356 JOURNAL OF SCIENCE. 
spirited guilds to come to the rescue; neither have we 
generous donors of endowments for such useful public institu- 
tions. Our manufacturers are for the most part struggling to 
establish their arts and industries, and their numbers are too 
small and their position too ill-assured to allow them to take the 
matter in hand for their common benefit. It is therefore the 
duty of all who desire to see the manufacturing industries of the 
Colony take root and prosper, to use their best endeavours to in- 
duce the public authorities to make provision as soon as pos- 
sible for the establishment, on a fitting scale, of such science and 
technical schools as are required. To me it appears that the 
wants of the Colony would, for some years, be sufficiently met 
if they were established in the cities of Auckland, Christchurch, 
and Dunedin. With them should be amalgamated the schools 
of art and design which are now maintained principally at 
public expense in the cities mentioned. 
“To provide the instruction and training here contemplated 
would necessarily involve considerable expense. The erection 
and equipment of suitable establishments would be somewhat 
costly, and the salaries of skilled teachers would, for some years 
at all events, amount to a considerable figure, while no great 
income could be expected from fees. In these circumstances 
the Legislature would, I think, be acting in the best interests of 
the nation if it set aside a sufficient part: of the ample reserves 
for the endowment of secondary schools and universities for the 
maintenance of the science and technical schools. The initial 
cost would have to be provided for by special vote of Parliament. 
The maintenance of these schools is certainly of as great national 
importance as is that of the numerous high and intermediate 
schools. In several of the neighbouring Australasian Colonies 
the provision of secondary education is left to the enterprise of 
corporations and private individuals, and these colonies can 
boast of not a few colleges of as high efficiency and utility as the 
best of our State-aided secondary schools. I mention this fact, 
not because I doubt the wisdom of granting State aid to secon- 
dary schools, but to shew that secondary schools may easily be 
made to a large extent self-supporting, and that. their efficiency 
need not be seriously lessened by diverting a portion of the State 
support now given to them to the maintenance of science and 
technical schools. So soon as we realise the importance for the 
development of our growing arts and manufactures, and for the 
opening up of resources yet untouched, of skilled artizans and ~ 
superintendents, versed in the scientific principles on which the 
arts they practise are based, intelligent, supple-minded, and in- 
ventive, the question of expense will not long retard the creation 
of institutions to serve effectually so useful a purpose.” 
A third duty considered incumbent on Government is the 
establishment of model farms for the propagation and culture 
of plants of economic value, whose cultivation could be advan- 
tageously carried on in the northern sub-tropical part of the 
Colony. Such model farms, where a knowledge of the best 
