EGMONT VILLAGE.

Taranaki Herald, Volume XXX, Issue 4068, 15 June 1882, Page 2

EGMONT VILLAGE.

[from our own correspondent.]

June 12. — In a gradually progressing bush district there can be but little for a i newspaper correspondent to write upon. At present the settlers are bringing to completion their autumn labours, prior to preparing either for spring cropping or bush filling. Cheese-making for the season hut) for some timo ceased, and those who have cows still in milk find a ready sale for the butter at a somewhat advanced price.

All around has been extremely uneventful, still there are two circumstances worthy of record — three children of tender years losing themselves in the bush, and staying the whole of the night, which was very cold. Their conduct and actions showed considerable determination and pluck. I The second relates to the kindness of Mr. Gordon, of the Telegraph Department, who on Wednesday evening delivered to the children of the school a well-digested and instructive lecture on the art of wood engraving, thus supplying the school with a fertile source for public essays. The whole process, from the selection and preparation of the timber, was lucidly described and explained, from the falling of the tree to the finishing and fixing of the block for the Press. Considerable stress was placed on describing the kind of timber best suited, coupled with a recommendation to the children to seek in the bush for appropriate trees that would yield a light-colored wood, with the firm, close texture of the Turkish box. Many pictures and drawings, with the graving tools, were exhibited as illustrative of the- explanations so clearly given. The value of technical lectures of this kind can scarcely be over-estimated. They tend to direct those tastes resulting from peculiarity of idiosyncrasy. A child may be restless and apparently indolent and careless because its individual capability has never been awakened. Technical science, in conjunction with physics und chemistry, should in education hold as high and as important a position as any other series of subjects. In New Zealand for years to come we shall not need those various languages and refinements bo requisite where intricate foreign diplomacy is intimately connected with progress. Our most healthful position is when we are developing those arts and products suitable to the soil and climate, and those in charge of our higher sc'mols should be deeply impressed with the necessity of well organised instruction in science, rot empirically taught or by causing a series of formulas to be learned by rote, but with as great a care as is devoted to grammar, mathematics, or any other branch. The care and forethought engendered in thoughtfully pursuing such studies has thus been commented on : "There is a morality brought to bear on such matters which in point of severity is probably without a parallel in any other domain of intellectual action." Again, the firmness it gives to character : '' The desire for anything but the truth must be absolutely annihilated, and to obtain perfect accuracy no labour must he shirked, no difficulty ignored." It must never be forgotten that education must go hand in hand with the cultivation of a taste for what is good, beautiful, and useful.