348 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY, 



of a happy, useful, and successful life. To be sure, this claim has 

 been made for the old education, but, the claim is not allowed. The 

 new education has the missing features all supplied. The old edu- 

 cation was like a two - legged stool, it lacked stability ; the new 

 education stands squarely on three legs, and it is steady on the 

 roughest ground. 



I shall be better understood if I briefly outline my idea of the feat- 

 ures of a manual-training school : Boys from fourteen to eighteen 

 years of age are admitted on examination. The grade is about that 

 of a high-school. The course covers three years. The programme of 

 every day includes three recitations (mathematics, language, and sci- 

 ence), one hour of drawing, and two hours of shop-work — making a 

 session, exclusive of lunch -time, of six hours. The order in which 

 these exercises come varies in different divisions. The shops and shop- 

 instructors are generally occupied during school-hours. In each sub- 

 ject taught the instruction is progressive and thorough. Mathematics 

 begins with arithmetic and ends with trigonometry. Language may 

 be English literature and composition, history and political economy ; 

 or Latin, or French. Science, beginning with Huxley's " Introductory 

 Primer," runs through botany, physical geography, elementary physics, 

 mechanics, and chemistry. Drawing is free-hand and mechanical, pro- 

 jection and " model," geometric, technical, and ornamental. 



The shop-work runs impartially through the range of bench, lathe, 

 and pattern work in wood ; forging, brazing, and soldering metals ; 

 bench, lathe, planer, and drill work in iron, brass, and steel. The aim 

 is to make every exercise in every branch disciplinary — intellectually 

 and morally fruitful. With the exception of the choice of Latin and 

 French, there is no option in the course. 



I claim as the fruits of manual training, when combined, as it 

 always should be, with generous mental and moral training, the fol- 

 lowing : 



1. Larger classes of boys in the grammar and high schools ; 2. Bet- 

 ter intellectual development ; 3. A more wholesome moral education ; 

 4. Sounder judgments of men and things, and of living issues ; 5. Bet- 

 ter choice of occupations ; 6. A higher degree of material success, in- 

 dividual and social ; 7. The elevation of many of the occupations from 

 the realm of brute, unintelligent labor, to one requiring and rewarding 

 cultivation and skill ; 8. The solution of " labor " problems. I shall 

 touch briefly on each of these points : 



1. Boys will stay in School longer than they do now. — 

 Every one knows how classes of boys diminish as they approach and 

 pass through the high-school. The deserters scale the walls and break 

 for the shelter of active life. The drill is unattractive, and, so far as 

 they can see, of comparatively little value. There is a wide conviction 

 of the inutility of schooling for the great mass of children beyond the 

 primary grades, and this conviction is not limited to any class or grade 



