therefrom. But they told their fellows on their return to the Fatherland that they had nothing to fear from the American people so long as our complacency prevented us from seeing that it was only the abundance of raw material and the extraordinary ingenuity displayed in our industrial and commercial combinations which led to our success. As a nation we had yet scarcely begun to realize the importance of quality in our output, and of the trained workman in making the most of our resources; and until we did, it was not likely that a nation like Germany which emphasizes such training and the quality of its output had anything to fear from the competition of the United States.1 Such comments, by thoughtful observers, contain a lesson that Americans should heed. Not long ago Mr. Vanderlip of New York expressed himself, in substance, as follows: The remarkable prosperity of the United States is due chiefly to three causes: the great abundance of our raw materials, our ingenuity in the invention of machinery, and our genius for commercial combinations. Not one of these three causes, however, can be looked upon as a permanent cause of success. Great inroads are being made on our raw materials, and some of them are even now fairly well used up. Labor-saving machinery and cheap production cannot be a monopoly of the United States, for this machinery is obtainable the world over. American commercial combinations are being imitated everywhere. (It has never yet been shown that the cause of American success in foreign markets was due to the quality of the goods produced. In that respect we have not yet made much progress, and until we do we are, of course, at the mercy of those who are able to use all the resources which we possess and, 1 Monthly Consular Reports of the United States, January, 1905, p. 229. Referred to by Professor Harlow Stafford Person in his Industrial Education, Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1907. VOL. 101 - NO. 1 in addition, to use them to better advantage. So far Mr. Vanderlip. . Germany is the classical example of a nation that has not neglected the development of all its resources, men included. For example, in one city-Munich -there are forty different kinds of industrial continuation schools - schools for chimney-sweeps, coachmen, hotel and restaurant waiters, jewelers, shoemakers, carpenters, machinists, blacksmiths, tinsmiths, printers and bookbinders, and the rest. The name continuation school -Fortbildungsschule-is chosen advisedly, for every youth who graduates only from an elementary school is obliged by law to continue his education in some continuation school during the period of his apprenticeship to his trade; and each youth finds a continuation school appropriate to his calling. Employers are by law required to give their employees the time to attend these schools - from six to twelve hours a week, depending on the trade, for from three to five years. These continuation schools are not even-> ing schools; because it is well known that boys fourteen to fifteen years of age, after a hard day's work in a shop or factory or on a building are unable to profit by evening instruction to the extent to which they could profit by the same instruction if it were given in the daytime. Moreover, it is clear that forced school work at the end of an arduous day is unhygienic. In these continuation schools one of the most suggestive arrangements is the close correlation of the theoretical found-, ations of each trade with the instruction in the processes of the trade. That is to say, the mathematics of the school is the mathematics of the shop, whether it is jewelry or shoemaking or carpentry. The same is true of the machinist's mathematics. Similarly the drawing of the school is the drawing of the shop. The 2 "American Industrial Training as Compared with European Industrial Training." In the Social Education Quarterly (Boston), June, 1907. problems which the boy finds in the shop to-day are dwelt upon at length in the school to-morrow. In the same way the closest possible relation of the sciences, physical or biological, to the trade concerned are maintained. The youth learns also the history of his trade, and civics, and the proper use of his mother tongue in relation to his trade. From the continuation school the youth at eighteen or nineteen enters the army, where for at least two years more he is under systematic educational influence. That is to say, the German nation has been unwilling, for more than a generation, that a youth after he leaves the elementary school should be without systematic educational influence until he reaches the age of citizenship; while, in this country, we are just beginning to realize our responsibilities in this respect. The effect of the extraordinary scheme of technical education of all grades, not only the elementary technical education which has just been sketched, but of all higher grades of technical education, on the progress of German industry and commerce is well known. Before the Franco-Prussian war Germany was, industrially and commercially, rather an unimportant nation. Immediately after the Franco-Prussian war, after German unity had been accomplished, the nation devoted itself to the development of its educational system and to the development of industry and commerce; and it has become, as is also well known, one of the most important manufacturing and commercial nations of the world — a tremendous rival in that respect of other progressive nations. While Germany's educational system is not the sole cause of this extraordinary prosperity, it is, nevertheless, one of the most important causes, and by the Germans themselves is regarded as the most important. Now while it would be undesirable and impossible to transplant any German institution to this country just as it exists in Germany, it is, nevertheless, clear that this particular German institution offers most valuable suggestions for America. We flatter ourselves that in our democratic society we provide equal opportunities for all through education. That is to say, we claim to provide educational opportunities that will enable a man to make the most of his capacity, his industry, and his character, whatever his original station in life may be. And yet we have failed to provide such an opportunity for that great mass of our population who must face the most serious problem of life-self-support and the means of progressive well-being at an early age. - Thus far, I have endeavored to show that there is a great need of industrial education. The manufacturer needs skilled labor. The workman needs an opportunity to develop "industrial intelligence" and skill, and a sense of responsibility. I have also endeavored to show that while we have developed with much industry and enterprise the material resources which we possess, we have done little, if anything, to promote the development of the most important resource we have, namely, the great majority of our wage-earning men (and women). I have endeavored to show also that, while the effect of this neglect is to deprive the employer of the industrial intelligence and skill that he needs, it also deprives the wage-earner of the greatest blessing which any man on earth can have — the prospect of a steady job, and an increasing wage based on progressive efficiency and responsibility. And, therefore, that there is here an educational need for which we have not yet provided an educational institution. This institution is the school of mechanical industries.1 And it remains to sketch in briefest outline the nature of this school. Such a sketch is suggested only as a basis for intelligent experimenting. It is thought to be definite enough, however, to serve as a possible guide in planning industrial schools, 1 Cf. the Report of the Massachusetts Commission on Industrial Education, March, 1907. Public Document No. 76. and flexible enough to permit adaptation to local conditions and local needs. Each school should receive boys (and girls) fourteen years of age and upwards who express their intention to learn a trade. When these schools are fully established, they would require four years of day instruction. The first two years would include much shop instruction, greater in amount and much closer to the trades than the shop instruction of most of the manual training schools now in existence; together with related mathematics, natural science, drawing, the history of industry and commerce, civics treated as concretely as possible, and shop and business English. These two years would serve first of all to direct the attention of boys and girls to a trade, would develop in them the vocational purpose, would explore their several capacities; and should enable them, with the help of their teachers, to select that trade for which they are best fitted by natural taste and capacity. The last two years would include specialized instruction in the trades appropriate to a given locality, and the theoretical foundations of each trade drawing, mathematics, natural science, and also the history of that trade, shop and business English, and civics, as before. These last two years could be completed in that time by pupils who are able to attend the school continuously, or in a longer time by pupils who are obliged to work a part of the time; or the work could be done by such pupils in the evening. Some manufacturers believe that some kind of part-time scheme - that is, part of the time in school and part of the time in the factory - is possible for some industries; whereas for other industries the further education of the pupil would have to be undertaken in the evening. Evening instruction for persons already employed in the trades would, of course, be an important part of every school. In every community that has a manual training school the plan just outlined for the industrial school could be easily car ried out. At this point a brief digression seems desirable. It seems worth while to indicate in a few sentences the difference between manual training and industrial training. Manual training is a means of general education just as history or chemistry or language is a means of general education. It has materials of its own and a method of its own, and hence the result is a peculiar kind of knowledge and power due to the nature of the subject and the method that it demands. That is to say, each subject of instruction is a means of general education because it supplies a peculiar kind of knowledge and develops a peculiar kind of power. Each of these subjects, therefore, possesses an educational value not shared by other studies. The peculiar educational value of manual training is that it gives a knowledge of our constructive activities and a sympathetic appreciation of them which cannot be gained in any other way; and an incipient power to be useful in them, which similarly cannot be gained in any other way. It is, however, as now carried on, usually much too general to be comparable to industrial training. Manual training abstracts the principles of all trades and teaches them. It ought to make a pupil generally "handy." It is, if properly carried on, an excellent preparation for industrial training. Indus trial training goes farther. Besides teaching all the processes of a given trade from the first attack on the raw material to the last touches on the finished product, it teaches the theoretical foundations of that trade. Hence it gives the worker a technical knowledge of his trade, and begins the development of skill in the practice of it. It must not be inferred, however, from what has just been said that an industrial school can turn out a journeyinan. The skill of the journeyman can be developed fully only in the factory. Such schools as have been sketched should be independent schools parallel to the existing high schools. They should be independent schools, because the motive which dominates them determines the value of their work in every detail. It is clear from what has gone before that the theoretical instruction of the general high school is not adapted to specific instruction in a trade. In a general high school no specific application of the instruction is aimed at. In the industrial school everything has its specific application. Therein lies its value and its significance. While in training for a trade, or in the pursuit of that trade itself, there is constant opportunity for the application of all that the pupil has learned, and hence the possibility of progressive growth in thinking about his calling and in his command over it, not only in the processes of the trade, but in all that the trade means. Under such circumstances the workman knows not merely the processes of his trade; he knows all of them as he cannot learn them in the factory, but he knows the principles of his trade as well. And he should be able to form a just estimate of his own value to himself and to the community. THE HOME OF BURLESQUE ALMOST any one will tell you that the Gaiety is "a theatre to which nobody ever goes." Nobody, that is, save the thousand low-browed men and boys who pack "the home of burlesque" to the roof twelve times a week. Never was nobody so multitudinous! Yet the mathematicians multiply zero indefinitely without increasing its value, and in a certain sense the Gaiety's audience consists solely of zeros. In another sense, though, it consists of your disinherited fellow mortals, whom no man with a heart in his breast will despise and whom only the Pharisee will decline to consider. Happily, they are easily considered and as easily comprehended in this sordid play-house; for the theatre, of whatever rank or pattern, remains always a sort of father confessor, fathoming the minds and morals of its devotees. Indeed, who knows but we shall emerge from the disgraced portals with a kinder and gentler spirit toward them of low estate, and with the pardonable elation of such as have essayed to gather figs of thistles and come off not wholly unrewarded? You will find the Gaiety's exterior which quite ferociously deterrent shows you why "nobody," a thousand strong, can't resist its attractions. Blatant posters announce "The Forty Flirts," describing them as "a bevy of bouncing, bewitching, bewildering blondes" and as "40 la belle Parisiennes 40," whose performance is "positively the limit of sensation." Ostensibly, the establishment thrives by virtue of its vices. Some vices it has, and none deplores them more grievously than I; and yet the philosopher who enjoyed visiting the penitentiary "because it was so inspiring to see so many men living according to their convictions" would derive far nobler edification from a visit to the home of burlesque, which, by a species of hypocrisy the-other-end-to, makes shift to live even above its pretensions. To take the posters at face value would be to argue yourself guilty of altogether blameworthy innocence. They are n't there to do justice to the show, but rather to flatter patrons by proffering a graceful and enthusiastic tribute to what the Underworld conceives to be its taste. Needless, then, or nearly so, the prophylactic steeling of the moral nature with which a student of low life first enters that whited lobby, joins the unwholesome queue before the ticket-window, and buys his seat, preferably one in a box, whence stage and audience — audience especially-may best be scanned. It's a wondrously cheap seat, though the Gaiety's costliest. And hereby hangs a paradox: with exquisite delicacy, the disreputable play-house conserves the selfrespect of the abandoned. A price that yields a seventh-class place in a firstclass theatre yields a first-class place in a seventh-class theatre; there you're the tail of the kite, here the kite of the tail. Observe, too, how magnanimously the balcony welcomes its twenty-cent adherents, while for a dime and a headache any rogue may find an appropriate perch in the gallery. Now for the entrance and an initial impression - alas, not a visual one! An extreme and very ancient sniffiness pervades the auditorium. But que voulezvous? Pure indoor air costs money. So do clean floors. And soon the eye completes the testimony of the nostrils in proof that here an ultra-Stevensonian manager has sought to "earn a little and spend a little less." What with dingy red walls untouched by brush since "78, chairs rickety beyond belief, aisle-carpets all in rags and tatters, and proscenium pilasters still showing bruises where the clowns of a bygone epoch belabored them with one another's persons, the house deserves canonization at the hands of any who call economy a virtue. Meanwhile it keeps an eye alert for small emoluments. A youth stalks to and fro, hissing, "Cigarss, gents? Cigarss? The drop curtain (bedaubed with a masterpiece labeled "The Swanny River" and well-stocked with fitting water-fowl) has a border of paid advertisements. Directed, rather than ushered, to your box, you seat yourself next to let us say a sailor in uniform vey the arrived and arriving host. Before you, a sadly questionable array of artisans, cheap drummers, petty clerks, temporarily opulent malefactors, and, plainly well, and sur discernible, certain daring souls from the rural glades. A nervous lot, these; valorous at the ticket-window, they afterward turn discreet, for they recall that custom permits humorists upon the stage to single out a front-seat enthusiast as target for highly personal and as highly unconventional sallies — such, for instance, as comment upon sparse-grown hair. A little farther back, a glummer and less decent company, though more at ease. Beyond them, a noticeably viler herd. In the balcony a blend of pickpocket, day - laborer, and unwashen ne'er-doweel. Thronging the topmost gallery beneath a placard that proclaims, "No guying, whistling, or cat-calls: you are liable to be ejected" a rabble of tramps, thugs, sots, jailbirds, and noxious urchins. The higher, the lower! As regards demeanor, the humblest set the fashion. If heat annoys, men shed their coats. Always they smoke - wisely, considering the atrocious atmosphere, but none too well as touching choice of cigars. Should two gentlemen engage in personal combat, back yonder by the door, the entire multitude will rise as one man, turn their backs on the glittering soubrette, and await the issue. Sometimes, under extreme provocation, they indulge in audible dramatic criticism. It is recorded that once, when an usher saw fit to chide an incipient William Winter for so doing, the spectators manifested their indignation by righteously quitting the Gaiety in a body, thus vindicating the sovereignty of the individual. But listen! There arises a gust, then a tempest of impatience. Whistling, stamping, and hand-clapping rage in gallery and balcony. Even the parquet folds its Hearst newspapers and joins in the uproar. This continues minutes actually, hours seemingly-till at last there comes a glow beneath the curtain, followed by the solemn up-climbing of some five or six musicians (more there never are) from under the stage. With phenomenal promptness those artists attack a yellow overture; and the curtain, |