628
塾英
每然
漢文粗淺英語遺忘矣惟聖會義學專教英文漫分時候是以獲益長多彼童家雖耳所聞者多是西洋中華言語迨出塾時說英語繕英文兩者俱佳肄業五六年間均計每日學習英文一時三刻或僅二時兼之大書院在該時期兼教方學代數化學等無怪乎遞年出院之童莫能說英語矣無怪夫文一節所有虧欠顯然易見矣推原其故敝監院以爲實因國家書館一向分時兼教英文華文桉漢文字義學之頗難學童家耳不聞英語况在塾同類者爲陪審之員按此數輩以華人而得備陪審人員之列或在港另有善說英語之華人若稽其肄業之區則自香港面外者由此觀之香港教習英文竟不能獲六人之数因照港例卽一千八百六十四年第十一條則例第四歎凡不闇英語者不得備陪審人員之列致使華人有因罪被鞫而不獲與其即本港能說英語之少年與十年來之教誨一較歴時如此之久效如此之少鹹不敷也現在香港居民華人不下十三萬五千欲從中選舉陪審人員書塾肄業五年要之如此教法倘果有益則少年子弟善說英語者今不乏人矣但自問絕不偏私實在可云現能說英語者寥寥無幾叉除英人子女外十名皆循法竭力兼教英文華文者監院以爲照依去歲之數而言溯自十年來均計每年可得專學英文或兼學英文華文之童九百名叉彼等各在教英文者或兼教英文華文者去歲學童共二百二十二名又有天主教耶穌教各聖會之輔翼義學專學英文者三百六十名合共學童約一千八百八童八百四十名其間學英文者計有四白之多惜其教法仍有未備者更有國家大書院兼訓英文華文者去歲學童九百九十名又有國家各義學或專
學見數
輩
惟國家書塾則欲爲所不能爲兼以忍耐堅守成法實足驚奇殊堪拜服
more or less English teaching also tainted with imperfection. Adding to this number 590 boys who were taught both English and Chinese in the Central School last year and 223 boys taught English or English and Chinese conjointly in outs Me Government Schools, also 368 children whocceived exclusively English teaching in Grant-in-aid Schools, both Catholic and Protes- tant, we have a total of 1,880 children under some sort of methodic and on the whole good English or Anglo-Chinese tuition. I feel sure I am not far wrong if I add, on the basis of the statistics of last year, that for the last twenty years an annual average of 900 children has been under English or Anglo-Chinese instruction, and that each child attended such teaching on an average for 5 years. Yet, considering what a number of English speaking young people there ought to be in the Colony if this teaching was at all effective, the fact strikes every impartial ob- server that the number of English speaking in- habitants is very small in the Colony and that, apart from the children of English parents, the number of English speaking young men and wo- men in the Colony is out of all proportion with the amount of English teaching given during the last twenty years. Out of
population of at least 135,000 Chinese resident in this Colony, we cannot muster even half a dozen Chinese on the Jury list, as under Ordinance No. 11 of 1864, Section IV, no person ignorant of the English
language can serve as a Juror, the effect of which is that Chinese offenders are generally tried by Jurors who are not their peers. Most of those Chinese who are Jurors or who do speak English fluently are found, on inquiry, to have been educated outside of this Colony. The prin- cipal cause of this manifest educational failure, as far us English speaking is concerned, I see in the attempt which the Government Schools of this Colony have all along made of dividing their limited time between English and Chinese teach- ing. As the Chinese written language is extra- ordinarily difficult, as almost all the children in Government Schools never hear English spoken in home, and are on an average only 5 or 6 years at school and scarcely more than 33/4 hours per diem at English studies into which-in the case of the Central School-even Geometry, Algebra and Chemistry are crammed, it is not to be wondered
at that an overwhelming majority of scholars leave our Government Schools year after year unable to speak English and with but a smatter- ing of the written Chinese language, whilst sure to forget soon again most of the English know- ledge acquired in school. Those Grant-in-aid
Schools which teach English at all give their whole undivided time to it and the result is of course satisfactory; though most of those children hear but Portuguese or Chinese spoken in their homes, they leave school able to speak English and able to write it to a certain extent with faci- lity. It is only in the Government Schools that the Danaide labour of trying to do the impossible is still continued with a perseverance worthy of all admiration.
於男
璎
或
四
男得四之三女得四之一但此塾男女童比較其數亦如疇昔年去歲實是十增其一但將各家管轄各女童之數較諸前增至四百三十一名故畧計國得女童三百四十三名去年則七十九名又查聖會義學前年三十五名去年頓減僅得一百查國家義學2年得女童二百
論及女學較諸兒童似更虧
於理或有未當
欠
所立不教門者或各聖會所傳楊天主耶穌二教者無非教人以克已愛人正心修身之道故各塾所關爲國民同各修其身而後乃可但監院深信上文所陳各塾果增此益與國與民蓋各書塾無論華人所設遵奉儒教者或國家小子讀書摹字殊非成全教化之意以此教法不足使人爲良民倘欲使國與民並受其益必須使肄業諸童各正其心八百四十名又有華人儒教書塾或有學童一千三百名而屬國家察理者共計學童約有三千四百六十名竊思徒教本港各塾教條若何賁爲最要按本港除各育嬰堂所有書塾内之小子外有未入國家察理之天主教書塾約有學童三百名其間有或晝夜學習英文者約三百名但惜其教英文之法猶未盡善者天主教書塾未入國家察理者學恥以爲香港華人趨不流於不英不華交雜之民而使政刑各署有不勝繁擾之事上文所言華人儒教書塾學童一千天文地理格物致知之道與夫外邦風俗當代規模齊驅幷教如斯固可使在港產育說英語之民且不慮有如今日所人語言者未嘗二什得一故與其教習華文究不如使多人解言英語在港教習英文之爲愈且也若教英文便可兼用
是一般珍貴但念使闔港興盛助國家治理如此地者則說華人語言者十居九五而歐洲人與各署官憲求其解華
4. As regards the education of the girls which
is even more neglected in Hongkong than the education of boys the number of girls in Govern-
ment Schools fell from 235 in 1878 to 179 in
1879, but as the number of girls in Grant-in-aid
Schools increased at the same time from 343 in 1878 to 431 in 1879, there has really been an
advance made in 1879 amounting to 10 per cent.
over the total number of girls in schools under
Government supervision in the previous year. The proportion of girls to boys in those schools
collectively is still about 1 to 4, which is a very unsatisfactory state of things.
5. The nature of the instruction afforded in
the schools of the Colony is a matter of the ut-
most importance. Not counting the infants in
the schools of the Foundling Houses of the Co- lony, there were about 840 children in Roman
Catholic Schools not subject to Government
supervision, there were further about 1,800 chil-
dren in independent native Confucian Schools, and 3,460 were in schools under Government super-
vision. Now whilst considering that mere teach-
ing of reading and writing and so forth is not education, and does not in itself tend to produce better citizens, but that the kind of instruction which would benefit the State and Public Society
must have a tendency to form a high moral cha-
racter in the scholars, I still believe that every one of those schools above mentioned contributes
to a certain degree such real benefit to Public Society and to the State. For in all those schools, whether they be purely native and therefore
Confucian, or purely Government Schools and
therefore secular, or Grant-in-aid Schools and as such Christian Schools, all the children in these
schools are being imbued with the principles of
love and self-sacrifice, with the spirit of a pure
and elevating system of morality. So far all those
schools are on the whole of equal value to the
Government and to the community. But what
is of specially great importance to the prosperity
of the Colony and to the administration of the
Government in a Colony like this, where over 95
per cent. of the population speak Chinese only
and scarcely 5 per cent. of the European residents
and officials speak or understand anything of
Chinese, is an extensive promotion of a know-
ledge of English. The principal advantage of
English teacling in this Colony, compared with
('hinese, is this that the teaching is then com-
bined with the enhanced educational influences
of natural science and modern civilisation, and
that it furnishes the means of creating here
an Anglo-Chinese community in place of that
hybrid form of social life, with pidgin English
speech, towards which the Chinese community in
Hongkong must otherwise continue to drift to
the great embarrassment of the Executive and
Judicial departments of the Government, Out of
those 1,300 scholars in independent native schools
(including night schools) about 300 are taught
English in a very imperfect fashion. Of the 840 scholars in Roman Catholic Schools, not under Government supervision. I assume 400 to receive