Grant City Corp., $150, Harbour Com\u2019n, $250.00 SCHOLASTIC FEES :\u2014 .; Faculty of Arts (ordinary & library).Faculty of Applied Science (ordinary & library).Botany & Zoology Gymnasium Registration Diplomas School Examination.secs es sue» $ 2,500.00 1,683.50 1,000.00 $ 5,133.50 400.00 COLLEGE GROUNDS CASUAL AMOUNTS ELECTION OF FELLOWS .\u202602200 0000 s ea 00 sac + rosea ANNUAL DONATIONS :\u2014 For Faculty of Applied Science \u201c Scholarships and Exhibitions \u2018\u201c Medals and Prizes SPECIAL DONATIONS:\u2014To Current Expenses ENDOWMENT SUBSCRIPTIONS, INTEREST INTEREST ON INVESTMENTS, &e.:\u2014 Accrued to date, including arrears from former y\u2019rs.33,507.25 Received this year on same 24,452.64 9,054.61 § 43,949.99 24,452.64 Leaving arrears of TOTAL ORDINARY RECEIPTS SPECIAL RECEIPTS :\u2014 For new Engineering Apparatus Molson Museum Maintenance 475.18 1,000.00 \u2014\u2014\u2014 1475.18 INVESTMENT ACCOUNT :\u2014 New Endowment Fund, 1881, payments W.C.McDonald Scholarship Endowment Investments repaid during year 103,546.21 30,720.14 $179,691.52 SPECIAL SAVINGS BANK BARANCES on hand, July 1, 1881.948.63 BALANCE IN GENERAL BANK ACCOUNT, July 1, 1881 20,771.51 MONTREAL, 2nd July, 1882.W.C.BAYNES, Bursar.ADMINISTRATION :\u2014 Salaries, (Principal, Secretary and Clerk).Office Expenses Porters\u2019 Account GENERAL EXPENSES: \u2014 .$ 3,899.92 .151.48 .1,152.96 \u2014\u2014$ 5,204.3 44 ue Printing, Advertising, and Stationery Charges (including Gibson Annuity and Insurance) Law Charges , College Repairs, $220, Grounds Maintenance, $320.36 EnpUCATION :\u2014 Faculty of Law : .Faculty of Arts and Vice-Deanship Faculty of Applied Science University Examiners (session 1880-1) Observatory Diplomas Natural Philosophy Class Gymnastic Instructor School Examinations 28,102.81 SCHOLARSHIPS and EXHIBITIONS Mepars and Prizes 2,345.42 Library, Maintenance and Assistance Purchase of Books 1,612.61 ELECTION oF FELLOWS 14.00 IMPROVEMENTS & ADDITIONS :\u2014College Grounds Museum, $528.86, Sundry petty items, $91.89 832.95 TOTAL ORDINARY EXPENDITURE $ 43,619.66 SPECIAL EXPENDITURE :\u2014 New Engineering Apparatus Molson Museum Maintenance 418.41 INVESTMENT ACCOUNT :\u2014 Invested during the year SPECIAL SAVINGS BANK BALANCES on hand, June 30, 1882.GENERAL BANK BALANCE on hand, June 30, 1881 102,167.62 1,686.68 81,799.15 \u2014 33,485.83 $179,691.52 VERIFIED, A.H.PLIMSOLL, Audaitor- DR, ARNOLD.DR.ARNOLD, THE PRINCE OF SCHOOLMASTERS.Br H.TarrersaLL, Hermitage School, Birkenhead.(Continued from p.50.) Arnold could use the cane, if required, and did use it.This capital punishment, however, was for the most pa confined to lying, idleness, insubordination, and such like vices.He never punished a boy for dullness.It was a good principle, and one well worthy of adoption by teachers generally\u2014that no scholar was castigated because he could not do a thing.He had another suggestive rule with regard to physical punishment\u2014he dia not appeal to it until, as he said, he had \u201c talked to the utmost.\u201d Ina letter written to a friend shortly after commencing at Rugby, he says: \u2014 \u201cI find that my power is perfectly absolute, so that I shall have no excuse if I do not try to make the school something like my beau ideal\u2014it is sure to fall far short in reality.There has been no flogging yet (and I hope there will be none) and surprisingly few irregularities.I chastise at first by very gentle impositions, which are raised for a repetition of offences ; flogging will be only my ratio ultima, and talking I shall try to the utmost.I believe that boys may be governed a great deal by gentle methods and kindness, and appealing to their better feelings, if you show that you are not afraid of them.1 have seen great boys, six feet high, shed tears when I have sent for them up into my room, and spoken to them quietly, in private, for not knowing their lessons; and I have found that this treatment produced its effect afterwards in making them do better.But, of course, deeds muat second words when needful, or words will soon be laughed at.\u201d In these latter days the principle of \u201ccorporal punishment\u201d has been made a burning question.A section of the {public has .arrived at the sublime conclusion that it is brutal, degrading, and barmful, and that it ought to be discarded.Able editors have descanted upon it, in most cases displaying their utter ignorance on the subject; sensational religionists have inveighed against it, ignoring alike the principles of Scripture and the results of practical experience ; critics and theorists of the Utopian cast have reviled it ; and tender-hearted\u2014almost equally tender- headed\u2014parents and guardians have raised their voices in protest 66 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.againstit.The pulpit, press, platform, and domestic circle have all joined.in the New Crusade.And the bulk of their efforts resolves itself into what a very distinguished man called the \u201c hair- brained chatter of irresponsible frivolity \u201d\u2014 what we prefer to call \u201cbosh.\u201d The grand failure of these sagacious reformers consists in this\u2014that they substitute nothing tangible for that of which th} wish to deprive us, and the great merit of which is its tangibility.Their objections are chiefly of a negative character.We are not in tune with the age; times and manners have advanced, and such punishment is now not suitable, but degrading, and has adeterrent effect upon the youthful characters of this Golden Era! The result of all which fine reasoning is that we, as practical teachers, have yet to learn that human nature in its youthful germs is of a more innocent or exalted constitution than it was when the schoolmaster first went abroad.It is interesting at a such a period to notice the answer of Dr.Arnold to the theory, against which even he had to contend, that for any offence corporal punishment is degrading.Arnold writes: \u201cI know well of what feeling this is the expression; it originates in that proud notion of personal independence which is neither reasonable nor Christian, but essentially barbarian.It visited Europe with all the curses of an age of chivalry, and is threatening us now with those of Jacobinism.At an age when it is almost impossible to find a true manly sense of the degradation of guilt or faults, where is the use of encouraging a fantastic sense of the degradation of personal correction ?There are other important points in Arnold\u2019s methods of discipline ; of which I cannot now speak in detail * It may, however, be remarked that his system, as a whole, was à thorou ghly revolutionary one in comparison with the then existing systems of public school management ; and, in the pursuit of it, he had many enemies and detractors.Not infrequently, in fact, the whole body of educationists was against him.But he pursued his course with unswerving constancy.Previously to his mastership, he had formed new and original ideas of his own with regard to school work and management.He took the post on the distinct *His much controverted \u201c fagging \u201d system hardly enters into the consideration of a paper of this character; nor can it be considered of much practical interest to elementary teachers. DR.ARNOLD.67 understanding that in these matters he was to be left absolutely free and unfettered ; and he had his triumph in the final successful establishment of his principles.System of Instruction \u2014Here it would seem as if we had Arnold at his best.He was pre-eminently, in the highest sense of the term, an educator.On contemplating him in this aspect one is struck with wonder and admiration.Surely no man ever brought to the work of education such a lofty conception of its duties, such a keen insight into its truest principles, such a concentration of thought and energy upon its requirements, and such an indomitable perseverance in overcoming its difficulties.He entered on his work with the vigour and freshness so characteristic of his nature.In this, as in everything, his earnestness and thoroughness were complete.In glancing at the distinguishing features of his system, I may first remark on one point which perhaps teachers would do well to emulate.He did not set a high value on mere intellectual ability.Not that he despised cleverness; like most teachers, he was glad to recognize and acknowledge it; but for ability which was devoid of moral tone he had not the the least respect.\u201c Mere intellectual acuteness,\u201d he said \u201cdivested as it is in too many cases of all that is comprehensive, and great, and good, is to me more revolting than the most helpless imbecility, seeming to be almost like the spirit of Mephistopheles.\u201d What he desired to see above everything else \u201cwas moral thoughtfulness\u2014the inquiring love of truth going along with the devoted love of goodness.\u201d Dean Stanley, in his excellent ¢ Tiife of Arnold,\u201d saye, \u201c The university honours which his pupils obtained were very considerable, and at one time unrivalled by any school in England; and he was unfeignedly delighted whenever they occurred.But he never laid any stress upon them, and strongly deprecated any system which would encourage the notion of their being the chief end to be answered by school education.\u201d What Arnold respected above all was plodding, persevering industry.When speaking of a pupil who had been noted for this quality, he once said \u201cI would stand to that man hat in hand.\u201d He once got out of patience and spoke sharply to a dull but plodding boy, when the pupil looked up in his face and said, \u201c Why do you speak angrily, sir?Indeed I am doing the best that I 68 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.19 can.\u201d Long afterwards he would relate the incident, and say, \u201cI never felt so much ashamed in my life; that look and that speech I have never forgotten.\u201d And so it was throughout.The generations of his boys upon which he looked back with the greatest amount of pleasure were not those who had displayed the greatest intellectual brilliance, but those who had been the most persevering and industrious.The great fulcrum of Arnold\u2019s whole method was one which elementary teachers would do well, so far as lies in their power, to adopt\u2014the principle, namely, of \u2018\u2018 awakening the intellect of every individual boy.\u201d One of the guiding rules which he set before his assistants and himself in their treatment of pupils was that as much as possible should be done by the boys, and as little as possible for them; and in this we recognize one of the great aims of true education\u2014the drawing out of latent powers.He taught to a large extent by questioning.His explanations were only just sufficient to clear away the difficulty; only the absolutely necessary amount of information was given.His teaching was Socratic; he imparted knowledge by eliciting it.He held, with regard to the younger boys, that \u201cit is a great mistake to think that they should understand all they learn; for God has ordered that in youth the memory should act vigorously, independent of the understanding, whereas a man cannot usually recollect a thing unless he understands it.\u201d But as the scholars advanced in the school he tried to cultivate in them, proportionately to their advance, an increasing degree of intelligence.They were not only to possess a knowledge of facts\u2014they must comprehend the principles underlying those facts and they must further be able to express those principles in language of clearness, and intelligence.\u201cYou come here,\u201d he said \u201cnot to read, but to learn how to read.\u201d In the school exercises, what he looked for above everything else, was thoughtfulness, the promise of originality.\u201cI call that the best theme,\u201d he said, \u2018\u201c which shows that the boy has read and thought for himself; that the next best which shows that he has read several books, and digested what he has read ; and that the worst, which shows that he has followed but one book, and followed that without reflection.\u201d His teaching, like everything else about him, was characterised by throughness.He looked at a subject all round ; exhibited it in all its bearings and relationships.Thus, in teaching a language, he did not consider the language only; DR.ARNOLD.69 but the particular age, and the authors connected therewith, were surveyed and commented upon.Of the different Subjects of Instruction, he was an advocate for the supremacy of classical studies as the basis of intellectual advancement.\u2018The study of language,\u201d he said, \u201c seems to me as if it was given for the very purpose of forming the human mind in youth.\u201d He stoutly defended classical instruction against those who assailed it.At the same time, however, he introduced much of newness and freshness into the school curriculum.He encouraged general reading, and stimulated any aptitude that was exhibited by any of the boys for particular pursuits.He also commenced in the school the study of modern history, modern languages, and mathematics, thus instituting a complete reform in the studies generally undertaken by the public schools of the time.In addition to this, he gave much greater prominence than was usual to the study of the Scriptures.That Arnold was a good classical teacher, went without saying; but every teacher has his favourite subjects, and his were modern history and geography.His teaching of these afforded the greatest delight and entertainment to his pupils.The two subjects he always maintained were inseparably connected, and must be taught together.But in all his teaching, whatever the subject might be, he never lost sight of the connection between knowledge and Christian morality.The bond of union between true ability and goodness he held to be indissoluble.To the all-absorbing claims of this bond he directed his energies.He would recommend his pupils to \u201cnote, in any common work that they read, such judgments of men and things, and such a tone in speaking of them as are manifestly at variance with the spirit of Christ.\u201d He would ask \u201c whether the Christian ever fecls more keenly awake to the purity of spirit of the Gospel, than when he reads the history of crimes related with no true sense of their evil.\u201d His biographer remarks, \u201c No direct instruction could leave on their minds a livelier image of his disgust at moral evil, than the black cloud of indignation which passed over his face when speaking of the crimes of Napoleon, or of Caesar, and the dead pause which followed, as if the acts had just been committed in his very presence.\u201d His personal share in the work of instruction was for the most part confined to the sixth or highest form.But in addition to 6 dise rip sise 70 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.this he conducted periodically general examinations of the school, and devoted two lessons every week to each form in succession.Stanley gives a most graphic account of his manner and bearing in conducting a lesson or an examination.He says his old scholars \u201cwill at once recall those little traits which, however minute in themselves, will suggest to them a lively image of his own manner.They will remember the glance with which he looked round in the few moments of silence before the lesson began; the attitude in which he stood, turning over the pages of Faccio- lati\u2019s Lexicon or Pole\u2019s Synopsis, with his eye fixed on the boy who was pausing to give an auswer; the well-known changes of his voice and manner, so faithfully representing the feeling within.They will recollect the pleased look and the cheerful \u2018 Thank you\u2019 which followed upon a successful answer or translation ; the fall of his countenance, with its deepening severity, the stern elevation of the eyebrows, the sudden ¢Sit down\u2019 which followed upon the reverse; the courtesy and almost deference to ?the boys as bis equals in society, so long as there was nothing to disturb the friendliness of their relation; the startling earnestness with which he would check in a moment the slightest approach to levity or impertinence; the expressions of delight with which, when they had been doing well, he would say that it was a constant pleasure to him to come amongst them.\u201d With the younger children his manner was always tender and sympathetic.\u201cIn examining them in the lower forms, he would sometimes take them on his knee, and go through picture-books of the Bible or of English history, covering the text of the narrative with his hand, and making them explain to him the subject of the several prints.\u201d Under this division of our subject it only remains to add that Arnold always maintained that, in order properly to discharge his duties, a schoolmaster ought to be continually and systematically improving his own mind.A teacher, he held, ought as far as possible to keep abreast of the age in which he lives.Writing to one of his old pupils who had commenced the work of tuition, he says: \u2018\u201c You need not think that your own reading will now have no object because you are engaged with young boys.Every improvement of your own powers and knowledge tells immediately upon them; and, indeed, I hold that a man is only fit to teach 80 long as he is himself learning daily.If the mind once becomes DR.ARNOLD, 1 stagnant, it can give no fresh draught to another mind ; it is drinking out of a pond, instead of from a spring, And whatever you read tends generally to your own increase of power and will be felt by you a hundred ways hereafter.\u201d Acting on this principle, he spent much time in reading and study ; and, although the school claimed by far the geater part of his time and energies, yet he busied himself in the preparation of important works for publication, and few questions of social, political or theological interest passed him unnoticed or uncom- mented upon.A very important feature of the indirect influence of Arnold upon the school, which I cannot but mention, but can hardly do anything more, it contained in the sermons which he preached to the boys, Sunday by Sunday, in the school chapel.These sermons almost invariably bore directly upon the position and relationships of the boys in the world of school; the cultivation of true nobility of character; the peculiar temptations by which, as youths, they were surrounded ; and the besetments and difficulties they might expect to encounter when, on leaving school, they would launch out on the battle of life.Such sermons, by such a man as Arnold, must have wielded untold influence for good in the minds and characters of, at any rate, many of his youthful auditors.Even at the time of their delivery they must have often produced a considerable impression, which was not confined to the naturally high-natured characters, but extended to those of a more carcless or indifferent tone.One who regularly heard them says, \u201c I used to listen to them from first to last with a kind of awe, and over and over again could not join my friends at the chapel door, but would walk home to be alone; and I remember the same effects being produced by them, more or less, on others, whom I should have thought as hard as stones, and on whom I should think Arnold looked as some of the worst boys in the school.\u201d One important point yet remains to be noticed\u2014his personal intercourse with and influence over, the scholars.In a school of 300 boys it was of course impossible to be personally acquainted with each to the fullest extent; but few scholars passed through Arnold\u2019s hands without experiencing the good effects of his individual interest in them.This feeling often commenced on his part long before the particular boy was aware of its existence ; 72 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.and in many cases not until they had either left the school, or were about to do so, did the boys become acquainted with his great sympathy and interest in their different characters : and pursuits.Speaking to one of his assistant-masters of a young boy, who had not been long in school, he once observed, with voice trembling with emotion, \u201c If he should turn outill, I think it would break my heart.\u201d And on another occasion he remarked \u201c It is a most touching thing to me to receive a new fellow from his father, when I think what an influence there is in this place for evil, as well as for good.Ido not know anything which affects me more.Ifever I could receive a new boy from his father without emotion I should think it high time to be off.\u201d The great degree of this personal sympathy, as has been hinted, far exceeded any outward or direct manifestation of it; but it was none the less real.One testimony, among others, to its depth and sincerity is well afforded in the inimitable \u201cTom Brown\u2019s Schooldays\u201d of Mr.Thomas Hughes, which, although a tale, is confessedly a relation of personal experience at Rugby\u2014in fact, the whole book is a witness to the greatness of Arnold\u2019s character.This fine characteristic of his personal sympathy, united to his many other great qualities, awakened in many of Arnold's pupils, as they advanced in the school, sentiments of the deepest respect and affection.One of them writes: \u201cI am sure I do not exaggerate my feelings when 1 say that I felt a love and reverence for him as one of quite awful greatness and goodness, for whom I well remember that I, used to think I would gladly lay down my life.\u201d His interest in the scholars did not cease with their school career, but followed them in their after-life.No pupil left him without receiving earnest and solemn words of advice and counsel.Some in straightened circumstances, received from him generous gifts of books, and even pecuniary aid.In their after-careers, many of them looked upon him as their most faithful friend and the\u2018r adviser\u2014turning to him in the emergencies of their lives for help and counsel, and reverencing him almost as a father.What teacher could but envy such a teacher as this?It would seem as, if in his case at least, the true, grand aims of education had been to a great extent realised.For fourteen years Arnold continued his work at Rugby; and he lived to see the triumph of his principles.Loud and frequent were the storms raised against DR.ARNOLD.13 him in the early stages of his labours.Great was the opposition to his educational innovations.From the public, the press, from parents, and from edueationists themselves, the voice of protest was heard loud and repeatedly; but he worked on unflinchingly, disdaining to sacrifice his convictions to popular clamour.At length people began to think there must be something in the new régime ; Arnold was tolerated, then lauded, and finally his system acknowledged to be supremely the best.Dr.Hawkins\u2019 prediction was fulfilled ; the face of the public schools throughout England became changed ; their systems were revolutionised; Arnold was the acknowledged regenerator, and Rughy became the model for all.In this paper I have naturally been most concerned with Arnold as a teacher and an educationist, and even that only in a very imperfect and fragmentary degree.To do him justice in all the phases of his character, would require more than a volume of essays.Notonly was he an educationist, but also a theologian, a preacher, an historian, an essayist, a politician, and a practical philanthropist.And in each and all of these, his character is invariably distinguished for its guiding principles of honesty fearlessness, earnestness, vigour, zeal, and, above all, deep Christian goodness.The results of his work as an educationist, are most prominently manifested in the public schools of England.But they are not confined to these; they have spread like leaven throughout the educational systems of the country.It would be interesting, and perhaps not altogether unprofitable, to speculate on the degree of influence exercised by the example of Arnold on our present system of elementary education.I am of opinion \u2018that the greater part of whatever good features that system pos- sessess finds a parallel in his methods.At all events, within forty years of his death the public school and the elementary school have alike been greatly elevated.May not we take heart and struggle on for our further improvement and elevation ?True, we work under very different conditions from Arnold\u2019s ; true, our labours are cramped and trammelled in a way in which his never were ; true, our sphere of action is lower and humbler than was his.But, after all, school is school, and education is education.And if we have our difficulties and obstacles to encounter, Arnold had his\u2014and he overcame them.The conditions are changed, but the principles are the same.\u2014 The Schoolmaster. Authorized by the Superintendent of Public Instruction.COURSE OF STUDY FOR ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS, Protestant Inspector of the Province.Unanimously recommended for the District Schools by the SUBJECT.FIRST GRADE.SECOND GRADE.THIRD GRADE.FOURTH GRADE.READING I READER.The meaning and spelling of words of each class.Special attention to be given to IT READER.of the lesson, subject matter of the pleasantness and brightness of] JIT READER.lesson and committing selections to tones, and fluency, clearness and IV READER.memory, to form part of the work correctness of pronunciation.SPELLING Writing words of Reading Lesson on slates from blackboard.Writing words dictated by the teacher.Copying words from Reading 00k.Copying portions of Reading Les- on slates.Dictation of sentences and detached words from Reading Book.Oral spelling.Dictation of sentences and detached words from Speller.Meanings of words.Oral spel- ing.Dictation.Definitions, Simple derivations.Oral spelling.\u2018WRITING Slate exercises in holding pencil and in hand movements.Simple words and their letters taken from Reading Lesson.Small letters and the numerals.Capital Letters, Analysis of Letters, Writing on slates.Copy Writing.Copy writing.Copy writing.Business forms.ARITHMETIC Counting, Mental Arithmetic, Addition and Subtraction with numbers_of three figures.Reading and Writing Nos.to 1,000.Multiplication table to 6 times 9.Mental Arithmetic, Four Simple rules to Long Division inelusive.Multiplication Table, Avoirdu- ois Weight.Long and Liquid easures.Mental Arithmetic, Long Division, Compound Rules, Simple Examples in Fractions.Dry, Time, Square and Cubic Measures.Mental Arithmetic, Fractions, Decimals, Elementary Interest and Percentage.Encuisu LANGUAGE LESSONS.(Conversation with pupils on familiar subjects.Short stories related by the teacher and repeated by the pupils.Writing names of objects.Writing one or more sentences about a particular object.Correction of colloquial errors.) (Completing sentences.Forming sentences containing particular words.Writing out the subject! matter of a story or of a Reading Lesson after it has been talked over.Correction of colloquial errors.) Also Reading and committing to memory interesting and simple selections from best English Prose and Poetry, with questions upon meaning and allusions of selections, meaning of words and Parts of Speech.Parsing and Analysis of Simple Sentences.Study of selections from best writers.Letter Writing.Descriptive Composition. DRAWING.Straight lines and their simpleriStraight Lines and Curves and|Drawing from flats.combinations on slates from their simpler combinations on Blackboard.slates from the Blackboard.of Western Hemis drawing.Divisions of|Map of Canada.phere.Map of school Elementary terms: Land and Water.neighborhood.GEOGRAPHY M Map OBJECT LESSONS or Useful Know- ., .Form, Color, Size, Weight, Motion, Plants, Animals, Manufactured Articles.Minerals of the Province, and their uses.) J Readings and Short Talks (at least once a week) upon Godliness, Truthfulness, Honor, Kindness to Animals.Respect for Other SCRIPTURE TORFY.\u2026.Oral Lessons on Chief Events in Old Testament History to Death of Moses.Commit to memory the Ten Commandments- Oral Lessons on Chief Events to ivision of the Tribes.Oral Lessons on Chief Events in the Life of Christ.Commit to memory the Lord\u2019s Prayer.Rote singing- Rote singing.Rote singing.Drawing from flats.Map of Eastern Hemisphere.Map drawing.(Special attention to Plants, Animals, Forest Trees and 8, Good Manners, Temperance and Oral Lessons on Chief Events to the end of the Captivity.Rote singing.Elements of musical notation.Outline of Canadian History to Capture of Quebec.Book-KEEPING.Outline of Canadian History.Great Events of English History.Single Entry, Making out Accounts, Receipts, Orders, &e.Texr-Books necessary for each grade Table Card, Slate, I Reader, Table Card, Slate, Copy Book, Blank IT Reader, Slate-pencil - Slate-pencil Book, Pen, III Reader, Speller, Arithmetic, Geography, Canadian History, Pen, Ink, Slate, Slate-pencil, Lead-pencil, Blank-book, Draw- ing-hook, Copy-book.IV Reader, Speller, Geography, Grammar, History, Arithmetic.Drawing - book, Blank- books, Sopy-book, Pen, Ink, Pencils, ate.The work indicated in each column should be done while the pupil is mastering the Reader at the head of that column.An Ungraded School with one teacher, should not have more than four classes in one subject.The pupils of such a Writing, Drawing, Object Lessons and Music.ELSON I.REXFORD, Secretary of the Department of school should be taken together in Public Instruction, Quebec. T6 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.THE LARGEST LADIES\u2019 COLLEGE IN THE WORLD.By J.C.TuorpeE, B.A., Oxon.(Continued from p.29.) I have said that the system of study in use in Wellesley College is the natural system, by which I mean that science in all the class-rooms is taught by object-lessons and by experiments performed by the learners themselves.The course of Mineralogy well illustrates my meaning.Each girl who enters for this course has a tray lent to her by the College, containing all the minerals which her class is studying, and this she can keep in her own room.She thus comes to have an acquaintance, not with the names of minerals but with the minerals themselves.She has also facilities for examining every specimen with the blow-pipe, and for determining its composition, and she thus comes to know all that is to be known about the object in question.The training in this course which I have instanced is thorough, and thoroughness seems to me one of the first essentials in education.This mode of instruction of course necessitates a large collection of natural objects within the museum walls, but the results obtained are well worth the preliminary expense.For what are the results of this method?Briefly these; that the next generation of American women will know how to observe accurately and to reason correctly.I have dwelt at some length on the system of instruction in the scientific class-rooms and laboratories.In the literary classes the methods are none the less natural.In the Modern Language classes, at first no text-books are used, and only French or German, as the case may be, is spoken.In the dining-hall there are French tables, and the French teacher is a Parisian.Thus in the study of modern languages the girls advance scientifically from the particular to the general.They learn no rule until they have become thoroughly acquainted with sentences illustrating the application of the rule.In the classes devoted to History and Literature no special text-books are employed; the girls have free access to all the works in the library, and they are expected to get up these subjects from the original authors.The study of literature is considered essential to woman's higher education, and is pursued, whichever of the courses mentioned above the student is taking up.Thus literature is not neglected by those WELLESLEY LADIES\u2019 COLLEGE.m7 who make a special study of science or of mathematics.Its refining and cultivating influence is felt by all.The girls are taught by means of lectures, at which attendance is voluntary, and by means of recitations, the latter sometimes taking the form of a quiz, or of question and answer.Teaching by means of recitations is, I think, unknown to the English system of education.It has much to recommend it.The student, after consulting her authors on any subject, is required to recite before her class, and to do this without the help of leading questions put by the teacher.She has to give in order what she considers the main points of her subject after she has arranged and classified the facts which she has gathered from the original authors.To do this with any success, the girls must form opinions for themselves, and such too as will bear criticism.Independent thinking is encouraged; and I should like to know why our girls, as well as our young men, should not be trained to become independent thinkers.Wellesley has many literary societies, and of these the Shakespeare Society is one of the most flourishing.At stated times this society has open meetings when the whole college is invited to listen to the reading of some play by some fine speaker.A systematic Sunday course for the historical study of the Bible is in universal use, and is so arranged that the whole Bible is gone through during the four years a girl spends at the College.Many will be interested to know that Latin verse is taught in the Latin classes, Particular attention is given to the writing of Latin prose.Wellesley possesses a large corps of professors and teachers, and it is particularly characteristic of this institution that all the resident teachers are women.The professor of Music is the only male professor, and he does not reside in the College.Occasionally lecturers come out from Harvard; and the lady to whose kindness I am indebted for a great deal of my information told me that they found more real enthusiasm amongst the Wel- lesley girls than in their own college.Certainly the surroundings at Wellesley are more calculated to inspire the young with enthusiasm than those at Harvard.At this point [ must speak of the Music Hall and Stone Hall.The Music Hall was completed in 1879, and is wholly devoted to the study of music.Its contains thirty-eight rooms for practice and for teaching, and a hall for choral singing.The floors are 8 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.deadened, while double partition walls and double doors prevent the transmission of sound from one room to another.The piano, organ, harp, violin, and violincello are taught.Besides those girls who join the five years\u2019 musical course, à few are allowed to devote their time solely to music.These latter, however, are only admitted after they have shown evidence of extraordinary musical ability.Stone Hall was founded by Mrs.Stone in 1879.It stands apart from the College, and is a large building, capable of accommodating 100 women.It is specially meant by its founder for those who are being trained as teachers, and within its walls are many who, finding their former education defective, have decided to go through a further course of study.Stone Hall is what Americans call a dormitory, i.e., a building in which a number of students have rooms; in this case they also take their meals in dining-rooms in the hall.Wellesley is thoroughly Christian and unsectarian.The deed of gift of Stone Hall, which is alike applicable to the whole Institution, makes it clear that to turn out Christian women is one of the first objects of the College.It is as follows :\u2014\u201c It is my hope and prayer that the young ladies who, in the coming years, may enjoy the benefits of Stone Hall, may learn, as the most important of all lessons, to become noble Christian women, and devote their powers and attainments to earnest lives of Christian usefulness.I have often and sadly observed the pitiable worthlessness, both to themselves and others, of the lives of women when given up to selfish frivolity or wasted in the pursuit of mere personal enjoyment.And often, too, have I noted, with admiration and gratitude to God, the saintly beauty and beneficent power of the lives of truly Christian women, whose learning has been too genuine for sceptical conceit, and whose refinement has been too thorough for fastidious selfishness, but whose highest aim has been simply to do faithfully and cheerfully the work which God in His providence had assigned them, wherever and whatever it might be.Such are the women whom, for their own sake and the world\u2019s, I most earnestly desire to aid in training\u2014women who will always regard a symmetrical Christian character as the most radiant crown of womanhood, and a life spent in humble imitation of Him, who \u2018came not to be ministered unto but to minister,\u201d as the noblest of all aims.\u201d I have spoken of the two principal and fundamental objects 79 WELLESLEY LADIES\u2019 COLLEGE.of Wellesley College.The first and principal one is to furnish teachers thoroughly trained in the most approved methods; and in particular those who take up science are taught that no training is of use, unless it is based on the most exhaustive practical work.The second object is to give to women a high class university education.Underlying these two objects, and of far greater importance is the aim of the College to pass out from its walls none except Christian women.I take a university education in its best sense to mean not merely the acquisition of a certain amount of knowledge combined with an intellectual training, but à training that will develop equally the physical, moral, and intellectual being of the man or woman subjected to it, This equal development of all sides of woman\u2019s nature is what Wel- lesley tries to accomplish.In the words of one of her graduates, \u201cWe strive to send out from our walls into the world women educated systematically, not in one direction only but in every way.We wish them to be strong physically, intellectually, and morally,\u2014beautiful, pure-souled girls who shall make the world better for their having been in it.\u201d I think I have shown what a high standard of intellectual excellence is required.The moral tone of the College is also very high.Here it is the fashion to work, and idleness is rare, through the force of public opinion.Some time ago one of the undergraduates was given to the use of keys or translations in preparing her translation lessons.This led the girls to pass a law against the use of ponies and keys.They proposed that any one found guilty of using them should be waited upon by a committee of the classes, and requested 10 give up the practice, and that, as a last resource, the faculty should be desired to order the removal of the offender.Monday at Wellesley is a whole holiday.This is the day on which the girls go into Boston or receive visitors.There is the same freedom as in young men\u2019s colleges, and this freedom is not abused.Here sense has expelled sensibility, and girls have ceased to walk in a row over a specified distance to be accomplished in a specified time.Between the teachers and the taught there is a sympathy and a fellow feeling which does much to make the college what it is.The teacher does not place herself on a pedestal of non-approachability, but is the friend, and in many cases the confidential adviser, of the student.The teachers are all Christian women, and none except such occupy any position of 80 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.authority.Each one has a class of about fifteen girls, to whom she imparts spiritual instruction daily for a short time.By this means all the girls are brought under the direct influence of one of the faculty.Twenty minutes are set apart twice daily for private reflection, prayer, or Bible-reading, when no talking is allowed.The physical training of the young ladies is not neglected.There is a gymnasium with fine appointments in which all the lighter exercises suitable for women are practised.With this a teacher is connected, and the girls are taught how to breathe and how to carry themselves with ease and grace.In the winter there is skating, whilst in the summer there is boating on the lake.The lake looked lovely in the spring; in the summer, when the trees are in full foliage, it must be gorgeous indeed, crowded as it is with the row-boats of the girls, while its shores re-echo with their merry voices and their boating-songs.Wel- lesley has her boat-club, and there are fourteen eight-oared and six-oared boats on the lake.The girls here are classed or ranked according to the year in which they are to complete their course.This is the American system.For instance, all the freshmen (sic) of 1882 belong to the class of 1886, as this year is the last of the four through which their college career extends.There are thus four classes.The freshmen, or first-year students; the sophomores, or second-year students; the juniors, or third-year students; and the seniors, or fourth-year students.Each of these classes has its champion crew on the lake, and it is esteemed a great honour, and is an object of every girl\u2019s ambition, to become a member of the champion crew of her class.The boats\\ are all named.Amongst others are Evangeline, whose crew once rowed Longfellow over the lake; Undine, Maud Muller, Portia, Nautilus, Bon homme Richard, Ellida, and Pinta.The boats are assigned by lot at the beginning of the rowing season to the various crews which the girls have formed amongst themselves.This is done by the coxswains drawing the names of the different boats.Each boat has certain colours attached to it, and after the assignation the various crews provide themselves with the colours of their respective boats.The boating dress consists of a loose blouse, or sailor waist, a short, full skirt, and some sort of jaunty hat or cap.The crew, which was universally allowed to present the prettiest appearance last year, had WELLESLEY LADIES\u2019 COLLEGE.81 as its costume tennis-cloth suits with garnet-satin trimmings and soft low-crowned tennis hats.The colours of the Argo are royal purple and gold.One boat has black and gold colours, which carries me back to Brasenose College, Oxford.The colours of the Tanager are scarlet, like that of the bird after which the boat is named.Each crew has its own peculiar signal, and when the boats pass one another they salute.Before coming into shore, after the rowing exercise for the day, it is the custom for all the boats to collect in the centre of the lake, and for each crew to sing its own boat song, or for all the crews to join in some College song.Lawn tennis and croquet are also played at Wellesley, and I was told that there had been several transient dreams of a Ball Club.Why should not physical exercise and training develop in woman a womanly, just as they are acknowledged on all sides to develop in man a manly, independence.Such exercises must and do strengthen character, and they are important factors in augmenting that will-power if which so many are deficient.Just as they have helped to no small extent to make Oxford and Cambridge what they are to-day, so they will be powerful factors at Wellesley in determining the future of American women.What an interest will a mother, who has had the benefit of a training at this College, take in the games and sports of her children, an interest which is too often lacking and given to far less worthy objects.Although a writer in an American paper has boldly asserted that these girls are ready to row against any crew of young men, the lady who obliged me with the above account of the boats, and was herself a member of one of last year's crews, assured me that this was not so.Wellesley has her boats and boat club, but not her boat racing.Boating is not here carried to excess.The pretty customs connected with the rowing remind me of others which are interesting, inasmuch as they afford an insight into these girls\u2019 lives.On Flower Sunday, the first Sunday of the College year, the chapel is always beautifully decorated with flowers, the platform, which takes the place of the chancel, being surrounded with palm-trees and other rare foliage plants from the College conservatory.The text for this day\u2019s sermon is always \u201cGod is love \u201d The sophomores usually come back in the autumn a little earlier than the rest of the girls, so as to receive 82 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.the freshmen, and give them a welcome to their new home.The freshmen, on arriving, all find flowers in their rooms, placed there by the girls who are their seniors by one year ; and on one evening in the first week of their residence they are invited to a reception by the sophomores.This is the hazing of the freshmen, and a pretty custom it is.The spirit of fun is not absent, and I was told that some of the freshmen had very rough times.I think it will be seen that there is a real social life at Wellesley.The meeting together of the girls at meals, the numerous literary and other societies, the boat club with all its associations, all these favour social intercourse.The girls see little company from the outer world.They occasionally, however, give receptions, Germans (cotillons), and costume and character parties, whilst the different classes have every term their class social.A few words must be devoted to the girls\u2019 private rooms.A suite of rooms consisting of a parlour and two adjoining bedrooms is set apart for every three or four, students.In Stone Hall, where the students are older, each lady has a suite of rooms to herself.In their own rooms the girls do their evening studying.There is no general room where all meet for this purpose.The rooms are handsomely and neatly furnished, they are lighted with gas from the College gas works, and furthermore each student is provided with a German reading lamp.Each study- parlour has its separate hot-air flue, and the heat can thus be regulated at pleasure, and it must be remembered that this air reaches the rooms charged with a proper amount of moisture.The girls retire at 9.45, when every light is extinguished.I shall surprise my readers when I state that Wellesley has its fire-brigade manned exclusively by the girls.On every floor and at each end of the building hose, hand-pumps, fire-extinguishers and pails of water are kept constantly ready for use.The officers of the fire-brigade are a superintendent, assistant-superintendent, and secretary, whilst each company, which consists of six privates, has a captain and lieutenant.Three companies are formed for each floor, and occupy rooms near the place where the fire- extinguishers are kept.The alarm is the ringing of the large bell, whilst the number of strokes indicate the floor.The girls are drilled in handling the pumps, in forming lines and in passing the pails.The college is little likely to take fire, and as yet the brigade has seen no active service, but it is remembered that the WELLESLEY LADIES\u2019 COLLEGE.83 homes of many of these girls are not of so incombustible a material, and, that to know what to do in case of fire and to be trained to presence of mind may be useful to any one of them.With regard to the dress and manner of the girls, I would say, that they dress with due regard to their health, and that simplicity and economy in this matter are encouraged.Their manners were dignified and graceful, they seemed full of fun but yet neither noisy nor boisterous.Neither in dress nor in manner was anything fast or loud noticeable.Wellesley girls are considered remarkably free from slang.With regard to tHeir personal appearance, there is endless variety ; of course there is beauty, but I should say, if a woman\u2019s beauty rests not only on external charms of face and form, but on the spiritual and sympathetic life, which is seen, as in a mirror through them, Wel- lesley may be justly noted for the unforgettable faces of many most attractive women.In conclusion I have only to assure those who have read this account thus far, that Wellesley College is without doubt the most perfect institution of its kind in existence.Here women are being educated as they are educated nowhere else, and are being turned out fully equal to the young men who graduate from the best American colleges.Though at present not a College granting degrees, but only affording a high literary or scientific education, and not training its women for any individual profession, if we except that of teaching, Wellesley is on its way to become a university in the broadest sense of the term, and probably within a short time a School of Medicine will be attached to the college, while should a future generation demand them, there is no doubt that Schools of Law and Theology will be added.In future ages I can foresee a great university, where women will be trained for many callings, and for many professions.I hope that should this come about it will not spoil the pure, simple, beautiful, and artistic life of the College as it to-day is.I trust I have given my readers some idea of the beauty of the surroundings and of the grandeur and perfection of the building itself.Wellesley must be seen to be appreciated.Any one really interested in learning more of this College, should write to the President for the College calendar.The calendar enters very fully into the mode of instruction adopted, and describes the different courses.The President is Ada L.Howard, 84 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.Wellesley, Massachusetts, U.S.In my account of the College I have been guilty of no exaggeration; if I have been somewhat enthusiastic, it must be remembered that enthusiasm is the glorious privilege of youth.To see Wellesley and not be enthusiastic over it, is impossible.A NOTE.The following note, suggested by an article in the Recorp for August, 1882, appeared in the Notes and Queries column of 7%¢ Star, February 10th, 1883.e original writer (Recorp, Nol.II, p.316), had suggested, as the natural translation of Tacitus's celebrated epigram, \u201c praefulgebant eo ipso quod non visebantur,\u201d the English equivalent « were conspicuous by their absence.\u201d Mr.Geo.Murray has conclusively shewn, what was unknown to the writer, that this expression wae originally suggested by the passage under discussion, His note is as follows :\u2014 Passing over the question of the forcibleness or feebleness of Emerson\u2019s version of Tacitüs, I merely wish to point out on the very best authority that the phrase ¢ conspicuous by their absence \u201d\u2019 was actually suggested by the words of the famous historian.If the editor of the EDUCATIONAL RECORD is already aware of this fact, he will, I am sure, forgive me for reminding him of it.Dr.Ramage (the well known compiler of \u201c Beautiful Thoughts from Latin Authors\u201d) was evidently unaware of the fact when he wrote in Notes and Queries, \u201c1 do not know if this epigrammatic saying has been before traced to its source.If not, I believe that the idea is due to Tacitus\u2014Annals Book IIL, chap.76.\u201d Dr.Ramage is undoubtedly correct, if we may take the word of the originator of the phrase\u2014Lord John Russell.In his \u201c\u201c Address to the Electors of the City of London,\u201d dated April 6, 1859, he thus wrote of Lord Derby\u2019s Reform Bill, which had recently been defeated : \u201c Among the defects of the bill, which are numerous, one provision is conspicuous by its presence, and another by its absence.\u201d About a week afterwards, finding that his expression had been sharply criticized, he thus defended it at a meeting of Liberal electors: \u2018\u201cIthas been thought that by a misnomer, or bull, on my part, I alluded to it as a provision \u2018conspicuous by its absence '\u2014a turn of phraseology which is not an original expression of mine, but is taken from one of the greatest historians of antiquity.\u201d It is not impossible that Lord John Russell had also in his - SPELLING.85 mind the French epigrammatic phrase, briller par son absence, which had long before his time been modelled on the phrase of Tacitus, and applied to the case of Arnauld and Pascal, when their names were omitted from Perrault\u2019s \u201c History of Illustrious Men.\u201d Lastly, we are reminded by the saying of Talleyrand\u2019s observation, when his attention was drawn to the fact that Lord Castlereagh wore no decorations : \u201c Ma foi ! c\u2019est bien distingue.\u201d On referring to the best translation of Tacitus\u2014that by Messrs.Church and Brodribb\u2014I find the following version of the passage in the \u201c Annals\u201d: \u201cThe busts of twenty most illustrious families were borne in the procession.But Cassius and Brntus outshone them all, from the very fact that their likenesses were not to be seen.\u201d SPELLING.By Miss J.LurtreELL, Royal Arthur School, Montreal.How the manes of dead and gone compilers of spelling-books must shriek and groan and ¢ desolate themselves,\u201d to put it in a French way, over the taunts and gibes of modern spellers at \u201c old fashioned methods of teaching spelling,\u201d \u201clong columns of detached words,\u201d \u2018meaningless meanings,\u201d and such phrases as invariably introduce a new spelling-book and preface its own commendation! Yet, where is the improvement that makes its superiority so decided over its predecessors?We look for it in vain.Turn over the pages of the latest of our spelling-books and what do we find?It is the direct descendant of the condemned stock; here ave the peculiarities of family feature, the long columns of detached words alphabetically arranged, the family traits character, nay, even the vices, revealing themselves in the very method of instruction and followed as faithfully as any ancient spelling-book maker could suggest.Rest, rest, perturbed spirit! The modern spelling-book has not degenerated.It seems, rather, to have escaped that spirit of unrest and discontent which has taken to pieces the Arithmetic again and again, has elaborated the Writing-book into an elegance unsur- passable, and which has reformed the History, Grammar, Read- ing-books into tolerable usefulness.Although the cycle of words in general use is comparatively narrow and with a little comprehensiveness of design might well be included, significations and all, in a very ordinary-sized book ; 86 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.yet the designer of the spelling-book contents himself, and us very often, with piling word upon word with no other information respecting these than that they are accented on the first or second syllable, the \u201csound of a is as a in fate, airs,\u201d etc., or ¢ these are words liable to be misspelled,\u201d and here follow the technical or abnormal words of the language.What an elevated estimate these have of the capabilities of the child-mind, when they fear not to tempt it to battle with the most difficult words of the language, words totally incomprehensible to it in its immaturity.They seem to have overlooked the fact, that the orthography of a word and its signification are connected, indeed one would imagine that so long as a word is correctly spelled, all further duty towards it is thereby discharged.\u201c Words are the signs of ideas,\u201d some one says.\u2018 Words are combinations of letters,\u201d we teach : and so, like the learned priests of old, we guard the mysteries of our etymologies from common understanding and reign in undisturbed pedagogy.There is no profit in indulging the rash humor which our mothers gave us in alternately reprobating and eulogizing this, as we tell ourselves, incomprehensible amalgam of languages which we so inevitably possess.One declares it a heterogeneous mixture of vocables, another loses himself in fond admiring panegyric, and still another, the orthographic revolutionist, lashes himself into a fury of criticism against its intricacies and inutilities, and rouses a throng of reformers with the war cry \u201cphonetic.\u201d Yet, none of these should influence us to neglect it, for whether words change their wonted form or not, they will still be significant signs, and as such it is our duty to initiate the rising generation into an intelligent, careful and thougthful use of them.Our orthographers have a few favorite maxims in common, such as \u201c Spelling is learned with the eye,\u201d \u201c Rules are puzzling to the child.\u201d Yet here is a goodly array.Again, \u201c Long columns of long words are reprehensible\u2019; after this, however, we find the following bringing up the rear :\u2014¢ Many words are derived from Latin and Greek roots, as cerno, sift or separate by a sieve, to distinguish, to judge, to determine, to concern, concern, concerning, decree, decreeted, * * discreet.\u201d If you are indiscreet enough to give a child such matter to commit to memory, you will require to work as the ancient builders of the walls of the Holy City, the book in one hand, compulsion in the other. SPELLING.87 Different parts of the human organism have, at different periods of the world\u2019s history, been poetized to a rank long since forfeited by more enlightened times.Knowledge is always progressing ; but are we still in the pathless wastes of conjecture and is the optic nerve, the only grue guide, as our orthographists would have us believe, in the matter of learning to spell?The eye is one of the inlets ot knowledge, a very important one; would that we each had the eagle\u2019s vision ! But let us not confound the mere act of looking with the mental progresses of noticing and observing\u2014one of the means through which we become conscious of outward existences with the superior operations of comparing, combining and concluding respecting these.Spelling requires these exercises of the mind as much as any other branch of learning.The child voluntarily notices what is peculiar, amusing, or interesting ; things that possess none of these qualities leave but a faint impression on his copsciousness and spelling, as commonly taught, is one of these.Words are to him arbitrary signs and he learns them because he must.Some words recommend themselves to him from their brevity, some are names of sensible objects, of which he understands something, and he readily associates the letters with their sounds; but the bulk of the rest, be it great or small, is learned by the constant repetition of their letters, till these force their identity on his consciousness and the memory establishes their order and succession, which order is liable to be forgotten or confused if not frequently confirmed.We teach spelling according to the received idea of making the eye the chief performer in the learning to spell and yet, after years of toil, we find our pupils mispell the simplest words, while so little have their minds grasped the idea their words represent, that they are unable to give an intelligent definition when unaided by a previously-learned dictionary meaning.You give a child his mispelled words to write down\u2014as you tell yourself, to impress their correct spelling on his vision\u2014but you often find, that after the third or fourth time of writing, they assume a shape you never intended they should; where were the eyes ?They were piloting the industrious fingers ; but the mind, attracted by the more seductive images of pleasanter things, had abstracted itself as comfortably as an old lady\u2019s over her knitting needles, and so those fingers went wrong.Or, in the case of 88 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.words too capacious for the\u2014as yet small\u2014minds, even though these are learned with their meanings, which we imagine help the child to master the words, much time, labour and eyesight have been called into service here.Hear them in the order in which they occur in the book, ag the scholars learned them, and the lesson proceeds most satisfactorily ; do bat vary that order, and meanings become entangled, orthographies confused in a most pitiable manner.Memory did all it could too and why did not the eye set all right?It is to be feared its pictorial power is very evanescent and very delible when not delineated upon a basis of understanding.Some maintain that good readers, that is fluent readers, are good spellers, implying that ease in recognizing words argues an acquaintance with their spelling.Incessant repetition will ensure a degree of facility in anything, but not always accuracy ; listen to a child commencing to read :\u2014he comes to the word choice, does not recognize it and begins ch then oi and, just as he gets here, its analogy to the spoken word suggests itself and he ventures choice.Sometimes he is not so fortunate, as when in the same way he calls diffuse \u201c differ ;\u201d but in this way, by half spelling the word and guessing the rest, he comes to read without any spelling at all.Yet, words that he can unhesitatingly pronounce become stumbling-blocks when he comes to spell or write them, for the retina has an awkward habit of confusing, omitting or adding letters, and its remembering power, as some one calls it, is a very poor dependency.But the corner-stone of this belief in the power of the eye is its reputed efficacy in detecting a wrongly spelled word when written down.\u201c Write down your words,\u201d say they, \u201cand at once the eye will decide for the right way.\u201d Is it the eye that raises the doubt, or it is that the picture which the eye gives does not correspond to a picture, an indistinct one perhaps, previously formed in the memory ?But have you ever seen a child from the age of five to eleven, indulge in the wise caution of writing down his words and cogitating over their right or wrong spelling ?As soon might you expect him, elephant-like, to test every inch of the ground over which he is going to run or jump.He will dash through this mud-puddle, sink ankle deep into the next and jump over the next, and his words, as he generally uses them, are scarcely treated with more care than his boots. SPELLING.89 We have certainly been unsuccessful enough in teaching spelling according to these unsatisfactory methods to warrant a change of tactics.It is the child\u2019s ignorance of the nature of his words that makes him thus careless, thus brainless, in his acquaintance with them.Words are to him spellings, disagreeable spellings.He knows no more about the composition of his language than he does about Ursa Major or the composition of platinum.His language is nothing wonderful to him ; do not father, mother, brothers and sisters talk it without the least trouble and even the baby is making splendid progress! Let him but be told that every time he speaks he makes use of words, that at some period of their history, were the words of Persians, Indians, Greeks, Romans, Celts, Saxons, and many other peoples, and that these words have been invited or come uninvited, being forced or cajoled or frightened, into becoming good English words, and thereby hangs a tale to nearly every one, and he will want to know all about them.His words will assume a new relationship to him, become something of his own that will afford him as much occupation for his mind, as his top or his marbles do for his muscles, and to be ignorant of the one will be as great a disgrace as not to know how to use the other.This is what a child asks for in learning as well as in play, work and plenty of it.And now that he is learning the etymons of his words, each new one he comes across, irresistible in its influence, beckons him to a search for its history and often rewards him with a tale of enchanting interest.A child\u2019s vocabulary increases as his knowledge extends; let him have a clear understanding, and thorough acquaintance with the ordinary words of his language and he will be the better prepared to master the more ambitious terms when they present themselves.We are occasionally treated to an etymological feast of roots, Latin and Greek, which are anything but savory to the mental palate of young learning; here we have a root and ten or fifteen words derived therefrom, and when he receives five or six of these to learn by heart, he is about as disgusted with his lesson as he well can be.If he has no previous knowledge of the signification of these words, the root helps him very little.It would be better to give him only such a number of words as he will be able thoroughly to dissect etymologically and orthographically, and let him introduce these words 90 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.into sentences and be able to give, if necessary, the significance of the prefix, suffix, root; or if the word has wandered away very far from its primitive meaning, then he will enjoy tracking it through its many escapades and making it give a veritable account of itself.PROCEEDINGS OF THE PROTESTANT COMMITTEE OF THE COUNCIL OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION.EpucATION OFFICE, Quebec, 28th February, 1883.Which day the quarterly meeting of the Protestant Committee of the Council of Public instruction was held.Present :\u2014 The Lord Bishop of Quebec in the chair, Dr.Cook, Dr.Matthews, R.W.Heneker Esq., D.C.L., E.J.Hemming Esq., D.C.L., the Hon.James Ferrier and the Hon.Gédéon Ouimet, Superintendent of Public Instruction.The minutes of the quarterly meeting of the 29th November, 1882, were read and confirmed.The minutes of the special meeting of the 2nd of February, 1883, were read and, in so far as they bore on the special business for which said meeting was called, were confirmed, but exception being taken to the other items of business taken up at said meeting, it was resolved that they should be taken up again.The Committee agreed to confirm the resolution passed at said special meeting, in regard to the EDUCATIONAL RECORD with this further recommendation that a page or two be put at the disposal of Teachers wanting schools, and of Commissioners or Trustees wanting teachers, such notices to be inserted free of charge.The Committee further agreed to confirm the resolution in regard to the furnishing a summary of the grand Statistical Tables of Inspection in reference to Protestant and mixed schools in the different districts of Inspection.The report of the Sub-Committee upon the petition of certain inhabitants of the School Municipality of Cox was received and adopted.The Committee agreed to the general principle of Dr.Hen- eker\u2019s letter on the preliminary examination of candidates for admission to the study of the professions adressed to William White, Esq., Batonnier of the Quebec Bar, Dr.Cook dissenting. EDUCATIONAL COUNCIL.91 The Hon.the Superintendent of Public Instruction stated that owing to the death of the Rev.George C.Robinson, recommended at the last quarterly meeting of the Committee to be appointed a member of the Ottawa Board of Examiners, no appointment had yet been made to said Board of Examiners and the Rev.T.E.Cunningham had been recommended in room of the said Rev.Mr.Robinson, deceased.The Committee requested the Hon.the Superintendent of Public Instruction to recommend the Government to appoint the aforesaid Rev.T.E.Cunningham a member of said Board of Examiners, Ottawa.The Hon.the Superintendent stated further that Mr.Lee\u2019s appointment as a member of the Board of Examiners, Stanstead, would be made at the same time with the filling of the vacancies in the Ottawa Board of Examiners.Dr.Hemming drew the attention of the Sub-Commitee on School Law #o his order on their last report.The Sub-Committee on School Law agreed to report the result of their interview with the Government at next meeting.A letter was read from the Hon.Mr.Joly recommending that the Committee should make the day appointed by the Government as \u2018 Arbour day \u201d a holiday in all the Schools under their jurisdiction.The Committee agreed to this recommendation on condition of the day\u2019s being employed in planting trees.As nothing further had been done in regard to the arrears of Marriage License Fees, it was unanimously agreed that his Lordship the Bishop of Quebec, Dr.Cook and the Hon.Gédéon Ouimet be a Sub-Committee to wait on the Dominion Government, in Ottawa, next month with a view to an early settlement of the arrears of Marriage License Fees, to be assisted by the Hon.James Ferrier.The report of the McGill Normal School Committee to the corporation of McGill University in regard to a higher grade of Academy Diploma and the adoption of said report by McGill University were brought before the Committee and the consideration of same was deferred till next meeting, the secretary being instructed to send in the meantime copies of said report to the several members of the Committee.A memorial from the Directors of the Quebec High School asking for aid for said High School from the Superior Education Fund having been laid before the Committee, it was agreed to defer the consideration of the same till next meeting.x 92 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORDA letter from Mr.McEmslie, Teacher, in regard to the proposed repeal of the Teachers\u2019 Pension Act was read.The Committee requested the Hon.the Superintendent of Public Instruction to lay it before the Government with a strong recommendation to favourable consideration.A memorial from the Protestant Teachers\u2019 Association of the City of Quebec praying the Committee to review its decision of last meeting in regard to the Teachers\u2019 Pension Act was presented and read.A Course of Study for ungraded elementary schools, prepared by Mr.Rexford, Protestant Secretary of the Department of Public Instruction, together with a letter from said Secretary, explanatory of the same, was laid before the Committee and after discussion it was agreed to defer the consideration thereof till next meeting.A Sub-Committee, consisting of Dr.Heneker, and De.Matthews, was appointed to inquire into all financial matters affecting educational interests under the care of the Committee and to report to next meeting.A letter was read from Mr.Rexford recommending: \u20141st.That second class Elementary Diplomas be issued for one year only.2nd.That a candidate taking the highest total marks and a first class diploma be exempt from fees.3rd.That candidates for Teachers\u2019 Diplomas be examined in drawing ; those for elementary Diplomas on Smith\u2019s Manual for Primary Schools, and those for Model School and Academy Diplomas on the Manual for Intermediate Schools.The Committee agreed to the second and third of these recommendations, and to the first, provided the Law and the Regulations of the Committee allow it.Dr.Richardson\u2019s Temperance Lesson Book was brought under the notice of the Committee with the recommendation that it be placed on the list of books authorized for use in the schools of this Province.After some discussion it was laid on the table.The accounts and vouchers submitted by the Secretary, were examined and found correct, the balance in the Bank of Montreal to date being $18.04.There being no further business, the Committee adjourned to meet on Wednesday the 30th May, or earlier if necessary on the call of the Chairman.: GEORGE WEIR, Sec.of P.C.of C.of P.L | PRIMARY GEOGRAPHY.PRIMARY GEOGRAPHY.By Wu.GirriN, AM., Newark, N.J.No study can be more interesting than Geography, yet no study is more difficult for the average teacher to teach; and I think I am safe in saying that in no study is the text-book used more by the teacher when conducting a recitation.The use of the book is one reason why teachers do not have better success in teaching the subject.The teacher is not much at home, therefore her class is not.I first teach the class the directions; as, that where the sun rises is east, and where it sets is west.That where my right hand is, is east; where my left hand, west: in front of me is north, and behind me is south.Next bring out the idea of the intermediate points.Then question them as follows : Name something north of you ; south, east, west, northeast, southeast, &c.Then I surround myself with a chair, desk, boy, and girl, and let them recite.\u201cThe boy is north of you ; the girl is east of you; the chair is south of you; the desk is west of you.\u201d Explain to them that they have been bounding me; that is, telling by what I am surrounded.Now place some object, as a bell, or a slate, and surround it with a knife, pencil, key, and penholder.Let the class bound it; as, the bell is bounded on the north by the knife, on the east by the pencil, on the south by the key, on the west by the pen- holder.I now turn the slate one-fourth round, and the order is changed ; as, the bell is bounded on the north by the penholder, on the east by the knife, on the south by the pencil, on the west by the key.After making the four changes that can be made by turning the slate one-fourth each time, a nice exercise to please the children, and at the same time to teach them, is, to turn the slate as fast as they bound the bell; namely, the bell is bounded on the north by the knife, on the east,\u2014and before they have time to say, turn that slate so that it will be the knife again; also for the south and west.The class has now learned some very important lessons in geography without having been asked to memorize any long definitions.They like the study, and are ready and willing to take something more difficult.I now prepare a table by nailing some moulding on the four sides, and fill the table with black soil, if I cannot obtain mould- 94 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORDing sand that has been used in a foundry.Place the table so that it will stand north and south in the class-room.Across the northern end make a range of mountains, with valleys between them.From the northeast corner of the table start a river by digging a trench some three inches wide and somewhat winding ; then place in this trench strips of polished tin, or better yet, of looking- glass to represent water, and cover with sand, making the river an inch or so wide.Have it flowing into a lake a little south of the centre of the table, making the lake as large as the looking-glass or tin you have will admit.From the northwest corner start another river, making it flow into the first one, thus forming a branch or tributary.In the northeast corner plant some evergreens to represent a forest; in the northwestern part a small lake or pond.On the left bank of the first river place ten or twelve toy houses with one or two churches, for a city; on the tributary, three or four houses and one church for a village.In the lake make two little islands, placing them so that the space between them will form a strait.Do not forget to have some capes also.On the western shore of the lake make a peninsula, forming it so as to have an isthmus.On the southeast side of the lake make a river flowing into an ocean, the ocean being represented by painting the table blue, \u201cwith waves dashing high,\u201d and on the coast form the seas, gulfs, and bays.At the western end of the ocean have a high and rocky cape for a promontory.On the western side of the table plant five or six evergreens for a grove.In some part of the table make a hill.The western side of the table will be a plain, on which place a toy cow, horse, pig, sheep, dog, man, woman, boy, and girl.When finished, the class may be questioned as follows : T.(Pointing.)\u2014Class, what is this ?C.\u2014Land.T.(Pointing to tin.)\u2014And what does this represent ?C.\u2014Water.T.\u2014How many can see the cow on the table ?(All hands up.) In what direction is she walking ?C\u2014 North.T.\u2014In what direction is the horse going ?C.\u2014South.T.\u2014You may now name the animals I point to and tell the direction in which each is going.(Pointing.) PRIMARY GEOGRAPHY.95 C.\u2014The cow is going north, the horse is going south, the sheep is going southeast, the pig is going northeast, the dog is going west, the man is going northwest, the woman is going southwest, the boy is going east.T.\u2014Very well done.Children, when a small body of land is surrounded by water, that is, when it has water on every side of it, we call it an island, Who wants to come to the\u2018 table and find an island for me ?(All hands up.) Kate may come.(Kate passes to the table and points out one of the islands.) T.\u2014How many think Kate is right?(Al hands up.) Why Jennie ?* Jennie.\u2014Because it is land, and is surrounded by water.T.\u2014What is an island, class?C.\u2014An island is a small body of land surrounded by water.T.\u2014Sometimes we have land that is not quite surrounded by water, but is nearly surrounded, and so we call it by a name that means almost an island, and that name is peninsula.Who can find a peninsula for me?Jennic may come.How many think Jennie is right?(AU hands up.) Yes, she is right.Who can tell me why ?\u2014Because it is land and nearly surrounded by water.T.\u2014Correct.Class may now take pencils and write on your slates answers to the questions I have written on the board; viz: What is an island?What is a peninsula ?The class write the definitions with little or no effort, as they are simply writing about something they have seen.\u201cThat which strikes the eye lives longest upon the mind,\u201d says Horace, who was born 65, B.C.; and yet we are told that objective teaching is something new.In the next lesson teach them about the lake and mountains, and so on until they have finished the table.The class will then be ready to answer the following questions : T.\u2014Who can tell me in what direction this river is flowing ?(Pointing to the first.) Mary may tell, Mary.\u2014North.T.\u2014Why ?I see you cannot tell.I know you answered without thinking; a very bad thing to do.Jennie may tell.Jennie.\u2014South.T.\u2014Why ?C.\u2014Because it could not flow up-hill to the mountains, 96 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.T.\u2014Right, and a very good answer.If it is flowing south, class, into what is it flowing ?C.\u2014Into the lake.T.\u2014 Yes, and a river that flows into a lake, \u2014that is, the river that lets the water in the lake,\u2014is called an inlet.Then what is this river ?C\u2014An inlet.T.\u2014What do you think we call the river that lets the water out of the lake ?C.(At once.)\u2014The outlet.At the end of the first term the class is familiar with the different divisions of land and water.The next step is to draw a map of the surface of the table.T.\u2014Children, if I desired to let a friend know about our table, so that he could make one like it, how could I show him without sending him the table ?(One little girl says \u201c Put it on paper.\u201d I suspect she has seen me working on the map.) Yes, that is true, and I have done so.Here it is.How have I represented the mountains ?( Pointing.) C.\u2014With little curved lines.T-\u2014How the land ?C.\u2014With black pencil-marks.T.\u2014How the city ?C.\u2014With a litile round dot.T.\u2014How the lake and river ?C.\u2014With wavy lines.T.\u2014How the ocean ?C.\u2014With blue pencil lines.T.\u2014How the village ?C.\u2014The same as the city.T.\u2014Your answers are right; and this is the way maps are made.The mountains, cities, villages, forests, &ec., are represented on the map just as you see here.The little round dot may be for a very large city or a small village.When you are in a higher class you will have descriptive geography that will tell you which are large or small.But, children, there is something else I desire you to find out for yourselves.In what part ot the table are the mountains ?C.\u2014In the northern part. PRIMARY GEOGRAPHY.97 T.\u2014On what part of the map?(After a moment one says, In the upper part.) T.-\u2014 Yes, or at the what?(Pointing.).C.\u2014At the top.T.\u2014Right.Then where is north on the map ?C.(At once.)\u2014At the top.T.\u2014Where is the ocean, on the table ?C.\u2014In the south.T.\u2014 Where on the map ?C\u2014At the bottom.T.\u2014 Then where is south on the map ?C.\u2014At the bottom.T.\u2014Where is the city on the table?C.\u2014In the east.T.\u2014Where on the map?C.\u2014On the right side.T.\u2014Then where is east on a map ?C.\u2014On the right side.T.\u2014Where must west be ?C.\u2014 On the left side.T.\u2014 When I point, you may name the direction and tell where it is found.(Pointing.) C.\u2014North is at the top, east is at the right, south is at the bottom, west is at the left.T.\u2014Correct.(AU of which they have found for themselves.) If now the table be turned so that north is where south was, the class may be questioned as follows : T.\u2014In what part of the table are the mountains ?C.\u2014In the southern part.T.\u2014On what part of the map are they ?C.\u2014On the northern part.T.\u2014If this is the right way for the table, what do you know about the map, Jennie ?J.\u2014The map is wrong.It should be the other side up.T.(Turning map up.)\u2014Is it right now ?C.\u2014Yes, sir.T.\u2014In what direction is the inlet river flowing now ?C.\u2014North.T.\u2014How do rivers always flow?(Not receiving any answer, she takes the slate and questions.) How am I holding this slate ? 98 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.C.\u2014Level.T.\u2014Let us think of the slate as land.I now pour a little water on the centre of it.What does it form ?C.\u2014A lake or ocean.T.\u2014How many know what tipping means ?(Hands up.) Another word I might use is sloping.Then how would this land be sloping if T tipped it so?(Pointing north.) C.\u2014North.T.\u2014(Tipping.) How is it sloping ?C.\u2014North.T.\u2014What does the water make now ?C.\u2014A river.T.\u2014How is the river flowing ?C.\u2014North.T.(Putting on more water, tipping the slate south, east and west, bringing out the fact that a river always flows in the direction the land slopes.) \u2014How is the inlet river flowing on the table ?C.\u2014North.T.\u2014How on the map ?C.\u2014North.T.\u2014Up-hill ?C.\u2014No, sir, it cannot flow up-hill.T.\u2014Why is it flowing north ?C.\u2014Because the land slopes north.The writer asks all teachers who read this, and who have not taken particular pains to teach the fact that north does not mean up-bill (and also those who think they have) to ask the following questions of their classes, requiring written answers: \u201c Which is the higher, Lake Erie or Lake Ontario?Does the St.Lawrence River flow up-hill or down-hill ?\u201d Ask one at a time, and send a candid report how they are answered, and he will give the result to the Teacher for publication.He must say that when he first saw the questions, and tested his classes, they set him thinking \u201c How must we teach Geography to have it understood.\u201d\u2014 Primary Teacher. AN IDYLL OF THE ILIAD.CHRYSES, AN IDYLL OF THE ILIAD.Curysrs, the priest, strode by the sounding sea, Which broke, and chafed, and spent itself in foam, As he in anger ; and his snow-white hair Streamed from his snow-white fillet on his brow ; The sacred bay-branch trembled in his hand, And strewed the shore with leaves ; the golden staff, His priesthood\u2019s symbol, wreathed with suppliant wool, Struck in the sand-drifts at each hasty step With added weight of passion; bitter tears Mixed with the bitter sea-spray down his \u2018cheek ; And all his aspect was of one whose life Has lost its dearest, and naught else remains But blank abandonment, and dull despair.Yet scarce one moon had waned, since Chrysa\u2019s towers, Nestled in Ida's sunny folds, looked down In peace on peaceful Thebe ; nor had sound Of neighbours vexed with war, nor any fear, Troubled their rest ; but daily smoke went up Of sheep, and wheaten flour, and fat of beeves, And all the land was guarded by its god.How changed the picture now! No bleat of sheep, No lowing kine, nor glow of altar-fires, But women\u2019s wailings, and great gouts of blood, And trampled cornfield, and the sullen smoke Of ruined rafters, marked the spoilers\u2019 way Gone was all peace ; gone, too, the fairest maid That ever twined a wreath of amaranth, Or wove a shrine with flowers.Day by day, Flitting in simple service to and fro, The young Chryseis, white-robed, golden haired, Had brought new sunshine to the Sun-God's courts, And to her father\u2019s heart enduring joy, Priest Chryses.He, soon as the sudden storm Had swept and passed, with trembling haste pursued The invaders\u2019 backward path, nor slept, nor ate.Till in the council of the chiefs, and face Of Agamemnon, king of men, he stood.The father\u2019s passion, and the outraged name Of priest, and proffered treasures of the shrine, Won all the Princes to the old man\u2019s prayer ; Only Atreides, blind with lust, of power, Brooked not the thwarting of his lightest will, And spake an evil menace, \u2014\u201cDotard, hence ! THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.Thy maiden hath found favour in my sight ; Therefore, begone ; nor let mine eyes again, Or now or ever, see thee at the ships, Lest worse befall thee, nor yon bauble-gauds Avail to shield thine hoary insolence.\u201d So spake the King, infatuate, nor knew Kindling Apollo\u2019s anger.But the priest Shrank silent, fear, amazement, anger, griet, O\u2019ermastering speech, and passed with aimless feet, That knew not where they trod, yet blindly sought The sympathy of solitude, and stir _Of angry seas ; till all his soul went forth In one fierce cry, that cleft the startled air, And shrieked its way to heaven,\u2014\u201c Apollo, hear ! God of the silvern bow, whose steps were erst Around my Chrysa, who encompassest Æolian Cilla, and thy might is known In white-cliffed Tenedos! By all thy names, Where\u2019er thou art, I, Chryses, claim thine aid! Slayer of vilest vermin, Sminthian, hear Thy priest! If all my boyhood, manhood, age, Have been a willing bondage to thy shrine, If lavished ornament, and stately piles, And blood of bulls and goats, and incense-smoke Have done thee aught of grateful service, hear! Hear my one prayer, and let thine arrows smite This godless horde of ravishers, who come To wreak their vengeance for the thing they do ;\u2014 Wreak Thou thy vengeance, Master, with thy shafts, And let their lives atone thy servant's tears.\u201d There his voice broke with passion.But the God Had heard, and rose, and veiled his awful face In night more awful, and the far-off sands, Where late the suppliant\u2019s agony had stamped The feeble footprints of his wrath, now shewed A sudden wall of blackness.Shafts of fire, Blinding, unearthly, unendurable, Reft a white chasm ever anon, And flashed and vanished; and with every shaft A Grecian life was quenched.Nine nights, nine days, The blackness, and the fire, and death, and fear Were round the ships ; and on the tenth the King Was broken, for the curse of Gods and men Weighed heavy on him, and his sullen soul Was bowed, perforce, to let the maiden go.\u2014 The Spectator. NORMAL SCHOOL WORK.101 NORMAL SCHOOL WORK.* By Joun Harprr, M.A., Rector of the Quebec High School.In approaching the positive phase of our inquiry, it is necessary to adopt some fair definition of the New Education.It has already been asserted, perhaps with undue emphasis, that education is a science; and yet it is not always easy to give a satisfactory definition of à science.Science simply means knowledge ; a science is knowledge circumscribed within certain limits, and involves, as in the case of the natural sciences, the explanation of phenomena grouped round a fundamental fact, law, or hypothesis.Such explanation is, for the most part, the discrimination be- \u2018tween a phenomenon and its cause,\u2014a cognition of the complex associated with, and emanating from, the simple,\u2014the mental exodus from the known to the unknown.In attaining to such an explanation or cognition we employ what is known as the scientific method, by which the reasoning faculty conducts the mind from one well-assured stage of thought to another, and in this way traces the heterogeneous to the homogeneous, develops the abstract from the concrete, and enables us to understand the effect through its cause.The New Education is the full recognition of this scientific, rational, or natural method in the process of mind development; or, in a more particular sense, it is the identification of cause and effect in school-work.As it is my purpose to indicate the development of the natural method of training children in its historical rather than in its philosophical aspect, it seems a wandering away from the subject to lay down any definition of causation.But as there is some difference between the general idea of causation and the logical, it is necessary to note the distinction.The cause of a phenomenon, say the logicians, and notably John Stuart Mill, is the inevitable antecedent or set of antecedents on which it is invariably and unconditionally consequent.In the common theory of causation there is asserted more than a mere sequence or precedence : inherent in the cause there is recognised as existing a power to produce the effect, the dynamical co-ordinating the material, a force acting under certain conditions and developing new phen- 4 Lat * Part of a Paper read before the Quebec Teachers\u2019 Convention, Sherbrooke July, 1882, With additions, 8 102 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.omena.Thus in watching the movements of a steam-engine, no one thinks of the cranks and pistons, the levers and wheels as forming the cause of the dynamical effect.Everyone readily traces the cause to the heat energy, which by promoting a mutual repulsion among the water molecules, produces activity in the piston by pressure.\u201c Can you tell me,\u201d said George Stephenson, the inventor of the locomotive, to one of the visitors at his country seat, \u201c what is driving that train ?\u201d \u201c Well,\u201d said the visitor, \u201cI suppose it is one of your big engines.\u201d \u201c But, what drives the engine ?\u201d \u201cOh, very likely a canny Newcastle driver.\u201d \u201c More likely the light and heat of the sun,\u201d said Stephenson.\u201c How can that be ?\u201d asked the visitor.\u201cIt is nothing else,\u201d said the great engineer.\u201cIt is light and heat bottled up in the earth for tens of thousands of years, energy which was at first necessary for the condensation of carbon during the process of vegetable growth, and which now, after being buried in the earth for ages in fields of coal, is brought forth and liberated, and made to work for great human purposes.\u201d Making use of this well known anecdote as an illustration of simple causation, we can see in it notice taken of at least three factors which regulate the effect of steam locomotion,\u2014the driver, the engine and the dynamical force,\u2014the driver or agent directing the force which acts in and through the object acted upon; and for purposes of our own we may render the illustration of some use to us, in striking an analogy between the factors enumerated above and the three principal elements which must be distinguished in the processes of the New Education.The following fictitious case readily occurs to us :\u2014 \u201c What gives that bright, cheerful, intelligent aspect to the school we have just been visiting ?\u201d\u2019 says an inspector of schools to a gentleman accompanying him on his rounds.\u201cNo doubt it is the system under which the school is conducted,\u201d answers the gentleman.\u2018\u201c But has the teacher nothing to do with the effect produced, outside of the system or methods employed ?\u201d \u201c Certainly; the teacher is evidently careful, intelligent and pains-taking.\u201d NORMAL SCHOOL WORK.103 \u201cAnd what about the intellectual aptitude of the children themselves ?\u201d \u201c No doubt,\u201d says he, \u201c that has a good deal to do with the excellent appearance which the school has made.\u201d \u201c But philosophically speaking, which of these three, the system, the teacher, or the intellectual energy-of the children would you look upon as the cause of what we have just seen ?\u201d \u201c The mental energy of the pupils is certainly the true scientific cause, the other two being merely conditions.Without the energy there could be no intellectual cffect whatever produced.It would not be amiss, however, to say that the true cause contains the three factors.In my opinion, it is the case of a carefully trained teacher, developing the natural intelligence of children, under a system founded on natural principles.\u201d As an element in the cause which produces the most beneficial effect in school-work, the teacher demands our earliest attention.When Augustus Franké opened his Seminarium Praeceptorum,\u2014 the first Normal School established in Europe, he was induced to do so from the conviction that in the influence of the teacher wisely directed, as much as in the enactments of the State, lay the prospect of educational progress.To elevate the teacher to a point of enthusiasm with his work, and to stir within him a sense of the importance of education, as an art founded upon true scientific principles, formed the crowning purpose of the life of this early educationist.He set out with the intention of developing a teaching faculty in his students, of making them more than scholars ; trying first to convince them that to labour as instructors of young folks without some carefully conceived plan or system was to sail without a rudder, and afterwards elucidating his own principles and plans for conducting a school.We all know how great has been the success of Franké\u2019s scheme.Such institutions as his are now scattered over the face of the civilized world, improved of course in the character of their work, but conducted with the same design of advancing education through the ingenuity and enthusiasm of the teacher.Indeed their necessity in every state or province which encourages education is now so'firmly established, that only the most wilfully ignorant community would raise its voice against them or their expense.The Normal School is the first pledge of the New Education.It forms the initiatory stage of a successful teacher\u2019s 104 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.progress ; indeed to it may be referred at least nine-tenths of the educational progress manifested in our elementary schools.Universally recognized, however, as is the necessity for Normal Schools, it is certainly a matter of the greatest regret to those, who know what a properly organized Normal School can indirectly accomplish for a community, to witness the neglect into which some of these institutions have fallen, and to see how others of them have wandered away from the original design of their organization.A Normal School, as a mere appendage of a scholastic institution, has seldom been a success.However economical such amalgamation may prove, experience points to failure in other respects.To save the time of the student-teacher, his teaching and training should be synchronous, it is true; but the preparation for a final examination should always be kept in the background.To acquire a knowledge of the best methods of imparting instruction is the great purpose of the student-teacher\u2019s noviciate; and unless the teaching and the training are complementary, and conducted by instructors who can and do illustrate the best methods in their own teaching, the training very soon degenerates into the conning of a text-book on school management, and the answering of a few printed questions at the end of the term.Perhaps the most wretched attempt in any of the Canadian provinces, to maintain the appearance of a Normal School is to be seen at the present moment in one of the Maritime Provinces.In 1877, when the Davies Government rode into power on the back of a movement supporting free education, a Normal School was organized, which gave fair promise of raising educational affairs in Prince Edward Island out of the rut in which they had lain for many aday.That school has since been merged in an institution which, through the political ingenuity of certain persons whose living depends upon its perpetuation, has long stood in the way of educational progress.The education of the few, at the expense of the many kept in ignorance, is a policy which in that province, as elsewhere, has perpetuated an indifference that seldom attempts to distinguish between progress and mere change.In that little colony, the people often play at politics and try to think it real.Nearly every discussion is resolved into a political wrangle\u2014men are found ready to pull each other\u2019s hearts out (politically speaking) over the price of potatoes, the purchase of a prize-bull, the building of a wharf, the \u2014 NORMAL SCHOOL WORK.105 macadamizing of a road.When the Governor-General visited the province, he was unable to occupy Government House, because the Government and the Governor could not agree about the price of paint and paper-hanging to make the place habitable.On one occasion, the whole community was thrown into a ferment for a week over the purchase of a pen for one of the Government offices ; while the Commissioner of Public Works, ably supported in his diatribe by the Premier and Provincial Secretary, has been known to make a three hours\u2019 speech against the payment of forty dollars to an underpaid female teacher.A Normal School, it may be said, was hardly safe in such a community.The Free School Government ran its course : in two years\u2019 time it was defeated, its acts reprobated, and its appointments to office cancelled.The Normal School, among other things, was dismembered.To swell the roll of a decaying institution, which had little in its favour but age, the incoming politicians, partly in spite, but mostly in ignorance, strangled the only hope of general educational progress for the province, and thus threw elementary education back at least thirty years.Nova Scotia and New Brunswick have each a fairly equipped Normal School, the former founded by Dr.Forrester, the father of the New Hducation in the Maritime Provinces, the latter supervised by a Principal who possesses all the enthusiasm of Franké himself.Ever since the death of its founder, the Nova Scotian institution has been in a chronic state of unrest, caused chiefly by the absence of a compulsory attendance clause in the law by which it was established, and partly from the weakness of its internal organization.During Dr.Forrester\u2019s time, the politicians made an attempt to take away its grant; and no one who ever heard or read them, will readily forget the words of the brave old enthusiast, when he defied the silly economists and threatened to nail his colours to the mast in face of the impending danger.Lately affairs have assumed a quieter aspect, in presence of a threat of dismissal which, it is said, hangs over the heads of those who manage its affairs.In the Province of Quebec, as we all know, there are three Normal Schools; and yet a large proportion of the elementary teachers have never been within the doors of any of them.This state of affairs is surely to be deprecated.In this respect, Quebec is certainly behind her sister province, Ontario.There, the 106 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.Education Department recognizes no elementary teacher who has not passed through a special training in a Normal or Model School; while in Quebec, any one can take charge of a school receiving government aid by merely passing a written examination.As yet I know very little about the condition of the country schools in the Province of Quebec ; but to judge from the description which fell from the lips of the newly-appointed Secretary of the Education Department, at a meeting of teachers held lately, some of them must be in a deplorable condition.And how can it be otherwise! The Commissioners in the country districts, I am told, care little whether the teacher they appoint be trained or not.\u2018The most capable person for the least money,\u201d is the criterion by which they generally select a teacher who, in many cases, is dear at any price.The papers of some of these dear teachers pass through my hands as examiner, and certainly if their teaching powers be not superior to their literary talents, any school in their hands must suffer.Then why pass them ?The examiners are powerless.The candidates have a legal claim which cannot be disputed.They make their percentage\u2014a third of the marks\u2014and immediately the law recognizes them as qualified to conduct a school.Just think of it! Young men and women with little experience, with no training, with the merest rudiments of knowledge, are passed through an examination as through a sieve, and in their raw, uncultured, condition are sprinkled over the country to replenish its remote corners with intellectual life and activity.Better such teachers than none.Certainly.Ice rubbed against ice produces some heat.Ignorance placed in frictional contiguity to ignorance may produce, and has produced some knowledge.A blind man may guide his blind brother some distance on his way: but no one is surprised on seeing a rapid waste in the ice, or at finding the two blind men fallen into the ditch.And so it isin the case of placing an educational trust in the hands of an untrained teacher.There is one may in the chances of his producing a good effect, but how many mays are there in the chances of the evil and corrupting ?Besides no true system of education has for its object the minimum of mental culture; it is the maximum of beneficial results that is generally aimed at, and this, I maintain, can only be attained by placing our schools in the hands of trained and skilful teachers.Nor have I any quarrel in this matter with the teacher born. NORMAL SCHOOL WORK.10% There are undoubtedly many excellent self-trained teachers, just as there have been many distinguished self-taught men.But the adage, praeceptor nascitur, is too narrow and unsafe ever to become a fundamental principle.The teacher-born is as rare as the poet- born, except as an hallucination; and certainly the untrained, self-deceiving teacher is not exempt from the bitter experiences which befall many young men before they become convinced that in them neither a Shakespeare nor a Burns is likely to be repeated.The teacher is not unfrequently born of a necessity, in which the question of bread-and-butter enters more largely than the glory of a divinely appointed mission.His enthusiasm develops with his success and with his strength to overcome difficulties.The Normal School anticipates the experience in school-work.Its training fortifies the novice: and hence the wisdom of a law which requires all teachers to spend some time in such an insti- tution\u2014the praeceptor qui nascitur as well as the praeceptor qui fit\u2014if for nothing else but to prevent mistakes, to avoid the risk of ruining some of our schools by bread-and-butter teachers, pure and simple, who for a few shillings more pay than that of a mechanic or charwoman, continue in an occupation for which nature has not fitted them, and for which they have kad the benefit of no training save their own bungling in the school-room.The day is probably distant when a Quebec law shall enact that every elementary teacher employed in the province must possess a Normal School diploma.And yet, perhaps, it may come sooner than we expect\u2014at least for the Protestant section of our schools.The enthusiasm and the courage of Mr.Rexford, the newly ap pointed Protestant Secretary, will, let us hope, ere long stir up the Municipal School Boards to greater exertions; and just as Dr.Weir, earnestly sustained by his colleague, Inspector Allnatt, has succeeded, by a system of written examinations, in exciting an emulous zeal among the County Academies and their teachers, so may we expect soon to find new life and vigour thrown into the work of the elementary schools.The question of an increased supply of trained teachers, I am told, must be discussed openly and publicly at a very early date.It is impossible for those in authority to shirk the difficulty much longer; and if it be found that the exist \u2018ing means for the training of such teachers be inadequate, then other arrangements must be made.A peculiar phase of this question is seen in the fact that while very many of the elemen- 108 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.tary teachers, actively engaged in the province, have never attended a Normal School, a large proportion of those who attend the McGill Normal School never mature as teachers, or otherwise fail to find employment.This is an anomaly that may or may not tell against the character of the work done in that institution.Perhaps, like some of the other Normal Schools, it has to some extent lost sight of the great aim or object of its organization.It may have become more of a teaching school than a training school ; and as such, no accusation can be made either against its efficiency or the capacity of its staff.But if such be the case it must return, and that very soon, to the original design of Normal School work.To meet the necessities of our schools, it must be prepared to re-arrange its terms and to revise its curriculum.1ts work is to train teachers for the elementary school in the country districts, as well as for the academy in the towns; and unless it succeeds with the one as it has with the other, Quebec cannot expect to keep pace with the other provinces in the matter of general educational progress.In preparing the way for further legislation, requiring the compulsory recognition of the Normal School graduate as the proper person to take charge of the country schools, the;assimilating functions of the proposed central Examining Board will effect an improvement.Under its operations, the Quebec educational system will certainly become more and more a unit; and it is safe to predict that one of the earliest effects to arise from this new arrangement will be a large increase in the number attending the Normal School.In Ontario there are two Normal Schools which continue to maintain their excellent reputation, though they have been of late years curtailed in their operations by the system of Model Schools established in various sections as auxiliaries.Whatever may be said in favour of the Ontario Model School, there is at least one strong argument to be urged against it: general uniformity is lost in the individuality of each school.But as the demand for trained teachers was greater than the supply, the necessity provoked legislation adverse to the centralizing idea ; and it is just possible that Quebec may have to imitate this legislation for a short time until all the schools are in the hands of {rained teachers.A temporary Normal Schodl at some centre in the Eastern Townships may be found necessary, unless the McGill Normal School can make arrangements to meet the diffi- 109 NORMAL SCHOOL WORK.culty.If anything is to be urged against the Ontario system, it is perhaps over-legislation: the machinery, it is said, is apt to get beyond the control of the centre of energy, the Education Department.But this is no unmixed evil.The Ontario teacher, by means of a healthy association and co-operation with his fellow-teachers, is beginning to take charge of himself and of the system under which he labours.The schoolmaster is being lost in the educationist; and the consequent intension of his personal and professional influence gives a stability to educational affairs in general.These teachers, be it said, are all or nearly all Normal School graduates.Their early Normal School experience gave birth to a professional spirit within them, an esprit de corps, which in its maturity becomes safe enough to be entrusted with everything pertaining to the teacher\u2019s calling in the school, province, or state.In the Normal School these teachers discovered the secret of the New Education, the secret which so many teachers never discover.They dissected the how and the why, as well as the what.They were trained to distinguish between a bad and a good method of imparting instruction.Becoming conscious that they were not mere machines, but living responsible agents, labouring for the accomplishment of a great and beneficent object, they are now to be seen standing together man to man encouraging one another in their labours, resisting, it may be, encroachments upon their rights, but promoting a love and zeal for their work, a dignity of purpose in their co-operation, and a confidence in their own judgment which induces others to respect and confide in them.With the facts of their success in every part of the world before us, it is too late in the day for any one to advance arguments in favour of Normal Schools and their training.As Dr.Forrester says in his treatise on Education, speaking of their earlier days: \u2014 \u2018\u201c Like every novel undertaking, they had to encounter obstructions and prejudices.Some objected to them on the score of their expense ; others on the ground of their untried character ; and others on the ground of their uselessness or inefficiency.Nevertheless, whatever their own character or the opposition they met, they grew and multiplied apace, and now, in theory at least, they are acknowledged by all civilized nations as one of the essential requisites of a national education, and provision has been made in every popular system for their support.Various other 110 THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.schemes have been propounded for the professional development.Some maintained that the necessity for such could be met by the appointment of a professor of paideutics in the university, and others that teachers\u2019 institutes and associations were sufficient.These may be good auxiliaries, but they never will, and never can prove a subtitute for a properly conducted and equipped Normal School.\u201d LOCAL ITEMS.Protestant Board of School Commissioners\u2014The regular monthly meeting of the Board for Febuary was held at the usual hour and place on Thursday, the 8th.The Rev.Dr.Norman reported that in accordance with official notification he had accompanied the Royal Commission on schools to inspect the several school buildings of the Board on Monday afternoon, and that on Tuesday evening, at the first session of the Commission in relation to the administration of the Protestant Board, he had submitted the protest of the Board with respect to the composition of the Commis sion, but that the Commission while receiving and filing the protest, had proceeded to the examination of the Secretary of the Board.Dr.Robins was appointed to appear before the Commission as Attorney for the Board.The Rev.Dr.Jenkins reported the sale of Burnside Hall for the sum of $30,100, and was empowered to complete all arrangements for transfer of the property.The regular monthly meeting for March was held on the afternoon of Thursday, the 8th.The monthly statement of accounts for February, duly audited, was examined.Reports of attendance of pupils and teachers in all the schools of the Board for the same month were laid on the table.From these it appears that there were in attendance 3,576 pupils, an increase of 72 above the month of January.Several teachers were reported seriously ill.The superintendent was instructed to inquire as to the best means of carrying on the work during their absence from duty.The resignation of Miss McCuaig, of the Sherbrooke Street school, was accepted for the 1st of May, and applications for employment as teachers from Mr.Lane and Mrs.Fawkes were received and held for consideration in case of future vacancies.Lennoxville and the Episcopate.-\u2014Bishop\u2019s College School, Len- noxville, has just been honored by the appointment of one of its \u201cOld Boys\u201d, Ernest Graham Ingham, to the Bishopric of Sierra Leone in Western Africa, made vacant recently by the death of the Bishop Steere.Bishop Ingham graduated from Bishop\u2019s College School in 1869, and is well known in Canada.He was a native of Bermuda, and graduated from St.Mary's Hall, Oxford, with the degree of B.A., in 1873, and was ordained LOCAL ITEMS , 111 in 1874 by the Lord Bishop of Chester.He has since held several charges in England, and an the 20th ultimo received the honoris causa degree of D.D., from Oxford University.He was consecrated in London on February 24th, St.Matthew\u2019s Day, by the Archbishop of York.: The late F.S.Haight\u2014The death of Mr.Haight occurred on Good Friday.He had been playing chess from 10 o'clock till shortly after 12, when he was suddenly stricken by paralysis and died in a few minutes.The late Mr.Haight graduated from Williams College, Mass., in 1857, having had for classmate the late President Garfield.In 1858, he came to this country, being for a time in the Lower Provinces and Ontario; for over fifteen years he has been a respected citizen of Montreal.He established a private school in the old Mercantile Association building, afterwards removed to McGill College Avenue, and later he built a school on Metcalfe street.For the past three years Mr.Haight hag been the head master of the Senior School, where, as in every other capacity, he earned the respect of all with whom he came in contact.Canadian Magazine of Science and the Industrial Arts.\u2014With this title the eleventh volume of the Scientific Canadian has taken a new start.Itis now under the able editorship of Professor Bovey, of McGill College, and the first two numbers are a sufficient guarantee of excellence to the public.They are full of interesting papers and the illustrations, of which there is an ample allowance, are well executed.In the first number we would call attention to papers by Professors Murray and Johnson, the former on Technical Education, the latter on the Transit.With it is incorporated The Canadian Patent Office Record and we can recommend the whole to all Canadians who are interested in the progress of Science and the Industrial Arts.It is published by the Burland Lithographic Co., the subscription being $2.50 per annum.\u2014We have received a copy of a paper by Mr.John Harper, M.A., the Rector of the Quebec High School entitled: \u201cThe Origin and Development of the Greek Drama.\u201d It was read before the Literary and Historical Society of Quebec, during February of this year, and will give those whose studies have not lain in that direction a taste of the pleasure to be derived from the reading of Æschylus and Sophocles.We notice the paper with pleasure as a hopeful sign that schoolmasters are beginning to take an interest not purely scholastic in the studies that it is their vocation in life to teach.Those who do not feel a personal interest in science and letters cannot hope to inspire their pupils with any enthusiasm for their studies. THE EDUCATIONAL RECORD.MISCELLANEOUS.Scotch Educational Congress.\u2014This important meeting took place at Aberdeen during \u201c New Year week.\u201d The most prominent sujects of discussion were the supply and certification of teachers and the evil of over-pressure in the Educational work of the day.To the former subject was devoted the opening address by Mr.A.Ramage, Rector of the the Free Church Training College in Aberdeen and President of the Educational Institute of Scotland.The subject of over-pressure was ably treated by two medical men, Drs.Farquharson and Beveridge.Educational endowments was the subject of an address from Dr.Webster, M.P., the discussion upon which took rather a local tone.Secondary education and university reform in the hands of Mr.James Moir, Rector of ths Aberdeen Grammar School, resulted in Resolutions in favour of raising the standard of Scotch University scholarship, and of Faculties for special teachers\u2019 degrees being constituted in all the Universities.The constitution of School Boards was fully discussed after a paper by Mr.MacArthur of New Monklands.Congress of Irish Teachers.\u2014This was held at Dublin during the last days of the old year, the inaugural address being by Mr.Cullen of Belfast, the President, and devoted mainly to financial questions.A paper was read by Mr.Nealon, on the position of Irish National Teachers; by Mr.Barrett, of Kingstown, on the promotion and classification of Teachers.At a public meeting a series of Resolutions was finally passed, for raising the salaries of Irish teachers to a nearer footing of equality with those of England and Scotland ; for securing a suitable pension for retiring teachers ; for providing residences for teachers in connection with their schools; for adopting some scheme of compulsory school attendance suited to the wants of the country ; and for the removal of all restrictions on the teaching of Irish in National Schools.These resolutions were addressed to Her Majesty\u2019s Government and to Parliament.Politics and Education in England\u2014Dr.Hornby, Head Master of Eton, and Tory by hereditary right, has compelled Mr.J.L.Joynes to resign, for having published a rather Radical book about Ireland.That is to say, Dr.Hornby has informed Mr.Joynes that, in consequence of the want of judgment he displayed in his tour, and his letters about it, which were subsequently embodied in a book, he can never be allowed to take a boarding-house.As this is an invariable privilege of a classical master, Mr.Joynes had no option but to resign, and is, in fact, ruined professionally for the crime of being too Liberal and too impulsive.There is no remedy, that we know of, except in the opinion which will be created by the bare statement of facts; and that is a poor one, for Dr.Hornby\u2019s action will only help to fill Eton with the rich \u2014 The Spectator."]