But it takes them time to appreciate altruistic efforts to secure their happiness through temporal means. If you go into the interior and offer to teach them the use of the improved handloom, ten to one they will suspect that you have some selfish motive in doing so, and it would take some time to disabuse their minds of such suspicions. It should be borne in mind that the days of mechanical invention are not yet over; and it is quite within the range of probability, that some discovery may be made within the next decade which will reduce the present cost of production of the mills, and thus enable them to steal a march over the handloom and intensify its struggle for existence. The foregoing considerations will, I venture to think, make it abundantly clear, that handloom alone cannot be reasonably expected to drive the foreign produce from our markets, or even to make a very serious impression upon it. Let every step that it is possible to take be taken to secure the development of the handloom industry. But, at the same time, there should be no abatement of the efforts which are being made for the expansion of the mill-industry. I am fully alive to the evils wrought by labour-saving machinery. It fact some of the great inventions of modern Science which are considered by western writers as its chief title to commendation are, to my mind, its chief title to condemnation. But the Asiatics must either suffer themselves to be exploited and to be gradually reduced to a condition of extreme poverty, if not of national slavery, or adopt the industrial methods of the West with their concomitant evils which, however, I am happy to say, are never likely to be so serious in the East as they are in the West. Besides, when by establishing mills and factories on a large scale, the Asiatics are able to drive the foreign manufactures from their markets, the occupation of the Western capitalists will be gone to a great extent, and Europe will then revert, at least partially, to the happy old times of the "Cottage industry." That is a more likely contingency than the overthrow of occidental capitalism by the artistic development of modern Science as contemplated by philanthropists like Mr. Havell. TECHNICAL Education may be roughly defined to be training required for the Industries. These are divisible into A. Industries dependent upon Science, or ScienceIndustries, such as, dyeing, tanning, sugar-refining, soap-making, glass-manufacture, electro-engineering, mining &c. B. Industries which have a very remote, if any, connection with Science and which may be called Art-Industries such as engraving, modelling, carpentry, shoe-making, &c. *Technical education may admit of a wider definition, so as to cover Legal and Medical Education, Agriculture &c. Here, however, the expression is used in its ordinary, restricted sense. 2. By slightly enlarging the scope of the existing Metropolitan Art School, and with suitable improvements and alterations in its machinery, the requirements of the training necessary for those who intend to follow the industries falling under the division (B) may be adequately met; and if necessary, classes for these industries may without any serious increase of expenditure be established in connection with the Primary and Middle Schools. 3. The case is far otherwise with the ScienceIndustries. Those who intend to prosecute them successfully must go through, first a general course of scientific training, and then a special course of instruc tion in the subject chosen for technical study. But until lately the education in our colleges (leaving out of course the strictly professional institutions, the Engi• neering and Medical Colleges) was of a purely literary character. The study of Science, it is true, has now been introduced, but in the words of Mr. Pedler, Professor of chemistry at the Presidency College, “in a theoretical and unsatisfactory manner." The arrangements for the teaching of Natural Science in our colleges are as a rule far from satisfactory. We have heard of a Calcutta college where one ordinary sized glass-caseful of apparatus and chemicals is considered sufficient for the teaching of Chemistry and Physics. Yet the college is well known to be a very successful one; that is to say, it passes a large number of candidates for the University Examinations every year. The Calcutta University is primarily responsible for this highly unsatisfactory state of things. It takes cognisance of theoretical knowledge only, ignoring most lamentably the principle now universally recognised that practical tests should form the distinctive feature of Science Examinations. As a necessary consequence there prevails a vast deal of what is known as cram. 4. The first step, then, requisite for technical training in the Science-Industries is to introduce better methods of Science teaching in our colleges.* This could, I believe, be done most effectively by the Calcutta University following its London model more closely than it has done hitherto. We do not think it would be at all desirable to introduce Elementary Science in the Entrance Examination at the sacrifice either of *The writer of the Home Department note on Technical Education justly observes :— "As Science is the foundation of every branch of technical instruction the principles of Science ought to underlie the education of those whose aim in life is the practice of the Industrial Arts.” para 76. |