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Chinese. Again there were 8 Anglo-Chinese Schools at work, giving to 1,158 Chinese scholars a European education in the English language (with or without Chinese teaching being given in addi- tion). Finally, there were 7 English Schools at work giving to 793 scholars of both sexes and of all nationalities a purely English education, exclusively in the English language.

8. It will be observed from the figures given in the foregoing paragraph that three-fifths of all the scholars in Schools receiving Government aid receive a non-English education, the teaching in the first of the five classes above enumerated being virtually that of the ordinary Chinese Village Schools, except that in all of them Geography, and in many also Arithmetic, is superadded, with the further addition of Christian religious teaching in the case of 44 out of these 77 Schools. Of course the fact that the vast majority of the residents of the Colony are Chinese, whose daily necessities do not abso- lutely require a knowledge of English, is sufficient to account for the preference given by the mass of the people to these non-English Schools. But the gratuitous character of the teaching given in these Schools, which are all free Schools for the special use of the poor. has also a great deal to do with the popularity of these non-English Schools. The fact that most of these Schools, being Missionary Grant-in-Aid Schools, combine Christian instruction with the study of Chinese classical lore, does not interfere with their popularity among the non-Christian section of the Chinese community, who unhe- sitatingly prefer a Christian Mission School to a secular Government School, even when the latter should be nearer at hand, provided that the former is considered to be superior in respect of Chinese classical teaching, or as regards method and discipline. The best classical teacher. be he teacher of a Mission School or of a Government School, invariably attracts the largest number of scholars. That it is best for their children to give them first a thorough grounding in Chinese classics, before they begin the study of English, has become the universal conviction of Chinese parents in Hongkong. These Schools act therefore systematically as feeders of the Anglo-Chinese and English Schools of the Colony and especially of the Government Central School.

9. The above mentioned Portuguese Schools,-with their 211 scholars, who receive there a European education in the local dialect of the Portuguese language, and learn neither English nor Chinese,-answer the same educational need, as the aforementioned Chinese Schools, viz., to enable every child first to learn to express thought and feeling correctly in the vernacular tongue, before attempting to acquire a foreign language. The Portuguese community are gradually, though but slowly, turning in the direction of recognizing this sound pedagogical principle which has been adopted several years ago by the Heads of the Roman Catholic Mission here, but the extent to which the parents of children accept and act upon this line of education is still very limited. Too many Portuguese parents, who speak Portuguese only, send their boys, when 6 years old, to an English School and insist upon their being hurried as quickly as possible through Standard after Standard, in order that they may the sooner get employ- ment as clerks and contribute towards the support of the family. The result in most cases is that the mental progress of such scholars is but superficial, that they become mere smatterers in English and, worst of all, such systematic hot-house training stunts not only the growth of the mental energies, but has often also the effect of a blight upon the higher moral perceptions. As the above mentioned Chinese Schools act as feeders to the Government Central School and kindred Institutions, so these Portuguese Schools are the natural Preparatory Schools for St. Joseph's College and the Italian Convent School.

10. Female education has, for some years past, been making steady, though very slow, progress in the Colony. This movement has been furthered, on the part of the Government, by establishing at the beginning of the year 1888 another Girls School intended to give Chinese girls an exclusively Chinese education. The BELILIOS Medal and Prize Fund. which, in the year under review, has been modified so as to encourage and promote education in Boys Schools as well as in Girls Schools, con- tinues to stimulate private efforts in the direction of female education. Nevertheless it is a patent fact that female education is still in a very backward condition in the Colony and there can be no reason- able doubt but that a vast majority of the 8,402 children in Hongkong who remain uneducated (see Table XVI) are girls. Of the 1,933 children enrolled in Government Schools during the year 1888, there were 1,804 boys and 129 girls, that is to say the girls numbered only 6.67 per cent. of the whole number of children in Government Schools. In the Grant-in-Aid Schools the proportion of girls to boys has been better from the beginning and is gradually improving. In these Schools there were, in the year 1888, among a total of 4,325 children, 2,538 boys and 1,787 girls. In other words, in Grant- in-Aid Schools the girls numbered 41.31 per cent. of the whole of children enrolled, so that for any

6 boys in these Schools there were also 4 girls under instruction. A census of Chinese Private Schools taken by the Registrar General, during the year 1888, by means of the District Watchmen, shewed that there were, among 1,704 children in 83 Chinese Private Schools, 1,679 boys and 25 girls, the girls numbering only 1-46 per cent. of the children in attendance. So far as Roman Catholic girls are concerned, be they of native or foreign extraction, ample provision has been made, under the Grant- in-Aid Scheme, for a modicum of female education. As regards Protestant European girls, there are two small Private Schools which might be enlarged or added to. with or without the help of the Grant- in-Aid Scheme, if the demand for female education by this section of the community were not so small and not so hedged in with religious and social caste prejudices. As regards Chinese girls whose parents do not aim higher than giving their daughters a purely Chinese, that is non-English, education, the Grant-in-Aid Scheme is doing, or capable of doing if availed of, all that is needful. But there is absolutely no provision made by private efforts nor by Government for offering Chinese or other girls.