of lectures are given during the winter on an endless variety of subjects. While at Boston, I also visited the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, interesting to me as a specimen of a peculiar class of schools which, so far as I am aware, have no exact counterpart in England. They are, in fact, based on the Technical Schools of France and Germany, and are intended specially for instruction in applied science, and for granting degrees to civil, mechanical, and mining engineers and others. There are several of these schools in the States, among which I also visited the Steevens' Institute of Technology at Hoboken, New York, presided over by Professor Morton, and made some enquiries about that at Troy, which is said to be the best civil engineering school in the States. Having been the head of a similar establishment in India for some years, (the Government Civil Engineering College at Roorkee), 1 I was naturally specially interested in these institutions. The students are generally admitted at the age of sixteen, and stay four years; the qualifications for 1 I had the pleasure (natural to an author) of finding our Roorkee books on Engineering well known and appreciated at these schools, and by many American engineers. The admission are very low, and much time is therefore consumed in teaching subjects which could be equally well taught at an ordinary school, and ought not to take up time at a technical college. Instruction is given in pure and mixed mathematics; in chemistry and natural philosophy, including laboratory practice; in drawing and surveying; and, generally, in modern languages and English composition as well. laboratory instruction, both at Boston and Hoboken, appeared to be very complete and extensive, involving both quantitative and qualitative analysis; and the collection of models and philosophical apparatus was very extensive. The method of tuition is by lectures and recitations, the latter term signifying that the student recites in class, or explains on the black board, what he has previously been desired to prepare. Excellent as the instruction undoubtedly is, the question still remains, which has been so often debated in England, whether such very practical subjects as the various branches of engineering can be satisfactorily taught apart from regular workshops and actual practice. The English Engineers, who have certainly taken the lead in these modern professions, have never encouraged institutions of this kind, maintaining that a college education unfits men for working with their hands, and that the only valuable engineers are those who have risen from the ranks and been trained in the shops as practical mechanics. One consequence of this neglect of technical education by the profession has been that the Government of India has been forced to establish a College of its own in England for training young engineers for the Indian Public Works Department. Of course, if technical schools pretended to turn out efficient engineers, the pretension would be absurd; the art can only be learned by practice. But they do nothing of the kind; they only profess to give such a training as will enable a young man to enter on his practical work well prepared and not forced to work by rule of thumb.' In the particular case of Mechanical Engineering, I believe a certain amount of training in the shops to be indispensable, and the difficulty is to combine this with the theoretical instruction, as both should be acquired when young. At Hoboken, they are attempting to dispense with it altogether, but I doubt if the experiment will be successful. I visited the Free Library at Boston and found it used extensively by all classes; books are freely lent out to residents of any class, and the librarian informed me that the average annual loss was one in 9,000! I walked one day from Harvard to the famous cemetery at Mount Auburn, some four miles from Boston. A more lovely resting-place for the dead I never beheld, and the view of the surrounding country from the tower overlooking the cemetery, with Boston and the sea in the distance, and a charming English landscape of woods and hills around, has left me one of my p leasantest reminiscences of American scenery. Sweet Auburn ! loveliest village of the dead, And when death comes, in some such lovely dell, CHAPTER VIII. CANADA-MONTREAL-QUEBEC-OTTAWA-THE COLONIAL QUESTION-TORONTO. FEW Englishmen are, I think, aware that Her Majesty's possessions in North America are greater in area than those of the United States. Yet such is the fact; and though their value, in agricultural and other resources, is very inferior, and the population very much less, yet the progress of the more favoured portions during the last few years has been nearly as rapid as that of the best parts of the States. Much of the northern territory is, however, very unproductive, owing to the long and severe winter, and, with the exception of Halifax, there is not a port on the Atlantic sea-board that is open during the winter months. The Dominion of Canada includes the six provinces of Quebec, Ontario, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, British Columbia, |