X.

LABORATORIES.

BY THE REV. T. NICKLIN.

THE hero in one of Mr. H. G. Wells' books, the estimable "simple soul," Kipps, was fortunate enough to be sent to an academy for young gentlemen, where science, according to the Principal's prospectus, was taught, and, it was insinuated by the presence of some test tubes in the entrance to the house, taught practically and experimentally. Kipps' practical experience, however, was, in the event, confined to inactively assisting with the other pupils at a demonstration which failed. Such an incongruity between profession and practice has, it is probable, never been presented by the Public Schools. their laboratories half a century ago were, in many cases, deficient or absent, the venditation of them was absent also. To-day, if their presence and excellence are not known to the whole world, it is because professional etiquette disallows parade. It would be hard to find a single Public School of recognised position that has not a laboratory which, if not palatial, is yet adequately equipped for that end of science teaching that is regarded in England as educationally best.

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It would be travelling outside the scope of this article to discuss in detail the objects and methods of science training, but it is necessary for a proper presentation of the facts in regard to Public School

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laboratories briefly to touch upon the subject. It is a remarkable and significant circumstance that Germany, England and the United States of America have severally evolved a distinct type of science teaching. "The German teacher relies upon the lecture rather than upon the laboratory method (even in the German Universities only chemistry is taught practically). The newer schools possess laboratories, it is true, but very little use is made of them. The German teacher considers that it is better from a pedagogic point of view to avoid than to correct mistakes. It is better for the pupil to see experiments properly executed, and to be trained to observe and reason correctly by his teacher than to grope helplessly along in the dark, endeavouring to discover for himself. Life is too short for inventive methods. A child of to-day . . is entitled to the heritage of civilisation. The accumulated knowledge and experience of the race is his, to assimilate and make his own as rapidly as may be. The shorter the period of adjustment, provided it is effective, the better for the child and the community (R. E. Hughes, The Making of Citizens, in "The Contemporary Science Series," p. 253). The same view of the most profitable function for education to perform in the equipment of citizens for life has been stoutly advocated by Professor Perry as regards the teaching of mathematics.

On the other hand, in the United States of America, "The Heuristic method is becoming the accepted method of the best high schools, as it already is of the best colleges. There is, it is confessed, in the average high school, a great amount of pure memorising going on. The text book is still the source of all the instruction, but the days of this poor system are evidently numbered. best high schools generally possess two laboratories for scientific training in practical physics and prac

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tical chemistry. The result of this scientific training of the best high schools, though poor if measured by the mass of accumulated facts, is, on the other hand, judged by a leading German educator to be very valuable, if it is considered as a process of true education. These American boys, though they know much less than boys of the same age from the German Gymnasium or French Lycée, possess a sprightly vivacity of intellect, a large share of self-reliance and independence, a keen love for intellectual pursuits, all of which would be looked for in vain in his French or German rival" (id., pp. 280-1). Of these Heuristic methods Professor Armstrong has for some time been the advocate in England, and, as will shortly be indicated, not without success.

The English Public Schools, as might perhaps have been expected, have given to their science training a form congenial to the national character. The German conception that teaching ought rapidly to hand on to the new generation the inherited knowledge of the present has hitherto been the underlying principle, while the initiative and vivacity of the American, it has been felt, would in English boys be engendered in other ways. The selfgovernment of Public School boys has formed in them a capacity to govern and to take the initiative even superior to the Americans. The only doubt might have been as to the intellectual vivacity, and here, as will appear below, English Public School masters are not insensible to the danger of their old methods, yet see no sufficient evidence for making radical change. For, while adhering to the German theory that lectures and intellectual teaching must be the staple of the work, the English Public Schools have from the first made considerable use of the laboratory, and to-day that use is on a larger scale and more thorough in character than ever before.

The more progressive schools, at any rate, have so far listened to Professor Armstrong's persuasions that they have enlarged and refitted their laboratories, so that every boy who learns science at alland in most schools it is now compulsory at some stage in the school curriculum-can and must have some practical experience of himself handling apparatus and repeating, verifying, or, under direction, initiating experiments. To give a perfectly adequate description of these laboratories-the neatness of their fittings and the elegance of their contrivance-photographs are needed. Something, however, can be done by words, and the following account, which describes a laboratory system such as can be found in many schools to-day, will show the reader what is achieved by those Public Schools that make it their study to teach science as thoroughly as any other subject.

In the first place, then, we find a physics laboratory in a separate and detached building of but one storey high-desirable conditions for exact accuracy in physics work, although the accuracy attainable by running stone supporting pillars underneath, deep into the ground, as is done in some laboratories, is an unnecessary luxury for schools. The building contains a lecture theatre, the desk ascending from the lecturer so that all may see, and seating thirtytwo boys. A lantern and screen, and two blackboards are available. Behind is a spare room for the preparation of experiments, and the elaborate

recording of a previous lecture or the like. Opening into both rooms is the laboratory proper, with two long benches (20ft. long, 54in. wide, 34in. high), so that thirty-two can be working simultaneously, when they work, as is usual, in pairs. A noticeable feature is the improved rail over the benches, which does not, according to the old pattern, run plainly over the centre of the bench, but projecting outwards

supplies two rails, each immediately handy to the set of workers on its side of the bench. Thus no time is lost in reaching for implements. At the same time the parallelogram of forces can be demonstrated by pullies running over these rails. A dark room, large enough for two at least to work in, completes the tale of rooms. The blow-pipe table, the sinks, the cupboards need only to be mentioned. Of apparatus we notice a barometer, a balance constructed to weigh to one hundred thousandth part of a gramme, a seconds pendulum, a ballistic galvanometer, and an Attwood's machine worked electrically -the last two superior to the requirements of ordinary boys.

We pass to a neighbouring building, and find at the top the chemistry laboratory. Again we find a lecture room, capable of holding at a pinch a hundred boys, or, if it be desirable that they have ample room for note-taking, fifty. Blackboards and lecturer's desk need again only to be mentioned. A lantern and screen are readily available. Behind the desk is again a preparation room, with a draught cupboard between the two rooms, and conveniently placed for the lecturer to have any odorous vessels set ready for him there till the moment he wishes to use them, when he raises the glass window and has them within his reach. From the preparation room we pass (after half-a-dozen lavatories) to a stock room, in which are also a number of balances for the use of pupils working in the adjoining laboratory to be presently described (a few more delicate balances are kept in the preparation room). Finally we come to the laboratory proper, which has recently been enlarged with the object of ensuring that every boy who learns chemistry, however little or however elementary, may do some practical work-in other words, to comply with the requirements of the Heuristic method, to which, as has been said, Pro