34 Middle-Class Education. 



advantages of a good hand — preaching which he is said to have 

 illustrated in practice. Beautiful handwriting is, as most 

 teachers will testify, from some strange cause, an hereditary gift. 

 There are some boys to whom its attainment costs nothing ; there 

 are others who could never acquire it, even by the most painful 

 application. Still, generally speaking, there is much to be done 

 in the way of improvement by a skilful teacher. Written im- 

 positions are sadly detrimental to a good style of handwriting. 

 I should, for this reason mainly, recommend that all impositions 

 be learned by heart, that they be well-selected passages, and be 

 always said over again a month after they were due and first 

 repeated. Then will punishment help to instruct : nor does my 

 experience induce me to think that the same objection can be 

 urged against such policy in schools as applies to prison disci- 

 pline, where it is reported that the ti'eadmill loses half its pain 

 when used to grind corn, or do other such good service ; the sting 

 of the punishment being keener in proportion to the worthless- 

 ness of the work. 



English Grammar is tedious and needless to anyone who has 

 learnt the Latin Grammar. 



The necessity of Geography and History it were superfluous 

 to dilate upon. The amount taught of each will depend alto- 

 gether on the teacher. A clever one needs no counsel : to the 

 inefficient no hint would be of service. For all practical pur- 

 poses I know no work so good as Cornwell's ' Geography,' and to 

 Chambers' ' Handbooks on History ' 1 must yield their fair meed 

 of praise. 



As regards Composition., we will speak first of its material aid, 

 Spelling to Dictation. Spelling should be taught at a very 

 early age at home by the mother or governess, when its first 

 principles are acquired quite mechanically. We all know how 

 puzzling it is to come to think how such and such a word is 

 spelt. After ten, which is the earliest period at which a child 

 should be sent to a regular boys' school, this branch of instruction 

 will be continued by the method of dictation. I would here 

 only suggest that the passages read out should not be taken at 

 random, but carefully selected from choice authors, and that 

 the pupil should subsequently say them by heart, and after- 

 wards reproduce them on paper from memory. Thus, beyond 

 the mere attainment of spelling, without effort, gradually and 

 insensibly will be formed a habit (instinctive as the dropping on 

 the right note in music) of clothing in appropriate garb each 

 native thought as it rises in the mind ; the pen learning to run on 

 and to print each idea as it occurs, a performance which is at 

 the very root of facile expression. 



Perhaps the most successful plan of teaching composition and 



