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people. To enter more deeply into the subject, to ask for all sorts of reasons for the solution of problems, is not one of their characteristics.„Our notion,“ said Mr. Arnold in May 1886, „is to give children the rule for doing a sum and then test them by seeing, if by that rule they can do so many sums right. The notion of a German Teacher is that the school hour for arithmetic is to be employed in ascertaining that the children understand the rule and the processes to which it is applied.9¹

In Geometrh, Euclid is still used everywhere. Mr. Raydt, who is a mathematician himself, has found a great many varieties in the different pupils of the same establish- ments.„Es war aber ziemlich überall denen, die sich besonders für Mathematik inte- ressierten(!) oder die sich auf ein Examen oder eine Preisbewerbung()), zu welcher beson- ders viel Mathematik verlangt wurde, vorbereiten wollten, gute Gelegenheit geboten, sich in derselben zu vervollkommnen.“? In comparison to the mathematical knowledge of German boys, it is interesting to read what Mr. Arnold said:„I am told that young men studying for Woolwich, who go to Germany to learn the German language, are at first struck in the schools there with the mathematics being much less advanced than at home; but presently they find that the slower rate of advance is more than compensated by the thoroughness of the teaching and the hold gained upon the matter of study.“¹³

As to Natural Sciences, Physics, Chemistry, ete., these important branches were not taught in our School at my time, as far as I remember. Natural Science is chiefly taught in the high class Grammar Schools, but it seems, in general, to be in a very hopeless state. Mr. Raydt says as to this:„In recht trauriger Weise werden auf den englischen Schulen die beschreibenden Naturwissenschaften behandelt.— Auch die Physik bildet an den meisten englischen höheren Schulen keinen besonderen Unterrichtsgegenstand.— Etwas mehr Gewicht wird an manchen Schulen auf Chemie und Geologie gelegt.“*

In Wales, even at the Universities, these sciences are much neglected. Professor Humpidge, who claims to have had considerable experience abroad, in speaking on this point, before the Committee of the Council on Higher Education in Wales and Monmouthshire, stated:„Our students do not come up to the second class of an ordinary gymnasium!“ It is a great pity and remarkable enough that in England, the native country of Newton and of Darwin, these branches of instruction are almost entirely neglected at Schools.

In the afternoon, I gave, four times a week, a half-hour dictation lesson to 8 boys of about 12 years. They wrote the dictation upon their slates, and I corrected it, within that very half-hour! The orthography of our boys was, in general, very bad, which was not surprising, for many of them spoke the broad Vorkshire dialect. There was, especially, one mistake which they made in all. possible varieties. They used very often to omit the „h“ of words beginning with an„hâ and to put an„h“ before words beginning with a vowel. Thus, they very often mistook us and has, and so forth. One also finds this wrong pronunciation in the cockney-dialect of London and, generally, among the lower hlgesed whilst the correct use of the aspirate is regarded as no inconsiderable sign of good

reeding.

After this lesson I had on my lesson-table„General Routine“, which implied that I. was to see that the boys worked and to assist them at their learning and writing.„We used to do“, as the above-mentioned pupil wrote to me some time ago,„between 3.30 and 5 many different things, such as Drawing, Arithmetic, writing exercises, etc.“ It was for me, pro- perly speaking, a superintendence at learning, not a fixed lesson.

At 11.30 I had to give a reading-lesson to a little boy of 8 or 9 years, and then followed my superintendence at writing. I was always pleased to see that nearly all the boys had

¹ Parliamentary Papers. 1886. Vol. 51.

² Page 178.

² Parliamentary Papers. 1886. Vol. 51. Page 258.

¹ Page 181.

*Parliamentary Papers. Minutes of Evidence. 1881. Vol. 33. Page 416.