304 Rkpokt 8. a. a. Advancement of Scikncm:. 



ance, has never wa\ei'ed. Of course I am taking here, as elsewliere in 

 my paper, the case of the boy whose surroundings correspond, more- 

 or less, with those of the EngUsh public school, using the word public 

 school in the narrower connotation understood by the word in England. 

 INIv experience may have been a lucky one, but I have seen the boy 

 out here adapt himself to the system which prevails in England and 

 turn out the same article. The public school tone, the public school 

 system have been tried out here, and I at least am more tlian satisfied 

 with the result. I will go further (I am sjjeaking from a long experi- 

 ence), and say that I piefer the South African boy. I do not deny 

 that lie has his faults, but his many virtues blind me to his faults, if 

 they exist. The boy out here may carry his worship of athletics too 

 far, but even this, assuming it to be true, is a healthy fault and will 

 disappear with the progress of his education and the enlarging of his 

 mind. And here I might say that to my mind the great charm to 

 a teacher out here lies in this, that he has "virgin soil" to work upon, 

 that he can do so much by his personal influence ; the personal factor 

 counts for so much. At a great public school in England the rough 

 corners have long ago been rounded off by the centuries of tradition ; 

 the boy drops into a mould which is alread}- made for him ; there is a 

 ready-made atmosphere and environment, which of themselves exercise 

 a subtle but real influence on him. Not so, of course, out here in a 

 new country. The schoolmaster is one of the pioneers, and his work 

 is a noble one, and not to be despised. He may exercise enormous 

 influence on the rising generation of a new country. His work may 

 be hard, but he has the satisfaction of knowing that there is work for 

 him to do, and work which gi-ses him definite and palpable returns ; 

 and therein lies his compensation. 



And this brings me to another point in this, I fear, somewhat 

 discursi^'e paper. To my mind, as the outcome of experience and what 

 I have seen, it is of the utmost importance that the very best teachers 

 should be sent out to a colony, and that it should not be regarded as a 

 "dumping ground" for the incompetent; and by the best teachers 

 I need hardly say that I do not mean the cleverest men intellectually ; 

 nor do I mean mere mechanical trained board school teachers. AVhat 

 is wanted out here, and here I am speaking of all the schools, and not 

 in the narrower sense as elsewhere in this paper, are men of large 

 sympathies, high ideals, high tone, manl}' instincts, sound judgment 

 and patience ; men who will set the tone and influence, as the born 

 schoolmaster can influence, the rising generation. There is no nobler 

 or more inspiring work for a man, and to my mind the work is as noble 

 as, and in the case of the young .South African layman, more valuable 

 than that of the parson. Such men are to be found, men with the 

 training of a public school and of one or other of the great universities 

 behind them ; men steeped in the best English traditions, men of large 

 views and high ideals; men wlio will broaden the mental outlook, bring 

 out the diamond from its rough setting ; always remembering that 

 "the boy is father to the man," and that the history of South Africa 

 lies with her sons and their early training and surroundings. If this 



