26 LAND REFORM 



hood slain." A system more calculated to give children 

 a distaste for country life and to divorce them from 

 their surroundings can hardly be imagined. It is, as 

 a writer observes, as if " the manufacture of little clerks 

 was the final end of education." 



Mr. J. A. Willis, one of H. M. Chief Inspectors, 

 puts the case very clearly. He says that the scheme 

 of work in several subjects is too large and too detailed 

 for rural schools. For example, he condemns the 

 practice of teaching history " in periods," as it involves 

 an amount of detail "quite foreign to the minds of the 

 elementary scholar.'' He adds . " Nothing can be 

 more mournful than to see little unfortunates, on their 

 first introduction to history, laboriously spelling their 

 way through statements in journalese English about 

 the policy of Sir Robert Walpole, because, forsooth, 

 ' we are taking the Hanoverian period ' 1" ^ 



Mr. Willis is content to abide the charge of " lower- 

 ing the standard of education." He very wisely has 

 the " ordinary child" in mind, though, as he says, the 

 " extraordinary child " need not be left out of account. 

 In the same report Mr. Willis states: "As I said in 

 my last report, I believe that if teachers were minded 

 the cottage garden could be made the basis of the 

 whole rural education." 



Many of the general body of Inspectors in the 

 same Report speak in a similar strain. These men, 

 being in continual touch with schools, teachers and 

 teaching, have the best opportunities of knowing the 

 actual state of things, and therefore their opinions 

 ought to receive the greatest consideration. 



' General Report on Elementary Schools (Cd, 1706-1903), Note. — 

 These Reports are quoted at some length because so few of the general 

 public have either the opportunity or the desire for studying Blue Books. 



