:
THE HONGKONG GOVERNMENT GAZETTE, 6TH MARCH, 1869.
33. It is assumed in the Charge:-
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1° That, previously to 1862, the Bible was read in all the schools, but that the reading of it has since been abolished. 2o That the schools were then, but afterwards ceased to be, under the care of the Board of Education.
3o That the attendance was greater then than it is now.
4o That their moral tone was then good.
5° That it is now not moral, that is, in plain English, immoral,all owing to the reading of the Bible having been "abolished."
This seems a fair summary of the objections which have been taken, and which have now to be considered. 34. Instead of replying to them seriatim, or of meeting assertion by counter assertion, which in the present case might easily be done, the purpose in view may be best accomplished by giving a short account of my own personal connexion with the schools. This method will answer all necessary purposes and remove the appearance of antagonism which I should like, if possible, to avoid.
35.-I arrived in the Colony early in 1862. During the two previous years the schools had been under no regular supervision. Only occasional visits were paid to them by members of the Board of Education.
36.-On the 10th March, 1862, the Central School was opened for the first time. I found myself on that day among a crowd of nearly three hundred boys, who could not speak English to me, and to whom I could not speak Chinese. Two Chinese assistant-masters were present, but they had almost forgotten any English they ever knew, and I could scarcely make myself intelligible to them.
37.-The original intention of the Board was to make the Central School a kind of model Chinese school, in connexion with which classes composed of the more intelligent of the boys were to be taught English. A fortnight's experience proved the impracticability of the scheme, under the very disadvantageous circumstances in which matters then stood. J. J. Mackenzie, Esquire, of the firm of Messrs. Dent & Co., who was a member of the Board, and always took great interest in its proceedings, proposed the scheme which is at present being carried out. The mixed character of the school was altered. Only those boys who were to be taught English and Chinese,-not Chinese only, were to be admitted; and, to secure competence, the Preli- minary Examination in Chinese was instituted. This radical change in the constitution of the school reduced the numbers by nearly one-half, and in this way it became more manageable.
38.-Not only to the Central School but also to all the Village Schools was there a rush of scholars at the commencement. A vague idea had apparently got into their minds that a royal road to learning would be discovered on the arrival of the "new foreign teacher." This expectation soon ceased to be entertained, and by the month of June of the same year the attendance had fallen off very considerably. The numbers kept on diminishing till the end of the year, when the actual attendance was only 299, as compared with 621 in April, the first month in which I visited the schools. If from 299 we subtract 108, which was the attendance at the Central School for the month of December of that year, we leave an average of only twelve to each of the Village Schools. There is not, therefore, much to be said on the subject of attendance in 1862.
39.-The first striking incident that occurred during the year was the trial of the school-master, and three of the villagers, of Tai-t'ám tuk for highway robbery. This did not tead in those early days to make my monthly visits to the schools at all pleasant excursions. I was prepared to meet ordinary highway robbers, who were then by no means uncommon on the Stanley and Sháu-ki wán roads, but scarcely so to come into collision with a Government school-master and his allies at some convenient turn of the road.
40.-On the school at Sai-wán, I had to report as follows to the Board of Education, after my first visit. "The next "school, the Sai-wan Hakka school, is certainly in a most primitive condition. To pronounce it a wretched place is to give "but a very imperfect idea of its character. The room is a dirty hovel; the master is impassive and unintelligent; the boys are, with one or two exceptions, dirty and idle,there being in the school more materials for play than for work. Toys of "several kinds, a number of young puppies, and some live fish in bottles of water, seemed to receive more attention and "impart greater delight than the wisdom of the sages of China."
41.About the month of November, it was discovered that the school-master of Stanley was frequently in the habit of shutting up the school and going away, sometimes for ten days at a time,-his school-roll all the while showing a very full attendance. One day he was caught flagrante delicto. I had evidently not been expected that day, and the school was shut up. Several boys who wanted to get in had been told to be off. After some difficulty, and no little confusion on the part of the master, who had thus unceremoniously been roused from a sound sleep at 11 o'clock in the forenoon, I got admittance, and found nineteen marked as the attendance for the day.]
42.-Although the people had been perfectly silent before, yet, Chinese-like, they had many faults to find with the master after he had thus been detected in one. The Board of Education accordingly deputed its chairman The Bishop, and two other members to go to Stanley, along with myself, and hold an investigation. The master, thinking a bold step now necessary on his part, had previously sent in a petition, in which he stated that the people generally, and the head-man of the village in particular, persecuted him because he was a Christian, and forbade their children to go to school when the Inspector was seen coming, in order that he might be dismissed. Trusting to the sympathy which as a Christian he thought he was entitled to from Christians, he gave as the reasons for this persecution, (which from the soundness with which he enjoyed his sleep could not have been very violent), that he would not set up a tablet to Confucius; that he insisted on teach- ing the Bible; and that he would not break the Sabbath by teaching the ordinary lessons on that day.
43.-Without detailing all that came out in the course of the investigation, it will be sufficient to give the conclusions at which the committee arrived. They were these:-
1° The teacher's accusations, made in his petition, are false.
2° He left his duties without leave.
3° The accusations made against him are general and unvarying.
4o The teacher must be changed.
All this, be it remembered, with the Bible daily read in the school, and a Christian master to teach it. 44.--Further details are unnecessary. Suffice it to say that, at the end of the year, five of the schools were discontinued. This, taken in connexion with the reduction of numbers at the Central School, accounts for the sudden falling off from 621 in 1862 to 469 in 1863. For all this, it will be seen by reference to Table V, that the Minimum Attendance, even in 1869, was better, both numerically and proportionally, than in the previous year; and the same Table will show that a steady improve- ment has been taking place all along since that time.
45. The principal difficulties which I had to contend with at the commencement were:-
1° Absence of discipline and of cleanliness, on the part of both masters and scholars.
2o Falsification of the school-rolls.
3 Setting a watch to report my approach, and paying children, in some cases at the rate of seven cash a head, to sit in the school, with books in their hands, during my stay.
4° Intractability of the masters and neglect of their duties, coupled with all sorts of falsehood and deceit.
5o The grossest deception in the matter of teaching the Bible.
46. The last of these only needs any special remark. The Bible was in all the schools, but under what circumstances? On entering a school, which I had to do very much after the manner of a detective, I found all the other books being hur- riedly put out of sight, and the Bible taken up,-the master's intention being that I should carry away the impression that it occupied the most prominent place in the teaching of the school. Even when in complete ignorance of the language, I was
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