The Journal of Education

present, will come back to an accumulation of indignation.
We are not concerned so much to criticize
the decision of the Board. Whichever
way that decision went, one party would
be aggrieved. A strong Department decides according
to law and a settled line of policy. But the decisions of
the Board of Education vary from year to year in a way
that is simply bewildering. The Swansea Town Council
pay a lower scale of salaries in one of the Church schools
than in the provided schools of the borough. The Board
(at that date Mr. Birrell) says this makes for inefficiency,
and calls upon the Local Authority to amend their ways.
The grievance continues; an inquiry is held. The report of

Boy Labour and Unemployment.

Government could intervene, public opinion must be further educated. The proposals are sound: that attendance at a continuation school should be compulsory up to the age of seventeen; that this reform should be accompanied by a compulsory reduction of working hours for young people under that age; that street selling should be prohibited to children under seventeen years of age; that Employment Committees should be established whose function should be to secure to children on leaving school permanent and suitable occupations; that the school-leaving age should be raised and half-time attendance abolished. To put the matter briefly, it is proposed that the State, which has taken charge of children between the ages of five and fourteen, should extend that responsibility for a period of three further years. It is inevitable that the advance of civilization should mean a longer period of childhood; and on this ground we are heartily in accord with the proposals. And it seems clear that any movement in the direction of lengthening the period of education will relieve, to some extent at least, the problem of unemployment. The unemployed consist largely of men who have started on some form of casual unskilled boy labour and have not learnt a trade.

Rates

or Taxes.

Education, both for elementary and for higher education. It is shown that the cost of education in all grades is increasing. It is admitted that it should and must increase. No desire is expressed that economy in any direction should be effected. It is recognized that free places in secondary schools must be provided in at least the proportion demanded by the Board. That there is no desire to stint secondary schools in Leeds is shown by the fact that the average cost per pupil throughout the borough is £15. In elementary schools it is shown with equal clearness that necessary improvements in buildings, in staff, in cost of medical inspection, and in provision of free meals, must result in a large additional expenditure. But-and this is the crux of the position-it is asserted that it is impossible to ask the rate-payers for more money. Nipping has taken place everywhere, we are told, that the rate may be kept down to its present amount of 1s. 7 d. in the £. The rate-payers resent the present amount, and to ask for any more will make education hateful to them." Thus we have the rate-payer, through his elected representative, demanding that his child shall be well educated, often free of cost, and in some cases with free meals, and at the same time urging his inability to meet the bill.

THE facts we have given above suggest the following comments. The rate-payer, we are told, cannot pay, but the tax-payer has unlimited resources, and will have no difficulty in providing the necesUnpopularity of Education. sary funds. We doubt if any difference between rate-payer and tax-payer can be found, except that the latter pays most of his contribution indirectly, and therefore cannot say exactly how much he does pay. The former pays directly, and is conscious of every additional penny in the . It is impossible to argue that the taxes fall on a class better able to pay than the class that pays rates. We are almost driven to wish that the rates might be collected in an indirect manner. In that case the burgess would not know

E spoke last month of the growing conviction that exactly what he was paying, and could not dot his i's children do not get sufficient sleep. In the Review of Reviews the subject is dealt with in reference

to adults, and Mr. Stead expresses the Slumber opinion that we all sleep too little rather again. than too much. He has collected the practice and opinions of many well known persons whose habits vary so greatly that no general rule can be drawn. Nine and a half hours of sleep is the longest period mentioned; several like to have from eight to nine hours, but many are satisfied with considerably less, some even being content with three or four. Of course there is sleep and sleep; some people can concentrate into three or four hours the rest that others need eight or nine hours to acquire. Sleep in a close atmosphere is less refreshing than sleep where the air is fresh. Sir Frederick Treves recommends a simple diet, fresh air at night, and outdoor

with so much precision as he does at present. He does not object to spending the taxes on education, but he does object to spending the rates, though the same purse provides both taxes and rates. He feels vaguely that education must be paid for, but he does not want to know how much he, individually, pays. He does not feel the taxes: when he smokes tobacco or drinks whisky he is not directly conscious of providing money for the Exchequer, but when the collector leaves the ratepaper then he knows and protests. We can only conclude that education is not really popular, and that a new generation must arise which has known the practical value of school and institute before the education rate will be cheerfully paid.

exercise during the day. The difficulty is to reconcile THE unpopularity of education is brought home to us

this advice with the conditions of life for adults; but in the case of children sufficient hours of undisturbed sleep under hygienic conditions is not an impossible ideal.

Isolation

of Schoolmasters.

again and again in a hundred ways. The successful business man tells you that he got no good from school; the artisan has the same feeling. I Give me an intelligent boy," says the merchant; "I do not care what he has learnt." And the same cry in varied forms is echoed by almost all employers of labour. Schools have not convinced the public that they have something useful to give. One reason is that schoolmasters have been too

much inclined to live apart from the life of the nation. Consciously or unconsciously, they have fostered the belief that school life and school studies have no practical and direct bearing on the wider life of later years; still more that they have no effect on the money-earning which is the first duty in life for most of us. They are fond of sneering at utilitarian studies, and proclaiming that study ought to be pursued for its own sake, apart from any value in the wage-earning market. This attitude, up to a certain point, is quite sound. Yet every citizen feels that his first duty is to provide that he and his family shall not become a burden on the rates. In the past, amongst schoolmasters, there has been the feeling, implied or expressed, that school prepares for the University or for the scholar's desk and not for practical life. Schoolmasters ought to be citizens, to be men of affairs, and to look upon school as a preparation for life in general, not forgetting in particular the need of earning a livelihood.

Life.

E think that Canon Storr, of Winchester, would agree with us in the views we have hinted at above. We say hinted at, for the very nature of these paragraphs excludes the complete exposiSchool and tion of an argument. In giving away the prizes to the boys of the Queen Elizabeth School at Kingston-on-Thames, Canon Storr delivered an address on some of the present problems of education. He analysed in a sound and masterly manner the existing difficulties, and showed that one Churchman at least could take a national view, and could feel that the national view might be wider than the view of the Church of England. But we refer to his address here, because he ended by giving some excellent advice which, we are sure, the elder boys and the masters would take to heart. As life grows more complex, he said, conduct needs more and more intelligent thought. The school years should include such a mental preparation as to enable a boy to form a judgment on the problems of life, local and imperial, on which every citizen ought to have a reasoned view. Life is not so simple as it has been in past ages: a scientific habit of weighing evidence and forming a judgment, a scientific attitude of thought towards the problems of the day, should be acquired. The bearing of studies on life should be made apparent. We are not quoting the Canon textually, but we believe we are giving the gist of his advice, and we cordially endorse it.

"The Schoolmaster."

E learn from the Daily News that the National Union of Teachers have bought the Schoolmaster. Up to the present time that paper has been the organ of the Union, but has not been owned by it. Many attempts have been made by the Union to secure the paper, which has been a very successful property. It is said that at one time the Union offered £10 per 10s. share, and that this offer was refused. By the simple expedient of stating their intention to publish a paper of their own, a move which would make the circulation of the Schoolmaster of no account, the Executive of the Union have persuaded the proprietors of the Schoolmaster to sell at the price of £3 per 10s. share. It is believed that Mr. Yoxall is to be the editor of the paper under its new proprietors. Mr. Yoxall, though he is best known to the public as a writer of novels, is as much a journalist by instinct as is Dr. Macnamara, who was editor up to the date of his acceptance of office in the Government.

Education and the Rates.

LOCAL AUTHORITIES.

AN important document has been issued by the Education Authority of Leeds dealing with the increasing cost of education and claiming that the Central Authority should be responsible for a greater share of this cost. The document is signed by the Town Clerk and the Secretary for Education of the Borough of Leeds; but it is based on information supplied from all the county boroughs but two. London is excluded because its conditions are unlike those of the other towns, and Chester omitted to reply to the inquiries addressed to it by the Corporation of Leeds. It is shown that, of the whole cost of elementary education in the sixty-nine county boroughs, the Board of Education and the Local Authorities, roughly speaking, provide the money in equal proportions, but in reference to those charges only that are included under the head of maintenance that the Board pays 63 per cent. of the annual cost. Now as to the future, it is argued that in Leeds the cost of education will increase immediately by a very large amount, that the rate-payers are quite unable to bear any additional burden, and that therefore the Government must be urged to contribute such amount in grants as will constitute 75 per cent. of the cost of maintenance, as against the 63 per cent. at present contributed.

THERE can be no question about the immediate increase in the cost of education. The medical inspection is expected Increasing Cost. to cost a d. rate, the feeding of children another 4d., or more. Teachers' salaries cause an annual increase of Id. rate. Then follows a statement of the increases which are difficult to estimate, but which will undoubtedly mean more money. These are the gradual abolition of supplementary teachers and their replacement by trained teachers at higher salaries; the requirements of the Board as to smaller classes with the consequent increase in staff; the provision of accommodation on a more generous basis than before, necessitating the building of new schools; and the increased rateable valuation of the schools-in Leeds amounting in 1906 to 1d. in the £. Comparing the cost of elementary education in Leeds for the years 1904-5 and 1907-8, it is found that of the increased cost the locality had to bear 95 per cent. It is claimed that the Board should endeavour making it 75 per cent. of the cost of maintenance, by an extension of to meet the difficulties of the localities by unifying the grant and the loan period, and by becoming responsible for half the interest on building loans.

The Secondary School Grant.

WITH regard to secondary schools also a strong case is made out for increased grants. It is shown that, while the cost of education goes on steadily increasing, the grant of £5 per pupil is actually smaller, in view of the conditions under which it is given, than were the previous grants of the Board. In Leeds, the usual fee in a secondary school is £6. 6s., the charge for books and stationery is 235., and the maintenance grant to holders of free places is 25s. a year on the average. In order to earn the £5 grant on four boys, one boy must be taken free. From the grant of 20 must therefore be deducted the fee, the charge for stationery and the maintenance grant, amounting to £8. 14s. ; leaving the aggregate gain out of the £20 the sum of £11. 6s. or £2. 14s. 6d. instead of £5 a head. It may be replied to this that the Board only insist on 25 per cen. of free places, and do not say that books must be provided free or that there need be a maintenance grant. It may also be pointed out that before this regulation was enforced there were some non-fee paying boys in the schools. But it is clear that the condition under which the grant of £5 per head is earned means in practice that a considerably smaller net grant must be credited to the income side of the balance sheet. The average cost in a secondary school in Leeds is £15 per pupil: the Board's grant is but a small part of this and might well be increased.

Bursaries

in Elementary Schools.

THE Surrey Education Committee have established bursaries for elementary-school children in accordance with the terms of the Administrative Provisions Act. It seems unfortunate that these young people should be known by the same name as candidates for the teaching profession. We shall have to speak of an "elementary bursar to distinguish him from a secondary bursar." The elementary bursaries in Surrey are to be tenable only at higher elementary schools or at approved elementary schools that provide an extended course of elementary education. Candidates for bursaries must be legally exempt from school attendance and must have passed Standard VII. Further, they must be recommended by the managers "as capable of benefiting by a further course of practical instruction, fitting them for some trade or occupation, which they must undertake to follow on leaving school." The bursaries are tenable for two years, but are dependent upon terminal reports of satisfactory progress. The bursars must also attend evening classes. The payment is £5 for the

first year and £7. 10s. for the second. No income test is applied to parents, and no attempt is made to compensate the parent for the loss of wages. This provision of elementary bursaries is certainly a move in the right direction, as tending to make elementary education more practical in relation to industries and as taking the place to some small degree of the apprenticeship of earlier days.

No Dearth of Teachers.

DURING the three months to which the last Report of the Surrey Education Committee refers the Staffing SubCommittee have made 93 appointments, no less than 53 of which were of uncertificated female teachers. Eighty out of the whole number were to fill vacancies. Thirteen fresh appointments were made-two certificated, nine uncertificated, and two supplementary. Contrary to the wildly extravagant estimates that were rife a few years ago, the SubCommittee had no difficulty in finding suitable applicants. There were 250 applications for the 93 posts. The Committee managed to find places for all the teachers who were on the selected list of the Goldsmiths' College; but we read further in the Report that "several of the Surrey teachers who were not on the selected list have accepted appointments at the salary of uncertificated teachers." This statement appears to mean that teachers, after undergoing a course of waining at the Goldsmiths' College, were compelled by the condition of the labour market to accept appointments to which they would have been eligible without training. It is contrary to the principles of trade unionism to take less than the standard rate of wages; we had thought that it was equally contrary to the principles of professional unionism for trained teachers to take the pay of untrained. If this condition of affairs is general, and the newspapers tell us that it is, there will be a considerable relaxation of the pressure on training college space. There is indeed a more excellent way-that the Board should for the future refuse to recognize uncertificated teachers.

Medical Inspection.

THE Report of the Medical Officer to the Surrey Education Com. mittee shows conclusively the need for, and the value of, medical inspection. At present, of course, very little has been done. For the most part the children examined were between five and six years of age. In small schools the children between thirteen and fourteen years of age were also inspected in order to save the time of a second visit. In all, 4,250 children have been inspected. Among the defects found we have"badly decayed teeth" (only the worst cases being recorded in the report), 1,805; post-nasal adenoids, 482; nutrition below the average, 386; heart disease, 38; lung disease, 31. Many of the defects were quite unsuspected by the parents until pointed out by the inspector. The number of children whose nutrition is below the average will afford a useful index to the number requiring the provision of free meals. The parents of such children can be seen by the teacher, and inquiry will make it obvious whether the malnutrition is the result of ignorance, indifference, or of poverty. After examining the total number of scholars elect, the medical inspection showed that, out of 173, I was rejected on the ground of unfitness, and 26 were accepted provisionally, subject to obtaining treatment for defective vision, teeth, or enlarged tonsils. Two of this number were appointed subject to improvement in personal cleanliness.

Secondary Schools

THE Report of the Kent Education Committee (Higher Section Maintenance Cost only) contains an instructive table of the maintenance cost of secondary schools in the county which are maintained by the Committee. One boys' school only is so maintained, the cost per head amounting to £12. 4s. 6d., varying only slightly from the cost in Here the the two years preceding. There are nine girls' schools.

in Kent.

cost varies from £8. 9s. 6d. in a school of 140 girls to 16. 12s. 4d. in a school of 62 scholars. The average cost works out at £11. 4s 3d. There are two dual schools and one mixed. The cost at the Dover dual School is £12. 15s. 8d.; at the Erith dual school, £15. 18s.; at the Gravesend mixed school, 11. 3s. 5d. The average for the three schools is £13. os. 4d. The average for all the schools taken together is 11. 17s. 7d. per head for maintenance, and the total cost is 13. 7s. 1od. a pupil. The fee charged to parents varies from £3 5s. 4d. to £9. 9s. 4d., and gives the average of £7. 2s. 5d. for all the schools. The grant earned from the Board of Education averages £3. 7s. Id. upon each child in attendance, other receipts from minor Local Authorities, sale of books, &c., bringing up the total income per child to 10. 13s. Id. This appears to leave a sum of £2. 14s. 9d. to be contributed by the Education Committee for each child in a maintained secondary school.

inspectors. They have examined upwards of five thousand children and have found 30 per cent. with defects. We quote the details in full lice, nits, and verminous condition, 19 per cent.; post-nasal growths and enlarged tonsils and obstructions to breathing, 20 per cent.; badly decayed teeth, 13 per cent.; eye diseases and defective vision requiring treatment, 11 per cent.; dull, very backward, mentally defective, imbecile and epileptic children, 8 per cent. ; deformities, 5'73 per cent.; defective hearing and ear disease, 3.8 per cent. ; tubercular disease, 2.8 per cent. ; ringworm, 1'7 per cent. The inspection by these medical men who are compelled to do the work in their periods of comparative leisure has not been found satisfactory for administrative purposes. It is therefore recommended that two wholetime officers should be appointed at a salary of £250 each. Travelling expenses are estimated at £250 for the two fficers, clerical assistance at £90, stationery and postages at £85, contingencies at £100. A whole-time officer is able to examine about twelve children in a school session or about 4,800 a year. The new scheme would effect a saving of over £200 a year.

The Swansea

THE Swansea Education dispute continues to arouse much feeling. The report of Mr. Hamilton, K.C., has now been Education Dispute. published. The report is long, and deals with the points raised at the inquiry in full detail. The conclusion is, however, simple and clear. Mr. Hamilton says: "I have to report that the Borough Council of Swansea, the Local Education Authority within whose area the Oxford Street Church of England School is, have committed a default in the performance of their duties as respects that school, and have failed to fulfil' part of their duties under the Elementary Education Acts, 1870 to 1900, and the Act of 1902, namely, their duty under section 7 of the last-named Act to maintain and keep efficient the Oxford Street Church of England School, being a public elementary school within their area. This very clear statement is accompanied by a covering letter from the Board of Education, in which it is stated that the Board have carefully considered the report and have taken legal advice upon it. The Board "decide accordingly that the Authority have not failed in their duty to maintain and keep efficient the Oxford Street School.' Mr. Runciman has fled to Egypt; Mr. Trevelyan, questioned by Lord R. Cecil, had nothing to add. But the matter cannot, of course, rest where it is.

First Cousins.

SCIENCE NOTES.

IT is interesting to note that such subjects as the marriage of first cousins are now regarded as within the scope of scientific analysis. Miss Ethel Elderton, of the University of London Eugenics Laboratory, in a paper read before the Eugenics Education Society on December 9, presented the results of a searching examination by statistical methods of the facts as to such marriages. The statistics are at first sight somewhat surprising. Sir George Darwin estimated that among peers 4'5 per cent. of marriages are between first cousins, and in the middle classes 3.5 per cent. From inquiries among medical men, Prof. Karl Pearson arrived at a general percentage of 4'69, but there are reasons for considering that this estimate is too high. The results commonly attributed to such marriages-a decrease of fertility, high infantile mortality, the excessive occurrence of deaf-mutism or albinism, or insanity in the children-are in various degrees established by Miss Elderton. The chief conclusion to be drawn from the inquiry appears to be that, if there is any taint in the family history on either side, even though the contracting parties may appear in all respects normal, the marriages of first cousins are inadvisable, for the chances are that any such taint will assert itself in an accentuated form in the offspring. Teachers should bear in mind that the abnormal stupidity of Smith minor may be due to Smith père's ignorance of eugenics.

THE Oxford University Press have published in pamphlet form the inaugural lecture of Mr. C. F. Jenkin, the new Engineering at Oxford. Professor of Engineering at Oxford, delivered before the University on October 16. Both in matter and form the address is admirable. But, even allowing for the hostile atmosphere in which the lecture was delivered, Mr. Jenkin seems to protest too much against the divergence between theory and practice. True, the doctor must "walk the hospitals," the sailor must "serve his time," and the lawyer must "devil in chambers." True also that the engineer must have a thorough knowledge of the pure sciences on which engineering is based-mathematics and physics, and to a less extent chemistry, geology, and metallurgy-and that a great deal can be learned from simple mechanical models. As Mr. Jenkin reminds us, Lord Kelvin admitted that he could not understand a particular

subject in physics unless he could make a mechanical model of it. Nevertheless, we cannot resist the conclusion that the Millard Laboratory, the only building provided at Oxford for the Engineering Department, which is described by the Professor as "small and somewhat shabby," does not provide sufficient equipment for the training which engineers ought to receive at Oxford if the new Engineering Department is to be a reality. "Large and elaborate apparatus," says Mr. Jenkin, "is unnecessary for an engineering laboratory, and is apt to become a snare for both teacher and student "-a pronouncement which cannot easily be reconciled with the hope expressed on the same page that a course in engine- and boiler-testing may be arranged for undergraduates in their second Long Vacation "at the lavishly equipped mechanical laboratory of the Birmingham University." "Testing of this nature," it is added, "forms a valuable adjunct to the ordinary laboratory work." The lecturer naturally recalled the "few wires and old bits of wood" which served Faraday for his greatest discoveries, and Clark Maxwell's workroom in 1848-a garret over a washhouse, with an old door set on two barrels, and two chairs, of which one only was safe. But the conclusion he draws "that Oxford students need not suffer from the roughness of the accommodation or the simplicity of the apparatus" is hardly convincing.

Ozone.

THERE seems to be a small boom just now in ozone. Some months ago the virtues of the "ozonizer" as a ventilating agent were extolled. This is an electrical apparatus for the generation of ozone in suitable quantities in rooms. The ozone, it is claimed, imparts an extraordinary freshness to the air, and destroys noxious organic matter. Unfortunately some doubt lingers whether an effective ventilating agent has at last been discovered; for Sir Oliver Lodge, in a letter to the Times, raised alarm by suggesting that the apparatus might generate, in addition to ozone, an appreciable quantity of nitrous fumes injurious to the throat. An American has discovered a simple apparatus for ozonizing household water as it issues from the tap. It is claimed for this apparatus that it completely sterilizes the water at very small cost. In Paris, we are told, many hundreds of these apparatuses are in daily use. Lastly, Mr. William Cramp and Mr. Sidney Leetham, in a paper on "The Electrical Discharge in Air and its Commercial Application," published in the second number of the Journal of the Municipal School of Technology, Manchester, show how air, which has been ozonized and afterwards passed through boxes in which electrical discharges are taking place between spark points, can be used as a bleaching agent for calico, flour, and other substances. The bleaching action, according to Prof. Armstrong, is the joint effect of ozone and oxide of nitrogen, the total amount of these gases being not more than two parts in 10,000. By the use of such a mixture a bleaching effect is produced which is so far better than anything that can be obtained by either of the constituents as to be accounted a new technical effect. The authors of the paper have applied themselves to the important problem of developing and perfecting a form of apparatus for the production of the gas. note that the journal in which the paper is reprinted is printed in the Photography and Printing Crafts Department of the Manchester School of Technology. Both the excellence of its production and the character of its contents provide remarkable evidence of the practical character and high standard of the work which the school is doing.

The Sun.

THE Times of December 22 contains an interesting account of Prof. Hale's recent investigations on the sun. By means of the spectro-heliograph it is possible to examine the distribution of the various elements whose luminosity contributes to the sun's light. Thus the calcium light appears in the photographs as "flocculi," large woolly masses comparable to cumulus clouds. Hydrogen occurs in complicated filamentary structures, which in the neighbourhood of sun spots are of a spiral character indicating a whirling motion. Moreover, evidence, which has long been expected, is now forthcoming, that the hydrogen particles in these vortices are electrified and that their rapid whirling produces a magnetic field. It is expected that far-reaching conclusions will in the future be drawn from the fact, now demonstrated, that the sun is electrified; it will be possible, for example, to establish some definite relation between sun-spot activity and magnetic activity on the earth.

Royal College of Science.

THE first annual dinner of old students of the Royal College of Science, London, to which reference was made in this column last month, passed off with great success on December 9. Mr. H. G. Wells, the Chairman, in proposing the health of the guests, announced that he had received assurances that the diploma of the associateship of the Royal College of Science would in the future be granted by the new governing body of the Imperial College of Science and Technology, in whose hands the decision of the important question of the continuance of the diploma

was placed by Mr. McKenna. The announcement will no doubt do something to dispel the feeling that the new governing body attach on value to the "good-will" of the College which has been placed in their charge. Even if the question of the continuance of the A. R.C.S. is finally decided in the sense desired by old students of the College, the anomaly that such a question should be settled without any reference to the interests of those most closely concerned will still call for remedy, and we have no doubt that the Royal College of Science Old Students Association which is to be formed will urge on the governing body the desirability of amending the Charter of the Imperial College so as to provide for the inclusion of a representative of old students on the governing body of the College.

THE annual meeting of the Association of Public School Science Masters is to be held at Merchant Taylors' School Science Masters. on Tuesday, January 12, when the new President, Sir Clifford Allbutt, K. C. B., will deliver an address on "The Relation of General to Technical Science Teaching." Papers will be read on 66 'Anthropometry in Schools" (Mr. M. D. Hill, Eton), "The Report of the British Association upon the Sequence of Studies in Science" (Mr. G. F. Daniell), "Geography, considered as a Science Subject" (Mr. W. D. Eggar, Eton), and on other subjects. There will be the usual exhibition of apparatus, for which a copious catalogue has been prepared. We trust the papers and discussions will reach a higher standard of interest than those of previous years. Why is it, by the way, that the Association refuses to discuss subjects of such great professional interest as the best kind of education and training for science teaching? Perhaps it is the old familiar argument that the education and training which has produced the present science masters in public schools cannot possibly be improved.

THE self-complacence of science masters in public schools receives rude shocks periodically in the reports of the Army Army Qualifying Examination. Qualifying Examination. Thus, the Examiners in Chemistry at the examination held in September, 1908, report that, on the whole, the quality of the work was distinctly poor. "Good answers showing a sound knowledge of the subject were infrequent, and many gave little indication either of intelligence or proper training. Little power of observation was shown: for example, it was frequently stated that marble placed in water dissolved, forming slaked lime and giving off carbon dioxide. Greater accuracy

is required in the practical work. Many of the candidates were unable to express themselves clearly or with precision, and the names of elements and common words were frequently spelt incorrectly." Some consolation may perhaps be drawn from the fact that the work in other subjects appears to have been equally unsatisfactory. The Précis was in most cases unequivocally bad"; essays "mediocre"; dictation "very uneven"; geometry very poor indeed." The study of Greek among the candidates was represented by one candidate who sent up half-a-dozen words of no value. It is difficult to imagine any possible defence for this state of things; the papers seem to be straightforward and not of too high a standard for boys of seventeen and eighteen.

Science in Modern Life.

THE Gresham Publishing Company have produced the first volume of a work with the attractive title, "Science in Modern Life." The editor, Prof. J. R. Ainsworth Davis, of the Agricultural College, Cirencester, has been able to secure the co-operation of a number of distinguished contributors. Stress is to be laid on the practical applications of scientific knowledge and on the ways in which scientific progress has contributed to material well-being. All the sciences, including Medicine, Surgery, Anthropology, and Ethnology, are comprehended in the scope of the work, and the illustrations will include a splendid collection of full-page plates, some in colour. The work is to be completed in six volumes, at 6s. net per volume. In the first of these Astronomy and Geology are the subjects dealt with, the authors being Mr. A. C. D. Crommelin and Mr. O. T. Jones respectively. A work so interesting in character and so well produced will be welcomed by science masters, especially those who sympathize with the modern tendency to widen the scope and increase the interest of school science.

THE ENGLISH ASSOCIATION.--The annual general meeting of the English Association will be held at University College, Gower Street, on Friday and Saturday, January 15 and 16. After the business meeting on Friday, Prof. W. P. Ker, LL.D., will lecture on "Romance," and in the evening the members will dine together. The President, the Right Hon. A. H. D. Acland, will be in the chair. On Saturday there will be discussions on English in Elementary Schools" and "Examinations in English." Further information can be obtained from the Secretary, 8 Mornington Avenue Mansions, London, W.

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The Journal of Education, Volume 31; Volume 41