IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) 1.0 I.I 144 I4£ IIIIM IIIIIM 1^ Is IIIM m 2U Hi l£ 1 2-0 1.25 1.4 ^ ^ 6" - ► cliool system ? How many has the public shool system pro- vided with a living ? Tiie answer is very easy. In a thousand boys ten take to tcaohing otlier boys, while they are studying law or medicine. .Two of these remain teachers all their lives. Fifty go into book-keepers' places where ten remain. The rest disperse to business of all kinds, trades and shopkeeping, all of which have to be learned, and in which the school education is of little use, save indirectly and by its general cultivation of the intelligence, 01 the thousand girls fifty go to teaching. The rest forget all they over learned. Of knowledge useful to them as mothers they have acquired nothing ; of house-keeping duties less. " This is the dark side of modern education. There is of course a bright one. Take a hundred workmen, brought up to any given handicraft, especially one requiring intelligence. The men who can read and write, and who have enjoyed the benefits of an English education, are more likely to rise in the world, to ii prove their position, than those who have never known anything but one routine of work from their earliest years. To become a skilled workman ^ indeed, education is absolutely necessary. The (lucstion remains — what sort of education is most likely to help them, one wholly theoretical, or on? in which practice and theory aro joined ? The answer is obvious. It is found in the great and increasing popularity of industrial schools, wherever such have been established by private philan- thropy. These are, so far, the only institutions of an educational nature public or private, with whose benefits no injury has been found to mingle. The only objection to their universal establishment is found in their ex- pense, owing to the vast variety of mechanical employments. These at {)resent rciJcr a complete scheme of industrial schools as a national under- taking, too difficuH for practical adoption. Ideally such a system would be the most perfect education yet devised. It would at once train the rising generation into useful citizens and true wealth producers. Failing that, let us see what can be done with present systems to attain this desir- able end. We fii;d that the common schools tend to produce school teach- ers, lawyers, doctors, politicians, newspaper men, booksellers, clerks, brok- ers, and all that class of men who live by their ivits. Of artisans, artists and agriculturists, capable of developing the wealth of a new country, they produce none. These come from outside." Ill almost all iiuluslriul uiuloi takings drawing of one kind or the other is required by those directing the siino, and soino great induatrios are en- tirely depending on the t.iUe developed by their inmagors, such as sculp- ture in stone and maible, work in cast iron grates, stoves and railings, furniture in wood enriched by carving, encaustic tiles, gas brackets or gasaliers in bronze or brass, ornamented china-ware, cil cloth, carpets or druggets, table cloth and curtain weaving, silver ware, jewellery, glass work, cotton printing, paper-hanging, frescoing, sign painting, lithography wood and steel engraving, etching, glass staining and painting, reproduc- tion of the round in plfister, nictuls and terra cotta, chasing and emboss- ing, etc., etc. It is needed by upholsterers, wood turners, watchmakei a, opticians, hardware workers, bookbinders, fringemakers, locksmiths, gun- smiths, harnessmakers, wheelwrights, carriage builders. It is absolutely necessary to the architect, engineer, carpenter, mason, machinist, millwright, workers in copper and metal and shipbuilders. The importance of drawing to the young is now universally acknowledged, and many a talent has been directed in its youth to channels of industry which could not have been reached if the occasion to study drawing had not been given in early life. Massachusetts has taken the lead in this branch of education on this side of the Atlantic, and made by an Act passed May 16th, 1870, drawing obligatory in pul)lic schools. This act also required of cities and towns of more than 10,000 ir.habitants to make pro- visions for free instruction in indmUial drawing to persons over filteen years of age. This Act met with much public favor, but it was soon found that it was impossible to realize satisftictorily the benefits intended by the act from want of competent teachers. An act was therefore passed by the Legislature, providing for the establishment and maintenance by the Board of Education of a State Normal Art School, which school is intend- ed as a Training School for the purpose of qualifying teachers and masters of industrial drawing. The term Industrial drawing includes both instrumental and free hand drawing, and is divided into four grades or classes : A, is devoted to Elementary drawing, 15, to form, color and Industrial design, C, to the constructive arts, comprising : — Descriptive Geometry, Topographical, Machine and Ship-drawing, Building construction and Architectural design, D, to Sculpture and design in the round. Its faculty is comprised of twelve professors and lecturers, and over 1200 have availed themselves of the occasion offered. In France, Germany, Austria, Sweden, etc., drawing is taught in all schools, and is considered almost as necessary as reading, writing and arithmetic, and it is established that it has a great influence on the future of the scholars. In public schools often are talents discovered which with a little fostering become in after years great lights in the profession they choose. The simple High School through which I hav'e passed has laid the foundation for great Artists, in painting and sculpture and many after only passing through its three years course had profited sufficiently to be enabled in after years to become Managers of large Iron works, Railroads, free f v. and Gugiucoi iiig E-.(al)l;shin'.Mit^ To diMwiiij; woio devotoil in cacli »»f tlio three classes uWout IVoni (i to S hours ii week ; in some hi;^h scihocis also, called Trade Schools, from 15 to 18 hours is devoted to drawing? and model- luig. High Schools, as 1 take it, ought to give general useful knowledge nob only to those who can go to Colleges, hut also to those who are to take charge of our Industrial Estahlishmonts; and I am highly pleased to learn that it is the intention of the Hoard of School Commissioners, to cstrjijish in High Schojl unothcr course hcsides the Classical, in which the dead languages aie dispiMised with, and suhjccts will ho introduced of hiiihly practical naturo, 1 ho|)e a course will ho followed something like that of a. Prussian Trade School of which Germany has now some Two Hundred^ in which aj lizans are trained and which act as preparatory to the Poly- technic Colleges, with the rudimentary knowledge of Chemistry, Physics, Mathematics and drawhuj. The scholars would also he prepared to enter the Technological Institute, enabling that establishment to become much more etfective than it is at present, whc" the rudiments of those branches have to be taught. It will also bo found that drawing combined with other studies works well; it is a relief of the mind from the strain caused by the study of dead and Modern Languages, and sciences. In it the scholar ex- periences as in writing, the pleasure of producing something tangible, ho sees his progress, he handles f)oncil, brush, compass, drawing pen and mod- elling tool more and more with perfection, ho experiences the intense en- joyment to create ; it is the most pleasing study that can be introducedin the course of any School, and remains so lu alter life, if used as an accom- plishment or in practical work. Many happy hours I have spent preparing in secret drawings to present to my parents on Cnristmas, to show the progress I had made in the past year, and the pleasure was always great to the giver as well as to the parents who valued them h'ghcr than any gift I could have presented. To show the high appreciation drawing is held in Boston I will only make a few extracts from, the reports of the Committee on Drawing of the Board of School Commissioners of that City : — " The training of young eyes to see correctly and of young hands to reproduce and combine forms simple and complex; this teaching of a new languaf!;o of form, is begun in the primary scliools, connected on a higher plane in the Grammar Schools, and carried on as far as possible in the High Schools, where efforts should be more and more directed towards awaking a love for the beautiful in nature and art in the minds of the pupils, besides preparing them for |;ractical work. " As this end is more and more plainly attained, we arc convinced that the public will be more and more disposed to regard the course pursued by the drawing committee with a favor which, in its present incomplete workings, it cannot be expected to meet with on all hands. The persons who shake their heads dubiously, are those amongst us who regard purely '• Mechanical Drawing," as unworthy of " state interference," who think that Industrial Drawing should from the first, have in it a pronoun- ccd artistic! cloiiu'iit, nu IVom Hi^'h Schools, wlio, having uouiinuiicod llicir odncatioii in tlio Kindergurttin or tlio I'riinary schools, !iuvo advanced to a rcidly liijih stale of attainment. " Willi Hiich a prospect in view we can allord to bear the donhLs an///» > system of instruction in Orawing would be insured. Operation cjuld begin almost at once, and the great benefits that will be derived from the instruction would be distribute I soon over the whole Province. In regard to the expense I can state that 13,00) a year would bo all that would be required as w-iges to Head drawing m ister, for patterns and models for the whole of the schools in this city. Yours truly, F,MIL VOSSNACK, C. E. Lecturer Mechanical Engineering', Naval Architecture and Instrumental Drawing, Technological Institute, Halifax, N. S. 74 Bedfoud Row, Halifax, Jan. 10, 1870. ing m- ping at IV3 lost ;e to iii- e of the ly : " I idicd so [e Latin r.ve lost h to dc- icqiiiro. of tim?, I wing ill teacher and ii ion and problem Normal 's of tlie ; 1 bcrty stemati i Lruction. ivonld be bencfit-i over the d be all patterns hitecture ^ical m.