176 SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNICAL EDUCATION 



can they practically show this preference ? So long as there is 

 no recognised curriculum leading to no recognised examination, 

 they can at most ask if the candidate has attended certain classes, 

 such as my own, and with what success. The profession cannot 

 institute a sort of matriculation examination, and a mere general 

 inquiry as to previous training will lead in future to no better 

 results than hitherto ; but if the University institutes a recog- 

 nised examination, conferring a recognised degree or diploma, 

 the profession can then select their pupils by asking a perfectly 

 definite question, Has he or has he not passed this degree ? and 

 if so, with what credit ? This is one reason why I think it is 

 incumbent on all universities professing to prepare engineers 

 that they should institute definite engineering degrees. The 

 particular examination which should be employed to test the 

 fitness of a pupil to enter an engineer's office or workshop should 

 embrace only the elements of those subjects which 1 have named 

 above ; but these would ensure that the pupils in engineers' 

 offices who had passed that examination should be very differ- 

 ently prepared from the pupils with which I have come in 

 contact (in the south). 



/ call, therefore, on my professional brethren to select their 

 pupils with reference to their previous training, and I call upon 

 the University to organise such a curriculum, and to institute such 

 an examination, as will enable pupils to be thus selected. 



In course of time, should the engineering instruction prove 

 successful, it will be necessary to institute some new chairs, such 

 as that of architecture, and possibly to divide engineering into 

 two branches, with lectureships on special subjects ; but every 

 step should be justified by the success of each previous advance. 

 The University can, however, at once do more than simply 

 test the fit preparation of engineering pupils by the institution 

 of a degree corresponding to that of Bachelor of Arts. It might 

 also offer to test how far, at the end of his pupilage, each pupil 

 has benefited by his practical training, and then give a real 

 diploma attesting his capacity in the particular branch which 

 he has studied. This was the proposal contained in the Univer- 

 sity Calendar, but abandoned for the present, owing to legal 

 informalities attending its adoption. 



Some disapprobation has been expressed at the proposal to 



