" cram:' 



19 



never be advantageously resorted to by those 

 who are capable of " good cram." To learn a 

 proposition of Euclid by heart is far more labo- 

 rious than for a student of moderate capacity to 

 master the nature of the reasoning. It is ob- 

 vious that all advantages, even in an examina- 

 tional point of view, are on the side of real 

 knowledge. The slightest lapse of memory in 

 the bad " crammer " — for instance, the putting 

 of wrong letters in the diagram — will disclose 

 the simulated character of his work, and the least 

 change in the conditions of the proposition set 

 will frustrate his mnemonic devices altogeth- 

 er. If papers be set which really can be an- 

 swered by mere memory, the badness is in the 

 examiners. 



Thorough blockheads may be driven to the 

 worst kind of " cram," simply because they can 

 do nothing better. Nor do the blockheads suffer 

 harm ; to exercise the memory is better than to 

 leave the brain wholly at rest. Some qualities of 

 endurance and resolution must be called into ex- 

 istence before a youth can go through the dreary 

 work of learning off by heart things of which he 

 has no comprehension. Nor with examiners of 

 the least intelligence is there any reason to fear 

 that the best-directed " bad cram " will enable a 

 really stupid candidate to carry off honors and 

 appointments due to others. No examination- 

 papers, even for junior candidates, should consist 

 entirely of " book-work," such as to be answered 

 by the simple reproduction of the words in a text- 

 book. In every properly-conducted examination, 

 questions are, as a matter of course, set to test 

 the candidate's power of applying his knowledge 

 to cases more or less different from those de- 

 scribed in the books. Moreover, good examiners 

 always judge answers by their general style, as 

 well as by their contents. It is really impossible 

 that a stupid, slovenly candidate can, by any art 

 of " cramming," be enabled to produce the neat, 

 brief, pertinent essay, a page or two long, which 

 wins marks from the admiring examiners. 



If we may judge from experience, too, " bad 

 cram " does not pay from the tutor's point of 

 view. That this is so, we may learn from the 

 fact that slow, ignorant pupils are ruthlessly re- 

 jected by the great " coaches." Those who have 

 their reputation and their living to make by the 

 success of their candidates cannot afford to waste 

 their labor upon bad material. Thus, it is not 

 the stupid who go to the " cramming " tutors to 

 be forced over the heads of the clever, but it is 

 the clever ones who go to secure the highest 

 places. Long before the critical days of the of- 



ficial examination, the experienced " coach " se- 

 lected his men almost as carefully as if he were 

 making up the university boat. There is hardly 

 a university or a college in the kingdom which 

 imposes any selective process of the sort. An 

 entrance or matriculation examination, if it exists 

 at all, is little better than a sham. All comers 

 are gladly received to give more fees and the ap- 

 pearance of prosperity. Thus, it too often hap- 

 pens that the bulk of a college class consists of 

 untutored youths, through whose ears the learned 

 instructions of the professor pass, harmlessly it 

 may be, but uselessly. Parents and the public 

 have little idea how close a resemblance there is 

 between teaching and writing on the sands of the 

 sea, unless either there is a distinct capacity for 

 learning on the part of the pupil, or some system 

 of examination and reward to force the pupil to 

 apply. 



For these and other reasons which might be 

 urged, I do not consider it worth while to con- 

 sider " bad cram " any further. I pass on to in- 

 quire whether " good cram " is an objectionable 

 form of education. The good " cramming" tutor 

 or lecturer is one whose object is to enable his 

 pupils to take a high place in the list. With this 

 object he carefully ascertains the scope of the ex- 

 amination, scrutinizes past papers, and estimates 

 in every possible way the probable character of 

 future papers. He then trains his pupils in each 

 branch of study with an intensity proportioned to 

 the probability that questions will be asked in 

 that branch. It is too much to assume that this 

 training will be superficial. On the contrary, 

 though narrow, it will probably be intense and 

 deep. It will usually consist, to a considerable 

 extent, in preliminary examinations, intended both 

 to test and train the pupil in the art of writing 

 answers. The great " coaches " at Cambridge, in 

 former days, might be said to proceed by a con- 

 stant system of examination, oral instruction or 

 simple reading being subordinate to the solving of 

 innumerable problems. The main question which 

 I have to discuss, then, resolves itself into this : 

 Whether intense training, directed to the passing 

 of certain defined examinations, constitutes real 

 education. The popular opponents of " cram " 

 imply that it does not ; I maintain that it does. 



It happened that, just as I was about to write 

 this article, the Home Secretary presided at the 

 annual prize-distribution in the Liverpool Col- 

 lege, on the 22d of December, 1876, and took oc- 

 casion to make the usual remarks about " cram." 

 He expressed with admirable clearness the pre- 

 vailing complaints against examinations, and I shall 



