schools" is probably a better and more workable condition. But some more definite instruction, on the lines of that given by Mr. Bryce's commission, would help rather than hinder the county and borough councils in the formation of their education committees. It is of vital importance that the right men should be chosen at the outset. In any case, Mr. Balfour might well consider the nomination of a certain number (say about one-sixth) of every such committee by the central authority.

Amendments are sure to be moved with the view of insuring that the majority of the education committees shall be not only appointed by, but actually members of, the local authority, and therefore popularly elected. It is possible that, in view of the outcry about popular representation in the spending of public money, Mr. Balfour may give way on this point. But, inasmuch as the supreme financial control will rest with the council itself, a popularly elected body, he may feel justified in adhering to his contention that this is a sufficient guarantee of popular control. In the natural course of things a council will appoint a majority of its own members, and can, if it pleases, introduce others (if there remain any such) as "persons of experience in education." But, if there is a difficulty in finding enough members of the council who are interested in education, the greater freedom given by the clause as it stands may be, educationally, an advantage, and will not really infringe the principle of popular control. That principle is being ridden hard by opponents of the bill, but not on educational grounds.

II Secondary Education-In the heat and turmoil of religious strife over the voluntary schools it has been almost forgotten that the original raison d'être of an education bill was the unsatisfactory condition of secondary education, and that in this particular bill as first drafted the duty actually imposed upon the new local authorities was the care of secondary education, it being left optional to them to undertake the charge of elementary education. It is still the view of some competent educationists-Mr. Arthur Acland, for instance—that this was the right line to take, and that the organization of secondary education is, from an educational point of view, the most urgent question. But the British public does not take readily to the educational point of view. It is much more interested in the religious and political disputes which have arisen over elementary education thru the rivalry between board and voluntary schools. And, as the condition of the voluntary schools was confessedly a matter of urgency, there arose such an outcry against giving any option to local authorities whether or no they would deal with elementary education that this option has disappeared from the bill. One effect has been to shunt the whole train of public interest and discussion from the secondary to the elementary line, and so far to justify the view of those who testified against the attempt to include secondary and elementary education in a single bill.

What, however, does the bill do for secondary education? It creates possibilities, it establishes machinery for future action, it suggests—rather dimly, it must be admitted-lines of activity to the authorities which it has created. Whether it effects much improvement or not will depend largely upon the courage, the public spirit, and the intelligence of those in whose hands it places the control of education. If the new local authorities

have the wit to see, and the enterprise to meet, some of the most urgent needs of secondary education for the sons and daughters of the middle and lower middle classes, there is a wide field of usefulness open to them. Mr. Bryce's commission, after setting forth most convincingly the deficiencies and general want of system in the existing provision for secondary education and the urgent need for local authorities to deal with it, arranged the functions of such authorities under four heads:

1. The securing a due provision of secondary instruction.

2. The remodeling, where necessary, and supervision of the working of endowed (other than non-local) schools and other educational endow

ments.

3. A watchful survey of the field of secondary education, with the object of bringing proprietary and private schools into the general educational system, and of endeavoring to encourage and facilitate, so far as this can be done by stimulus, by persuasion, and by the offer of privileges and advice, any improvements they may be inclined to introduce.

4. The administration of such sums, either arising from rates levied within the local authority's area, or paid over from the national exchequer, as may be at its disposal for the promotion of education.

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. The commissioners, while trusting that the measures recommended by them might stimulate private enterprise to supply some of the deficiencies noted, expressed a decided opinion that private enterprise cannot be entirely relied on, and that the duty of seeing that an adequate supply of secondary instruction is provided must be thrown on a public authority." This duty, they consider, should be imposed by statute on each local educational authority.

This has now been done under clause 2 of the bill. As originally drafted, this clause only provided that the local education authority may supply or aid the supply of education other than elementary-a futile provision, characteristic of the national and Parliamentary unwillingness to grasp the nettle firmly. As amended in committee the clause now provides that "the local education authority shall consider the needs and take such steps as seem to them desirable, after consultation with the board of education, to supply or aid the supply of education other than elementary (including the training of teachers and the general co-ordination of all forms of education)." This is a great step gained, and may be the starting-point of far-reaching reforms in our educational system. Educationally, it is of vastly greater importance than the "management clause" (7) so hotly disputed. Whichever way it is ultimately settled, that clause will have but slight educational effect. But clause 2 opens the door to that organization of secondary education of which Matthew Arnold prophesied in the wilderness half a century ago, and which has ever since been a chief article in the creed of genuine educational reformers. It lays for the first time upon a definitely constituted public authority a definite duty in regard to secondary education, the provision of which has hitherto been left to private enterprise, with no supervision, no system, and no aim other than commercial. It translates into fact the recommendations of the Royal Commission above referred to; and if at present the central authority-i. ., the board of education-is not sufficiently empowered to

see that the local authority fulfills its duty, there should be no difficulty in making this power statutably clear.

Two expressions in clause 2 as amended deserve notice as specially welcome from an educational point of view-viz., the "training of teachers" and "the co-ordination of all forms of education." That teachers should be trained for their profession is an axiom in all countries where education is taken seriously. In this country, where elementary education alone is seriously organized, elementary teachers alone have as yet received this necessary equipment for their work, and even for them the appliances for training, however good in quality, are sadly lacking in quantity. For teachers in secondary schools the need of some training has only in the last few years been recognized at all, and is just beginning to be provided tentatively, by voluntary co-operation of the Universities with some of the more enlightened headmasters of public schools. More training facilities for elementary-school teachers and the creation of a system of training for teachers in secondary schools are among our chief educational needs, and are recognized as such in this bill. In the reports upon the various educational systems of the United States recently issued by the board of education we see that the special training of teachers is always provided for, "normal" or training schools being included in the arrangements of each State or city. The Americans are a practical people, with a strong belief in their schools as a training ground for good citizenship. They feel that much depends on the teacher, and they are resolved that he (or she, a majority of their teachers being women) shall be as well qualified as possible for this great service to the State.

Into the financial provisions of the bill with respect to secondary education it is not necessary to enter here. They are details capable of modification as need arises and as the work grows under the hand of the new authorities. Those who fear, as some do, that a twopenny rate will be utterly inadequate may take heart from the working of the Welsh Intermediate Education Act. The county education committees under that Act have found that, in addition to the "whisky money" and educational endowments, a county rate of a halfpenny in the pound, with an Exchequer grant of equivalent amount, has enabled them to do much for the provision of secondary education. With regard to the "religious difficulty," happily much less acute in secondary than in elementary education, the application of the "Cowper-Temple Clause" to schools provided by the local authority seems reasonable in itself, and may help to keep the difficulty at arm's length-a result much to be desired on educational grounds. We do not want religion banished from secondary any more than from elementary schools; but we do want to keep out the "religious difficulty."

III Elementary education-With the actual details of the education given in our elementary schools the bill is but slightly concerned. It is, as regards them, an administrative rather than an educational measure. The great battle in Parliament is over questions of management and control; and clause 7, in whatever form it finally emerges, will have no perceptible effect upon the education given in the schools, except so far as good management and efficient control may affect its quality. If Mr. Balfour could have seen his way to a larger element of popular represen

tation on the boards of management, the bill might have been a step in the direction of stimulating greater popular interest in the schools. The want of such interest in England, as compared, for example, with Scotland, Switzerland, or the United States, is half the explanation of our educational inferiority; and from this point of view the introduction of more representatives of the parishioners upon the local management of schools ought to be welcomed even by the clergy, whose "one-man "management has in many cases been not sought by, but forced upon, them thru the apathy of their neighbors. If it increases popular interest, it will indirectly make, as time goes on, for educational efficiency. But, so far as any direct educational effect is concerned, the constitution of the local committees of management is of very slight importance. The controversy that rages round clause 7 is religious and political, but hardly educational.

Yet the bill, if it becomes law, should have very important educational results. Chief among these is the placing of all schools under the same financial conditions, thus getting rid of that worst anomaly of the “dual system," the "intolerable strain" of the unequal competition of voluntary schools with limited means against board schools drawing at their own discretion from a bottomless purse. The result of this anomaly was that the voluntary schools, educating half the children of the country, were inferior in staff, in buildings, and in equipment; an inferiority which could not but affect the education given in them. Only national indifference combined with religious intolerance could have endured this state of things even for a generation. As to religious intolerance, there were faults on both sides; and it was perhaps as much due to Churchmen as to Nonconformists that no modus vivendi had been found possible. There was much allowance to be made for the clergy. They had borne the burden of public education before statesmen would touch it with one of their fingers, and they were contending for a great educational principle, that this education should rest upon a definitely religious basis. They still contend for this in the schools belonging to them, tho willing, in return for increased public aid with a view to educational efficiency, to accept a measure of public control. Their attitude is not unreasonable. But what is to be said of those so-called advocates of progress, those stanch upholders of Liberalism in all its forms, who, because the great majority of denominational schools are connected with the Church, whose ascendency they detest, put educational considerations aside and set themselves to discredit and, if possible wreck a bill which, in the words of a recent correspondent to the Times, "ought to mark the beginning of a new era of educational progress"? To an impartial observer, anxious above everything for educational efficiency, it is no longer the clergy of the Church of England or the Conservative party, but the chosen leaders of Nonconformity and the exponents of Liberalism, who desire to set back the clock. Is it too much to ask them to forego the fascination of a party cry in the cause of educational efficiency? Is it too much to ask that, in the interest of the children (too little regarded by wrangling politicians) and for the well-being of the nation, all true statesmen and all who really desire the improvement of national education will unite to secure the passing of a bill, which, if not perfect in all its parts, is, educationally, a real

step forward? In its provisions as regards secondary education it is the first attempt, good as far as it goes, to carry out the carefully considered and most valuable recommendations of the two Royal Commissions that reported in 1868 and 1895. In its provisions for uniformity of administration of elementary schools by local authorities taking cognizance of educational requirements over sufficiently wide areas, in the closure which it applies to the financial inequalities of the existing dual system, and in its assertion of the principle that public education should not depend upon private charity, it marks for elementary education the greatest step in advance since the Act of 1870, and may well be the beginning of a new era in educational efficiency.

The Lake Placid Conference on Home Lake Placid Conference on Home Economics held its fourth annual session Economics September 15-20. This conference is devoted to the scientific and sociologic study of the home, the aim being to concentrate the best thought of leading workers along special lines in order that the discussions may count as distinct progress in some limited part of the field. Different specialists are invited each year as the subjects discussed vary, but a nucleus of the same workers controls the permanent policy and development of the Conference.

The special subject for consideration this year was the family in its relation to society. Dr. Thomas D. Wood of Columbia University gave an address upon "Some controlling ideals in the family life of the future." He showed the application to family life of the principle of "projected efficiency." When human beings and families rationally and intelligently subordinate their own interests to the welfare of the future, the world will have a more effective and enduring type of family life than exists at present. This can only be accomplished by the development of controlling ideals which are supported, not only by reason and intelligence, but by ethical impulse and religious motive.

Dr. Charles R. Henderson of the University of Chicago, altho unable to be present, sent a paper on "Social conditions affecting the law of family life.” The paper recommended tenement-house legislation for the purpose of saving and purifying the monogamic family by preserving for its environment the sacred privacy of a home; child-labor legislation, and the establishment of juvenile courts for the protection of the