AnnualReport-1924 — Page 498

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classes, the maximum number allowed is 30 in Government Schools, 40 in Grant Schools and 50 in other schools, and it is hoped that with increased facilities there will be no further excuse for exceeding these numbers.

In schools, as in classes, the temptation to excessive num- bers exists, but less in private than in Government Schools, which feel an obligation to meet public demands and are not so severely limited by economic necessities. It is a question whether any attempt should be made to enlarge these beyond the limit of one man's supervision, and of mutual interest and sympathy throughout the school. It must remain a matter of opinion what that number is, whether 1,000, 500 or 250 or less. but I think there is no doubt that the larger figures must spell some loss in necessary attention to the individual pupil.

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In Chinese as in British schools there is a further tempta- tion for parents, teachers and pupils to seek a short road to the acquisition of means of livelihood. This carries with it two attendant dangers, first that the foundation of the pupil's life, which can only be based on an understanding of his mother tongue, will be deserted too soon for the more immediately profitable study of English, and second, that external results will be sought in preference to real mental and moral progress. The first of these dangers has been noticed by recent commissions on native education in Africa and India, and here in Hongkong we have less excuse for neglecting, as we have greater reason for encouraging, the initial stage of a good understanding of their own language. Here, even more than in other countries, it is the necessary condition of any good education in a foreign tongue.

The second danger is more considerable, and more elusive. The final examination passed, the career safely entered, seem the natural goal of a boy's education, and parents, teachers, and pupils alike have accustomed themselves to look no further for evidence of a successful education. Indeed if external evidence is needed, the examination seems the most convenient and the fairest to all. It has recently been observed that whereas the opinion of a doctor is readily accepted as a test of health, the opinion of a teacher carries little weight as a test of education: and yet it should form the only true test. We can only say now that if the teacher can once deserve and command the confidence of the public, this test will be possible and we shall be near a solution of the problem.

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It must be recognised that for the strength of any education we must look chiefly to the spirit which animates the staff and the pupils, and it will be too heavy a price to pay for official control, if it achieves efficiency and good discipline at the expense of spontaneity and personal inspiration. Nor can an education that is to succeed stop with the improvement of teachers and pupils: it can only achieve its greater successes if