t$2 FIELDS, FACTORIES AND WORKSHOPS. 



they learn the foundations of each of the three trades 

 sufficiently well for supplying the school itself with 

 a number of useful things. Besides, as far as I could 

 ascertain from what I saw in the geographical and 

 physical classes, as also in the chemical laboratory, the 

 system of " through the hand to the brain," and vice 

 versa, is in full swing, and it is attended with the best 

 success. The boys work with the physical instruments, 

 and they study geography in the field, instruments in 

 hands, as well as in the class-room. Some of their 

 surveys filled my heart, as an old geographer, with joy. 

 It is evident that the Gordon's College industrial de- 

 partment is not a mere copy of any foreign school ; on 

 the contrary, I cannot help thinking that if Aberdeen 

 has made that excellent move towards combining science 

 with handicraft, the move was a natural outcome of what 

 has been practised long since, on a smaller scale, in the 

 Aberdeen daily schools. 



The Moscow Technical School surely is not an ideal 

 school.* It totally neglects the humanitarian education 

 of the young men. But we must recognise that the 

 Moscow experiment not to speak of hundreds of other 

 partial experiments has perfectly well proved the pos- 

 sibility of combining a scientific education of a very high 

 standard with the education which is necessary for be- 

 coming an excellent skilled labourer. It has proved, 

 moreover, that the best means for producing really good 

 skilled labourers is to seize the bull by the horns, and 

 to grasp the educational problem in its great features, 

 instead of trying to give some special skill in some 

 handicraft, together with a few scraps of knowledge in 

 a certain branch of some science. And it has shown 

 also what can be obtained, without over-pressure, if a 



*What this school is now, I don't know. In the last years of 

 Alexander II. 's reign it was wrecked, like so many other good institu- 

 tions of the early part of his reign. But the system was not lost. It was 

 carried over to America. 



