118
7. It cannot be said in Hongkong, that English studies are neglected by students after leaving Queen's College; there is abundant evidence that they aim at progressive self-improvement. Nor must we forget the little colony of our boys in the Northern Universities, as well as those scattered over the area from Japan down the coast of China and Tonquin, even to Singapore, and beyond to Penang, A large proportion of these speak and write in the English language admirably, and several of them are anxious to assist their fellow-countrymen in the acquisition of Western ideas; they there- fore write for the most part in Chinese, and but little is known of their unostentatious labour. Mr. LUK, our Second Chinese Assistant, is engaged in bringing out a Second Edition, Revised and Enlarged, of his bilingual English Grammar; and Mr. WAN, our late Fourth Chinese Assistant published a Chinese Translation of Outlines of English History. Several works too have appeared, due to the industry of our old scholars; a book on Insurance and two on European and Chinese Civili- sation compared, by Mr. CHAN HE-WAN; and last year Messrs. Lo SING-LAU and Mox LAI-CHI have independently published little books on English Conversation with Chinese equivalents.
8. While on the subject of publishing, it may not be amiss to add that within the last three years, six little books for the use of this college have been printed (as they are for private circulation, the word published is hardly appropriate) at the expense of the Government. One of these is Notes on the Geography of the Chinese Empire, a very useful book by Mr. DEALY, Senior Assistant Master; the remaining five are Translations of Chinese books in use in various classes, made long ago by different masters, but suffering from the effects of tradition and transcription, on which account they were finally revised by myself. Considerable saving of time, hitherto employed in copying from the Blackboard is thus effected, to say nothing of the prevention of many careless errors in taking down bandwriting.
9. His Excellency the Governor, at the Prize Distribution last February, offered two prizes of $50 and $25 respectively to the Chinese boys of this Institution, who should write the best and second-best Essays on the Progress of the British Empire during the last Fifty Years. Seven boys competed last November, and the Governing Body, who acted as judges, reported Li Ur and Sis CHEUNG, as writers of the two best essays. His Excellency accordingly presented them with the
amounts.
10. Mr. JONES has been on leave throughout the year. Mr. JAMESON and Mr. Woodcock went on leave in April, the latter on completion of six years' service. Messrs. BARCLAY and COURTNEY have been Acting Assistant Masters since April and June respectively. Mr. FUNG KI-CHEUK A. A. one of our cleverest Junior Chinese Assistants, resigned in April, on getting employment as Assistant Compradore.
11. Our boys paid 33 fees for the Oxford Local Examinations, but only 24 presented themselves, equally divided among Seniors, Juniors and Preliminary. Of these 11 or 46% passed; exactly one half of the Seniors and the same proportion of the Preliminary passed; which may be viewed as satis- factory, being the average of former years. The Mark Good, which is next to Distinction was awarded as follows, to 9 boys for Arithmetic, 1 for History, 1 for Shakespeare, 3 for Robinson Crusoe, 3 for Geography and 1 for Acts.
12. Acting under instructions from the Governing Body, I conducted the Annual Examination. Pursuing the practice of former years, I took 100 marks as the maximum in every subject; less than 50 obtained was reckoned a failure in any subject; for a class pass, a boy had to pass in half the subjects offered i.e. in the Upper School, passes in 7 subjects, in 5 in the Lower School, and in 3 in the Pre- paratory, were required; which is sufficiently severe. The general result of the examination is far above the average; in fact, I should have been justified in characterising it as a phenomenal success, had it not been for extreme weakness in Class 1 B. and the two lowest non-Chinese sections. The total number examined was 517 boys, of whom 469 or 90% passed, represented as follows in the three main Sections:-
Total number examined.
1896
Percentage passed.
1894
1896
1894
Upper School.................... 114.
217
81
90
Lower School..........209
201
93
92
Preparatory............194
169
94
96
The whole staff deserves great credit for steady and careful teaching of which there is ample evidence, even in those cases referred to above where the percentages are low. In by far the majority of papers, there was none of the drudgery attendant upon the correction of ill-digested and badly written answers. 13. The usual Tables of the number of boys examined and passed in each subject, and of percent- ages of passes are here subjoined.