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17. Instruction is given to children under thirteen, of both sexes, and to boys over that age. As is the case at the Kowloon School, the small children greatly predominate. It is too early to say how far it will be possible to give a secondary education to the upper Classes : that depends of course on the average length of the boys' career in the school. Experience at Kowloon seems to shew that a syllabus based on the hope that any considerable proportion of the pupils will stay for more than 3 years, is one based upon sand. There can, however, be no doubt that the school is meeting a genuine need. The numbers on the roll reached 51. by the end of December. Everything is being done that can be done, in the way of classifying the pupils and co-ordinating the school work, to render the instruction in the two British Schools as similar as possible, in order that when pupils are superannuated under the age limit, they may pass into the sister school with the minimum of inconvenience,

18. Extracts from the Report of the Headmaster are given in Appendix E.

Belilios Public School, English Side.

19. The average attendance has at last shewn a slight improvement, being 93 as com- pared with 85 last year. But the School tends to become more and more exclusively Anglo-Chinese. There are signs of an increasing desire on the part of Chinese parents to give their daughters an English education, though the feeling is nothing like so strong as it is in the case of their sons, Should this tendency become accentuated, the English Side of the School is capable of rapid development to supply the want; in the meantime, the Chinese Side must be regarded as the main effort of the Government to assist Chinese female education.

20. I take this opportunity of expressing my great regret at the approaching retirement of Mrs. BATEMAN, the Headmistress, who has held her appointment almost from the found- ation of the School.

THE DISTRICT SCHOOLS, UPPER GRADE.

21. An important change has been made in the organization of the schools. They have been made feeders to Queen's College, so far as it lies in the power of any but the boys and their parents to make them. The courses of study have been modified to make them coin- cide as closely as possible with those followed in the Lower and Preparatory Schools of the College, and the nomenclature of the Classes has been altered to the same end: the free entrance scholarships into the College from the 3 District Schools have also been revived. Moreover, it has been arranged that boys applying for admission to the College and failing to pass the entrance examination, shall be given cards which shall procure them a prior right of admission to the three schools; and that boys so admitted shall after a year or two, on again applying for admission to the College, be given priority over boys who have pre- pared themselves at outside schools. These measures must necessarily produce their effect but slowly. The object to be gained is a concentration in the Upper School at Queen's College of the boys who ask for an education of more than 5 years. Unfortunately, the boys who wish to prolong their education to this extent are a small minority.

22. The Saturday morning Normal Classes have been continued throughout the year. Some of the junior Chinese masters have greatly improved their methods by attending them.

Saiyingpun Anglo-Chinese School.

23. Mr. WILLIAMS having been transferred to the Victoria School at the beginning of the year, and Mr. MORRIS, his successor, not arriving in the Colony until the middle of the year, there was a long interregnum, which acted disastrously on the attendance and general condition of the school. Things have now righted themselves; and there is no reason why it should not prove successful. But it must be remarked that the Western end of the City is very liberally supplied with schools of the same class; so that any startling increase of numbers can hardly be hoped for. The average attendance was only 44, as against 69 in 1904.

24. With the permission of Government, the early hours of instruction followed in the summer were retained through the winter term, to allow of the continuation o series of excursions on which Mr. MORRIS has taken his boys, These include, bess regular

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