May 23, 1889] 



NATURE 



9r 



and carried out by the Telegraph Construction and Maintenance 

 Company, is now working satisfactorily. Unfortunately, how- 

 ever, it is found ;o be too costly for adoption except in very 

 special cases. 



( To be continued. ) 



A BILL TO PROVIDE TECHNICAL EDU- 

 CA TION IN ENGLAND AND WALES. 



'X'HE following Bill, introduced into the House of Commons 

 ■*■ by Sir Henry Roscoe on behalf of the National Asso- 

 ciation for the Promotion of Technical Education, was read a 

 second time without opposition on Wednesday, May 8 : — 



Whereas it is expedient that due provision should be made for 

 technical education in public elementary schools and elsewhere : 



Be it therefore enacted by the Queen's most Excellent 

 Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords 

 Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parlia- 

 ment assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows : 



I. This Act may be cited as the Technical Education Act, 

 1889, 



?• (i) After the passing of this Act any school board may 

 make provision for giving technical education in any school 

 under their management, and either by day or evening classes, 

 or both, as may seem fit, having regard to the daily occupations 

 of the persons to be benefited thereby. 



(2) If no such provision is made, or if it is insufficient, and 

 if the local authority by special resolution determine that 

 provision or further provision ought to be made, they may them- 

 selves make such provision. 



3. Where technical education is given in any school, not being 

 a public elementary school (including for the purposes of this 

 section any college), which is not under the management of a 

 school board or local r.ulhority, and is either within their 

 district or accessible to the inhabitants thereof, the school board 

 or local authority may contribute or they may join together with 

 other school boards or local authorities in contributing from their 

 respective funds tow ards — ■ 



{a) the maintenance or improvement of that school or of its 

 provisions for technical education ; or 



{h) the payment of the fees at that school of deserving 

 students who before proceeding to such school have been 

 resident in the district of the contributing board or authority ; 



(c) the establishment of scholarships for deserving students. 



The mode in which and the terms upon which contributory 

 school boards and local authorities shall be represented upon the 

 governing bodies of schools receiving such contributions, so far 

 as technical instruction is concerned, shall be such as may be 

 agreed upon between the school boards, local authorities, and 

 governing bodies respectively in each case. 



Plvery such contribution shall be deemed to be expenses of 

 such school board or local authority incurred for the purposes of 

 this Act. 



4. (i) Where any school imvhich technical education is given in 

 pursttan e of this Act is also a public elementary school, a parlia- 

 mentary grant may he made to such school by the Education 

 Department and by the Science and Art Department, or by either 

 of such Departments. 



(2) The conditions required to be fulfilled by such school in 

 oraer to obtain an annual parliamentary grant shall be those 

 contained in minutes isiued by the Committee of Council on 

 Eaucation. 



(3) Any minute made in pursuance of this section shall not 

 cotne into force until it has Iain on the table of both Houses of 

 Parliament for one month. 



5. (i) Where any school in which technical education is given 

 in pursuance of this Act is not a public elementary school, a 

 parliamentary grant may be made to such school by the Science 

 and Art Department, subject to such conditions as that Department 

 may prescribe. 



(2) Any minute made by the Science and Art Department in 

 pursuance of this section shall not come into force until it has 

 lain on the table of both Houses of Parliament for one month. 



6. (i) All the provisions of the Elementary Education Acts 

 rekiting to the powers of school boards with respect to sufficient 

 accommodation, fees, the combination of school boards, and the 

 acquisition of land, shall apply to school boards in whose 

 schools technical education is given, or to be given, under this 

 Act ; and a school shall not cease to be a public elementary 



school within the meaning of the Elementary Education Acts by 

 reason of technical education being given therein. 



(2) A school which is under the management of a schoot 

 board, and in which technical education is given under this Act,, 

 shall be conducted in accordance with the same regulations as ai> 

 elementary public school under the Elementary Education Acts ,- 

 Provided, however, that every such school shall be open to the 

 inspection of any inspector appointed by the Department of 

 Science and Art, as well as of Her Majesty's inspectors as- 

 defined in the Elementary Education Acts. 



7. The expenses incurred by any school board in carrying this 

 Act into effect, including any contributions made by the school' 

 board in aid of technical education in schools not under their 

 management, shall be deemed to be expenses of the said schoot 

 board within the meaning of the Elementary Education Acts^ 

 and payable accordingly. ' 



A school board shall have the same powers of borrowing for 

 the like purposes, but subject to the same consent and other 

 conditions, as they have under the Elementary Education 

 Acts. 



8. The expenses incurred by a local authority in giving effect 

 to this Act, including any such contributions as are above 

 mentioned, shall be payable out of the local rate. The local 

 authority shall have the like powers of borrowing for the 

 purposes of this Act, but subject to the same conditions, as for- 

 other purposes. 



9. The provisions of this Act with respect to a local authority 

 shall not apply to the Metropolis. 



10. It shall be competent for any school board or local 

 authority, should they think fit, to institute an entrance examin- 

 ation in reading, writing, and arithmetic for persons desirous of 

 attending technical schools or classes under their management, or 

 to which they contribute. 



11. For the purposes of this Act the expression "technical 

 education " means instruction in — 



(i.) Any of the branches of Science and Art with respect to 

 which grants are for the time being made by the Department of 

 Science and Art. 



(ii.) The working of wood, clay, metal, or other material for 

 the purposes of art or handicraft. 



(iii.) Commercial arithmetic : commercial geography ; modern 

 languages ; book-keeping, and shorthand, 



(iv. ) Any other subject applicable to the purposes of agriculture, 

 trade, or commercial life and practice, which may be sanctioned 

 "by a minute of the Department of Science and Art made on the 

 representation of a school board or local authority that such a 

 form of instruction is suited to the needs of its district. 



12. The provision to be made for technical education under 

 this Act may include the providing of school laboratories, 

 apparatus for teaching and experiment, museums and their 

 contents, libraries, books, workrooms, schools or schoolrooms, 

 or the improvement of existing provisions of any of these kinds, 

 and the maintaining of the same in such manner as may be 

 necessary to give effect to this Act. 



13. (i) Save as otherwise provided by this Act the ex- 

 pressions "school board," "public elementary school,"' 

 "managers," "parliamentary grant," and " Education Depait- 

 men'," respectively, have the same meaning in this Act as in 

 the Elementary Education Acts. 



(2) The expression " local authority" means in any borough 

 the council of that borough, and elsewhere the district coimcil if 

 district councils are established under any Act of the present 

 session of Parliament, but if not then the urban sanitary 

 authority or where there is no urban sanitary authority the 

 county council. 



The expression " local rate " means in a borough the school' 

 fund or borough fund or borough rate, and elsewhere the general 

 district rate or other rate corresponding thereto. 



14. This Act shall not apply to Scotland or Ireland. 



SCIENTIFIC SERIALS. 



Bulletins de la Socii!t^ d^Anthrojologie, tome onzieme, se'rie 

 iii., fasc. 4 (Paris, 188S). — Conclusion of M. Variot's paper on the 

 removal of marks of tattooing ; and on an instrument for tattoo- 

 ing, by the same writer. — On the sacrum of a chimpanzee, by 

 M. Chudzinski. In this case the sacrum was composed of seven 

 vertebra, the normal number in the Anthropoids being only five, 

 or at most six. — A process for mounting histological specimens- 



