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22. The master of VB seems to have well taught the general outlines of Europe and Asia, and has driven his facts home by frequent references to local geography. We were pleased to find, on telling the Class to mark off on the map of Europe a part equal in size to Hongkong, that the problem puzzled nobody. The flags of the great powers were described, and the difference between the red and the white ensign was elucidated-all this without using a word of Chinese. In IVA the Geography of China was well known on the whole. Rather more attention should be paid to the "build" of the country, e.g., the physical causes which led to the change in course of the Yellow River were not at all understood. Contour maps both here and in other Classes should be used oftener.
23. In the Upper School we have again to point out the lack of a scheme calculated to suit the instruction to local requirements. The work in the two highest Classes is dependent on the demands of the Oxford Local; and they in turn depend on the needs of English boys in England not of Chinese in Hongkong. Thus, such relatively unimportant countries as Sweden or the Netherlands are studied in detail, while Japan, Corea and Manchuria are left untouched. There is no class in the school to which such a question could fairly be put as ompare the policies of Japan, the Philippines and the Straits Settlements with regard to Chinese immigration.
HISTORY.
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24. History is not taught at Queen's College in the Lower and Preparatory Schools. We examined the Upper School by means of written papers. We make a few general remarks upon the teaching of History in the College, after shewing how the boys acquitted themselves in the work actually studied by them.
25. Class I (A and B).-The period selected was the Stuart period. Papers were answered by 21 boys. We have much pleasure in saying that the boys have been most carefully taught. TANG, TAT-HUNG sent in the best aper, but U HANG-TOK gave a very good reply on the question of the divine right of kings.
26. Class II (A and B).--The period studied was also the Stuart period, taken however in much less detail than in Class I. The questions we asked were broad and general, such as What were the causes of the Civil War ?" "What do you know about John Bunyan ?" On the whole the questions were well an- swered, though in Class IIB it was a common mistake to suppose that Mary II was the daughter of Charles.
27. Class III (A, B and C).-The period was the Normans and early Plan- tagenets. The questions set were simple, and most of the correct answers appear to have been learned by heart, e.g., to the question "What do you know of the Feudal System?" this reply was given in exactly the same form by a large number of boys: "The Feudal System was the custom of paying for land by giving service in war, instead of giving money for it." On the whole the answers were good; and the text-book had been carefully learned-in many cases almost by heart.
28. But while acknowledging that the History taught was well taught and learned, we have a further question to consider. Is the knowledge of History acquired by the senior boys of any use to them? Or could History be taught to them in a more useful way? The prevailing system is this. As a boy passes through the Upper School he learns three periods of English History (which some- times overlap and sometimes leave wide gaps) and there his knowledge ends. This system can be defended, as it seems to us on two grounds only:
I. Because such is the instruction provided in most English schools.
II. Because the Chinese boy in Hongkong is thus taught the History of the dominant race in Hongkong.
29. The first reason has only to be stated to be refuted. In the first place History is usually very badly taught in English Schools. In Germany and in the the United States of America, where far more importance is attached to the sub- ject, the history of foreign countries is not neglected. In the second place the English boy cannot go through his course at school without learning a great many historical facts outside it. He reads the Classics, he learns his Biblical History, he