192 SANTIAGO. 



ual instruction ; and during the remainder the young men are employed in various workshops 

 belonging to the establishment, as carpenters, blacksmiths, founders, &c. The school is in 

 Yungai, where a large building has been erected especially for the purpose ; and a steam-engine 

 imported from France serves to drive the machinery, and as a model for instruction at the 

 same time. Unfortunately, on account of its complicated construction, the engine is not per- 

 fectly adapted to the circumstances, and it would be economy of mental labor to substitute a 

 simpler one. There are forty pupils, who, at the termination of their apprenticeship, are 

 required to direct personally for six years a workshop of the trade they have learned, in such 

 province as the government may elect. Backward as the mechanics are in the knowledge 

 of the commonest arts, no more valuable school could have been instituted ; and the citizens 

 of Chile may of right anticipate adequate returns from such expenditure of the public funds in 

 better and cheaper products of labor. 



The Quinta Normal, as the Agricultural School is called, is also in Yungai, and has in view not 

 less interesting and important results. About one hundred and twenty-five acres of land have 

 been enclosed and laid off for practical instruction, and the buildings are already erected for 

 officers and pupils of the institution. The number of the latter is limited to thirty, twelve of 

 whom, selected according to the same rules as those of the gratuitous pupils at the National 

 Institute, are at the expense of government. The other eighteen are required to pay $100 per 

 annum, which is expended in their maintenance and clothing used whilst at labor. No one is 

 received whose age is under fifteen years or over twenty years ; and the course occupies four 

 years, during which they are taught grammar, geography, arithmetic, practical geometry, draw- 

 ing, religion, agronomy, practical agriculture, and rural economy the last three subjects em- 

 bracing every branch that can be of use to an agriculturist in the widest sense. All the pupils 

 are interns. The school was only organized in 1850, and its beneficial effects are not yet -visible; 

 though I believe that government has found it necessary to meet all the expenses, no paying pupils 

 having offered themselves. Another of its objects, however, has already been accomplished to some 

 extent viz : the foundation of a nursery of native and foreign useful and ornamental plants, to 

 be sold at equitable prices. With the climate and soil of Central Chile, almost every vegetable 

 product thrives luxuriantly ; and there is little doubt that industry, united to the practical 

 information to be gained in the Quinta Normal, will enable its graduates to render this one of 

 the garden-spots of the world. 



The schools of Painting and Music are in a part of the old University building, near Santa 

 Lucia. For the former there have been imported a number of plaster statues and busts, and 

 engravings of different portions of the human frame, which are conveniently arranged in a tole- 

 rably well lighted room. These are to serve as models. There is neither a fixed number of 

 pupils nor a period assigned in which the studies are to be completed ; and the only distinctions 

 are amateurs, who are under no rule except such as good manners require, and those who obtain 

 permission from the Minister of Public Instruction to become enrolled pupils, in consideration of 

 which they may twice a year compete for the rewards government holds out to the most proficient. 

 The latter are, by law, required to be present at least two hours every day ; and if absent for 

 fifteen consecutive days, they forfeit their right to compete for the premium. They are divided, 

 for instruction, into three classes: 1st. Elemental drawing from engravings, subdivided into 

 three sections rudiments and heads, extremities, and full-length figures. 2d. Imitation of 

 relievo or statuary, arranged in the same number of sections as the preceding. 3d. Drawings 

 from the living model and imitation of costumes. These complete the series required for his- 

 torical composition (say the regulations), though the pupil should have followed a complete 

 course of literature, or at least of rhetoric, and another of philosophy, in order to comprehend 

 and express the passions that are developed in parts of the compositions. The five orders of archi- 

 tecture and landscape painting should also be understood, in order to draw the back-ground of 

 pictures. The director is an Italian, who receives a handsome salary ; for which, in addition to 

 instruction, he contracts to paint two historical pictures for the national gallery every year. 

 Those completed under the agreement are probably imaginary portraits of heroes in American 



