THE CIVIL SERVICE EXAMINATIONS.

Evening Post, Volume XXI, Issue 17, 21 January 1881, Page 2

THE CIVIL SERVICE EXAMINATIONS.

? The official report on the Civil Service examinations for December, 1880, is now published. It appears that at the December examination 94 junior candidates applied to be examined, and 87 actually underwent examination. Of this number 36 passed and 51 failed. Of those who were "plucked," 16 failed in all four subjects — English, arithmetic, history, and geography, 13 failed in 3 subjects, 12 in 2, and 10 in 1. History produced the largest number of failures — 38, English coming next with 36; in arithmetic 34 failed, and 29 in geography. Only one Wellington candidate — William F. Kitchenappears among the successful junior candidates ; he is reported as educated at Wallington College two years, and stood 25th in the order of merit. For the senior examination 42 candidates applied to be examined, and 36 presented themselves for examination. Of these 13 passed and 23 failed. Two Wellington candidates were successful — viz., Reginald P. Greville and Louis C. Augarde, who stood respectively Bth and 12th in order of merit, and who Bcored respectively 2117 and 1515 marks, the number recorded by the candidate who won firßt honors being 3543 marks. Greville is described as educated 4 years at Hokitika, 1 at Thorndon School, Wellington, and 6 months at Wellington College evening classes. Augarde was educated wholly at Nelson, including 2 years at Nelson College. In fact, Nelson oarries off more than the " lion's share " of the prizes at this examination, 12 out of 36 successful in the junior classes, and 7 out of 13 in the senior belonging to Nelson, while the Ist place in both seniors and juniors was secured by Nelson, and Ist, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th in the juniors. Wellington does not show at all to advantage, even the few successful candidates belonging to this place being chiefly educated elsewhere. It would be interesting to know how many of the failures should be debited to Wellington. Of the total number of senior failures there were 18 in English, 11 in algebra, 10 in geometry, 9 in history, 8 in geography, 5 in Latin, 5 in arithmetic, 4 in trigonometry, and 2 in physical science.