RURAL EDUCATION 33 



sur I'Enselgnement Agricole en France, Imprimerie 

 Nationale, Paris). 



They are described in this Report as "practical 

 schools of agriculture for the class of peasant pro- 

 prietors, who form such an immense majority of the 

 cultivators of the soil — for those laborious peasants 

 who are counted by millions, and who constitute one 

 of the greatest forces of the country." The Report 

 further states that the children are taken at the age of 

 thirteen, on leaving the primary schools, with the 

 object of completing the instruction given in those 

 schools. 



It is claimed for this widespread and " very suit- 

 able agricultural education,"^ that it binds the children 

 to rural life, and makes them less desirous of going 

 into towns "to swell the numbers, already too 

 great, of those d4classds who constitute a perpetual 

 danger to society." There were thirty-nine of these 

 schools established at the date of the report, and a 

 hope is expressed that the time is not far off when 

 each of the eighty-seven departments of France will 

 possess one.^ These institutions are referred to at this 

 length because they are so nearly connected with the 

 elementary schools, and chiefly because of the value 

 set on them by the French authorities, both central 

 and local. They are valued, not only from an 

 economic point of view, but on account of the great 

 effect they are supposed to be having on the social 

 life of the nation. 



The most important and instructive document of 



^ See Vol. I, p. 74. 



"^ The present writer has visited two or three of these schools, and 

 though it is unwise to generalize from a few examples, yet, judging from 

 these examples, the schools deserve the high praise given to them. 



