GYMNASTIC TRAINING.—RESOLUTION. (Hansard, 8 July 1862)

§ LORD ELCHO
said, that in bringing the subject to which his Motion referred before the House, he should have to claim its indulgence; for although the subject was one of great importance, and his Motion had been for some time on the paper, yet his time had been so fully occupied, and people were so apt not to do to-day what could be put off till to-morrow, that he had not yet given to the subject of his Motion all the attention it demanded. The subject to which his Motion referred was, that of the establishment of gymnastics and physical training in schools. It was not merely as a Volunteer that he wished to bring the question under consideration—though undoubtedly it would tend to promote the permanence of the Volunteer 23 movement—but because he was convinced that such a system of training and military drill would confer a great economical, social, and educational benefit on the people. The advantage of physical training had been acknowledged from the earliest times. In Greece and other ancient countries it was diligently practised. In the earlier periods of English history, too, schoolmasters were obliged by law to have bows and arrows, in order to teach the youth to shoot; parishes were assessed for the purpose, and much attention was paid to those manly exercises which made the English archer able to defend his home, and to carry his arms successfully on the continent of Europe. Roger Ascham, the tutor of Queen Elizabeth, spoke of shooting as a pastime "wholesome for the body and honest for the mind," and testified that some of "the best-learned Bishops" of his time were skilled in the art. Though the spirit of those by-gone times still survived, as might be seen from the fondness of the English people for various kinds of manly sports, yet it should be borne in mind that as a system of national education, anything like attention to the physical training of youth did not exist. Two years ago his attention was specially drawn to the subject from having been called upon to preside at a meeting at the Thatched House Tavern, held for the purpose of establishing military drill in public schools. Many of the wisest and best men of the land—men who had given great attention to the subject of education—concurred in thinking that the greatest benefits, bodily and mental, would arise from the establishment of such a system. Letters of apology were received from the Dean of Christchurch, Oxford, Lord Brougham, Viscount Palmerston, the Bishop of London, and Lord Lyndhurst, all approving the object of the meeting; and Dr. Hawtrey, Mr. Byng, General Evans, Lord Campbell, the Chaplain of the Forces, and other gentlemen took part in the proceedings. A committee was formed, which met two or three times and then ceased to exist, because they had succeeded in their object; for within a few weeks military drill was established at Rugby, Harrow, Eton, Westminster, and other schools, and had been attended with the happiest results. It had also been introduced into many proprietary schools. But it was especially with regard to the necessity of physical training for the pauper population of the country that he wished to call the atten- 24 tion of the House. Through the energy and ability of Mr. Tufnell, the district inspector of the London Union, there had been established in the schools under his jurisdiction a system of military drill of which from five to six thousands of the poor children in the neighbourhood of the metropolis were deriving the benefit. He believed the President of the Poor Law Board had recently paid a visit to the Limehouse District School, and was delighted at what he saw there. He had, himself, visited that school, in which children of the very lowest and most criminal class, many of them stunted in growth and naturally scrofulous, were being educated, and it was really astonishing to see what tidy, obedient, orderly, and respectable boys the military training to which they were subjected made them. He saw them go through their drill, which they did with the greatest precision, and he afterwards called out one of the boys, who commanded a company, and asked him to drill the remainder, and he did it admirably. Besides military drill, music was also taught to these boys, who, in consequence, were enabled on quitting school to obtain almost immediate employment as musicians in the army. Naval drill, too, was taught, and in the union-yard a mast, fully rigged, with sails, ropes and spars, was erected, and the boys of the naval class were exercised in doing everything which sailor boys should do. They furled and unfurled the sails, stowed them away, and ran about the rigging like monkeys. The result was that these district boys of thirteen from the pauper workhouses of London got higher wages, when they went to sea, than boys two years holder coming from seaport towns; and one captain had declared that he would give any money to get more of them, because they were so well drilled. He believed that the annual expense for training boys in the navy was about £45 per head, whereas the training of these boys in the district schools cost only a mere trifle. Mr. Tufnell stated, that if the Government would only supply the schools with old masts, rigging, and spars, which were lying useless in the Admiralty yards, he would supply the navy with 400 boys annually admirably fitted for the navy from the metropolitan districts alone; and it certainly would be well for the noble Lord the Secretary to the Admiralty to consider whether, instead of selling old stores for nothing, it would not be a better investment of property to give a portion of 25 them to these schools. He was anxious to see this system of school drill more generally adopted, believing that it tended to the physical development of the boys, and was accompanied by other advantages. For instance, sailor boys trained as he had described, at a district school, received higher wages than the sailor boy two years older from a seaport town; and as soldiers the boys had a better chance of becoming non-commissioned officers after they had learnt their drill at school. With regard to other trades and occupations, the evidence given before the Royal Commission on education went to prove that the trained schoolboys were prompt and punctual as compared with the other boys; and it was calculated, that if the system of drill prevailed in all the schools, one-fifth would be added to the value of the labour of the country. The boys, moreover, were rendered more apt, disciplined, and obedient. In further corroboration of this fact he could refer to cases where drill having been abandoned for a time, the schools lapsed into confusion and disorder in consequence, and they were obliged to resort again to the system in order to restore discipline and a healthy tone to the general instruction of those schools; in fact, the drill-sergeant was found the schoolmaster's best friend. He had ascertained from some of the gentlemen, who two years ago were in favour of the establishment of drill in public and other schools, that their opinion on the subject remained unchanged. Mr. Tufnell said that almost all the large schools about London now practised naval and military drill with the utmost advantage to the boys educated therein. As regarded the sanitary aspect of the question, it was universally admitted that the practice of drill tended to establish a strong and healthy constitution in those that resorted to it. It appeared that the death-rate in the schools where the system he advocated was not practised amounted to about 12 per cent; whereas in those establishments which included drill in their educational course the death-rate was reduced to about 7 per cent. Dr. Goodford, the provost of Eton, had given the strongest testimony in favour of military drill. Mr. Warre, one of the Eton masters, warmly supported the rifle movement and the training of boys to military practices, as being conducive both to their moral good and to their physical development. There could be no doubt that the practice of drill in schools was the source of unmixed good. There was at 26 Oxford one of the finest gymnasiums in the world, which proved that those practices were conducive with the highest order of collegiate education, and that the development of the mental and physical faculties might go hand in hand. The objections to the extension of the system appeared to be—first, that it was not desirable to take boys away from cricket, foot-ball, and other healthful exercises; and secondly, that it would be expensive. With regard to the first of these arguments, one hour a week was all that was required for this drill, and he was one of those who thought that that hour might with advantage be taken from the time devoted to other things than the exercises referred to; for those philosophers who had turned their attention to the subject of education had made the discovery, that the less they tied a boy to his studies, the more was he likely to learn. With reference to the cost, it appeared from the papers before him that the cost of drill in district schools amounted only to 1d. per head each week. Now, when it was clearly shown that the system increased the value of the labour of the boys by one-fifth, he thought it was obvious that this additional cost would prove a wise investment of the ratepayers. He hoped that the House would affirm the Resolutions he was about to move, and thereby stamp with their approval a system which already existed and was in operation amongst 5,000 or 6,000 pauper children. The system was one which would add to the manly vigour and strength of the youth of this country, and, as he believed, would increase its power and security. By the general adoption of the system of drill they would be only reverting to the ancient usages of this country, and following the example of many continental nations. He trusted, therefore, the House would not hesitate to stamp with its approval the system which he advocated, and begged to move— That the physical, moral, and economical advantages arising from a system of physical training have been clearly shown in evidence before the Royal Education Commission: That is is expedient for the increase of the bodily as well as the mental aptitudes of children for civil, industrial, as well as for possible Military Service that encouragement and aid should be given for the extension of the practice of systematized gymnastic training, and for teaching Military and Naval drill as now practised in the district half-time Schools for Orphan and Destitute Children, and in other Schools for Pauper Children.

§ MR. ADDERLEY
seconded the Motion.

§ MR LOWE
said, he must confess that 27 the Resolution of the noble Lord, notwithstanding the elucidation it had received from his speech, appeared to be extremely obscure. The noble Lord had told the House that gymnastic exercise were already practised in pauper schools as well as in many public schools with great advantage, and sought to establish as an inference "that encouragement and aid should be given for the extension of the practice of systematized gymnastic training." "Encouragement and aid" to whom, he would ask, and "extension" in what direction? From whom, he might further inquire, were the aid and encouragement to come? To that important question the noble Lord had supplied no answer. He had, indeed, stated that a penny a week would be sufficient to procure for each child, instruction in drill, and that that amount would, in his opinion, be very properly expended in the promotion of such an object by the ratepayers or whoever else would have to pay it. But who, he should like to know, were the persons indicated by those words, "whoever else"? Did the noble Lord allude to the Committee of Council on Education? Now, for his own part, he had not a single syllable to say by way of objection to the panegyric which the noble Lord had pronounced on the scheme of exercise which he advocated, but the proposal which he made was no trifling one. There were at that moment upwards of a million of children, on the average, in attendance under the Privy Council system. Half of that number was composed of boys, and they would come under the operation of the Resolution—so that a sum of 3s. 8d. per annum, taking the time at forty-four weeks in the year, would have to be paid for each of 500,000 children. The proposition of the noble Lord, was in short—if he meant to throw the burden on the Committee of Council—that whereas a maximum of 12s. was paid by the State for each child for being taught reading, writing, and arithmetic, as well as in the shape of a capitation grant for average attendance, the present grant should be increased by one-fourth. The simple question, then, was—admitting the excellence of the training which the noble Lord so much eulogized—had he made out a case why the Government should pay out of the general taxes of the nation a certain amount of money for the promotion of the object which he had in view? It should be borne in mind that education throughout the country was not so much in the hands 28 of the Government as in those of the managers of schools. The Government lent their aid in carrying out the system, and had established particular criteria by means of which the extent of that aid was determined; but, as he had frequently pointed out, reading, writing, and arithmetic, for the teaching of which Government came to the assistance of the mangers of schools, did not signify a complete scheme of education. There was besides religious instruction, as well as instruction in geography, history, and other matters, which the children might receive, although the Government did not pay for it. The proposal of the noble Lord, however, would seem to go the length of imposing upon the Government the duty of paying the managers for having the children taught anything which it might be deemed useful that they should learn. He would have a capitation grant for instance, for instruction given in music, or in shoemaking, or in any other branch of trade. But the House could not fail to perceive, that if that principle were established, and if the capitation grants were made until the subsidy now given to schools was doubled or tripled, we should be entirely relieving the managers from the voluntary burden the undertaking of which constituted one of the grounds upon which grants were at present supplied. His noble Friend's speech, therefore, although it might be very proper as an exhortation to the managers of schools and to ratepayers to provide gymnastic training for the children with whom they happened to be connected, yet embodied an idea—the idea that it was the duty of the Privy Council to devise means in addition to the existing education grant to promote the teaching of anything because it might be deemed useful—which he must altogether repudiate. The proper principle upon which to proceed was not that in every case in which instruction might be usefully given Government aid ought to be rendered, but that education, to a certain extent, having been provided for the people, Government should lend assistance to its promotion on certain conditions. If, he might add, that principle were departed from, and such a system as that indicated by the speech of the noble Lord were adopted in its stead, the extravagant expenditure of the public money which would be the result would, he ventured to say, operate most prejudicially. For those reasons he begged to protest against the Resolution of the noble Lord, 29 if it was to be understood, as he was afraid it must be, as pledging the House to the opinion that the educational grant should be increased for such purposes as that which the noble Lord advocated.

§ MR. ADDERLEY
said, that he thought nobody could dispute the proposition of the noble Lord that great importance was to be attached to military training both morally and physically; but there was a want of point about the proposition, and some alteration in the Motion was necessary to render it practicable. The right hon. Gentleman stated that the proposition did not fall within the scope of the Education Grant, but he (Mr. Adderley) did not see why some aid should not be given to that part of education. He trusted the right hon. Gentleman, who, he thought, had exaggerated the expense, would not oppose the proposition if it were rendered practical, and he would suggest to the noble Lord the propriety of altering the form of his Motion so as to require the Committee of Council on Education to give instruction to the School Inspectors on the subject, and attach to the grants the necessity of the use of gymnastic exercises for the boys in all the schools aided by Government Grants.