646 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



1. The principal statistics in regard to the causes of insanity are 

 derived from asylums for the uneducated classes. 



2. An attack of excitement caused by mental strain in the young 

 is often temporary, and is treated privately. 



3. When suicide is successful before the patient reaches an asylum, 

 the case is not to be found in lunacy statistics. 



4. Cases of epilepsy often remain at home ; and the same remark 

 applies, of course, to brain-fag and general nervous exhaustion. 



In regard to one of these points I would observe that, when I have 

 been able to examine into the causes of cases of insanity admitted into 

 non-pauper asylums, I have found a considerable number traceable to 

 excessive mental work either as a predisposing or an exciting cause. 

 No doubt this is often associated, as I have just said, with anxiety and 

 other emotional states. It is sufficient, however, for our present pur- 

 pose if it be admitted that a considerable number of attacks occur in 

 connection with overwork, although complicated with emotional ex- 

 citement. It must be remembered that the mischief thus done is only 

 one part of the evil wrought by the intemperate pursuit of knowledge. 

 The lungs and other organs also suffer. Dr. Andrew Clark writes to 

 me : " I am a witness to the grave and sometimes irreparable mischief 

 done at schools and in working for competitive examinations. As an 

 illustration," he adds, "of the evil effects of overwork for competi- 

 tive examinations, I can say that, of the young men passing the Civil- 

 Service Examination for Indian Service, and afterward sent to me by 

 the Civil Service Coramissioner for health certificates, ten per cent, dur- 

 ing the last three years have had temporary albuminuria." 



I have before me tabular statements of the school hours and the 

 subjects taught in some of the principal English public schools, as well 

 as in private seminaries. It is utterly impossible to present them to 

 you in the brief period allotted me ; I can therefore only offer a few 

 general remarks upon them, and refer to two or three by way of illus- 

 tration. 



The number of hours actually spent in school does not (as a general 

 rule) appear to be excessive in our large public schools. There are 

 exceptions, but this evil and the multiplicity of subjects taught apply 

 rather to the private schools. Where the chief danger seems to lie in 

 most schools is in the encroachment made on the play-hours. In some 

 day schools the lessons set to learn at home are absurdly long and tedi- 

 ous. I find that in other schools, public and private, a great deal of 

 work is done during the period nominally allotted to recreation only. 

 This is a very important part of the actual school-system, and one 

 which requires great care on the part of masters. I will now take the 

 school hours of the sixth form in one very excellent school for the mid- 

 dle and higher classes. There is an hour's work before breakfast, three 

 hours in the morning, four hours in the afternoon, and two hours in 

 the evening, making a total of ten hours for study. Between breakfast 



