126 



NA TURE 



{June 6, 1889 



Unusually Large Hail. 



Some very large hailstones fell here about 3.30 p.m. on 

 Sunday, June 2, during a short but sharp thunder-storm. Most 

 of them were ellipsoidal in outline : some were mammillated, 

 and some were evidently compound, formed of several hailstones 

 partially fused together. Ten picked up at random as being 

 fairly large ones measured from | to \\ inches (|, -I, i, li, H, 

 li. 1^, .I2. if. if inches) in greatest diameter. Many of them 

 wereforaied of four, five, or six concentric layers, which were 

 alternately clear and snow white. Some of these hailstones 

 lying on the grass took more than an hour and a half to melt 

 away (temp. 65° F. ) 



Mr. I. C. Thompson has just drawn my attention to the 

 residue which they leave Avhen melted on a clean glass slide. 

 This, when examined under a high power of the microscope, is 

 found to contain, along with inorganic particles, a number of 

 minute plant spores. W. A. Herdman. 



University College, Liverpool, June 2. 



The Muybridge Photographs. 



Allow me to state, in order to save correspondence due to 

 the omission of a publisher's name in connection with the 

 Muybridge photographs (Nature, May 23, p. 78), that they 

 may be seen and ordered of Mr. Muybridge, at 38 Craven Street, 

 Strand, London. E. Ray Lankester. 



University College, London. 



THE VICES OF OUR SCIENTIFIC EDUCA- 

 TION} 



'T^HE subject which I. desire to bring to the notice of 

 -*• the Association to-day must necessarily remind you 

 of the attack which was recently made on our competitive 

 examination system in the Nmeteenth Century. 



In some respects the writers of the article, or articles, 

 in the Nineteetith Ce/i/iny, appear to me to have right on 

 their side when they object to the existing state of our 

 competitive system. 



They begin by complaining against the dangerous 

 mental pressure, and the resulting physical mischief, 

 which accompany the working of nearly all parts of our 

 present educational systein. This complaint seems to me 

 to be just. 



The fact is, in my opinion, that nearly all our examina- 

 tions are much too difficult — too much beyond the mental 

 and physical abilities of the examined. 



Let me take, as a supreme instance, the examination 

 for the Mathematical Tripos at Cambridge. P2ver since I 

 have known anything of this examination, I have 

 wondered how it can be possible that young men, three 

 years after leaving school, can successfully grapple with 

 problems, a great number of which are of transcendent 

 difficulty, in such an immense range of mathematical and 

 physical subjects as this Tripos contains. Indeed, when 

 we are admitted behind the scenes by reading the solutions 

 of these problems by those who have set them, our wonder 

 is increased ; for we find frequently that the discussion of 

 a single problem occupies four, five, or six (and sometimes 

 more) pages of small print. Such problems have a very 

 great value for the student who has plenty of time to con- 

 sider them in the solitude of his study ; but I should 

 think that the attempt to attain the amount of knowledge 

 and adroitness necessary to deal with them on the spur of 

 the moment in the Senate House must often produce 

 mental and physical injury. Are we really to believe that 

 a young man of twenty-one or twenty-three has made 

 himself master of nearly everything given to the scientific 

 world by Newton, Laplace, Gauss, Jacobi, Helmholtz, 

 Cayley, Thomson, and Clerk Maxwell .? 



The desire to place before a student a standard which 

 (I suppose I am right in assuming) he can never reach is, 

 of course, quite defensible ; and it is one which appears 



'A Faper read 1 e'ore the Asso'iation for the Iirprovement cf Gtor.etiltel 

 Teaching, January ig, 18:9, by Prof. Minchin, Pieiident. 



in every educational competition. But it- is not in all 

 cases carried out with a regard for riglitness of method. 

 For, this desire to be always in advance of the student 

 leads some examining bodies to hurry him through a 

 large number of subjects in a short time. It is, I think,, 

 a marked characteristic of our very modern method that 

 we require half a dozen branches of mathematics and 

 physics to be got through in a time which, say, twenty 

 years ago, would have been devoted to the study of twO' 

 or three. Is there, for example, nearly so much time now 

 devoted to the study of pure Geometry as there was then ? 

 Is Trigonometry so thoroughly and leisurely studied now 

 in the schools ? 



With the rage which now exists for rushing students; 

 through elementary mathematics in order that they may 

 in the shortest possible time reach physics, both experi- 

 mental and mathematical, the necessary foundations of 

 scientific knowledge are seldom properly laid. Boys who 

 ought to be learning skill in Algebraical manipulation, in 

 assimilating Trigonometrical formulae, and in applying 

 them to various problems of Mensuration, are, I find, 

 endeavouring to limp through Statics, Hydrostatics, and 

 Kinetics. When to these comparatively advanced subjects 

 we add some Chemistry, the phenomena (at least) of Heat, 

 Optics, Sound, Electricity, and Magnetism — to say no- 

 thing of languages — the result is inevitable that the less 

 showy subjects of elementary pure Mathematics must be 

 insufficiently studied — must, in fact, be merely skimmed. 



There is no subject in which the result of this over- 

 haste is so easily recognized as Trigonometry ; for, at the 

 outset, the student's work in this branch must largely 

 consist in committing to memory a number of formula?, 

 and nothing but long-continued practice in application 

 will fix them in the mind. Hence, as the necessary time 

 must be given to several other subjects, I find very many 

 students exceedingly slow in repeating, and even in 

 recognizing, some of the most elementary and frequently 

 useful formulas in Trigonometry. Hence also a large 

 portion of the knowledge brought out in competitive 

 examinations consists of what is called " Cram," and it 

 is, therefore, customary to heap odium on the " Cram- 

 mers." I do not think, however, that the fault rests with 

 the Crammers, who do merely what they are invited to do 

 by educational authorities. 



I shall take as an instance of the excessive haste with 

 which students are pushed on through various branches 

 of Science the Matriculation Examination of London 

 University ; and what I say with reference thereto is the 

 result of a present experience which I have in assisting 

 a young relative in his reading for this examination. In 

 last year's Regulations for Matriculation you will find that 

 the course of Mathematics consists of Arithmetic, Algebra 

 as far as easy quadratic equations with questions involving 

 their use, Geometry to the extent of the first four books 

 of Euclid, with simple deductions ; and in Mechanics the 

 requisites are " elementary notions as to Velocity, Acce- 

 leration, Force, Mass, Momentum, Work, and Energy, 

 Composition and Resolution of Velocities, Accelerations, 

 and Forces in one plane. Moments and Couples in one 

 plane. Centre of Gravity, or Mass-centre. Transmission 

 of Pressure in Liquids ; variation with depth of the pres- 

 sure due to weight of liquids. Specific Gravity and modes 

 of determining it. Pressure of gases, and laws relating 

 thereto. Atmospheric pressure. Common instruments 

 and apparatus whose action depends upon the pressure 

 of liquids, or of the atmosphere, or both." In addition 

 to this, the candidate must take up either Chemistry, or 

 Heat and Light, or Electricity and Magnetism. 



Now you will observe particularly two things about 

 this prescribed course. Firstly, the candidate is not sup- 

 posed to have any knowledge of the fifth and sixth books 

 of Euclid, and therefore no knowledge of the propositions 

 relating to the ratios of linear or other magnitudes ; and, 

 secondly, that all knowledge of Trigonometry is excluded. 



