PROCEEDINGS OF SECTION J. 625 



boarders. That this is still a difficulty in England may be judged 

 frOiH the fact that in two famous English day schools, of which I 

 sav/ something iu a recent visit, a penalty was imposed on boys 

 who were found in the school grounds more than half-an-hour after 

 the end of afternoon school. 



We have here, I believe, the finest material in the world on 

 which to work ; material which has characteristics differentiating 

 it in some particulars from any other. Have our educators con- 

 sidered it as such, and endeavoured systematically to make use of 

 and to emhpasize its strong points, while correcting its peculiar 

 defects? I fear not. And so the voice of Professor Adams comes 

 to us with an additional insistence to investigate the nature of 

 our material, to classify it, to compare it with the results of 

 investigations in other countries. With some objective standards 

 established for our teachers, it will be for them to follow the Aus- 

 tralian plan of trying new methods adapted to the needs of this 

 country. 



When I first made the acquaintance of the Australian boy, I 

 rather feared and disliked him. I believe I can speak in more 

 mature age with less prejudice. I know now that what I at first 

 mistook for want of respect is, in most cases, a desire to be friendly 

 and communicative, and that he is much surprised and hurt if his 

 advances are not met in the same spirit as they are offered. The 

 sense of the wide, free spaces of this country comes early to the 

 Australian boy; he has no class consciousness, and "is not afraid 

 with any amazement," when he speaks to his elders. He cannot 

 pray, " God bless the squire and his relations, and teach us all our 

 proper stations." But I cannot think he is the worse for that. In 

 alertness, self-reliance, and power of initiative, he has no superior; 

 bis breeding, and the nature of this country, make him adven- 

 turous and ready to take risks. His breeding, because the men 

 and women who populated Australia were of the most adven- 

 turous type facing, as they did, a voyage to which this century 

 affords no parallel, and a landing in a strange wild continent of 

 unlimited and mysterious distances. The nature of his country — 

 because, if it is true that Australians are a gambling people, one 

 must remember (even in this succession of good seasons), that this 

 lan,d of flood and flame is, and must be, a breeder of gamblers, 

 or, to be more polite, of men who willingly take risks. His readi- 

 ness of resource is shown by the fact that Australians who wander, 

 as many do, to make a living abroad, almost invariably succeed, 

 thanks to the merciful Australian theory that no work can degrade 

 a man. When you are brought up never to ask, " Who is he ?" 

 but "What does he do?" and where the only social disqualifica- 

 tion is idleness, the problem, " What to do with our boys " is 

 solved by themselves, and satisfactorily to themselves, with much 

 greater ease when they find themselves in foreign lands. Mr. J. 



