THE HONGKONG GOVERNMENT GAZETTE, 15TH FEBRUARY, 1868.
41
it is to be attributed, it is curious to find that the girls make much more satisfactory progress than the boys. Neatness characterizes everything they do, and their handwriting, especially, attracts the admiration of those Chinese who have been shown it. In the school at Bowrington alone is needle-work taught, in addition to the ordinary routine of reading, writing and committing to memory, but I hope that it may soon be introduced into the other school also."
14. It is unnecessary, I trust, for me to state that English is carefully excluded from these schools. To the melancholy results which, in nearly every instance, have followed from teaching Chinese girls English I need not more particularly allude. Its effect on the character of the boys is not, I am sorry to find, what one could wish, but on the character of the girls it has proved to be fatal. And the reason seems to be this, that coming, as they nearly all do, from the poorer classes, the care, such as they have never experiented before, which is taken of them, the comforts, to them luxuries, which they enjoy, and the so called accomplishments, which they are taught, totally unfit them for the sphere of life in which they would otherwise naturally remain, and out of which it is impossible for them to rise.
15. The only aim which is attempted to be reached in the Girls' schools, which are under Government control, is that of making them honest and useful in their own humble sphere, and I am happy to say, from enquiries which I have made, that - the effort to do this has not been unsuccessful. The Master of the school in Sheung-wán tells me that the scholars who have left him, during the ten years in which it has been in existence, have, as a rule been respectably married in their own native Districts of Nám-hoi and Pú'n-ü.
16. Further than stating that the Stanley school is, in the meantime, the most regularly attended and that a Girls' school may be established as soon as there is a suitable school-house, I do not think it necessary to do more at present in connection with the Village Schools than refer you to the statistics which are appended to this Report.
17. I have now, in conclusion, only to refer to the Central School, and, in doing so, I shall be very brief, as no important changes have been made or results reached beyond those previously reported.
18. The attendance was well sustained during the year. It is a matter of some surprise to me that it was so; for, in the first place, the chances of obtaining situations have lately been rapidly diminishing, and in the second, it is not to be concealed that the classes are by far too large for only two En lish Masters, with the additional duty of inspecting the Village Schools devolving on one of them. The progress of the boys is certainly not what it ought to be, or what I should like to see it. Strangers who pay a casual visit may find some cause for commendation, but those who are daily engaged in the actual working of the school find much that is unsatisfactory, and which either an additional Master or decreased attendance would materially remedy.
19. In previous Reports I have referred to this difficulty. I had hoped that ere this time the Revenue of the Colony would be in a condition to admit of the appointment of another English Master but I fear such a proposition cannot, in the meantime, be entertained. I content myself therefore, under the circumstances, with saying that nothing could more contribute to the efficiency of the school, and that it will not be efficient without it.
20. Allusion has already been made to the main source of the apparent popularity of the school--the means of money-· making which are derived from a knowledge of English. In another respects, I was sorry to be told lately by one who has opportunities of knowing that those Chinese who have no sons at the school look upon the boys in anything but a favourable light. By giving themselves airs, by affecting a superiority they do not possess, by forming clubs, to the exclusion of those who do not know English, where all sorts of dissipation exist, the boys do not place the character of the school or the results of the training which is attempted to be given them in the light which those, whose time and energy are spent in their behalf, have perhaps a right to expect. When one thinks, however, of even the effects of Christianity itself, in its earlier stages, and that one Church in particular which had much to commend it had to be seriously cantioned, among other things, against a propensity to steal, one needs not despair at finding may things to annoy and disappoint in the promotion of Education in Hongkong. Like civilization, or any other moral and intellectual change, education is a comparative term which bears a relation not to this arbitrary standard or to that, but to the particular mental condition of the people among whom it is being disseminated. From the six years' experience I have now had of the work, I do not expect to find any great or lasting results in my time. My only hope is that, at the close of my connection with the schools, I may have done something which my successor will not have to undo.—I have the honour to be, Sir, your most obedient Servant,
The Honourable CBCTL C. SMITH,
Acting Colonial Secretary,
&c.,
$c.,
fe.
FREDERICK STEWART, Inspector of Government Schools.
NUMBERS and ATTENDANCE at the Government Schools during 1867.
Maximum Minimum Enrolment. Enrolment.
Maximum Minimum Attendance. Attendance.
1. Aberdeen
24
17
23
14
37
85
2. Bowrington
55
*47
52
33
3. Central School
266
205
221
-176
397
4. Girl's School
48
37
44
28
72
5. Shau-ki-wan
45
34
40
20
60
6. Stanley
45
37
38
29
67
7. Tang-lung-chau (Hakka).
29
14
26
10
36
28
8. Tang-lung-chau (Punti)
22
20
20
8
9. Webster's Crescent.
11
11
8
9
$3
10. West End
30
34
19
11. West Point (Hakka).
12. West Point (Punti) 13. Wong nai-chung
44
28
39
21
2
54
38
48
34
15
10
14
8
700
533
610
408