TECHNICAL EDUCATION.:
WHAT       IT  IS,
AND WIWAT AMERICAN PUBLIC SCHOOLS
SHOULD TEACH.
AN ESSAY
BASED ON AN EXAMINATION OF THE METHODS AND RE- 
SULTS OF'TECHNICAL EDUCATION IN EUROPE, AS
SHOWN BY OFFICIAL REPORTS.
BY CHARLES B. STETSON
BOSTON:
L. PRANG & COMPANY.
I876.




Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1873, by
JAMES R. OSGOOD & CO.,
In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington.
BOSTON:
STEREOTYPED AND PRINTED BY RAND, AVERY, & Co.




CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
PAGE.
Introduction. — Competition no longer Local, but World-wide. -Manufactures no longer Few and Rude. -Decay of Apprenticeship;Labor, Rude, Dexterous, and Skilled. -Popular Education. -Natural Sciences a Part of Popular Education. -Drawing a Part of
Popular Education. - How Time is to be had for the New Studies.
-Object of this Compilation. - The Manufactures of most Value.  1
CHAPTER II.
Value of Technical Instruction. - British Opinions expressed by Chambers of Commerce.- Letter to Lord Robert Montagu, M. P. -
Foreign Competition in Hardware made in Birmingham. -Worsted
Trade of Bradford. -Decline of Silk Manufacture in England.French Testimony. - Views of Prof. Leoni Levi. - Replies to Lord
Stanley.- Testimony of Mr. Samuelson. — Testimony of English.Artisans......                                  31
CHAPTER III.
Importance of Varied Education. -Literary and Scientific Training.- ~
Report of Sub-Committee of French Imperial Commission. - Manual Labor. - Mission for the Succor of Apprentices..       114
CHAPTER IV.
Special Schools for the Instruction of Apprentices. - Municipal School
at Besangon. - Apprentice Schools in Belgium. - Power-loomWeaving.-School at Mulhouse......      131
iii




iv                        CONTENTS.
CHAPTER V.
PAGE.
Instruction of Workmen.- Popular Lectures.-Museum of Industrial
Products.- Reports of English Artisans. —Universal Primary
Education........... 143
CHAPTER VI.
Drawing.- The French Imperial Commission.- Replies to Lord Stan.
ley's Circular, - Testimony of English Artisans. - Testimony of
J. Scott Russell.-Belgian Testimony.-Mistaken Study of the
Human Figure.- Geometry the True Basis of all Elementary
Drawing. - Degrees in Teaching. - French Report on Drawing. 176
CHAPTER VII.
Conclusion. -The Work must begin in the Primary Schools. -Cram- 
ming. -Variety and Alternation of Studies. -Room for Additional
Studies. — Mental Discipline. - Thorough Instruction and Exhaust.
ive Instruction.- Text-Books in Natural Science.- Course of
Drawing for Common Schools.-Special Instruction... 251




TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
CHAPTER I.
INTRODUCTION.
THE education required by a people is not a fixed
quantity. That which is adequate for one generation
or. for one locality is not, necessarily, adequate for
another generation or for another locality. It may be
said, in general, that the education of a people should
always conform to their necessities; that, as the conditions of life change, the education of a people
should undergo a corresponding thange: it may be
one of degree or of character, or it may be a change
involving both. The present is a time when those who
have the shaping of popular. education in America
should consider anew the practical application of this
simple truth.
1




2            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
For the American laborer, whether in the work-shop,
in the counting-house, or on the farm, the conditions of
life have, within the last fifty years, undergone a radical
change, and of such a nature, that the laborer must now
receive a vastly better education than he required one
or two generations ago: otherwise he cannot advance
himself as he should, nor even maintain his old position.
This will be evident from a simple glance at three or
four things which strikingly distinguish his present
situation from his past.
COMPETITION   NO LONGER LocAL, BUT      WORLDWIDE.- First, the railroad, steamship, and telegraph
have changed, in a marked degree, the condition of the
American laborer. Before they came, the competition
he had to meet was almost wholly local. If he did his
work as well and as cheaply as those who went to the
same church, or sat on the same jury, with himself, there
was for him no need of further concern. He, and -these
neighbors of his, fixed the price of their products, since
they sold in a market from which all but local competition was virtually -excluded. There is nothing of this
now. Telegraphy and steam have made, as it were, one
neighborhood of the whole world; and the competition
the American laborer must now meet, even at his own
door, is no longer local: it comes from the ends of the
earth. In a market admitting the competition of the




INTRODUCTION.                   3
world, those who go to the same church, or sit on
the same jury, cannot longer determine the- price of
their products. The world, of which they are. but a
part, settles that.
Has. an Ohio farmer a fleece of wool to sell?
He meets in the market the wool-grower of Australia. Has a Minnesota farmer a bushel of wheat to
dispose of? The return for it depends, more or less, on
the crop in California, or along the shores of the Black
Sea.  Is the seller a cotton-manufacturer of Lowell?
He must compete with the looms of Lancashire. A
Maine manufacturer of axes? He must face the axemaker of Birmingham, whom he has, by the way,
driven from the American market, while he successfully competes with him in the market of the world.
Is it a Philadelphia builder of locomotives'? He feels
-the influence of Creuzot, though he may never have
actually met a French locomotive on this side of the
Atlantic. Is it an American ship-builder  He knows,
to his sorrow, that there are other builders on the Clyde.
Indeed, there is scarcely one product of American industry, whose market-price is not now determined, in large
degrees by tte competition of the whole world; and this
as the result, mainly, of steam-carriage and telegraphic
communication,  The more efficient these new instrumentalities become, the sharper will be the world's competition, reaching even the most secluded hamlet.




4            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
The destiny of the laborer is, perhaps, more influenced
by steam as a carrier than by steam as.a producer; for
steam, especially when aided by.telegraphic communication, is a great leveller in the world of industry. No
levelling produces just the same pleasing effect for all.
Take England as an illustration. Having established
~ her manufactures when her insular position and sailcarriage gave her comparatively'easy access to the European and other markets, she now finds herself everywhere confronted by products which the railway has.brought from the manufacturing cdntres of interior
Europe. While she glories in the railway achievements
of her Stephenson, those very achievements have greatly
diminished the vantage which was previously hers in
the market of the world. But what of vantage she has
lost through- steam and telegraphy, she is now struggling to recover through a better education of her pro'
ducing classes.  By the same levelling process the
American laborer is affected. Unless he does his best,
he is liable to be driven from the market, even of his
own town, by a produ'cer who lives hundreds, perhaps
thousands, of miles away.
Here, then, is one particular in which the life of
the American laborer has undergone a decided change;
for him competition is no longer local, but worldwide.




INTRODUCTION.                  5
LiND ONCE NEW AND FERTILE, NOW OLD AND IMPOVERISHED.- Consider, in the next place, the land.
When it was new, bone and muscle, vigorously exercised,
were enough to insure an abundant harvest. Whatever
was planted grew without stint; nor were there a thousand pests to destroy the fruits of the earth. The American farmer, then, had little occasion for chemistry,.geology, botany, entomology, engineering, to secure immediate and satisfactory results. As the remote result,
however, of the stupid agriculture of the past, the present generation inherits vast tracts of impoverished,
unproductive soil. It may be found everywhere, from
the Atlantic seaboard to the Mississippi, from the Lakes
to the Gulf. But little of the land which has been cultivated for two generations, now yields as well as it did
forty years ago. Much of it, indeed, is returning to a
state of nature.
The work of exhaustion still goes on. What is to
check it? for it must- be checked. What is to restore
the land already impoverished? for it must be restored.
No American farmer should consent to go into the
market with wheat, corn, butter, cheese, mutton, beef,
cotton, which lave cost him more than the same things
have cost his competitors. -But he must do this, unless
he puts into his work something more than bone and
muscle, something more than the equally stupid energy
1l




6            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
of reapers.and steam-ploughs. There must be Tabor,
indeed, but no Wasted labor. That there *may be no
waste, the labor must always harmonize With the invisi-.ble forces of Nature, - those sleepless, ever-active giants
with whom it is easy to work, against whom it is impossible for the farmer to achieve aly thing. It is educated mind, working through bone and muscle and
machinery, which is to restore the impoverished lands,
and keep them   at their highest point of profitable
production, whatever that may be. In England that
point is, for wheat, about twenty-seven bushels to the
acre.
Here, then, is a second particular -diminished productiveness of "much of the soil -in which a decided
change has come over the- life of many American
laborers.
MANUFACTURES NO LONGER FEW AND RUDE. - In
the third place, the demands upon the American artisan
have increased wonderfully. Fifty years ago it was a
very limited variety of products required at his hands:
to-day the variety is almost infinite, ranging from a
tenpenny nail to an ocean steamship; from a pair of
spectacles to a telescope for exploring tle most distant
nebulae. But the change is not indicated alone by a
wonderful increase in the variety.of the manufactures.
Raw material and bone and muscle cohstitute a much




INTRODUCTION.                  7
smaller part of their value; while skill and taste count
for vastly more than they did when the shoemaker
boarded around as well as the schoolmaster, and made
the shoes and boots for the neighborhood. The house,
and the furniture put into it, must have more of elegance and comfort. The fabrics of the loom must be
more beautiful in design, and must show a higher finish,
than in the days of homespun. More graceful forms
must issue from  the founderies, glass-works, potteries,
and quarries. The ship must have a better model;
and its workmanship must be finer in every part. Indeed, though the work of the American artisan is, as a
whole, far behind that of some other portions of the
world, yet there has been decided progress not only in
the variety, but in the quality, of the products.
The progress in taste is largely attributable to the
importation of foreign designs and designers. It may,
however, be said generally, that the progress in American manufactures is due to individual effort and to the
subdivision of labor.  There has certainly been no
united, systematic effort to produce skilled workmen,
except so far as the literary education of the public
schools has indirectly contributed to such a result.
This indirect contribution has not been a slight one,
however. The subdivision of labor has enabled the
workman to learn one part of his business more thor



8            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
oughly by remaining ignorant of all the other parts.
He has thus become a more dexterous workman in a
limited field, but not, necessarily, a more skilful workman; that is, he knows no more, necessarily, but less,
perhaps, about the underlying principles of his business, than he did when he served an apprenticeship, and
got some knowledge of all parts of his business.
It is essential, then, that the American artisan receive a much better technical education than present
opportunities permit. It is essential for him, individually, that he may hold his own with his fellows; it is
essential for the capitalist who employs him, that he
may hold his own in the market of the world: and so
it is essential for the common welfare. It is only the
skilled labor of the multitude which will suffice. It is
not enough that there be a few men highly qualified for
their work; it is not enough that there be intelligent
direction; it is not enough that the artist work under
the same roof with the artisan: director, artist, and
artisan should be, as far as possible, united in the same
person. The less the artisan resembles a machine, the
better and cheaper will be the products of his labor.
All this will be placed beyond question by the unimpeachable evidence which will be given in subsequent
pages. It will be seen that it is not the pauper labor,
but the educated labor, of Europe, like that seen in




INTRODUCTION.                  9
Creuzot, France, which America has good reason to
fear. It will be seen that the cheapest of all labor is
skilled labor, such as every State may secure by properly educating her citizens.
Here, then, is a third particular-multiplied and
improved manufactures- in which a decided change
has come over the life of a large class of American
laborers.
DECAY OF APPRENTICESHIP. - In the fourth place,
apprenticeship has become almost wholly a thing of the
past in America, and largely so in Europe. Yet there
never was a more urgent demand for skilled workmen.
This decay of apprenticeship is mainly due to the
subdivision of labor which is now observed in the manufacture of nearly all things, from pins to locomotives,
because it is found to yield the best results. The use of
machinery, the character of which is often such as to put
an end to small enterprises, has promoted this subdivision
by accumulating workmen in large groups. The beginner, confining himself to one department, is soon able to
earn wages. This gratifies both himself and his parents; and so he usually continues as he began. If,
however, he wishes to become a master of his trade, and
the employer agrees to instruct thoroughly, the latter is
often tempted to keep his apprentice at work an undue
time in the department he- may have first well learned,




10           TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
and in which his labor is, consequently, profitable. If
the employer does not yield to this temptation, then
who is there to give the apprentice proper instruction,
seeing that so many workmen usually work by the piece,
and cannot afford to spend any time in the instruction
of others? Nobody. Thus it happens that the beginner usually confines himself to one department, and is
only anxious to receive wages as soon as possible.
While this is to the present advantage of employer
and employed, it is to the ultimate disadvantage of
both; for it is found that the workman who knows all
the departments of his trade -knows the theory as well
as the practice - will always do better work in any particular department he may devote himself to. Again:
the workman who can do but one thing, or rather one
part of one thing, has little chance for promotion. He
also finds himself helpless, when, at some unfortunate
turn, his limited specialty fails him; and there is more
frequently an excess of workmen in a subdivision of any
industry than an excess in the industry as a whole.
Furthermore, the use of machinery, instead of diminishing, rather increases, the artisan's need of thoroughly
understanding his trade: unless he does, he cannot make
the most of about the only chance (an increase of daily
wages) which he now has for bettering his condition.
Machinery having rendered individual enterprises so.




INTRODUCTION.                 11
expensive, the artisan has, in most cases, little chance of
ever becoming his own master. Twenty-five years ago,
when there were, for example, more daily papers in Boston than now, and more. shoe-manufacturing employers,in New England, the industrious, frugal artisan working
for wages had. a reasonable hope that he might tome
day become an employer himself. That hope, as a stimulating, lifting power, must have been wonderfully productive of good. But what, in any department of industry,
is there now to lift the workman, to stimulate him to
greater exertion? Virtually, nothing but a prospective
increase of his per diem by doing more and better work,
and by a merited promotion to some one of the many
subordinate places of oversight and trust. He should,
therefore, be provided with every means for improving himself as a workman, and qualifying himself for
promotion. Apprenticeship having essentially departed
never to return in its ancient form, something else must
take its place in America, as its place has already been
largely taken in Europe by special schools, and give the
American artisan that technical instruction which he
must have, or perish.
Here, then, is a fourth particular-the decay of
apprenticeship-in which a decided change has come
over the life of a large class of American laborers.
LABOR, RUDE, DEXTERORUS, SKILLED. -It is thus




12           TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
seen, from the four particulars enumerated, that the
times have decidedly changed for the American laborer;
that it is now of the utmost moment.for him, whatever
his work, to be skilled in the full sense of the word;
and that he cannot become thus skilled without instruction- having such an object in view. But what is skilled
labor and its value?
All manual labor may be divided into rude, dexterous,
and skilled labor. The first requires only, or mainly,
the strength and. patience of the stupid plodder. The
second requires nice finish, and celerity of execution:
but the work is all done by "rule of.thulmb;" that is, in
ignorance of principles. Subdivision of labor is specially favorable to the production of dexterous workmen.
The third requires both dexterity, and a knowledge of
underlying principles. It is theory and practice united;
and it enables the workman to adapt himself to new
conditions, and always to do the best thing in an emergency, - to improve old methods of work, or devise new
ones. It may be said, in general, that, while the rude
laborer earns one dollar, the dexterous laborer will earn
two dollars, the skilled laborer three dollars; all working
with their hands. In some varieties of labor, thb difference is much greater than this.
For the ruae laborer there is no hope of promotion;
for the merely dexterous laborer the prospect is limited:




INTRODUCTION.                 13
but the skilled laborer, master of his business in theory
and practice, may count surely upon advancement.' In
dull times the skilled laborer is the last to be discharged; yet he is the one who has savings to rely upon,
— the one who can most readily adapt himself to a new
occupation.
There are but few kinds of labor, giving employment
to comparatively few persons, which require only the
rude strength of the steady plodder.  Such stupid
drudgery is the exception; while labor requiring a
greater or less degree of skill is the law. Frequently,
indeed, labor is degraded to drudgery by reason of the
stupidity with which it is performed. It may, therefore,
be justly said, that almost every laborer should possess
skill; the more skill the better. Even in sawing wood,
spading earth, tending a cotton-picker, there is a philosophy, a best way to proceed, which the intelligent,
but not the stupid, laborer is sure to discover and to
follow.
POPULAR EDUCATION. - But there can be no such
general diffusion of skill among laborers, without'a
popular education beginning in the primary school, and
having that for one of its objects. Hence it is quite time
American schools, instead of longer proceeding much as
they did forty years ago, recognized the change in the
social situation; quite time they were so modified as,
2




14           TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
by direct intention, to educate the'pupils more for skilled
laborers, -farmers, artisans, merchants, manufacturers
— than for the literary and professional occupations.
When the best possible result of this kind has'been
secured, there will always be inevitable blockheads
enough to do the inevitable drudgery of the'world.
They who oppose the systematic technical education of
workmen, fearful that there will then be none left ignorant enough for drudges, need not be alarmed.  Nor
will a little early industrial culture be wasted, even on
those who may become theologians or iudges; but rather
it will do them good.
But how should the popular education be modified?
To-day it may be described as literary, -for the use of
the head, and not for the use of the hands. Preserving
its general character Qf fifty years ago, it does not bear
directly upon the leading pursuits of the people. In
the organization of many schools, and in the methods
of instruction, there has been great change; but there
has been very little change in the things taught, though
a large increase in the quantity. The text-books for
reading, spelling, arithietic, grammar, geography, writing, have grown in number and size; and much more
time is devoted to each of these studies. Indeed, in
nearly all the public schools of the land they occupy
five-sixths of the pupil's time. Could the school-year




INTRODUCTION.                 15
be doubled in length, twice as much time as now would
be given to the studies enumerated, if the educational
spirit of the past, which is, in the main, the American
educational spirit of the present, continued to control
the schools, as it does now control them with few exceptions. It would be more arithmetic, more geography, more grammar, more spelling, with no fundamental
change of character.
There is, however, a growing tendency to modify
American popular education, and to bring it into harmony with the age and the manifest demands of labor.
What has already been well done in some parts of Europe, and what the other parts (notably England, so
thoroughly alarmed by the International Exhibitions,
beginning with the one in London in 1852) are making
such zealous efforts to do, will doubtless soon be regarded by all Americans as,. in the main, the proper thing
for the technical education of American labor. It is
with this technical education that European governments are just now specially concerning themselves;
and it is with the same tlying that they who have the
shaping of popular education in America must specially.
concern themselves during the next twenty-five years.
In the present- public-school system, with its strong
literary features, they have a broad and excellent foundation upon which to build. No amount of instruction




16           TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
in science and art can fully compensate for lack of
literary training, even when industrial Tesults alone are
sought.
NATURAL SCIENCE A PART OF POPULAR EDUCATION.- This harmony between education and the demands of the age.requires that the natural sciences,
- like chemistry, botany, physiology, - which bear directly upon great industries, and otherwise tend to
promote the common welfare, should form a distinguishing feature in popular education, - should be added to
the present literary curriculum of the American public
school. The whole people should not only be made
acquainted with the leading principles anil the more
important practical applications of natural science, but
they should. be so instructed as to acquire, in good
degree, the scientific habit of investigation and thought.
The farmer has daily need of this knowledge in the per-.formance of his routine labors; also daily need of this
habit of investigation and thought in order to meet
emergencies, -to meet the cases not laid down in the
bools, nor inherited through tradition. Lacking this
knowledge and this habit of mind, he wastes his energies
in a blind contest with the invisible forces of nature,
and draws the most absurd conclusions, or no conclusions at all, from surrounding phenomena. For him
labor degenerates into drudgery; while profits diminish,




INTRODUCTION.                   17
or disappear altogether.  Then there are many artisans
who have urgent need of similar knowledge, and of a
similar habit of mind. By the same things the kitchen,
too, would be greatly profited; cost of living would be
reduced, yet people would fare better, and their years
would be prolonged.
While, as it will be claimed, it is not the business of
the common school to make specialists, - farmers, carpenters, accountants, engineers, cooks, - it is the business of such a school to teach at least the elements of
technical knowledge, and to teach these elements to
all. Such instruction, because of the discipline it affords,-like in part, in part unlike, that afforded by
other studies, - is of indirect value to every one. It is
also of direct value to the great body of the people; for
it is the'universal European experience, that laborers
cannot be satisfactorily educated for their work, unless
they have first received, in schools for children and
youth, not only literary instruction, but also instruction
in the elements of technical knowledge, scientific and
artistic.  With a broad foundation of elementary instruction, and not otherwise, special instruction can be
successfully added according to the'requirements of each
workman. Such is the universal experience of those
European countries that have undertaken to educate
workmen for their special pursuits.
2*




18           TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
DRAWING A PART OF POPULAR EDUCATION.-This
harmony between education and the demands of the
age also requires that drawing should hold a conspicuous place in popular education. Both for the peculiar
culture it imparts, and for its practical uses, it should
be taught in every public school. As the result of
extended and careful investigations, made from time to
time, for the purpose of determining the character of
the education requisite to produce skilled workmen and
promote industrial welfare, European governments now
lay greater emphasis upon drawing than upon any other
study.' Indeed, it holds so prominent a place in the
education of the people of most European communities,'
that it may be said, roundly, to constitute a fourth part
of all the education the artisan receives. And yet even
in France, where the artisan has for some time been well
educated in drawing, it is regarded of vital importance
that the present instruction in drawing be increased,
and made of still better quality. Indeed, the evidence
places it beyond question, that, in Europe, the welfare of
the individual artisan, of manufacturing establishments,
of whole communities even, may be justly attributed to
instruction in drawing. As drawing has no particular
home, it may render to American industry services
equally valuable. The whole people should not only be
made acquainted with its leading principles and more




INTRODUCTION.                 19
important industrial applications; they should be so
instructed as to acquire, in good degree, artistic habits
of mind arid manipulation.
Almost every thing that is well made now is made
from a drawing.   In the construction of buildings,
ships, machinery, bridges, fortifications, nothing is done
without drawings.  It is not enough that there be
draughtsmen to make the drawings: the workmen who
are to construct the objects' required should be able,
without help, to interpret the drawings given for their
guidance. This they cannot do without instruction that
acquaints them withj the principles on which the drawings are made, and so trains the imagination as to enable
it to form from the given lines a vivid mental picture
of the object required. The workman who lacks this
knowledge and this ability, as it is probable that nineteen-twentieths of American artisans now do, must
work under the constant supervision of another, doing
less and inferior work, and receiving inferior wages.
But it is also essential that the workman himself be'able
to make at least a rude working-drawing, whenever, as
frequently happens, an emergency requires it.
Furthermore, it is not enough that the artisan be able
to make an object, and to make it expeditiously; not
enough that his workmanship be of the highest order.
There are thousands of things whose commercial value




20           TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
depends tnainly upon their beauty, for which the world
is always so willing to pay. This beauty may be in the
form of the objects themselves, or in the applied dbcora.
tion, or in both. However strong a piece of carpeting
may be made, however exquisite may be its finish, an
ugly design will ruin its sale. It is the design, no less
than the quality of the workmanship, that determines
whether or not an' object from  the furniture factory,
from the glassworks, or the pottery, shall sell for more
than the cost of the raw material. It is the same with
Nature's products. The beautiful horse'is, preferred
to. the one equally serviceable, but homely. Indeed,
beauty has a commercial value almost unlimited. But
wherever the beauty is found, -in the shape of the object or in the decoration, -it. is mainly due to form;
and so its principles and their applications are best
learned by persistent practice in drawing.
It is not enough, however, that.there be special designers. In most departments of industry, the workmen who are to reproduce given designs in the form of
commercial products cannot do this successfully, unless
they have received such a training as to give them an
artistic taste and the power of artistic manipulation.
This training they must have, if they are simply to reproduce given designs; but they also need it, that they
may be able themselves to modify the given design (as




INTRODUCTION.                 21
it is often necessary to do), the better to adapt it to the
object required, or to the material of which it is made.
The evidence, indeed, leaves it in no doubt that the
artisan should receive an artistic training (the more of
it the better), of which drawing should constitute the
chief element. The best results have been secured,
where the one who designed and the one who executed
were the same person; the next best results, where the
one who executed had received an artistic training. It
may be accepted as a general truth, the more of an
artist, the better the artisan; for the work will ever tell
of the workman. Hence it is of the utmost importance
that instruction in drawing should go far beyond exercises in mere copying; that the principles of good design should be'thoroughly taught; and that the pupils,
from an early age, should be systematically trained in
the pleasant and intellectually stimulating production
of original designs.
How TIME IS TO BE HAD FOR THE NEW STUDIES.The two great features which should be ingrafted on
popular education in the United States, if that education is to be brought into harmony with the times and
the manifest requirements of labor, have now been
designated.  They are practical science and practical
art.
But how can these additions be made?    Whence




22           TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
is the time to be had for the instruction of the boys and
girls in the public schools, most of whom fail to accomplish all that is now required of them? Yet there is no
study now in these schools which should be excluded.
The evidence is incontrovertibly strong, that the best
technical education alone is not sufficient to produce
even the best practical results: there must also be literary culture, the more of it the better. Never was there
a broader and firmer foundation upon which to build a
popular industrial education than is afforded by the
public schools of the United States. This foundation
must be preserved, and, if possible, made better still.
But how can new studies be added, and new and old
receive proper attention?
When the necessity of adding new studies is fully
recognized, a way will be found. Doubtless it will be
found, upon considering just how much of each study it
is essential to teach, - that some, if not all, of the present
studies can be greatly abridged without diminishing the
quality of the mental discipline acquired, or the amount
of really useful knowledge. Would the spelling-books,
for example, be of less service, were the words they contain reduced to one-third of their present number, and
confined to those in common use?   This reduction
would save the pupils many days which they now devote to the task of spelling words they will never have




INTRODUCTION.                 23
occasion to spell when they are once out of school.
Would the instruction in geography be of less value, if
it were limited to the general principles and to the more
important facts; which the pupils would be able to retain
after they were once learned? This would reduce by
two-thirds those details which are now memorized only
to be forgotten; and the pupils would save months of
time. And would it not be better to confine arithmetical instruction to the science of numbers and its practical applications? Doubtless it will also be found that
some of the schools, if not all, can be made much more
efficient by change in their organization or methods of
instruction. Why, for example, should the bright,
healthy, industrious pupils in graded schools be required
to go the same pace as the stupid and lazy?  Why, indeed, may there not be such a flexible school organization as to afford each a chance to do his best, - to finish
any study at the earliest moment? Why not reduce
the lessons in arithmetic, geography, grammar, to four a
week, and even drop these studies an occasional term?
Thus would time be secured for new studies without increasing the. daily lessons of the pupil. And doubtless
it will be found that parents, when they realize the great
value of instruction in practical science and practical art,
will send their children to school longer than most of
them do now. As for suitable teachers, they will be




24           TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
had as they are wanted. But, after the present public
schools have done all it is proper for them to undertake,
much additional technical instruction must be provided
for American workmen in special schools, as is now the
case in so many parts of the civilized'world. These
special schools, except the higher ones, must be adapted
to the requirements of the different localities where they
are established. In one place the school must be, in the
main, commercial; in another place, agricultural; and,
in a third place, it must be adapted to those engaged in
building, in wood, leather, or textile manufactures, in
quarrying, in locomotive or machine construction, or
whatever else may be the chief pursuit.
OBJECT OF THIS COMPILATION.- It is the object of
these pages, mainly filled with extracts from governmental reports, to give a general idea of what has been
done for the technical education of workmen in Europe,
how it has been done, what the evident results are, and
what it is there urged should be further attempted. As
the testimony is foreign, it is of special value for Americans, since it shows them the character of the competition they must meet in the market of the world. It is
hoped, therefore, that this, though slight, contribution
in favor of a modified education for the American people
will not be wholly without influence with those who
have the special care and moulding of the public schools




INTRODUCTION.                  25
of the country. It is hoped that it will strengthen and
somewhat accelerate the general movement now beginning in behalf of popular industrial education. Much
precious time has already been irretrievably lost; and,
for a generation to come, American laborers must feel
the evil consequences. In a matter which depends upon
the education of the whole people, there must always be
patient waiting for results. Nothing can be achieved at
a bound.
While so little has been done for industrial education
in America, so much has been done, and is now doing,
in other countries, that it must be many years, even
with the best possible effort, before American farmers,
manufacturers, and artisans, as a body, can equal the
skill of many of their foreign competitors. Because the
fullest results cannot be immediately secured, that is no
argument for further neglecting the industrial education
of the people, but rather an argument for the speediest
and most vigorous action in its favor. Though we
stand still, other nations will not.  But it is not
simply a matter of foreign competition: there is the
home competition of State with State, of city with city,
of one establishment with another, and of one artisan
or farmer with another. No tariff can protect any
community against this home competition.
Where manufactures are already established, they can
8




26           TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
be permanently retained only by the technical education
of the workmen in local schools. Though these manufactures have hitherto been successful in spite of unskilled labor, it will be hazardous in the extreme to.rely
upon such labor hereafter, or upon skilled labor to be
got by chance from abroad. Where it is the wish to
establish new manufactures, there the manufactures, if
they are to be made secure and profitable, must be
established on the technical education of the workmen
in local schools. That is the only foundation upon
which it is safe to build the new, or to which it is safe
to trust the old, unless the manufactures are very rude
indeed, and owe their value mainly to the raw material
consumed.
THE MANUFACTURES OF MOST VALUE.- But the
manufactures for which a community should specially
contend are those in which skilled labor counts for
much, and raw material for very little. As such manufactures require a good degree of intelligence for their
successful prosecution, they yield the largest profits,
and afford the best class of citizens. That is not all.
The demand for the products of skilled, artistic labor, is
not limited by the number of purchasers, but only by
their taste, and by their desire and ability to purchase.
The demand is, therefore, essentially unlimited. Thus
a shawl costing five hundred dollars because of its




INTRODUCTION.                  27
beauty will always be preferred to another equally
warm and durable, but costing only ten dollars. On
the other hand, the demand for simple, rude manufactures,-like ploughs, carts, shovels, hammers, jeans,
plain cottons, which only require to be well fitted for
use, and substantially made, -is limited by the number
of purchasers, who take the least possible amount, and
of the cheapest variety, that will serve their turn. It is
much the same with these manufactures as it is with the
staple products of agriculture, the demand for which is
limited by the number of the consumers rather than by
their ability to purchase; since the. rich man can consume no more bread than the poor man, while the latter
must have as much as the former for his healthy, vigorous support.
The   labor-saving  implements  now  employed  in
American agriculture, enabling one man and two
horses to cultivate each year forty to sixty acres of
land on a Western prairie, does not increase the products of the earth beyond the fixed amount required
by the population, but reduces the number of laborers
engaged in agriculture. Whatever facilitates the cultivation of the soil inevitably tends to diminish the
relative number of farm-laborers, and to increase the
relative number of those engaged in other pursuits. It
is to the use of labor-saving implements on the farm




28           TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
that is to be largely attributed the greater relative
growth of American cities compared with the increase
of the agricultural population. In Europe, a similar
relative increase in the city population over that of the
country is largely due to a more intelligent cultivation
of the soil, whereby the same labor obtains much larger
returns than it formerly did; and so there is a demand
for less farm laborers compared with the whole population. When a high degree of skill is added to the
labor-saving machinery now employed in American
agriculture, there will be seen a yet greater relative
increase of the city and manufacturing over the agricultural population.
This increasing multitude of artisans will not be
able to find profitable employment as rude workmen.
There is a rigid limit fixed to the demand for rude products, as already indicated. They will be able to find
profitable employment only as skilled, artistic workmen,
- employment in the production of all those things
which skill and taste know so well how to create for-the
embellishment and delight of civilized life, and for which
there can be.no rigidly limited, but always an increasing demand. It is for such manufactures that communities should specially contend, and, to contend successfully, must educate their people in practical science and
in practical art. When a military result is required, the




INTRODUCTION.                  29
whole people must be educated in the military art, as
Prussia has demonstrated by putting the spiked helmet
into all of her schools. When an industrial result is
required, then the whole people must be educated in
the industrial arts, as Switzerland has exemplified so
well. The earliest day is the best day to begin this
work of education. Those communities which first establish their manufactures have a decided initial advantage over all new competitors, though not a sufficient
advantage to justify them in neglecting any precaution
against encroachment. Since, then, skilled labor is the
only sure foundation for prosperous manufactures, and
since the artisan class is increasing, and must, for the
reasons given, continue to increase, in relative numbers
and importance, much more rapidly than the whole
population, the proper education of this class becomes,
with each succeeding year, a matter of more vital consequence.
The following pages will clearly show that the technical education of workmen cannot be made in the
highest degree efficient, unless it begins in the primary
school; and that instruction in art and science alone is
not enough, but must be based on general literary culture. The American system of common schools already
gives every one the general culture, to which those fundamental elements of technical education which belong
34




30           TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
alike to nearly all departments of labor can be easily
added without making specialists of the pupils. After
the common school must come the special schools, even
now so numerous in Europe. The following pages will
also clearly show that drawing and art must occupy
the most conspicuous place in the technical education
of workmen. They will also show that different European governments have been, for a series of years, making earnest, systematic efforts - and perhaps nothing
so engrosses their attention now - for the technical
education of workmen; beginning it in primary schools,
and continuing it through evening schools, Sunday
schools, apprentice schools, schools of arts and trades,
popular lectures and museums, with its culmination in
great technical universities. To-day it is with educated,
skilled labor- ever the cheapest as it is the best labor
- that Europe proposes to meet the world in friendly contest for industrial supremacy. Let America take note
that it is the educated, skilled labor of Europe, and not
pauper labor, as so many believe, which she has good
reason to fear, and against which she can defend herself only by educating her workmen equally well.




CHAPTER II.
VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.
THE numerous extracts given in this chapter show
clearly, among other things, that,
1. The person who has general charge of any business should understand that business both theoretically
and practically. His knowledge of principles should be
such as to enable him to instruct any subordinate
requiring instruction, to determine at once the comparative value of different processes of work, or to invent
new ones when emergencies require it. In a word, he
should be able to reach just conclusions at once by his
knowledge of principles, and not slowly by "trial and
error." He should be workman enough to know when
work is well done, that he may not be cheated by those
under him, and that he may be able to render justice
unto all by duly discriminating between the skilled and
the unskilled laborer. He should understand his business as a whole, and the relation of each part to the
81




32           TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
whole.' Neither skilled workmen nor tariffs can compensate for stupidity on the part of the superintendent.
Only the very few exceptional geniuses, like Stephenson,
become thus qualified to take charge of enterprises,
great or small, without special school instruction.
2. The workman should not only be dexterous in
manipulation; he should certainly know so much of the
theory of his business as will enable him readily to comprehend all instructions, verbal or graphic, given for his
guidance. The more extended and thorough his knowledge of principles, the better. Such a workman requires
very little supervision: he executes with rapidity; he
wastes the least possible; he adapts himself readily to
new methods; he devises novel and better ways for
doing even the simplest things; he is the first to be
promoted; he is the last to be discharged; he always
commands the best wages, and yet his labor is the
cheapest in the market. On the other hand, the workman who works only by "rule of thumb," though he may
be dexterous, lacks logic, lacks invention, lacks adaptability; indeed, is only a better kind of machine.
3. The workman should be better instructed because
of the machinery used; since it is the rude or dexterous workman, rather than the really skilled workman, who is supplanted by machinery. Skilled labor
requires thinking; but a machine never thinks, never




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.          33
judges, never discriminates. Objects which have a
simple and regular form, and require high finish, or
not, may be made with advantage by machinery, if the
objects are produced in large numbers. Most kinds of
work which demand little besides strength for their
execution can usually be best done by machinery too.
Though the employment of machinery does, indeed,
enable rude laborers to do many things now, which formerly could be done only by dexterous workmen, yet,
after making allowance for all the bearings of the question, it is clear that the use of machinery has decidedly
increased the relative demand for skilled labor as compared with unskilled labor; and there is abundant
room for an additional increase, if it is true, as declared
by the most eminent authority, that the power now
expended can be readily made to yield three or four
times its present results, and ultimately ten or twenty
times, when masters and workmen can be had with
sufficient intelligence and skill for the direction and
manipulation of the tools and machinery that would be
invented.
4. All those persons whose business it is to produce
new combinations of matter - such as the farmer,
miner, dyer, bleacher, founder, maker of machinery,
and numerous others - should have a knowledge of
chemistry. Without such knowledge, which is an




34           TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
essential element of skilled labor in these departments
of industry, neither rude nor dexterous labor can produce satisfactory results.
5. The utmost effort should be made to produce
articles of beautiful design, whether in form, or in color,
or both. The difference between good design and poor
design is the difference between success and failure in
the market of the world. When the beauty of the
object depends, as it usually does, upon its own form,
or upon the form of the applied decoration, the workman should be one who has been thoroughly instructed
in artistic drawing and designing. Not only should the
originator of the design have been thus instructed, but
also the reproducer of the design in wood, metal, earth,
or other substance.
6. For the most successful prosecution of any great
enterprise in land or naval architecture, in the construction of railroads, canals, machinery, there should not
only be an abundance of thorough and expert draughtsmen, but each workman should be draughtsman enough
to make a drawing of any object he is required to construct. Of two competing establishments, the one having such workmen, the other not, the former would not
only win, but would distance the latter every time.
It will be seen that these six points are fully sustained by the testimony of the extracts.




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.             35
BRITISH OPINIONS EXPRESSED BY CHAMBERS OF COMMERCE.
The Right Hon. Lord' Robert Montagu, M.P., VicePresident of the Committee of Council for Education,
&c., submitted in 1867, to the Chambers of Commerce
in Great Britain, the following questions: —
1. What trades are now being injured by the want
of a technical education?
2. How, and in what particulars, are they injured?
3. How do other countries, from their greater attention to technical instruction, absorb our trade? Give
instances, and, if possible, statistics.
4. What plan of technical education would remedy
the evil?
The replies to these queries as to technical education
were ordered by the House of Commons to be printed,
March 25, 1868. A summary of the replies will be
found in the following:Letterfrom the Chairman of the Association of Chambers of Commerce of the United Kingdom to the Right Hon. Lord Robert
Montagu, M.P.
MY LORD, - The Association of Chambers of Commerce of the
United Kingdom have submitted the questions suggested by your
lordship to the respective chambers. It is thought more con.
venient to give you a summary of the answers, rather than to
trouble you with the separate reports, except those from Notting



36             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
ham, Kendal, the Staffordshire Potteries, and Birmingham; in which
the statements are more detailed, and are therefore forwarded with
this statement in the same shape as received.
The Birmingham report states, that " every trade in Birmingham and the district is being injured by the want of technical
education, and those trades the most in which the cost of the
articles produced consists most of labor, and least of the raw
material."
The Belfast Chamber reports, that they are not aware of
any trade in Belfast and its neighborhood being injured by the
want of technical education; but they are convinced that improved
education, both technical and general, would indefinitely increase
the industrial efficiency of society.
"The higher branches of industrial knowledge, that is to say,
mathematics, engineering, and chemistry, both general and as
applied to agriculture, are taught in the Belfast Queen's College, in
a way that we believe to be most satisfactory.  But there is no
adequate provision for the instruction in these and similar branches
of any class of society below that which sends pupils to the Queen's
College."
The Staffordshire Potteries Chamber replies as follows:" It would be difficult to say what trades are now injured by the
want of technical education.  The question would, perhaps, have
been better put, had it been asked'What trades would be injured,
if they could not have imported workmen, or the productions of
workmen, who, from having received a better education than the
workmen of this country, had thus fitted themselves to perform
duties which could not be undertaken by our own people?' If the
question be so put, it is only necessary to point out the numerous
cases in which foreign workmen are employed, and foreign designs




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                 37
carried out, in most, if not all, of the principal manufactories of
this country, -work which might have been performed by English
workmen, had they been sufficiently educated for the purpose; the
result of which is an increased expenditure to the manufacturers,
and, consequently, a greater inability on their part to meet foreign
competition, both at home and abroad, resulting in loss to the
English workman and the country generally.   In the Pottery
district, several manufacturers employ foreign workmen as painters
and designers; and, in one manufactory, a sum of two thousand
pounds a year is paid to foreign workmen."
In reply to the second question, " How, and in what Particulars,
are the Trades of this Country injured? " the general purport of
the answers is, that among employers, foremen, and workmen,
great deficiencies exist in those branches of knowledge which bear
most intimately on the great departments of industry.  For most
trades, a knowledge of design, of theoretical and applied mechanics,
and of abstract and applied chemistry, are of the highest importance.
The Sheffield Chamber thinks that the steel trade would be benefited,
and strengthened against foreign competition, if the foremen were
educated in chemistry and metallurgy.  The Wakefield Chamber
speaks of the " want of theoretical and applied knowledge on the
part of the workmen in the various trades in which they are
respectively employed, particularly of mechanical drawing as an
art, practical geometry required by engineers, cabinet-makers, and
mechanics generally, and of chemistry practically applied."
With reference to art, the Nottingham Chamber, while acknowledging the advantages of the present schools of art, states, "that
the expense of attending such schools is considered to be too great,
and deters the poorer classes from availing themselves of these
advantages.  It is the opinion of this chamber, that our national
4




38             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
system of art-instruction lays too great stress upon high finish in
the execution of the work, rather than upon a system of work
which would give our art-workmen the facility of rapid and intelligent execution; nor is it successful in training-students sufficiently
numerous and well educated to take the places now occupied by
hundreds of French designers and modellers, and German mechanical draughtsmen.  Greater facilities and more encouragement
should be given to students of the artisan class; and the present
system, however well adapted for teaching drawing, is not favorable
to the production of designs with celerity and originality.  It is
deemed desirable that prizes should be given for sketches and
designs drawn within a limited time, and for works from memory."
The answer of the Birmingham Chamber is, that "a large
proportion of the multitudinous trades carried on in this district
especially suffer, because so many of our manufactured articles are
composed of a variety of metals and other materials, which depend
for their successful combination and treatment upon a knowledge
of chemistry and other sciences, and the beauty of their form on a
knowledge of art; while our workmen have scarcely any knowledge
of either, but are guided in their work by imitation of one another
and tradition."
Referring to the trades of the Kendal district (textile manufactures, dyeing, machine-making, leather, and farming), the report of
the Kendal Chamber says, "In these, the workmen, as a rule,
are unable to go out of their accustomed groove, and, from want of
a knowledge of the scientific principles of their trades, are continually wasting or spoiling material through mistakes which would
not occur if they had received a technical education.
"The want of scientific knowledge, and especially of chemistry,
is a great obstacle to progress in the manufactures of this district.




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                   39
The patterns produced by men who have been trained in designing
and the principles of color are superior to those produced by the
workmen who have not had these advantages. Many manufacturers employing French artists, and others procure their designs
from abroad. The trade of pattern-collecting is a recognized one in
Paris; and the collector divides his new patterns among his numerous correspondents in England.
"In dyeing, the foreign dyers, especially the French, produce
brighter colors than the English; and this is mainly in consequence
of the knowledge of chemistry possessed by their workmen. The
specimens of manufacture from this locality exhibited last year in
Paris excelled in every thing but color.
"The same may be said of the leather trade, in which the. best
colored leather for fancy purposes is still imported from France; and
several of the discoveries for the best treatment of fine leather have
been made in France, in consequence of mere knowledge of chemical processes.
" In machine-making, the want of workmen who understand the
law, as well as the practice, of mechanics, is severely felt; and this
applies to all trades in which machinery is used, especially in the
introduction of new machinery.
"In agriculture, a knowledge of chemistry and natural science
would be exceedingly beneficial to the farmer; and the need of it is
becomingi daily more and more apparent. Some of those who have
attempted to carry out a little knowledge in the neighborhood have
been greatly benefited; and larger and more diffused knowledge would
be of incalculable value in developing the productions of the soil."
The Dewsbury Chamber states, that "ofttimes woollen fabrics
are spoiled in the dyeing for want of a knowledge of chemistry.
Progress in the improvement of the manufacture of textile fabrics




40             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
is retarded by the want of a more intelligent understanding by the
workmen of the various processes; and the duties of workmen in
the engineering and machine-making business are imperfectly discharged for want of a better knowledge of the principles of
mechanics."
In reference to the want of mechanical science, the means of
instruction are most limited. The Nottingham Report states, that
"the machinery, both for the lace and hosiery manufactures of this
district, is of an exceedingly ingenious and complex character; but,
for want of instruction in mechanical science, the inventive power of
the workmen is misdirected, time is lost, many valuable inventions
are never perfected, and, if the desired improvements are at last
obtained, they are the result, not of scientific induction, but of
numerous trials and failures, which a proper technical education
would have rendered unnecessary."
The report from the same chamber, referring to the processes of
dyeing, states, that "a knowledge of chemistry is essentially
necessary for the carrying-on successfully of these trades; but such
knowledge does not generally exist amongst either the masters or
workmen. Should a master desire to give his son a thorough
education in practical chemistry, he must send him to a distance,
and incur great expense: whereas his competitors in these arts, both
in France and Germany, can obtain the best possible education on
the spot, and at a cost of as many shillings as it requires pounds in
England. The apprentices and artisans of Chemnitz, which is the
great competing town with Nottingham in the hosiery trade, obtain
a technical education of the highest class gratis, when it can be
shown that they are meritorious, and unable to pay the small fce'of
the institute. For the same class in Nottingham, there is no iustruction that will at all compare with it.




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                 41
"This chamber has no access to statistics which would show to
what extent our manufactures may have been superseded by the
manufactures of other countries; but, in many of our articles, we
find a growing competition both in our home and foreign markets,
owing to the superiority of design and finish of certain classes
of goods.  In those countries from which we experience the
strongest competition, the work-people have the advantage of
excellent technical schools, where complete technical education can
be obtained at very moderate cost, and in some cases free; and
in addition to this, in many parts of the Continent the children of
the work-people have all previously received good primary instruction.
"It is shown to this chamber, by the most competent persons,
that our workmen, generally, are utterly ignorant of the properties of
materials they are daily using, and of the best method of using such
materials, and that all attempts at scientific teaching for the workingclasses will produce very limited results, as compared with other
countries, until a system of primary education, of a more thorough
and comprehensive character than that which exists at present,
shall have been introduced."
The South of Scotland Chamber (Hawick) states, that "the
French are very superior dyers. The manufacturers of Verviers
(Belgium) have absorbed a large portion of the woollen-yarn trade
of Scotland, by producing a superior article at the price. One of
the manufacturers visited Verviers lately, and was informed by one
of the most intelligent manufacturers there, that young men who
had been at the technical school at Mulheim had made the greatest progress in the business."
The Batley Chamber believes, that " the shawl trade of Leeds
has been absorbed by Continental manufacturers by reason of their
4*




42              TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
technical knowledge, especially as respects the laws of form and
color."
Even in processes not connected with textile manufactures, the
necessity of improved education is insisted upon by Mr. Freeman
(Falmouth Chamber), who writes, -
"My experience here in the management of an extensive business in the granite trade leads me to believe that technical education
would be of great advantage to the working-classes and to the
trade generally.  There has been but little improvement in the
character of the tools they use; while at the same time there has
been great improvement in the tools used in America, by which a
finer finish is given to the work, and labor is much diminished.
Without some instruction to make the young mechanic acquainted
with the advantages, I see no prospect of inspiring him to the use
of them, more especially as the Trades' Union has great power here,
and interferes to prevent any alterations in the process of manufacture."
The Newcastle Chamber writes, that although "the want of
a technical education amongst the persons employed here has not
been generally felt, yet such manufactories as those for engineering,
glass, earthen-ware, chemicals, iron, and iron ship-building, and
mines for coal, lead, iron, and minerals and clays, would benefit
through technical education."
In reply to the third question, "How do other Countries, from
their Greater Attention to Technical Education, absorb our Trade "
the answers show that the superior education afforded on the Continent, and which is conducted with special reference to industrial
pursuits, enables the manufacturers there to compete with us in
departments of industry which hitherto we considered peculiarly our
own.




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                  43
The Macclesfield Report states, " that the silk trade is injured
by a superior skill in dye and finish on the Continent, causing a very
large increase in foreign competition, which is aided by unequal
tariffs and cheap labor abroad."
The Wakefield Chamber replies, "By possessing a thorough
theoretical and practical knowledge of their several trades, the
designers, dyers, and engineers in foreign countries, produce greater
purity and beauty of design, clearer and brighter colors in the cloths
and other fabrics they manufacture, finer patterns, and greater lightness, with efficiency combined, in construction, and in a more approved machinery."
The Dewsbury Chamber is of opinion, " that hitherto the heavy
woollen trade of this district has not been absorbed, to any great degree, by the woollen manufactories of other countries; but, in lighter
and more fancy fabrics (textile), Continental manufacturers supersede
us by a greater attention to art-instruction, and the production of
good colors in dyeing."
The Kendal Chamber says, "As the trade of the district is
principally confined to the United Kingdom, foreign competition is
not so severely felt as in some other parts of the country; but there
is no reason why, with increased knowledge, several branches of
trade that once largely manufactured for exportation should not
again return to this neighborhood."
The answer from the Birmingham Chamber is as follows: "In
other countries the work-people are instructed in science and art:
the effect of this is shown in the rapid improvement of their manufactures, in beauty of form, excellence of finish, adaptation to the
purpose for which they are intended, and cheapness; and their excellences enable them now to be in the course of largely supplanting
us in the markets of the world."




44             TEChNICAL EDUCATION.
With reference to the request for statistics, the answer is, that the
Government has ample means for ascertaining the great develop.
ment of trade on the Continent; and to the Birmingham Report will
be found appended a list of articles made in Birmingham and the
hardware district, which are largely replaced in common markets of
the world by the productions of other countries, - a list which might
be considerably extended.
With reference to the fourth question, viz., " What Plan of Technical Education would remedy the Evil? " the answers substantially
agree in the following propositions: 1st, THE NECESSITY OF
LARGELY INCREASED PRIMARY EDUCATION; 2d, TIE ESTABLISHMENT OF SCHOOLS OF SCIENCE AND ART IN THE GREAT CENTRES OF INDUSTRY, AIDED BY GOVERNMENT.
The Kendal Chamber thus states its views: "The advantage
which it is sought to obtain by an improved system of technical
education is twofold; 1st, It would not only supply the want of
such scientific knowledge as bears directly upon the art practised by
the workmen; but, 2d, It would overcome that common contractedness of mind which produces an inability to perceive the general
purpose of a process apart from its accessories, that inaccuracy in
detail which accompanies confusion of thought, and a want of
precision in action and the use of terms. Thus it is the habit of
mind as well as a deficiency of knowledge which renders it so
difficult for the average workman to adapt himself to any improvement, either of process or machinery. This is also the great obstacle to specific scientific instruction.
"It would seem, therefore, that the first object in technical
schools should be to train young men to habits of accurate thought,
and give them that general enlargement of mind, without which
accuracy becomes tyrannical. To this end, the elements of mathe



VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                  45
matics should be taught and developed, as far as practicable, in an
early stage of education.
"Then there is, perhaps, no single acquirement which more expands the mind,'by showing the possibility of every-day thought,'
than gaining a familiarity with a foreign language. For this
purpose, the language should be taught by an intelligent, welleducated Englishman, able to develop the structure of his own
language, and introduce the elements of comparative grammar.
"Along with this preliminary course of mathematics and language, there should be some instruction in the elements of science,
with a view of explaining scientific method, rather than of impalting
definite instruction. Then would follow the higher development
and teaching of the above, with more detailed and full instruction
in those special sciences on which our industries depend.
"But the most prominent object should be, in the technical
schools of a high class, thoroughly to instruct the pupils in science
proper.
" The question now arises, How this course of instruction is to
be given to a large number of young men, without too much interfering with the practical learning of their trades? As some only can
give their whole time to study, it is suggested, that, as in many
businesses work is not so brisk from December to May as during
the rest of the year, it would be possible for many apprentices, or
young men learners, to study during five or six winter months without injury to business. Thus they would have six months of
practical work alternately with six months at school. By this
means they could apply their technical or scientific knowledge, from
time to time, more efficiently than they would be able to do by any
directly technical instruction given in a continuous course of school
education. Besides, coming from the application of acquired knowl



46             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
edge back again to the fount, they perceive the object to be
attained by further investigation, and better appreciate what they
have to learn by having experienced already how usefully knowledge
can be applied.
"It would be a great boon to the poorer students, who would
thus provide the expense of half a year's instruction by the labor
of the other half, as has often been done by earnest students at the
Scotch universities.
" At first, high-class technical schools could only be established
in large towns; but by degrees, as the number of competent teachers
increased, they should be extended, and schools should be eventually
established for the preliminary courses in every town in the
kingdom.
" As other associations will deal with the necessity of an infinitely
higher class of elementary education being requisite than what is at
present taught, should Parliament establish a system of national
education, chambers of commerce may limit their observations to a
government system applicable to purely technical instruction.
"In France, government aid is given by competitive exhibitions,
varying in amount from a fourth of the cost of education to a full
payment of the whole of the fees. A similar endowment of merit
is attached to technical colleges, where the students are taught,
boarded, and clothed. Such a plan enables the cleverest youths in
the humbler classes to obtain- the best instruction. By means of
communal funds, schoolhouses have been erected, and masterships
established. The Government has also supplied professors to
departmental and local schools.
"If a board of education be established in each county, or
division of a county, in England, the best school within its district
should have connected with it a technical department. The mode
of providing the funds is one for the legislature to settle.




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                 47
"In districts and towns where the population is engaged in trade,
the Government might aid, in terminable loans at a low rate, the
erection of school-buildings; attaching to such schools queen's medals and exhibitions for successful students in science and art.
"So stimulated, partly by school-fees and the payment by the
employer of the fees of clever youths, together with endowments by
liberal and prosperous men of business, technical and scientific
schools may be expected to spring up if properly qualified teachers
can be found."
The following resolution was passed at a special meeting of the
Birmingham Chamber of Commerce, Jan. 10, 1868: -
"That the council be instructed to request the Association of
Chambers of Commerce to inform Lord Robert Montagu, M.P.,
that, in the opinion of this chamber, it is of the utmost importance
that government schools of science should be established in the
great centres of industry, for the purpose of giving systematic
technical education both to the middle and working classes.
"The chamber wish it to be understood, that, by the term'technical education,' they mean both artistic and scientific instruction."
The Nottingham Chamber is of opinion that the education
should be "of a thorough and useful character, and in all cases
taught with a view to its application to arts and manufactures.
Which of the Continental schools does this most effectually, the
Government, with the resources at its command, will ascertain
without difficulty. But it is of the highest importance that such
institutions should be established immediately, that they should be
in no wise inferior to the best Continental schools, and that they
should be equally cheap and accessible."
The Batley Chamber recommends, that " a central establish



48             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
ment should be organized and carried on in some town (say Leeds)
for this district, and that other places in the district should be
affiliated to it on certain conditions. Local classes might be held
in the day and night schools, or in mechanics' institutes. We
think part of the cost should be paid by Government, and other
part by fees from pupils. The direction and supervision of the local
classes might (we think) be left to local managers; but we think
the central school should be in the hands of some department of
Government."
The Hawick Chamber, after making a similar recommendation,
adds, "To enable the working-classes to reap the full benefit of
the technical schools, a thorough system of national education is
required; but there should be no delay in establishing the schools,
as there are already numbers of workmen sufficiently well educated
to take advantage of them."
The Macclesfield Chamber recommends, " that the present system
of primary education should be consolidated, and made compulsory,
so as to insure such education being given to every child in the
State.
" That local efforts for secondary or technical education should
be supplemented by government assistance by way of annual
grants, loans," &c.
The Sheffield Chamber recommends the establishment, in that
district, of "schools of chemistry and metallurgy in connection
with the school of art, but which, if they are to succeed, must not
depend for their support on private contributions."
The Wakefield Chamber thinks that the Government ought to
establish, in all the great centres of industry in the United Kingdom,
schools equal to the best technical schools in France, Switzerland,
Prussia, and Saxony.




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                  49
The Belfast Chamber, on the other hand, states, " We do not
see our way as yet to recommend the introduction of any system of'trade-schools' into Ireland. The subject of technical education is so
new to the people of this country, that we cannot feel sure that such
schools would be appreciated and supported. What we would
suggest as most practicable and desirable is an extension of the
course in the national schools, so as to bring instruction in elementary geometry and algebra, mensuration, mechanical and free-hand
drawing, and bookkeeping, which branches form the basis of all
technical education within the reach of all children, in towns at
least, who can give the necessary time."
The Coventry Chamber has passed the following resolution
unanimously: "That, in the opinion of this chamber, it is essentially necessary that schools for technical education should be
established in the different manufacturing towns; and that the
special schools which would be most beneficial to this city and
neighborhood comprise those for teaching elementary chemistry,
texile manufactures, practical mechanics, and horology."
The Dewsbury Chamber recommends "local schools for the
instruction of artisans in the principles of their respective trades,such schools to be partially supported by local rates, and supplemented by government grants, - together with a central school, to
which more advanced students might be sent to receive further
education in science and art."
The Staffordshire Potteries Chamber consider that " a plan of
education which would remedy this evil would be to establish a
system of education in this country, in art and science, which would
render it unnecessary for manufacturers to employ foreign talent.
This could only be done by a national system  of primary and
technical education throughout the country, supported, so far as is
6




50              TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
necessary, from a fund to which all should contribute; for, if the
future national prosperity of the manufacturing and   trading
interests of this country is supposed to depend upon a more efficient
system of technical education, the expense of supporting it ought to
devolve upon the nation at large, and not, as has hitherto in a
great measure been the case, on individuals and localities. Primary education ought to be one of the first considerations, - be
made compulsory, as far as possible, with scholarships attached to
these schools, so as to enable scholars to obtain by diligence a free
education in the higher branches. There can be little doubt that
trades' unions have injuriously affected most of the trades of this
country; but a good system of education would, in all probability,
have a very strong tendency to do away with some of the most
objectionable rules at present existing in these unions."
In addition to these evidences of the general feeling among
chambers of commerce in all parts of the country in behalf of
technical education, the Committee of the Associated Chambers
(appointcd specially to consider the question) have passed the
following resolution: "That, whilst the details of a comprehensive plan of technical education must be the subject of minute
examination, the Government be urged to direct its attention at
once to the systematic training of professors of theoretical and
applied science, and to give increased assistance, beyond that
conferred by the late minute on science schools (21st December,
1867), to all serious local efforts to establish and extend the teaching
of science and art."
Signed on behalf of the Association,
SAMPSON S. LLOYD, Chairman
Association of Chambers of Commerce of the
United Kingdom, 29 Parliament Street, S.W., Feb. 10, 1868.




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                       51
Reference is made in the preceding letter to a list
of articles furnished by the Birmingham Chamber of
Commerce. It is as follows: -
List of some articles made in Birmingham and the hardware district,
which are largely replaced in common markets of the world by the
productions of other countries.  This list might be immensely extended
byfurther investigation, which the shortness of time did not permit.
ARTICLES, OR CLASS OF ARTICLES.             COUNTRIES.
Carpenters' tools; as hammers,
pliers, pincers,' compasses, hand  Germany, chiefly.
and bench vices.
Chains of light descriptions, where
the cost is more in labor than in
material; as halter-chains and  Germany.
cow-ties, and such like.
Fry-pans of fine finish.          France.
Wood-handled spades and shovels,
an article of very large consump- United  tates export them to all
~~~~~tion.  ~our colonies.
tion.
Hoes for cotton and other purposes, United States compete with us for
their own use, and to some exan article of large consumption.  ter O    u
tent for export.
Axes for felling trees, &c., an article  United States supply our colonies
of large consumption.            and the world with best article.
Carpenters' broad - axes, carpenters' and coopers' axes, coopers'
tools (various sorts), shoemakers' Germany and the United  tates
hammers and tools.
Matchets for cutting sugar-canes, an
important article.          Believed to be now Germany.
important article.
United  States export to South
Nails, cut.                         America and our colonies.
Nails, wrought.                   Belgium.
French and Belgian largely superNails, point de Paris (wire nails).  sede English.




52              TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
ARTICLES, OR CLASS OF ARTICLES,          COUNTRIES.
Beautifully made by machinery in
Horse-nails.
the United States.
Pumps, of various sorts.        Largely exported by United States.
[NOTE.- An    American   pump
found water for the Abyssinian
expedition.]
Agricultural implements,-ploughs,
cotton-gins, cultivators, kibbling- Many articles similar to these are
machines, corn-crushers, churns,  exported by United States to
rice -hullers, mowing-machines,  common markets.
hay-rakes.
Sewing-machines.                United States.
The United-States petroleum lamps
Lamps for use with petroleum, now supplant the English in India and
an article of very large consump-n I                       d 
China; French even imported to
tion: lamps for the tableEngland.
Tin - ware, - tinned spoons and
cooks' ladles, various culinary
articles of fine manufacture and
finish.
Locks, - door-locks, chest - locks,
drawer-locks, cupboard-locks, in United States, France, and Germany.
great variety.
Door-latches, in great variety.  United States export to Canada.
Curry-combs.                    United States and France.
Traps - rat, beaver, and fox.   United States export to Canada.
Hinges, in wrought iron, for doors,
grates, &c., in great variety, United States export to Canada,
gimlets, and augers (twisted).  and probably elsewhere.
Brass foundry (cast), as hinges,
brass hooks, and casters (great These articles, in great variety, are
variety), door- buttons, sash-  now extensively exported from
fasteners, and a great variety of  Germany and France.
other articles.
Brass foundry (stamped), as curBtain pins and bands, cornices  These articles, in great variety, are
tain pins and bands, cornices,
gilt beading, and a great variety  now extensively exported from
of other brass foundry.         Germany and France.




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                    53
ARTICLES, OR CLASS OF ARTICLES.          COUNTRIES.
Needles. An article of large con- Mostly from Germany (Rhenish Prussumption.                       sia); even imported to England.
Fish-hooks.                    Believed Germany.
Guns. A great variety of sporting guns, articles of large con- Now exported largely from Liege,
sumption, formerly entirely from  Belgium, and St. Etienne, France.
Birmingham.
Breech-loading muskets, revolver
pistols.                      United States.
Switzerland and France, even imWatches.
ported into England.
Clocks.                         United States and France.
[NOTE. - Watches made in United
States interchangeable by machinery.]
Iron.                           Belgium.
Glass for windows, an article of
Belgium supplants ours in our own
large consumption, spectacle and  Belium  pplants ours in our own
colonies.
all other glasses.              colonies.
Table glass.                    Believed to be Belgium and France.
Swords.                         Prussia and Belgium.
France and Germany. These arti
Jewelry, - gold and gilt, fancy
Jewey - g a, f v    cles are even imported into Engsteel; these in very great variety.  land.
Small steel trinkets, as bag and
purse clasps, steel buttons and France and Germany; many of
chains, key-rings, and other fast-  these even imported into Engenings, and many others in great  land.
variety.
Austria, France, and Prussia. We
Leather bags, with clasps, purses:  believe about all these articles
&c., courier bags, &c.          sold in England are imported.
Buttons, mother-o'-pearl.       Vienna, imported to England.
Buttons, horn.                  France, imported to England.
Buttons,  porcelain  (formerly  France entirely superseded English,
Minton's of Stoke).             and imported to England largely.
Steel buttons (formerly Bolton and
Watts).                       France




54               TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
ARTICLES, OK CLASS OF ARTICLES.           COUNTRIES.
Florentine or lasting coat-buttons.  Germany.
Steel pens, penholders.          France.
Brass scales and weights.        France.
Cutlery, in great variety, - scissors,
light edge tools, such as chisels, Germany.
&c.
Pins for piano-strings, and other
small fittings for pianos.     France.
Silver wire for binding the bass France
strings of pianos, &c.
Iron gas-tubing.                 Germany.
Elastic bells, with metal fastenings. Germany.
Brass chandeliers and gas-fittings.  Prussia and France.
Harness buckles and furniture.   Prussia and France.
German silver,- spoons, forks, &c. France, Austria, and Prussia.
Locks, -best trunk - locks, best
Prussia and France.
door and cabinet locks. 
Umbrella furniture.              France and Prussia
Horn combs.                      Prussia.
Pearl and tortoise-shell articles.  France and Austria.
Iron wire.                       Prussia and Belgium.
Iron and brass hooks and eyes.   Prussia and France.
Bronzed articles.                Prussia and France.
Hollow-wares, enamelled.         Prussia and France.
Optical instruments.             France, Austria, and Bavaria.
Mathematical instruments.        France, Austria, and Bavaria.
Japanned wares.                  Germany and France.
Bits and stirrups.               Belgium and France.
Coach-springs and axle-trees.    France.
Electro-plated  wares, customers France
preferring French goods.
Gas-fittings.                    United States.
Weighing-machines.               United States.
Plumbers' brass foundry.         United States.
Table glass ware.                United States.
Doors, locks.                    United States.
Machines for domestic purposes, as
sausage-machines, coffee-mills, United States.
and washing-machines.




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                 55
ARTICLES, OR CLASS OF ARTICLES.        COUNTRIES.
Nuts and bolts.               United States.
Penknives and scissors.       United States.
Stamped   brass-ware  (certain United States.
kinds).
American "notions," as buckets,
clothes-pegs, washing-machines, United States.
agricultural machines.
THE WORSTED TRADE OF BRADFORD.
The following letter from Mr. Jacob Behrens to Lord
Robert Montagu, Vice-President of the Committee of
Council on Education, England, gives an interesting
account of the worsted trade of Bradford.      The great
success of the past is largely due to a limited amount
of technical instruction, which must be hereafter increased, or Bradford will lose her pre-eminence.
BRADFORD, Jan. 24, 1868.
MY LORD,- By a circular which the Secretary of the Association of Chambers of Commerce has addressed to the various chambers, it was intimated that you desire to receive answers to the following four questions:1st, What trades are now injured by the want of technical education?
2d, How, and in what particular, are they injured?
3d, How do other countries, from their greater attention to
technical education, absorb our trades? Give instances, and, if possible, statistics.
4th, What plan of technical education would remedy the evil.




56             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
As a member of the Committee on Technical Education which
was appointed by the Associated Chambers in November last, I had
to consider these four important questions; but, having long taken
an active interest in all matters relating to education, I venture to
trouble your lordship with my own personal views, without in any
way prejudging the answer which the Committee will, no doubt, be
prepared to return.
In discussing these questions from an essentially local point of
view, I shall be able to enter into details which cannot be included
in an answer from a body representing all the trades and industries
in the United Kingdom.
I also suppose, that, in addressing all the chambers of commerce,
it was desired to elicit information with reference to the local want
of technical education at the principal seats of trade, which, when
collected, may enable the Council for Education to obtain a general
view of the wants of the whole country.
Before answering the four questions, I must beg permission to
suggest that a great service would be rendered to the public by the
statement of the exact meaning which the council attach to the
words " technical education."
In the absence of any such precise definition, almost every discussion upon this subject (and hardly a day passes without it being
referred to in public) degenerates into-a discussion on education in
general.
Your lordship will perceive that I have used the term in a wider
sense than as the merely practical and theoretical teaching of
mechanical and chemical science.
In answer to the first two questions, I may state that the principal industry of this town and district is the manufacture of worsted
goods, and that perhaps in no other trade has the absence of scientific instruction been less injurious to a more rapid development.




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                57
Nor can we complain of that trade being materially injured by
the want of technical education; for the worsted trade of this neighborhood is yet the largest in the world, and. has been estimated to
amount to thirty-three million six hundred thousand pounds in 1864.
Notwithstanding this satisfactory condition of our trade, signs
are not wanting, and they are perfectly palpable to every one engaged in the export trade, that other countries are endeavoring
keenly to dispute our pre-eminence.
If we have attained our present position in spite of a deficient
state of theoretical instruction (and I believe in no other great seat
of industry have there been fewer schools of science than in this
part of Yorkshire), the practical education as given in our factories
must have been extremely good.
We must, however, remember, that, until lately, we had great and
exceptional facilities for the worsted trade; which, by degrees, became
concentrated in the immediate neighborhood of Bradford and Halifax.
The population of this district has for centuries been trained in the
combing, spinning, weaving, and dyeing of the long wool grown in
this and some neighboring counties, and nowhere out of England.
Machine-combing, the power-loom, and the invention in dyeing,
hereinafter referred to, gave an immense impetus to our trade; and
thus Bradford, which in 1831 had only 43,527 inhabitants, numbered 106,218 in 1861; and 130,000 is a moderate computation for
the present.
Our being first in the field gave us many advantages, and we.
have thus not felt the pressure of foreign competition so soon as
some other industries; but, notwithstanding the superiority which
we still claim, we are conscious that we cannot afford to go on in
the old way much longer.
We not only export the machinery which enables our competi



58             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
tors abroad to comb, spin, and weave in the same manner that we
do; but our superior workmen accompany these machines to teach
foreigners how to use them.
Our operative dyers, although, as a rule, ignorant of the first principles of chemistry, have invented a very ingenious process by which
vegetable and animal fibres can be dyed together, and have become
so skilful in this branch of their trade, that our black and color dyers
find employment at high wages all over the continent of Europe.
The machines we export are, in many cases, worked by persons
possessing a superior education, and, consequently, a more developed
intellect than our ordinary mill-hands; and, above all, the owners
and managers of many foreign factories apply the results of their
scientific training to our machines, and improve them to a degree
which already compels us to acknowledge a marked superiority in
some of their productions.
Foreign dyers, possessing a thorough knowledge of chemistry,
have brought the finish of worsted goods to a perfection which we
do not equal; and foreign pattern-designers, who appear to possess
a more cultivated taste than ours, show by their productions that
they know how to apply it for the benefit of their employers.
Special instances of superior foreign workmanship are not uncommon, but each may be the result of various causes; and it is
perhaps impossible in any one case to ascribe it to the superior technical education of our competitors alone.
But, whatever may be the cause, competition on the part of foreign countries has become a serious fact, which deserves our most
earnest consideration.
The mills at Rheims produce, from Australian wools, merinos,
the perfection of which we have never been able to approach.
The worsted mills at Notts, in Belgium, employ the same kind of




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTiRUCTION.                 59
weft and warp as we do, but weave fancy goods which are preferred
to ours in neutral markets, such as Switzerland and others.
Germany, and principally Saxony, import annually above five
million pounds' worth of our worsted yarns; of which a great part
is re-exported to the United States, manufactured into fancy goods.
Thousands of pieces of Orleans (cotton and worsted woven together) are every year sent to France to be dyed and finished there,
which would not be done if the French had not improved upon the
original invention of our operative dyers.
It is perfectly true that in some, even in most instances, the
superiority of foreign produce may consist merely in a more careful
attention to what we are here too much in the habit of considering
small matters. Sometimes it is the finish, or a closer study of each
country's peculiar taste or special requirements; but, in the aggregate, the results are important enough to obtain in many cases the
preference in neutral markets for the goods which have had the benefit of such attention or such study.
It may therefore be reasonably assumed that the owners of these
establishments, having derived their practical instruction from us,
were frequently able to improve upon our practice by their having had
the further benefit of a superior system of primary and secondary education, and by taking advantage of the many means that are offered
to them for the acquirement of technical and scientific knowledge.
The ready access to museums and art galleries, with which many
of them are privileged, affords facilities for educating and cultivating their taste, which must also be a great advantage to them.
It is perfectly clear, that we shall have to adopt similar means of
improvement if we wish to maintain and improve our position; but,
unfortunately, we do not at present possess the appliances for education which alone can make commerce and industry a liberal profession.




60              TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
Our local teaching of science is so imperfect, that our masterdyers, who require to introduce a more scientific element into their
establishments, cannot find amongst their men, and amongst the
youths in the neighborhood, the acquaintance with the principles of
chemistry and physical science which is necessary for the delicate
adjustment of the chemical agents they have to deal with.
Not confining my definition of technical education to mechanics
and chemistry, but including in it the training for commercial pursuits, I may state that the ignorance of modern languages, of the
geography and the laws and customs of foreign nations, which is
yet prevalent amongst the rising generation, even of the affluent
classes, is a great bar to their commercial progress, and has been
one great means of throwing almost the whole of our Continental
export trade into the hands of foreigners residing in this town.
We feel that a better preparation for the trade or industry in
which we are engaged would enable us to meet foreign competition
with a better chance of success, and that the absence of such training must be injurious to the best interests of England.
Our young men who are to become the future masters of the
large factories erected by their fathers, even those who have had the
questionable advantage of a so-called first-rate commercial education,
require, in addition, a thorough scientific training to enable them to
meet on equal terms the young men of the same class abroad.
They leave school early, and are taught in their father's mill the
father's trade, in the same practical manner in which he himself has
learned it, and which has enabled him to rise to his present position,
when England possessed exceptional advantages over all other
countries.
It is now generally admitted that something more is required, if
the young men of the rising generation are to maintain the position
created for them by their fathers.




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                  61
The answers given to the first two questions apply also to the
third; but I may mention that the trade of Bradford is not " ab.
sorbed " by any other place or country.
We may have abandoned the manufacture of some articles for
which other places appear to have superior natural or social facilities;
but we have created other branches, which, in ordinary times, give
more than sufficient employment to a rapidly increasing population.. We feel nevertheless, and very keenly, that, even in the production of articles in which we excel, we begin tobe very hardly pressed
by other countries, which, until lately, were very far behind us,
-particularly by Germany, Belgium, and France.
When we examine into the causes of their success, we find that
they all have one advantage which we do not possess; namely, a
better system of technical education.
Considering, also, that fifty years of peace, and the application
of steam as a motive-power and to locomotion, have in a great
measure deprived England of the exceptional privileges which she
possessed formerly in her accumulated wealth and in her geographical position, we are naturally anxious that others shall not outstrip
us in the race by means of superior training.
Although the same kind of loom will work equally well in England as in Saxony, there will be a great difference, whether the
overlooker who superintends its working, and even the weaver who
attends upon it, are intelligently trained workmen, or mere automata.
The man who understands the construction not only of this particular loom, but that of all other looms, must be a more efficient
overlooker, or manager, than the mere mechanic of our factories.
I have already referred to the disadvantages connected with the
merely practical training of our dyers, and to the necessity for
their obtaining a scientific knowledge of their trade.
6




62             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
The German clerk - who has a good knowledge of three or four
languages, who has been taught to understand the working of the
exchanges in the whole world, the tariffs of different countries, and
their commercial laws and usages- will find employment, and rise
into an important position or to independence, much sooner than
the English clerk, who has not received'the same educational
advantages.
We expect a remedy for all these evils from the movement which
is now making such auspicious progress; and it may not be out
of place to mention the fact, that an attempt to impart technical
instruction has been signall successful in Bradford.
Years ago it was felt that some artistic education had become
necessary, if we wished to retain even a portion of our fancy trade.
Schools of design and a school of art were established; and,
though not numerously attended, they were very useful by giving
to our pattern-designers a better knowledge of forms and of the
proper combination of colors.
Much more in the same direction is wanted; but I have no hesitation in ascribing a considerable part of our past success in the
production of fancy goods to the influence of these schools, and
cannot but believe that equal, or even greater or more lasting, benefits
would be derived from facilities being offered for the acquirement
of the scientific knowledge of the principles which we have to carry
into practice.
The fourth question involves the whole problem which now
occupies so much of the public mind; and he would be a bold man
who undertook to answer it categorically.
We are all anxiously waiting for the Report from the School Inquiry Commissioners, and for answers to a circular issued by Lord
Stanley to her Majesty's Foreign Legations, with reference to
technical education abroad.




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                 63
After having obtained these documents, we shall be better prepared to study the whole question, and to form an opinion as to the
system of technical education we may prefer.
But I believe, whatever may be the tenor of these reports,
the people of Bradford will be confirmed in their opinion, that
technical instruction not based upon a system of sound elementary
and secondary education would not meet the wants of the country;
and that government action in this matter ought to embrace the
whole system of education, and not a part only.
In no other country has practical technical education been more
perfect than in England; and the great number of most valuable
inventions and improvements which have been made by uneducated
workmen prove that this practical education has had excellent results.
I may also state that I am convinced that no school can ever give
the same practical education as that which is given in the real workshop; but it is evident that in places like Bradford, where this
branch of education is so thoroughly satisfactory, teaching of a more
scientific character would be doubly beneficial.
To impart this necessary theoretical instruction, technical schools
of different grades will be required; and as your lordship has asked
the question, What kind of technical education we have to propose?
I may be permitted to conclude with a few practical suggestions.
A polytechnic university like the Polytechnic School of Zurich,
or the Central School at Paris, of which Mr. Samuelson gives so
favorable an account, might be established in London, if a more
central place in the kingdom be not preferred.
Three or four intermediate science and art colleges in different
parts of the country, like the Ecoles des Arts and Metiers in France,
might prepare the young men from fourteen to eighteen years of
age for the central university, or complete the education of those




64              TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
who do not intend to take degrees, or cannot aspire to the highest
places in industrial professions.
Local institutions, such as weaving-schools, upon the Elberfeld
model, with schools of art, lessons in chemistry, mechanics, and
higher mathematics, might be spread over the whole country, each
adapted to the industry of the district, and all connected with and
aided by the superior schools and central university.
Evening classes might greatly assist the youths who have not yet
obtained the benefit of those improvements in primary and secondary
education, which, we trust, may not only give us more intelligent
workmen and overlookers, but will afford to the rising generation
in general that education which has so greatly assisted Germans
and Swiss to become such dangerous competitors in the world's
trade.
I have, &c.,
(Signed)                    JACOB BEHRENS.
To the Right Honorable the Lord Robert Montagu, M.P., Vice-President
of the Committee of Council for Education, &c.
DECLINE OF SILK MANUFACTURE IN ENGLAND.
The following letter from     Mr. Francis Beunoch       to
Mr. J. Hole shows that a lack of suitable technical education had much to do with the decline of silk manufacture in England.
80 WOOD STREET, E.C., Jan. 23, 1868.
DEAR SIR, - In reply to your letter and circular, received a few
weeks ago, desiring me to note down any facts connected with the
decline of the silk-trade in England, I feel obliged to embrace a




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                 65
wider range of view than the question at first sight might appear
to render necessary.
Primarily, permit me to observe, that, although the French treaty
may have hastened what has been almost a catastrophe in the silk
manufacture, it had very little, if any thing, to do with the absolute decay. The skilled English operative is, in my opinion, quite
as clever as the foreigner. The ignorance or incompetence exists
where few suspect, - not in the worker or weaver, but in the master
or employer. Protection fostered and pampered the trade, rendering
a moderate profit possible and easy. But, when the competition became closer, ignorance succumbed to skill; for, unhappily, protection enabled many men to live by manufactures who knew little or
nothing of manufacturing. I shall briefly notice the various stages;
and, with the exception of the skilled weaver, I fear I shall have to
condemn, or at all events criticise severely, and give little credit to,
the trained ability manifested by those who profess to conduct the
silk business.
RAW MATERIAL.- At the very outset, the English manufacturer
is placed at a great disadvantage. No silk is produced at home: all
must be imported. He relies, to a large extent, on China, Japan,
and India, for his supply. The markets of France and Italy are
opened to him; but there he is forestalled by the enterprising manufacturer of France, Switzerland, and Germany.
The English manufacturer chiefly depends for his supply upon
the silk brought to London. The French, Swiss, and German
manufacturers contract with the agents at Milan, or elsewhere, for a
supply of the exact article required. Excellency of manufacture
depends greatly on the evenness of the thread. In this respect the
French and Italian silks are admirable. To secure this the greatest
care is indispensable at the very first operation, -that of reeling
6*




66             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
from the cocoon. In all Asiatic silks, not only is this important
process most negligently executed, but, when completed, the producer not only takes no heed as to keeping the several sizes apart,
but brings to bear the utmost ingenuity to put together into the
same hank several sizes, by reeling, first the coarsest, then a finer,
and a finer still, until the coarse is completely enveloped in, or plated
over, by a quality infinitely superior: so that the silk in this way
may appear ten or twenty per cent better than it really is.
To separate and re-divide such hanks, and arrange them in exact
sizes, is next to impossible. The remedy for this must be applied at
the fountain-head. But who is to do it  The importer of silk
is not, or very seldom is, interested in silk manufactures: so long as
he can obtain silk in exchange for his calicoes, shipped to the East
upon terms that leave him a profit, he cares little how it is produced,
or what becomes of it. With careful reeling, there is no reason why
the excellent fibre of the Chinese silk should not rank with the best
Italian.
What has been done once may be repeated with advantage. I
remember the time when Brutia silk ranked very low in this market, lower than our ordinary China: but some enterprising men,
accurately estimating the value of the fibre, arranged to have it
reeled on the Italian or French system; and the result was, that a
silk once lightly esteemed now ranks with the best French or Italian silks, and for lace purposes is preferred to any other. Taking
a money criterion, a silk which stood so low, if reeled as formerly,
would not now, in this market, be worth more than twenty-one to
twenty-four shillings, is at present worth forty-four to forty-eight
shillings per pound.
This very year supplies a further argument in favor of the advantage of careful reeling. There have been great variations in the




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                 67
quantity imported; but it is found to be so irregular and badly
reeled that it cannot be used with advantage in the fabrics most in
demand. The consequence is, that, whereas French and Italian
silks are even higher in price than they were a year ago, Asiatic
silks are lower by twenty to twenty-five per cent. Here, one would
think, is inducement enough for enterprising men to imitate a wiser
system. But again I ask, Who is to do it  No substantial improvement in this respect can take place until the importer or merchant, and manufacturer or consumer, come closer together, and
work with or for each other. At present they are kept apart, and
are ignorant of each other, by a system that damages both. Did
the manufacturer come in contact with the merchant, and fully discuss his requirements, the merchant would, for his own advantage,
duly advise his agent in China or Japan, who would instruct the
native producer; and so, in a short time, the evil pointed out might
be partially amended, if not entirely overcome.
THROWING. - The throwster, again, is a middle-man; occasionally, but not always, a manufacturer. His business is to take the
silk as imported, split up the skeins into their appropriate sizes,
wind, twist, and prepare the silk for the manufacturer. This is
the second and most important process; and carelessness on his
part, or want of skill in separating and arranging the sizes, must
be shown in the manufactured goods.
His work is delicate and difficult, and, I must admit, conducted
with little notion as to his responsibility.
The general custom is, that, for a certain price per pound-weight,
he undertakes to throw the silk into organzine, or tram, or warp
and weft, and return the same weight.' Thus if the throwster receives a hundred pounds silk, valued at thirty shillings per pound,
he throws it, and whatever it produces (say ninety-five pounds of




68             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
thrown silk) with five pounds waste, which he returns to the dealer at
33s. 6d.; the 3s. 6d. being the amount agreed to cover the charge
for throwing, including waste. Here, you will observe, lies a great
temptation, which few are able to resist.
In the best silks, the natural gum forms from eighteen to twentyfour per cent: this natural gum must be boiled out before the silk
can be properly dyed. To secure himself a better profit, the throwster takes out as little of the foul or rough thread as possible,
though every rough thread makes an imperfection in the web; in
addition to which he will increase the quantity of soap used to
soften the gum and make the silk more easy to wind, and, by leaving a portion of this adhering to the silk, he may lessen the difference in the raw silk received and the thrown silk returned, by
two or three per cent. Indeed, so skilful have some throwsters become in this respect, that they can not only return the full weight
received,, but have some to spare, although five per cent to ten per
cent must go in waste during the many processes through which
the silk is put in the course of throwing.
I have frequently known instances when silk lost in boiling off
from thirty per cent to thirty-five per cent in gum, soap, and other
abominations; though the natural gum did not exceed twenty per
cent to twenty-two per cent.
Mark the result: no really first-rate manufacturer on the Continent will look at English thrown silk for high-class goods. I freely
admit, that, among the throwsters, there are many skilled and honorable men; but they have little influence to counteract the prevailing feeling, which is not a prejudice, but a principle. Men do
not like to pay thirty shillings or forty shillings per pound for soap
worth only sixpence per pound.
All this is destructive to our reputation as producers of prepared




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                 69
material, and most damaging to our home manufacturers, who, to
a large extent, depend upon the English throwster for their supply
of material. With material so prepared, what reasonable being
could expect excellency of result?
DYEING. - We have some very good practical dyers, but few
who have been scientifically trained in chemistry. The consequence
is, that, even in black, large quantities of silk are sent, at very heavy
expense, every year to the Continent to be dyed, returned to Spitalfields, Coventry, Derby, Manchester, &c., to be woven,-a fact
most discreditable to the dyers of England, and a great disadvantage to the manufacturer.
MANUFACTURING. - Here I take up the observations made at
the outset, - very few of our manufacturers have any true technical
training. To a great extent, they depend upon help supplied in the
shape of a foreman, who has probably been a weaver, and knows
something of putting silk together, but very little of the nature or
inherent quality of silk, yet is made responsible for selecting a silk
which he thinks may answer in producing a class of goods which his
master has decided to make. A certain kind of silk has produced
certain results before; and they think it probable that the silk
offered them by the dealer may do the same again. And (in Coventry, for instance) it is frequently handed in bulk, so much organ,
so much tram, with instructions to make the material into such
and such goods; and they see no more of it until it is returned in
the manufactured state. How can that be called manufacturing?
The uncertainty as to the size of the material they use, and the
ultimate result, renders it almost impossible for the professed
manufacturer to estimate what the cost is of any given article
until it is produced; whereas the foreign manufacturer, by the absolute knowledge of every department of his business; the reliance he




70             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
can place on his material, and his skill in design, is enabled, after
a careful examination of almost any pattern that can be laid before
him, to give an estimate of cost within one or two per cent.
Instead of continuing the unpleasant task of showing what the
English manufacturer cannot do, I shall endeavor to depict or describe the training necessary to make an accomplished manufacturer; and, in doing so, I shall not draw on my imagination, but
keep steadily in view examples of men who have pursued a similar
course of training. One of the great obstacles to success in silk
manufactures in England is pride, as if being a manufacturer was
an absolute degradation. It is not so on the Continent.
When the usual course of education is finished, and the young
man has to determine, or his friends have to determine for him,
what his future career is to be, his studies are regulated accordingly.
If a manufacturer, he attends classes and lectures on natural
science, with special reference to the branch of manufacture he
intends to prosecute, -whether wool, linen, cotton, or silk, and does
not waste his time on much discursive study. He studies the different kinds of silk, ascertains their nature, what classes of goods they
are beneficially adapted for, and what they are not: so that, when he
comes to practical working, he knows to a certainty what to reject,
and what to select for his purpose. Along with this he prosecutes
the study of chemistry, and, by experiments, learns what class of
silk is best adapted for certain colors, and what is not. Equipped
with this indispensable fundamental knowledge, he proceeds to
Italy, or elsewhere, and practically engages in reeling from the
cocoon: by and by he enters a throwing establishment, and becomes acquainted with every detail. In future life he can not only
describe what he requires, but how it may be accomplished; for
the ultimate result depends much more on the character and ex



VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                   71
actness of the several processes than many would suppose. Armed
with this knowledge, he returns, and studies the art of design, and
how best to produce a desired effect without the waste of a thread of
material, and probably, for a year or so, practically studies weaving,
and becomes a weaver at the loom. He is thus able personally not
only to superintend, but practically carry out, every scheme his
imagination can suggest.
With judgment so matured, and knowledge so complete, it requires no depth of reasoning to decide how easy would be the
victory of such a man over the untrained manufacturers of England.
I will only describe one process to show the difference between
the practice in Basle and Coventry. In Basle, when the warp is
completed, it is arranged ready for the loom, stretched over and
between two beams, and carefully examined. Every nib, knot, and
rough part is removed from the threads, so that, when in the loom,
the weaver drives along merrily. The shuttle seldom, if ever, ceases
through imperfection in the warp. Whilst in Coventry, the silk is
warped and put into the loom as it comes from the dyer; and, while
the weaver is picking and cleaning his warp before it comes to the
baton, he not unfiequently has one or two pickers or cleaners behind the loom, removing the rough part from  the threads, with
many stoppages and delays in the process of weaving. Any one
may see that the one is clumsy and primitive, whilst the other is
characterized by common sense, skill, and considerable economy.
No man can pretend to show that the weavers of Lyons, St.
Etienne, Zurich, Basle, or Crefeld, are superior to those of Spitalfields, Coventry, Norwich, Manchester, and Macclesfield; but any
one who would venture to maintain an equality of skill, practical
and mechanical knowledge, on the part of our manufacturers, would




72             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
only expose his ignorance of the facts so easily acquired by all who
wish to obtain them.
In many respects the Swiss have carried their technical knowledge a step beyond the French. What but the personal skill of
the manufacturer could have enabled Zurich, in many classes of
goods, to successfully compete with Lyons, or Basle to rival St.
Etienne? These are facts which cannot be gainsaid; and we cannot but lament the supineness, or want of pluck, in our manufacturers, who lazily permit a most beautiful branch" of industry to be
taken from us.
Those who call for protection seek to protect, not trade, but
ignorance and idleness.
Take one instance. Immense quantities of spun silk are produced in England, sent to the Continent, made into ribbon-velvets,
and returned to England in quantities almost beyond belief. The
mere expense of carriage and expenses of various kinds cannot be
estimated at less than ten per cent. Here is protection enough to
stimulate enterprise; and yet, of the hundreds of thousands of
pounds' value of velvets imported annually, scarcely a piece is made
in England. What is the reason? Nothing but the want of welltrained, practical scientific mechanical skill. If the French Treaty
had been the cause of distress in Coventry, St. Etienne would necessarily be in a state of high prosperity; but it is not so. St. Etienne
is as badly off as Coventry, so far as ribbons are concerned. Basle,
by superior technical skill and great economy, has beaten St. Etienne, as well as Coventry; and, while these ancient cities are in a
state of collapse, Basle seems to enjoy a high tide of successful industry.
As regards Coventry, fashion has much to do with its great depression. While women wear doyleys, or small mats, on their heads




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                  73
the ribbon trade must languish. But that has little to do with the
general question; and you may gather from what I have stated, that
we have, in my judgment, small hopes of recovering our prestige in
any branch of silk manufacture, until importers, throwsters, dyers,
and manufacturers will each and all earnestly resolve to acquire all
technical knowledge connected with the trade, and, working together,
determine to apply it.
It would be unjust to close these hurried notes without stating
most emphatically, that combinations among the men, and the determination of a small set of workmen to establish trade-lists, or
prices, was the beginning of the decay of our silk manufactures. I
have personally had instances where many thousands of pounds'
value of goods were ordered on the Continent because of some small,
wretched, technical objection on the part of the weaver, or of his
tyrant, the Trade Union, because it seemed to interfere with a tradelist in Coventry. My memory supplies me with one case where
an order was declined, although the weaver could have made over
forty shillings a week wages, had the price offered been accepted;
the result being, that, in one season, more than twenty thousand
pounds' worth of goods was ordered on the Continent which might
have been produced in England.
Perfect freedom to employ or dispose of labor is an indispensable
element for the future success of the silk-trade in England.
I am, &c.,
FRANCIS BEUNOCH..
FRENCH TESTIMONY.
By imperial decree, June 22, 1863, a large and able
commission was appointed to inquire into the character




74            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
of technical instruction   throughout France.      Some
thirty different persons, whose evidence it was thought
would be most valuable, -professors, heads of colleges,
and manufacturers,- were summoned before the commission. The abstract of evidence taken by the commission,
and the report it made June 20, 1865 (Gen. A. Morin,
reporter), were deemed so valuable by the British Government, that a translation of the same was made and
presented to both houses of parliament by command
of her Majesty.    Extracts will be given in different
parts of this volume.
In his evidence, M. Girardon, founder and director of
the Central School at Lyons, professor at La Martiniere
School, a free technical school, says:"The majority of the pupils of La Martiniere succeed in the
careers in life which they select. There are in the town of Lyons
a large number of skilled artisans who have sat on the benches of
the school. The principal dyers are old pupils of the school; and to
them is due the increased prosperity of the trade of the town by the
remarkable discovery of the new and fashionable colors. The
Polytechnic School has also received many of the pupils; and it is to
their first success in La Martiniere that they owe the brilliant
position they have obtained, —a just recompense of their assiduity."
The evidence of M. Houel, manager of the Derosne
establishment of Cail and Company, contains some things
not directly pertinent to this chapter; but, as the directly




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                 75
perunent parts cannot be readily separated from        the
test, the whole is given.  M. Houel says:"I shall commence with the question of the instruction of apprentices. I believe that in the principal centres of industry, as
Lille or Mulhouse, more favorable conditions could be created than
at Paris. Thus at Fives, at the establishment of Parent, Schaken,
Caillet, and Company, of which I am the fourth partner, we have
begun to give special instruction to our apprentices; and, doing this
in the interest of the children and in that of the parents, we believe
that it is also in the interest of our establishment.
"In fact, the provincial workshops are under quite different conditions from those in the capital. At Paris, as many workmen as
are wanted can be found: in the provinces, on the contrary, it is
often difficult. We are compelled to create a staff of employes and
operatives, who, we wish, may become attached to our establishment:
we must attract both children and parents by making it easy for
them to find dwelling-places and schools close to their work. This
is what we wish to effect, and in which we have already succeeded in
many centres.
"Our establishment, founded now about three years, employs
fifteen hundred to eighteen hundred men: we have sixty apprentices;
and we are thinking of raising the number to three hundred or
four hundred. Our apprentices have one hour of intellectual labor;
but we believe, that, to learn properly, they should have four or
five hours daily. We would willingly allow it to them; and we
should probably arrive at an instruction which would qualify
some of them to become candidates for the schools of arts and
trades, and that under conditions very favorable to their practical knowledge.




76             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
" It has sometimes been spoken of to make workmen study at
night: I believe that to be almost impossible. A man that has been
at work all day cannot study, unless, indeed, he has an exceptional
constitution. A man who has the care of a family, who works at
piece-work, and gives all his energy to it, has need of the evening
for rest. According to my idea, the working-man cannot gain much
by studying at night: he may go to his class one evening, but he
will not go again. It is the apprentice with whom we should occupy
ourselves, because he is of an age to divide his time between manual
and intellectual labor.
" Now-a-days it is necessary to have educated workmen. France
sends as many artisans abroad as Fngland. When we have a workman to send to Italy or Spain, we inquire what he knows, and we
find, that, in general, he is a thoroughly practical man, who knows
his work perfectly; but if we ask him to make a calculation, or to
keep an account of petty cash, we directly discover his incapacity.
On the other hand, if we take a pupil from the schools, we find him
less practical than the working-man, less able, on the whole, to meet
the requirements of the situation. In fact, we are compelled to send,
in preference, a man who is not educated, but who knows how to
work. What is wanting, then, is a man capable of working, yet instructed; and it is therefore of the greatest importance to trade to
promote the instruction of apprentices by attaching a school to the
workshop, as we have done at Fives.
"I confess I have here given utterance to an idea which deserves
to be considered practically. It would be well to examine in detail
what are the cases where a child, giving six hours of work a day to
his master, can be replaced by another child while the first one goes
to school. There are circumstances under which there would be
some difficulty in making apprentices thus alternately go to work;




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                  77
but I think, that, in most cases, it would be possible. Thus, in a work.
shop like ours, I do not see why we could not employ two hundred
apprentices, as well as thirty or forty: in fact, the majority merely
work as assistants to the workmen, and could easily be replaced in
this work by others. It is only when a child has himself commenced
a piece of work, that it cannot be finished by another. But I think
that this difficulty can be overcome by having twice as many children as are wanted for their work, and by giving each of them only
half of what he can do in twelve hours.
" I think, then, that it would be an excellent plan to organize in
one large industrial establishment an intellectual training sufficiently
advanced to allow of practical and scientific acquirements being
placed on the same footing, and to enable parents who are sufficiently
enlightened to send their children  to the schools of arts and
trades. For my own part, I know of no better instruction to make
able workmen than that which is given at those schools, because
there the studies run parallel to one another. We are indebted
to them for the fact, that, in mechanical construction, we are the
equals of any other nation in Europe. We ourselves employ a
great number of the pupils of these schools. Of the three hundred
who pass out of them every year, there are some who are more or
less not so well prepared; there are some of whom we can make
nothing but workmen, sometimes even only moderately good workmen: but there are others who are very intelligent, and have profited to the utmost by the intellectual and scientific training they
have received. Such as have not been able to learn mathematics,
but possess practical capabilities, become excellent foremen. We
meet with men among them who have a great liking for practical
acquirements, because in general they are good draughtsmen. A
young man who can work well, and is skilful with his hands, is also
7*




78             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
a good draughtsman; and that is one of the first qualifications of a
good foreman.
" We are all the more in a position to feel the want of workmen
who have a knowledge of drawing, in that our method of manufacture (which we owe to the schools of arts and trades) is quite different
from that adopted in England, and from that which, for a long time,
was in use in France. I am the manager of two works, - those of
Messrs. Cail and Company, and those of Messrs. Parent, Schaken,
Caillet, and Company, which employ together about five thousand
hands. That number might be easily increased to fifty thousand, if
we had a sufficiency of draughtsmen. Our method consists in
giving full details of every work, piece by piece: so that the workman has only to execute the piece according to the drawings which
are confided to him. With a large staff of draughtsmen we produce works at these establishments to the amount of over thirty
millions of francs, which would be an impossibility without our
means and process of maufacture.
" It must be acknowledged, that, in large workshops, apprentices
arc not in such favorable circumstances for learning their trades as
in smaller ones. Establishments with large capital undertake considerable contracts, and are therefore compelled to make many
things of the same description. In a small workshop, on the contrary, where they execute a variety of works, the same objects are
not turned out in so large a number. We manufacture in our three
establishments a hundred and fifty locomotives; and we could
make two hundred: there are therefore many parts which are repeated. If a young man executes well a piece of work which is
intrusted to him, it may happen that he has given to him the same
work for a year or more; and he will be able to make a profit by it.
In a pecuniary point of view, it is at once the interest of his em



VALUE OF TECINICAL INSTRUCTION.                 79
ployers, of his parents, and of himself, that he should continue for
some time manufacturing the same thing.
" In the schools of arts and trades, this method is not adopted.
There the pupils are made to execute works which are gradually
made more and more difficult, so that their acquirements may increase gradually. But this mode of instruction has also its inconveniences; for the result is, that the pupils cannot produce their
work rapidly. They ought to execute in these schools a greater
quantity of work, and to have among the pupils a number of skilled
mechanics to show them how to turn out their work quickly. We
take every year fifteen pupils from the school at Chalons; and, as
they are much sought after, we do our best to obtain the best. For
two years they are employed in our workshops, and are then sent
into the drawingoffice: at the end of four or five years, they are of
great service to us. But it is evident, that, if they were more conversant with manual labor when they leave school, they would not
have to pass two years in the workshop: they could be spared that
probation, and would be sooner in a position to occupy higher
posts. Works of greater importance ought to be executed in the
schools; and if, by the side of the pupils, there were a few picked
workmen who knew how to turn out work well, they would serve
as an example to the young men of the school; and those who possessed industry and ability would endeavor to emulate them in
rapidity of execution and skill."
A sub-commission investigated and reported on technical education in Germany and Switzerland. Of the
prosperity of Nuremberg this sub-commission says: -
" There exist in Germany certain institutions, all having for their




80             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
object, though differing in form, the professional training (properly
so called) of workmen. Foremost among the things taught in these
schools, or classes, which are held on Sundays or evenings, always
stands freehand and linear drawing. In some countries, as in Wurtemberg and Bavaria (Nuremberg), drawing is the especial object
of these schools; and the impulse it has given to all the industries
requiring that art are sufficiently striking, and so generally recognized as to render evident the usefulness and necessity of this branch
of instruction.
"A glance at the immense variety of children's toys with which
Nuremberg supplies the whole world will suffice to show the progress due to this diffusion of the art of drawing. The very smallest figures, whether men or animals, are all produced with almost
artistic forms; and yet all these articles are made in the cottages of
the mountainous districts of the country. They find employment
for the whole population, from children of tender age, as soon as
they can handle a knife, to their parents; and this home manufacture,
which does not interfere with field-work, contributes greatly to the
prosperity of a country naturally poor and sterile."
The same sub-commission, in giving an historical account of the schools of arts and trades in France, tells
the following anecdote of the first Napoleon, which indicates the value he placed upon technical education:" One day the emperor, while still first consul, paid a visit to
the college at Compiegne, and questioned some of the elder pupils as
to what they intended to do on leaving the college. He was much
dissatisfied with their answers.' The government,' said he,'pays
considerable sums to educate these young men; and, when their




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                  81
studies are ended, none of them, except those who enter the army,
are of any use to the country. Nearly all of them remain at home,
a burden to their families, which they ought to aid. This shall
continue no longer. I have just visited the great manufacturing
establishments in the north, and the larger workshops of Paris. I
everywhere found foremen clever in the manual labor of their trades,
but scarcely one among them able to draw the outlines, ormake the
most simple calculations, of a machine to convey his ideas by a
sketch or a written description. This is a great defect; and I will
here provide the means for remedying it. There must be no more
Latin here (that will be learned in the lyceums about to be organized), but the study of trades, with so much theory as is necessary
for their progress: by this course we shall obtain well-taught foremen for our manufactories."
VIEWS OF PROF. LEONI LEVI.
Prof. Leoni Levi, Doctor of Economic Science of the
University of Tiibingen, having investigated technical,
industrial, and professional instruction in Italy and
other countries, made a report to Lord Montagu, the
vice-president of the Committee of Council on Education in Great Britain. This Report was ordered by the
House of Commons to be printed, Dec. 6, 1867. After
describing the instruction in different countries, Prof.
Levi says: -
" This is but a general review of what is being done with a view
to promote scientific and technical instruction in different countries,




82             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
yet it is sufficient to show that the greatest attention is devoted to
the subject; that a general desire is evinced to advance in industry,
not by the empirical method of chance acquisitions, but by a profound study of the great principles of art and science; that experimental science is attracting an extensive number of laborers, intent
upon making fresh discoveries and greater conquests over the grand
and mysterious powers of matter; and that the exercise of the different professions of life is no longer left in the hands of persons
untaught and undisciplined, but is everywhere made to depend on
an extended knowledge of the sciences which they demand, and of
the duties which they impose.
" What is done in this country towards promoting objects of
such paramount importance? The principal defect in popular education in this country, I apprehend, is a want of elevation of mind
and of capacity of exercising force or power of thought. There
appears to be a want of agility and adaptability in the mental powers of our working-classes, produced, probably, by the early ages
at which they are sent to work, the hardness, constancy, and sameness of labor, and by the dull and unenlivening climate. In the
constant use of machinery, the laborers in the manufacturing districts become, to a great extent, the slaves of mechanical force, and,
bound to follow the automaton by a constantly watchful eye, they
lose that vivacity of mind which is necessary to the efficient pursuit
of every branch of industry. Nor have the majority of laborers
much opportunity to acquire an intelligent knowledge of the work
they have to do.
"The only means generally provided for learning the work is by
the system of apprenticeship; but, in the hurry and turmoil of the
workshop, no attention is paid to the principles of the work. By
constant practice, by great care, by natural aptitude, the laborer




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                 82
may acquire an unrivalled excellence of workmanship; his eye may
be so sharpened, and his touch so refined, as to be able to detect the
most infinitesimal flaw in the work at hand: but ask him to alter
his course, or to introduce any novelty, and he is utterly incompetent for it. This is the effect of apprenticeship unaided by any
study of the principles involved in the art. The laborer is, in fact,
reduced to the character of a copying-machine: he may be able to
transcribe what is set before him with the utmost perfection, but
cannot at any time alter, invent, or even skilfully control, what is to
be done.- He is rather the slave than the master of the work he has
on hand. What the laborer really wants is a knowledge of the principles on which the work is done. It is not desirable to substitute
science for practice; but it would be most useful to superadd the
one to the other.  It is not a question of abolishing the system
of apprenticeship for the school, but to let the school be preparatory
to or the immediate attendant of apprenticeship."
REPLIES TO LORD STANLEY.
In  1867 Lord Stanley addressed a circular to her
Majesty's ministers abroad, requesting them      to obtain
and forward information relating to technical or industrial education in foreign countries.
1. What is the nature of any technical or industrial
education which is carried on in        -?  What are
the particular industries which it is intended to promote? Are there any distinct schools or colleges, &c.,
for the purpose?




84           TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
2. If there be such schools or colleges, with what
industries are they connected?
3. For what class of persons is this technical instruction adapted? — for masters, overlookers, or workmen?
4. In what way are these institutions supported?
and particularly do they receive any contribution from
public funds, as endowments, subsidies from local or central authorities?
5. What is the average number of the students?
6. What is the cost to a student? Are there any
exhibitions or free places tenable at industrial schools,
&c.? Do private manufacturers often defray the expenses of students?
7. Is there any special qualification required for admission to the industrial school, &c.?  What is the
time usually spent by students at the schools, &c., and
the ages and sex of the students?
8. What is the amount of the education presumed, or
generally acquired, before admission to the school, &c.?
What are the subjects of instruction at the school, &c.?
What is the mode in which instruction is given?  Is
the instruction accompanied by participation in actual
manufacturing works or processes?
9. Are there any special privileges attached to studentship at the school, &c.? Is any special education




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.             85
of this kind made necessary for admission to the exercise of any particular trade or profession?
10. How are the teachers appointed? What qualifications are they required to have? How are these qualifications ascertained? and'how obtained by those who
possess them?
11. What advantage, if any, has resulted from these
schools, &c., in promoting or extending the manufactures with which they are connected?
12. What is the opinion prevalent among the industrial classes, whether employers or employed, with regard to the working and effect of these schools?
In 1868 the replies were presented to both houses of
parliament by her Majesty's command. With his reply relative to France, Lord Lyons sent numerous documents, - one a circular letter dated April 6, 1868, which
was sent out by the minister of public instruction in
France. It accompanied a plan of studies for the special schools. In this letter the French minister says of
Switzerland, -
"Science continues its discoveries, and every day places at the
disposal of industry new and serviceable agents; but, in order to be
well applied, these agents, which are sometimes very delicate and
sometimes very powerful, require to be skilfully handled. This is
the reason why, in the present day. industrial progress is so intimately connected with educational progress, and why questions which
8




86             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
it is the duty of the university to examine and to solve have acquired so great an importance even as regards the material prosperity of France.
" Should any one doubt the importance of the revolution which
is taking place, let him look at Switzerland, that country of lakes
and mountains, which Nature has made so beautiful, while at the
same time denying it every condition required to make it the abode
of industry, -a country loved by artists and by poets, but without
ports, without navigable rivers, without canals, and without mines.
Yet, fiom among these sterile rocks, there is exported every year an
amount of products sufficient to pay for all the importations made,
and more especially for the two hundred million francs' worth of
goods which France alone sells to that people, which in former
times cultivated mercenary warfare as its sole branch of industry;
and the country produces, besides, so many skilful men, that, in every
commercial city of the world, a Swiss colony is found holding the
first rank; and in almost every great commercial house may be
found intelligent clerks who have come from Basle, Zurich, or
Neufchatel."
Mr. Lowther, in his reply from Berlin, speaks thus of
the general effect of technical instruction in Prussia:"The advantage obtained is, that there has been a very good class
of workmen established, which thinks, and has a knowledge of the
things they are required to make, and consequently comprehends
more easily. The class of workmen has become also better mannered, more civilized and refined. The middle class of tradespeople
has been able to raise the profession: it has been able to carry into
effect all repairs in factories, and to arrange and direct them in such




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                  87
a way that they are cared for in the most convenient manner. It
has been able to introduce new methods in manufactories, &c. The
highest education of German engineers has caused the profession to
be very much sought after on account of its extensive and fundamental knowledge. By means of all these circumstances, Prussian
establishments, like Prussian industry, have been able to raise themselves.
" The industrial classes have the most favorable opinion of this
education, as proved by the very great use made of all the technical
places or establishments of education of all grades, &c., as proved
by the necessary enlargement of existing, and formation of new,
establishments. The workmen feel the influence of the knowledge
they have acquired, and are anxious to attend the lectures at the
vereins (unions), which conduce to show the workman the importance of theory. From ten thousand to twelve thousand men attend
the lectures of the Ilandwierker Verein at Berlin alone.
"Looking at the result given in answer to Question 5, that
about eleven thousand men receive a technical education annually
in various grades of knowledge, it will easily be understood that the
effects of these technical establishments of education are generally
recognized."
Mr. Doria sends with his report from       Stockholm    a
communication from     the Swedish Government, which
says of the technical schools in Sweden:" The facts that the number of persons who seek admission into
the schools is constantly increasing, and that manufacturers and
others engaged in industrial pursuits exert their influence in every
diet to promote the increase or extension of technical educational




88             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
establishments, are sufficient proof that the use of such schools is
evident to the public, and duly appreciated."
Of the good effect of the many industrial and technical
schools in Belgium, Lord Howard de Walden says: —
"The benefits which these institutions have conferred, and are
conferring, upon the working population of Flanders, as regards
their material prosperity, in resuscitating a decayed industry, and in
opening a career of renumerative labor to all who are willing to
avail themselves of the opportunity placed within their reach, whilst
teaching them, at the same time, early habits of discipline and
order, are incontestable."
With his reply, Lord Howard de Walden sent an
elaborate report on industrial education in Belgium
made by the minister of the interior in 1867.    This report gives an account of a large number of local technical schools. Of the good influence of the one at Soigneis, specially designed for workers in stone quarries, and
in which great attention is paid to drawing, the minister
says:" The school has a good influence upon the working-class, and
upon the industry of the town of Soigneis and the neighborhood.
It provides this industry with efficient powers and skilled workmen,
who work the stone with taste, and execute the most complicated
work, and, above all, remarkable carvings, which the owners of the
quarries could hardly undertake before, or which they were obliged




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                 89
to have executed elsewhere. On the other hand, it provides the pupils with knowledge which enables them to improve their condition
considerably. It also acts favorably on their morality, giving them
a taste for study, and ideas of order and providence which contribute to the spread of well-being and competency in families."
TESTIMONY OF MR. SAMUELSON.
Mr. Bernhard Samuelson, member of parliament, having made a tour of observation, wrote a letter, Nov. 16,
1867, on the industrial progress, and the education of
the industrial classes, in France, Switzerland, Germany,
&c. This letter, addressed to the vice-president of the
Committee of Council for Education in Great Britain,
was ordered by the House of Commons to be printed.
Of woollen manufactures Mr. Samuelson says:"In contrasting what I saw at Leeds and the older seats of the
woollen manufacture with the worsted spinning and weaving factories at Bradford, I had no difficulty in comprehending how it happens
that Continental competition is being far more seriously felt in the
former than in the latter department of the woollen trade. In the
woollen manufacture proper, every thing has stiffened into tradition
and routine. The most enlightened and enterprising manufacturers
are discouraged by the passive resistance of their old-fashioned overlookers and other'leading hands.' Even in those cases where
improved machinery is introduced, it is not used to the utmost
advantage. One result is, that the spinners and manufacturers of
Belgium are exporting woollen yarns and cloths, valued at nearly
two million pounds, annually to this country, produced from wools,
8*




90             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
a great portion of which are first imported from our colonies and
transatlantic countries, into London, and shipped thence to Antwerp. I was told by the president of the Leeds Chamber of Commerce that the discouragement arising from these conditions is so
great, that the more enterprising young men refuse to engage in the
woollen manufacture, and enter one or other of the numerous
branches of industry which have recently sprung up in Leeds, and
to which the maintenance of its prosperity is principally due.
" It is not surprising, under these circumstances, that the manufacturers of Leeds, through their Chamber of Commerce, should
urge the necessity of giving a more free and scientific training to its
rising generation.
"At Bradford all is different. The worsted manufacture, a comparatively young trade, is carried on with the newest appliances, in
factories admirably designed, by master manufacturers of unsurpassed energy, and a working population free from the prejudices
which, amongst ignorant people, are the unavoidable accompaniment of routine."
Of the good influence of art instruction on lace manufactures Mr. Samuelson observes: -
"To the general depression of the Nottingham lace-trade the
manufacture of lace curtains forms an exception. To this branch,
the admirable local school of art, the erection and fittings of which
cost nearly eight thousand pounds, has rendered the greatest service. I saw some beautiful designs by pupils of the school, which
were being executed in one of the factories; and I have been informed that the English patterns in this branch are preferred to
those of France, not only in England, but in the markets of the
world."




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                  91
The following, from Mr. Samuelson, illustrates how
rude labor may be supplanted by machinery, the product of skilled labor:"Apart from their general interest, the works of the Isthmus
of Suez Canal (the beautiful drawings and models of which attracted so much attention in thq Champ-de-Mars) afford an instance, which I cannot omit to notice, of the resources of French
mechanical engineering. It will be remembered that the progress
of this great undertaking was arrested about five years ago by the
prohibition, on the part of the Porte, of forced labor. The contractors, finding themselves deprived of some eighteen thousand workpeople, at once reconsidered their plans, and proposed to substitute
special steam-machinery of an entirely original character for the
manual labor previously employed in excavating and embanking
the main and fresh water canals and the entrance from the Mediterranean. Nearly the whole of that machinery, costing several
millions sterling, was executed in France, - about six hundred thousand pounds' worth by Messieurs Gouin and Company of Paris.
Within twelve months from the receipt of the order, these gentlemen
prepared the plans of the dredges, barges, cranes, &c., and delivered
and erected at Port Said a sufficient quantity of the material to
commence the works; and within three years the whole of this
enormous plant was completed, and in satisfactory operation. Monsieur Gouin is a pupil of the Polytechnic School; and Monsieur
Lavallee, the contractor, to whose talent and energy the conception
of these tools, and the resumption of the works, is due, a pupil of
his late father at the icole Centrale."
Mr. Samuelson thus describes the wonderful results




92             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
which have been achieved at Creuzot, France, by the
technical education of the workmen and by perfect
organization   -
"The works were founded in 1781, and dragged on a precarious
existence until they were purchased by Messieurs Schneider, in
1836, after having been abandoned for several years. They are still
the property of Monsieur Henry Schneider (president of the Corps
Legislatif), of his son, and a small number of other partners, with
limited liability. When they passed into the hands of Messieurs
Schneider, sixty thousand tons of coal were raised, and four thousand tons of iron produced annually; and there were no traces of
the vast mechanical workshops whose magnificent products formed
so remarkable a feature of the late Paris Exhibition.
" The works now cover three hundred acres; the workshops and
forges, fifty acres; and the mines yield annually two hundred and
fifty thousand tons of coal, and three hundred thousand tons of iron
ore: three hundred thousand tons of coal, and about a hundred
and twenty thousand tons of ores, are purchased. The iron-works
produce more than a hundred thousand tons of iron, besides machinery, locomotive and marine, iron bridges and viaducts, and
even iron gun-boats and river-steamers, of an average yearly value
of six hundred thousand pounds. The pay-sheets return nine thousand nine hundred and fifty work-people, and wages amounting to
three hundred and seventy thousand pounds per annum; and the
steam-engines are equal to a duty of nearly ten thousand horse-power.
These marvellous works have therefore been virtually created in
thirty years; and, in fact, the well-built, well-paved town of Creuzot,
with its churches, its schools, its markets, its gas and water works,
and its handsome public walks, inhabited by nearly twenty-four




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                  93
thousand well-fed and decently-clad people, has taken the place of
the wretched pit village of two thousand seven hundred inhabitants
of 1836. There is no overcrowding; the space in the dwvellinghouses averaging one thousand one hundred cubic feet per head
of the population. Notwithstanding his public duties, Monsieur
Schneider retains the chief direction of the works. During the session of the chamber, the immediate management on the spot is in
the hands of his son; but, in the recess, he resides at Creuzot. After
having conducted me for several hours through these vast works,
Monsieur Schneider returned to his office to complete and despatch
his correspondence, and debate the most minute economical points,
items of cost, and rates of carriage, with the heads of departments;
showing himself, as he expressed it,'industriel jusqu'au bout desongles.' He will forgive me for entering into these personal details.
They are interesting to France and to England, more especially to
England, where high political duties are still deemed almost incompatible with an active industrial career.
"To describe the works in detail would carry me beyond the
limits of this Report. I saw no new mechanical contrivances. The
best English designs were followed; but no appliances for producing perfect work, or for economizing the cost of production,
have been omitted; and the new forge contained under a single
roof (a thousand three hundred feet in length and three hundred
and ten feet in breadth) is probably unequalled in the world. A
very large proportion of the personnel of every rank in this great
establishment was born and has been trained on the spot; and the
possibility of thus forming highly-skilled workmen, competent engineers and accountants, is due, in a great measure, to a system
of education, dating back as far as 1841, which, though it is modestly styled elementary, is far more advanced and'special' than




94             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
the term implies. The course —not necessarily followed throughout; by all, but open to all of sufficient capacity -extends over nine
years, and includes advanced instruction in French literature, history, geography, natural philosophy, the chemistry of metals, algebra, geometry, mechanical and freehand drawing, and modelling.
The more promising boys are sent to the secondary and higher
technical schools; and many a Creuzot laborer's son may be found,
who, having passed through the Ecole des Arts et M6tiers, at Aix,
has returned to fill a responsible position in the technical management. The other boys are drafted from the school into the works,
and placed there strictly according to the capacity which they have
shown at school; some as simple workmen, others as accountants
or as draughtsmen. Education is not compulsory; but no Creuzot
boy is admitted into the works who cannot read and write, and
none who has been turned out of school for misbehavior.
"No doubt many of the boys, as they grow up, unlearn much of
what they have accquired. It is not in one generation that the most
strenuous efforts in favor of education can be expected to bear ripe
fruit; but a proof that they are not illusory as to the mass may be
found in the fact, that whereas, amongst those employed at Creuzot,
but coming from the villages or from a distance, thirty-one per cent
of the conscripts, on the average of the last six years, were illiterate,
only nine per cent of those born or brought up in the town were
unable to read and write. There are adult classes, less as a corrective of deficient elementary instruction than as a help to those
who wish to carry their studies beyond that of the school. They
are held on Tuesday, Friday, and Sunday, and included, at the outset, reading, writing, arithmetic, geometry, natural philosophy,
chemistry, geography, history, linear and freehand drawing, and
music; but, of late years, six of the heads of departments, pupils




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                   95
of the tcole des Arts and Metiers, have been appointed to teach
special classes, bearing directly on the occupations of the workmen,
and including, as one of the most important, a complete course of
machine drawing. Though the proportion of adult pupils here,
as elsewhere, is small,- five per cent of the whole number of workmen, - the result is, that Monsieur Schneider, in walking through
the sheds where several pairs of marine engines were being erected,
was able to inform me that there was not a man amongst the
mechanics employed in that department who could not make an
accurate drawing of the work on which he was engaged.
" What this signifies and is worth, a mechanic alone can fully appreciate. Of the two hundred and sixty-eight superior engineers,
managers, book-keepers, &c., a hundred and twenty-seven, or
nearly one-half, were educated at Creuzot; five were pupils of the
tcole Centrale; five, of the Imperial Mining School; twenty, of the
three Ecoles des Arts and Metiers; two, of the Ecole la Martiniere
at Lyons; a hundred and four from various schools. Most of
the latter, however, were of middle age, and entered Creuzot when
its present system was still in process of creation. The schools
which were opened in 1841 with ninety-one children contained
4,065 in 1866, of whom 2,219 were boys; the entire number of
children in Creuzot between the ages of five and fifteen being 4,638
at the same period. There are eleven schoolmasters, under a chief
director, in the boys' schools; and the girls are taught by eleven
soeurs. The school-fees are seven pence per month for the children of persons employed in the works, and fourteen pence for those
of strangers. Wages, though they have increased about one-half
during the last twenty years, are still low compared with those to
which we are accustomed. They amount, on the average of the
entire establishment, to 2s. 10d. per day, including the unskilled




96             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
laborers and boys. The average wages of those employed at the
mines and coal-pits are 2s. 8d.; at the forges, 3s.; at the blast-furnaces, 2s. 3d.; and in the workshops, 2s. 9d.: but the more highly
skilled mechanics will earn as much as 6s. 6d., and the puddlers
from 6s. to 9s. 6d. per day. The lowest wages of the latter, according to a pay-sheet exhibited in the forge at the time of my visit,
were 5s. 6d.; and it is worthy of observation, that whilst, in nearly
every other department, the working-staff is recruited amongst the
children of the work-people, they are averse to the rude task of the
puddling furnaces, in spite of the attraction of high pay: so that in
this branch the labor is imported generally from the surrounding
villages; boys being taken into the forge at the ages of sixteen and
seventeen, when their frames are approaching maturity. But the
tendency of modern improvements is to substitute mechanical and
chemical processes for such work as that of puddling; and it will
probably not be long before it is superseded. Meanwhile, the employment of children of tender years during the night is almost entirely dispensed with. Girls under seventeen are never admitted.
Women do not work below the surface, as they do in Belgium; and
the few females in the works, only four per cent of the whole, are
employed in the light day-work of dressing ores, and similar occupations. Boys scarcely ever enter the works before fourteen. Every
person is paid immediately by the proprietors, and nearly all by the
piece or the ton. The ruinous system of contracts with middlemen,
pursued in our iron works, is unknown. There are no "butties,"
no forge contractors earning their two pounds per day, no " underhands" paid by puddlers: the humblest laborer comes into personal
contact with the managers; and his work is appraised by men of
education, and paid for according to its relative value. Tables
showing the actual daily earnings of every man are suspended in




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                 97
the workshops of the several departments, so as to be open to the
inspection, and to stimulate the emulation, of all.
"In reference to the moral condition of the population, I will
simply state, that, during fifteen years, the entire number of serious
felonies in the town of Creuzot was twenty-three; but of these only
nine would have been felonies according to our law. The number
of misdemeanors was about forty annually; but many of these
would not have constituted breaches of the law with us: amongst
others, I may mention simple bankruptcy, maiming to escape miiitary service, and abusive language. I was told that three policemen
form the entire preventive force. Drunkenness is rare. I certainly
did not observe a single case during my visit."
TESTIMONY OF ENGLISH ARTISANS.
Through the efforts of the English Council of the
Society of Arts, sufficient money was secured, mainly
by private subscription, to send more than eighty
skilled workmen, representing almost as many industries, to study the Paris Exhibition, 1867, and to visit
different parts of France for the examination of various
workshops and manufacturing establishments.          Each
workman, upon his return, was required to furnish, and
did furnish, a written report giving the result of his observations.   To most of them      report-writing was a
novel labor; but their reports, compactly filling a volume of some seven hundred pages, form one of the
most valuable contributions to the industrial literature
of the day.
9




98             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
Mr. Thomas Connolly, stone-mason, says: —
"It is impossible to estimate the loss which is entailed upon
England through the neglect of art culture in every department of
our industry. Through it we are reduced to mere hewers of wood
and drawers of water for other nations. The bulk of our ablebodied population is engaged in manufacturing goods to be sold
cheap, or in producing raw materials for other people to work;
while the more delicate portion have to subsist on their earnings for
want of employments suitable to their strength. The streets of
London and our large towns are torn up with heavy traffic, which is
scarcely perceptible in Paris; for, if a ton of iron enters there (for
which we may get less than a pound), they are sure to put a hundred pounds' worth of labor on it before it leaves their hands...; "When a stone has to be worked to a mould, or fitted to a square
or a straight-edge, no man can do it more workmanlike, or to a
greater perfection, than an English mason; but, when the hands
have to realize the imagination, the Frenchman's familiarity with
art, and his early training in its principles, enable him to outstrip
us; and, as every building in Paris is more or less decorated with
carving, you are at a loss to know how they get all their art workmen. But the difficulty would not appear so much, if you could
read the large placards, in French, which are posted up at the ends
of the bridges and other public places, informing workmen where
they can be taught drawing and modelling every evening fiee of
expense. That he outstrips the Englishman in this respect does
not, I feel certain, arise fiom the possession of an especial art
genius, but because whatever of it is in him is fully developed, and
encouragement is given to its practice; and, if English workmen are
behind in this respect, it is not because art genius is deficient in our




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                  99
nature, but because it is not developed and encouraged sufficiently....
"The French Exhibition has shown us that England is far
behind in art manufacture; so that any suggestion for our improvement is worth considering. I believe the superiority of the
French is owing to their education, and study of their business, both
in and out of the workshop, to a greater extent than Englishmen."
MIr. WV. T. Swene, practical superintendent of glassworks, Birmingham, says:"But I cannot refrain from once more pointing out the necessity
that exists for art teaching; for we not only want skilled designers,
but we want, in a greater degree, a knowledge of art on the part of
our workmen. For how can a glass-blower who cannot draw the
most simple curve be expected to have a correct eye for form, and
true judgment in the proportions of the articles he is called upon
to make?   Or the glass-cutter similarly situated, how can he be
expected to combine his decorations so as to improve, and not to
spoil, the forms put into his hands? In the most important point,
we may readily receive a great lesson from the Continental workers,
who, while improving in a great degree in the quality and execution
)f their work, never lose sight of the importance of combining
Industrial skill with the application of art knowledge."
Mr. Benjamin Lucraft, chair-maker, says:" Not so with chairs of an artistic character: the lines are only a
guide up to a certain point; and, from that point, the mere workman
stands not the slightest chance with the workman of a cultivated




100            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
taste. The art workman of France has a great advantage over us
in England. In Paris they are surrounded by works of that kind,
which none but the most obtuse can long remain uninfluenced by.
Their museums and palaces are central, and most numerous: their
decorations and furniture are of the highest order, and nearly
always open to the people. Even the Palace of Versailles, with its
beautiful Louis Quatorze decorations, can be reached by rail as
readily as I can reach South Kensington from my house at Islington. I mention these advantages the French enjoy, to show, to those
who think climate and our plodding race have something to do with
our want of taste, that there are other causes."
Mr. James Mackie, wood-carver, says:"Our great want is good designs, something that shall not be
an unmeaning jumble, a more intelligent direction in carrying
them out, a liberal use of thoroughly modelled works to be reproduced in the wood; and not till then shall we have a chance of
reaching the goal side by side with other nations."
Mr. R. Baker, wood-carver, says: -
" In comparison with the French, the English carving is tame
and spiritless. The French workman seems imbued with a true love
of his art, and executes it with a warmth of feeling which gives it
life and sentiment; and this gives his work its superiority. If we
examine attentively a portion of French work, we find the main
object of the carver is to give his work spirit and expression. Take
a rose, for instance: it expresses all the. characteristics of a rose:
the form, the life, and even the color, is there substituted; and yet it




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                 101
is not the exact copy of the form of a rose, for, if it was, it would
look poor and lifeless; but it looks rich, and full of life: and this is
done with comparatively little labor. The carver must understand
and feel the true spirit of the object he is carving, otherwise he may
bestow much labor, and display much skill and cleverness in tooling; but his work will still be deficient in that which is essential to
its artistic merit: not that there is a total absence of this artistic
feeling in the English work; but they seem to have studied cutting
their work sharp and clean, in preference to any thing else. As a
whole, the English carving is equal, and perhaps superior, to any of
their previous exhibitions. Their progress is seen not so much in
what is actually exhibited, as in the almost entire absence of
decidedly bad work. There arc scarcely any of those tame and laborious imitations of nature which usually abound in our exhibitions.
This indicates improvement in taste....
"The French workman is generally supplied with good designs
and models, which he slightly alters to suit the grain of his wood,
without injuring the original design: this facilitates his progress.
In fact, the employers seem to give their workmen every scope and
encouragement for the display of their abilities."
Mr. Thomas Jacob, cabinet-draughtsman, says:"France is certainly before us in design, but not in workmanship. If steady hard labor or good sound workmanship is required,
the English mechanic is second to none in the world, provided he
has the tools and materials to work with; but, if art workmanship
is required, it must come from a man, who, besides being a good
mechanic, must, to some extent at least, be able to use the pencil also.
This being the case, just as education proceeds, and a taste for the
9*




102            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
beautiful is diffused among workingmen generally, by means of
schools of art and free access to our museums, particularly on Sundays, so will art workmanship in this country rise to at least a
level with that which is so much admired abroad....
" The French carvers do not work mechanically: invariably they
make their own models to begin with, receiving only a rough sketch
from the draughtsman; it being generally left to their taste to
arrange it, so that they work in perfect freedom, with greaterpleasure, and thus perfection."
Mr. L. S. Booth of Coventry, reporting on ribbons,
says:"The ribbons, as a whole, are artistic in design, harmonious in
color, and perfect in workmanship. No painter ever put color on
canvas, and made those colors appear like real fruit or flowers, with
bloom and every variety of tint, with more success than have the
varied artisans engaged in this trade done. The productions are
perfect specimens of their kind; in which the artist has brought all
his varied power to imitate nature in form, the chemist in hue and
color, and the artisan judgment and skill to work the whole, and
make a success.  Nor should it be forgotten, that, in producing
these patterns, there has been an enormous outlay by the manufacturer for design, draught, and cards.
"To look at these articles in detail, we must begin with those
produced in France, the first by way of order and also excellence."
Mr. John Randall, china-painter, says: -
"When we come to high-class ornamentation in iron, earthenware, china, or glass, the superiority of French art is obvious. As




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                 103
long as we confine ourselves to geometrical forms in hammering,
pressing, turning on the lathes, or printing on the surface, we have
no difficulty in holding our own; but where an intellectualism is
concerned, or a free educated hand is required in decoration, our
deficiencies become apparent. The fault is less our own than our
rulers', who have denied us education, or who have, at least, given
us nothing to fit us for our destinations in life, but have left us
groping in the dark, forever feebly attempting to overtake lost
opportunities."
TESTIMONY OF J. SCOTT RUSSELL.
Mr. J. Scott Russell, the builder of C The Great Eastern," is one of the most justly eminent authorities on
the education of the working-classes.      From   his book,
" Systematic Technical Education of the English People," the following extracts are made: -
"It is shown how easily education might double the value of the
work done, of the profit reaped, and of the wages received.
Twenty-five pounds represents the actual cost in education of a
highly skilled over a skilless workman: in other words, the cost
of producing a skilled workman is less than one year's purchase
of his increased value to the nation....
" It is notorious that those foreign railways which have been made
by themselves in the educated countries of Germany and Switzerland
have been made far cheaper than those constructed by us in Enrland: it is known that they have been made by pupils of the industrial schools and technical colleges of these countries; and I
know many of their distinguished men who take pride in saving




104            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
that they owe their positions entirely to their technical schools. I
find everywhere throughout their work marks of that method, order,
symmetry, and absence of waste, which arise from plans well thought
out, the judicious application of principles, conscientious parsimony,
and a high feeling of professional responsibility. In the accurate
cutting of their slopes and embankments, in the careful design and
thoughtful execution of their beautiful but economical stone-masonry,
in the self-denying economy of their large span bridges, the experienced traveller can read as he travels the work of a superiorly
educated class of menl and when we come down to details, to the
construction of permanent way, arrangements of signals, points,
and sidings, and the endless details of stations, we everywhere feel
that we are in the hands of men who have spared no pains, and who
have applied high professional skill to minute details....
"It seems to me almost an axiom, that intelligent men must do
better work than boors; that trained, skilled men must do better
work than clumsy and awkward ones; and that the more any man
knows of the objects and methods of his own work, and of the work
of all those who around him are engaged in co-operation, the more
likely he is to do his own part well, and so as to make it exactly fit
into and form one with his neighbor's work. Thus I think that an
intelligent community of workmen will get through their work
quicker, will fit the parts more nicely, will finish off every thing more
sharply, will waste less material by trial and error, and so give
higher value, as well as quality and durability, to all their work, than
ignorant, unrefined, ill-educated men....
" An important but perhaps not an obvious result of the systematic technical education of men of every class trained together in
the same schools, colleges, and university, would be a transference
of the same organization from the school to the workshop, and an




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                105
amount of good understanding between all fellow-workers, which
cannot fail to lighten individual labor, to save much waste of pains,
materials, and thought, and to give great unity and perfection to the
work done. The master being only a degree better educated and
instructed than his foreman, it is plain that less pains will be required to make him understand what he is to undertake and do, and
how he is to set about and do it; and thus the master's work will
be all the easier, and his anxiety about its satisfactory execution all
the less. Next, the foreman or leading workman will be only a
little more able and better informed than the men under him, and
only a little less skilled than his master, so that he can easily make
his wishes known to those who have so much knowledge in common.
The men, on the other hand, are perfectly prepared by their education and skill to comprehend the aim of their work, and its relation
to the materials and the processes of which they are masters.
"Here, then, is produced by community of education that
variety of co-operation by which the greatest and noblest works can
be executed in the best and highest way.
"Where, on the contrary, workmen, superintendents, masters,
have all received independent training, and come from classes of
society kept apart from each other, even in their elementary education, the workman more or less illiterate, the master perhaps a
scholar, but unskilled in work, it is plain, that, for some time at
least, they will be kept far asunder by want of common ground for
sympathy. To remedy this evil, the workman should have had a
higher education, the master a more technical training; but, in the
absence of these, what generally happens is a cure which perpetuates and exaggerates the distance between them. A middle-man
steps in between the two, - sometimes he is a contractor for the
labor of the men,- who says to the master,'I know the nature




106            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
of the men and their work; give me the money you have set aside,
and I will see that they do the work, and undertake that it is done
for the money.' He takes care, of course, that he himself is well
paid. The wider the distance between master and men, the larger
the margin for his profit; it becomes his interest that this margin
shall grow: hence his skill is devoted to diminishing the wages of
the workman and the profits of the masters. To the men he complains that the master is a screw; to the master he complains that
the men won't woik. Thus between uneducated men and unskilled masters a breach is made, ever growing wider and deeper.
At the root of much of the -system of combination of men against
masters will be found to lie this primary incongruity of knowledge
and ignorance, skill and unskill; and from it an alienation of interests ever growing, and always fostered by meddling middle-men,
who at last become an indispensable but baleful element, beginning with conciliation, and ending with alienation. It matures
into class distinction of the worst sort, continually deepening into
class antipathy....
"That systematic education would lead to greater equality in
the distribution of wealth, to a truer appreciation of each man's
wvorth, and to a deeper interest of each man in his neighbor's welldoing, is not difficult to recognize. First, by equality of education
inequalities in birth and fortune are in some measure equalized.
Second, when all men of the same district and of the same age have
been trained up in the same technical schools, even though some
have enjoyed a longer period there than others, it will follow that
their talents and characters are known to and appreciated by their
comrades; and the place of each man in the rank and file of society
is felt and conceded. The fool cannot set up as master, nor the ignorant man as foreman; neither would it be permitted, that, without




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION. 107
merit, one man should monopolize a large portion of the joint earnings. The master's merits will be valued on some such principle
as the man's merits; and the share of the joint produce to which
a master may be fairly entitled would be subject to the same appreciation as the earnings of each man. Capital would still be entitled
to interest, and labor to wages; but why capital should absorb the
profits of labor would be a question as open to debate as why one
man should reap the crop which another had labored. In actual trade
a very common practice is, that capital shall not merely have interest, but shall, in addition, put a large quantity of wages into the
pocket of the capitalist, to which he gives the name of business
profits; and that, of course, is so much subtracted fiom the wages of
the men who do tlhe work: but when education has given to each
man a knowledge of all the branches of his work, and there remains
no difference of rank, excepting superior skill and intelligence, then
e:ach man's individual work will be weighed in the balance; and
the true share of his merit will be appraised in the scale of wages.
The question will be, how much in that scale the true earnings of
one man outweigh those of another. Under the present system, the
master of a thousand men may pocket, in the shape of profits, onehalf of the whole earnings of all the men, or he may pocket only a
sum equal to the wages of a hundred men; but it will then be a
matter for consideration whether one man in the same trade, possessing skill of the same sort, can really be entitled to a just charge
for his services of ten or a hundred times the wages of his skilled
and educated fellow. It is plain, that, under such a scale of estimation, these unequal proportions would be likely to diminish; and in
the end that would be considered great merit which should give a
man not only the honor of leading his fellow-craftsmen, but also
the advantage of double wages: the idea of giving him tenfold or a




108             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
hundred-fold would have disappeared from the catalogue of possibilities. The education of the future will, therefore, lead to a great
reduction of masters' wages or profits, and to a fair, fixed remuneration for capital invested, and to a fair division of the earnings for
work among those skilled men who execute it, in some recognized
proportion to the contribution which their skill makes to the common work. Equality will be then, as now, impossible; but the
scale of each man's life may be one of steady, continual, meritorious
rise..
"In our opinion, the philosophers are far before the people in foreseeing the times that arc coming; and the people don't take warning because they are not educated. Agriculture is in revolution;
for agriculture is becoming chemistry, and husbandry is becoming
machinery: yet our agriculturists have not become chemists, nor
our husbandmen mechanics. In common trades a revolution is
coming; for all that is done without skill is going to be done by
dead machinery, not by intelligent men; and it is well that it should
be so, for mere routine processes, requiring brute strength, without
refinement or intelligence, can all be better done, more evenly, regularly, and unvaryingly, by dead matter than by living force; and
it is, moreover, better for the intelligent and moral being that he
should not be degraded to the level of the brute elements, or
lowered to the rank of an unsentient machine. Why should a
human being be doomed to spend his days in mounting and
descending a ladder with twenty-seven burnt bricks on his shoulder,
while, at one-tenth of the cost, a machine made of iron, and fed with
coal, will do the work, if he will only undertake the more intelligent
task of tending, feeding, oiling, and repairing it? This last demands education, intelligence, conscientious care, all the qualities
that go to make a man a superior, thoughtful being. Who, then,




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                109
can regret the time coming when every occupation which requires
no skill, and only brute force, shall-cease to be the daily work of
a human being, and when that being shall be raised to be a maker,
worker, or director of machines 2
"To that time the working-man is rapidly approaching, and for
it he must be fitted; but above and over him will arise the class,
who, in their turn, are to instruct, guide, and think for him. However skilled to work his machine, he will still depend on a superior
to invent or make it; on a man who shall go before him to lay out
his work and prepare it; on a man who shall come after him to
complete it. These are the higher departments which form the
higher ranks of crafts: in short, above the skilled doers we must
have the skilled thinkers.
"In this view of an intelligent, skilled nation, it is plain that we
shall be able to do without the unskilled, the unintelligent, and the
uneducated. We shall not merely be able to do without him; but
we shall think it better to be without him. The law of society
will become this, -that he who cannot create his food shall not
eat it; for assuredly in the time that is coming he will not find in
civilized Europe a place for him. The man of the future must
have one of two qualifications, -skill to do, education to know, -
or both....
"What is, then, the mercantile or moneyed value of a well-trained
skilful Englishman, as compared to a strong, able-bodied man who
understands no craft, handiwork, or art? The shop-value of the
two men is at once told by the labor-market. The one man can
earn for the community twenty-five pounds a year; the other man
has an average of sixty pounds, and, with superior skill, a hundred
pounds a year. Or if we take the three grades of unskilled, moderately skilled, and highly skilled men, we may represent their mean
10




110            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
values by twenty-five pounds, fifty pounds, and seventy-five pounds:
in other words, the highly skilled man is worth three times the
value of the unskilled man.
" At the present time, there are (in England) about a million of
skilled workmen; but there are a million of very poorly skilled, and
two millions of utterly unskilled men. Supposing that by education we can raise the million of lower skilled into highly skilled
men, and replace them by one million of unskilled men, raised by
some little education to their rank, we have by that single act
earned for the country fifty million pounds a year.
" We can now put the question in a new and very precise form:
Is the addition of fifty million pounds per annum to the nation's
wealth, through increased training, knowledge, and skill, worth the
annual outlay of a million pounds from the nation's budget.
" There is, however, an important practical question to be asked.
Skill, capacity, and ability are not in themselves wealth; and it
may not be clear and obvious how this additional fifty million
pounds is to be earned without the addition of a single man to the
population. The manner in which skill creates wealth is not difficult to understand. Take one million tons of the iron whicl we
export from this country in little better than the brute form in
which Nature has providently stored it up for us immediately below the skin of our soil, and for which we now receive barely three
million pounds; let us suppose that we expend upon that iron a
little of the skill which Mr. Bessemer, the great technical schoolmaster in steel, can so readily teach us; and let us convert it into,
say, half a million of Bessemei- steel rails, and it will at once have
risen to the value of six million pounds: the other half million of
tons have gone to supply the waste, and pay the other costs of the
process. In this case skill has earned three million pounds sterling




VALUE OF TECHSICAL INSTRUCTION.                 11
in a highly marketable commodity. But we need not stop here.
The steel in these rails may be converted by still higher skill into
boilers, wheels, axles, and parts of locomotive engines; and, if the
skilled workmen of our country are more skilled than those elsewhere, a hundred thousand tons of that steel may be worked up
into two thousand locomotive engines and tenders, which will flone
be worth four million pounds; and thus the value of this portion of
the steel is quadrupled.
"It is easy to imagine what may be done with the remaining four
hundred thousand tons of steel. Part of it might be converted into
agricultural steam-engines and steam-ploughs to till every man's
fields; and in that shape the value of each ton might be taken at
fifty pounds a ton; so that a hundred thousand tons would become worth five million pounds. A'nother portion might form the
steel of still smaller tools and implements, which, in proportion to
their smallness and the higher ratio of skill and artifice, would easily become of double the value, or ten million pounds. There can
hence be no difficulty in seeing how the higher skill of the additional million of skilled men'whom we have raised by education
could be able to earn their twenty-five additional nillions of higher
wages; and, moreover, there can be no difficulty in seeing how the
less skilled million below them could earn their additional wages as
helpers to these, or as users and employers of the improved tools
and machinery which the others had created....
"But to return to the mere vulgar usefulness of educated human
beings. I will venture a remark from personal experience in my
profession, which I trust may illustrate the vast importance to us of
educating not only governors, or masters, but of extending a high
scientific education and skilled technical training to the workingmen of all skilled occupations. It is this: The community at




112             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
large are deprived of the use of enormous treasures in mechanical
invention, and enormous progress in scientific arts, by the fact of
the general want of education in those who practise them. It may
not be known, but it is yet true, that the mechanical power employed in all our manufactures is infinitely more costly than it need
be. a It is equally true that some skilled men of such professions
know thoroughly how to produce immense economy in the production and use of mechanical power; but that we dare not put the
means into the hands of the uneducated masters under whose control they would be applied. I am not now speaking of a loss of
five, ten, twenty, or thirty per cent: I say that we know that we
are only utilizing one-tenth to one-twentieth of the power we employ and
waste, and that an economy of one hundred, two hundred, three hundred,
and four hundred per cent, is quite within our power so soon as a better
informed, higher skilled, more perfectly trained class of men and masters
shall arise, who are fit to be trusted with the use of instruments and
tools at present utterly beyond their comprehension, control, or
application to use."
The following is from     the Nineteenth Report (made
in 1872) of the Science and Art Department of the
Committee of Council of Education, England: —L" The steam class established by Mr. Taylor, Cushnie, Kincardineshire, for the instruction of ploughmen in the management of
agricultural steam-machinery, has also been successful. Mr. Taylor writes,'As to the ploughmen's class in steam and mechanics,
there is no doubt, that, after draining, cultivation by steam-power is
one of the greatest modern improvements in agriculture; but the
great want is skilled men in the different districts competent to




VALUE OF TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION.                113
work the engines. The class has done much good in dispelling
prejudice which existed among ploughmen against steam-cultivation and evening classes.  For the first time they find that education has a money-value. In the last letter I had from one of the
men sent to the Scottish Steam-Cultivation Company, he told me
he was then earning twenty-five shillings a week: when he left,
about six months ago, his wages would be about fourteen shillings.
All the others I have sent are getting not less than nineteen shillings.' In a subsequent letter, Mr. Taylor states that he has received
an application for twenty additional trained ploughmen, - an application he is unable to comply with. The demand for skilled labor of
this description is so great, that Mr. Taylor intends carrying out his
class through the summer months, instead of, as customary, only in
the winter."
10~




CHAPTER III.
IMPORTANCE OF VARIED EDUCATION.
THE testimony of the extracts given in this chapter
seems to place it beyond question, that, 
1. Special knowledge is not sufficient to produce even
the best special results. The best workman is always
the one who has a knowledge of tools and principles
beyond the direct requirement of his work, whatever
that may be. The best scientist is always the one who
acquaints himself with other departments of science than
the one to which he is specially devoted. The best
artist is always the one who does not limit himself to
his specialty, but studies the whole circle of art. This
breadth of study and work gives a breadth of knowledge
and training which decidedly strengthens the mai for his
specialty, be that however rude.
2. A thorough technical education, embracing all that
science and art can bestow, is not enough to produce
the best industrial results: there is need of the addi114




IMPORTANCE OF VARIED EDUCATION.         115
tional discipline which comes only from the study of
letters. The man must be formed, as well as informed,
before he is fully educated even for practical purposes.
In science and art alone there is not enough of the formative, disciplining, shaping element. Whether they
have more of this element or less than letters, may be
a debatable question; but they certainly have less than
science, art, and letters together. Hence, in the education of workmen, the literary and the technical should
combine; the more of each, the better.
3. Since apprenticeship has virtually ceased through
the subdivision of labor, it is doubly necessary that the
public schools should give the elements, scientific and
artistic, which form the basis of a technical education.
And they should do this without diminishing the literary culture they now impart. Only by such an enlargement of the common school curriculum  can the
great body of laborers secure the education so essential
for their welfare, and be kept from degenerating into
mere machines for doing a limited variety of work.
4. The introduction of systematic manual labor into
public schools for elementary instruction appears to be
a thing of altogether doubtful expediency. Girls may
be advantageously taught the use of the needle; while
boys may, by way of pastime, be taught the use of a
few tools by using them. In technical schools, how



116          TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
ever, manual labor may be judiciously introduced;
but it should never take the leading place. This manual labor should always be of such a character as to
show the student the practical application of his studies,
and not labor simply to aid the student in supporting
himself. It is questioned by some whether there should
be any manual labor at all in the highest technical
schools; they preferring that the student should acquire
what of practical application he needs by work in actual
fields of labor. But in apprentice schools, - schools
attached to workshops and manufactories, - as it is the
leading object of these schools to teach practical applications, systematic manual labor should, of course, form
the leading feature of the instruction given. There can
be no doubt that a certain amount of manual labor,
especially if it shows the practical application of the
theory which the student is acquiring, does not retard,
but decidedly promotes, his progress in theoretical
knowledge.
LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC TRAINING.
The following is from the evidence of M. Monjean,
Director of the Chaptal Municipal School, Paris, taken
by the French Imperial Commission mentioned in the
last chapter: -




IMPORTANCE OF VARIED EDUCATION. 117
"M. Monjean's observations on the results of the practical
schools (Real Schulen) in Germany have led him to the conclusion,
that the prevalence of an instruction purely practical, and based
entirely on the applied sciences, has directed the attention of young
men exclusively to subjects of self-interest and immediate profit, and
has quenched the generous aspiration which sees in life something
else than mere profit to be realized: the moral, in fact, is sacrificed
to the mechanical man. Moreover, though the German practical
schools have produced such moral results, they have not obtained
for industry and commerce the objects they had in view. On this
point, practical experience has given decisive evidence. Some merchants of Cologne and of Magdeburg, having selected from the practical schools and the gymnasia a certain number of young men of
equal intelligence and capabilities, placed them at the same kind of
work. For a short time, the pupils who had been brought up at the
former schools maintained a certain degree of superiority; but, when
they had been submitted to a longer period of probation, it was
found that they were beaten by the pupils of the gymnasia, who,
having received a more general and intelligent education, were
better adapted for all pursuits to which they might be called."
These extracts are from the evidence of M. Pompee,
founder and proprietor of the professional school at Ivry,
vice-president of the Polytechnic      Society, &c., taken
by the French Imperial Commission:"M. Pompie finds the results of the instruction, and the success
of his pupils, to be most satisfactory. The methods adopted are of
a character to keep the attention always on the stretch; and boys
whom want of success in their classical studies has rendered dull,




118            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
apathetic, and idle, have recovered at the Ivry school all their
activity of mind: their reasoning powers are awakened; they take
an interest in their work; masters have not to punish, nor parents
to complain. The employers under whom they find situations on
leaving school are the first to discover the great difference between
pupils trained on this plan and those who have received a classical
education.
" On the whole, M. Pompee thinks that the tendency to attend
special rather than general instruction is rapidly increasing in
France, notwithstanding its present incomplete organization. Even
in the university, the inspectors-general have had occasion to remark
the constant augmentation in the number of those who attend the
special classes..
" In reply to the question as to what should be done to organize
in France a complete system of professional education, M. Pompee
advocates changes of rather a sweeping-character. He likens his
plan to a railway system, with its main-line stations, junctions, and
branch lines. First, taking all the courses of study at present pursued at the primary schools, the technical schools, the communal
colleges, and the lycees, he would from them construct one general
course, to extend over nine years, and to be pursued by all alike,
rich or poor, upper, middle, or lower class, sitting side by side on
the same benches. This would form the main line of his system; but
it would be impossible for all to reach the advanced years of the
course. Just as passengers on a railway get out at the different
stations, so the children, who, from pecuniary necessity or social
position, are compelled to earn their livelihood at an earlier age,
might leave school at any point of this course, subject to certain
conditions. Along the main line he would place his branch lines,
- the special schools, which would take at particular periods from the




IMPORTANCE OF VARIED EDUCATION.                 119
general course those children who have to adopt a distinct career in
life. Thus all the passengers would be admitted indiscriminately
to the same train: they can book themselves for any destination,
they can be carried to the end of the journey, or be set down at ally
station they may please. If they have been put down at any station,
and have changed their mind as to their destination, they can continue on the same road, or rejoin the nearest branch, without being
obliged to retrace their steps. In other words, if such a general
and uniform course of study were adopted, we should see at the end
of every scholastic year pupils, more or less advanced, leaving the
various classes, all, according to the amount of knowledge they
have acquired, able to take their proper place in the different strata
of social stratification, -some entering at once the factory, the counting-house, or the workshop; others to undergo their apprenticeship
in the agricultural, commercial, industrial, or art schools which are
ready to receive them.
" As regards the principal course, the subjects of instruction would
be arranged progressively for each succeeding year of the nine years
over which it would extend; but they would be taught in a different
order, and on different methods from those now adopted. Thus, M.
Pompde would postpone the commencement of the study of the
ancient languages (of use only to the minority) until the pupil has
reached an advanced class, when, by reason of the knowledge he has
already acquired, and by the development of his faculties, he could
in four years complete with pleasure and interest the classical studies
which now occupy the whole of his time, and leave behind them
often nothing but the recollection of fatigue and annoyance. At
this time, that is to say, when the pupil is thirteen or fourteen years
of age, the others who had not determined to study Latin or Greek
will either have left school altogether, or have been drafted into the




120            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
institutions for special instruction. By this means, all will have
received a thoroughly sound elementary and general education,
forming a foundation for the superstructure of an extended profes-.sional or technical training."
In their special report on Bavaria, the Sub-Commission
of the French Imperial Commission says:" The system of industrial education adopted in 1864 has recently undergone important modifications, which have been suggested
by experience, and are well deserving of attention. In the order of
things established in virtue of a new law, which was passed after
long discussions, the trade schools were to draw one part of their
pupils from those educated in the primary schools, and the other
from those of the Latin schools, which have four classes: the pupils from the latter, however,' were to begin with the second year's
course of studies. On the other hand, the instruction given in the
trade schools, which have been somewhat ambitiously called scientific gymnasia, was of an order high enough to enable those who had
received it entire to enter the polytechnic institutes.
" But the difference in the origin and preparation of the pupils
of these schools opposed a serious obstacle to the progress of the
teaching; and it was likewise ascertained, that, if the pupils who
entered polytechnic institutes from the literary gymnasia appeared at
first inferior to the others for scientific studies, they generally, at a
later period, attained the superiority over those from the scientific
gymnasia. The pupils from these last-named establishments were
also open to the reproach of not possessing sufficient literary instruction, of being unable to express their thoughts in a clear and
elegant style, and of being commonplace both in thought and lan.




IMPORTANCE OF VARIED EDUCATION. 121
guage. Five years since, the Bavarian Council of Bridges and
Roads had decided on admitting into the body of government engineers none but those, who, before entering the Polytechnic School,
had followed the complete course of the literary gymnasia. The
Administration of Mines had also constantly required the same
qualifications.
"One of the distinguished men, who, for many years past, have
studied this important question, has explained the change which
had come over his ideas on this matter. Being a devoted friend and
successful cultivator of the sciences, he was persuaded that their
study, the habit of following their methods of explaining and of
applying their results, was calculated, as well as the culture of letters, to develop the intelligence, and form the habit of clearly
expressing thought in good language, at the same time that it was
capable of giving a higher tone to mind. While professing chemistry, physics, and natural history in one of the first trade schools
of the kingdom, he had strenuously supported this opinion, which
greatly contributed to procuring him the appointment of professor
in the Munich Polytechnic Institute, still retaining his chair in the
trade school. In the first-named establishment he had to deal with
pupils from the trade school or scientific gymnasium, and also with
those from the literary gymnasium. But he soon made the discovery, that, though the pupils trained to scientific studies appear at
first most competent to follow out their applications, those who
come from the literary gymnasia, after completing their studies
there, were not long ere they surpassed the others. This personal
experience, after long and conscientious observation, won over this
eminent professor to the opinion that the culture of letters gives the
mind a clearness of conception and expression most favorable to the
study of the sciences.
11




122            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
"The experience of the military schools at Metz and Saint-Cyr
in France has long since shown that the pupils who have been so
fortunate as to combine advanced literary acquirements with the
study of the sciences are nearly always those who attain most distinction in after-life.
" The result of the criticism and discussion to which the old system gave rise is embodied in the new system, which makes the trade
schools (Gewerbe Schulen) a continuation of the primary schools, to
prepare pupils for the schools of agriculture, commerce, and ordinary'industry. By the side of the literary gymnasia for classical
studies, there are now practical gymnasia (Real Gymnasien), which
impart a literary and scientific instruction sufficient for pupils who
intend to enter the polytechnic institutes. This system is almost
identical with that adopted in France in 1852, chiefly with a view to
the literary instruction of youth destined for the public services,
with this fundamental and advantageous difference, however, that, in
Bavaria, the two kinds of establishments are separated instead of
being united.
" Under the present system, the establishments for technical education are divided into, -
"1. Industrial or trade schools (Gewerbe Schulen), to which, according to local requirements, may be annexed special divisions for
commerce, agriculture, &c.
"2. Practical gymnasia.
"3. A polytechnic school, comprising four special divisions, —
for constructions, technical mechanics, technical chemistry, and
commerce."
Mr. Samuelson says, in the letter quoted from in the
last chapter:



IMPORTANCE OF VARIED EDUCATION. 123
"I was told by several competent observers, that, although the
Real Schule or the Gewerbe Schule may be a more preferable introduction to the factory and the merchant's office than the gymnasium
(and even this is denied by some), the superior mental training of
the gymnasium far more than compensates for the greater amount
of'knowledge' supposed to be acquired in the former as a preparation for the polytechnic school; and this applies even in a greater
degree to the Gewerbe Schule, in which the technical instruction is
more special, than to the Real Schule, where it is more general.
However this may be, and it affords matter for reflection, in the organization of our own public schools, it is certain that the neglect
of literary instruction in the Gewerbe Schulen, as now organized,
tends to deprive their pupils of the breadth of cultivation which is
the distinctive characteristic of the Germans."
The   Ecole    Centrale   des  Arts   et  Manufactures,
France, is probably the most celebrated school of the
applied sciences in the world.    From   the two thousand
young men who have left this school have come many
of the most distinguished manufacturers and engineers.
In their first prospectus the founders of this school said,
"All the subjects really form     only one and the same
course: industrial science is one. Every one engaged in
any branch should possess it in its entirety, under pain
of inferiority to the competitor who is better armed in
the struggle than himself."
MANUAL LABOR.
The following extract is from      the evidence of M.




124             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
Marguerin, director of the Turgot Municipal School,
Paris, taken by the French Imperial Commission:"M. Marguerin is not of opinion that the introduction of manual labor into technical schools would be productive of any practical
benefit. He considers that one of the great advantages of the system of education established at the Turgot and other schools of the
same description is, that the pupil has completed all his more important studies before he is too old to enter upon his apprenticeship.
In order that the pupil might undergo a course of manual labor at
school, he would be compelled to sacrifice some of the more important branches of general education, which the teacher finds to be so
useful in the training of his pupils. It is a common argument to
refer to the professional school at Mulhouse; but it must be borne in
mind that the manual labor at that school is confined to two hours
of joiners' work in the week, and that this labor is considered more
as an athletic exercise than as a preparation for apprenticeship;
also that the mechanical workshop, the chemical laboratory, the
school of design, and the weaving workshop, which form a part of
the Mulhouse school, only take in pupils after they have received
several years of general instruction....
" In summing up what he has to say upon the subject, M. Marguerin repeats his objections to the introduction of manual labor
into schools. In the first place, he believes that the expense of providing teachers and tools for instruction in so many branches of
trade and manufacture would form a serious consideration; secondly,
that the schools are not likely to reap any profit from the sale of
the manufactured article, as it can scarcely be supposed that in this
they can compete with well-trained and skilled artisans."




IMPORTANCE OF VARIED EDUCATION. 125
M. Pompee, founder and proprietor of the professional
school at Ivry, is reported as saying in his evidence
before the French Imperial Commission: —
"For instruction in manual labor time is wanting: it is impossible to select from the subjects now taught any one which could be
sacrificed to it. If, indeed, time could be found without injuring the
training in elementary schools, what kind of manual labor should
be chosen? Should it be the plane, the file, the chisel, or the shuttle? And where would be room for the bench, the lathe, the anvil,
or the loom? Where can be found a master capable of teaching
the use of these tools, and of many others? It is true, in case of
necessity, the use of the spade and the rake might be introduced into
rural schools; but at that age it could serve rather as an athletic
exercise than as a profitable training.  It would be far better to
devote the time to the acquirement of the elements of natural science,
chemistry, or mechanics, which, as agriculturists, the children could
apply in after-life. Of course, the use of the needle should not be
neglected in girls' schools, because, whatever their position, all
women should become seamstresses for their own families. Another
strong objection to the introduction of manual labor into schools
would be its great cost; the necessary enlargement of the school,
the tools and machines (to be renewed with every improvement), the
raw material (for which, when unskilfully manufactured, there would
be no sale), would be sources of enormous expense. In one word,
M. Pompee sums up, manual labor out of the workshop is nothing
but a pastime."
In the examination of Messrs. Gaumont and Guemied,
editors of "The Journal of Professional Education," by
the French Imperial Commission, they said: —
11*




126            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
"It is often objected, that, by reason of the great varieties of operations in manual labor, it would be hopeless to find an individual endowed with an aptitude or sufficient flexibility of the organs to learn
them all. But, according to the ideas of M. Gaumont and the gentlemen who think with him, the processes of all manufacturing industries
can be reduced to a certain small number of identical manual operations. Thus the processes and tools employed in working in metals
have many analogies with those used in working in wood: for
example, whether a workman turns in metal or in wood; whether
he turns by the aid of the bow, of the foot, or of a machine moved
by steam-power, -the operation reduces itself to nearly the same
method of manipulation. So in fitting, it always depends on a
correct eye and manual skill; and the individual who can fit a piece
of iron by means of the file will soon fit a piece of wood with the
aid of plane and chisel. Thus both in technical and apprentice
schools can be taught the fundamental manual operations which are
employed in all manufactures. Turning and fitting would form the
practical portion of the instruction, geometry and linear drawing
the theoretical part, and the elements of general technology the
higher and finishing part.
"If we consider manual labor merely as a means of instruction,
it will still find a place in the technical school. A knowledge of
manipulation is required in the chemical art: why should it be otherwise in a knowledge of the construction of machines and buildings?
It is only possible to teach by four methods: 1st, Oral explanation
given by the teacher; 2d, Written explanation taken from books;
3d, Graphic explanation rendered by drawing; and, 4th, Practical
explanation obtained from execution. Up to the present time, only
the first three methods of demonstration have been employed, and
nothing but theorists produced: the moment that it is desired to




IMPORTANCE OF VARIED           EDUCATION.       127
train practical men, the fourth method will be added, and technical
instruction will have been founded. Every technical school must
admit into its course the manual labor of the workshop and of the
laboratory: that is its distinctive characteristic, the cause of its
existence. This principle admitted on general grounds, it becomes
still more incontestable when applied to special industries. Machine
manufacture, building, dyeing, weaving, &c., require not only a
knowledge of applied science, but also a practical acquaintance with
manual operations. Thus, by the side of industrial schools with
general programmes, there must exist special schools for particular
trades, established, like the first, to train managers and foremen; then,
for a lower class, apprentice schools, and public courses of lectures
for workmen, whether apprentices or adults."
The French Commission report M. Maignen, director
of a Mission for the Succor of Apprentices, as saying: -
" With regard to school workshops, M. Maignen does not think
that they are productive of benefit. An apprentice can only become
a good workman by seeing others at work, and by learning the large
processes of manufacture. It is in the motion and life of a large
undertaking that the intelligence and ability of a young man develops itself, that he comprehends the value of a particular material, that he learns the manner in which, and the conditions under
which, it can be best worked. On the contrary, the young man in a
small school workshop is at no pains to be industrious, and never
acquires any great degree of skill."
M. Bernat, Director of the School of Industrial Arts




128             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
and Mines at Lille, testifies before the same Commission: -
" The training given in the workshops is intended to accustom
the pupils to the working of machines and looms, to give them
manual skill, a practical acquaintance with the processes of execution, a knowledge of the difficulties which the raw material opposes to
mechanical action, and, finally, to fit them specially for undertaking
the charge of workshops and the direction of workmen. By this
means, the works executed excite their emulation, and the action of
the machines becomes familiar to them; the whole forming a technical and experimental system of instruction which could be replaced
by no other."
In his evidence before the French Commission, M.
Rossat, Doctor of Science, head master at Charleville, is
reported thus: —
"Altogether, M. Rossat has observed that the practical are in no
way injurious to the theoretical studies: on the contrary, in the
subjects descriptive geometry and industrial drawing, manual labor
seems to stimulate the pupils. Practical work in the shops and laboratory occupies two hours a day; and yet the pupils beg that that
time may be extended. Already many of them possess great skill.
The shops and all the works are under the direction of a civil engineer; and under him are three foremen, - one in the fitting, another
in the smith's, and the third in the carpenter's shop. The proceeds
of the labor of the pupils, if any, goes towards the maintenance of
the workshops. In the fitting-shop, the most skilful pupils are at
present occupied in putting together a steam-engine to replace the




IMPORTANCE OF VARIED EDUCATION.               129
portable engine which now drives the machinery: others are making models and parts of machines to be placed in the machinery
collection of the museum. The carpenters, of whom there are about
thirty, learn the use of the saw, the plane, and the lathe: they make
patterns for the iron casters, joiners' work, and carpenters' work,
and models for solid geometry. There are fifty smiths engaged at
the forge in the repair of tools, &c.; and in the same shop there are
employed a few pupils who are intended for the veterinary schools.
Lastly, under the direction of the head master himself, the remaining pupils are occupied with manipulations in the laboratory."
In his evidence before the French Commission, M.
Malet, Professor at the Imperial Artillery School at
Douai, says: -
" Attached to the classes are two apprentice-workshops, - one for
working in wood, the other for working in iron, each in charge of
a director, who is engaged to give in it practical instruction in
manual labor. These workshops are situated in an annex of the
town hall, which contains the normal school, and the upper primary school. The practice includes, in the one shop, working at
the forge, fitting, and turning in metals; in the other, joining, carpentry, upholstery, and turning in wood. It is expected, that, in
time, these shops will be capable of turning out work which can be
sold, and become a source of profit to the institution. The number
of pupils is nearly fifty, about equally divided between the shops.
Work is carried on every day, except Thursday and Sunday: it
begins at half-past five, and concludes at half-past eight, in the
morning."
In their account of the Central Imperial School of




130            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
Arts and Manufactures, the French Commission say: —
"It has been said that the pupils of the school ought to devote
a part of their time, like those of the schools of arts and trades, to
manual operations; that they would then become far more capable
of managing workshops. It is a mistake to think that intellectual
and manual labor can be combined without inconvenience. Experience has proved that they injure each other. It is not absolutely necessary to be able to perform every manual operation one's
self in order to see that artisans do their work properly; and it has
often been found that he who pays excessive attention to details
neglects the general effect. Should it, however, be deemed necessary
to initiate a young man in the operations of the workman, let him,
on leaving the school, pass a year or two in a good workshop, executing all kinds of work; sad he will thus learn far better than by
practising at school."
In their report giving the conclusions at which they
had arrived from the evidence taken, the French Commission say: -
"In general, the reproach brought against every school-workshop is, that it does not realize the necessary industrial advantages;
and especially that it does not accustom the pupils to that rapidity
of execution which is one of'the principal conditions of economical
production. These objections are serious ones; and most of the
examples on which they are founded do but too well justify them."




CHAPTER IV.
SPECIAL SCHOOLS FOR THE INSTRUCTION OF
APPRENTICES.
WITH the decay of apprenticeship, numerous special
schools for the instruction of apprentices have been established in Europe. These schools are supported in
part by local, and in part by State contributions. The
service they have rendered to industry cannot be lightly
estimated.
Such schools can have no uniform organization, since
they must be adapted to the industrial wants of each
locality. One will be a school for weaving, another for
lace-making, another for dyeing, another for watchmaking, another for jewellers, another for machinists,
another for carpenters, another for ship-builders, and
so through the catalogue of industries.  Of course,
those things which are common to different industries
can be taught in the same school.
Labor performed under the direction of experienced
workmen occupies a good part of the time: the re131




132          TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
mainder is given to those studies which have an immediate bearing upon the industry taught. It is drawing, that, in nearly all of these schools, holds the leading place. When the early education has been sadly
neglected, general instruction is sometimes given. Not
only can the apprentice be taught more quickly and
much better in one of these schools than he can be
taught in the workshop, under the present system of
labor, but he can be taught much more cheaply. As
a general rule, a "green hand" is not regarded as a
valuable acquisition to any industrial establishment.
Even for such simple work as weaving cotton cloth, there
is a perpetual contest among the cotton manufacturers of
New England to secure operatives of experience. Indeed, some mills refuse to employ a "green hand"
under any circumstances, considering it cheaper, as well
as much less vexatious, to employ those only who have
have had experience, though  obliged to pay them
more for the same yards woven. There can be no doubt
that it is quite time apprentice-schools were established at all the manufacturing centres of the country,
in imitation of those in Europe.
Reference has already been made to the reports of
the British artisans sent to the World's Exhibition at
Paris. Some of these artisans visited other parts of
France. John Gregory and James Stringer, watchmakers, thus describe:



SPECIAL SCHOOLS FOR APPRENTICES. 133
MUNICIPAL SCHOOL OF THEORETICAL AND PRACTICAL WATCHMANUFACTURE AT BESANCON.
"This school is founded to secure the professional education
of young people who intend devoting themselves to the art of watchmaking. The city of Besangon is the principal seat of the manufacture of watches in France. The manufacturers of this city,
almost exclusively supply the French market, as, of 378,498 watches
sold in France in 1865, Besangon supplied 296,012, or nearly fourfifths of the whole number.
" The school has for its object thoroughly to teach children
the trade they intend to follow; to supply, in fact, the notorious
deficiencies of an actual apprenticeship: and, if the apprentices at
the present time are so ignorant of the practical part of their trade,
they are much more so of the theoretical part. The object this
school is now carrying out on a large scale is to offer to young
watchmakers an opportunity of constant comparison of the theory
of watchmaking with the results at which they arrive practically.
" The regular time for this practical and theoretical course is three
years; but it is desirable that the students whose aptitude and conduct is reported favorably of should prolong their stay at the
school, in order to perfect themselves. The classes are held in a
large building belonging to the city, the situation of which is all
that could be desired. The classes are under the management of
a director, who carefully sees that each branch of study is diligently followed out. The teaching is divided in the following
manner:First Year. - (Third Division.)
"Practical Teaching. —Filing, turning, hardening, and tempering metal, perfecting small tools for doing first halves of the ordinary sizes.
12




134            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
" Theoretical Teaching. -Revision of early education, arithmetic,
mensuration, geography, mechanical drawing, general principles,
making the more simple tools and machines employed in watchmaking.
Second Year. - (Second Division.)
"Practical Teaching. - Doing first halves of various sizes, pivoting, and making the different parts of a cylinder escapement.
" Theoretical Teaching. - Studying style, geography, arithmetic,
elementary geometry and its application, mechanical drawing, geometrical models, models of tools and machines used in watchmaking, designs of the different parts of a watch.
Third Year. - (First Division.)
"Practical Teaching.- Constructing and planting the escapement, examining, regulating.
"Theoretical Teaching. - Course of mechanics, ideas of industrial chemistry, cosmography, commercial book-keeping and general
geography, mechanical drawing, study of various cut-wheels, models
of escapements, and designing watch-movements for the model.
"The theoretical lectures are given in each division every day,
from seven to nine o'clock in the morning, Thursday excepted.
"The work-hours are from nine o'clock in the morning till noon,
and from half-past one till five.
" Drawing-lessons are given in each division on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Fridays, from five till seven o'clock in the evening.
"The course of commercial book-keeping and general geography
for the first division is held every Wednesday, from five to seven
in the evening.
"On Saturday, the director examines the pupils in the work
of the week, so as to note step by step the progress made. In addi.




SPECIAL SCHOOLS FOR APPRENTICES.                 135
tion to the instruction given in the school, the pupils are taken
from time to time to the different manufactories in the neighborhood, so that they may become familiarized with the various combinations and applications of machinery; and also to different workshops where the several parts of a watch are made. The knowledge which they thus acquire of the methods used in the actual
process of manufacture, and which can only be gained in the workshops themselves, completes the education indispensable to a
thorough knowledge of watchmaking.
"The school is visited each week by two members of the Board
of Directors composed of the most skilled men in the trade, who
take note of the quality of the work done, as well as of the progress
of the pupils. At the expiration of each scholastic year, the pupils
are subjected to a general examination, at the end of which prizes
are awarded to the most deserving pupils. The distribution of
these prizes takes place in public, under the direction of the mayor.
" This distribution is preceded and followed by a public exhibition
of the productions of the manual labor of the students, and the
designs executed by them, during the year. The vacation begins
on the first of September, and continues during that month.
"The conditions of admission into the school are as follows:"The school for watchmaking receives any young people, without distinction as to country or nationality. To be received into
the school, the pupils must be able to read and write fluently, and
know the four rules of arithmetic. They are examined before a
special jury before being admitted."
The French Imperial Commission, which is more
fully described in the second chapter, speak thus of
apprentice-schools in Belgium:



136             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
APPRENTICE SCHOOLS IN BELGIUM.
"Belgium offers in Western Flanders, by her communal schools
for apprentice-weavers (6coles communales d'apprentissage), a remarkable example of the results that may be obtained in such institutions. These schools, in which primary and religious instruction
is united with manual labor, are intended for the children of poor
parents, and are adapted to the industry of the neighborhood;
namely, weaving. The communes, aided by the State, have provided a building with looms; and, under the direction of a paid overseer, these school-shops work up raw material furnished by manufacturers of the neighborhood. The apprentices receive small
wages, which increase with their capacity, until they know their trade
well enough to be admitted into the factories, where they can earn
a living. From fifty-five to sixty apprentice-schools of this kind
are distributed over as many communes, and receive from thirteen
thousand to fourteen thousand pupils. The official reports published at Bruges in 1863 show that everywhere instruction and
habits of regular employment have produced the most successful
results in improving the morals not only of the children, but also
of the parents, and that mendicity and vagrancy have almost
entirely disappeared from those districts.
"When the first attempts were made to organize apprenticeschools for the different sorts of manufactures, the exclusive and
almost absolute direction was confided to masters who had an interest in them. It was, however, soon discovered that the authority
charged with watching over the execution of the indentures on
behalf of the children had not sufficient powers: consequently the
majority of the institutions of that kind were allowed to die out;
and in their place were substituted communal workshops,'created
exclusively for the professional instruction of th, working-classes




SPECIAL SCHOOLS FOR APPRENTICES.                137
and in the general interest of trade; the committees of which
endeavor to vary the instruction of the pupil as far as possible.
"'The pupils of those workshops are usually compelled to attend
school for two hours; and, while the apprentice thus derives a rest
by this cessation from labor, he at the same time acquires knowledge admitting of a general application. Experience has proved
that the introduction of literary and moral instruction is effected
with the greatest facility in those communal workshops in which it
was not practised, and that it produces an excellent effect on the
character and morals of the young workmen.
" It has even been found that with the space of time devoted daily
to instruction in reading, writing, the rudiments of arithmetic, &c.,
the pupils who attend the workshops learn almost as rapidly as
those who are obliged to remain all the day at school.'
"This remark agrees with the observations made in England on
the half-time schools. The object of these workshops not being
merely to show the child a loom which is to enable him to gain
a livelihood, but also to contribute to his intellectual and industrial
progress,'it is sought to instruct the pupils not only in weaving,
properly so called, but also in the preparation of the warp, in arranging the loom for the execution of different patterns, in deciphering designs, and, in short, every thing belonging to the weaver's art.'
"In 1863, out of fifty-four apprentice-workshops established, in
forty primary instruction was being given to the extent desired;
and in fourteen only was it not completely organized. According to the official returns, the organization of those special apprentice-workshops, which only date from 1851, are at present fifty-four
in number, comprising: —
Looms......        1,285
Apprentice Pupils.....  1,652
12*




138            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
"The number of workmen they have trained during a period
of twelve years amounts to 13,481, the greater part rescued from
want, mendicity, and all the vices they engender.
" Let us add in conclusion, as is remarked by the author of the
report, M. Renier, inspector of the apprentice-workshops, that a
number of young apprentices who had never entered a school
have left the workshops with a fair knowledge of reading and writing; and that this important result has been obtained in the greater
part of the communes which contain a workshop. It evidently
results, from this observation, that the workshop, far from taking
boys fiom the schools, is, with the aid of a good organization, a
powerful means of extending the benefits of instruction, and of
counteracting the selfish and short-sighted conduct of parents, who,
without concerning themselves for the future, only think of the
trifling salary to be earned promptly by an ignorant workman."
The French Imperial Commission thus speak of the
power-loom weaving-school at Mulhouse: -
POwER-LOOM-WEAVING-SCHOOL AT MULHOUSE.
"The apprentice-workshops are not only of use in forming
simple workmen: they may also constitute a sort of technical and
special schools for preparing educated youths for the direction of
manufactories. With this view, some manufacturers of Mulhouse,
convinced of the utility of a complete instruction in the principles
which should guide the manufacturer of the great variety of stuffs
now produced, and enlightened by the example of Germany, raised
by subscription, in 1861, a fund of thirty-seven thousand francs
destined to found, as an experiment, a school of weaving with
power-loom. This school, which is placed under the direction of
M. E. Fries, admits thirty or forty out-door pupils, who pay a




SPECIAL SCHOOLS FOR APPRENTICES.                        139
certain sum yearly, and receive a theoretical and practical instruction in the process of weaving, sufficient to enable them to superintend manufactories.
"To show in what degree such institutions meet the requirements of trade, it will not be without interest to exhibit the progressive results of the administration of that school during the first
three years of its existence: -
Receipts and Expenditures of the School of Weaving at Mulhouse
from  Nov. 1, 1861, to Nov. 1, 1864.
Capital raised in 1861, by
subscription, among the
principal manufacturers
Receipts of the School.  Expenses of the School. and merchants of the Departments of the HautRhin and Vosges, 37,000
francs.
Frs. C.                Frs. C.               Frs. C.
From Nov. 1,)          From Nov. 1,)          Year   18611861, to Nov.  6,178 10 1861, to Nov. I       1862. Drawn  15,432 70
1,1862,     )          1, 1862, cur-. 14,000 80 from  the
rent expen-            capital,
ses,        J
Fitting up     4,600 00
schoolrooms,   4,600 W
Purchase   of  30     
machinery,     3,010 
Total expen- 
diture, 1861-  21,610 80
1862,          _
From Nov. 1, )         From Nov. 1,)          Year   18621862, to Nov. 12,540 50 1862, to Nov. I       1863. Drawn  13,306 55
1, 1863.               1, 1863, cur-  12,721 05 from  the 
rent expen- J          capital,   J
ses,        J
Purchase of 
a steam-en-   13,126 00
gine,       )
Total expen-)
ses in 1862-  25,847 05
_________ 1863,
From Nov. 1,)          From Nov. 1,           Year   18631863, to Nov. 16205 45 1863, to Nov           1864 excess
1,1864,,      1, 1864, cur-  12,325 75 of receipts  3,879 70
rent expen-            over expen_   ses,                diture,




140             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
" The above table shows, that, after scarcely three years' existence
and experience, this school, in which the number of pupils was at
first only ten or twelve at the most, has been able to organize itself,
purchase its material and a steam-engine; and yet, having borrowed
for that purpose only 28,739 francs from the subscription-fund, it
has obtained a net profit (its material and all expenses being
paid) of 3,879 francs at the end of the third year. This result,
which proves what benefit the manufacturing towns derive from
making a judicious outlay for the promotion of technical instruction,
determined the founders to give to their school of weaving a definite
constitution, and to form, with that object, a company with a capital
of seventy-six thousand francs, divided into seventy-six shares of
a thousand francs each, which were subscribed for immediately.
" At present the school is established in a building erected for the
purpose: it is provided with a steam-engine, with every thing that is
necessary for transmitting the motive-power, and twenty-four
different looms, on which various stuffs may be manufactured. It
works not only as a theoretical and practical school of weaving, but
also as an ordinary factory, so as to cover by the sale of its productions a part of the outlay.
"Its financial position in the month of September, 1864, was as
follows:Frs. C.
Capital, seventy-six shares at a thousand francs.. 76,000 00
Funds disposable March 1, 1864, from the first subscription.  8,260 75
Surplus of receipts over expenditure in 1863-1864.     3,879 70
Capital disposable on March 1, 1864...... 88,140 45
EXPENDITURE.
March 1, 1864, purchase of ground and costs.       10,018 00
Sept. 1, 1864, building of workshops..           56,000 00
Total expenditure..,.             66,018 00
Balance..... 22,122 45
88,140 45




SPECIAL SCHOOLS FOR APPRENTICES.                141
"The school opened under these favorable conditions on the 3d
of October, 1864.
"The studies are partly theoretical, and partly practical; the pupils
passing alternately and regularly from the one to the other. The
theoretical studies consist principally of the decomposition and
analysis of all kinds of stuffs, especially those which concern the
manufactures of Alsace. The course is terminated by mechanical
drawing, the study of the internal arrangements of manufactories
with plans and estimates, the calculating of the cost-price of manufactures, and book-keeping. The practical studies consist of the
working of the looms, the fitting-up, regulating, adjusting, preservation, and repair of all the machinery, and, lastly, the weaving itself
in all its operations by the pupils themselves, assisted by an experienced foreman.
"The charge of admission to the theoretical and practical
course of studies is six hundred francs for the scholastic year
of eleven months; but the pupil is at liberty to attend only
one of the two courses. Foreigners are admitted as well as Frenchmen.
" These studies are terminated by examinations before a board of
manufacturers and engineers, which delivers certificates of capacity
to the successful candidates. At this examination the pupils have
to submit to the board a general plan of the school, with its steamengine and apparatus for the distribution of the motive-power, and
with drawings of the different machines, and the complete plan of a
manufactory.
" It will be seen by the above details that nothing is neglected in
the studies of the pupils; so that those who have received certificates
of capacity are at once competent to direct manufactories of various
kinds. We must add, that the manufacturerswho founded this school




142            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
of weaving are precluded from participating in the profits the establishment may make, and that they have only a right to the legal
interest on the money they have advanced, and its reimbursement on
the breaking up of the association."




CHAPTER V.
INSTRUCTION OF WORKMEN.
IN various ways it has been attempted, with a greater
or less degree of success, to improve the technical education of workmen after they have become workmen.
1. For this purpose popular lectures have been found
serviceable. They must, however, be specific, and not
general: they must have a direct bearing on the employment of the workmen. If the lectures deal with their
subjects in a general way, they may entertain and perhaps stimulate somewhat; but they will prove of little
advantage to the workmen. While imparting positive
knowledge, they must not neglect the reason of things,
but set the workmen to thinking.
But the workmen must have had some elementary
technical instruction, or they will not be able to comprehend the lectures; for the lectures, to be of the best,
cannot deal in glittering generalities, but must employ
technical terms, and must usually assume that the
143




144          TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
hearers are acquainted with certain elementary data.
The workmen must also have had some elementary
literary instruction: for it is essential that they should
take notes of the lectures; otherwise the knowledge
imparted by the lectures will, in the main, be soon.
forgotten.
These things have been found essential to the success
of popular lectures for the technical instruction of workmen.
2. For such instruction, evening schools have also been
found serviceable. The room in which such schools are
held should be well warmed and well ventilated: it
should be well lighted from above, and in such manner
as to prevent all cross-lights. These are general requisites. The equipment of the room must vary somewhat
according to the character of the instruction given. As
drawing is usually the leading thing to be taught in
such schools, precedence must usually be conceded to
that in the equipment of the room.
It has been found by experience that men actually
engaged in the business in which instruction is to be
given, as foremen, for example, and practical draughtsmen, make excellent teachers for these evening schools.
These teachers from the workshop know just what the
workmen require in the way of practical application:
they know the obstacles to be overcome in applying




INSTRUCTION OF WORKMEN.             145
the theory, and just how to overcome them. Usually
they cannot explain the theory so well as the professional
teacher; but their intimate knowledge of the practical
applications of the theory enables them much better to
satisfy the workmen, who are always impatient of a long
drill in theory before coming to direct applications, -a
course that can be successfully pursued in an ordinary
school.  The very best teacher, however, for these
schools for workmen, is the professional teacher, who, to
his knowledge of the teacher's art and to his knowledge
of the theory of the thing to be taught, has added a
knowledge of the practical applications of the theory,
which he may readily add by investigations in the
workshop. Thus it will be seen that there seldom need
be a lack of good teachers in any place where an evening technical school is required.
Workmen and apprentices should be taught together.
The latter not having advanced far enough in their
business to appreciate the value of the instruction, they
are too much inclined to neglect it when taught by themselves. But the example of the men stimulates them to
study. As a rule, all under the age of fifteen years
should be excluded from these evening schools.
When the school is small, there cannot well be more
than one class; and all must attend to the same study at
the same time. When the school is large, then it can be
13




146          TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
divided into two or more classes for the pursuit of different studies, or of different parts of the same study.
The teacher may give his explanations to the class as
a whole, requiring all the members to attend to the same
thing at the same time. Further assistance may then
be rendered to individual members who failed to comprehend the explanations when given to the whole class.
This plan enables the teacher to do the most for the
whole class in an allotted time; but, on the other hand,
the more zealous and intelligent members are kept back
somewhat.
Or the teacher may explain only general principles to
the class as a whole; each member making a different
application of these principles. In the applications the
teacher can render individual assistance.  This plan
does not restrain the more zealous and intelligent, nor
need it deprive the laggards of suitable instruction, if
the teacher is active. It also permits instruction to be
given at the same time in two or- three different trades,
when they have common foundation principles, as they
may have, for example, in chemistry, geometry, drawing.
Thus much of the instruction in drawing required by
the carpenter, machinist, and cabinet-maker must be
of the same general character.
Or the instruction may be all oral, illustrated by experiments or diagrams. This has two or three grave dis



INSTRUCTION OF WORKMDN.             147
advantages. The stupid require repetition, and sometimes those who are not stupid require it; but frequently it cannot be had, as in the case of experiments, or
from lack of time. The study of the subject cannot,
therefore, be continued out of school. Again: it is often
essential that notes be taken; but this many workmen
cannot do from lack of elementary instruction.
The conclusion is, that judicious blending of oral instruction with use of a text-book is much the best thing.
All book is out of the question. The book should contain the theory, with some practical applications; but
most of the latter must be got outside of books, and
should be selected with special reference to the wants
of the workmen receiving instruction. With the book
before him, the workman more readily understands
the teacher; with the explanations of the teacher, he
more readily understands the book, though the teacher
may not always express himself as clearly as the book.
The book can also be used out of school, which is a great
advantage.  If, however, the workman's elementary
instruction has been neglected, he will find himself
troubled to use even the plainest book understandingly.
Aside from text-books, the school should have books for
general reference.
Whatever general mode of teaching is followed, speedy application of the theory must be a part of it, other.




148          TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
wise the workmen will lose their interest. Indeed,
theory and practical application must go together from
the outset in the instruction of workmen. It is also the
conclusion of European experience, that a small fee
should be changed for the instruction in these schools.
3. Museums have also been found exceedingly serviceable for the technical education of workmen. Local
museums must conform to the wants of the different
localities where they are established. Thus, in its local
museum, the dominant industry of each district should
be specially represented. If, for example, it is the production of machinery, the workman should be able to
find in the museum illustrations of just what he desires
to learn about the application of power, and the making
of machines. If it is the production of textile fabrics,
all the best and latest achievements of the loom should
be there exemplified for the benefit of the local manufacturer; and so on. In every museum, however, for
the culture in taste and delight of all should be gathered beautiful objects illustrating the different departments of art.
With well-stored museums, easy of access at all times,
the workman can use his eyes to the greatest advantage in perfecting his technical education. Through the
eye is the readiest approach to the mind. Frequently a
single glance of the eye will give the workman a clearer




INSTRUCTION     OF WVORKMEN.              149
comprehension of a principle in mechanics than he
could obtain from a long explanatory discourse, or from
reading a book. Then it has been well said that "'taste
is the recollection  of the beautiful."    Whether this
definition be true or not, certain it is, that for the cultivation of the taste, which is so valuable in nearly all
industrial arts, there must be beautiful objects for frequent contemplation and study. This lacking, all other
instruction fails to impart correct taste.
4. In several European countries Sunday schools for
the technical instruction of workmen are numerous, and
well attended.
POPULAR LECTURES.
In their report, the French Imperial Commission,
more fully described in the second chapter, speak thus
of popular lectures for the instruction of workmen: —
"It will be remembered, that in 1819 the first industrial courses
of lectures were founded and organized in various towns of France
by the zealous efforts of Baron Charles Dupin. Responding to an
appeal, in which he eloquently invoked the memory of Gaspard
Monge, many pupils of the Polytechnic School, chiefly officers
of engineers and artillery in the towns where they were in garrison,
engineers of the bridges and roads and of mines, placed themselves at the disposal of the municipal authorities to diffuse a knowledge of science among the industrial population of every class. Of
all these educational undertakings, the best organized and the
most successful was the institution founded by the town of Metz,
13*




150             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
with the aid of MM. Poncelet, Bergery, and Bardin. The first.
named of these gentlemen, ardent in the propagation of science,
then entered on the course which he has since followed with such
distinction, and which led him to explain by the aid of the rudiments of elementary geometry most of the principles and delicate
problems of mechanical science. To him belongs the honor of having shown that it is not so difficult as might be supposed to popularize, and bring within the grasp of ordinary capacities, the study
all the propositions of industrial mechanics.
"Since M. Poncelet, others, following in his steps, have sought
to extend the same mode of teaching in the public lectures of the
Conservatory of Arts and Trades, and in those of the Polytechnic
and Philotechnic Associations; and their efforts have been attended
with results of immense value. The first-named of these associations instituted in 1830 popular lectures, which were, from the very
beginning, exclusively intrusted to ex-pupils of the Polytechnic
School. These lectures have since been established in every quarter
of Paris; and in 1860 this same association founded in the amphitheatre of the School of Medicine isolated lectures, which, in their
turn, called public attention to this particular mode of disseminating
useful knowledge among the people.
"But it would be wrong to lose sight of the fact that public
lectures, or merely oral teaching, even'when accompanied by
experiments made with the aid of good models and of applications
to common questions, often leave on the memory and understanding of the auditors only evanescent impressions. This effect is still
more certain when the audience, composed exclusively of apprentices and workmen, is only prepared for the instruction given by an
imperfect elementary education, which has not prepared them for
mental effort, whilst their professional habits unceasingly draw them




INSTRUCTION OF WORKMEN.                   151
towards practical and material results. The consequence has been,
that notwithstanding all the talent and zeal of the professors of
public lectures, whether in Paris or in the large towns of France,
this mode of teaching, in so far as it is specially devoted to workingmen, has not produced all the results its founders expected, although truth compels the acknowledgment that it has not been
altogether fruitless....
"Though, for the technical teaching of workmen disposed to
devote part of their leisure to studies which may be useful to them,
it has been thought proper to give the preference to regular classes
over public or simply oral lectures, it does not follow that such
lectures, or even occasional meetings, may not be really useful.
There are, in fact, a great many scientific and technical questions
which possess great interest, not only for the workmen themselves,
but also for their masters, for young men, and, indeed, for a host of
people who would not submit to a regular attendance at such
classes as those of which the organization has just been described,
ana which require punctuality and practical application. On the
other hand, certain special branches of science, though very desirable
to be learned, do not always admit of regular teaching, nor of any
considerable number of lessons. A person well versed in the theory
and practice of some particular art might be disposed to give a few
lectures on the subject he has mastered, but would not choose to
give a course limited to workmen only. Giving public lectures and
holding meetings, in such cases, cannot be otherwise than beneficial;
and although they are not so effective for the technical instruction
of workmen, properly so called, as regular classes opened expressly
for them, the fact is none the less certain, that, by diffusing and
popularizing science and experience among the public who attend
them, much good will be done."




152            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
EVENING SCHOOLS.
In his evidence before the French Commission, the
Rev. Father Baudine, assistant superior of the Christian Brothers' School, says:"The classes are divided into two divisions, - one, open from six
to eight o'clock in the evening, for apprentices from thirteen to sixteen years old; the other, from eight to ten, for workmen of sixteen,
and above. Every year the works of the pupils are exhibited in
one of the amphitheatres of the Conservatory of Arts and Trades.
Each work bears the name of the pupil, his age, the time of his
apprenticeship, and the name and address of his master. A board,
composed of manufacturers of good position, awards and distributes
the prizes.
" In different quarters of Paris, local committees, composed of
manufacturers and persons of good position, have been formed to
visit the different schools weekly, and to bring masters and apprentices into communication."
In his evidence before the same Commission, M.
Bardin, professor of industrial drawing to the communal schools of the city of Paris, says: -
" There does not appear to be any disadvantage in causing both
workmen and apprentices to meet in the same class; for apprentices
rarely understand the utility of application, and they are encouraged by the industrious workmen who frequent the classes....
"If the workmen paid, however small the sum, they certainly
would be more regular in their attendance at the drawing-classes
than they are now; and the instruction would be regarded more




INSTRUCTION OF WORKMEN.                     153
earnestly by them: this is a fact which has been attested by experience. This system has, besides, numerous precedents. The workmen in their practical courses take upon themselves the expenses
of the premises and lighting. The private schools, receiving subsidies
from the town, have about three hundred and fifty pupils who pay:
moreover, a great number of workmen who enter their names for
the courses of the communal schools come with the intention of
paying.
"The only objection that could be made is in favor of apprentices, because they earn nothing. This is true; but, for those
whose families could not afford these expenses, the masters, who
give a little money every week to the youths working for them, as
a recompense, would willingly pay the monthly fee of the school
(which might be as low as possible), and would also undertake
to see that the apprentice profits by the advantages offered to him."
Messrs. Gaumont and Guemied, editors of " The Journal of Professional Education," said to the French Commission:"All pupils attending public courses of instruction should pay
a small fee, to give them an interest in their work. Everywhere
where a good system of public instruction is maintained, this plan
is adopted. At Mulhouse nothing is gratuitous: it is the same in
all the Swiss cantons. At Paris the most frequented courses of
drawing are those at the municipal schools, where a fee of from
two to three francs is exacted monthly....
" To give special instruction to workmen, it is of much or even
of more importance, that the teacher should possess a knowledge
of the trade than of pure science. It is almost indispensable to




154             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
have lived the life of the workshop in order to be able to elevate
the mere handicraftsman from practice to theory."
In their report, the French Imperial Commission
express themselves in this wise: —
" In towns of moderate size, where the number of pupils, and
consequently of professors, will be rather limited, it will generally
be found advisable to unite pupils of equal proficiency in one class:
thus there will be no other divisions to introduce but those indi.
cated by the degree of progress in study. But the case will be very
different in large towns; and, whenever the number of pupils shall
exceed forty or fifty, it will be necessary to form several classes.
It will then be advantageous to place workmen of the same or similar
trades under a common course of instruction, which may be more
particularly adapted to their occupation.
"Though it is impossible to indicate in a general report all the
divisions which the requirements of local industries may thus introduce into technical education, still there are certain trades in
which many workmen are engaged whose co-operation is indispensable to all the others, and for which it is possible to indicate the
method in which the work to be executed by the pupils in their
classes ought to be conducted. Among these industries, that of
building is at once the most general, and also comprises the largest
number of different trades; all having recourse to the art of drawing, and requiring the rules of geometry, and sometimes even those
of mechanics. Moreover, it may. be noticed that the labors of
these different trades all contribute to one and the same end, and
that it is consequently desirable that the workmen who practice
them should follow a similar course of study. It will therefore
often be practicable to form a special class for all employed in the




INSTRUCTION OF WORKMEN.                     155
building trade, including masons, stone-cutters, carpenters, smiths,
joiners, and other accessory trades.
"The technical instruction to be given by drawing'in this class,
and which will likewise serve as applications of the rudiments of
geometry and projection, will comprise the principal details of the
labors of each profession. Masons and stone-cutters will learn to
draw the different modes of construction to be employed, according
to the nature of the materials and the parts to be executed, -simple
and mixed masonry, chimneys, the different kinds of arches and
their intersections, and their voussoirs and templates, staircases, &c.
To these studies may also be added the actual execution, in plasterof-Paris, of all the masonry of certain parts, on a small scale,- a
proceeding which has been practised with success in certain schools
of France and Germany. Carpenters and joiners will also execute
working-drawings of roofs and constructions in wood; and so on
with other trades.
" In towns where there are machine-workshops, it will be advantageous also to form a special class for engineers, for the purpose
of making drawings of the more important portions of machines,
especially of such as are peculiar to the locality, or are most used.
The series of designs executed by the pupils of the schools of arts
and trades may be taken as types of the mode to be adopted. The
artisans engaged in the different trades working in metals may be
joined to this last class, unless there should be in the neighborhood
some special factories employing a great number of hands, as in the
manufacture of clocks and watches, hardware, or locks; for whom
a separate class ought then to be opened.
"In one word, the object of these classes being to give each workman the technical instruction required in his trade, every effort
must be made to teach him to execute drawings of the articles he




156             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
has to manufacture, employing them as means to make him comprehend the principles of geometry, which he will be taught at the
same time.'He may also be required, as an application of his
knowledge, to calculate the surface, volume, and weight of the
objects drawn, when their forms are not too complicated.
"It has been deemed necessary to enter somewhat minutely
into these details, for the purpose of showing that this kind of
instruction can only be successfully given by men who are fitted
for it by their profession, or who, from enthusiasm, have devoted
their attention to learning all the practical details. From  this it
is evident that the teachers must, for the most part, be found among
engineers, architects, builders, and foremen, who, without abandoning their profession, will undertake the direction of these Sunday
or evening classes....
"These studies, intended for practical purposes, cannot, therefore, be efficiently directed with all the befitting details of execution,
with the explanation of processes, and the necessary experiments,
except by men who have themselves practised the arts whose
principles and rules they have to explain, and who. know how to
speak the language of the ship-yard and the workshop. Hence
results the impossibility of establishing for professional or industrial
teaching, even from a general point of view, a uniform body of
rules and methods, an organized professional staff, in short, a university of industrial education. This consequence is still more evident
in all that concerns those technical studies which have for their
immediate object the methods, rules, and application of the sciences.
"It is, therefore, often on the very spot where the technical
instruction is to be given, or in the workshop itself, that many of
the professors ought to be chosen; and, in general, they must be
sought among engineers, practical men, and manufacturers."




INSTRUCTION OF WORKMEN.                    157
In his report, to which reference was made in the
second chapter, Prof. Leone Levi says of the canton of
Geneva, Switzerland: -
"There are evening industrial schools, which, after providing
for a preliminary course on arithmetic, including decimals and the
metric system, have, in the inferior division, geometry, physic, and
lineal design; in the middle division, algebra, book-keeping,
chemistry, and industrial design; and, in the superior division,
natural history, political economy, mechanics,'design, descriptive
geometry, and chemical manipulations. The fees in these schools
are, for regular students, five francs for the preparatory course,
ten francs for the inferior division, fifteen francs for the middle, and
twenty francs for the superior. The fees for occasional or not
regular students are five francs for the preparatory course, ten francs
for the inferior division, eight francs for one course in the middle
division, and ten francs for one course in the superior division.
Teachers are paid in part by a fixed rate per hour, and in part by
a portion of the fees, divided among all professors in proportion to
the number of lessons given by each."
Prof. Leone Levi further speaks in this wise of the
evening instruction which has been provided for workmen in England: -
"If, from the education of children, we pass to the instruction of
those who have already entered on the active duties of life, the want
now felt in this country becomes still more evident. An attempt
was early made for diffusing instruction among our artisans, the
foundation of mechanic institutes, the original object of which was
14




158             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
to impart instruction to workmen in those rules and principles
which lie at the basis of the art they practice; but they have failed
to attract the mechanics. In the membership of mechanic institutions, the mechanics, millwrights, overlookers, spinners, and
other laborers figure only in a small proportion; whilst the number
taking advantage of such institutions, in proportion to the total
number of laboring-classes in any one town, is quite insignificant;
though it is quite possible, that, in many cases, the working-man,
by contact with any such institution, becomes more enlightened
and refined in manner and bearing, that, leaving his ordinary dress
at home, he is in the evening little distinguishable from persons
belonging to the middle class of life, and that, in many ways, the
working-classes still derive from them essential benefit.
"A   mechanics' institute, as usually organized, has evening
classes for five evenings in the week; one evening being usually
dedicated to lectures and lighter entertainments. It has a library
for reference and the circulation of books, and a reading-room open
from early in the morning till late at night. The subjects of instruction in the different classes are very extensive. They comprise
nearly all the branches of elementary science and literature necessary
for educated young men in the middle class of life, such as arithmetic, book-keeping, English composition, English grammar,
English literature, drawing, and foreign languages, with some of the
more advanced sciences, such as chemistry, geometry, mathematics,
natural philosophy, &c.; and the fees are very low. But they are
wanting in unity and system. The instruction is not consecutive:
it does not extend over any definite period; whilst there is no connection whatever between the private classes and public lecturers.
In fact, as schools of science and art, they are in most cases very
defective; and, as to funds or modes of existence generally, their




INSTRUCTION OF WORKMEN.                     159
condition is most precarious, the greatest efforts being needed to
maintain such institutions in existence.
"Of similar character, at least in its original object, is the Working Men's College, founded in 1854 in London. The studies there
comprise drawing, vocal music, history, and law, languages ancient
and modern, mathematical and physical sciences, at very low fees,
and free lectures delivered on Saturday evenings by some of our
most eminent men. Yet the college does not draw many of the
mechanics and artisans, the greater number of students being clerks
receiving very small salaries; whilst, with fees at the lowest rates, the
college is not self-sustaining. The good work is in reality carried
on by zealous teachers acting gratuitously; and the building itself
was established by generous contributions. Nor is it to be wondered at, since even the best institutions, which appeal to the
middle and higher classes, experience the greatest difficulty, and
are seldom self-supporting and remunerative. The classes on those
branches of study which are of acknowledged necessity, and otherwise popular, attract a sufficient number of students to allow a fair
remuneration to the teachers; but those on subjects more elevated,
or of more partial application, are attended by too few scholars to
render it worth while either to the teacher or the institution to
maintain them.
"Yet exceptions to this general rule present themselves here
and there, and prominently so is the case of the evening classes at
King's College, London. It is now fifteen years since, with the
authority of the council of King's College, I opened (in 1851
evening courses of lectures of a practical character on commerce
and commercial law. From year to year, those lectures attracted
greater and increasing attention, until, in 1855, a department was
established for the purpose of providing a complete system of prac



160            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
tical instruction to young men daily employed in business, which
now includes divinity, Latin, Greek, French, German and German
literature, Italian, English, Spanish, Portuguese, and Hebrew language, history of England, geography, arithmetic, writing, mathematics,.commerce (including principles of commerce and banking), monetary science and foreign exchanges, commercial and
maritime law (national and international), drawing, elements of
chemistry, practical chemistry, mechanics, physiology, botany, experimental physic, mineralogy  and geology, zoology, political
economy, public reading and speaking, law, and a civil service
class. These classes have been most popular from the commencement; and from six hundred to seven hundred youths are every
evening there employed in learning different branches of science,
who heretofore had no opportunity to satisfy their taste, and far
less to obtain the necessary erudition for the practical duties of life.
King's College, situated in the very centre of this great metropolis,
fulfils in this manner a most important function in the education
of the adult.
" Still more recently University College, London, has established
its evening classes, where Latin, Greek, Hebrew, English, French,
Italian, German, geography, history, elocution, mineralogy and
geology, mathematics, physic, elementary chemistry, drawing, writing, book-keeping, English law, Roman law, jurisprudence, and
equity and common law, are taught by men of great ability, and
at very moderate fees.
"Nor can I omit that most valuable institution, the City of
London College, whose evening classes are crowded by persons
belonging to the commercial houses in the city. Some of these
colleges and schools may succeed in maintaining themselves, though
with great difficulty; but in the majority of cases it is otherwise, and,




INSTRUCTION OF WORKMEN.                    161
in my opinion, there will never be a sufficient provision for the
diffusion of science in this country, especially economic and commercial, natural and experimental, unless those institutions obtain
a well-regulated State support."
The committee of the Hamburg (Germany) Society
for the Promotion of Art and Industry say of evening
schools:"On the fixing of a plan of lessons for a Sunday and evening
school, it appears advisable, that, as far as possible, the artistic instruction should be given in the evening, and the scientific in the
daytime, as it is found from experience, that, in general, workmen
are too exhausted after their day's work for attention to subjects
such as mathematics for instance; whilst they appear sufficiently
fresh for instruction in drawing."
A committee of the Hamburg (Germany) Society
for the Promotion of Art and Industry thus describe
The Museum of Industrial Products of the Royal Institution for Industry and     Commerce at Stuttgart,
Wurtemberg.
" This is destined to aid in the promotion of existing industries,
as also to lay the foundations of industries in general; but it is in no
way occupied with the promotion of any one special branch of
industry.
"The principle which is the groundwork of the institution is
the general aim of improving the elements of industrial occupation
14



162            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
by exhibitions of real objects, and consequent encouragement to
study, and to make these accessible to all.
"The museum contains, in spacious rooms, a rich collection
of German and foreign manufactures, a great number of useful
machines and implements of all kinds, an excellent collection of
industrial art, a trades" drawing-school, a library, a reading-room,
and a chemical laboratory.
"The collection of manufactures, arranged according to the
annexed plans, contains: —
"Leather and leather work; work and carvings in wood, ivory,
horn, cocoanut-shell, &c.; inlaid furniture; works in clay, cement,
earthenware, and china; bricks and tiles; glass ware and glass paintings; articles made of wax, papier-mache, gutta-percha, caoutchouc,
plaster, &c.; bookbinding and portfolio-makers' wares; brushes;
paint-brushes; combs; basket-work in straw, osier, and reeds; patterns of clothing and ready-made clothes; nets and hooks; fabrics,
and fabrics in process, made of wool, silk, cotton, flax, hemp, jute,
&c.; colors; chemicals; combustibles; pencils; oils; glue; instruments for measuring, measures, scales and weights; implements for
drawing; apparatus used in cooking, in the house, for lighting, warming, and extinguishing; agricultural and garden tools; locks and
keys; door and window fastenings; works in tin and copper, &c.
"On account of their origin, we must particularly notice the
many patterns of printed, embroidered, and woven stuffs, as well as
of paper-hangings. There are business-houses in Paris who receive
subscriptions for the supply of all the new patterns brought out,
and who furnish annually to their subscribers from two hundred
to four hundred specimens. The Royal Wurtemberg Industrial
and Art Department is in correspondence with such a house,
Messrs. T. C. Claude Brothers, 32 Rue du Sentier, Paris, and pays,




INSTRUCTION OF WORKMEN.                    163
for example, two hundred and fifty francs annually for about three
hundred new patterns of hangings. The patterns are tolerably
large; and from them drawings might be made for other purposes.
All the patterns are bound together, with a notice of the price and
plan of origin, and form a valuable portion of the library, which is
more especially useful to merchants. T. C. Claude Brothers undertake, among other things, subscriptions for drawings of the
most modern Parisian furniture.
"Apart from this collection of manufactures, the division for
machines and implements is to be found in an opposite room.
"As motive-powers to set in motion the other machines, there
are exhibited, a caloric machine, a machine moved by gas (by
Lenoir), a two-horse locomotive, as well as a stationary steam-engine.
After them are placed in rows articles of machinery; viz., a collection of English castings, such as water and steam cocks, pumps,
level indicators,.balances, valves, grease boxes, gas apparatus, dyanometers, &c. Farther on are articles of wrought and cast iron,
hydraulic and other presses, an hydraulic crane (Hebervinde), a
screw windlass, machine for raising water, fire-engines, weights,
flour and crushing mills, looms, boring-machines, implements for
drilling and turning, machines for hammering and planing, implements for various trades, &c. Besides these, there are machines
and contrivances for helping in household works, sewing-machines,
washing and drying machines, apparatus for filling and corking
bottles, beer-pumps, &c.
"The industrial art division of the exhibition numbers nearly
a thousand beautiful works, executed, for the most part, by the
newest processes of art printing. These are arranged according to
trades, and contain works of ornamentation and art industry, for
mechanicians, builders, joiners, paper-hangers, coach-builders, house.




164             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
painters, workers in metal, earthenware manufacturers, as well as
embroidery and other needleworkers, for weaving, book-printing,
and instruction in drawing.
" There are also exhibited a quantity of photographic pictures,
and a great collection of price-catalogues and price-lists, which,
besides giving information as to prices, and plans of origin, help
also- in the drawing-up of similar catalogues.
"A great part of this collection is made up by the apparatus for
instruction; and here we may particularly mention with approbation the rich collection of plaster and paper copies, as well as the
plaster figures for the drawing-school. This collection, from the.
way in which it is arranged, gives also an opportunity of studying
the various styles of art.
" The public drawing-school is annexed to the industrial art
collection, and has already been mentioned in the first part of this
report. This is attended by artisans, who use the collections for
their own special callings, and also by those learning art industries;
but especially by the teachers who wish to perfect themselves for
giving instruction in drawing. We may particularly mention, that,
in the industrial art division, artisans receive artistic instruction
gratis, and make diligent use of it.
" The chemical laboratory which is annexed to the exhibition
has the aim of making experiments as to new discoveries in the
department of chemical industry, as well as of undertaking the
execution of analyses. Of these, from five hundred to six hundred
are made annually for manufacturers, and at very moderate prices,
-almost under cost price.
"The not inconsiderable library of the exhibition, which embraces the department of industrial activity and commerce, is much
used, as also the reading-room, in which about seventy periodicals




INSTRUCTION OF WORKMEN.                    165
relating to industrial, commercial, and economical subjects, are taken
in, as also the directories of large commercial towns, and a list of
the patents granted in England and America. Lastly, there is in
the neighborhood of the exhibition a weaving school, with looms,
which need merely be mentioned here.
"One department of the exhibition, which in its foundation was
incorporated with it, has for some time ceased to exist: this is the
department for the exhibition of the industrial products of Wurtemberg.
" This was intended to make foreign merchants acquainted with
the home manufactures, and to promote their sale.. Native manufacturers were not allowed admittance, in order, as far as possible,
to protect the exhibiter from the imitation of new fabrics by competitors.
"Against all expectation, this department did not attain the
desired aim.
" The Royal Department for Industry and Commerce possesses
a yearly revenue of ninety thousand florins, of which thirty thousand florins are annually expended in acquisitions for the exhibition.
"This is open, on working-days and holidays, from ten to twelve
o'clock in the morning, and from two to six o'clock in the afternoon. All persons who visit it for the purposes of their trade, and
who will enter their names in a book placed for that purpose, have
free admittance. Others pay six kreutz entrance. On Sundays,
from half-past ten till half-past twelve o'clock, admittance is free,
without exception.
" The loan of patterns and of articles in the industrial art collection was particularly mentioned at Stuttgart, and pointed out as
being especially advantageous.




166            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
" That the influence of the exhibition is most salutary, as also
that it has effected a decided progress in the industry of Wurtemberg, all the manufacturers of the country would no doubt unanimously admit. How extensively it is made use of, is to be seen
from the fact that a third part of the collections is lent out at one
time, and serves for the thorough instruction of the workmen. Let
us reflect how long it often is before a small manufacturer (and it
is exactly this numerous class of persons which needs support) can
be made acquainted with new technical improvements, and can get
to see them; how long he continues to work with forms of which the
fashion has already become antiquated, and uses instruments which
have long been replaced by more convenient ones; let us think how
important any movement is to the manufacturer which furnishes
him with new ideas, and how necessary it is in the present day, for
the success of even the most skilled workman, that he should introduce novelties into the market, - we can then imagine how grateful
the hundreds of workpeople are to the Wurtemberg Museum, which
is of such service to them in their instruction, and the promotion
of their trades."
In chapter two mention is made of the reports of
the English artisans who were sent gratuitously to the
Paris Exhibition, 1867. One of these artisans, Mr.
Charles Alfred Hooper, cabinet-maker, says of museums: -
"The boys serve three or four years in the trade, and have better
advantages for getting an art education than we have. All the
schools are open to them, where the higher branches are taught;
and they are not kept, as our boys, to simply reading, writing, and




INSTRUCTION      OF WORKMEN.               167
arithmetic. The art galleries and museums are all open free to them
Sundays and week days, so that they imbibe a taste for art and
refined behavior before they can read or write."
Another, Mr. Aaron Green, porcelain decorator,
says:"The show-rooms and museum    at Sevres are, perhaps, the
greatest treat which a porcelain painter could be favored with:
there he can see specimens of every country and style. And they
are not mere specimens; but many of them are of the rarest quality
and value. The porcelain painting exhibited in the show-rooms
here is not equalled by any in the Great Exhibition, and is of such
surpassing excellence as to warrant the French in assuming a
superiority over any other nation. The painting of some of the
figure subjects is truly grand; while the fruit and flower painting
of Jaccober it seems impossible to surpass: indeed, I have never
seen any thing that at all approaches it. There are large vases
covered with ornament, which for beauty, distribution, and purity
of form and color, filled me with amazement, and a feeling somewhat approaching to humiliation.
"  think there can be no doubt but that the close proximity
of the workshops to the museum must be of immense value to the
decorators and designers, refreshing their memory, inciting their
ideas, and continually adding to their stock of knowledge. And in
this instance the French teach us a lesson; for, while the examples
purchased from time to time by the nation are very valuable and
instructive, they would be of more use and real service, if, instead
of being assembled in the metropolis, each locality that is pre-eminently famous for some speciality had its own museum. I think
by this means our national industry would be benefited, and the




108             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
general prosperity of the nation increased; for it is obvious, that,
under the present system, our artisans (at best) can see the examples they need only at rare intervals; and that often, when they
wish to make use of them, they have to depend upon recollections
considerably weakened by time, and consequently of a very imperfect character."
Another, Mr. Benjamin Lucraft, chair-maker, says:"I will now, in as few words as possible, offer two or three suggestions whereby this state of things may be altered, and the art
workmen of England enabled so to improve themselves in matters
of taste as to successfully compete with the now more fortunate
workmen of France. In the first place, the council of the Society
of Arts may use its influence with her Majesty's Government for
the establishment of local museums of art manufacture, with lecthrehalls, libraries, and other necessary adjuncts and appliances, for the
use and instruction of the people, and open at such hours as will
suit their convenience and opportunities for attending; which, as a
matter of course, will be in the evening, when lectures by competent men would be largely attended; and I venture to suggest that
the loading industries of certain districts may form their principal
feature. In this way, if for the north of London a museum should
be established, its position ought to be as near as possible the centre
of its manufacturing district; and the most important industries
of that district should be especially considered in the fitting-up, and
the specimens to be exhibited. For example, to assist the cabinetmakers, carvers, chair-makers, and upholsterers of Shoreditch,
Hoxton, and Lower Islington, - where this trade is carried on to
a great extent, -good specimens of different styles and times ir




INSTRUCTION OF WORKMEN.                     16b
these branches would be of the greatest value; and in the adjoining parishes of St. Luke and Clerkewell, where tens of thousands
of the population are dependent on the trade of the watchmaker,
the jeweller, the gold and silver workers, and all the various trades
connected with the precious metals, examples of these, from the
earliest times, and from all countries, would be of the greatest interest and benefit, not only to them, but to the whole nation."
Another, Mr. James Mackie, wood-carver, says: —
" The education of the workman is of primary importance. Our
schools have rendered valuable service; and much of our progress
is traceable to their influence; but they are capable of doing more,
if only a new life is infused into them. Our great buildings are full
of excellent examples, which deserve to be more studied than they
are. In our museums and galleries there are splendid examples
of art, that, if studied, would work wonderful changes in our taste
and power. I know that they are not esteemed as they should be;
and I also know that they are not so accessible as they should be.
Establish more museums of industrial art, be they ever so small,
and let them be open at convenient hours and days for the artisan
class. Let the architects look to the carving that is being done in
our new London; for much of it is a scandal and a disgrace to our
taste, and its effects upon the carver's education are most damaging.
Something better is demanded. If we are to have any art in our
streets, pray let it be good and instructive.' Let us have open spaces
in the metropolis arranged to please the eye and develop the taste;
and at the same time provide the means of rest for those who do
not want the accommodation supplied in places of resort that are
questionable. Do not forget that the education of the workman is




170            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
not confined to the established schools; for there are many ways ot
increasing his knowledge outside the walls of those useful places.
Let the workman be encouraged to learn and practise the arts of
drawing, modelling, and design; for they undoubtedly constitute
the very groundwork of the carver's art. Let the encouragement
be kind, friendly, and continuous, taking the form of liberal prizes
to the advanced workmen, accompanied with numerous small
prizes, in order to develop the industry of all. Lectures on art
would be of great value; for men would be by them induced to
study, and put forth their strength. Let our system of instruction and practice at our schools be simple, inviting, and interesting,
not dull, repulsive, and crushing, as it certainly has been to
many. We have the stuff amongst us: let it be cared for in a
large and liberal spirit, and it will be strange indeed if the England
of the future does not see something more worthy of her great
name."
Another, Mr. Thomas Jacob, cabinet draughtsman,
says: -
" To improve the taste of working-men, every possible opportunity should be given them of inspecting works of art during their
leisure hours, that they may see what has been and is being done
by the artists, who are but men like themselves. It is unreasonable
to expect a man to imitate or rival that which he has never seen;
but after he has seen these things, if he has talent and mettle of the
right sort in him, he will not long be content to lag behind his fellow workmen of this or any other country."
Mr. J. Scott Russell, in his book, " Systematic Tech.
nical Education of the English people," says: -




INSTRUCTION OF WORKMEN.                    171
"The two words' look there,' are often more valuable than an
hour's lecture. The pupil takes into his mind the form, color,
meaning, of the thing itself, which no words could give him: and,
in good collections of this sort, the insides of things are shown him
as clearly as the outsides; so that the pupil's knowledge is thorough,
instead of merely skin-deep. It should also be remembered that education by the eye is as fertile in fruit as education by the ear; and
that merely to familiarize men with the sight of things made as they
should be is the most effectual teaching to avoid and dislike what
is inferior or wrong. The material element of teaching is, therefore,
secondary only in value to the living element."
UNIVERSAL PRIMARY EDUCATION.
The French Imperial Commission described in the
second chapter elicited the following from the editors of
"The Journal of Professional Education," as to the elementary education of artisans:" There is no doubt that one of the first indispensable requirements in children who are to receive a professional training is a
knowledge of the elements of the science, - such as geometry, physics,
and chemistry,- in a degree adapted to the wants of any special industry. For this purpose, schools on the plan of the Turgot School
should be mulciplied in the great manufacturing centres, Paris,
Lyons, Nantes, Bordeaux, Lille, and Mulhouse. A preliminary
training of this description is required even by children who are
destined for the handicrafts. Every manufacturer knows the difference between an apprentice who has been thoroughly accustomed to
scientific definitions, and one who can merely read and write: even




172             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
in learning the use of tools, the former is twice as quick as the latter
besides understanding more easily the explanation of the master."
In their report the French Imperial Commission
say -
"In fact, the failure of the first foundations of this kind attempted in England, about 1825, under the name of' Mechanics
Institutes,' like those which since 1800 have succeeded in Scotland
under the direction of Dr. Birkbeck, who was their first founder,
proves that it is of paramount importance, first of all, to make sure
that the workmen for whom the lectures are intended have received
as sound and complete a primary education as possible. Thus
whilst, in Scotland, the Parochial Schools had spread among all
classes of the population an amount of instruction about equal to
that which the French law of 1833 defined as superior primnary instruction, the day and evening classes of the Mechanics' Institutes
obtained a complete and almost general success. In England, on
the contrary, the teachers in these institutions had scarcely begun
to talk of science to the mechanics, when they encountered an
obstacle which had not been found to exist in Scotland to the same
extent. The absence of elementary instruction was complete.
Lord Brougham and his friends were in advance of their age....
Of these institutions there soon remained nothing but the name and
the building; which last was used for other purposes. I/n most
cases, it was occupied by a mechanics' or middle-class club, where
persons who paid a small monthly contribution met to amuse themselves on winter evenings. There was no such thing as teaching."
In their summary of the inquiry on technical education in Germany and Switzerland, the sub-commission
of the French Imperial Commission speak thus: -




INSTRUCTION OF WORKMEN.                    173
"In the first place, and almost with one accord, all the persons
consulted have recognized and insisted on the necessity of a degree
of general preparatory instruction proportioned to the extent of
professional or industrial education which is to be its complement;
and which is intended to place every individual in a position to follow with success the career he may have in view, or has already embraced. But at the same time it has been as positively declared by the
most eminent principals of industrial establishments, that the deplorable and far too general absence of primary instruction, among even
the most intelligent workmen was one of the greatest and most
lamentable obstacles to the development of their faculties, and the
progress of industry....
"The course to be followed, and the different means to be employed, to improve and extend the education of workingmen already
engaged in the practice of their trades, have been among the most
important objects of the inquiry. The difficulties thrown in the
way of this kind of instruction by the almost total absence of primary education, and especially by the general ignorance of the
scientific forms of even the simplest reasoning, have been pointed
out to the commission. However, numerous examples tend to
show, that, by combining the study of drawing with the teaching
peculiar to the different industries, it is not impossible to obtain
happy results. The man who is in the habit of working any given
substance, often, indeed, acquires by a sort of intuition a sounder
and more intimate knowledge of its fundamental properties and
mechanical effects than he who has limited his studies to the desk."
In chapter two, reference is made to the report of
Prof. Leone Levi. He says: —
"Hitherto, the progress of Britain in industry and manufacture
15




174            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
has been achieved by a few leading minds operating with an army
of laborers wonderfully endowed with physical and moral power
to overcome the greatest resistance, yet singularly deficient in intellectual power. Incomparably greater would be her progress,
were science and art more diffused amongst the entire community.
What is required, therefore, is, first, a more extended and comprehensive system of primary and secondary instruction, well arranged,
and adapted to the requirements of society; and, secondly, the
diffusion of technical instruction, or instruction in those sciences
and arts which enter into the different occupations and professions
of life, altogether direct and practical in its teaching, and everywhere associated with the realities of life."
Mr. James Hole, honorable secretary of the Yorkshire Union of Mechanics' Institutes, in a letter to Lord
Robert Montagu, vice-president of the Committee of
Council on Education, England, says:" All who have expressed any opinions on this question concur
in thinking that we must have a much more complete system of
primary instruction before secondary education can become developed and improved to a satisfactory degree. For many years
past, the greater part of the educational work of our mechanics'
institutions has been to supply the mere elementary education
that ought to have been acquired in the day school; and the
great object for which mechanics' institutions were originally
established -viz., the technical education now so much talked
about - has remained almost in total abeyance."
"In his reply to Lord Stanley, Mr. Lumley encloses




INSTRUCTION     OF WORKMEN.               175
a report on popular education in Switzerland, which thus
speaks of primary education: —
"Instruction in the Swiss primary schools comprises reading and
writing in the mother-tongue (German, French, or Italian, according to the canton), arithmetic, and the first principles of geometry,
drawing, singing, Swiss and general history, geography, and the
elements of natural science. Gymnastics are also being gradually
introduced; and female needlework is taught to the girls at fixed
hours in the girls' and mixed schools."
Mr. J. Scott Russell, in his work on " The Systematic
Technical Education of the English People," says:"Unhappily, mechanics, when taught to working-men, is generally either taught superficially, unphilosophically, or with little
or no reference to the business of their life. Economy of bodily
strength, best ways of handling things, best ways of moving things,
best ways of helping each other, best ways of carrying, lifting,
shifting things, -these are seldom taught. Some foolish algebraical
formula, or abstract geometrical diagram, is put before the poor
mechanic, and called science. As well call it magic....
" I am hopeless in the matter of educating the'working-man'
who has grown up into manhood without education. For the
most part, such men are too old to learn. I have never seen, but
exceptionally, much good come of trying to drive figures and geometrical problems, and mechanical theorems, and light and shade,
into the head of a full-grown workman who had failed to get a good
education when young. There have been brilliant exceptions - how
brilliant! how few! "




CHAPTER     VI.
DRAWING.
THE evidence which is presented in this chapter,
coming from many and the most trustworthy sources,
shows beyond reasonable doubt, that among all the
branches of instruction, from the lowest to the highest,
which can contribute to the technical education of
either sex, drawing, in its varied forms and applications, is the one most essential to make common. As,
in teaching other things, somewhat different methods
are successfully followed, so the evidence shows, as was
to be expected, that somewhat different methods are
successfully followed in teaching drawing. While there
are methods which receive the universal condemnation of good educators, there are other methods which
receive their universal approval, though not in the same
degree. The methods must, of course, vary, more or
less, according to the age of the pupils, according to the
circumstances under which the instruction is given,
176




DRAWING.                   177
and according to the particular result which it is desired
to attain. The following points appear to be clearly
settled: -
1. There is such an intimate relation between the
different departments of drawing and art, while broad
culture is always so much better than narrow culture,
that the best results in any one direction can be
secured only when the instruction is general. To become a thorough master of any department of drawing
or art, one needs to be acquainted with all departments.
Hence the instruction in drawing should be, whenever
possible, broad, and not simply special, even when
special results alone are sought.
2. As it is impossible that every one should be thoroughly instructed in all the departments of drawing, it
is well, in determining what the public schools should
attempt, to divide drawing into three general courses: a
preparatory course, an industrial course, and an artistic
course. The preparatory course, embracing the elements
of both industrial and artistic drawing, should be pursued
by all pupils alike. When this course - whch should be
quite liberal, extending at least through the grammar
school —has been finished, those pupils of the high
school who are to engage in industrial pursuits, but
have not time to take both the industrial and artistic
courses, should give special, though not exclusive, atten



178          TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
tion to projection and working drawings. For a similar
reason, those pupils of the high school who desire to
obtain a more purely artistic culture will give special
attention to shading and perspective, to drawing the
human figure, and from nature. As it is not the
proper business of the public schools to make specialists, the instruction in the industrial course should
be, in the main, confined to those things which
the different industries have in common. So, too, the
instruction in the artistic course should be, in the
main, confined to those things only which belong alike
to the different artistic professions. Those things which
specially belong to any one industry, or to any one
department of art, and are therefore of limited use,
should usually be left to special schools.'3. In its general character the instruction should be
rational, not dogmatic; that is, the pupils should be
taught the reason for what they do, so that every drawing, every line they make, will be an expression of
intelligence. With rare exceptions, the teacher need
not, and the judicious teacher will not, give young
pupils things to do which involve principles clearly
beyond the range of their comprehension. When this
must be done, then the less said about the principles
the better: of necessity the instruction must, in such
case, degenerate into dogmatism. Dogmatic instruction




DRAWING.                   179
will simply enable the pupils to do again what they
have once done, -a thing of great value indeed; but
rational instruction, giving a mastery of principles, will
not only enable the pupils to do again what they have
once done, but to make new applications of the principles learned. It should be the aim to produce workmen, designers, artists, who can do something more
than imitate; who, working in obedience to fundamental principles, can meet the ever-changing requirements of actual life, can give the world original
creations. Those pupils whose instruction in drawing
simply enables them to copy have been poorly instructed indeed; and the instruction will tell adversely
upon their future careers.
4. There are two general and very different modes
which are followed in the execution of drawings. The
first lays great stress upon fine finish, less upon expression; the lines are drawn with the utmost care from
the outset; and the shading is elaborately executed
with a pencil-point. The last lays great stress upon
expression, less upon fine finish; the lines are drawn
boldly from the outset, it being left to time and practice
to give accuracy; while the shading is rapidly done with
the stump. The first, which may be called the English
method, tends to produce workmen, designers, and
artists who work slowly, and finish finely, but whose




180          TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
work is lacking in life and character. The second,
which may be called the French method, gives rapid
execution, and yields products, which, while oftentimes
lacking in finish, are always instinct with life and
character. The preference is given to the latter method
both for purely artistic and for industrial purposes.
But evidently the best method must aim to secure both
finish and expression with celerity of execution. Any
product which is both well designed and well finished
must command a better price than if it is only well
designed or only well finished.
5. From time to time, teachers should vary somewhat
their method of instruction. They should accustom
their pupils to use different materials; as the blackboard, which permits such freedom of movement, should
occasionally take the place of paper. They should not
always require their pupils to draw from the flat, nor
always from objects, nor always from the human figure.
Indeed, the instruction should be judiciously graduated, with ever something of variety for the purpose
both of better pleasing and better disciplining.
6. After a little preliminary practice in the drawing
and division of lines, pupils should begin with exercises in
drawing from flat copies, which should be symmetrically
regular; that is, geometrical or conventionalized forms,
without perspective and without shading. These exer



DRAWING.                  181
cises should be continued long enough to familiarize
the learner with pure form; to familiarize him with the
leading principles of design, especially as applied to
textile fabrics and to all flat ornamentation; to familiarize him with the different styles of decorative art,
both ancient and modern. The copies, therefore,
should be largely historical, and the most beautiful it is possible to select. When the pupils have thus
become acquainted with what has been done, and have
learned the principles according to which it was done,
they will be prepared not only to reproduce intelligently, but to originate intelligently: indeed, while
they are working at their copies, they should be constantly required to produce new designs, which they
will be both able and pleased to do, and thus will become much more than mere copyists. Again: the taste
of the pupils - especially if " taste is the recollection
of the beautiful," as it has been defined- must be
greatly improved by the long study of such beautiful
forms as the copies will furnish.
When the pupils have learned to draw regular forms,
which permit them to verify their work and to determine whether their drawings are accurate or not, then,
and not till then, should they begin to draw irregular
forms, like those in nature, which do not permit them
to verify their work and determine whether or not their
16




182          TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
drawings are accurate. If the pupils cannot learn to
draw regular forms accurately, it is absurd to expect
that they will ever learn to draw accurately forms
which are irregular. Until they are able to do the
first with a good degree of success, they should not be
set about doing the second.  The symmetrical should
therefore precede the unsymmetrical: that which can
be verified should precede that which cannot be verified.
A little intermixture, perhaps, of the latter with the former, for the sake of variety, may not be objectionable. But
when it comes to drawing from nature, from unsymmetrical objects, what should be the general character of
such drawing in the public schools? As a chief reason
for putting drawing into the public schools must be industrial, it is evident that those natural objects should
be first taken which have the most to do with practical
art. It is the vegetable world, not the animal world,
nor the human figure, from which practical art, both
ancient and modern, has derived the greater portion of
its principles and its designs. It is particularly appropriate, therefore, that pupils in the public schools
should first learn to draw those vegetable forms -leaves,
flowers, vines —which have contributed so much to
practical art. Useful as it undoubtedly is, especially
in the matter of discipline, to draw the human figure,
yet it is an indirect and laborious way of reaching




DRAWING.                   183
practical results. Indeed, it may well be questioned
whether satisfactory results can ever be reached in this
way alone, as some have claimed.
7. Taken at the proper time, but not at the outset,
it is clear that drawing from geometrical models and
beautiful artificial objects, from beautiful ornaments in
relief, and from graceful casts, is of the most unquestionable value, both industrial and purely artistic. The
pupils thus learn to represent on paper objects having the three dimensions. For industrial purposes,
the value consists mainly in disciplining the imagination, training the eye, and improving the taste.
Every artisan should be so thoroughly trained in this
species of drawing as to be able to see mentally the
exact form of any object he is required to construct,
determining at once the direction of each line. If it
is a beautiful object that is required, he should be able to
make it, which he can never do unless he is first able to
discriminate between what is, and what is not, beautiful.
This species of drawing involves somewhat of perspective, of light and shade, - things which are indirectly
of much industrial value, while they lead directly to
the highest artistic results.
8. Drawing with instruments, which is almost wholly
practical in its applications, can and should be taught
in the public schools. While the great object is to train




184          TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
the hand and eye, to teach the principles of design, to
discipline the judgment and cultivate the taste, by
freehand drawing, yet the industrial applications of
drawing, which can only be mastered by the use of
instruments, are so many, and so exceedingly important,
that the ruler, triangle, compasses, and bow-pen, if nothing more, should find a place in all public schools
except the primary. The evidence shows that children from ten to thirteen years of age, if properly
taught, can be made to comprehend, and to execute with
instruments, not only linear drawings, based on plane
geometry, but working-drawings, which involve the
principles of projection, and are based on descriptive
geometry. It is very essential that each artisan should
know enough of the principles of projection to be able
at least to read the working-drawings which are placed
in his hand, if he has not skill enough to make such
drawings. Very few American artisans, whether carpenters, ship-builders, masons, machinists, or others, now
know enough to do this; and so they are obliged to
work under constant supervision, and at reduced wages.
It is not the business of the common schools to make
draughtsmen, but to teach all enough of the theory
and applications of projection to meet this universal
want of artisans. The finished draughtsmen must be
the product of the special schools. A knowledge of




DRAWING.                   185
perspective, which is the drawing of objects as they
appear, is most readily obtained after a knowledge of
projection (orthographic), which is the drawing of
objects as they are. Even the artist, therefore, is
served by a knowledge of the general principles
involved in working-drawings. Again: there is no
one of either sex who can well afford to dispense
with tile peculiar discipline which is derived from
instrumental drawing. The use of instruments should
alternate with freehand practice.
9. The pupils should not be wholly dependent on the
teacher for instruction, as some have thought it best
they should be. Above the primary schools a printed
text should go with all the copies (whether the copies are
in books or on charts), and with all models (whether for
freehand or instrumental practice). This text, carefully
prepared, will afford a clearer explanation than can usually be given off-hand by the teacher; and, further, the
pupils can go over it again and again until it is fully
comprehended. With a text for their guidance, the
pupils can make much more rapid and more intelligent
progress than they can possibly make without it; while
the labor of the teacher is thereby greatly diminished.
Even with a good text in the hands of his pupils, the
teacher will find enough to do in the teaching of drawing, as he finds enough to do in teaching arithmetic, his




186          TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
pupils having a book for their guidance. The teacher
must often give dictation-exercises, that the pupils may
learn to imagine the form of a drawing from the oral
description, as, in actual life, they must frequently
imagine the forms of objects from oral descriptions.
The pupils having executed the drawings, each according
to his interpretation of the oral description, the teacher
then places the drawing on the blackboard, that the
pupils may see whether they interpreted the oral description correctly. Again: the teacher should often exercise
the pupils in reproducing from memory drawings previously executed, whether from flat copies or from models.
But, after making due allowance for all methods and
devices, the progress of the pupils will be greatly accelerated if each has a text telling how to execute the
given exercises, and describing the principles of drawing
and designing. Indeed, it should never be forgotten
that one of the great objects of early education is to
teach pupils to use books readily, in order that they may
continue to advance in their studies after leaving school,
when they have no teacher to direct, but must rely
wholly upon books. To-day very few American artisans
are able to obtain instruction from even the best prepared book, because they find it so difficult to interpret
printed language.
10. Like the flat copies, the models and other objects




DRAWING.                     187
placed before the pupils should be the most beautiful it
is possible to obtain. Well-appointed museums which
can be frequently visited by the pupils will greatly aid
in the development of correct taste. So, too, the taste
will be decidedly influenced by the architecture which
comes under the daily observation.
11. When   logical demonstration   can  be   supplemented, as often it may be, by graphic demonstration,
the understanding of any subject is always rendered
much easier. For this reason, the power to draw is of
great service to the teacher, and should be acquired by
every one who aims to do the best work in the schoolroom. When acquired, it should be frequently used for
the amusement and instruction of the pupils in various
branches of study.
THE FRENCH IMPERIAL COMMISSION.
[See Chap. 2, for particulars about the French Imperial Commission,
to whom what follows for a number of pages is accredited.]
In his evidence before the commission, Rev. Father
Baudine, assistant superior of the Christian Brothers'
School, says: -
"A series of drawing copy-books was published in 1860, adapted
to popularize the drawing of ornament in all schools, from the
village school to the middle-class school of large towns. In the
method adopted in giving this elementary instruction in the draw.




188            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
ing of ornament, care is taken to select copies on good grounds
only; that is to say, either on the score of taste or style. Every
study, every fragment, has a name attached to it, giving the character of the style to which it belongs. Thus, after going through
the course of copy-books, the pupil can easily distinguish between
Grecian, Roman, Byzantine, Gothic, Renaissance, &c., orders of
ornamentation, and is even sufficiently advanced to make an original design belonging to one of those orders.
"Drawing from the cast, and modelling, naturally follows on that
of ornament; but the little time which the junior pupils can devote
to the subject permits this branch to be carried on only in the adult
evening classes. To ornamental drawing ought to be added geometrical drawing; being of much more importance to the workingclasses. The method adopted in teaching this subject consists in
hanging up before the class a large sheet, four feet by three, containing copies of joiner's work, upholstery, carpentry, architecture,
and machines. The pupils have by them figured sketches of these
copies so as to be able to reproduce on their books these copies to any
required scale.. By this means, a class of from fifty to sixty, and even
a hundred, pupils can work at the same subject, and follow the explanations of the teacher. To facilitate still more the study of this
subject, and in order that the pupils may have a better knowledge
of what objects they reproduce, they have set before them solid
models of the same objects as are on the large sheets, - some in
wood, others in plaster or cast metal. The models are cut by vertical
or horizontal planes; so that the details for the drawing are better
understood. To these models others are added to be handled by
the pupils themselves, that they may make sketches of them,
with different elevations and plans. By this means it has been
found possible to make children of from ten to thirteen years understand the theory of projections."




DRAWING.                        189
In his evidence before the commission, M. Delahaye,
director of the Professional School at Batignolles, member of the Council of Head Masters of the Department
of the Seine, thus expresses himself:"Great importance is attached to the teaching of drawing, so
much so, that the boys of seven years old commence to learn drawing at the same time that they begin to learn to write. A peculiar
method is adopted in this subject, which might, with advantage,
be adopted in the primary schools. Paper ruled in squares is used;
so that, by the aid merely of the ruler and pen, a child can make
many different drawings; which, it must be confessed, are not
very artistic, but which accustom him to neatness, give him a
notion of symmetry, and educate his taste. When  these children come afterwards to the use of the compass and bow-pen,
and to tint their drawings, their hand is practised, and often very
skilful."
In his evidence before the commission, M. Bardin,
professor of Industrial Drawing to the Communal
Schools of the City of Paris, says: —
"All the models that are put before them are accompanied by
a descriptive text. Each of them comprehends and retains what he
studies. He can work alone. The professor has only to correct the
work, or to explain a point which has not been understood at first.
These models, thus explained, have an immense advantage over an
engraving which does not even bear an indication of the drawing
that it represents; besides which, a text accompanying a drawing
16*




190            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
is always more precise than the oral description that the master
can give to each pupil, and helps to keep alive the remembrance
of it."
In his evidence before the commission, M. Lequien,
director of the Communal School of Drawing in the
Rue Menilmontant, Paris, says: -
" I believe instruction in these subjects (linear and architectural
drawing) to be indispensable to all engaged in the manufacture of
furniture. Cabinet-making particularly would derive great benefit,
both as regards the proportions, elegance, and purity of form, as
well as regards the harmony of the mouldings, which are often disproportionate, or of different styles.  A piece of furniture, no
matter what it may be, - whether a cabinet, sideboard, bed, or
console,- is nothing but an edifice applied to a useful purpose.
Architectural design should rule the whole as well as the details;
and it is from the judicious combinations of these elements, arranged
with a view to its use, that it derives its merit. Furniture destined
for repose ought to be of simple construction: the ornaments with
which it is often overloaded appear to be made rather to hide the
clumsiness of its form than to embellish it. Ought not the furniture
of a room to agree both in shape and color with the architecture?
It is a whole, each part of which should be in harmony. In this
last part of the work the architect is often replaced by the paperhanger, who, having no architectural or decorative knowledge,
allows himself to be guided by the extravagant caprices of fashion
or by a traditional routine. Again: bronzes, lustres, candelabras,
cups, and the basement of a clock, may all be considered in relation
to their architectural fitness. Ceramic art borrows its first and




DRAWING.                        191
principal value from form. No matter how great the merit of the
paintings which ornament porcelain, it is the proportion and the
elegance of the. shape which ought to be the first consideration.
In Monumental art, statuary itself is subordinate, in its proportions
and its effect, to the laws of the science of lines, which ought to prevail in every manufacture."
In his evidence before the commission, M. Gerardon, founder and director of the Central School at
Lyons, professor at La Martiniere School, says: —
"The method by which descriptive geometry is taught is also
peculiar, and well worthy of notice. For this study each pupil is
furnished with a small tin box about eight inches long, four inches
broad, and three-quarters of an inch in depth. This box is filled
with yellow wax, prepared so as not to turn hard. It represents
to the pupil the horizontal plane of projection. The edge opposite
to him is the ground line; and he can imagine for himself the plane
of elevation passing through this ground line. Small strips of iron
wire serve to represent lines in space, the projections on the horizontal plane by laying them on the box, and those on the plane of
elevation by fixing them on the edge which represents the ground
line. The movement of these strips is effected by direction of the
teacher; and the pupil is enabled easily to understand a diagram in
descriptive geometry.
" Instruction in drawing consists of machine-drawing in perspective and projection, as well as of the method of tinting. At first
the pupil draws on his slate to facilitate correction, and avoid waste
of paper. The first models which he has to draw from are figures in
iron wire, representing cubes, prisms, pyramids, &c.: then he draws




192            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
parts of machines, and finally complete machines. Afterwards he
proceeds to drawing projections, first in figured sketches, and then
in drawings to scale: finally he completes his studies by learning
to tint. The pupils are arranged in a circle round the model,
which is placed on a stand in the midst of them. They are seated
on stools carrying a stage to support the slate or drawing-board.
There is also a class for modelling and moulding; but it is not
numerously attended..
" At the Central School, as at La Martiniere, the pupil, from his
first entrance, begins to draw in perspective from models: then he
passes quickly to projection, which is more closely connected with
the labor of the workshop. As soon as he has acquired sufficient
skill, the following plan is pursued: A model is placed before twelve
or fourteen pupils; the teacher takes it to pieces before them, explains the principal arrangements, draws attention to the different
forms, and, after having given all necessary explanations, removes
the model. The pupil must then execute from memory, and without instruments, sketches of the whole, and of the details and
sections required by the teacher. When the time fixed for the execution of this drawing from memory has elapsed, the model is replaced before the pupils: the teacher points out the corrections to
be made; and a pupil placed close to the model takes all the measurements, and dictates the dimensions. The model is once more
removed; and from the sketch the pupil must now make a drawing
to scale. This kind of work, and a little drawing of ornament, and
practice in tinting, constitute the study of the first year. During
the second and third year, the pupils, while continuing from time
to time the drawing from memory, pass on to another kind of study.
Drawings of machines are given to them, but not to be servilely
copied: they are required to draw a section on a line marked on the




DRAWING.                        193
drawing. In this way the pupil can never copy a drawing without
understanding it: he must analyze it in all its particulars for himself. To others, again, is given a drawing, -as, for example, of a
steam-engine,- taken from some work on machinery, together with
the text which accompanies it. The teacher explains to the pupil
a certain portion of the machine, - the cylinder, for instance, -with
the arrangement of its parts: the latter must then draw every piece
of it (as if it were taken completely to pieces) to a certain fixed scale.
When this work is finished, the copy is removed; and the pupil
must proceed to draw the whole fiom the drawings which he has
already made of the parts. In these two divisions the young men
are also practised in making designs of parts of machines according to the principles of the strength of materials, which they have
learned in school; designs for boilers according to the principles
of physics; designs of machines or of buildings of all kinds, as
applications of the sciences which they have studied at school.
As a supplement to the study of drawing, the pupils of the
second and third years visit, every Thursday, certain manufactories which are fixed upon, and must bring back figured sketches
of some of the machines: these they must afterwards reproduce as
finished drawings to scale. Afterwards, from all these drawings,
a selection is made of those which possess most interest, or are of
the greatest utility; and, these being lithographed, an album is
made, intended specially for the use of the pupils of the school."
In his evidence before the       commission, M. Malet,
professor at the Imperial Artillery School at Douai,
says:" The class in drawing meets every day from half-past twelve to
two o'clock. Formerly it used to meet from five to seven; and prob17




194            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
ably the old arrangement will be resumed, as it had the advantage-of
accustoming the pupils to draw both by artificial light and by day.
light. The class contains about seventy or eighty pupils, of from
thirteen to fourteen years of age. As to the method of instruction,
it is that which is generally adopted: the basis is the study of the
figure, and effect is obtained by line shading. But this method,
though good in principle, is, in the opinion of M. Malet, not one
which is to be recommended for those who are not fine-art students,
but have need of the power of sketching rapidly and accurately.
He would wish to see introduced three divisions -one preparatory,
another industrial, and the third artistic - for the students who wish
to become artists, and aspire to the Fine Art School (Ecole des
Beaux Arts)."
In his evidence before the commission        M. Gouin,
civil engineer, Paris, says:"Nothing is more difficult to form than a machine designer and
mechanical engineer. A hundred engineers for making railways cal
be found before one who can make a good machine is discovered.
To become a good mechanical engineer great patience is required:
five or six years must be passed in a drawing office, and a year
or two in making tracings, so as to know a machine as a whole, as
well as its details, and not to be obliged to have recourse to calculation or drawings to know how to trace a piece which has to be
made. Just as an artist is not compelled to measure every time
the proportion of the head to the body to make a correct study of
the figure, but has it all in his eye, so a machine designer ought tc
have in his head all the relations of the different parts of a machine.
This knowledge is only acquired after a prolonged examination of
excellent models."




DRAWING.                        195
In their elaborate report, based upon their wide investigations, the Imperial Commission say:" One immediate conclusion from the facts above stated is, that
drawing, in all its applications, may and must be regarded as one
of the simplest and most direct means which technical education
can employ; since it renders visible to the eye, and perceptible to
the mind, most of the propositions of elementary and descriptive
geometry with their applications, and likewise affords the means of
submitting to calculation many mechanical phenomena and the proportions of the constituent parts of machines. Moreover, in all
that concerns the art of construction, drawing familiarizes the
pupil with execution and with the proportions which science or
practice have sanctioned.
"All these considerations have led the commission to propose:"1. That, for the instruction of apprentices and workmen, it is
advisable to encourage, in preference to purely oral lectures, the
establishment of regular classes to be held especially on Sundays
or in the evenings of working-days.
"2. That this teaching should not be at all dogmatical, but
should make it a rule to explain in the simplest possible manner
the principles of science by the aid of facts, and by showing their
applica tion.
"3. Lastly, that drawing, with all its applications to the different industrial arts, should be considered as the principal means to
be employed in technical instruction....
"Drawing is, in all branches of industrial art, a means so evident,
so useful, and so indispensable for embodying the conceptions of
the mind, for studying and fixing the forms to be given to productions, for rendering the creative idea, that there can be no need of




196             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
insisting on the necessity of developing that branch of instruction
which has for its object the diffusion of such an acquirement among
artisans of every class. This necessity, which has long been deeply
felt in France, has led to the multiplication, in the great industrial
centres, of schools for art and scientific drawing, which, while offering to the national taste the means of manifesting itself, have
hitherto secured to French industry a great superiority in a large
portion of its manufactures.
" The Universal Exhibition of 1855, and especially that of London in 1862, have clearly shown the results which England has
already obtained from the immense efforts - among others the
establishment of the splendid museum at Kensington - she has
made, ever since 1852, to deprive France of that superiority in the
works of industrial art, which the first exhibition of 1852 had proved
to be indisputable. Soon after this exhibition, the most competent
judges in England, far fiom refusing to acknowledge the pre-eminence of our artists over theirs, publicly proclaimed it; and, with
the promptitude and active energy peculiar to their nation, they set
about diffusing through all classes of society a taste for drawing and
the arts, not only among working-men and artists, but also among
the general public.
"The English Government, abandoning its principle of nonintervention in home administration, decided at this period on
taking up the general organization of art education, and formed
in the privy council, a new section under the name of' Science and
Art Department,' especially charged with propagating the study of
drawing.
"The institutions dependent on the Science and Art Department
are divided into two categories: —
"' 1. Public Teaching: Schools of art and local associations of pri.




DRAWING.                        197
mary schools for teaching drawing; annual inspections of the local
schools and primary schools combined in associations; annual local
competitions; Central Museum at Kensington; loans of models and
books on art from the museum to local schools; exhibition in the
localities of the articles thus lent; pecuniary grants to the local
schools for purchasing models, and, in certain cases, towards the
expense of first establishment.
"'2. Training of Art Masters: Examinations of fitness, and
graduated certificates; free admission of exhibitioners from the
schools of art, and of pupil-teachers intended to become art-masters;
normal school of art; certificates of fitness to teach elementary
drawing, given upon examination to primary school-teachers of
either sex.'
"Notwithstanding this organization, which would seem to indicate that the Art Department has become a sort of university for
teaching drawing, acting like the French University for Literature
and Science, the action of the department is limited to encouraging
local or private foundations, to directing their efforts, to preparing
and training capable teachers, and to indicating by general programmes the proper course to be followed.
" The summary programme of the central schools of drawing is
as follows: -
"'1. Elementary Course: Geometrical drawing, linear perspective, free-hand drawing with shading, drawing from reliefs,
figure-drawing from lithographed or engraved models, principle
of water-color drawing.
" 2. Superior Course: Drawing from relief, painting, ornaments,
flowers, still life, landscape.
"' 3. Special or Technical Course: Art anatomy, elementary composition, designing, modelling, architectural and machine drawing.'
17*




198             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
"MM. Marguerin and Mothere's remarkable       report, from
which we have copied the above, contains very complete informa.
tion respecting all this organization, which, in 1861, taught drawing to 91,836 pupils, more or less advanced.
"Everybody knows the magnificent Art Museum at South Kensington, for the founding of which the Science and Art Department
has collected from all quarters masterpieces of every kind, at a
total expense to the State of not less than a million pounds sterling
since 1852. Besides this outlay for first establishment, the Art Department has a yearly grant of eighty thousand pounds sterling.
"By the extent of the resources placed at the disposal of this
special and new department, created for the purpose of enabling
English industry to compete with ours, an opinion may be formed
of the importance rightly attributed in England to the participation
of the art of design in all industrial productions..
"England is not the only rival of French industry which has
recognized its superiority with regard to works which require the
aid of art and taste. Germany, moved by the same sentiment, has
organized, since 1852, at less cost, but perhaps with as much success,
drawing-schools of different degrees. In all the practical schools
and in the polytechnic institutions, the teaching of drawing holds
a prominent place..
"The drawing-school which is justly regarded as the best in
Central Germany is that of Nuremberg, the director of which has
laid down the principle, that, to become a skilful industrial artist,
it is indispensable first to study art in all its varieties. Under his
energetic supervision a great number of professors and artists have
been trained, who have disseminated good methods, and have
brought about in the productions of industry, especially in those
of Nuremberg, a most remarkable artistic improvement....




DRAWING.                        199
"If the teaching of the art of drawing, considered as a whole,
and with its principal varieties, should be regarded from a generally
elevated point of view, even when the sole object is its application
to the works of industry, it is advisable that the pupils should successively cultivate the higher branches, - the human figure, architecture, ornament, modelling, and sculpture on wood and stone;
so that one and the same composition or subject may be conceived,
treated, and executed by the same artist. To provide against the principal idea of a work being'either weakened or entirely lost, the artist
should be so far instructed in the different branches as not to be
obliged, as some historical painters have been in times past, to get
the architecture of their buildings drawn by one assistant, the landscape by a second, and sometimes the horses by a third. The history of the art and of the styles which have prevailed, and characterize
the productions of different epochs, ought also to be the object of
serious study; so that the artist may not be in danger of jumbling
together in the same production the forms and ornaments belonging to very different periods and styles, as was the case with many
of the English exhibitors in 1862. On this account, the demand for
the founding of a superior school of industrial art, made in 1850 by
the leading Parisian artists, appears to be well founded.
"Besides the study of artistic drawing, properly so called, that
of linear drawing, based on geometrical principles, has also been
widely extended in Germany. Descriptive geometry is taught elementarily, and with entirely practical applications, in the drawingclasses opened for artisans: there they also acquire the theory of
projections....
"Independently of the question of taste and art, which is of such
vital importance for a great number of the higher branches of
French industry, there is also a necessity, as many of the members




200            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
of the commission have remarked, for introducing first into the
primary schools, then into the technical classes of all kinds, the
teaching and practice of geometrical drawing. This subject
presents for the instruction of artisans the twofold advantage of
giving the exact representation of the forms and proportions of
objects, and the not less important one of supplying with the aid
of models and simple apparatus, in a great number of cases, a direct
means of demonstration. From this point of view, the teaching
of geometrical drawing may be considered as a most effective auxiliary means in the method adopted for the technical instruction
of workmen. Convinced of this truth, the commission expressed
the following opinion:"'The commission attaches great importance to extending the
teaching of geometrical drawing as well in primary schools as in
establishments devoted to technical instruction. It regards geometrical drawing as a most useful training for the practice of various
trades, and as an excellent means of direct demonstration."'
The English editor of the report, as printed by the
English Government, adds a note to the following
effect: -
" It may be remarked, however, that, in instruction in linear and
machine drawing, we are much behind the countries of the Continent. It is not unusual to find in the drawing-offices of our great
machine-works foreign draughtsmen. One of the reasons for this,
no doubt, is the smaller rate of wages at which they can be
obtained; but it seems, also, that the special instruction they have
received in really scientific drawing gives them great advantage over
the English draughtsman, who has studied his art only by rule of




DRAWING.                         201
thumb. A reference to the table of the attendance at the government science classes will show, that, since the year 1864, the number
of students attending the three drawing subjects -practical and
descriptive geometry, machine construction and drawing, and building construction and drawing-has steadily and considerably increased. When practically and scientifically taught, the subject
of descriptive geometry takes the place of mathematics in the technical training of those, who, from their limited elementary education,
cannot appreciate the value of rigid mathematical proof, nor comprehend the use of formulae."
The sub-commission of the French Imperial Commission, appointed to inquire'into the state of technical
instruction in Germany and Switzerland, say in their
general report: -
"We may add as a general fact, that, in all kinds of technical
instruction whatever, freehand and linear drawing rightly hold a
piominent place; that they serve as a means of teaching by affording ocular demonstration of many matters which could scarcely be
well understood by merely mental effort. As for the methods followed for this special teaching, that which -without exception, from
the high school of Nuremberg to the humblest village classes in
Wurtemberg - has always and everywhere been most successful is
the one proposed by the late M. Dupuis, which has been too much
neglected in France. It consists, as everybody knows, in making
the pupils, either at the very outset, or after a few attempts at copying model drawings (to give freedom to the hand, and accustom it
to act in accord with the eye), draw from subjects in relief: at first
very simple, then combined and varied in position; rising gradually




202             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
from subjects of ornaments in relief to drawing from the round or
from nature. With a few unimportant modifications, this system is
found in nearly all the schools of Germany. Persuaded as we are that
one of the first and most important measures to be taken in organizing industrial education consists in teaching everywhere the art
of drawing, we feel bound at once to call attention to the choice of
this method."
In their special report on Austria, the sub-commission say:"Drawing is taught in the earliest classes from models in relief;
and no copying is allowed, except for the purpose of teaching pupils
to handle the pencil at the very outset. In the first year, the pupils of
the first class, eleven years of age, practise freehand and elementary
geometrical drawing, and make sketches of solid bodies and of geometrical forms, after models like those used in the Dupuis method.
The use of rule and compasses is not permitted. They thus continue freehand drawings of ornaments from casts, make copies of
heads, and finish by drawing from the round. In the third class,
which contains pupils from thirteen to fifteen years of age, drawing
receives considerable extension, especially with regard to its appli —
cation to the practice of the trades the pupils intend to follow.
With this view, special care is taken to make each pupil execute
the designs which are most likely to be useful to him. For teaching
descriptive geometry, much use is. made of rectangular planes and
pins, which render sensible to the eye all the rules of the projections. This, in fact, is the mode of teaching which has been proposed and employed by M. Olivier, professor at the Conservatory
of Arts and Trades. His apparatus consists of two wooden planes




DRAWING.                       203
articulated with hinges, and covered with cork, in which the pins
are stuck to represent the lines of projection.
"The choice and number of the subjects treated in the threeyears' studies are such that the young men who intend to follow
the practical industries of constructing buildings or machines may
obtain in the lower practical schools sufficient instruction to become
master-builders, capable of understanding the plans to be executed,
and of representing their own ideas in drawings. These lower
schools are, therefore, well adapted for giving the pupils the theoretical instruction calculated to make them clever master-workmen,
foremen, and conductors of works, when they shall have acquired
the practical part of their trades in workshops and building-yards.
The pupils who wish to continue their studies pass on to the fourth,
fifth, and sixth classes, in which the teaching of drawing is at once
theoretical and practical....
" Of all the practical schools in Germany, that of Prague is certainly the one where linear drawing is best taught; and we are
inclined to attribute this fact to the attention given from the very
outset to the practice of freehand drawing, which early habituates
the pupil to trace his lines with a light hand."
In their special report on Bavaria, the sub-commission say of Nuremberg:
"In this town, so noted for its various manufactures, there are
several drawing-schools of different degrees, according to -the trade
the pupils intend to follow. The first and most important is the
higher school of industrial drawing conducted by M. Kroling. It
is justly regarded in Germany as the one which has rendered most
service to industry. In order that the pupils may, in a few years,




204             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
acquire some real skill, none are admitted but those who have
already attained considerable proficiency. The principle adopted
by the professor of this school is, that, in order to form good industrial draughtsmen, the pupils must pass through all the degrees
of artistic drawing; so that they may be able, in the very varied and
different combinations required by manufacturers, to blend judiciously and harmoniously all the various kinds, without there being
any necessity, as too often happens, for having recourse to one artist
for the architectural part, to another for the figures, and to a third
for the ornaments, &c.
"As for the method of teaching, it is exclusively based on drawing from models in relief, graduated according to the proficiency
of the learners, and advancing from the simplest models to the
finest left by ancient art, and then to nature. The talented director
expresses his antipathy to- copying from lithographs, which he
regards as caligraphy, not drawing. In accordance with these
principles, he has formed for his pupils very fine and very complete
collections of models. The teaching is distributed in three divisions: 1. Drawing of ornament; 2. Drawing from  the antique;
3. Drawing from nature. After attaining proficiency in drawing,
the pupils pass on to modelling and sculpture in wood and stone:
then, as soon as they have attained a certain degree of skill, they
have to compose designs, and to model and carve them.
"The general opinion of the persons who have made a study of
questions connected with teaching, not only in Bavaria, but also
in other parts of Germany, is, that the Nuremberg school has contributed more than any other to the progress of the national industry. This progress is especially manifest in the very decided
improvement in the manufacture of children's toys, which are one
of the staple productions of the country. For some years past, the




DRAWING.                       205
improvement in the forms of the articles, whether moulded in clay,
or sculptured in wood, with which the Nuremberg manufacturers
supply the shops of Paris, has shown us that great progress must
have been made in the teaching of drawing; and ample confirmation
of this opinion may be obtained on visiting the higher drawingschools of this town. The Parisian manufacturers, though superior
in other matters dependent on the arts of design, are, with regard
to children's toys, very inferior to the Nuremberg artisans.
"As a preparation for the higher drawing-school, there is an
elementary school, with courses occupying two years. The first,
of eight hours per week, is entirely devoted to freehand drawing, beginning with exercises on straight lines and curves, on plane
surfaces, on symmetrical and regular bodies, and on simplex and
complex ornaments, finishing with compositions.  The second
course, of six hours per week, is devoted to drawing ornaments,
to drawing from the round, fiom the antique, and also to drawing
furniture."
In their special report on Wurtemberg, the sub-commission say:" One of the most remarkable features in the primary schools
of Wurtemberg is the extraordinary attention paid to the teaching
of drawing. The Department of Trade and Manufactures has persuaded the Ministry of Public Instruction and Worship to add
classes for industrial drawing to all these schools; and the ministry
has had the wisdom to leave to that department the care of organizing and superintending their progress. They were founded, aftel
the Universal Exhibition of 1851, to enable the manufacturers of
the country to compete with France in the industrial arts. These
18




206             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
schools were at first gratuitous; but experience proved that at.
tendance was better secured by requiring a small payment, varying,
according to the means of parents, from half a florin to twelve
florins a year,
"The teachers are, as far as possible, chosen from among the
workmen or masters of the chief industries of the place, who, having been taught in the same schools, have there acquired the
requisite knowledge. But these workmen thus made teachers do not
abandon their trades, and receive only an indemnity of about two
florins per hour's lesson. They generally give three a week, of two
hours each, - from seven to nine o'clock in the evening. At Geisslingen, for instance, there is a school where a hundred and eighty
scholars are taught by a master mason. In more than one parish
the heads of establishments have so well appreciated the importance
of this instruction, that they themselves send their young workmen and apprentices to the schools. It has been remarked that
artists of considerable talent have not succeeded so well as masters,
as mere artisans; which proves that there would not, be so much
difficulty as is supposed in expeditiously training teachers for this
kind of schools.
"The Department of Trade has adopted examples to be used in
all these schools, of which the first series, intended for beginners,
consists of lithographs, easy, and few in number, merely for practice, - to give freedom to the hand while accustoming the pupil to
guide it by the eye. The next step for the pupils is to draw from
plaster models, graduated from the most simple figures to the finest
casts from the antique, which are reserved for the principal schools.
These models are supplied by an artist of Stuttgart, according to a
tariff approved by the Department of Trade. They are delivered
by him to the parish schools, which pay for them; but, at the end




DRAWING.                         207
of the year, the department pays back to the schools one half the
sum so disbursed. Besides these models in relief, the Department
of Trade has formed a collection of the best publications on
industrial art, from the most costly to the humblest albums of
furniture, cabinet-work, bronzes, &c. It distributes these works
throughout the country, lending them to the masters of the schools
for a certain period, - usually one month. They must be returned
in fair condition; and any damage suffered must be made good.
"Every other year, the schools send to Stuttgart a collection
of their drawings of all kinds for exhibition; after which prizes are
given to those which sent the finest productions. The masters
themselves are invited to attend this exhibition, and to control the
awards made. From among the most skilful masters a certain
number are chosen, who during the vacation, or at other times, go
round to the schools as occasional inspectors, and suggest improvements to the masters; sometimes even giving them private lessons.
"Drawing also forms part of the instruction given in the normal
school for primary teachers; so that they may be able thereafter to
teach their pupils the first elements. A few of the pupils who have
shown most skill and taste are sent to the Superior Art School at
Nuremberg.
"Thus there have been established in the kingdom of Wurtemberg more than four hundred drawing-schools; and this organization, which does not date back more than ten years, has already led
to very decided improvements in the manufactures of the country.
"It is satisfactory to know that the designers trained in these
schools, if they evince any considerable degree of taste and invention, easily find occupation in their own country. The more distinguished among them are sometimeA sent to France for improvement. Great emulation exists among the teachers and professors




208             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
of drawing; and, besides the biennial exhibitions made by order of
the government, an association has been formed by the masters, which,
aided by voluntary contributions, has raised a fund for the purpose
of organizing regular exhibitions of all the pupils' drawings, and
for awarding prizes."
The Imperial Commission, in their summary of the
Inquiry on Professional Education, say: —
"Among all the branches of instruction, which in different
degrees, from the highest to the lowest grade, can contribute to the
technical education of either sex, drawing, in all its forms and applications, has been almost unanimously regarded as the one which it is most
important to make common."
REPLIES TO LORD STANLEY'S CIRCULAR.
[See Chap. II. for the particulars about Lord Stanley's circular letter.]
Mr. Ward, answering        from  Hamburg     (Germany),
says, giving the director of the Hamburg Trade School
as authority:" Free drawing without instruments begins with drawing from
wooden models, according to Heimerdinger's method, in which
simple objects, such as tools used by joiners, engineers, &c., are
included; attention being paid to the vocation of the pupil in the
choice of the models. Ornamental drawing from plaster casts, in
outline, and in respect to shading, then follows. Those pupils who
devote themselves to building or ornamental trades study the figure
from casts and anatomy. The metal-workers draw freely, without
instruments, portions of machinery, &c. The mode of execution




DRAWING.                         209
(which is with lead-pencil, pen, brush, and rubber) is always the most
suitable to the branch of technical art to which the pupil intends to
devote himself. In close connection with this style of drawing are
the exercises in ornamental design. Plants, flowers, and leaves
are drawn from life; and these drawings are used in designing. By
these exercises the pupils become very soon independent of all help.
Geometrical drawings are executed from large copies. The
teachers explain the perfect principles of construction, and pay
special attention to exactness in execution. When the pupil has
acquired confidence in the use of his instruments, and has mastered
the essential principles, the measuring and drawing of some simple
and more complicated bodies follows. This class is attended by
metal-workers, joiners, builders and carpenters, carriage-builders,
ship-builders, &c. The instruction is imparted by measuring and
drawing real objects, such as parts of machinery, tools, furniture,
doors, windows, carriages, &c., according to fixed rules and specified plans.
"Instruction in freehand drawing can only be of use to the
pupils when they use real objects, and not drawings. By the
method pursued here, the hand needs no particular preparation,
because the nearest model offers an example by which the hand and
eye are both alike exercised. No particular introduction to the
rules of perspective is needed. The scholar learns to see correctly;
and his attention is directed to the principles of perspective by the
teacher.
"From the specimens of freehand drawing which were exhibited
at Paris this year, it would appear that no method can compare with
that here referred to, for producing a satisfactory result in a short
time. The results of several other industrial schools are in this
respect far behind those of the Hamburg School. Drawing from
18*




210            TECHNICAL -EDUCATION.
specimens should be entirely avoided in industrial schools, in freehand as well as in geometrical and technical drawing..
"In all these trade schools (at Frankfort-on-the-Main) the greatest
value is always placed upon the instruction in drawing. Freehand
drawing is begun from the flat, and goes on, as soon as possible, to
drawing fiom the round and from plaster casts; in which particular
regard is paid to ornament. Even with the more advanced pupils,
less regard is paid to shading and the formation of shadows than
to the outline. Only the best pupils are occasionally allowed to
undertake shading, and then only with the stump.
" Linear drawing is, as a rule, begun with the construction of geometric figures, by which the pupil is practised in the use of the rule,
the compass, and the drawing-pen: he then proceeds to the copying
of simple implements, to which succeeds drawing from wooden
models, and, lastly, exercises in construction.
" The descriptive geometry as taught at Stuttgart and Nuremberg is very profitable for various trades, - such as workers in tin,
bookbinders, &c., - as the pupils are taught the drawing of network,
the intersection of plane surfaces, &c. With linear drawing it
might be advisable, as far as possible, to divide it according to industries, especially in the higher branches."
From Paris Lord Lyons sends, among other things,
the methods prescribed by the government for instruction in the special schools. With reference to descriptive
geometry, which is the basis of so much mechanical
drawing, it is directed:"Many pupils find it difficult to represent to themselves the
geometric figures in space, to read in space, as it is called: never



DRAWING.                        211
theless, to read in space is an indispensable faculty for artisans and
other persons following industrial pursuits; and every effort must
be made to develop it in the pupils of the special schools. The
teachers of descriptive geometry should, therefore, make use of the
planes with turning joints, and the stems furnished with points,
which are used in the Conservatoire des Arts et iMetiers, in order to
represent straight lines and planes, and to render palpable their
various respective positions. The pupils - being provided with
similar apparatus, but on a smaller scale - should themselves realize
the figures proposed. When all the pupils have finished their constructions, the professor should exhibit his from every point of view,
in order to accustom the eyes of the pupils to the different aspects
under which it may appear: finally, suppressing lines and planes,
he should draw on the board the material figure which he has just
constructed, after having assured himself that all the pupils have
read correctly in space, and have understood the relations of the
lines and the planes. The instruction given in this way is slower;
but it keeps alive the attention of the young people. The method
is, besides, indispensable for many of them. The success of the
pupils in the study of projections, perspective, and cosmography,
and as regards the works which they will one day have to undertake, depends entirely on their perfect understanding of this first
part of the course; which is, as it were, the alphabet of a more complex kind of reading.
"It is well known that the data of a practical geometrical
question are essentially numerical: thus a point is given by the
distances of the two planes of projection, measured and expressed
in metres and centimetres; a straight line, by two df its numbered
points, and, frequently, by a point and the angles which the straight
line makes with the planes of projection, &c. The pupils should,




212             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
therefore, be early exercised in constructing on some given scale
the data of the question proposed. The amplifications, the reductions,
the changes of scale, ought to be rendered familiar to them by
numerous examples. Every problem in the theory has its correspondent in numerical data; and all the plans are executed on a
given scale. Furthermore, as the instruction is addressed to young
people, who, as yet, are little accustomed to abstract considerations,
their eyes ought to be constantly appealed to in aid of their understanding. The professor should, therefore, propose numerous examples in support of the principles propounded; and the objects
in relief should be placed before the pupils. The representation
of bodies should be much dwelt upon. The proposed exercises are,
in the first place, useful in themselves, because they give to the
pupils their first notions of frame-work (charpente); but the exercises
are more especially beneficial by giving the pupils the habit of reading the language of projections, and of figuring to themselves
objects in space. Lastly, every opportunity should be seized for
representing simple applications to stone-cutting and the determination of shadows: -
" Representation of a point and a straight line to trace the projection of a cube, a prism, a pyramid; some simple joinings of
timber-work, such as joining with mortise and tenons, &c.; projections of a pair of principals; representation of a plane, straight
lines (droites), and perpendicular planes; method of rabbeting(rabattements), angle of two straights; angles of two planes; rotatory movement round a vertical axis; applications; intersections of a sphere
and a plane; curve of contact of a sphere with a circumscribed
cylinder," &c.




DRAWING.                        213
TESTIMONY OF ENGLISH ARTISANS.
[See Chap. II. for particulars about the report of the English artisans
who were sent to the Paris Exhibition in 1867.]
Benjamin Lucraft, chair-maker, says:
"Having on other occasions, when in Paris, observed that lads
of fourteen or fifteen years of age were intrusted with superior
work to that of our lads in London, I determined to make the
subject one of special inquiry; and, while visiting one of the factories already named, a good opportunity offered. Seeing some
lads at work with the men in the carvers' shop, I went to the bench
of one about fourteen. He was carving a chair-back of a medieval
pattern, from a working-drawing: it was nearly finished, and well
carved. Finding, from inquiry, that he had done the whole himself, I expressed my surprise that one so young was found capable
of carving so well, and was informed that boys at school are
specially prepared for the trade they fancy, or that their friends
have decided upon for them; so that a boy about to be apprenticed
to learn carving is instructed in ornamental drawing, modelling,
and designing."
Francis Kirchoff, glass-painter, reports: -
"The French work, when compared with the English, shows a
greater diversity of design in construction, and more freedom and
grace in the drawing of the ornament; but, in excellence of color
and pleasing harmony, the English glass is much superior."
In his report, James Mackie, wood-carver, says:"I visited the Acole Imperiale Speciale pour 1'Application des




214             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
Beaux Arts'a lIndustrie. On that occasion there was an exhibition of the works of the students; and the number and variety
were considerable and interesting. Conspicuous among the exhibits were some large models in clay. The minister of instruction
had dictated the subject; and the following were the particulars
given: A somewhat large tympanum of a pediment, to have the
head of a bull for the centre, resting upon a shield, with accessories
of boys, and festoons of fruit and flowers. The best was a very
successful interpretation of the order given. A vase, intended to be
executed in silver, was also modelled according to instructions.
There were several competitors in each case. T hese studies were
little more than good sketches in clay; but it was evident that the
students were learning a most useful lesson, that would stand them
in good service when they went forth into the world. There were
the usual school studies, both in clay modelling and drawing, or
rather superior sketching; the prettiness and high finish aimed at
in the English schools being left alone. There were copies of casts
of figures and ornament, drawings of natural leaves and flowers,
sketches (from memory) of well-known works, original designs, and
sketches done in a given time. All of them were interesting, and
indicated great industry and a promise of excellence. It seemed
abundantly clear that the system pursued was simple and rapid,
and that the teaching and practice produced valuable results. It
seems to have great vitality; never being without deep and varied
interest to the students,-features that should distinguish every
school, and without which they will assuredly fail in accomplishing
the objects sought to be attained. This system of being content
with good sketching in all branches of instruction in art seems to
be the life and soul of art as applied to maufactures. Good sketching is acquired; and, as few will require to gain a subsistence by




DRAWING.                        215
making finished pictures, a valuable and sufficient power is gained
that is always in great request, and is never lost.
"A visit to the exhibition of the works of the students of the
kcole Inmperiale Speciale de Dessin pour les Jeunes Personnes
showed that the young ladies practised the same system with very
profitable results, although in a less degree. Their studies partook
largely of pen-and-ink drawings, with a view to the practice of the
art of wood-engraving."
R. Baker, wood-carver, reports: -
"A knowledge of drawing being essential to a good carver, the
schools of design in Paris are more numerous, and easier of access,
than in London. Their system of teaching is superior for practical
purposes to our own: it gives a better general idea of the object
designed. Instead of exact outline, and a slow and tedious process
of shading, they time their pupils, allow them more latitude, and
get a better general resemblance of the object copied. Apprentices
generally attend these schools in the evening. At the age of
thirteen or fourteen, boys are apprenticed, serving three to five years,
and are remunerated in proportion to what they earn. This
encourages quickness. Being free at the age of seventeen or
eighteen, they change their workshops, and gain experience, at the
age when the mind is best suited for receiving instruction. At
twenty-one he is already an experienced workman, just when our
apprentices are merging from their semi-torpid existence."
William  Letheren, art-metal workman, says:"The skill of the smith is displayed in uniting the parts of a
piece of iron-work, so that the different leaves and other parts,
when complete4, form a whole, blending one with the other. Then




216             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
we get use, durability, and ornament combined. This the older
smiths made their study; and it should be our aim to excel them.
In this class of work, the workman-must not only be practical, but
have a knowledge of design and drawing. In this, as a rule, the
English workmen are behind: for we may find many a good smith;
but, having no knowledge of drawing, he only destroys the good
effect intended by the designer.
"I think the schools of art have done much toward the'improvement of the mechanic; but few avail themselves of the opportunity.
The French have an advantage in this respect; the master of an
apprentice is bound by law to give him two hours a day for education: and the class of schools formed for such have a peculiar
advantage, inasmuch as the artisan is invited to bring specimens
of work of whatever kind; and prizes are awarded, at certain times,
to those that excel. In this respect the French are far before the
English."
In his special report on the condition and habits of
the French working-classes, Richard Whiteing says: —
"We are convinced a course of systematic instruction in the
principles of design, and the nature of materials, is what is most
needed in our art schools at the present day. It is not enough to
give men the best examples to copy, the best materials to use: the
greatest care should be taken to explain to them  why those
examples and those materials are considered the best; to show them
that beauty in the wrong place becomes deformity; and how
narrow is the boundary line, which in art, as indeed in every field
of human endeavor, separates the sublime from the ridiculous. All,
or nearly all, the faults which in the past were charged against




DRAWING.                        217
English design, were mainly traceable to the causes we have pointed
out. It was not denied that there was beauty here and there in
our houses, our furniture, our dress; but what was complained of
was, that those beauties were mostly chosen without any perception
of harmony in their relation the one to the other. They were
exotics from many climes, loosely jumbled together, each neutralizing the effect of the other. Since the establishment of art schools
in this country, we have made a much nearer approach to congruity
of ornament; but much yet remains to be done: whereas, in the
earliest examples of French manufacture, there is always visible a
certain sense of the becoming, a certain harmony of parts, and subjugation of details to one leading idea,- a false one it may be, but
still having a distinct individuality of its own. The word' style' is
always on the French workman's lips; and its claims are no less
rigorously enforced in the inferior products of the industry of our
neighbors than in their highest efforts in literature and in art."
James Taylor, practical foreman of gas-fittings manufactory, Birmingham, says: -
" With respect to education, I did not have an opportunity to
notice much more than that the workpeople generally are much
better up in fine arts than our people. This I think a great failing
with the English, - that they are not sufficiently educated in drawing and the fine arts. I think, unless there is something done in
this direction, that we shall not retain the supremacy we now hold
with respect to the chandelier trade. France has made such progress in the trade these last few years, that, unless something is
done in that direction, we shall not be able to keep pace with
the French"
19




218            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
William Gorman, brass-founder, says:"Taking our own productions in this branch generally, our
great deficiency is in design, in which we are surpassed by most
of the nations on the Continent: and the deficiency is not confined
to ornamental articles; for the plain are frequently very bad in
form. I believe one great cause of this defect to be the custom
which generally prevails of employing the workman to make his
own patterns. If we are to maintain our position, we must pay
more attention to form and design, and encourage education in this
important direction."
James Plampin, working-jeweller, reports: —
" Their superiority is in taste; and taste is essentially a mattel
of education. Owing to the extent of this kind of education, the
taste of the whole nation is higher than that of the English. While,
perhaps, there are scarcely more than four out of two hundred
English jewellers that can draw, from inquiries made there are
scarcely four out of two hundred in France who cannot. Nor is
this surprising, when we learn that drawing is regarded and taught
more as an essential than as an accomplishment. As children,
they are taught at the day-school, and that not occasionally, but
as part of the usual routine."
Frank J. Jackson, designer and art teacher from
Birmingham, says, in his report of the Paris Exhibition: -
"One noticeable feature in French industry is the universal
application of art, no object beino too mean for adornment; and




DRAWING.                        219
every article capable of being turned into a thing of beauty receives
its share of attention at the hands of the artist. To such an extent
is this love of art carried, that mere mechanical finish is sacrificed
at the shrine of beauty; and we find that the very things we pride
ourselves upon, and boast of achieving, are by them set at nought
in favor of aiming at a higher quality. In England I find the
matter is entirely different. Where there is an attempt to develop
a better style of art, it is almost sure to be of a special and restrictive character; and it invariably occurs that the same house
that will produce rare and costly works fails to devote that
attention to ordinary wares, so as to raise their artistic character;
being content with ugliness, so long as the objects are perfect in
polish, and have passed through the routine of processes that are
ever dear to the mechanical mind. Again: the vitality of French
art is very remarkable. In their search after novelty, they show
a wholesome disregard for that which has gone before, and strike
out with an amount of artistic daring that is startling, yet, nevertheless, governed by such taste, that their very extravagances pass
unchallenged, and surprise us into admiration. Their treatment
of the human figure is, perhaps, of a more daring character than
even their use of ornament, both of which are rendered with great
warmth and brilliancy, - qualities which are never neglected, whatever style of decoration they may adopt. For example, the style
now so much in use is the Greek; but instead of its being the cold,
severe style of the past, in their hands it becomes revivified, rivalling
their favorite renaissance, and earning the name justly bestowed
of'Neo Grec.'..
"The facilities for French students of industrial art are very
great. Besides the ordinary academies, they have what are called'technical schools,' where, in the same institution, drawing is taught,




220             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
in which a knowledge of a trade to which art is to be applied can
also be acquired, the fees for which are almost nominal. This class
of school is, I think, of the utmost value, and clearly demonstrates
that the French do really possess' schools of practical art.' The
system of drawing pursued, as far as I could judge from an examination of many folios of drawings shown in the Exhibition, is very
excellent. There seems to be no over-anxiety for fineness of outline; while in shading, the readiest method is generally adopted,
more importance being attached to the realization of form, and less
to mere manipulation. Great stress also seems to be laid upon
drawing from the human figure, and flowers from nature. Most
of the specimens I saw were very spiritedly executed, but scarcely
up to the English notion of neatness.  The method of teaching
carried on in our government schools offers a marked contrast to
that of the French. Examine the drawings that are occasionally
exhibited, and it will be found that an immense amount of labor
is spent upon fineness of line and mechanical finish. In this
respect, I think we are decidedly in error; in fact, we begin at the
wrong end. Fineness and neatness of line are the results of much
practice, and in early training are of much less importance than
the acquisition of correct notions of size, proportions, and forms:
to insist too strongly on the former is to jeopardize the realization
of the latter. Again: I do not think we have sufficient drawing
from nature, from the human figure, or flowers; and much of the
students' tine that is spent in making copies from the' flat' would
be more effectually employed in drawing from objects. Drawing
from the'flat' is only the beginning of the end: whereas it too
generally appears as if copying was the end itself. Still further,
we are entirely without any institutions, that I am aware of, that
will compare with the French technical schools, the importance of




DRAWING.                         221
which can scarcely be overrated. Our schools of design are not
at all comparable with them; for they give no evidence of a special
course of instruction any more than is shown by ordinary private
academies."
Mr. James Hole, honorable secretary of the Yorkshire Union of Mechanics' Institutes, in a letter in 1868
to Lord Montagu, vice-president of the Committee of
Council on Education, says: —
"Our art schools do not bear a sufficiently close relation to the
actual work in which art workmen are engaged to give the latter
a personal interest in the studies. The great merit of the trade
schools on the Continent is the intimate relation they establish
between the instruction in science and art, and its practical applications. Our schools of art produce highly-elaborated works, much
as if we aimed at producing artists rather than skilled workmen.
The national medals are given for excellence in subjects interesting
mainly to amateurs, artists, and professional teachers, —painting
from nature in colors, drawing from the antique, and design, -but
in which manufacturers and machinists have little share, as medals
are not given for excellence in mechanical drawing. No examples
for students to draw from are provided for the schools of art; and
those that are made use of in the Leeds School of Art (the centre
of a machine-making district) are French drawings purchased in
Paris.
"Until the instruction of the schools can be made to have a
more direct bearing upon industrial work, neither workingmen
nor their employers can be expected to take a very strong interest
in the schools. But once establish that relation, and it probably
19*




222            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
would not be difficult to induce employers to permit a small portion
of the work-time to be devoted to the purpose of practically illustrated brief lectures on the principles involved in their work. And,
if the employers were thus enabled to see the importance of this
union of knowledge with labor, artisans would likewise deem it
an object of ambition; and we should thus get some of the best
results of the Continental trade schools. It is vain to expect that
any considerable portion of our workmen will give up their hardlyearned leisure for studies the importance of which they cannot
yet feel. During the recent discussions on this subject at Birmingham, a manufacturer stated that he had introduced lessons on
design into his workshop for the benefit of his apprentices, and
with the most beneficial and satisfactory results."
TESTIMONY OF SCOTT RUSSELL.
Mr. J. Scott Russell, in his work on the " Systematic
Technical Education of the English People," says: —
"It is not enough that the workman thoroughly masters the
form which his work shall take: he must also be able to draw what
we have called the three plans of his work on paper. This may
be considered an unnecessary piece of skill for the man who has
only to do the particular work assigned to him, and of which,
probably, a perfect pattern is put before his eyes to guide him.
But the mere seeing of his pattern is not adequate to superior execution. Every bit of work which one man does has to fit into some
other bit of work of some other man's doing. In work there are
degrees, -perfect fit and misfit of all grades. To make his work
fit other people's, a man must know, not merely his own, but that
of all about him. Each man should therefore understand the plans




DRAWING.                    223
of the complete we'k on which he and his fellows are engaged, in
order to work well to the other's hand. The only way to get this
thorough understanding of plans is to have learned to draw them
one's self. Complete plan-drawing, applied to his own business, is
therefore essential to a good workman."
It was generally conceded by the artists of England,
and by foreign visitors, that the textile manufactures
from India were the most perfect in design of any that
appeared in the London Exhibition, 1851. Owen Jones,
the author of "The Grammar of Ornament," referring
to this fact, says, "We see in the ornaments and
articles from India the works of a people who are not
allowed by their religion to draw the human form; and
it is probable, that to this cause we may attribute their
great success in their ornamental works. Here in
Europe we hiu e been studying drawing from the human
figure; but It has not led us forward in the art of ornamental design. Although the study of the human
figure is useful in refining the taste, and teaching accurate observation, it is a roundabout way of learning to
draw for the designer for manufactures."
A simple glance at the programme of any special
school for industrial education, even for agriculture or
gardening, will show how much importance is attached
to drawing in nearly all parts of Europe. Thus about




224          TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
one-half of the time, on an average, is devoted to drawing in all the trade schools of Germany; which schools
are for the instruction of apprentices and master artisans. In the lower practical schools, not designed for
any particular industry, from two to four hours a week
are consumed in drawing; while, in the higher practical
schools, drawing occupies from one-quarter to one-third
of the time. In the technical universities and colleges,
the students give about one-half of their time to drawing. Some, of course, give more, some less, according
to the department of industry for which they are preparing. What is true of Germany is true of France,
of Switzerland, and of other European countries. Then
below all this lies that earlier instruction in drawing
which is almost universally given in the elementary
schools, where the education of the whole people begins.
BELGIAN TESTIMONY.
A congress to examine into the best methods of making artistic instruction general was held at Brussels,
Sept. 21-23, 1868. This congress was attended by a
large number of teachers and inspectors of drawing
from the Belgian academies, by Belgian painters and
sculptors, and by delegates from various foreign countries. In his opening address, defining the object of




DRAWING.                       225
the congress, the questions to be discussed, M. Visschers, member of the Board of Mines, and president
of the Committee of Organization, said:"GENTLEMEN, - You have all seen the remarkable exposition
of drawings by the pupils of our academies and our free schools.
A jury, composed of competent men, has been commissioned to
judge of these productions, and to propose to the government the
distribution of suitable rewards, to be given to the authors of
the best works. Our duty, on the other hand, will be to examine
the questions contained in our programme, -' the extension of the
instruction in the principles of drawing to all the primary schools,
and re-organization of the artistic instruction imparted in the secondary and higher schools.' The subject before us to-day is inseparably interwoven with the true interests of the mass of the people,
the advancement of industry, the useful and the fine arts. The
question is, by what means we can place in the hands of all men,
particularly the working-man and mechanic, a new instrument to
increase their personal capital, - the power of usefulness and enjoyment."
As with other educational subjects, the discussion
which followed developed a variety of opinions, more or
less divergent, as to the best manner of teaching drawing. It was generally agreed, however, that drawing
ought to be introduced into all the primary schools, and
should consist chiefly of linear drawing.
M. Von Marke said he would begin with straight




226            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
lines, then proceed to geometrical figures, followed by
rectilinear designs, and then by those having curved
lines, advancing to ornaments. The pupil could now
take up drawing from nature with advantage, copying
solids first, then models of simple ornament, gradually
advancing to things more elaborate and difficult.
Having been urged by many members of the congress, M. Hendricks, whose method of teaching drawing has been widely commended in Europe, described it,
in brief, thus: -
MISTAKEN STUDY OF THE HUMAN FIGURE.
" I must state here, that I had investigated every thing carefully
before I became aware of the evil (the deplorable state of instruction in drawing in its application to industry and the different
trades), and found that it consisted alone in confused ideas on
the part of teachers. In my opinion, this evil is not the consequence of want of talent in those who teach: on the contrary,
many of our teachers are very competent; and by far the greater
number possess undoubted talent. No: the fault lies in another
direction, —in that too frequent and widespread mistake, that
the study of the human figure suffices, and ought to precede
every thing else, how inferior soever the trade may be to which the
pupil intends to devote himself. There lies the mistake, and the
generally-acknowledged decline of our artistic teaching in its applications to the various branches of our national labor. I will prove
this by mentioning a few simple statistics. Upwards of ten thousand
pupils attend annually our various academies and schools of design;




DRAWING.                        227
and the majority of them have practised nothing but copying the
human figure from engravings or plaster casts. Now, if this exclusive study was sufficient, ought not our manufactures, as a general
rule, to show the highest artistic taste? We all know that this is
far from being the.case. Nobody will deny that the study of the
human figure is the basis of all purely artistic teaching. But it
may likewise be very justly remarked, that several branches of art -
such as the painting of landscapes, flowers, views of cities, naval
scenes, and many other subjects - have been cultivated to their highest degree of perfection, without their authors being able to show a
profound knowledge of the study of the human figure. A great
number of other less important branches of art may likewise thrive
without having this study for their basis. To the decorator or
ornamental sculptor, the natural kingdoms furnish a large number
of other elements which are just as indispensable for him. The
foundation of his whole art lies, more than anywhere else, in the
study of the various phenomena presented by the vegetable kingdom, from whose inexhaustible sources, he, from time immemorial,
has drawn the ideas for his most beautiful creations, and his happiest applications to useful objects, as well as for the architectural
designs which antiquity has bequeathed to us.
GEOMETRY THE TRUE BASIS OF ALL ELEMENTRY DRAWING.
"According to my idea, all elementary drawing should take, as
its foundation, geometry, and make the elements of this science
subservient to the analysis of artistic forms, in such a manner that
they are not an inanimate instrument only, but, on the contrary, a
means by which the pupil can himself control and appreciate his
work. Every method should be rational, positive, and not leave
room for doubt in the pupil's mind. This is the idea which has




228            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
served me as a starting-point in making out the method which I am
about to lay before you. I have arranged it in such a manner that
the pupil is at once enabled to appreciate the peculiarities of the
most complicated forms, using simpler forms with which he has
already been made familiar.
FIRST DEGREE OF TEACHING.
"These studies consist in the fiee-hand drawing of forms and figures, in general, geometrically represented. Before letting the pupil
reproduce a copy of the smallest object, we exercise his eyes and his
hands in using elementary figures which allow him to understand
gradually their relative proportions, their characteristic combination,
their particular form, and, finally, all their details. On the thorough
practice of these preliminary exercises depend the immediate and
complete results in the reproduction of forms and figures. The pupil,
knowing how to construct (by free-hand drawing) a perfect square,
and rectangular figures of all dimensions, will gradually apply the
generic geometrical figures which he has been taught. This knowledge, practically acquired, will enable him to understand immediately the characteristic combination of the object presented to him,
to analyze all its outlines, and reproduce them in all their relative
dimensions.
SECOND DEGREE OF TEACHING.
" Solids, their Construction and their Study. - As in the first degree
of teaching, we also here, before letting the pupil copy from some
figure, give him the means of understanding the form, and the way in
which it is composed. We commence by making him understand
the construction of elementary figures. He learns, first of all, the
construction of the cube, and its different rectangular divisions, and,
next, to place it in all the positions possible. If he has once acquired




DRAWING.                        229
this foundation, he successively refers to it all the generic forms, the
combinations of which he makes in the various positions which the
teacher prescribes. He proves by this that he can see in the space,
and that he possesses a correct knowledge of the principal parts of
which any given figure is composed. Arrived at this point of his
studies, he undertakes the construction of more developed figures,
at the same time studying the various elements of ornaments in their
second degree. He represents, on an even surface, what a moulder
represents by his mould. He sees solid forms; and he will soon be
able to express his thoughts in drawing, building, &c., forms whichconstitute the object of his special study.
THIRD DEGREE OF TEACHING.
"Drawing after Objects or Figures placed at some Distance. - It is
indispensable here, that, at the very outset, the pupil should become
thoroughly familiar with the rules of perspective; but, simple and
easy as they are in their application to the whole figure, just as difficult and tedious do they become in their regular application to the
construction of every single part of an object. In recommending
the study of the rules of this science, we do not mean the rigorous
application of these rules to the elevations on the profiles of the
thousand different points of a capital (of a pillar) or other architectural ornaments. We will leave this to men who study science for
its own sake. What we want is this: that the pupil learn to know
the construction of the objects which he has to represent, that then
he may learn to give to all the details of this object their proper
perspective position. The same would also apply to the study of
light and shade.
" Any pupil who is in earnest, and has thus been prepared by the
elementary and analytical study of the three degrees of our method,
20




230             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
will be able in less than a year to copy any object placed before
him, and do it successfully. Thus does the first degree comprise
the study of forms geometrically represented, and the means of
reproducing them in all their just proportions; whilst the second
and third degrees have for their aim the initiation of the pupil in the
construction and reproduction of forms and figures such as they
present themselves in space."
M. de Taeye, Director of the Royal Academy of Fine
Arts at Louvain, said:" We may here, for safety, establish this principle: the elementary study of every kind of drawing must be based on geometrical
forms; only we shall see, that, in putting it into practice, it is indispensable to pursue two different ways. By geometrical drawing,
One arrives at an exact, precise, and mathematical representation of
the object, taking note of its length, breadth, &c. Thus the mind
gets a complete knowledge of its real form, and is enabled to make
the most delicate analysis; whilst, by drawing from sight, one only
takes note of the apparent form of the object, according to the point
of view from which one considers it, without being able to arrive at
an analysis of its real form. The first way of drawing obtains its
results by means of instruments, such as ruler and compasses;
whilst the second relies substantially on the exercise of the eye, and
the practice of the hand. I believe, therefore, that a combination
of these two methods is an absolute necessity in order to constitute
a complete and rational system of teaching which satisfies the demands of imagination and reason."
[For a fuller account of the discussion by the congress at Brussels, see
"Technical Education," by Henry Barnard, LL D.]




DRAWING.                       231
FRENCH REPORT ON DRAWING, AT THE UNIVERSAL
EXPOSITION, PARIS, 1867.
The following is the report made to the French Minister of Public Instruction, by the committee on "instruction in drawing in the normal schools, the primary
schools, and the course for adults," in France:"Commissioned by your Excellency to examine the drawings
executed for the Universal Exposition, we finished the first part of
this work with M. Brongniart, inspector of schools for the city of
Paris, placing a mark upon each drawing to indicate its value.
"My colleague of the superior council of special instruction,
M. Sebastien Cornu, desired to repeat the examination with me;
and we have ranked each of the schools whose products were displayed at the Exposition.
" We have, therefore, had a double means of verification, of proof,
in an investigation which we wished to make with extreme care, as
we desired to respond the best we could to the felicitous thought
which your Excellency has expressed for the improvement of drawing in France.
" We realize the full importance of your resolves concerning this
matter, now that we have seen the sacrifices made abroad, especially
in England and Germany, in order to enter the pathway of a like
progress.
"Hitherto, relying on an honorable past, on great examples, and
on this personal initiative, which have been regarded wrongly, according to our view, as sufficient in art, things have, in large measure, been left to themselves in France. Undoubtedly, even without




232             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
direction, without schools, without encouragement, there will always
arise on French soil, artists, - choice natures, - who will leave the
multitude in spite of every thing; but if the times, if the conditions, become little favorable, these happy exceptions will be more
rare: some natural dispositions will be smothered, others perverted.
Genius itself, without severe study, shrinks to the proportions of
talent. An age will give Watteau or Boucher in place of Leonardo
da Vinci and Louini. And, if we go back to the real influences which
determine the merit of artists, we see of what necessity are classic studies
from the very dawn of life; indeed, how the first instruction in drawing
is responsible for the future public taste.
"It is of this future we would wish to speak with entire
freedom.
" Present results, so far as relates to mechanical drawing, graphic
drawing, machine-drawing, are almost always very satisfactory: on
the contrary, when we consider ornamentation, the copies and models and the instruction are equally defective; while all that pertains
to the figure, to imitation-drawing, is worse still.
"If we except the schools of Paris, Potiers, Nancy, Mulhouse,
Metz, Grenoble, Orleans, St. Quentin, Rochefort, the normal
schools of Tulle, Chaumont, Cluny, the lay schools of Beauvais,
d'2pinal, Peronne, Chapelle-sur-Loir, the ecclesiastic schools of
Mezieres, Sedan, Bayeux, Rive-de-Gier, and Reims, the specimens,
the works of the pupils which we have had in hand, show how much
good a prompt reform would do. In the normal schools, in the imperial lyceums, - that is to say, in the schools for the class called to
direct, to form, to elevate others,-we have found the drawings much
inferior to those which a school of workmen in Paris could execute.
It seems to us important that this should not be so. Out of Paris,
in the matter of drawing, there is, with very rare exceptions, no su




DRAWING.                       233
periority manifested by the adult classes or in the popular courses.
There is almost everywhere an equally bad level. Yet we have
often found among the pupils a great desire to do well, real aptitude, with an enormous amount of work.
" As far as we can see, with some remarkable exceptions, the
time devoted to imitation-drawing is almost completely lost; and
these are the principal causes of this misfortune: -
"Everywhere the copies and models of figures and of ornaments
are as bad as possible, and will be the cause of perpetuating bad
taste and ignorance. Many of the teachers of drawing, who have
often been the first victims of this state of things, cannot draw:
what is worse, they do not know how the drawing should be done;
while their taste is that of the copies and models which they buy.
They teach error with a profound conviction, with the best possible
faith. The notes placed by them upon the miserable productions of
patience very badly employed often showed, that, if the master did
not do the work for his pupil, he was ready to indorse it.
" Another cause of evil is this: in the lyceums, in the colleges,
the drawing-lesson, taken out of the time for recreation, has always
been considered by the students as a species of encroachment upon
their rest and their sports. They come, therefore, to these studies,
however attractive in themselves, with an ill-humor which they
regard as well founded. They are resolved on a retaliation, of which
they are the first dupes in reality, and defend themselves against the
lesson, instead of seeking to profit by it as do the pupils in the artisan classes. Those only, and at the last moment, who are going to
the special schools, strive to learn just that which they regard as
sufficient to cover their ignorance, and help them through their
examination.
" Finally, there is a graver cause than bad instruction: it is found
20*




234            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
in the debasement of the public taste. This is sometimes a species
of weakening of the moral sense, revealed by certain lamentable
signs.
THE GREAT VALUE OF GOOD DRAWING-COPIES.
" When we have striven to discover what is best in France, in
order to ask your Excellency how to make it general by searching
for that which had produced it, my colleagues and myself have been
surprised to see how the art sentiment, perceptible even in the drawings of children (if we may speak of them), is radically modified by
the objects which are constantly under the eyes. I desire to maention
only one striking example.
" The city of Nancy sent landscapes, figures, ornaments, flowers,
executed by different schools. In spite of the variety of instruction,
all the works had a unique character of grandeur, of amplitude, a
little marred, however, by that bad taste which Stanislas everywhere
impressed upon a city rebuilt in one period. The influence of that
period -of that architecture of Stanislas - has been such that we
can recognize a drawing from Nancy among a thousand.
"The models, therefore, are not simply those sheets of paper
which are only for an hour under the eyes during the drawing-lesson,
but every thing, indeed, which we behold in childhood; especially
every thing which we regard with passion, with love.
"Thus at Athens, when the Greek chisels cut the marble, they
could produce only beautiful things. Doubtless, it is impossible to
give the children of a little town, otherwise than by photography
and engraving, specimens of beautiful monuments capable of enlarging, elevating, their ideas. But, if one cannot always procure the
best, to shun bad impressions is a duty.
" After this assault upon bad drawings, we shall ask you to have
excellent ones made; for this is the true way to fortify against the




DRAWING.                        235
bad. We could wish to see appear a complete, serviceable series of
figures, ornaments, flowers. Beyond the good ones which already
exist, would it not be possible to obtain some contributions from
certain large commercial cities, or from establishments having a
direct interest in the creation of schools of taste, of schools of practical and serious art? Would it not be possible to imitate the great
progress accomplished in Paris?
WHAT PARIS HAS DONE FOR DRAWING IN THE MUNICIPAL
SCHOOLS.
" I would like here to give the provinces an account of what the
city has done —I ought to say, grandly, generously- with such farseeing liberality. I wish the inspectors of the departments could
see what I began to examine first as a matter of conscience, of duty,
but which I afterwards studied with extreme interest, - the schools
of drawing, the schools for adults in Paris.
"A few years ago the city authorities perceived how important it
was, at this juncture of affairs of industry, to have at its service
more artisans who understood drawing, -men of taste in all the
departments of labor. Embossers, sculptors, metal-workers, those
who produce pottery, objects of luxury, all have need of artistic
studies, which make the worth of the man, the worth of the article,
and the fortune of the merchant.
" And yet Paris had for schools only certain miserable low halls,
without air, windows narrow, badly lighted by day, badly lighted also
by night; and what copies! what models! But in spite of this, in
spite of the insufficient appointments, so deleterious to the health of
the pupils, so Jittle attractive to young men, for whom every thing
around them was attractive, these miserable schools were full.
Stone-cutters wished to become sculptors; at least in the next gene




236             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
ration. House-painters aspired to become decorators. Knowledge
of personal interest recommended the study of art, for the purpose
of increasing wages, to all artisans who were anxious to advance.
Among men of ability are always men of heart. The lofty
and wise activity of the prefect of the Seine, moved by the desire
of the municipal council, which is the organ of art-interests, took
the business in hand. A commission -presided over by the distinguished savan and friend of youth, M. Dumas, whom one finds at
the head of all these generous organizations - was appointed. This
commission obtained the firm and steady co-operation of the superintendent of the fine arts, and of the members of the institute,
who formed a part of it. All have held it an honor to follow in
minute details the execution of a plan which should have for the
regeneration of art the most serious consequences. In a situation
less elevated, but not less useful, we will mention the services of a
young artist, M. Brongniart, secretary of the commission, and his
colleague in the inspection of schools of drawing, M. Balze, both
of whom have shown themselves patient and indefatigable, and
who, in a few years, have given to all the schools uniform and
excellent appointments, have organized the use of copies and models,
and impressed everywhere habits of precision, of orde,.and a passion for duty.
"Many young persons, thanks to the labors of the -commission
and to the authority of the prefect, are now using, under excellent
teachers, select copies and models, and attend courses of instruction
which augment their zeal. Instruction in drawing has indeed revived in Paris. Even after we make allowance for the conditions,
always more favorable in a large city, still we are compelled to say
that the results far exceed what the rest of the empire can show.
Charged simply with an examination, with a comparison perhaps,




DRAWING.                        237
of different schools, doubtless it does not belong to us to advise such
or such measures for establishing everywhere that equality of good
which we have found at Paris. The resources and the obstacles
must differ in each locality; but in recognizing a real superiority
over the rest of France, or over foreign countries, we have desired
to learn, as far as we could, the course pursued to produce such
rapid improvement; and we believe the memorial of it ought to be
preserved. This, briefly, is the substance of it:"Under the able magistracy of the prefect of the Seine, the
universal desire for progress, at first manifested only by the municipal council, led that council to establish a commission, which
should ascertain, beyond doubt, the exact state of instruction in
drawing in the municipal schools. The commission devoted a year
to investigations, as severe as important, in order to determine
what reforms should be inaugurated, what capital they required;
in a word, to determine by what means they could effect, in a
durable manner, the reforms of which we have been able to state
the marvellous results. These investigations once finished, the
University hastened to give her co-operation to measures of which
she could appreciate the full necessity. Funds were appropriated;
and the realization of good did not linger.
" The examination made by the commission showed that there
was in Paris a condition of things analogous to that which we find
everywhere in France to-day, -that is to say, copies and models
insufficient in number (generally of a very mediocre character,
suggesting to the pupils a detestable past of commonplace), a small
number of teachers, and, indeed, very inadequate appointments.
"This is what was done to obviate these various evils: in order
to have better copies, after submitting to a severe purification all
those in use, they appealed to the kindness of Count Nieuwerkerke,




238            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
member of the commission, as well as superintendent of fine arts.
Among the studies from nature which had gained medals for their
authors during the course at the school of fine arts, he had search
made for a certain number of figures hitherto overlooked; concealed
at this school, and which now furnish the pupils of the municipal
schools most precious resources. Then followed the happy thought
of promising a recompense to the future laureates, when their
figures should be taken as models for municipal instruction.
"For the same purpose, the pensioned pupils at Rome were
required to send a certain number of drawings after the Italian
masters, or after nature. Finally, M. Gerome, member of the institute, colleague of Count Nieuwerkerke on the commission, undertook the task of having a limited quantity of lithographs made,
which would serve to show the printsellers the new way it was
resolved to try; to show them the impossibility of continuing to
sell for the purposes of instruction, which was henceforth to be
better, the productions of the past, which had been executed by
contract, and without competition for honors. As to the teachers,
the task was yet more difficult. This is how they satisfactorily met
the difficulty: For many worthy artists it must be advantageous to
give some hours to the instruction of youth, as a rest from other
fatigues, other labors. This professorship, profitable alike to teacher and pupil, not only affords the teacher a money recompense, but
it is an honorable title.
"Instead of choosing the teachers from among candidates, with
out guaranty, and upon information which might lead astray, they
established competitive examinations and diplomas, which, elevating the level of studies by emulation, present the advantage of
revealing the capacities and unknown aptitudes for imparting instruction. These diplomas, whose advantage had always been con



DRAWING.                         239
sidered incontestable in other branches of education, produced a
marvellous result.  They afforded to Paris strong evidence of
merit: they will afford, in the future, lists of capable teachers open
to calls from the provinces and from abroad.
"Finally the commission (and this will be one of its titles to
gratitude) made the competitive examinations established among
the different pupils of its schools the object of a double recompense,- one for the students who were successful, and one for the
teachers who had led to their success; the salaries of the teachers
to be augmented according to the number of prizes obtained by the
young laureates.
" We have, then, at Paris to-day, in the municipal schools, emulation of pupils and teachers, frequent examination of work, and
certainty that they who teach'carry not into their classes an indifference which might exist even with real talent. There is, thanks to
this combination, the assurance of a union of efforts towards the
same common end.
" As to the appointments, to speak the truth, and render
justice to every one, I ought here to say, that they have been modified in the happiest manner, and do no less honor to the commission than to the zeal which their secretary displayed in changing
completely the halls of drawing all along one bank of the Seine,
and a portion of the other.
" All those who are occupied with education know how the love
of labor is increased by objects apparently insignificant.  One
works better in a good class, where order reigns, under a good
light. In looking at the magnificent appointments of Cluny, one
of the examiners said to the director, that, if his hopes were to
produce ordinary masters, the fiture would show chemists, savans,
were it only for the magnificence of the laboratory, capable, in
itself, of making all the youth dream of the institute.




240            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.'"The good arrangements of the halls of drawing have contiib.
uted, we are convinced, to diffuse the taste and the habit of work
among all the young draughtsmen in the suburbs of Paris; and we
sincerely believe, that, if other cities were willing to imitate a movement which I have only been able to describe in a brief and incomplete manner, the results would be everywhere equally decisive.
"As to the special normal school at Cluny, I cannot do better
than to quote here an extract from the report made by M. Dumas
for the commission charged with the inspection of the establishment (June, 1867).
NORMAL SCHOOL OF CLUNY. —DRAWING.
"'The inspection of the instruction given at Cluny by the professor of drawing has been very satisfactory. The method, which
is that of Hendricks, is as good as a method can be; for we must
not expect to obtain decisive and heroic results, even from a very
rational course of instruction, which can, at best, only develop the
inborn tendencies, restrain dangerous impulses, and abridge the
time of the studies.' The instruction at Cluny presents all these advantages. The
professor is clear in his explanations, full of zeal; and one has only
to approve what he has done. His pupils listen to him with attention, respect, and a desire to understand and to do well.
"'M. H. Dufresne, member of the Superior Council of Special
Instruction, who has consented to accept the mission of judging the
pupils of Cluny in relation to drawing, is at this moment charged
as a juror, to examine, at the Universal Exposition, the different
modes of instruction practised abroad. He has everywhere seen the
Hendricks method produce good results. The geometrical tracings which form its basis permit one to compare exactly the pro



DRAWING.                       241
portions of the copy, facilitate enlargement or reduction, and
habituate the pupil to discover for himself his errors, and to correct
them. Leonardo da Vinci, and almost all the Italian masters, employed this method for their pupils and for themselves. Indeed,
this mode of procedure is analogous to that of the sculptors for
getting the proportions of their marbles, and gives the same results.
This comparison is sufficient to indicate what are its advantages
and its limitations.
"'It seems advisable, indeed, not to continue this manner of drawing for a long time, but to vary it sometimes; for example, by
making the geometrical tracings after the execution of the figure,
as a proof; or, perhaps, by confining them to certain points of
division, to certain great lines of movement, so as to acquire the
habit of drawing rapidly and with spirit, while drawing well.'
"Finally, I would conclude this report with certain practical
hints as to the way in which we could wish that instruction in drawing should generally begin.
"'At the Universal Exposition,' says M. Cornu, my colleague,
in a note which I produce entire,' various methods of teaching
drawing are exhibited by different nations, with the results obtained
by each of them. These methods arc rational. They are based, for
mechanical drawing, on geometry. They are illustrated, for the
most part, by figures in relief, and have mathematical exactitude.
As to the methods of teaching drawing fiom copies, they depend
upon principles and means of demonstration generally good and
ingenious in their mode of application.
FORM, AND NOT SHADE, THE IMPORTANT THING FOR BEGINNERS.
"'The geometrical, machine, architectural drawings, &c., are more
satisfactory, whatever be the nation to which they belong, than the
21




242            TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
copies of figures, flowers, and ornaments of the different classes oft
imitation-drawing. One might attribute this relative inferiority to
the copies, defective in taste and form; also to a certain negligence
in teaching. You cannot sufficiently combat the tendency of pupils
to shade too much in order to arrive at effect, and to destroy their
masses of light by too much detail, and their masses of shade by too
much reflection. We cannot too often repeat, that the important
point is, not to load a drawing with exaggerated lights and shades,
which give an unnatural aspect to the object represented, but rather
to render its true character by a faithful and intelligent outline, and
by lights, shades, and half-tints in their proper place, and in relative
and harmonious proportions.
"'Here are certain estimates of instruction in drawing abroad: -
ENGLAND.
"'The Kensington School presents at the Exposition an important collection of studies of different kinds. Some of these studies
are very remarkable; notably, the flowers painted by Menzies, the
ornaments in various styles, by Reule, Boon, and Collins, and
also the drawings for paper-hangings by Chandler. It is evident
that the pupils of this fine establishment have the best and rarest
sources from which to draw. How, then, can we help being astonished at the difference which exists between the works which we
have just named, and the figures painted in oil, in water-colors, or
made with the crayon? Without speaking of a picture representing a woman bathing, -the execution of which, and the taste, leave
much to be desired, - those studies are, in general, soft and affected,
or in a hard manner, and jumbled in colors and effects. The drawings of anatomical figures, made with so much care and manual
skill, as well as academical collections drawn too hastily, show




DEAWING.                        243
clearly that it is more important and more difficult to give the true
character of external forms and accuracy of movement than to
give the minutest details of the muscles concealed under the skin.
AUSTRIA.
"'Many schools of drawing established at Vienna and in other
cities of the empire have sent to the 2Exposition their methods of
instruction and the works of their pupils. The school directed by
Prof. Machatschek is one of the most important, and the one whose
works are the most numerous and the most satisfactory. The section of architecture and mechanics, principally, offer a list of works
executed with method, and in a laudable manner. It is to be regretted that the imitation-drawings of figures, of flowers, and of
ornaments, as well as the model studies in bass-relief of divers styles,
leave something to be desired in selection and execution. We make
one exception for the Baugewerbe Schule of Vienna, whose drawings of ornament are in good taste, and well executed.
DENMARK.
"'The drawings by the pupils of the School of Copenhagen
deserve to be honorably mentioned for the simple and intelligent
manner in which they are done. One finds there, what is seldom
seen in the works of pupils, the sobriety and harmony of effect, permitting form to predominate, making it serviceable, instead of
destroying it, as so frequently happens. In conclusion, this exhibition does honor to the instruction and to the enlightened direction
of the School of Copenhagen.
BAVARIA.
"' It is just to phce in the first rank the Nuremberg School of
Art and Industry. The beautiful exhibition of the products of it,




244             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
various departments do the greatest honor to its skilful direction, as
well as to the talent and intelligent zeal of its professors. The
drawing of figure and ornament, the modelling and sculpture, are
explained and developed in a manner original and varied. From
studies of heads, of draperies (whether in drawing or in relief), of
portraits in historic costumes, of academic figures of small size to
those which are drawn of natural size stumped on a shaded ground,
there is a very remarkable specimen of the works of student painters and statuaries. The sculpture, more particularly decorative,
shows, also, a very great quantity of ornamentation, composed almost
wholly in the Gothic style, foliated and flowered a little beyond
measure. In the whole number we discover but two or three bits
in the Roman style. The Greek does not appear at all. This
almost complete absence of the antique element must be attributed,
without doubt, to the necessity of forming special sculptors to restore
the ancient Gothic edifices injured by time, and also to ornament
the new monuments erected in this same style so dear to Germans.
Thus it happens that there is a void to be regretted in the instruction of the Nuremberg School. On the other hand, the course of
study in the direction of invention and of composition of objects of
industrial art appears excellent, and gives the best results.
WURTEMBERG.
"'A remarkable collection of plaster models, from elementary
geometrical figures to the most complicated ornaments of pointed
architecture, has been formed,at Stuttgard by M. de Steinbeis.
Mouldings of plants and foliage, most skilfully made from nature,
supply the pupil with excellent subjects for study, and show him
what assistance he can obtain from nature for decorative art. The
judgment which presided over the creation of a course of drawing




DRAWING.                       245
by mouldings after nature cannot approve the bad method followed
in making the great black drawings which cover the walls of the
Bavaria and Wurtemberg Exposition, - a method which consists
in forcing the pupil to spend much time on complicated drawings,
filled with heavy shades that are produced by great effort at hatching, and which teach them absolutely nothing.'
"Here are the theories of art, which we present to those who are
delegated to teach. In other respects, the whole personal initiation
is left to them."
IIENRI DUFRESNE, Reporter.
PLAN   OF  TEACHING   DRAWING   AT  THE ROYAL INDUSTRIAL
SCHOOL IN NUREMBERG, ADOPTED IN NOVEMBER, 1869.
I. Ornamental drawing, preparatory class. (a) After ornamental models, twelve hours weekly. (b) Exercises in the drawing
of surface ornaments, six hours weekly; Prof. F. C. Meyer.
II. Drawing from the antique, twenty-four hours weekly; Prof.
Jaeger.
III. (a) Drawing from living models, groups of figures and
drapery, twelve hours weekly; Supt. Kreling. (b) Drawing of
heads, twelve hours weekly; Supt. Kreling and Prof. Jaeger. (c) Execution of cartoons, paintings on glass, &c.; Supt. Kreling and
Prof. Wauderer.
Technical School. - First Course.
First Term (of six months). -Education of the eye and hand by
the drawing of lines and geometrical figures. Full size drawing of
bodies with plane surfaces. Explanation of the faculty of sight,
21*




246             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
and the first principles of perspective. Linear drawing without
instruments is combined with free-hand drawing.
Second Term. - Continuation of free-hand drawing. Drawing of
simple ornaments, from pictures fastened on the walls, or from
slightly relieved or intersected objects. Linear drawing with the aid
of square, and mathematical instruments. Division, measuring, and
transfer of right lines, angles, and figures. Construction, gradation,
and subdivision of scales.
Second Course.
Drawing of figures in relief. Drawing of compound ornaments,
from "plastic " (plastischen) models. The proportion of the human
head and its parts in firm, simple outlines, from pictures fastened on
the walls. Exercises in the construction of regular curved lines.
Architectural details. Projections of simple surfaces and plane circumscribed contours. Relief-drawing, after simple "plastic "objects
in different proportions as to size.
Third Course.
Continuation of the exercises in free-hand drawing, curvilinear
objects, drawing of animals and plants, - so far as applicable in
ornaments, - with light shading to mark the form. Explanation
of the manner of representing style. Drawing of the human body
and its proportions in outlines. Linear drawing. Continuation of
exercises in the drawing of projected figures, with reference to simple machines and models. The (five) orders of architecture. Industrial ornamentations and profiles, - if possible, in natural size, -
after models. Sketching from nature. Exercises in India ink. Designs in intersection. Relief-drawing, after pictures of simple forms
from the antique.




DRAWING.                        247
Agricultural School. - First Course.
First Term. - Training of the eye and hand in the drawing of
lines, geometrical figures, and simple ornamental forms, from large
pictures fastened on the walls. Drawing from correspondingly large
bodies with plane surfaces. Explanation of the act of seeing, and
the first elements of perspective.
Second Term. - Linear drawing, with the aid of square and instruments. Division into spaces. Measuring and transfer of straight
lines, plane angles and figures. Construction and division of scales.
Exercises in the drawing of simple geometrical bodies in outlines,
and in various positions. The principles of projection.
Second Course.
Exercises in drawing of details of architecture, and especially
arrangements of agricultural buildings, after models and original
designs. Drawing of simple agricultural implements. Instruction
in the designing of maps, and division of land into sections, intended
for various agricultural purposes (culturplinen).
Third Course.
Exercises in the drawing of whole buildings, after models on a
diminished or enlarged scale. Sketches of buildings in elevation
and in profile. Drawing of agricultural implements and machines,
after original designs.
Polytechnical School [Real Gymnasium]. - First Course.
Free-hand drawing. Exercises in the drawing gfstraight lines,
and the formation of geometrical figures out of these lines. Drawing of bodies with plane surfaces, accompanied by explanations of




248             TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
the faculty of sight,. and the first elements of perspective with reference to single figures and groups of figures. Exercises in the drawing of curved lines, and the formation of simple ornaments out of
these lines. Drawing of symmetrical ornaments and implements,
from pictures fastened on the walls, and from slightly-relieved plaster casts of antique forms of art.
Second Course.
Free-hand drawing. Division and relations of different parts of
the human body, from pictures on the walls. Foreshortening of
single parts in different positions; the form of the human body in
different movements. Richer ornaments, round and plane, in outlines. Linear drawing. Exercises with rule, square, and compasses,
by dottings or figures. Explanation of the principles of projection.
Exercises in the delineation of simple bodies in projection. Measuring and reduction of models of bodies, and their projection
according to various positions.
Third Course.
Free-hand drawing. Practice in the art of shading in its simplest form, -at first from plane-surface ornaments, afterwards from
round. Heads in different positions; hands and feet, after easy
models. Ornaments of different epochs of art, in connection with
architectural details.  Linear drawing.  Measuring of compound
models of bodies with plane surfaces, and their projection, by the
application of geometrical rules, on an enlarged or reduced scale,
according to position. Relief-drawing. Projection of ornamental
details and of entire ornaments, - at first after solid, then after plane
models, on an enlarged or diminished scale.




DRAWING.                       249
Fourth Course.
Free-hand drawing. Drawing of animals and plants, with close
regard to foreshortening and oblique positions. Explanation of
style, and its mode of presentation. Drawing of figures, after plane
models. Ornamentation in conjunction with the human form, and
forms of animals. Linear drawing.  Projections of bodies with
curvilinear surfaces, and their interjections. Drawing of the orders
of architecture.  Exercises in linear perspective, and shading of
outlines. Construction of models. Execution of forms of crystals,
and their transitions, in pasteboard, after originfal designs, in accordance with the rules of descriptive geometry.
With the authoritative testimony presented in this
chapter, it cannot now be difficult to determine what
should be the general scope and character of a course
of drawing for common and special schools in this country, calculated to give both educational and industrial
results of the highest order.    Such a course of drawing, whatever may be said of details, must embody
the   leading  features   which   are  approved   by   the
authorities here cited; as does, for instance, the
course prepared by Prof. Walter Smith, Director of
Art Education for the State of Massachusetts.          For
the purpose of preparing a course of instruction in
drawing, and superintending its introduction into the
public schools of the State, on the recommendation of
the Science and Art Department of the British Govern



250          TECHNICAL EDJCATION.
ment, Massachusetts and the city of Boston secured the
services of Prof Smith, an English teacher of drawing
and art, who had had an experience of many years as
the head master of the school of art at Leeds, while he
was familiar with the work done in the best Continental
schools. With the results of European Art Education
before us, and a clear understanding of our own needs,
it does seem that there need be no more misconception
of what is really meant by drawing, and no more serious blunders made in teaching it in this country.




CHAPTER VII.
CONCLUSION.
THE testimony of the -preceding pages is conclusive,
that, at this juncture in affairs, American labor should
be thoroughly educated. It would be better for the
laborer who is educated; since, by doing skilled work,
his toil would bring him an ampler reward. It would
be better for the employer; since, with the same capital,
he would obtain products of greater value, while he
would have, in the educated labor under his control,
an assurance of stability, an assurance that others could
not excel him, and drive him from his business. It
would be better even for the laborer who is by nature
so stupid that he cannot be educated; since the advancement of him who was educated to higher grades of
employment would improve the chances, by diminishing the quantity, of ignorant bone and muscle. It
would be better for the merchant; since it would enable him, in the markets of the world, to meet success251




252          TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
fully the competition of the world with native products;
and the markets of the world, to-day are no less the
home than the foreign markets. It would be better for
the State; since it would give her more intelligent, more
thrifty, more virtuous citizens. Indeed, as educated
labor is in every way the best, so in every way is it
the cheapest labor in the world.
THE WORK MUST BEGIN IN THE PRIMARY SCHOOLS.
-The testimony is also conclusive, that the education
now required by the laborer must be much more than
merely literary, much more than merely technical: it
must be a due combination of both elements. The
work, too, of imparting this education, must begin in
the primary schools, -with language and mathematics,
with art and natural science. In the higher public
schools it must keep the same breadth, mainly leaving
specialties of all kinds for special schools. There must
be enlargement here, reduction there, all the way along
the common-school curriculum, until we secure the
popular education which the times demand for all, but
especially for those who labor with their hands.
Consider what a large proportion of the pupils quit
the public schools, never to enter them again, after they
are thirteen years old. How essential, therefore, that
some of the elements of a technical education should




CONCLUSION.                 253
be taught in the primary schools! that pupils, before
they are ten years old, should make a rational commencement with certain of the natural sciences and
with drawing! It is always found, in attempting to
acquire a knowledge of any new subject, that the most
difficult part is to make a satisfactory beginning. Such
beginning once made, farther progress becomes easy
and rapid. That is one of the reasons why an adult
of the average ability and spirit, but without any early
technical education, so seldom attempts to make himself, by study, master of his business. If he is a farmer,
for example, he cannot read the best books treating of
agriculture, because he does not understand the chemical and botanical terms with which he meets, and without whose aid the books could not have been written.
For the same reason, many of the best articles in his
agricultural journal are for him  a stumbling-block,
and without profit. What is true ot the farmer is
equally true of the carpenter, machinist, &c., if they
have received no early technical instruction. It may
be said they ought to set themselves studying the
elements of those arts and sciences which bear upon
their occupations, until they know enough to be able, at
least, to read such books as would be of special service
to them. But the great majority of them do not, and
never will, if left entirely to themselves. Now and then,
22




254          TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
even in this country, we meet with men of considerable
business capacity, men who have accumulated money,
and yet cannot write their names. Rather than give
the little time and labor which would be sufficient for
learning to write their names, these men subject themselves to the continuous shame of making their mark.
Though each needs to learn only the letters composing
his own name, yet he goes on making a cross for his
signature to the day of his death. This, indeed, is an
extreme illustration of the inertia of the adult mind
when the learning of something new is involved. But,
for the writing of one's name, substitute.the elements
of any science or of drawing; then you have, for the
average adult mind which has not been previously
introduced to these mysteries, what will appear an overwhelming task. It may, indeed, be safely asserted,
that, if all technical instruction is put off until the
learner has become a workman, the instruction can
never in any way, even with multiplied special schools,
be made adequate to the requirements of the age. If,
however, a proper beginning has been made in the
common school, then there will be little difficulty with
subsequent instruction.
But even if we could be assured that every child in
the public schools would remain there until seventeen
years old, and would afterwards attend suitable special




CONCLUSION.                 255
schools, still it would be best to begin teaching the
elements of natural science and art in the primary
schools. Nearly every department of knowledge has
features which are adapted to the minds of children,
and which can often be better learned in childhood than
at any later period. Notably this is true of drawing
and of natural science. Both appeal to the perceptive
faculties, and train the sight. Drawing deals with
visible lines and forms: natural science deals with
facts, phenomena, instead of words and abstract statements. Drawing cultivates the taste, confers manual
dexterity, develops the inventive powers. The training which gives these things should begin early. Better than any other study adapted to childhood, natural
science teaches to compare, to generalize, to tabulate, -
things which pupils should begin to do at an early age,
always providing that they are confined to things which
they clearly comprehend.
CRAMMING.- Then you would devote the primary
schools and public schools generally, it will be said, to
the work of cramming pupils with a great and confused
variety of facts, when they should quit the schools
with a compact mass of knowledge, well arranged and
well digested. Instead of giving them mental discipline,
strong tendencies of mind to act in the right direction,




256           TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
you would leave them with good, strong habits of mind
all unformed, the result of the vague impressions and
fleeting influences to which they had been subjected by
a too varied course of study. Certainly not. We
would strive, and we believe successfully, for the just
mean of knowledge and discipline, of formation and
information; keeping two ends always in view, —the
one educational, the other directly practical.
What is cramming?   The mind must be supplied
with a certain amount of facts, impressions, data, as
the body must be supplied with a certain amount of
food, before there can be digestion, assimilation, and
growth. So long as the supply does not exceed the
amount which can be well digested and assimilated,
there is no cramming; and the young, growing mind,
like the young, growing body, needs a large supply of
food to keep it in healthy, prosperous condition. Just
how much, it is, of course, impossible to tell. It is not
necessary that the body be nourished with the same
limited variety of food month after month, and year
after year. Indeed, an occasional change is known to
be decidedly advantageous. By the change, the relish
with which the food is eaten is frequently increased,
and, in consequence, the capacity for digestion and
assimilation. Though there may be more eaten, as the
result of the change, there is not, necessarily, any more




CONCLUSION.                257
cramming, -gluttony; because all that is eaten may be
well used. A glutton may be gluttonous with a single
dish. Change and variety of food do not, therefore,
necessarily imply cramming for the body, but, rather,
health and growth. Nor does variety in study necessarily imply cramming for the mind, but, rather, increase of knowledge and strength.
There may be just as much cramming with a few as
with many studies. How often pupils in the public
schools are compelled to learn the spelling of fifteen or
twenty thousand words, and that, too, without heeding
the laws of orthography, when there is no assurance
that one pupil out of fifty will have occasion, in all his
after-life, to write above three or four thousand different
words, and those the most common! What is that but
cramming? How often the pupils in the public schools
are compelled to memorize, and that, too, with little reference to generalization, twenty to forty thousand facts
in geography, when it is well known that not more than
one-tenth part of these facts will be permanently remembered, or would be of any use if they were remembered! What is that but cramming?    And what is
that (which is sometimes done) but cramming, when
children are made to memorize the solutions of numerous problems, and to learn a variety of arithmetical
processes, yet are never required to compare one prob22*




258          TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
lem with another, nor one process with another, and
never get a general view of arithmetical principles and
their applications?  And what is that but cramming,
when children memorize whole grammars, and repeat
them  verbatim, while their discriminating powers are
not equal to the comprehension of one-quarter of what
they repeat? Yet if the pupils in the public schools are
kept to spelling, arithmetic, geography, grammar, - the
old recognized studies, -it is supposed by many that
the evils of cramming will be avoided; while the truth
of the matter is, that cramming in its worst form is
usually found in those schools where the fewest studies
are pursued, and where huge text-books receive their
heartiest welcome. A large percentage of pupils now
waste time enough in cramming with the spelling-book,
to give them, if their energies were rightly directed, a
rational, substantial start in botany.  The common
words which they will have occasion to spell after they
leave school, they would spell as well as now; while their
knowledge of botany, and the discipline derived from
its study, would be so much clear gain.
VARIETY AND ALTERNATION OF STUDIES. - With
an increase in the number of studies, it by no
means follows that they must all be pursued at once,
but rather that they should be taken at intervals, with




CONCLUSION.                 259
due alternation, as in the case of food. It is especially
necessary in schools for the smaller children, that quite
a variety of things should be taken in hand each day;
since it is often impossible to keep the pupils, for any
great length of time, interested in one thing, hpwever
well they may like it on the whole. When their interest
is gone, there is no improvement; but, rather, disgust for
school, for instruction, springs up. John Locke spoke
very truly when he said a boy would soon tire of the
sport, if he were required to spin his top a stated number of hours at the same time each day. And so it is
with little children and their studies, however agreeable
the studies may be in themselves. There must be a
sufficient variety to give the children a healthy, unflagging interest in their work. Because there is not now
such variety in many schools, the larger part of the
time of the children is worse than wasted. The older
the pupils are, and the better trained in applying themselves to study, the fewer the things which will suffice
to give the requisite variety. If all the studies it is
thought essential that pupils of a given age should be
instructed in are not required for this purpose, then let
the studies be taken at intervals; thus diminishing the
number of lessons learned daily by the pupil, and the
number of class-exercises conducted by the teacher.
The studies should not, however, alternate from day




260         TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
to day, nor from week to week, but, rather, from month
to month, or from term to term. It is, for several reasons, impossible to secure adequate results in any study,
with a short lesson every third or every second day.
Put the instruction which would thus be devoted to
any study in three months all into one month, and
very much more would be accomplished. LeA the work,
then, when any thing is done, be continuous and
earnest.
There is no reason why arithmetic even, when once
taken up, should be pursued without interruption until
it is dropped finally. No harm, but, on the whole, good,
rather, would come from dropping it; also geography
and grammar an occasional term. The pupils would
take up the work with renewed relish and vigor; what
had been partially forgotten would soon be recovered;
and then their advance over new ground would be more
rapid than if there had been no period of rest. Experience justifies this declaration. If deemed advisable,
however, that any general division of study should be
pursued without any interruption, then, in the mathematics, for example, geometry might take the place of
arithmetic, even with the youngest pupils.  Natural
science and drawing have, also, their different departments, which could be pursued with proper periods of
alternation.




CONCLUSION.                261
ROOM FOR ADDITIONAL STUDIES. - Thus, if we reduce each study to its legitimate bounds, as determined
by the two fundamental considerations, - the one educational, the other directly practical, -we can readily obtain
place for additional studies in the public schools, and at
the same time avoid the evils of cramming. While we
give a pleasing variety to the studies in primary schools,
utilizing all the time of the children with advantage to
both their mental and physical health, we can at the
same time, by giving to different studies intervals of
rest, confine within a rational limit the number of lessons learned daily by the older pupils, and the number
of class-exercises conducted daily by the teacher. Having done thus much, if we can then, without sacrificing
any part of the economy of class instruction, so modify
the present cast-iron system of graded public schools as
to give the pupils in them an equal freedom with pupils
in ungraded schools, enabling a large percentage of the
pupils to accomplish in three years (and they are abundantly able to do it) what they are now compelled to
spend five years upon, there will be yet more time
gained for additional studies. This same change should
also relieve the teachers of a part of their present responsibility for the advancement of their pupils, and put
it where it belongs, - upon the pupils themselves, and
upon their parents. The teacher would then become,




262          TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
what he should be, an assistant in the education of the
pupil, or director at most. The self-reliance of the pupil
and his love for his teacher, - who would be regarded
as his friend, and not as his master, - would be greatly
augmented. But if we cannot have these modifications
in public-school instruction, then the new studies demanded by the times must go into the schools as they
are, and each study take its chances. When parents
and pupils see in schools certain new studies which have
a direct bearing upon daily labor, the pupils will attend
school a year or two longer for the sake of obtaining
instruction that will tend directly to increase the returns
for their toil. For the purpose of learning a little more
geography, a little more arithmetic, a little more grammar, most pupils do not care to attend school, and most
parents, we know, do not send them; but when there
is seen in the schools something which will help them
directly to become better farmers, better carpenters, better machinists, better artisans of every kind, the whole
situation will be reversed, and a large part of the pupils
who now leave school at such an early age will be found
attending school a year or two longer if possible.
MENTAL DISCIPLINE. -What is discipline?     To
increase the number of studies will diminish, it may be
said, the discipline which the mind should always derive




CONCLUSION.                 263
from pursuing a course of study. Already it has been
shown, that to enlarge the course of study will not, necessarily, enlarge the amount of cramming, —one of the
worst features of bad instruction. But what of the variety? Though there should be no more cramming, will not
the variety tend to give only vague, fleeting impressions,
instead of strong tendencies in the right direction,
instead of enduring habits of mind?  Let us see.
While each study has its peculiar characteristics both in
matter and method, which exert a peculiar influence
upon the mind of the learner, yet all studies have much
in common  and the learner who has gained a knowledge
of one finds it easier to gain a knowledge of all the
others.  The memory needs to be cultivated; but it
should be cultivated in different directions.  Pupils
should not be kept constantly exercising their memory
with one subject, -with the facts of geography alone, of
arithmetic, of grammar, of science, of history. It is
far better that it be exercised with various things, the
pupil always shunning the fatal mistake of memorizing
words according to the order of their sounds, and not of
their meaning. Pupils should also learn to compare and
discriminate; and this they can learn not only from the
problems and processes of arithmetic, not only from
the grammatical usage of words, not only from the
phenomena of science and the forms of art, but best




264          TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
from them all combined. Pupils should learn to generalize and to tabulate; but no one study has a monopoly
of these things.  Pupils should learn application and
self-reliance; but no study is without its obstacles and
its demands for persistent effort. Hence it follows, that
a change from one study to another does not break the
continuity of the discipline: it only modifies the discipline, and, on the whole, for the better. Then there is
a certain power and aptitude which comes from breadth
of study, that can never be obtained from a narrow curriculum, and which enables one to do even special work
better than the mere specialist. For this, among other
reasons, no harm results when a study is occasionally
discontinued for a brief interval, that another may be
taken in its stead.
THOROUGH    INSTRUCTION  AND EXHAUSTIVE INSTRUCTION. - Great emphasis is justly laid upon thorough instruction; but the mistake is often made of putting exhaustive for thorough. One may know little of a
given department of knowledge, yet know that little just
as thoroughly as if he were acquainted with every thing
that pertains to the department. One may have a clear
comprehension of the great principles, laws, of any
science, yet be totally ignorant of nine hundred and
ninety-nine facts in every thousand known to be em



CONCLUSION.                265
braced by those principles or those laws. Now, it happens that too frequently text-books are made, and too frequently teachers attempt to teach, on the exhaustive
plan. Cramming is the inevitable result, instead of
rational instruction. Every text-book designed for public
schools should be made, first, with reference to the best
educational; second, with reference to the greatest practical, results derivable, not from one study, but from the
whole course.  Agreeably to these requirements, the
books should be made large or small, more or less exhaustive, but always rational, always according to sound
principles of instruction. And teachers of the public
schools should always labor with the same objects in
view, not unduly fostering one study, and neglecting
another, because they chance to like the former, while
they dislike the latter.
TEXT-BOOKS IN NATURAL SCIENCE.        The textbooks of natural science which are designed for use in
the public schools should attempt no more than a clear
outline of each department, acquainting the pupils with
only its leading and most characteristic facts, with its
nomenclature, its general principles, and best methods of
investigation. To do this, the books must be rationally
constructed, having in view both an educational and a
practical result. The different departments, - as botany,
23




266          TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
zoology, chemistry, mineralogy,- when they do not
follow, can alternate with one another; that being taken
which is best adapted to the season of the year.
COURSE OF DRAWING FOR COMMON SCHOOLS.Since the testimony of the preceding pages is conclusive, that drawing should form the main feature in
technical education designed for the great mass of the
people, it will be well to add a few final words to what
has already been said. The scope of the instruction,
and, consequently, of the text-books, must be determined
by the real needs of the people, and much or little be
done accordingly. The needs, it is evident, are great;
while the services which can be rendered by drawing are
great also. Upon that we must proceed. The methods
of instruction which are followed must aim to give both
the best educational and the best practical results: they
must be methods which have been justified by experience,
or certainly methods which have not been condemned.
Of course, original methods, unless they are absurd on
their face, are never to be cavalierly dismissed.
A full and suitable course of drawing for public
schools must include several clearly-defined departments. The whole must be systematically arranged,
with reference, first, to logical order of principles; second, to difficulties of manual execution; third, to ca



CONCLUSION.                 267
pacity of pupils at different ages; fourth, to sound
principles of teaching. In a word, drawing is not a
thing of vague uncertainties. It must be treated as
should any other branch of study, that is, rationally, if
it is expected to obtain satisfactory results. The twc
general divisions of drawing —free-hand and instrumental-may be divided into several minor departments, each having its peculiar characteristics. First,
there should be free-hand drawing from copies in flat
outline, dealing almost wholly with pure form. This
work the youngest pupils should begin with slates, to
be followed by similar but more elaborate drawings on
paper. The practice in flat outline, while training the
eye to distinguish beautiful forms, and the hand to
draw them, should also teach, first, common geometrical figures; second, principles of practical design as applied to flat surfaces in woven fabrics and mural
decoration, and to the contours of glass-ware, tableware, and all kinds of pottery; third, some of the
features which distinguish the art of different nations,
as Egyptian, Greek, Roman, Gothic.
After a degree of skill in free-hand work has been acquired by the pupils, then should come mechanical drawing with instruments. This should concern itself
mainly with those problems in plane geometry which
are most extensiJely employed both in the construction




268          TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
of flat designs, and by carpenters, masons, machinists,
and artisans generally. This instrumental drawing,
since one of its educational objects is to teach the severest precision, should alternate, from day to day, with
free-hand practice in flat-outline, which aims, among
other things, to teach freedom of movement, and celerity of execution. This alternation has been found to
help each kind of drawing: it tends to give accuracy
in free-hand practice, and quickness in the manipulation
of instruments.
Thus far, little or no thought has been given to the
three dimensions, - to length, to breadth, and to height.
Next in order, therefore, should come model and object
drawing, which involves the three dimensions, and has
for one of its educational aims the development of the
imagination, that the pupil may be able to form a distinct mental picture of any object. This every one,
but especially the artisan, has almost constant occasion
to do. In this department, the leading subjects of
study should be geometrical solids, manufactured objects
specially illustrating geometrical forms, ornaments in
relief, and natural objects having marked geometrical
features, and illustrating principles of practical design.
The models and objects, also the flat copies which
should accompany them, should be beautiful as possible
in form, that the taste may continue to be cultivated.




CONCLUSION.                269
As but little can be done in this department without a
knowledge of the principles of perspective, and as these
principles cannot well be learned without drawing
objects of three dimensions, it is quite proper that perspective drawing with instruments should alternate, from
day to day or week to week, with free-hand drawing of
models and objects. This work should begin in the
grammar school, and conclude in the high school.
It is proper that the mechanical drawing of the figures
of plane geometry should precede model and object
drawing, and perspective. For how can one put a hexagon, for example, into perspective, unless he can first
draw it geometrically? As perspective drawing, also
model and object drawing, in the public schools, must
be largely of the most practical nature possible, many
of the objects drawn will necessarily have plane geometrical sides, contours. Unless, therefore, these objects can be drawn geometrically, that is, as they
actually are, with their true proportions, it is impossible
to draw them in perspective, that is, as they appear,
with all their proportions modified by the laws of
optics.
Before coming to object and model drawing, and to
perspective, very little or nothing should be done with
light and shade, and not very much then, though something. Form should predominate. There remains one
23




270          TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
other, a fifth, general department of drawing which can
imperatively claim a place in the public schools; and
that is mechanical projection. This should be so far
taught as to give the principles which are common to
all kinds of construction, - architecture, machinery,
bridge-building, and the like. The object should not be
to make draughtsmen, - a work properly belonging to
special schools, - but to enable the pupils readily to
read working-drawings. Whether this department of
instrumental drawing be taken    before  perspective
among the less advanced pupils, or after perspective
among the more advanced pupils, it should be, in the
main or wholly, an elective study, to be pursued by
those who will probably engage in some kind of building construction.
This is a general outline of what must constitute a
practical and artistic course of drawing for the public schools. It is certainly the least that should be
taken. While the general features must be such as
have been described, there may, of course, be minor
modifications to meet the requirements of local circumstances. For the more' advanced pupils, especially for
those showing a marked aptitude for art, there should
be added, in the high school, more drawing from nature and from the cast, with greater attention given to
light and shade.




CONCLUSION.                271
For each department of drawing, even for model and
object, there should be text-books. They should be
few or many, large or small, according to the requirements of the work to be done. They should contain
drawings to be executed, directions for executing them,
and full, clear explanation of the principles involved,
that the pupils may become much more than mere copyists. Such a text, lessening the labor of the teacher,
and generally diffusing the principles of art, has a value
hardly second to that of the drawing-copies themselves,
though the latter are, what they always should be,
beautiful in design, and perfectly accurate in drawing.
With such books in the hands of the pupils, it is far from
a necessity that the teacher should be an expert in
manual execution. Indeed, the regular teachers of the
public schools, possessing the great advantage of a general knowledge of teaching, can always do excellent
work, aided by such books as have been described.
They will usually excel the mere draughtsman in the
schoolroom. But if the teachers of the public schools
were all expert at drawing, even then the pupils should
be supplied with such text-books as have been described,
and not be left to receive their instruction wholly from
the teachers, who would thus find their labors greatly increased, while the advancement made by the pupils
would be much less rapid. It should be one of the




272          TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
chief aims of the public school to teach the pupils how
to use a book properly. Only a small part of them now
learn this lesson, upon which depends so much of their
progress in knowledge after leaving school. They learn
to memorize the words of the text-books; but the real
meaning of the words, that, too frequently, they fail to
learn. Now, aside from diminishing the labor of the
teacher, and accelerating the advancement of the pupil,
the execution of a drawing, especially an instrumental
drawing, from a printed text, is one of the best possible
exercises.for teaching a pupil the exact force of words.
If he follows minutely the directions of the text, he
obtains a correct result: if he mistakes the meaning of
the words, his drawing is wrong, and he needs no one
to tell him it is wrong. He has only to begin again,
studying his text with greater care. It is not a matter
of memorizing words, as it might be in almost any
other study; but he must ascertain just what the words
mean, and then do just what that meaning requires.
This is a decidedly important educational feature.
A large part of the drawing copies and models, especially in the early stages of instruction, should possess
definite general proportions, and strongly-marked geometrical features, which can be indicated by construc
tion-lines or geometrical tracings. To make use of these
helping lines is to follow the practice of the best masters




CONCLUSION.                 273
of different ages. By their aid the pupil does his work
understandingly: he is enabled to make his drawings
larger or smaller than the copies, - an essential matter.
It is the true way to approach the study of Nature; for
Nature, in her general features, usually builds upon regular geometrical forms, however much she may deviate from
them in details. Unless the pupil can first draw that
which is regular, symmetrical, of definite proportions,
and which can therefore always be verified, how is it
possible for him to draw an object, whether of nature
or art, which is irregular, unsymmetrical (if only in
details), which has no definite proportions, and so does
not permit the drawing to be verified by measurement?
The blackboard should be frequently used by the
teacher for the purpose of class-instruction in principles
and in the execution of drawings. Time is thus saved.
It should also be quite frequently used for the purpose
of supplying the pupils with copies to draw to a much
smaller scale on paper. They thus learn reduction.
The pupils themselves should often draw on the blackboard, enlarging the copies in their books. Thus they
learn enlargement, while they acquire great freedom
and boldness of movement.
Pupils should frequently make drawings, the features
being orally dictated by the teacher, instead of always
drawing from copies, models, objects. This will test their




274          TECHNICAL EDUCATION.
knowledge of what they have been over; will show them
that words and lines, forms, are convertible, while it
will develop the imagination: since it will be impossible
for them to draw a single line correctly, unless a mental
picture of it has first been made. If we consider the
practical view alone, it is exceedingly important that
the imagination should thus be trained; for every one
must at times work under oral orders. Pupils should
also be exercised in the reproduction from memory of
drawings previously executed; especially should they
be thus exercised in drawing noted historic forms, until
the distinguishing peculiarities of these forms are indelibly traced upon the memory. In this way, not only
will the memory be strengthened, but the pupils will
acquire the power of distinguishing the features which
characterize the art of different nations and of different
ages. But especially should pupils be exercised in that
most delightful and most profitable kind of drawing, -
original design. Having learned some of the principles
which should both direct and restrain the invention, and
having become acquainted with some of the historic
materials to be used, also with the method of procuring
new materials from the exhaustless sources of Nature,
there can be no end to the delight, to the intellectual
stimulus, to be obtained from the practice of original
design.




CONCLUSION.                  275
SPECIAL INSTRUCTION.- A broad, rational foundation for art and science to build upon having first been
laid in the common schools, special schools of all grades,
for students and for workmen, and museums, should be at
once established throughout the country. What should
be the general character of these special schools and
museums has been clearly outlined in the preceding
pages. It is not proposed, here and at this time, to
give details, but simply to urge that such schools and
museums be established at the earliest day, upon the
broadest, most liberal foundation, and at all those central points where their influence upon the local industries will be the most direct, the soonest felt and
recognized. While the technical instruction given in
the common schools will tend to swell largely the numbers found in the higher special schools, the influence
of the latter will also tend greatly to elevate the technical instruction of the former, just as the higher classical
instruction of the academies and colleges has, in the
past, tended greatly to elevate the literary instruction
of the common schools.








INDEX.
A.                Artisans, increasing number of,
Adult mind not disposed to learn  28; French, large number sent
new things, 254.               abroad, 76.
Agriculture, labor-saving imple-  Austria, Report of the French
ments employed in, 27.         Imperial Commission on drawAmerican artisans ignorant of    ing in, 202, 243.
drawing, 184.
Apprentice schools in Belgium,
136.                         Baker, R., English wood-carver,
Apprentices, large number of,    on the superiority of French
employed at Fives (France),    work, 100.
75; have better opportunities  Bardin, M., professor in cornin small shops than in large   munal schools in Paris, reones, 78; special schools for  port of, 152, 189.
instruction of, 132; should  Batley Chamber of Commerce,
study together with workmen,  report of, 41, 47.
145.                         Baudine, Father, of Christian
Apprenticeship, decay of, 9.     Brothers' School, 152, 187.
Art, French, remarkable vitality  Bavaria, report on industrial
of, 219.                       education in, 120; drawing
Art-masters, training of, 197.   in, 243.
Art-metal work, report on, 215.  Behrens, Jacob, letter of, to Lord
Art Museum at South Kensing-     Montagu, 155.
ton, 198.                    Belfast Chamber of Commerce,
Artisan, the, should receive an  report of, 36, 49.
artistic training, 21.       Belgian testimony, 224.
24                             277




278                       INDEX.
Belgium, industrial and techni-  Chernnitz, apprentices and artical schools in, 88; apprentice  sans of, obtain a technical edschools in, 136.               ucation gratis, 40.
Bernat, director of School of In-  Children's toys, variety of, made
dustrial Arts at Lille, testi-  at Nuremberg, 80.
mony of, 127.                Christian Brothers' School, 152.
Besan9on, municipal school of,  City of London College, 160.
watch-manufacture at, 133.   Cluny, Normal School of, 240.
Beunoch, Francis, on the decline  Communal schools of Paris,
of silk-manufacture in Eng-    152.
land, 64.                    Competition  world wide, 2;
Booth, L. S., of Coventry, re-   home and foreign, 25.
port of, on ribbons, 102.    Connolly,   Thomas,   English
Birmingham Chamber of Com-       stone-mason, on Paris Exmerce, report of, 36, 38, 43;  hibition, 98.
resolutions of, 47; hardware  Co-operation. of masters  and
district, list of articles made  workmen, J. Scott Russell on,
in, replaced by productions of  105.
other countries, 51.         Coventry   Chamber of ConBradford, worsted-trade of, 55.  merce, resolution of, 49; deBrass-founding, report on, 218.  dine of silk-trade in, 73.
British Chambers of Commerce,  Cramming, 255.
opinions of, 35.             Creuzot, France, immense ironC.                  works at, 92.
Capital and labor, relative pro- 
portions of profits of, 107.
Central Imperial School of Arts  De Walden, Lord Howard, on
and Manufactures, 130.         the effect of industrial schools
Central School at La Martiniere,  in Belgium, 88.
mode of teaching drawing at,  Decline of silk-manufacture in
191.                           England, 64.
Chambers of Commerce, British,  Denmark, drawing in, 243.
opinions of, 35.             Dewsbury Chamber of ComChemistry, knowledge of, neces-  merce, report of, 39, 43, 49.
sary to  producers, 33; to   Doria, Mr., on technical schools
dyers, 40.                     in Sweden, 87.




INDEX.                       279
Draughtsman, value of an ex-   Drawing-copies, great value of
pert, 34.                      good, 234.
Drawing a part of popular edu-  Dyers, superiority of French,
cation, 18; relations of, to   39, 41, 58.
art, 177; general character of            E.
its instruction, 178; different
modes of execution of, 179;  tcole Centrale des Arts et ManEnglish and French methods     ufactures, 123.
of, 179; from flat copies, 180;  Educated labor the cheapest as
from  vegetable forms, 182;    well as the best, 252.
from geometric objects and   Education should conform to
casts, 183; with instruments,  the necessities of a people, 1;
183; ignorance of American     popular, 13; how should it be
artisans in relation to, 184:  modified, 14; drawing apart
as taught at La Martiniere     of, 18; of artisans at Creuzot,
school, 191; the  principal    France, 94; equality in, leads
means in technical instruction, to equality in distribution of
195; training of art-masters,  wealth, 106.
197; in  Austria, 202; in    England, drawing in, 242.
Nuremberg, 203; in Wurtem-   English artisans at Paris Exhiberg, 205, 244; a knowledge    bition, testimony of, 97.
of, essential to wood-carving,  English government taking up
215; Belgian  testimony in    the general organization of
relation to, 224; geometry the  art-education, 196.
true basis of all elementary,  Evening schools for workmen,
227; first degrees of teaching,  144, 152, 157.
228; Taeye, M. De on elementary, 230; French report
on, 231; in the municipal    Farmers require education, 5.
schools of Paris, 235; at Clu-  Fashion, influence of, on the
ny, 240; in England, 242; in   ribbon-trade, 72.
Austria, 243; in Denmark,    Foreign competition, remedy of
243; in  Bavaria, 243; in      evils from, 44.
Royal Industrial School at   Form, and not shade, the imNurembcrg, 245; course of, in  portant thing for beginners in
public schools, 266; special   drawing, 241.
instruction in, 275.       1




280                       INDEX.
Freeman, Mr., of Falmouth, on  Granite-trade, technical educaw
the granite-trade, 42.         tion advantageous to, 42.
French art, remarkable vitality
of, 19.                                   H.
French Imperial Commission,    Hamburg Society for Promotion
~~~187*~. ~of Art and Industry, 161.
French report on drawing at    Hawich Chamber of Commerce,
the Universal Exposition, 231. recommendation of, 48.
French students of industrial    oe    m       secretary of YorkHole, James, secretary of Yorkart, facilities of, 219.       shire Mechanics' Institute, letFrench testimony on technical    ter of, to Lord Montagu, 174,
education, 73.                 221.
French workman imbued with a     ooper Charles A., on the adtrue love of his art, 100.     vantages of museums, 166.
Furniture, value of drawing in  Hou, M., on the employment
the manufacture of, 190.       of apprentices, 75.
pGE~. Human figure, mistaken study
of, 226.
Gaumont and Guemied, examination of, by French Com-                 I.
mission in regard to manual
o  in r. ma India, superiority  of  textile
labor as a means of instruc-,tion, 125 153.           fabrics of, 223.
tion, 125, 153.
i on,. 125. 13       Industrial drawing in NuremGeometry, descriptive, the basis
berg, 203.
of mechanical drawing, 210;    berg, 23
Instruction of workmen, 143.
the true basis of all elemene te b   o a  e    Isthmus of Suez Canal, a result
tary drawing, 227.
of superior French mechanical
German clerks, superior educa-   o    eri     n 
tional advantages of, 62.      engineering, 91.
Girardon, M., testimony of, to
the successful careers of pupils
from technical schools, 74.  Jackson, Frank J., designer and
Glass-making, need for art-teach-  art-teacher, report of, 218.
ing in, 99.                  Jacobs, Thos., cabinet draughtsGorman, William, report of, on   man, on superiority of French
brass-founding, 218.           designs, 101, 170.




INDEX.                        281
K.                Leoni, Levi, Prof., report of,
Kendal Chamber of Commerce,      printed by English House of
report of, 43, 44.              Commons, 81, 157, 173.
King's College, London, evening  Literary and scientific training,
classes at, 159.               evidence of M. Monjean on,
Kirchof, Francis, glass-painter,  116.
on comparison of English and  Lowther, Mr., on effect of techFrench glass, 213.             nical instruction in Prussia,
86.
L.                Lucraft, Benjamin, on the superior advantages enjoyed by
Labor, influence of steam upon, 
4; effect of subdivision of,     rench funiture-makers, 99,
8, 12; rude, dexterous, skilled, 8
11; skilled, and not pauper,              M.
that America has to fear from
Europe, 30; rude, may be     Macclesfield Chamber of Comsupplanted by machinery, 91;   merce, recommendation of, 48.
American, should  be thor-   Machinery, effect of, upon artioughly educated, 251.          sans, 10;'increases the relative
Labor-saving implements, effects  demand of skilled labor, 33.
of, 27.                      Mackie, James, on need of intelLaborer, rude, no hope of pro-   ligence in wood-carving, 100,
motion for, 12.                169.
Lace-manufacture, influence of  Malet, M., of Imperial Artillery
art-instruction on, 90.        School, on apprentice workLa Martiniere technical school,  shops, 129, 193.
success of pupils of, 74.    Manual labor, evidence of M.
Land, deterioration of, 5.       Marguerin   on, 124; as a
Leather-trade, 39.               means of insrtuction, 126.
Lectures, popular, 149.        Manufactures no longer few and
Leeds, shawl-trade of, 41.       rude, 6; of most value, 26.
Lequien, M., on the value of   Marguerin, M., on manual labor,
drawing in the manufacture      124.
of furniture, 190.           Mechanical engineers, resources
Letheren, William, art-metal      of French, 91; scarcity of,
workman, report of, 215.        194.
24*




282                      INDEX.
Mechanics' institutes, founda-   Royal Industrial School at
tion of, 157.                  245.
Mental discipline, 262. 
Money value of skilled labor,
compared   with  unskilled,  Object of this compilation, 24.
109.                         Oral and text-book instruction,
Monjean, M., observations of,    blending of, 147.
on practical schools in Ger- 
many, 116.
Montagu, Lord Robert, letter   Paris Exhibition, testimony of
from Chamber of Commerce       Enlish atisans at, 97.
to, 35; letter from  Jacob   Philosophers before the people
Behrens to 55.                 in foreseeing the times, 108.
Mulhouse, power-loom-weaving-  Plampin, James, working-jewelschool at, 138.                ler, report of, 218.
Municipal school of watch-man-  Pompe, M   of the Polytechnic
Society, before the French
ufacture at Besan9on, 133.      ociet  before the   rench
Municipal schools of Paris,      Commission, 117, 125.
drawing in the, 235.         Porcelain-painting  at Sbvres,
167.
Museums serviceable for tech-    1
nical e'ducation of workmen, Power-loom-weaving-school at
nical education of workmen,
148.                           Mulhouse, 138.
Primary education, universal,
N.                  171.
Napoleon First, value placed   Primary schools, industrial eduupon technical education by,   cation should begin in, 252.
80.                          Prussia, general effect of techNatural science a part of pop-   nical instruction in, 86.
ular education, 16.
Newcastle Chamber of Com-                   R.
merce on technical education,  Randall, John, English china42.                            painter, on  superiority of
New studies, time for, 21.       French ornamentation, 102.
Nottingham  Chamber of Com-    Raw material, silk, 65.
merce, report of, 40, 47.    Remedy for evils springing from
Nuremberg, prosperity of, 79;    want of industrial education,
industrial drawing in, 203;    44.




INDEX.                        283
Ribbons, report of L. S. Booth  Special schools for the instrucof Coventry on, 103.           tion of apprentices, 131.
Room for additional studies, 261.  Staffordshire Potteries Chamber,
Rossat, M., on practical and     report of, 36, 49.
theoretical studies, 128.    Stanley, Lord, replies to circular
Russell J. Scott (builder of Great  of, 83, 208.
Eastern) on   education  of  Superintendent of a business,
working-classes, 103, 171, 175,  necessary qualifications of, 31.
222.                         Sweden, technical schools in, 87.
S.                Swene, W. T., on the need of
Sanuelson, Bernard, M.P., let-   art-teaching in glass manuter on industrial education    facture, 99.
in France, Switzerland, Ger-  Swiss carry technical knowledge
many, &c., 89.                 beyond the French, 72.
Switzerland, skill of workmen
Science, natural, a part of pop- Switzerland, skill of workmen
ular education, 16.            in, 85; popular education in,
Science and art department of 
Council of Education    in                T.
England, report of, 112.     Taeye1 M. De, on elementary
Schulen, Real and Gewerbe, 123.  drawing, 230.
Sheffield Chamber of Commerce  Taste, progress in, 7.
on the steel-trade, 37, 48.  Taylor, James, report of, on
Silk-manufacture in England,     gas-fittings, 217.
decline of, 64.              Technical education in Germany
Skilled labor the only sure foun-  and Switzerland, 172.
dation for prosperous manu-  Technical schools of a high
factures, 29.                  class, prominent objects of, 45.
Smith, Walter, Director of Art  Text-books in natural science,
Education for State of Mas-    265.
sachusetts, 249.             Thorough instruction and exSouth Kensington, art museum     haustive instruction, 264.
at, 198.                     Time for the new studies, 21.
South of Scotland Chamber of   Trades of England, in what parCommerce, report of, 41.       ticular injured by foreign comSpccial instruction in drawing,  petition, 37, 42.
275.                         Trades' unions prevent altera



284                      INDEX.
tions in the process of manu-  Weaving-school at Mulhouse,
facture, 42; cause the decline  receipts and expenditures at,
of the silk-trade in Coventry,  139.
73.                          Whiting, Richard, special report
U.                  of, on condition and habits of
Universal primary  education,    French working-classes, 216.
167.                         Wood-carving, French, superior
V.                  to English, 100.
Value, comparison of, between  Workman should    know   the
trained and untrained work-    theory and practice of his
men, 109.                      business, 32.
Variety  and  alternation  of  Workmen should be draughtsstudies, 258.                  men, 34; generally ignorant
Verviers, manufacturers of, 41.  of the properties of the materials they use, 41; cannot
W.                  gain much by studying at
Wages of workmen at Crenzot,     night, 76; instruction of, 143;
France, 95.                    and apprentices should  be
Wakefield Chamber of Corn-       taught together, 145.
merce, report of, 43, 48.    Worsted-trade of Bradford, 55.
Watch-manufacture at. Besan-   Wurtemberg, drawing in, 205,
9on, 133.                      244.