MANUAL TRAINING. 57 



been conducted on tlie laboratory metbod, and tbe best schools 

 count electrical and chemical laboratories a necessary part of 

 their equipment. It is only very recently, however, that physics 

 and natural history have been made laboratory courses, and the 

 usage is still far from general. It has long been desired, but in 

 most schools practical and financial difficulties have stood in the 

 way. These are being gradually overcome and the science work 

 is being put upon a sound foundation. It requires some little ex- 

 ecutive ability and considerable in the way of material resources 

 to provide laboratory facilities for several hundred boys in so 

 many different branches, and the schools which fail in this re- 

 spect must not be criticised too severely. In our own school, for 

 example, with a capacity for about three hundred and fifty boys, 

 we have for the manual work of all sorts, seven laboratories or 

 work rooms in addition to two large drawing rooms and the 

 dynamo and engine rooms, and we find the accommodation quite 

 insufficient. The character of the science work is in all cases 

 elementary. So little is done in this line, in the lower schools that 

 the high schools have to begin practically at the very foundation. 

 The time devoted to science does, however, permit some material 

 progress to be made. It will be noticed that the work proceeds 

 with marked singleness of purpose. Except in the senior year 

 only one branch is taken up in a term, and this concentration of 

 effort leads to results. Even in the senior year, but two branches 

 are taken up during the entire year, and these are too closely re- 

 lated to lead to a dissipation of thought. 



Half the day is gone. The occupations are classed as academ- 

 ic, but they have all involved some form of manual work writ- 

 ing, drawing, measuring, adjusting instruments, handling chem- 

 ical apparatus, dissecting. The manual part has been apparently 

 incidental, but its exercise of the senses and its reactions upon the 

 brain have been no less certain. Let us keep this in mind, for no 

 gulf is crossed in passing to the other half of the day, to the more 

 obvious manual occupations of the drawing room and workshop. 



A school of three hundred boys requires two teachers of draw- 

 ingone for the constructive drawing and one for the art work. 

 They are kept very busy, too, for the classes must be as small as 

 practicable and the, lesson comes every day. The work in con- 

 structive drawing is continuous, and is kept in close touch with 

 the workshops. It begins with the simplest sort of mechanical 

 drawing, such as a right-lined exercise for the wood shop done in 

 pencil on manilla paper, and passes by easy stages to the more 

 difficult and complicated mechanical drawings of the senior year 

 gear wheels, bridge trusses, valve movements, and the like. 

 The work in constructive drawing is held to be a very important 

 part of the manual training course. Its value is both for its di- 



VOL. XLTI. 5 



