H.—ll,

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tionable whether the severe and continuous repression, by means of which alone perfect stillness can be enforced, is not too high a price to pay. As to the moral tone of our schools, I shall do what I can to correct a very general misconception. There seems to ho a strange want of plain speaking on this subject. To put it shortly: the moral tone of our school children will be just as good, or just as had, as that of the homes from which they come. And yet it has got to be a generally-accepted doctrine that the teachers of our primary schools are to be held solely responsible for the misdeeds of their scholars. And a portion of the Press, with a suspicious readiness to write what is sure to be popular, is careful to point out, whenever a lad is caught using bad language or robbing a hen-roost, how defective the training in our public schools must be. It would be about as reasonable to fall foul of the clergy or the police. It is high time that the blame should be put on the right shoulders, and that parents should be reminded that they cannot thus cast their responsibilities upon a body of public servants who have already quite enough to do without bearing this additional burden. Do the faultfinders ever seriously consider how small is the portion of each day during which the scholar is under the supervision of the teacher? Deducting holidays, the actual school-hours amount to about twenty a week throughout the year, or less than an eighth of the total number of hours in each week. Is it not clear that this fraction of time —mainly taken up, as it ever must be, with purely mechanical instruction —is far too little to enable the most skilful and zealous of teachers to undo the harm that has been done elsewhere ? It is not in our schools, or under the watchful supervision of our teachers, that boys learn to swear, to smoke, and to pilfer. The seminaries where these and kindred habits are acquired —in our towns at least-—are the street-corners, where groups of lads, who ought to be at home, may he seen lounging of an evening, uncared-for by those who add to the sin of neglect of a plain duty, the meanness of blaming the innocent teacher. Unless well seconded by parents, a schoolmaster can do but little towards effecting a permanent reformation. The blackguard who is sent to him to be cured is merely a suppressed blackguard while under the master's eye, and will speedily relapse when the check is withdrawn. Good conduct, like charity, should begin at home ; and it is not too much to hope that a better feeling may hereafter prevail on this point, so that parents may habitually co-operate with teachers in their efforts to improve schoolboj'" morality, and may even be brought to understand that, in condemning the morals of school children, they also stand self-condemned. Surely it is obvious that the primary school is but one out of many humanizing agencies, and that it can only perform its part effectively when working in conjunction with these. I have, &c, W. C. Hodgson, The Chairman, Nelson Education Board. Inspector of Schools, Nelson District.

WESTLAND. Sic, — Hokitika, 21st January, 1880. I have the honor to submit my report for tho year 1879. All the schools, excepting those in the southern part of the district, have been visited at least twice during the year, one visit being made without notice, for the purpose of observing the work of the schools under ordinary conditions, and the other, of which due notice was given, for the purpose of holding the annual result examination. I have also made prolonged visits to several schools to assist teachers in improving their organization and methods of teaching. I took charge of ono important school for several weeks, in order that it might not be closed during the interval between the departure of one head-teacher and the arrival of his successor. The remainder of my time has been employed in preparing examination papers for, and supervising, the first scholarship examination ; in supervising, at the request of the Inspector-General, the examination of teachers in March last; in preparing papers for the examination of the schools according to the new standards, and papers for the pupil-teachers' examination; in examining and marking the work of scholars and pupil-teachers, preparing and tabulating the results of both, and in rendering assistance to the Secretary. Travelling has also necessarily consumed a considerable amount of my time. The past year has been one of severe triasfor the cause of education in this district. The effect of the changes the Board was compelled to make at the close of last year, although clearly foreseen, had only begun to be felt at the date of my last report. Twelve teachers who were then in your service have since left the district, and obtained more profitable situations in other parts of the colony. Many of these were among the most efficient teachers in the district; and, even assuming that their successors are persons of equal ability, the occurrence of so many changes in the school staffs, each change being attended by a longer or shorter interregnum, cannot but have had a retarding effect upon the general progress of schools so affected. There is scarcely a school of any importance that has not suffered more or less from this cause, and others have been similarly straitened through the illness of some member of their staffs. The experiment of half-time schools also has completely failed, the inhabitants of all the districts in which such schools were established having, after six months' trial, elected to take advantage of the 88th clause of the Act, and to establish full-time schools. It is much to be regretted, however, that in only one instance, as far as I know, have the inhabitants done anything towards augmenting the miserable pittance which the capitation allowance usually affords to the teachers, a pittance with which no properly-qualified person can be expected to be satisfied, while teachers are so much in demand in all parts of the colony. These half-time schools will necessarily compare most unfavourably with the other schools, since for the first half of the year they were working up to the limited programme recommended by me in my last report for use in such schools. From the time of their re-establishment as full-time schools they have, of course, taken up the ordinary work; hut, as there was in nearly all cases an interval of from one to three months between the abandoning of the half-time system and the commencement of work under the 88th clause, little or nothing could be expected in the direction of improvement, and it is therefore not surprising that in these schools the majority of the children in the classes above the third have failed to pass at the late examination. Considering the impossibility of retaining the services of efficient male teachers for