ON THE MENTAL AND PHYSICAL DEFECTS OF CHILDREN. 489 
Mental and Physical Deviations from the Normal among Children in 
Public Elementary and other Schools.—Ieport of the Committee, 
consisting of the late Sir DouGLas GaLTon (Chairman), Dr. FRANCIS 
Warner (Secretary), Mr. E. W. Braproox, Dr. J. G. Garson, 
and Mr. E. Waite Wauuis. (Report drawn up by the Secretary.) 
APPENDIX.—Zable shoning the conditions of 1,120 children requiring special 
careand training . - 2 : : . . . page A490 
In presenting this our Seventh Annual Report, we must first express our 
‘deep regret at the loss sustained by the death of Sir Douglas Galton, at 
whose instigation the Committee was first appointed in 1892, who acted 
as Chairman, and took a deep interest in all its proceedings. 
The Committee have continued to work in conjunction with the 
Childhood Society, to whom they are indebted for access to the records of 
children examined individually by members of this Committee and the 
Society. 
Since our first Report in 1893 much attention has been directed to the 
care of children subnormal in mental or physical conditions, and a Bill is 
now before Parliament to make better provision for the elementary edu- 
cation of defective and epileptic children in England and Wales. 
We here give a further account of the 1,120 exceptional children 
requiring special care and training, in continuation of our former Reports. 
They have previously been arranged in sub-classes, presenting the class or 
classes of defect named only ; the cases being distributed first in age- 
groups, secondly under school standards. 
Some of these children will require special modes of care and teaching, 
many are delicate in health, and a small proportion are imbecile. 
This catalogue of cases was asked for in evidence by the Committee 
of the Education Department on Children Feeble-minded ; it appears in 
our Report for 1897. 
Following the catalogue of cases is a table, in which the children are 
arranged in primary groups, presenting only the class of defect indicated ; 
_ they form about 1 per cent. of the children in public elementary schools. 
- Table B 3 (Report 1897) deals with children collected by the Charity 
Organisation Society in various parts of London, and presented for 
_ report as to mental and physical status ; they were examined and re- 
ported on by Dr. Francis Warner. It is there shown that of 149 boys 
and 89 girls collected by the C.O.S. Committee and teachers as being 
defective, only 88 boys and 68 girls were on examination found so far 
subnormal as to be reported ‘exceptional children.’ This indicates that 
much care and discretion will be needed in selecting these children and in 
organising special classes of schools. 
In our Report (1898), the co-relation of classes of defects in these 
children is shown to be very high: they have a much greater tendency 
than average children to become delicate in an adverse environment, 
_ especially the girls ; this, as might be expected, is most marked in those 
under seven years of age. 
In our present Report the 1,120 exceptional children are arranged 
in a table as presenting only the class ar classes of defect indicated in 
