2 Yeo much importance cannot be attached to the many influences which are helping on a New Education for China, In contrast to the great efforts which Japan has pnt forth during the last thirty years to establish a now educntional system the efforts of the Chinese Government seem puerile and almost unworthy of notice. Much was hoped for the educational commission which Yung Wing persuaded Viceroy Li to commence in 1872, and the friends of Chinalooked for large results from the careers of the 120 students who were chosen to study in America, The nominal elevation of Yung Wing to be 68 Vice-Minister at Washington and the appointment of Wa Ize-tang to be the commissioner sealed the doom of that undertaking Tu 1881 the young men were recalled with the approval of the Chinese Minister Chen Lan-pin, and were soon scattered in various parts of the Empire where they have wasted their sweetness on the desert air. In the year 1880 hopes were again revived of an educational reform by the establishment in several large cities such as Canton, Nanking, and Foochow, Schools of Languages—Tung Wen Kuan, These schools have mainly survived and have continued to receive the support of the Government although they have yielded only small results. Again during the year 1883 fa joint memorial was presented to the Emperor by the Board of Civil Office and the Board of Rites recom-35) mending that at exch annual examination in the various provinces for the first degree—siutsai—enndidates should be allowed to compete in mathematics. This memorial was received favourably and was followed by an Imperial Edict' in which the wore set.
Alongside of the inactivity of the Government and its short-lived energies there have been well-sustained and thoroughly organised efforts on the part of several missionary societies to establish first-class schools in various parts of the Empire. The first of these was established by the Morrison' Educational Asvociation but the number has now risen to a score or more of really first-class schools, In Shanghai our readers are familiar with the wone done in St. John's College, the Anglo-Chinese Co'ege, and other schools, We are -t to note also that in Nanking, tse capital city of these three provinces, there is a University under the control of the Methodist Episcopal Mission whose work deserves more than a passing notice. It has recently held its First Graduation Exercises which were duly reported in our Nanking correspondence, These exercises. attracted the attention of the whole official body of the city, and ata reception held especially in their honour leading representatives of both the civil and military officials visited the Univer sity and were entertained at dinner, The Viceroy Liv Kun-yi, who is supposed to be anything but favourable to foreigners and their methods, himself called at the University and presented prizes amounting to $100 to the graduating pupils, This is undoubtedly the first time in the history of the new education in China when so high an official has taken such an interest in the work of an institution under foreign control, and it is a most hopeful sign, The greatest barrier to progress is the conservative ignorance which sits quietly within the four walls of decaying yamens and la content to know nothing of outside progress, It is gratifying that in this
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.