A PLEA FOR MORE TRAINTNG-SHIPS.
[To TRH EDITOR OP THE "SPECTATOR:1 SIB,—In the House of Commons a few days ago a Scottish Member asked the Secretary for Scotland "whether he would approach the Admiralty with the object of obtaining for the Highlands and Islands one of the obsolete cruisers about to be sold, as a training-ship for the mercantile marine." The Secretary for Scotland is reported to have replied that "it would serve no useful purpose to approach the Admiralty."
Those who are acquainted with the valuable work of our float- ing schools cannot but desire that they should be multiplied. In the debates on the Education Bill no notice seems to be taken of these. A vast amount of money has been spent, is being spent, and, I suppose, will continue to be spent, in building palatial Board-schools in which the average child gets a smattering of many things which will be of little practical use to him in after life. With regard to the reclamation of our waifs and strays, it would seem that we are riding the hobby of education too hard. It reminds me of a conundrum picked up in the Christ Church Common Room, and attfibuted to the singular genius who pre- ferred to be known by the pseudonym of "Lewis Carroll"
When is higher education like a pheasant? When its somewhat higher than is pleasant."
Meanwhile it seems to be overlooked that ships no longer service- able for the Navy might be utilised for educational purposes. There are a few, too few, of them in the mouths of some of our larger rivers. Why do we not have more ? Why should we not have one or two in the neighbourhood of every large town where there is a navigable river ? Instead of truant-schools on land, in which captured wastrels are taught various unnecessary things and then allowed to return to homes—if homes they can be called—where all they have learnt is promptly neutralised, would it not be better to sweep our street-arabs into these floating schools, where they would be segregated from former associates and sheltered from evil surroundings, where they would be under wholesome discipline, where they would get industrial training, and have a chance of being converted from probable pests to society into honest and self-respecting citizens ?
Last week some of us who are interested in the welfare of our waifs and strays availed ourselves of an opportunity of inspecting a batch of some sixty lads on board the brig attached to the 'Mars' training-ship. They were all boys who three years ago were in a perilous position. They have all done well. The' Mars' has made men of them. Their healthy looks, the smartness of their appearance, the precision and nimbleness of their move- ments as they swarmed up the shrouds, manned the yards, and unfurled the sails, their successful signalling, their cheerful singing, their whole demeanour, testified to the soundness and thoroughness of their training. On our return from this encouraging spectacle we come upon a painful but instructive contrast, —a number of ragged boys hanging about the station, or wandering about the streets, with no opportunity of learning a trade, or helping to man our ships, or becoming useful members of society, like the more fortunate boys on board, but qualifying in too many cases for a career of crime.
There is a cry for men to man our ships, or to recruit our mercantile marine, and there are still serviceable ships which are being broken up, but which might be utilised, like the Mars,' to convert the raw material I have spoken of into the men we are in want of, in default of whom we have to depend in large measure upon seamen of foreign extraction. The Secretary for Scotland says "there are no funds available for the purpose." I may point out that the money which might be saved from building some of these superfluous Board-schools might be applied to the purpose. The schools we want are there. They are already built, and only waiting to be made use of. Why should they be allowed to go to pieces P The officers and teachers, too, for these need not be men of the high attainments now thought necessary in our Board-schools. University men with corresponding salaries would not be required. The public money set free by the consequent closing of prisons no longer needed, and the reduction of poor-houses become superfluous, would go a long way towards defraying the expenses of what would be, in many cases, an admirable substitute for Board-schools, which do not, and cannot, deal with the residuum, for whom the require- ments of our Board-schools are unsuitable, and who often manage to evade them. School-ships would prove a greater benefit and a less expensive proceeding than the palatial schools which are now provided, and provided often to little purpose, for our slum population.
The parents, of course, where possible, should be compelled to contribute towards this invaluable training for their neglected children. But even if the main part of the expense were borne by the nation, supplemented as it no doubt would be by private beneficence, it would be a national benefit. If only it might be made possible to sweep into such floating schools the perennial supply of slum children, whose one idea of work is to sell matches or halfpenny newspapers in the streets, who haunt railway stations on the chance of picking up odd jobs, who manage in many cases to evade or outwit the School Board officer, who develop into "snappers up of unconsidered trifles," who seem qualifying to swell the criminal classes of the country—in a word, every child in our streets who cannot give a good account of himself—it would be a blessing to the whole community.
It has been stated in the public prints that a number ot disused men-of--war are to be disposed of, and more no doubt must go out of use for their original purpose from time to time. Could there be a better way of disposing of these than in the way I have ventured to suggest, so as to give these poor children a chance, which now seems absolutely denied them, of being rescued from a possibly criminal, certainly from an unprofitable career, and becoming creditable members of the commonwealth ? Every municipality should be empowered to capture the home- less, destitute, neglected children who prowl about our streets, qualifying for admission into our prisons and poor-houses, or recruit- ing the army of the unemployable, and place them in the nearest of these arks of salvation. We might well put to this new use our old warships, which would still be for the service of our country in another and not less important sense, and into which these young candidates for our Police Courts might be compulsorily conveyed, for the common good. This would be compulsory education to some purpose.
9 Grosvenor Street, Edinburgh.
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