206 REPORT—1874. 
the sound mind in the sound body, what, in short, is the type of perfect woman- 
hood and how it is to be developed, are questions waiting for impartial study, and 
on the right solution of which the future welfare of the race will largely depend. 
The last point to mention is the system of examinations, which practically governs 
our whole scholastic procedure. We require some scientific principle to decide 
what is the right system of examination, whether it shall test memory or intelli- 
gence, the knowledge of words or of ideas, of rules or of principles underlying 
those rules. Since an examination is now the inevitable portal to every professional 
career, it is not too much to say that the results it tests and rewards will be the 
only ones generally aimed at. It is not expected of schoolmasters and mistresses, 
and mothers of families, that they should master this vast range of knowledge or 
be ready with answers to all these questions. What is wanted is that they, like 
our practical navigators, should be furnished with the principles of a science they 
have not had to discover for themselves, and with charts to guide their general 
course, leaving to their individual acumen the adaptations and modifications 
required by special cirumstances. 
The proofs of these charges against the present system, or want of system, in 
education are to be found in the Reports of the Royal Commissioners on Public 
Schools and Endowed Schools, of the Committee of Council on Education, of the 
various medical examining bodies, in the evidence of schoolmasters and mistresses, 
and in the facts of our social life. Great services have been rendered to the cause 
of scientific education by many writers and practical educators at home and 
abroad, in times past and present ; but these services have not had their due meed 
of public recognition and acknowledgment, and the valuable materials supplied 
have not been coordinated into a body of science admitted into the recognized 
hierarchy of sciences, although education, as the application of all other sciences 
to the production of the highest of all results, may be boldly proclaimed the crowning 
science of all. 
Sanitary Legislation and Organization : its Present State and Future Prospects. 
: By Tuomas W. Griusnaw, 4.M., M.D. 
Although the parliamentary session which has just terminated has not been so 
eventful in sanitary legislation as many sanguine sanitarians anticipated, yet, with 
the small time at its disposal, the extreme hurry of public business, and the 
difficulties which a new Ministry had to deal with in a new House of Commons, 
a considerable advance has been made in sanitary legislation during the past 
session by the passing of the Public Health (Ireland) Act, the Public Health 
(Scotland) Act, the Sanitary Laws Amendment Act, the Vaccination Amendment 
Acts, and the Registration of Births and Deaths Amendment Act, besides the advan- 
tage likely to accrue from the Report of the Select Committee on the Adulteration 
Act of 1872, and the passing of the new standing orders with regard to the 
destruction of dwellings of the working classes for the construction of works for 
public companies. 
The requirements of sanitary legislation appear to me to be as follows :— 
I. A codification, consolidation, and amendment of existing laws. 
II. Convenient areas for administration, with easily workable subdistricts, 
III. Uniform authorities without clashing of jurisdiction. 
IV. A complete executive organization. 
V. Constant supervision by the central authority. 
VI. Security for a certain amount of independence for the local officers from the — 
local authorities. 
I. Codification and amendment of sanitary law. 
I believe sanitary law to be one of those subjects so technical, and the terms of — 
which are susceptible of very considerable accuracy of definition, that it is emi- — 
nently suited for codification. , 
Not only was sanitary legislation spasmodic, but generally undertaken under 
the influence of panic, either from a recently past, present, or impending epidemic. 
The first real attempt at systematic legislation was made in 1848, In 1866 was 
passed the Sanitary Act of 1866, which may be considered the first attempt at 
