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general course to show the attractiveness of the subject to
those that have any bent towards it and induce them to continue
their reading of it when they have left school.
5.
On the other hand I am not satisfied that
the syllabus in History and Geography embodied in the Report
(of which I now transmit copies) of the Committee appointed
by Sir Henry Blake to make recommendations with regard to
education in these subjects, is entirely satisfactory. This
is especially the case in the history course where the first
three years' study deals mainly with peoples and countries of
which the scholar is unlikely to hear anything outside the
lessened by reading
school-room. My doubts have not been
over answers to questions recently set at an examination on
the first year's course at one of the Anglo-Chinese Schools
of the Colony.
6.
I have therefore decided not to impose
the new syllabus for the present either on the Head Master of
Queen's College or on the Managers of the assisted denomination-
al schools of the Colony which are the establishments from
which the candidates for the Oxford Local Examinations now
come. Instruction inaccordance with this syllabus has already
been inaugurated at the Government Anglo-Chinese Schools
(Saivingpun, Wanchai, and Yaumati) and will continue to be
given there and, with such modifications as the average period
of school careers and the classes from which the scholars are
drawn may render necessary, at the British Schools at Kowloon
and Victoria. When scholars at these Anglo-Chinese and British
Schools have been through the complete course it will he pos-
sible to decide from the results attained whether it can
advantageously