798 TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION L. 



I must, however, return to it for a moment, if only to emphasise the danger of 

 that specialisation, which, since it takes place at school and not at the University, 

 is bound to be narrow, and which is often encouraged in pupils of special aptitude 

 preparing for University scholarships. 



That a boy or girl should for a year or even two years before leaving school 

 be practically confined to one subject, and should before entering the University 

 be examined in that alone, appears to me to be contrary to all the best traditions 

 of school teaching, and to the often expressed desire of the Universities to insure 

 a good general education in those whom they admit. There should, I think, be 

 no scholarship examination which does not include several of the subjects of a 

 normal school curriculum, however much additional weight may be given to 

 any of them. Although it may be necessary that University entrance scholar- 

 ships in one subject should be given either to encourage its study or to discover 

 those who have a special aptitude, yet, so far as scholarships are intended to be 

 rewards for intellectual pre-eminence, they should, I think, be directed to general 

 capacity, and not be used as an encouragement to limited study. From what I 

 have already said it will be clear that I do not attach much importance to special 

 preparation at school for those who intend to proceed to the University. If a boy 

 has a very special taste or aptitude, it should have abundant opportunity for dis- 

 playing and exercising itself at the University, provided only that it has not been 

 stifled, but has been given some encouragement in the school curriculum. I under- 

 stand, for example, that those who teach such a subject as physiology at the 

 University would prefer that their pupils should come to them from school with a 

 general knowledge of chemistry and physics rather than that they should have 

 received training in physiology. With the present modern differentiation into a 

 classical and modern side, or their equivalents, the ordinary school subjects 

 should be sufficient preparation for any University course if they are not mutually 

 strangled in the pressure of an overcrowded curriculum. 



To be fair, however, I must state another view. A very experienced college 

 tutor who has had previous valuable experience as a master in a public school 

 tells me that in his opinion the real problem of the public schools is the ' arrest of 

 intellectual development that overtakes so many boys at about the age of sixteen.' 

 'There are few public schools,' he says, 'whose fifth forms are not full of boys 

 of seventeen or eighteen, many of them perfectly orderly, well-mannered, and 

 reasonable, in some sense the salt of the place, exercising great influence in the 

 school and exercising it well, with a high standard of public spirit, kindly, and 

 straight-living, in whom, nevertheless, it is difficult to recognise the bright, 

 intelligent, if not very industrious, child of two or three years before.' 



He thinks that there is a leal danger of degeneration at this age, owing, for 

 one thing, to the manner in which the boys are educated en bloc; up to a certain 

 age boys can be herded together and taught on the same lines without great 

 harm being done, but after a certain time differentiation begins to set in. The 

 school curriculum, however, does not admit of being adjusted to suit the dawning 

 interests of a couple of hundred boys ; and he sees no cure for this difficulty 

 except a considerable increase in the staff and a corresponding reduction in the 

 size of the forms. But he thinks that much may be done by an alteration in 

 the system of matriculation examination, which sets the standard at the public 

 schools. He would make this consist of two parts : an examination coming at 

 about the age of sixteen and well within the reach of a boy of ordinary intel- 

 ligence and industry, and comprising the ordinary subjects of school curriculum 

 at this age ; he would then let the boy leave the subjects from which he is not 

 likely to get much further profit and begin to specialise for the remaining two 

 or three years, say, in two subjects, which would then be the material of the 

 second examination. In this way they would make a wholly fresh start at a 

 critical age, and he thinks that the bulk of the boys would probably find this a 

 great advantage. 



I quote this opinion because it shows that an experienced schoolmaster 

 regards it as highly desirable that at a certain period in a schoolboy's career a 

 real change should be made in his curriculum, and I have expressly stated that 

 I find it difficult to express an opinion upon this particular educational period. 



What should be the exact nature of the teaching before and after the age of 

 sixteen or seventeen for the mass of ordinary boys I would prefer to leave to the 



