that it does apprehend. Education, unfortunately, is an art which is subject to so many delusions, that teachers whose work is not tested by examination as well as by inspection will be sure to deceive both themselves and the inspector. But the combination of careful and intelligent inspection with judicious and thorough examination obviates the defects which belong to either system separately, and renders the tests whereby an experienced inspector is enabled to judge of the work of a school as sure and perfect as the means of forming any human judgment on such materials can well be rendered.

3. Why a School should be Inspected before it is Examined.-Inspection should precede examination :

First, because if he inspects a school before examining it, an inspector will find when he comes to the examination that he has already obtained much information about the school, which will help him to estimate rightly the value of the answers given and the work done by the children in the examination. He will have seen much that will show him when and where he ought to make allowance, and when and where he may be righteously severe.

Secondly, because the scholars having become used to his voice and presence during the inspection, will be less shy, timid, or excited when they come to their examination, and less likely to do themselves injustice.

Thirdly, because examination causes so much derangement of the ordinary routine of a school, that when it is begun no fair judgment can be formed of what would be the discipline and other

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conditions of the school if the ordinary routine had not been interrupted. The finer points of the teachers' relations with their scholars, and of the tone of the school, must be missed, under the pressure and excitement of an examination.

Fourthly, because, inasmuch as the grant to the school depends much less directly on inspection than on examination, both teachers and inspectors will be apt to slur the inspection over, and go through it in a perfunctory way, if it is left to take its chance of what time and strength there may be left to spare at the end of a long and fatiguing day. There is little or no fear of the examination for the grant being so slurred over.

And, fifthly, to go to a matter of detail, because, in the case of a small school where inspection and examination are both taken on the same day, if inspection is taken first, the elder children, who can be better relied upon to return to school in the afternoon, can be dismissed as soon as the inspection is ended at about eleven or half-past eleven o'clock, to get their dinner and to rest, while the examination of the younger children is being conducted with a view to their being dismissed altogether about one, or half-past one o'clock. This will be found a most useful plan, particularly in cases where an inspector has to inspect and examine a small school single-handed; as not only does it save all the children from exhaustion, but also gives more space and quiet to those who are under examination.

In the case of a large school, where inspection and examination cannot both be got through in the same day, it may sometimes be necessary to take

examination first; as, for example, where children who have left the school during the preceding year for employment, or for schools in another locality, are recalled for the purpose of being examined. But even this necessity may generally be prevented by a little forethought and care on the part of the inspector, if he gives the managers notice beforehand of the course he intends to pursue. And it may be taken as a general rule, to which the exceptions should be as few as possible, that inspection should precede examination.

4. Pupil-Teachers should be Examined before the Inspection. — The examination, however, of the candidates and pupil-teachers employed, in the school should have preceded the inspector's visit to the school. For, as I shall show presently, it is a most important part of an inspector's duty to take with him to the school the papers which have been worked by the pupil-teachers at such examination, and to speak to them, and to the principal teacher, on their merits and defects. Nothing can be more useful to the pupil-teachers and to their instructor than that the inspector should have an opportunity of actually showing them what answers have been made to the questions set in examination. And the fear of having their blunders so brought home to them will produce painstaking in young teachers, who are too often callous to warnings which come in dry and terse terms from Whitehall.

5. Preparation for Inspection.—I proceed, then, to treat of these two parts of an inspector's work, viz., inspection and examination. And, first of all, may be assumed that he is aware of the importance of his being early at a school, and is therefore

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an early riser, and ready either to breakfast at eight, or to take a journey before breakfast, so as to be at his school betimes. Let us suppose him coming to a large town school of three departments,-boys, girls, and infants. He is there by 9.30 or 10 at latest. By means of a circular, which he sends round to every school on his list, his district is aware of his method, and there is no uncertainty, doubt, or anxiety as to how he will proceed. Consequently, when he reaches the school, he finds it working without disorder or derangement in its usual routine, all the teachers and their classes being engaged on the work which the time-table shows they ought to be doing at that particular hour. The time-table itself is, of course, hung in a conspicuous place upon the wall, and it is only necessary that the inspector should go up and look at it in order to be able to understand what is going on at the moment of his arrival. Except that, of course, he interchanges salutations with the principal teacher, no interruption is caused in the work by his arrival. His circular has announced that the work of the school should, when he arrives, be proceeding, and should after his arrival continue to proceed, until he calls for a change, according to the time-table; and that the log-book, registers, and all other records of the school, together with the returns required by the Education Department, should be lying ready on the table or desk; that the order and discipline of the school will be chiefly judged by observation of the working of the school under its own teachers, in its regular routine; and that, therefore, if the managers permit the presence of visitors at the inspection, it is most important that

they should request them to be perfectly silent, and to place themselves in such a position as will least interfere with the routine of the school; that he will endeavour to give the children an interval, and to save them from unnecessary fatigue and excitement; but that, as he cannot always undertake not to detain them beyond their usual dinner-hour, the children should be cautioned to come to school on the day of inspection provided with food.

6. Inspection of the Infant School.-If, as I have supposed, the school consists of three departments, the inspector's plan will be to take the infants' department first, because its scholars will be less able than those of the upper departments to bear the strain of expectation. I will suppose, then, that he has made arrangements to do this; and that, on arriving at the school, he proceeds first to the infants' department, where they are expecting him. If the principal teacher is a stranger to him, and, on this account, or from his knowledge of her derived from previous inspections, he has reason to think she is nervous, he will endeavour to remove her nervousness, and that of her pupil-teachers and scholars (for the nervousness of a principal teacher is sure to communicate itself to her scholars and her subordinates), by finding something in the school about which he can say a kindly and cheery word. An inspector of any tact can always find something on coming into a school, such as the cleanness of the floor, or the large attendance, on which he can bestow a word of praise, so as to take away the teacher's fear, or overcome the stiffness which is felt at the beginning of an inspection. As a general rule, however, it may be said that if an inspector has a