for boys of fourteen." Just the sort of school Froebel would have been most delighted to see, we may be sure.

A second passing remark may be made by way of answer to an ob jection. It is sometimes urged that a mechanic arts school cannot properly be made a part of the public school system, for the reason that such a school prepares boys for trades, and the teaching of trades is no proper part of the public school work. The schools, it is said, ought to teach how to live, and not how to get a living. The reason given for the objection is an overstatement of the fact; but this may be waived for the present, to be taken up later.

Let it be granted, in general, that the instruction of the mechanic arts high school has a large reference to the probable future occupations of its pupils. Is not the same thing true of the classical high schools? Have they not, for more than two centuries, been helping their pupils a long way on in preparation for a certain class of occupations--the socalled learned professions? While teaching how to live, have they not done much by way of teaching how to get a living, in professional pursuits? Not that classical high schools are professional schools, but some classical training-at least as much of it as a classical high school can give-is generally regarded as an indispensable prerequisite to the final preparation for professional life. When early in the present century the instruction commonly given in classical schools was felt to be ill adapted to the wants of the many boys who were looking forward to other than professional pursuits, a new kind of high school was devised the English high school-which proposed to teach the subjects such boys most needed to know. Experience has shown that this kind of school is well adapted to the training of boys whose pursuits are to be in trade and commerce. Not that it teaches arithmetic and bookkeeping only; it gives some liberal training through studies in science and modern languages. Not neglecting to teach how to live, it has also taught how to get a living, in useful and honorable callings not numbered among the so-called learned professions. Again, girls' high schools and high schools for both sexes have been organized in great numbers during the last fifty years, and universally their courses of study contain subjects which have been put there for no other reason than that a knowledge of such subjects is useful in after life-useful in the sense of better preparing one for earning a livelihood. For girls as well as for boys the teaching of how to get a living has been united with the teaching of how to live.

Therefore, the principle has long been admitted and acted upon that public high school instruction may properly have regard to the probable future occupations of the pupils. This is not, indeed, the highest reason for a high school's existence, but it is, nevertheless, a very strong and legitimate reason, and one which wise people will not ignore. The application of this principle has already produced different kinds of high schools and different courses of study in the same high school.

Carry the application one step farther-take into consideration the wants of the many boys who will enter, or might, if properly trained, enter, the various skilled industries-and we shall have the mechanic arts high school, as now proposed.

Opposed to this principle is an old theory that all public school instruction ought to be general, equally adapted to the wants of all, and fitted for all to pursue as far as personal circumstances allow each to go. This monodromic scheme of education takes little or no account of special needs; has no room for commercial training nor for industrial training, and does not even attempt a full, all-sided mental training; but leads, chiefly by way of the classics and the mathematics, to college and the professional schools; declaring all the way along that he will get the best education who runs farthest on this single highway, while he who abandons the highway and wanders in byways must give up the hope of being considered a well-educated man at all. The new theory proposes to open highways in several directions-in any direction in which large numbers of youth with good reason desire to travel-and claims for all such highways equal recognition and a share of public support. It is proper here to recognize a certain limit beyond which the application of the new theory may not wisely be carried. An acceptance of the principle that a public high school instruction may properly be shaped with reference to the probable future occupations of the pupils, does not oblige us to conclude that such reference may be so specific and exclusive as to make the occupations themselves the direct and only matters of instruction. To do this would be to sacrifice the general aim to the special. It would be even worse. The special aims, when made the only ones, would certainly fail of their best realization. The general aim-liberal culture-is ever to be held superior, even for the best realization of the special aims. Therefore, the mechanic arts high school can never properly become a mere trade school, making its pupils apprentices to a single trade, nor a collection of trade schools. In its history thus far it has disclosed no tendency to lose its character in that way. This is the point in respect to which the objection we have been considering rests on an overstatement-the overstatement alluded to a moment ago, but postponed. Let it now be corrected.

It is not true, as alleged, that the mechanic arts school teaches partic ular trades. That very important instruction is to be found elsewhere. But it is true that a good mechanic arts school helps boys a long way on to many trades. It deals with the leading principles involved in a great variety of mechanical processes; it develops general mechanical skill by bringing mind and hand into ready and accurate co-operation, but it does not undertake to make its pupils finished artisans in any trade. No more does the English high school undertake, in its commercial course, for example, to make expert book-keepers for keeping books in all lines of business-bank book-keeping, corporation book-keeping, railroad book-keeping, broker's book-keeping, and all the rest. All that such a

school can well undertake-and that is quite enough-is to familiarize the pupils with the common forms, and to train them in the analysis of ordinary business transactions, and in the application thereto of the fundamental principles of book-keeping. Professor Runkle has pointed out that the mechanic arts are few, but the trades in which these arts are applied are many. Hence the mechanic arts and not the trades are proper subjects for school instruction. The former involve principles, the latter only details of application. Professor Woodward has said of the course in the St. Louis school: "Without teaching any one trade, we teach the essential principles of all."

It remains now to mention briefly the results of experience. An exhaustive review of all the experiments that have been made, with consideration of all the local conditions and influences, would be a most interesting and valuable work for some one to undertake; but the limits of this paper preclude anything more than a brief mention of the main points.

Experience appears to have proved satisfactorily

(1) That a three or four years course of study, consisting of selected and graded shop work two-fifths of the time daily, drawing one-fifth, and appropriate book work two-fifths, results in a high degree of mechanical intelligence, a good degree of general mechanical skill, and a well-marked development in the power of independent thinking.

(2) That such instruction takes a strong hold on the minds of a large class of boys who are either not so well reached or not reached at all by the subjects and methods of teaching current in the older high schools.

(3) That such instruction draws some pupils away from the older high schools, but more from a class of boys who have not, as matters have stood heretofore, become pupils of the older high schools at all.

(4) That such instruction is very keenly relished and appreciated by boys, who usually like no studies so well as those which have an obviously direct bearing on their future occupations, and delight most of all in exercises that bring their active powers into productive activity.

(5) That up to a certain point such instruction is a substitute for apprenticeship, now gone out of use; and, as far as it goes, is vastly better than apprenticeship ever was in its best days.

(6) That such instruction forms an excellent, and no doubt ere long to be considered indispensable, part of the preparation of students for schools of science, technology, or industrial art. Indeed, it is to be remembered that the mechanic arts school, as we now know it, origi nated in a purpose to give such preparation to students of mechanical engineering.

(7) That such instruction is very popular, apparently because it is meeting a widely felt want.

(8) That such instruction-particularly the mechanic arts part of itcan be effectively and economically given to classes in a school.

(9) That a school organized for giving such instruction is entirely convenient and manageable as a part of the public school system in a large city.

(10) The cost of such a school-building, equipment, running expenses-is quite in keeping with the cost of any other high school.

This brings us to the exact question proposed for discussion to-day, namely: To what extent and how can manual training be introduced into city graded schools? My answer is: Organize mechanic arts high schools either as separate schools or as departments of existing high schools. To this extent, at least, and by this means a now neglected educational field can be occupied to great advantage. But this is only a partial answer; it applies to only one branch of the question; but it is the branch that I happen to have most at heart just at the present time.

To touch for a moment on the other branches of the question, it may be observed that there is for young children the kindergarten, whose gifts and occupations appeal largely to the child's active or creative powers. The adoption of the kindergarten carries into the schools a form of manual training of whose good results there is nowadays little serious question. But what of the great gap between the kindergarten for children of four and the "kindergarten for boys of fourteen"? There is much that might be said of experiments in this field; but it must be owned that results thus far are isolated and fragmentary. Nothing like a broad, continuous, and effective course of manual training reaching from the kindergarten upward through all the grades of primary and grammar schools has yet been worked out.

What can be done with the Swedish Slöjd? An answer to this question on the basis of American experience is not yet ready, but interesting experiments are going on.

And the better half of the question-that which relates to manual or industrial training for girls-I must now, for lack of time, leave wholly untouched.

DISCUSSION.

The discussion was opened by Lieutenant Ford, who read the following paper:

HOW SHALL MANUAL TRAINING BE INTRODUCED INTO THE GRADED SCHOOLS?

BY JOHN D. FORD, U. S. N.,

Principal of the Baltimore Manual Training School.

The state has exercised the right to train and to care for her young, and to care for her insane, her paupers, and her criminals, for so long a time that it may almost be said to be the unwritten law of the land, that she is to continue in the discharge of these duties; and I think no one will now question her right to use all means at her command to prevent, as well as alleviate, the latter conditions. It would seem out of place to inquire into the conditions of modern life and society were not these conditions so intimately associated with the subject under consideration. From the very beginning of time the only recognition given to the training of man's hand has been to wield the sword and the pen; to commit deeds of blood and record the acts for the admiration and emulation of future generations. Occasionally, as we read the story of the past, we read of Hiram of Tyre, without whose assistance Solomon could not have fashioned the temple; of Alexander, the coppersmith, who wrought shrines of "Diana" for the Ephesians to worship; or of Stephenson and his good work about the steam-engine; but these are only some of the exceptions that prove the rule. All through history it is war and blood, and always a ready pen to perpetuate the story. To come to our own times: The outcome of the Civil War and the action of the trades-unions have swept away the apprenticeship system, and no provision is made for our children to learn handicraft. If one is so fortunate as to obtain a position in works of any kind, who is to give the necessary instruction? The employers have not the time, and the employé, as a rule, feels that he or she is giving instruction to a future rival; hence, takes little or no interest in the fortunate unfortunate,-fortunate in that he appears to have opportunities above his fellows,-unfortunate in that he is too often deceived, from the very causes that I have stated. Show me the works that will give the youth opportunities in every branch in the establishment, and I will show you an honorable exception to the general rule. Again, the doors of the country are thrown wide open, through lax emigration laws, and skil ful foreigners are crowding to take the places that we should train our boys to fill. As a matter of policy and of self-protection this question must be met and practically applied, whether we would have it so or not, unless we are to be content to see our children grow up to become idlers, vagabonds, and criminals. But I may be met by the question,