INSTRUCTION IN AGRICULTURE IN PRUSSIA.

The royal department of agriculture of Prussia in 1897 submitted to the Prussian legislature a course of study in agriculture for rural public schools which had been in successful operation as the course in agriculture for the model schools (Musterschulen) of the circle of Rybnik in Prussia.

In the Pädagogische Zeitung, the organ of the German Teachers' Association, this course is described, the journal taking the occasion to speak of the poor pedagogical condition of the rural schools and to ask the question, "What can the agricultural minister of each State of the German Empire do to build up the agricultural continuation schools?" and to answer the question thus: "He should improve the course with strict regard to the requirements of the agricultural calling; should provide a course for the instruction of teachers of rural schools; should supply traveling technical teachers, compile reading books, provide apparatus, and distribute prizes." The curriculum of the model continuation" schools now being established in Rybnik "Circle" in Prussia, continues the Zeitung, is to be taught by a traveling agricultural teacher and the regular teacher. The programme is as follows:

One hour weekly.

NATURAL SCIENCE AND AGRICULTURE.

First winter.-(1) Physics, to wit: The general properties of bodies and gravity; the sources of heat and its distribution; the thermometer; water, liquefaction, steam, ebullition, fog, dew, rain, ice, atmospheric heat phenomena. (2) Chemistry: The most important agricultural inorganic compounds; carbonic acid, sulphuric acid, phosphoric and silicic acids, nitrogen and the air, ammonia and nitric acid, hydrogen, water (in December). Potassium, sodium, magnesium, lime, alumina, iron and its most important combinations (January). (3) Soil formation (February). (4) Fertilizers (March). (5) Agricultural plants, to wit: Useful and objectionable plants; cultivated plants, meadow plants (pasture grasses?); weeds and their destruction; the value of a forest (die Bedeutung des Waldes) (November). Inner and outer form of plants; increasing by budding (Knospen) and seeds; conditions of germination and growth (December). Nourishment of plants (January). Irrigation and drainage (Be- und Ent-wässerung); rational preparation of the soil (February). Sowing, cultivation, and harvesting; the more important cultivated plants, including kitchen vegetables (March).

Second winter.-(1) Chemistry, the more important organic compounds, to wit: Starch, sugar, fat, albumen (November), Dairying, food, circulation of the blood, and respiration (January). (2) Physics: The lever, inclines, pulleys, specific weight, atmospheric pressure, barometer, pump, hose, siphon (February). The more important agricultural implements and mechanics (March). (3) Zoology and cattle raising, to wit: Useful and harmful animals, bony structure (November). The more important breeds of domestic animals; structure of the teeth (December). Breeding, habits, and care of animals (January). Feeding animals, especially young cattle. (4) Rural economy, to wit: Concurrence of land, capital, and work; relations of grain and forage farming; rotation of crops; mutual cooperative societies and insurance (March).

CHAPTER XXXIV.

CONSULAR REPORTS.

Contents: Gardeners' schools in Russia-School gardens in Russia-Educational institutions and methods in Corea-Leipsic Commercial University-Commercial education at Gera, Germany--Weaving schools in Germany-Education in Russia-School for merchant marine in Russia-Supplementary education in Saxony-German studies of malarial disease-Practice of professions in Japan.

GARDENERS' SCHOOLS IN RUSSIA.

In compliance with a request from a resident of Massachusetts the Department of State sent an instruction to various United States consular officers in Russia to forward information in regard to gardeners' schools in that Empire. Reports have been received from Odessa, Moscow, and Warsaw. These replies appeared in Advance Sheets of Consular Reports, and are here reproduced. They will serve to supplement an article on "School gardens," Vol. 1 of this Report, p. 224.

ODESSA.

United States Consul Heenan writes, on February 5, 1898:

In compliance with instructions from the Department I have the honor to transmit a report on school gardens and agricultural science in Russia. In this report I have given a brief history of the efforts made to improve the conditions of agriculture in Russia. It seemed advisable to do this, in order that the subject of school gardens should be better understood.

The system of farming in vogue among the peasantry in Russia is primitive in the extreme, the peasant believing that what was good enough for his grandfather is good enough for him. The difficulties and opposition which private and official efforts meet in Russia would scarcely be understood in the United States. It is quite safe to state that the soil which is tilled by the peasantry here, if it were tilled in a proper manner, would yield two and even three times as many bushels per acre as it does at present. How serious a competitor Russia would then be in the grain markets of the world will be easily understood, when it is remembered that its wheat crop alone in 1896 was 372,000,000 bushels; in 1895, 397,000,000 bushels; in 1894, 446,000,000 bushels; and in 1893, 402,000,000 bushels.

The historic part of this report was taken largely from Prof. N. P. Moskalske's article on agricultural schools in Russia, which was prepared for the Columbian Exposition at Chicago in 1893. The part relating to school gardens was obtained by correspondence with various parties and by visits and conversations with others.

I have confined this report to the school gardens in the government of Ekaterinoslav, because this province is a fair example of what has been done.

The first practical school of agriculture in Russia was founded in the government of St. Petersburg, late in the last century. It was the first attempt to develop the science of agriculture in Russia. Persons of both sexes and of all classes were admitted; the full course was three years. The attempt, however, was a failure and was abandoned in 1803.

In 1822 the Agricultural Society of Moscow, in connection with the Economic Society of St. Petersburg, established at Moscow an agricultural school with an adjoining farm, where, at first, only peasants belonging to landowners were admitted. Later on, in 1835, boys of all classes had free access to the school. The qualifications of entry were that all applicants should be able to read and write and should be not less than 16 years of age. The full course was for five years, and comprised the ordinary sciences, as also geodesy, chemistry, physics, mechanics, agriculture, architecture, and bookkeeping. The aim of the school was to qualify young men to manage estates.

In 1825 a similar school was founded in St. Petersburg by the Countess Strogonov, who gave it over to the Imperial Economic Society and permitted the students to make their practical studies on her estate of 1,200 acres, in the government of Novgorod, about 60 miles from St. Petersburg. Eventually the Russian Government contributed toward the support of this school; nevertheless, as it proved to be too great a financial burden for the Countess, and as it did not show very practical results, it was closed in 1844. The same fate awaited the two agricultural schools founded near St. Petersburg in the forties-that of Udelnoe, exclusively for peasant boys, and the St. Petersburg school, belonging to the Economic Society, exclusively for boys of the nobility. The peasant students soon left the school and returned to their old ways of farming, while the students of the other school, profiting by the rights given them by the school, entered the Government service. The committee for improving agriculture in Russia, which was founded in 1833, had great influence on the development of the science of agriculture in Russia. It was due to the influence of this organization that Government aid was secured for existing agricultural schools, and also for the establishment of new schools. In 1836 a new school was established in the town of Gorki, in the government of Mojilev, with teachers specially trained for their duties by the professor of rural economy and technology in the University of Jurjev.

The first establishment in Russia for teaching the science of gardening was founded in the Crimea in 1812 and was known as the Nikitsk Garden. The principal aim of this institution was the cultivation and acclimatization in the Crimea of the plants of southern countries. In 1828 the Magarachsk School of Viticulture was joined to the garden. Later on, two garden schools were opened, one in Penza and the other in Ekaterinoslav, and also the Imperial Botanical Garden in St. Petersburg. Of these, the Ekaterinoslav school was closed in 1859, while the others have remained in existence ever since.

The above brief summary gives the history of private effort in Russia to spread the science of agriculture. It is only since the reign of Nicholas I, when the ministry of Crown domains and agriculture was estbatished, that systematic measures for spreading the science of agriculture have been taken by the Russian Government. An agricultural school with an extensive special course, but with very limited instruction in other branches, was opened in the town of Gorki in 1840. It was divided into three sections-a lower, designed principally for peasants; a higher, called the Gorki Agricultural Institute, for furnishing educated agriculturists; and a middle, for preparing land stewards and farm bailiffs. Twenty thousand dollars was annually appropriated for the maintenance of the institution, together with the school and farm.

Young men who had finished their literary studies in a secondary school were admitted to this institution. The course was four years, during which time students were trained in natural and agricultural sciences and were given practical lessons in farming. Those who finished the full course in the institute had the same rights as those who graduated from the universities. Ir 1864 this institute

was transferred to St. Petersburg, and in 1869 the teaching of forestry received so much attention that the institute was divided into two sections-agriculture and forestry. In 1878 the first section was closed altogether, and the school was changed into a higher school of forestry. From the foundation of the Gorki Agricultural Institute to the year 1865, when it was transferred to St. Petersburg, 499 persons had completed the full course. If the 70 students who finished the higher section be included, the total would be 569.

The agricultural schools which were afterwards established in the various governments of Russia were chiefly molded on the Gorki Institute. For the lower instruction in agriculture the Government provided eight farms on Crown lands in the different divisions of Russia. These farms were designed for preparing young peasants to be expert farmers and for making experiments to improve the industry. Young men from 16 to 20 years of age, able to read and write, were admitted as pupils on these farms. The teaching was exclusively practical and consisted in working on the farms and in studying the best methods of agriculture. The course was for four years, and corresponded to that of the lower schools, adding thereto the fundamental rules of agriculture and of veterinary surgery by simple means. Schools of these three grades also existed in Russia for teaching gardening. In the fifteen years during which farms and nurseries existed for teaching boys, the number of pupils who had finished their full course was as follows: Up to 1865 there were on the farms 2,410 pupils, and in garden establishments, up to 1869, 849 pupils, of whom 518 were in garden schoo's and 331 in nurseries. These pupils, chiefly serfs, were of great use to their masters. The records show, however, that these schools made but little improvement in the peasants' method of farming, as most of the pupils on returning home continued to follow the old systems of farming. The principal reason why the teaching of these schools was not more effective was that the pupils were too little taught to study special branches. There was no elementary instruction in the natural sciences preparatory to the study of special subjects. The boys often attended these institutions not from choice, but under compulsion, and looked upon the whole course in the light of an unpleasant duty. This view was pretty general among the peasant farmers, and even among the landowners.

This brings us down to the reign of Alexander II and the liberation of the serfs in 1861, which freed the Crown peasants from the jurisdiction of the ministry of Crown domains, and resulted in a complete change in the system of developing agricultural industry in Russia. The Government soon discovered that the landowners, as well as the peasants who had been set free, were in great need of instruction in farming, and steps were taken to disseminate the science of agriculture among them. Without going too much into detail, it will suffice to state that the efforts made consisted in still further developing and increasing the number of schools. These schools were classified as higher agricultural schools, middle schools, farm schools, land-surveying schools, and garden schools.

It is not the intention in this report to do more than mention these schools and to add that they have been very successful. It is with the lower agricultural schools and the efforts to reach the peasant class that this report has to do. When the middle agricultural schools had attained a sufficient development, the ministry of Crown domains began to establish lower-grade schools. These were organized one by one, and during the ten years from 1871 to 1881 six were established. The first founded was a dairy school, opened in 1871, in the town of Edimonovo, on the River Volga. The school admitted pupils of both sexes, without any restriction as to age or qualifications. The number of pupils was over 80 per year. There was no theoretical course and no fixed plan for practical studies in the school.