1 by
January 28, 1905.)
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CHINA OVERLAND TRADÈ REPORT.
Chinese learning English to judge of the pupils' school career is over you will be able to progress. There was a short oral examination, derive pleasure from all beautiful things to be and some did papers set by Mr. Irvine In read about in books and which have been seen October this year we had the plea ure of re- and hear in every corner of the earth; so that ceiving our
Governor, new
Sir Matthew when you leave school yon may be helpful in Nathan, at our school. He expressed satis- your homes, and the girls, when they marry faction at what he saw, and we were only sorry companions to their husbands, and in the case of that he had so litt e time to spare us, but the Chinese girls, assistants to their mothers- before coming t us he had been at Queen's in-law (laugher). I am very pleased with one College, and that being so large a school, had statement in the report that is, conduct-it is taken up most of the time. Perhaps we may good, and there is an improvement in the man- have the pleasure of another and more lengthyners of the Chinese. I have wished to mark visit another day, when we can show him more my appreciation of this by presenting a special of what we do.
prize for good e nduct, and as Mrs. Bateman has told me that Ida Noma is the best conduct girl, I will present her with the prize.
HIS EXCELLENCY was then called upon, and distributed the prizes after which he said:
Ladies and gentlemen-It was only after some hesitation that I acceled to the suggestion of the Inspector of Schools that I should include this school amongst those at which I was to present prizes this year, as the subject of girls' education is not one with regard to which I have very definite ideas, and such ideas as I have are, I fear, somewhat heterodox The fauctions of men and women in life are very different, and must, I believe, always remain so. The most ardent supporter of women's rights will hardly claim that they can become soldiers and policemen, blacksmiths or carpenters, as no one can well direct work he is physically unfit of himself performing. It follows that women are by nature precluded from those professions ultimately based on physical force or bard labour, such as the administration of government, the practice of navigation, law, engineering, etc. Then I believe that with the physical difference between men and women goes a mental difference. There are two elements in the mind of every man and every woman. The first is that element which is called variously judgment, reasoning power, or colloquially The second is the female element which is by different people termed intuition, imagination, and sometimes genius. In the man the first of these elements predomin- ates, and in the womau the sec. d. But without some imagination a man, though he may be effectual, cannot be great. In the
lacks often
that closeness
sound common sense.
Woman
there
form,
Mr. IRVINE, on behalf of the head master, staff and scholars, thanked His Excellency for his kindness in attendin; to distribute the prizes.
DIOCESAN SCHOOL VACATION.
THE GOVERNOR ON HI TORY.
His Excellency was again called upon on Jan. 24 to distribute prizes. This time it was to students of the Diocesan School
the
and
Orphanage. There was a large numb r of ladies and gentlemen pr-sent, and the morning's proceedings were enlivened by songs rendered by the school chair.
The Head Master, Mr. G. PIERCY, read the annual report, in which the following passages occurred:-The past twelve months have been marked by several importaut changes. As more boys apply than we can possibly receive, we have selected young applicants rather than the older ones of 18 to 23 years, so that the average age of the school is lower than formerly and the several members of a class are more nearly of an age. The new Code which came 1st January allows greater into force on
latitude in arrangement of subjects and classification of pupils. H.M. Inspector wrote that pending a full report he might say the school did very well.
Local Examination:
Twenty-one boys entered for the Oxford 16 passed, namely 2 Seniors, 4 Juniors, 10 Preliminary. For the first time we had a Senior candidate in Honours, Edward Law having that proud position and being also specially distinguished in his tory, which is the only distinction won by Hongkong candidates. John Crolius was placed in Honours in Preliminary. Mr H. Hastings, a former pupil, now re-ident in Formosa, Las kindly presented valuable prizes to these two.
The total enrolment of scholars was 256, and the average daily attendance was 188 (last year 171).
of reasoning power necessary to give practical effect to her genius. and it is thus only through her influence on others that she can become the creator of great works. Roughly speaking man makes life possible, woman makes it beautiful, or as a poet has practically put it, we are God's trees, women God's flowers. Cul ure is necessary for the proper development of both, but has to be differently directed. In the use of the trees we want the wood and the shade, that is the strength and the protective power. In the case of the flowers it is the fragrance, the colour, and the
The health of the Institution has been that is sweetness, sympathy, and gentleness, remarkably gool, there being an almost entire that we look for. While, therefore, the absence of malarial fever, wounds and bruises education of boys must be largely utilitarian incidental to footbal and cricket being almost the training of girls should be directed towards the only ailments. The charitable side of the making them intelligent and appreciative. The work is not n-glected, and in fact is increasing. power of conversing in their own and other In addition to four orphans supported by the Freemasons, there are eight boarders entirely Languages, and the understanding of arts, music, and literature with attendant studies of geo-dependent on the school for board, clothing graphy and history are the proper subjects for and education, as well as others on reduced them to be taught, with only so much arithmetic fees. Two English boys born in Australia as will help them in their marketing and house-have been rescued, one sent us by H.M. Consul hold duties and so much practical science as will enable them to apply the principles of hygiene to their homes and may help them in that great and comparatively new branch 4 of woman's work, the nursing of the sick. I see no need for the instruction which I found being given in one of the girls' schools in the Colony in stocks and shares. Such instruction can lead them to no ideals and hardly even to that object of questionable desirability, the acquisition of wealth. I see little advantage to be gained from the study of algebra and other branches of mathematics, subjects not likely to yield either profit or pleasure to a girl in after life, In science again more than in other subjects the little knowledge likely to be gained in a girls' school may prove a dangerous thing. Ladies and gentlemen, what I have said has been addressed to you. It has probably been, as it was intended to be, somewhat over the heads of the boys and girls here.
The report which has been presented to me by te Inspector of Schools is quite satisfactory. It shows that you have worked hard, and I hope will go on working hard so that when your
you
I
CAS)
at Amoy, from actual slavery in the interior, and the other sent us by the Ladies' Benevolent Society, evidently a of kidnapping for thanks are again due to the slavery. Our following friends who have kindly contribu'ed prizes: Mrs. Siebs, the Hon. Mr. Wei Yuk, Rev. F. T. Johnson, Messrs. L. Arnold, F. B. L. Bowley, T. Edwards, Fung Wa-chuen, H. Hastings, E. A. Hewett, Ho Fook, Ho Tung, J. Olson, A. Rumjahn, J. A. dos Remedios, and Sin Tak-fan.
His EXCELLENCY, having presented the prizes, said:-
My Lord Bishop, ladies and gentlemen: The report of the Head Master which has been read to us is satisfactory. Here, as at Queen's College, there are more boys desirous of entering the be received, showing an school than can increased appreciation of the education offered at the principal boys' schools of the Colony. The division of the lower classes into Chinese and non-Chinese sections has effected an improve ment which the report for 1903 showed was necessary. The school did well on the visits of the Inspector of Schools and at the Oxford
63
Local Examinations, and I would add that I had direct evidence at my own inspection on September 26 that the teaching of the boys was thorough and the tons of the school good. I congratulate Mr. Piercy and results. his very capable staff on these The weak point of the school, according to the report of the Inspector of Schools, is history. In spite of the distinction gained by Edward Law the inspector calls attention to the fact that while the boys who presented themselves for the Oxford Local Examinations passed in geography they were successful in less than half of their papers in History. It seems to me possible that the lack of interest aroused in shools by the study of history may be due to the dulness of its groundwork, consisting, as it generaly does, largely of names and dates
ommitted to memory.
I have often thought whether this could not be avoided and some more attractive method of teach- ing introduced, but I have been forced to the conclusion that names and dates are more easily and more permanently learnt in our schooldays than afterwards, and are the only satisfactory scaffolding from which a sound structure of historical knowledge can afterward- be erected. It is true that unless one is endowed with the memory of a Macaulay one cannot
carry a collection of dates all through life, but if one starts with a collection one has incidents and periods between or around which to group the great movements of the world's development. I will give you one or two examples of this grouping. At the present moment I am ashamed to say I do not recall the exact date of the founding of Rome or of the fall of Consta iti- nople, but I know that Roman history limited in either direction by those events extended from about seven and a half centuries before the Christian Era to nearly fifteen centuries alter it.
the downfall
The
The first two and a half centuries were those of the growth of the town under the somewhat mythological kings. During the next period of nearly equal length, Rome. as a republic, extended over Italy. In the third period of some 250 years, which brings us to the Christian Era, she became an west and south of empire covering the Europe, the north of Africa, and the east of Asia. It was close on 500 years before this empire began to break up, and for another 1,000 years its traditions and forms lingered in the Eastern Empire with its capital at Constan- tinople. The fall of that city, which sent classical learning wandering westward, oce ir- ring as it did about the same time as the invention of printing and the early maritime discoveries, produced the first great more- ment of modern Europe -the Renaissance. The height of that movement was at a date which always clings to my mentory -the year 1492. In that year a new world was discovered across the Atlantic. Mussulman who had so recently gained a foot. ing in the East was finally expelled from western Europe by the conquest of Granada 'an the death of Lorenzo the Magnificent, and also in of Florence, the city par ex- ellence of art and learning, where the Tuscan painters Michael Angelo, Galileo, Pico, and the Platonists, and a host of others flourished under the enlightened patronage of the Medici. As the Renaissance was the movement of the 15th century, so was the Reformation that of the 16th. The close of the 17th century was mark. ed by the growth of modern scientific and philo- sophic ideas and the desire for freedom which acted against the oppression of ruling classes and produced the vast upheaval of the French Revoln- tion in the last decades of the 18th century. The absolutism of Napoleon at the mencement of the 19th century was the natural reaction from the license of the Revolution, and the quiet period that followed the downfall of Napoleon was again a reaction from the stirring times of the war which lasted during his domina- tion of Europe. The quiet time gave birth to the industrial movement which characterised the latter half of the nineteenth century. I will now leave the general history of Europe in order to give you an example from English history of the use of dates as historical scaffold. ing. The year 1215 is familiar to you all as the date of the signing of the Magna Charts in the reign of John. This King was nicknamed Lackland because he lost his French territories The result of this loss was that the Plantagenets
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