Nov. lo, 1887] 



NATURE 



45 



ing at the increased rate of rise of the last few years, as a sudden 

 augmentation due to special causes, it is obvious that as the 

 limit is approached the rate of rise must rapidly diminish. This 

 limit, as far as it can be arrived at by calculation from popula- 

 tion, &c. , probably about 200,coo persons under instruction in 

 science — there were last session 1 10,000 under instruction. Con- 

 tinuing the curve for science as it may reasonably be expected 

 to run, we should arrive at about ilo,oco in 1896." In any 

 case there is no real cause for alarm, because the standard of 

 work required lo secure a grant can always be raised, and, as a 

 matter of fact, appears to be steadily rising year by year, and, 

 after all, the sum of even ;^ioi,i75, which is the estimated 

 expenditure for the current year in aid of science instruction, is 



a remarkably small annual expense for the instruction of 103,362 

 students all over the country. 



There has been for several years at work another central 

 agency, which promotes technical instruction in the same man- 

 ner as the Science and Art Department, viz, by payment upon 

 the results of examination. This body is known as the City and 

 Guilds Institute of London. These examinations carried on by 

 this body were originally established in 1873 by the Society of 

 Arts — the subject that year being cotton manufacture, steel, and 

 carriage building, the number of candidates being respectively 

 one, two, and three, making a grand total of six. The next 

 year, gas manufacture and agriculture were added, and the total 

 rose to thirty-six. Subjects continued to be added, and the 



Fig. I. — Science and Art Department. 



Fig. 2. — City ani Guilds of London. 



numbers to rise year by year, until ten years ago the latter had 

 reached 184, since when the following table shows the progress 

 made, the City and Guilds taking over the whole responsibility 

 of the work in 1881. 



Table II. — Society of Arts and City and Guilds Exa7ninations. 



I have plotted the above results in a similar manner to those 

 cf the Science and Art Department, and it will be seen (Fig. 2) 



that the rate of growth is far more rapid ; and rich as are the 

 worthy livery companies of grocers, fishmongers, tanners, spect- 

 acle makers, and others, who form the City and Guilds Institute, 

 they too must have reason to confess that technical education, 

 towards which they have recently contributed not less than a 

 quarter of a million of money, is not quite at a standstill, for at 

 the present rate of growth the number of candidates, large as it 

 now is, will have doubled in the next seven years, though even 

 this, with an assured income of ;^33.ooo a year, may not give 

 them cause for alarm. It may be well to explain that the ex- 

 aminational work of the City and Guilds, and that of the Science 

 and Art Department, not only do not clash, but bear an import- 

 ant and valuable relation to each other. Thus the former is 

 more distinctly technical, dealing with ^special details of trades 



