X. SOUTH AFRICAN ASSOCIATION FOR ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE. 



continue ; but it has to be remembered that governments and depart- 

 ments can only spend the money that is voted them ; unless there 

 happens to be a benevolent despotism which pushes on the clock Avith 

 a firm hand, as was the case in Prussia a hundred years ago under 

 the wise direction of Wilhelm von Humboldt. It is not the Govern- 

 ment, but the whole people, who are to blame if they allow one of the 

 very first duties of a civilised community, namely, the providing of 

 elementary education for every boy and girl in the State, to be so 

 imperfectly discharged. 



But the shortcomings of our educational system are unhappily 

 not confined to leaving fifty thousand children totally unprovided 

 for. Of the three-fourths of the children of South Africa who are 

 nominally at school, a large number are attending school so irregu- 

 larly that only a very partial benefit can be derived from such 

 education as they are receiving. Anything like normal regular 

 attendance only exists in the higher-class Government schools, and it 

 is probably near the truth to say that at least one day in every week 

 is missed by more than one-half of the children attending schools. 

 Such a result can, of course, not be due in any great measure to 

 unavoidable causes such as illness, but is mainly accounted for by the 

 lax and casual manner in which school work is invariably carried on 

 in countries where attendance is not made compulsory by law. (As 

 an illustration in point, I may mention that a Johannesburg head- 

 mistress told me she was frequently asked to excuse her girls their 

 home lessons, because they had been to the " Empire" the night 

 before.) 



It would naturally be expected that the large number of 

 children not attending any school is due to the scattered popula- 

 tion in the remoter country districts ; but this is not the whole 

 explanation by any means. The two largest towns, one the oldest, 

 and the other one of the youngest, towns in South Africa, are 

 almost equally behindhand in point of primary school attendance, 

 about one-third of the children in both receiving no education at 

 present. Thus Capetown, with 8,015 European children of school- 

 going age, had last year only 4,850 on the rolls ; and out of the 

 12,000 or 15,000 white children in Johannesburg there are still 

 5,000 unprovided with seats in any kind of school. Wherever we 

 take any fairly large body of children, whether in town or country 

 districts, we find the same state of things ; from a third to a fourth 

 of them are receiving no education. This will cause no surprise 

 to those who have looked into the past history of education in other 

 countries. Indeed, that so high a proportion as three-fourths of 

 the children are going to school without compulsion is evidence of 

 exceptional intelligence and keenness for education in the country 

 at large ; but it is certainly no reason for neglecting the duty of 

 bringing the remaining fourth within the operation of a school 

 law with as little delay as possible. During the thirty-five years 

 that have elapsed since the passing of the Elementary Education 

 Bill which made primary education compulsory in England, the 



