APPENDIX.

EXHIBIT NO. 2.

Public Education in France and Hawaii. Interesting Statistics from the two Republics.

Public Education in France and Hawaii.

FRANCE.

Course of Instruction in the Public Schools of the Republic.

The following interesting statistics on the condition of public education in France are furnished by Dr. W. W. Skinner. He writes as follows.

Conformably to your request, I have been gathering information concerning the public schools of Nice, France, and indirectly I have also necessarily been largely informed in regard to public instruction as it is generally given throughout the country at large.

"The age during which attendance at some institution of learning is obligatory for all children is from six to thirteen years. It is not to be supposed, however, that absolutely no child eludes this provision of the law, as in our own country, where attendance is obligatory, many children are deterred, for various reasons, from constant presence at school during this period. In general, however, the authorities are strict in their efforts to secure the attendance required, and the heads of families, even of the poorest, are anxious that their children shall have all the instruction possible.

"In many places, especially in large cities, children may attend school at a very early age indeed, even at the age of two years. The schools for pupils of this age are called maternal schools (écoles maternelles) and they receive pupils from two to six years old. The program followed in these schools is as follows: Games, and graduated movements accompanied by singing; manual exercises; first principles of moral education; the most common knowledge of things; language exercises, recitations, or stories; and first principles of drawing, reading, writing and calculation (arithmetic).

"On leaving the maternal school at the age of six (if he has attended one) the child begins his regular primary instruction by entering the primary school of the commune or district in which he lives. Here his studies are obligatory, gratuitous and unbiased by any form of religous teaching. He attends school until the age of thirteen receiving what is called 'elementary primary instruction,' for afterward he may receive 'superior primary instruction' as will be shown below.

"In this primary communal school there are thirty hours of schooling per week. On Thursdays and Sundays there is no school. One lesson in moral instruction is given every day; two hours per day are devoted to the French language (reading, grammar, orthography, composition); one or one and one-half hours to scientific instruction (arithmetic, natural and physical sciences); one hour each to history and geography, conjointly with civic instruction; at least one hour to writing; at first, short lessons in drawing, later two or three hours per week; singing, one or two hours; gymnastics, once every other day; and manual work, two or three hours weekly.

"Of late years there is no religious instruction unless it occurs in the course of instruction in morals where 'duties toward God' are touched upon. Religous teaching is left to the family and the church.

"Many pupils finish the course of elementary primary instruction, arrive at the age of thirteen and still have two or three years at their disposition before being obliged to work for a living. For such there is a course of superior primary instruction' available. In this course the studies extend more deeply into the national language and literature, into history, geography, the sciences and drawing. Besides this, new subjects are taken up, a modern language, elementary notions of common law and of political economy, as well as bookkeeping.

"This terminates the gratuitous instruction given by the State. If the studies are to be continued it is done by commencing what is known as 'secondary instruction' given in colleges, lyceums and gymnasiums, until the age of eighteen years or thereabouts is attained. This instruction is given at the private expense of the pupil or his family.

"At the present time this advanced instruction is divided into 'classical secondary' instruction and modern secondary' instruction. The former has for base the dead languages as distinguishing quality, and varies but little from the old form and subject-matter taught until quite recently.

Modern secondary instruction, a designation employed since the ministerial decree of the 4th of June, 1891, embraces more especially the modern languages together with the sciences. This instruction comprises the French language and literature, the English and German languages and literature, philosophy, moral philosophy, principles of law and of political economy, history, geography, mathematics, physics, chemistry, natural science, drawing, and bookkeeping. The pupil on entering the lyceum chooses which of the two forms of instruction he shall follow, the classical or the modern.

"Since 1880, there are lyceums and colleges for girls. The popularity of, and the attendance at, these institutions are increasing, so that in 1889 there were two lyceums and twenty-five colleges in operation and four new lyceums and one college about to open. The system of public instruction actually operating in France has obtained ever since the time of Napoleon the First. By a decree dated March 17, 1808, the following grades of instruction and of teaching institutions were established. Beginning with the lowest there are:-'Primary schools' and various schools for little children in which they are taught to read, to write and to acquire the first notions of calculation (arithmetic); these are now obligatory, gratuitous and lay;-pensions in which children are received into the house of a private individual, living there entirely as in their own family. This private teacher boards and lodges his pupils, and his school is not under the supervision of the State. Then there are institutions managed by private individuals also, but in these the subject-matter of instruction is more extensive and approaches that of the next class. Colleges come next; these are communal (or regional) schools for secondary instruction established especially in small cities or towns in which there is no lyceum. The elements of ancient languages and the first principles of history and the sciences are taught here. Lyceums (lycées) are governmental schools under strict supervision, in which ancient and modern languages are taught as well as history, rhetoric, logic, and the elements of the mathematical and physical sciences. These are found in the larger cities. Finally there are faculties of various kinds (medicine, law, theology, etc.). These different grades are found in each academy of France of which some large city is the centre, as the academy of Aix, of Lyons, of Paris, etc. The various academies are united under the jurisdiction of a higher corporation, the University of France, a governing body, having its seat at Paris.

"On one occasion I paid a visit to the primary normal school, located at Nice, of which the name in French is école normale primaire d'instituteurs communaux. The director, Monsieur Bousquet, received me very courteously and spared no pains to render my visit instructive and satisfactory.

"As its name implies, this institution is one in which the training is given that prepares the pupil to become the master of a primary school of the commune or district. There are thirty-one pupils here at present, a number found to be inadequate to the needs of the communal schools of the department (Alpes Maritimes), which is a