far as it goes; there will be no affectation or shallowness in it. The work of the drawing-master would be at first little more than the exhibition of the best means and enforcement of the most perfect results in the collateral studies of form.

Secondly. His critical power should be developed by the presence around him of the best models, into the excellence of which his knowledge permits him to enter. He should be encouraged above all things to form and express judgment of his own; not as if his judgment were of any importance as related to the excellence of the thing, but that both his master and he may know precisely in what state his mind is. He should be told of an Albert Durer engraving, "That is good, whether you like it or not; but be sure to determine whether you do or do not, and why." All formal expressions of reasons for opinion, such as a boy could catch up and repeat, should be withheld like poison; and all models which are too good for him should be kept out of his way. Contemplation of works of art without understanding them jades the faculties and enslaves the intelligence. A Rembrandt etching is a better example to a boy than a finished Titian, and a cast from a leaf than one of the Elgin marbles.

Thirdly. I would no more involve the art-schools in the study of the history of art than surgical schools in that of the history of surgery. But a general idea of the influence of art on the human mind ought to be given by the study of history in the historical schools; the effect of a picture, and power of a painter, being examined just as carefully (in relation to its extent) as the effect of a battle and the power of a general. History, in its full sense, involves subordinate knowledge of all that influences the acts of mankind; it has hardly yet been written at all, owing to the want of such subordinate knowledge in the historians; it has been confined either to the relation of events by eye-witnesses (the only valuable form of it) or the more or less ingenious collation of such relations. And it is especially desirable to give history a more archæological range at this period, so that the class of manufactures produced by a city at a given date should be made of more importance in the student's mind than the humours of the factions that governed, or details of the accidents that preserved it, because every day renders the destruction of historical memorials more complete in Europe owing to the total want of interest in them felt by its upper and middle classes.

Fourthly. Where the faculty for art was special, it ought to be carried forward to the study of design, first in practical application

to manufacture, then in higher branches of composition. The general principles of the application of art to manufacture should be explained in all cases, whether of special or limited faculty. Under this head we may at once get rid of the third question stated in the first page-how to detect special gift. The power of drawing from a given form accurately would not be enough to prove this; the additional power of design, with that of eye for colour, which would be tested in the class concerned with manufacture, would justify the master in advising and encouraging the youth to undertake special pursuit of art as an object of life.

It seems easy, on the supposition of such a course of study, to conceive a mode of examination which would test relative excellence. I cannot suggest the kind of questions which ought to be put to the class occupied with sculpture; but in my own business of painting I should put, in general, such. tasks and questions as these:

(1.) "Sketch such and such an object" (given a difficult one, as a bird, complicated piece of drapery, or foliage) "as completely as you can in light and shade in half an hour."

66

(2.) Finish such and such a portion of it" (given a very small portion) "as perfectly as you can, irrespective of time."

(3.) "Sketch it in colour in half an hour."

(4.) Design an ornament for a given place and purpose."

(5.) "Sketch a picture of a given historical event in pen and ink."

(6.) "Sketch it in colours."

(7.) "Name the picture you were most interested in in the Royal Academy Exhibition of this year. State in writing what you suppose to be its principal merits-faults-the reasons of the interest you took in it."

I think it is only the fourth of these questions which would admit of much change; and the seventh in the name of the exhibition; the question being asked, without previous knowledge by the students, respecting some one of four or five given exhibitions which should be visited before the Examination.

This being my general notion of what an Art-Examination should be, the second great question remains of the division of Schools and connexion of studies.

Now I have not yet considered-I have not, indeed, knowledge enough to enable me to consider-what the practical convenience or

results of given arrangements would be. But the logical and harmonious arrangement is surely a simple one; and it seems to me as if it would not be inconvenient, namely (requiring elementary drawing with arithmetic in the preliminary Examination), that there should then be three advanced schools:

A. The School of Literature (occupied chiefly in the study of human emotion and history).

B. The School of Science (occupied chiefly in the study of external facts and existences of constant kind).

C. The School of Art (occupied in the development of active and productive human faculties).

In the School A, I would include Composition in all languages, Poetry, History, Archæology, Ethics.

In the School B, Mathematics, Political Economy, the Physical Sciences (including Geography and Medicine).

In the School C, Painting, Sculpture, including Architecture, Agriculture, Manufacture, War, Music, Bodily Exercises (Navigation in seaport schools), including laws of health.

I should require for a first-class, proficiency in two schools; not, of course in all the subjects of each chosen school, but in a well chosen and combined group of them. Thus, I should call a very good first-class man one who had got some such range of subjects, and such proficiency in each, as this::

English, Greek, and Medieval-Italian Literature.
English and French History, and Archæology.

High. Average.

I have written you a sadly long letter, but I could not manage

to get it shorter.

Rev. F. Temple.

Believe me, my dear Sir,

Very faithfully and respectfully yours,
J. RUSKIN.

Perhaps I had better add what to you, but not to every one who considers such a scheme of education, would be palpable,—that the main value of it would be brought out by judicious involution of its

studies. This, for instance, would be the kind of Examination Paper I should hope for in the Botanical Class :—

1. State the habit of such and such a plant.

2. Sketch its leaf and a portion of its ramification (memory). 3. Explain the mathematical laws of its growth and structure. 4. Give the composition of its juices in different seasons.

5. Its uses? Its relations to other families of plants and conceivable uses beyond those known.

6. Its commercial value in London? Mode of cultivation ? 7. Its mythological meaning? The commonest or most beautiful fables respecting it?

8. Quote any important references to it by great poets.

9. Time of its introduction?

10. Describe its consequent influence on civilization?

Of all these ten questions there is not one which does not test the student in other studies than botany. Thus, 1, Geography; 2, Drawing; 3, Mathematics; 4, 5, Chemistry; 6, Political Economy; 7, 8, 9, 10, Literature.

Of course the plants required to be thus studied could be but few, and would rationally be chosen from the most useful of foreign plants, and those common and indigenous in England. All sciences should, I think, be taught more for the sake of their facts, and less for that of their system than heretofore. Comprehensive and connected views are impossible to most men; the systems they learn are nothing but skeletons to them; but nearly all men can understand the relations of a few facts bearing on daily business, and to be exemplified in common substances. And science will soon be so vast that the most comprehensive men will still be narrow, and we shall see the fitness of rather teaching our youth to concentrate their general intelligence highly on given points than scatter it towards an infinite horizon from which they can fetch nothing, and to which they can carry nothing.

DEAR ACLAND,

Letter from G. RICHMOND, ESQ.

Encombe, Wareham, November 23, 1857. I have read all the papers which you sent me with very great interest and attention, and, as far as I am able to judge, I think the very best thing that could have been done by Oxford to further a

knowledge of Art, is accomplished by treating Drawing and Music as branches of general education, and obliging those candidates for the title of Associate in Arts, who may exhibit even extraordinary power either in music or drawing to give evidence that they have not neglected all the other parts of a sound liberal education.

Hitherto as far as I know the arts of design have been wholly unrecognised by the Universities, and if so, the step now taken is a great one-because it is the first, and will not, I think, be the last. And after all your interest and labour in the subject, you must feel it as a great reward, that something has been done towards accomplishing that which is so beautifully expressed by Ruskin as a first object of the Art-Examination :-"To put the happiness and knowledge which the study of Art conveys, within the conception of the youth, so that he may in after life pursue them if he has the gift."

I had some expectation of being able to pass a day or two at Killerton this week, but I am sorry to say I must give up the hope, as I am detained here longer than I expected, and have pressing reasons for returning to town the moment I leave this.

I remain, dear Acland,
Yours very faithfully,

G. RICHMOND.

P.S. You see I have availed myself of your permission to write shortly. If it is necessary to say anything of my opinion, I wish it to be known that what has been done has my hearty concurrence.

ON MUSICAL EXAMINATION.

THE following suggestions from Mr. Hullah appear to me so important in their bearing on the whole principle of " Practical Education," which runs through our Oxford scheme, that I must put my imperturbable as well as indefatigable printer and myself to some inconvenience to insert them at the last moment.

It must be remembered that Mr. Hullah has the best title to be listened to on Music as a branch of General Education. He has made it so in England. He has delivered and printed more than one lecture on the right use of Music as an instrument in