to choose his employment, it sometimes happens that boys are sent into the town to learn a trade not taught in the school. Changes of occupation are very rare, but are sometimes permitted. The blacksmiths are principally engaged in the repairs of arms, the saddlers make the caps and accoutrements, &c., used in the house, the tailors all the uniforms, the shoemakers supply not only this orphan-house, but that of the girls with shoes, and the lithographers are occupied in copying forms for the school or war department, manuals, &c. They work about seven hours a day, under a master-workman from the town.

An hour of each day is spent in gymnastic or military exercises in the open air in summer, and in winter in the large room before spoken of. The military exercises, besides the ordinary ones, comprise some which are peculiar to the Prussian service. The usual exercises of gymnastics are introduced, omitting any which seem to have a tendency towards the tricks of the mountebank. For instruction in these exercises, the whole school is divided into two parts, and each again into squads, so that the teacher need have but twelve to fourteen under his charge. Non-commissioned officers are the under teachers, and in turn are superintended by higher teachers, and by an inspector.

There can be no doubt that to these well regulated and perseveringly continued exercises it is, in great part, due that the physical development of these youths is, on the average, so perfect. Judicious recreation, a proper diet and clothing, great cleanliness, a proper number of hours of work, of instruction and sleep, no doubt, are necessary, each and all in their degree, but great influence must be besides allowed to the gymnastic exercises.

The pupils have two hours of instruction during the day, intended to keep up their knowledge of the branches taught in the elementary school, rather than to teach new ones. Military drawing is, however, added.

When not in the shops, nor in school, nor at exercise, they are superintended by non-commissioned officers. The discipline in this school is military in spirit, as well as in details.

Those pupils who have manifested a decided musical talent in the lower school, are here instructed thoroughly in the theory and practice of music. The object is to supply musicians to the regimental bands. These pupils have a separate superintendence from those of the other schools, and different hours of exercise and duty. They keep up the knowledge acquired in the elementary school, as is done in the trades' school.

Military Orphan-House at Annaburg.

The following plan of instruction was prepared by Dr Harnisch, one of the most distinguished teachers of Prussia, formerly Principal of the Teachers Seminary at Weissenfels.

In order to rise to the place of a non-commissioned officer, the pupil must have gone through the lowest classes of the Upper School, where there are the following studies:

Religions instruction, arithmetic, singing, the German language, calligraphy, geography and history, algebra, geometry, trigonometry, and drawing.

The courses in the different branches are arranged as follows:FIRST. Religious Instruction.

LOWER SCHOOL.

Class VII Bible stories, psalms and hymns, appropriate to the senson. Four hours per week. Class VI. Histories from the Old and New Testament, portions of the history of the Christian church, catechism. Four hours per week.

Class V. Reading and explanation of the Bible, and of its arrangement. The gospel and

historical works are selected, and the history is connected with the geography of the Holy Land. Catechism. Five hours.

Class IV. Doctrines of the Lutheran church, taught by Luther's catechism. Five hours.

UPPER SCHOOL.

Class III. Moral instruction, duties to God and man. Three hours.

Class II. Reading the Bible with comments, the pupils making abstracts. Three hours. Class I. (Two years.) The first year a repetition of Luther's catechism. The second, a history of the Christian dispensation. Three hours.

Every class commits verses from the Bible to memory.

SECOND. Arithmetic. Mental and written arithmetic are taught together, that the readiness afforded by the one, and the accuracy of the other, may both be cultivated.

LOWER SCHOOL.

Class VII. The four ground rules, with three places of figures mentally. Application to questions in weights and measures. Three hours.

Class VI. The same rules extended. Three hours.

Class V. Fractions, with applications to weights and measures. Three hours.

Class IV. Proportions. Three hours.

UPPER SCHOOL.

Class III. The applications of proportions to questions of weight, strength, value, time, and general quantity. Two hours.

First year, practical operations. Second, theory of arith

Class II. Exercises in practical algebra. Two hours. Class 1. Review of the course. metrical processes. Two hours.

THIRD. Vocal Music.

LOWER SCHOOL.

Classes VII & VI. Practice of songs, adapted to youth of a cheerful, serious, military, or religious cast, with one part. Two hours.

Classes V & IV. Choral and other songs, with the different parts. Elements of music. Two hours.

UPPER SCHOOL.

Classes III, II, & I. More difficult choral pieces. Theoretical instruction continued. One hour. There is, besides, instruction given to a select choir, intended to conduct the vocal exercises of the church.

FOURTH. Reading In the lower classes, a readiness in reading, and in the higher, the style of reading, is attended to especially. Pieces learned previously, by heart, are recited.

LOWER SCHOOL.

Class VII. A good pronunciation, and some facility in reading. Six hours.

Class VI. Readiness in reading, and repeating the substance of what has been read. Familjar illustrations. Five hours.

Class V. Reading some work in reference to knowledge useful in common life. Four hours.

Class IV. Reading, with attention to emphasis. Four hours.

UPPER SCHOOL.

Class III. Reading the Bible and sacred melodies, with the view to correct reading in this kind of composition. Two hours.

Class II. Reading various selected works, in and out of the class.

Class I. Reading continued, and recitations from works previously read.

FIFTH. Orthography and Writing. These may be taught together in the same way as mental and written arithmetic; the teacher is, however, at liberty to follow his own method.

LOWER SCHOOL.

Class VII. Copying on slates from the blackboard. Four hours.

Class VI. Copying on paper, from the board, and from books. Four hours.

Class V. Writing from copy-slips, from books, or from dictation. (Practice in spelling and writing.) Four hours.

Class IV. Similar exercises continued. Four hours.

UPPER SCHOOL.

Class III. Copying useful papers, such as registers, accounts, contracts, &c. Two hours. Class II. Calligraphy, with Roman as well as German letters; practice in orthography; reading of letters and documents in various handwritings. Two hours.

Class I. Copying papers relating to the management of the institution, as a practical introduction to business. One hour.

SIXTH. Useful knowledge taught by induction

LOWER SCHOOL.

Class VII. The pupils give their ideas, verbally, of surrounding objects of the most simple kind, of the commonest productions of nature and art. Conversations relating to them. Drawing the most simple mathematical figures on the slate. Three hours.

Class VI. Descriptions of animals and plants, the former in the winter, the latter in the summer term. Written remarks on these, serving to afford exercise in the formation of phrases and in orthography. Four hours.

Class V. The most essential parts of physics and natural history, the pupils taking notes of the lessons. Four hours.

Class IV. Compositions on various subjects. Letters relating to civil and military affairs. Four hours.

UPPER SCHOOL.

Class III. History of Prussia, and drawing of maps. Four hours.

Class II. General geography, particularly that of Europe. Passing from physical to polit. ical geography. Civil geography in connection with the former. Five hours.

Class I. Universal history. One year is devoted to ancient and one to modern history. Selections are made of the more important parts of history. Five hours. The remaining studies only belong to the higher school.

SEVENTH. German grammar and style.

UPPER SCHOOL.

Class III. Logical and grammatical instruction of the German language taught.

Class II. Idiom of the language. Compositions on military subjects, with especial refer. ence to correctness of grammar.

Class I. Acquaintance with the best writers. Exercises of composition on subjects taken from history.

EIGHTH. Geometry.

UPPER SCHOOL.

Class III. Teaching the names and properties of mathematical figures by induction, in con. nection with drawing.

Class II. Equations, with application to problems of common life.
Class I. Elements of trigonometry.

NINTH. Drawing.

UPPER SCHOOL.

Class III. Drawings from common objects, varying the positions, &c.

Class II. Copying flowers, or drawings of implements.

Class I. Architectural drawing with instruments, drawings of furniture, &c.

Dr. Bache makes the following remarks on the above plan:

I have allowed myself to present this extended programme, because it conveys, in as brief a compass as possible, excellent ideas of the succession of courses in an elementary school, and in a technical or trade school, for such the higher school must be considered. It should be remembered that the main purpose is the preparation of youth for the military service, and hence that the wants of the service are especially consulted. Another fact must be remembered, namely, that this is a Lutheran school, and therefore the religious instruction is adapted to the particular views of that church. The course of morals of the third class, I must say, however, seems to me out of its place, for although our duties to God and our neighbor are of course best learned from his Word, yet their inculcation by precept and example can not commence too early.

In the arithmetical course, the union of mental and written arithmetic is absolutely essential. The gradation appears to me good, and the application to questions of common life gives a zest to such studies, attainable in no other way. The theory of arithmetical processes, however, should accompany or follow more nearly their practical acquisition. Indeed, if they are taught as they ought to be, by induction, the theory goes with the practice.

If the youth at Annaburg take the same pleasure in the exercises of song, from the elements to the completion of the musical course, as those of the school* actually superintended by the author of this project, the success will be complete.

The connection of orthography and writing, especially if combined with early reading, is natural.

The exercises of induction, which in the lower classes are well drawn out, deviate from the appropriate track in the fourth class, and in the geographical and historical courses do not return to it. The system in both these branches is rather synthetical than inductive. There is a great temptation to break away from this method, into that of giving positive instruction, from the apparently greater rapidity of progress of the pupil; some teachers have abandoned it altogether, as too slow, though ultimately to their cost, as appeared to me in cases where I had an opportunity of comparing the results.

The writing is preceded by an introductory course of drawing, which might

* Seminary for Teachers at Weissenfels.

with excellent effect be so extended as to branch out into complete courses of drawing and writing.

As this plan results from an extended experience, the number of hours of instruction, per week, necessary to secure the results, is an important datum, and as such I have retained it, whenever it was inserted in the original programme.

II. THE SCHOOL DIVISION OR NON-COMMISSIONED OFFICERS' SCHOOL.

A military school of a somewhat peculiar character for training up young men for the duties of non-commissioned or under officers exist at Potsdam, and is known as the School Division.

The rules of the Prussian Military system, which require only three years absolute service in the standing army in time of peace, evidently entail a great practical difficulty in this respect. The soldiers, as a rule, prefer to quit the service at the end of their three years' time, and require great inducements to persuade them to remain. As one inducement, the state has declared that twelve years' service gives a non-commissioned officer a formal claim to civil employment; as, for example, on the railways or in the custom-houses. Their pay also as non-commissioned officers goes on increasing according to the length of their service; and it was stated to be the usual practice not to advance soldiers to be non-commissioned officers until they had signed an undertaking to serve for a longer period than could be exacted of them otherwise.

A further means of supplying the want has been sought, and appears to have been found in the School Division. The circumstances of its origin have placed this establishment in immediate connection with the Corps of Guards, to which, in a military sense, they belong, at whose head-quarters, the town of Potsdam, their buildings are situated, and whose garrison duty in the town they occasionally undertake.

At its first commencement the pupils chiefly came in drafts from the Military Orphan-Houses. But the applications from the country in general have been so numerous that this practice has been, it is said, abandoned, and a higher class of admissions has been attempted. The Commander of the Battalion of Landwehr for the Circle (Kreis) receives all applications in that Circle; he sees that the candidate is examined on the spot, in reading, writing, and cyphering; and forwards the name, height, age, and other particulars (the Nationale) to the authorities. The decision is said to be mostly made by the candidate's height, and his medical certificate, and to be rather a difficult matter. Only one-third of the applications are successful. A new boy had just presented himself with

his father at the time of our visit; both son and father were well dressed, and apparently belonged to the middle rather than the lower classes. There seems every reason to be satisfied with the amount of acceptance with the country which the school had begun to receive.

The age of admission is from seventeen to twenty, and the youth on entering the school takes a military engagement to give two years of service in the standing army for each year of his maintenance at the school, in addition of course to those three years of military service to which every Prussian is bound, but with the privilege of counting as military service the period spent at the school.

The usual school course is one of three years, and his engagement is thus for a term of nine years; that is, deducting three spent at the school, six years' time with the troops.

The School Division is 496 strong; there are four companies of 124 men. The whole body is commanded by a captain, or major, who has an adjutant. To each company are attached four officers and fourteen non-commissioned officers; the latter teach in the two first years, the former in the third. The school course begins on the 1st of October; the afternoons of three days in each week are employed in ordinary school instruction, but the remainder of their time in winter and their whole time in summer is devoted to military training. The school instruction is not carried beyond reading, writing, and arithmetic up to the rule of three; geography, drawing skeleton maps, and copying, and learning the significance of military representations of ground. Some very respectable specimens of their skill in copying maps were produced; it appeared to be a favorite exercise.

About 150 are admitted yearly, an extra number being taken to supply possible vacancies; about 130 yearly are drafted into the army, six usually as under officers at once, forty at least with certificates of being qualified to receive the grade in a short time; and the whole number who go out have generally obtained their appointment before twelve months are completed. The highest number that may go out at once as under (or non-commissioned) officers is twelve; three for each company. Many, however, have latterly, it is said, become so within six weeks after their leaving.

Where the young men are strong and full-grown, they are allowed to join the army at the end of two years; their whole service (two years for each at the school) being therefore reduced to six years. Young men, on the other hand, who show no disposition or like