a feast of the Roman Catholic Church, held on the 14th September. See Cross.

EXAMINATIONS are of various kinds, according to the objects in view in conducting them,—such as tuitional, competitive, testing. Of these, the first forms a necessary part of every scheme of education; the second is applied to determine the relative merits and attainments of students; the third, to ascertain whether their acquirements are up to a fixed standard, so as to entitle them to certain degrees, or to fill certain situations. Each of these again may be conducted in several ways; 1. Orally; 2. By written exercises done under inspection in a set time; 3. By original compositions written leisurely at home; 4. By disputations; 5. By a combination of the preceding methods. It is proposed in this article briefly to consider each of these kinds of examinations, to discuss the advantages of the different methods of conducting them, the kind of merit and ability which they are qualified to detect, and their value as tests of men so far as concerns their qualifications for practical life.

1. Tuitional Examinations.—A system of tuition necessarily involves a system of examination. The object of a teacher being in general to impart to his pupils a knowledge of facts and principles, with the view of storing their minds and developing their faculties, he must take constant pains to ascertain whether these have been clearly apprehended, which he can do otherwise than by obliging his pupils to reproduce and apply them. In this reproduction a new set of the pupil's faculties are brought into exercise, and the training which his mind receives in examination is seen to be no less important than the acquisition of knowledge itself. Thus, examinations are in a twofold sense necessary accessories to prelections,—the practical and productive fa- Examinations being exercised by the former, as the receptive are by the latter. Hence, some of the peculiar advantages of the catechetical teaching still pursued in one or two of our universities, which blends the lecture and examination after the Socratic method. It will be seen that all the methods of examination are applicable to, and necessary for, the purposes of this kind of examination.

2. Competitive Examinations.—Though examinations may be presumed to have been purely tuitional in their origin, their power to call out the emulation of the pupils, and to spur them to diligence in their studies, cannot have been long undiscovered. Thus, examinations which were first the teacher's means of gauging the minds of his pupils, so as to satisfy himself of the success or failure of his instructions, soon passed into competitive struggles for honours and prizes, as rewards of merit, and stimulants to industry. The emulation thus educed gives a teacher a most powerful means of securing the mental progress of his pupils—a means at the same time which should be used with caution, inasmuch as it is better to foster a love of learning for its own sake, than a desire for it as a means of triumph. Too often the desire for superiority becomes secondary in competitive struggles to the desire of winning the prizes. This is the case to a considerable extent in the English universities, and especially in Cambridge, where the primary design of competitive examinations is to some extent thwarted, in consequence of the discouragement to the cultivation of specialties arising from the requirements for the final examination. However much it is to be regretted, it naturally results from the number and value of the prizes awarded to success, that not a few among the candidates for honours in the English universities regard their time, and labour, and the cost of their tuition as an investment, towards securing their position in life, rather than as a contribution to their mental capital. Besides the exhibitions, scholarships, and fellowships which may now be won by competition at our schools and universities, a new class of prizes has lately been opened to successful competition, viz., appointments in the India civil service; and it is highly probable that the vacancies in the home civil service will ere long be supplied by a similar process. The result of rendering the competitive examination system universal cannot at present be safely speculated upon. The Chinese empire, in which the prizes of literary success have for ages been office, wealth, and power, affords an extreme example, which is far from favourable. It seems as if success in science and literature were reserved for those only who follow them with a generous love, for the pleasures and satisfaction they are capable of affording, and as if nature refused to unlock her secrets to any but those who come to her animated with a simple love of truth,—desiring to know her for her own sake, and not for their personal advantage. But whatever may be the ultimate effect of recent changes on the progress of learning and science, there is no doubt of their numerous advantages, meanwhile, in opening up to the aspiring youth of the humbler classes avenues by which to ascend to a better condition; and at the same time in securing for the public service a class of men on the whole better than it has hitherto obtained.

Testing or Pass Examinations.—These are examinations to determine whether candidates are worthy of admission to a college or university, or to offices to which they have been nominated, or to be promoted from one class to another in schools and universities, or to determine their title to degrees—that is to a public recognition of their having creditably completed a certain course of study. These examinations are usually conducted with much less rigour than the competitive, and in many cases are a mere mockery. Besides these more properly scholastic examinations, all the professions are fenced by tests more or less real, which propose to determine whether the candidates for admission to them possess the minimum amount of knowledge and ability necessary for maintaining the honour and credit of the profession, and for practising in it with safety and benefit to the public.

In addition to the testing or pass examinations to which we are accustomed in our own country, there are others of more universal application in use in various foreign states, which require by law that their subjects should be able to read and spell their mother tongue correctly, to write accurately from dictation, and to know the first three or four rules of arithmetic, and a certain amount of geography, before they are allowed to accept responsible employment of any kind. In Denmark this is called the "Confirmation" examination, and a certificate of having passed it must be presented before even a private employer can engage a servant into permanent occupation. In Germany it is called the "Maturity" examination. Some efforts have been made of late to introduce a similar examination in this country, but the genius of our people seems to be opposed to any such innovation.

Oral Examinations.—Examination vivé voce, in itself the most natural and direct method, in cases where it is admissible, seems of all the methods of examination to be the most satisfactory; and there is little doubt that no examination can be quite satisfactory which is not partly oral. In vivé voce examinations there can be no concealment or deception; where knowledge is clear and matured in the mind of the candidate it cannot fail to appear, and where it is hazy, crude, and glimmering, it cannot fail to be detected. The numberless subterfuges with which ignorance may be cloaked in a written exercise, so as to leave the examiner in doubt, are here unavailing. The crammed man stands at once exposed. "A shot," to use the university phrase, is seen to be "a shot" the moment it is made; and an examiner—himself master of his subject—can rarely fail in a few minutes conversation to detect the height and depth of the candidate's knowledge. Of course, oral examination is impossible in all cases, and recourse must be had to written exercises wherever time and deliberation are required on the part either of the candidate in producing his answers, or of the examiner in forming his judgment—as where it is desired to test the candidate's power of applying principles, his ingenuity in solving problems, his appreciation of the beauties and niceties of language, or powers of composition. But oral examinations are liable to this objection, that they make the candidates nervous, and temporarily incapacitate them for the free use of their knowledge and faculties. This however might be obviated if examinations were always conducted in a courteous and affable manner.

At the English universities examination vivé voce is conjoined with examination by written papers in all but the principal degree examinations, and forms part of all the examinations at the chief colleges. The previous (pass) examination, at both Oxford and Cambridge, is partly oral; and in the recent publication of "Papers relating to the Reorganization of the Civil Service," it will be seen that nearly all who were consulted recommend a vivé voce examination as part of the scheme, and that the reporters have adopted this recommendation. In fact, it is commonly agreed by those best able to form an opinion, that if the choice lay between an examination altogether vivé voce or altogether by written papers, the former should be preferred.

In the last report of the university commissioners for Cambridge, the recommendation of several of the professors and private tutors, that a vivé voce examination should form part of the examination for honours, has been adopted, and a change may soon be expected in accordance with it.

Written Examinations.—The best system of written examinations hitherto devised and put in practice in this country is to be found in the English universities. The greatness of the prizes in these institutions, and the number of the competitors for them, have long forced the attention of the university authorities to the subject of examinations, and to the best means of securing an impartial and correct classification of the candidates for honours; and, on the whole, though the system is not without drawbacks, it may be said to work satisfactorily. An account of the examination of candidates for mathematical honours at Cambridge will suffice for a general account of written examinations, with all their merits and defects. Every year there are appointed two examiners for the business of examination. These examiners are joined to two moderators, who are usually elected for two years, and the four together form a board of examiners for mathematical honours, the duties being divided among them. The number of subjects professed by first-class men may be set down at twenty-five, and on these there are set in all sixteen papers, about three-fourths of which are on what is called "book-work"—or the principles of the sciences, and the remainder on their application; and of late has been usual to accompany every piece of book-work by a "rider," or simple problem or theorem, the solution or proof of which will test the candidate's apprehension of the principle and his ingenuity, enabling the examiners to discern whether his judgment as well as his memory has been exercised in his reading. The problems are always "made up" for the occasion, and are of all shades of difficulty. To each question, rider, and problem, a number of marks are assigned, according to an average agreed upon by the examiners, and a specified time, generally from two to three hours, is allowed for each paper. He is held to have done best in the examination who has won most marks in the time, and, after him, the rest are classed in the order of their marks. The examination may be said to be on the whole a fair test of mental quickness, of memory, clearness of apprehension, judgment in seizing on the point of a question, and rapidity in penmanship—in fact, it may be said to test intellectual agility and clear-headedness directly, while indirectly it tests to a degree the powers of application, and the carefulness of students in their studies, and thus, in some measure, both their habits of life and thought.

It may be conceived that success in such a struggle must be the triumph of dogged perseverance, united to genuine ability; and this is the case to a considerable extent. In such a competition there is, however, a chapter of accidents of no mean length, and many features more or less repulsive to the best class of minds. Not unfrequently the health and nerves of candidates affect their position in the lists, and they lose in a day the advantage of years. Besides this, the crotchets of the examiners (though by submitting their papers to one another these are to a degree removed) are always more or less marked; and it occasionally happens that all the subjects are not done equal or due justice to, and that thus a candidate is deprived of a fair chance, while, at other times, the accidents of the examination place a man far above his true place. Besides these drawbacks, there are others connected with the manner in which the subjects must be "got up" for the contest, and to which the best minds are painfully sensitive. Many things must be crammed into the mind which are destined in the nature of them to drop out of it, and which never should have been committed to it; and by this necessity a good man feels more or less degraded. On the whole, however, and these drawbacks notwithstanding, the man of talent who lays himself out to excel in this competition rarely fails in it, at whatever cost to his feelings or damage to his mind.

In proof of this, appeal may be made to the university calendar, from which it will appear that for one junior soph who distinguishes himself in after-life, at least twenty wranglers rise to eminence.

The great objection to examinations conducted as above described is, that the candidates are forced to send up answers to questions and solutions to problems written off in great haste, and that they give no chance to that valuable order of mind—the "slow but sure;" the other general objection has already been stated, that, by forcing all reading and thought on the part of the candidates to turn towards production in examination papers, it cramps their minds and makes their studies ungenerous. In at least one of the Scotch universities, and in several classes at the rest of them, it is usual to allow an unlimited time for the writing of the papers; but this, while obviating the objection against the haste and flurry of the English system, has a drawback in the absence or laxity of the inspection. The natural supplement to the written examinations in the English universities is the vied roce and the Essay, which is now to be considered.

Essays.—When the honour of candidates can be relied on, or when, by the other methods of examination, such an approximation to the ability of a candidate has been obtained as may form a check against his practising deception, essays on prescribed subjects done leisurely at home afford a good supplementary test of ability, giving every man a chance of appearing to the best advantage, and obviating alike the hurry of written and the chill of ill-conducted vied roce examinations.

Disputations.—This method of examination, in which competitors were matched against each other in cross-examination and argument, is now gone into disuse in this country. It still forms a feature in the Concours in France, in connection with which it will hereafter be referred to. Its value as an element in an examination affecting to be thorough will be shown in the same connection.

Mixed Examinations.—From what has already been said, it may be gathered that the preceding methods should be conjoined in every examination which aims at a just and impartial classification of candidates according to their real merits and acquirements. That we have in this country no examination even pretending to combine these methods is a matter of reproach, intellectual competitions being so common among us. In the absence of any instance of the mixed examination among ourselves, the combination must be illustrated by an example borrowed from France—viz., the Concours—for the admission of members to the medical profession. The Concours consists of an assembly of all the members of the medical faculty who can be brought together in the district. Besides these there are the candidates, who, on the occasions of the elections of eleves internes, usually number between 100 and 200; and the examination is conducted before a public audience consisting commonly of several hundred persons. The first business is the appointment by ballot of a jury of five of the medical practitioners. A number of skilfully framed and comprehensive questions are then put in a vase, whence one at a time is drawn out by a public officer and given to each of the sets of candidates as they pass in turn to private rooms, where they are kept under inspection. Each set is allowed eight minutes to frame verbal answers to the question which falls to its lot, at the end of which time they return and make their answers before the public. At this stage each candidate is at liberty to question his competitor—cross-examination resulting, which in contests for the higher offices often lead to finished and instructive displays of science and skill. Besides these questions for verbal answers, others of a higher order are put to the sets, to which written answers are required within two hours, the answers being framed as in the former case under inspection. These are delivered sealed, are opened and read by the examiners before the public, and are then submitted for the decision of the jury. The examination is thus continued from day to day, sometimes over a fortnight, till the candidates are thoroughly sifted and the elite of them discerned. Here then are combined the best possible security against partiality on the part of the judges, and the best guarantee that if a man's merits are not detected it must be from some radical defect in himself which mars his better qualities; the race, the written exercise, and the disputing being here practically combined, before an impartially chosen tribunal.

This account of the Concours naturally leads to a consideration of the practical difficulties encountered in competitive examinations in general. These are connected, 1st, with the appointment of examiners; 2d, with the affixing of marks to the questions, and the adjudging what proportion of the full marks the answers sent up merit. With regard to the first it may be set down as a rule, that in a college or university the prelector should not be the examiner of his own class, and that in any case the same examiner should not be employed on more than one or two occasions. In colleges where professors act as the examiners for their own classes, and in the case of examining boards such as that of the London university—which is virtually a permanent body—students soon discover what questions are considered crucial by the examiners, their croquettes become familiar, and the examination tends to degenerate into a mere test of cramming. The system followed at Oxford and Cambridge, whereby fresh men are annually brought to the task of examination, seems to be the only one in this country free from objection. The permanency of the board of examiners for the India Civil Service is the worst feature in the scheme of reform, and may (acting conjointly with a similar board for the Home Civil Service) have a very prejudicial effect on the progress of education. Where those who are to decide upon the merits of candidates are previously known, and hold their office permanently, it becomes the interest of the candidate to ascertain their opinions and croquettes; and, as a matter of course, he directs his studies to their specialties and standard, rather than to the latest state of scientific information, which, in professional matters especially, is too frequently not the state most favoured by the examiners. And that this is the case may be inferred from the fact that a body of examiners is always to be found drilling men successfully for examination by all such permanent examiners, whose habitual routine of questions they make a business of ascertaining, preparing their pupils to answer them and them only. Whereas, when the examiners are varied from year to year, as at the English universities and in the French Concours, a candidate can only expect to win his way by sedulous attention to the entire course of his study, and by availing himself of every opportunity of gaining the latest and best authenticated information on the subjects allied to it. The difficulty connected with the appointment of examiners will be seen to be one of expense; and if the weight of objections to the present arrangement in our Scotch universities, as well as to the proposed permanent boards for the civil services, were duly appreciated, there is no reason why they should not at once be removed. Regarding the difficulty connected with the affixation of marks to the papers of the respective candidates, there appears to be no remedy; merit must remain, within certain limits, a matter of opinion. It is plain that short of omniscience on the part of the examiners, the distribution and affixation of marks cannot be accomplished with any great degree of accuracy, and all that can be expected is, that the examiners being honourable men, will take due care in the performance of their task, and satisfy their own judgments and consciences that they have to their best ability faithfully discharged it.

The growing importance which is being attached to examinations in literary and scientific subjects as tests of qualifications for practical life, makes it necessary that a few words be said here on their value as tests of such qualifications. It will be admitted by all who have had to do extensively with examinations and the education of youth, that, however useful examinations may be in ascertaining the special acquirements of men, they are nowise certain to detect the man of real talent, endowed with practical good sense, and with ability to conduct himself with propriety and decision under new and unexpected combinations of circumstances. At the age when examinations are entered into, it often happens that a man fails because his intellect has not fully developed itself, and as often that a sickly precocity bears off the palm. Not unfrequently, too, men win prizes at competitive examinations who have, under the influence of a strong hope or fear, laboured hard at their studies, and who, the moment the motives which urged them to exertion are removed, collapse into spiritless indolence—a case of common occurrence in the English universities; while, on the other hand, a man of sturdy fixed principle, being, it may be, above the considerations which actuated his contemporaries, passes into life in possession of healthy and not overtaxed faculties, finding in practical affairs motives to exertion which he failed to find in the world of scholarly ideas. Besides, unless a man has been previously tried in practical life, an examination will not ascertain, or will only ascertain imperfectly, the qualifications of industry, punctuality, correctness in the transaction of business, steadiness or reliability, or the power of fixing the attention immediately and steadily on new work. But these are the very qualities necessary for success in practical life. And as these observations are made with special reference to the proposed reforms in the civil service, the experience of that service in past times may be quoted in proof of the preceding view. In this service it has been found, that even first-class men from Oxford and Cambridge have proved failures in as large proportion of instances as any others,—the failures arising both from unsuitable qualifications, and from holding themselves above the valuable steady labour, called "drudgery," required in subordinate appointments, and above applying zealously such general qualifications as they may possess. This experience raises an objection to every scheme for the appointment of public servants which proposes to apply to them academic tests alone. If at present learning, science, and scholarly accomplishments have little or no weight in determining appointments, the practical qualities which directly fit a man for the business of life are in danger of being overlooked under the new system. This danger is heightened by the consideration, that the best men, who are generally ambitious, are not likely to offer themselves as candidates for such meagre appointments as those of the subordinate offices in the civil service (where the prospect of rapid promotion is so very small), but will prefer the more open, though more hazardous, competitions of professional life; and thus the choice for the civil service may lie between the men of middle-rate intellect, as displayed in academic pursuits, and the men of "unadorned" business talent, over whom, however, the mediocre class of scholars are sure to be preferred in the academic contest. The loss to the service may thus prove to be greater than the gain contemplated in the proposed "improvement." And while it is easy to run up a long list of eminent scholars, who, after leaving the schools and universities, distinguished themselves in public life,—such as Hastings, Metcalfe, Wellesley, Law, Ellenborough, Mansfield, Eldon, Stowell, Gibbs, Tindal, Tenterden, Lyndhurst, and a host of others of recent date, or who are still famous; it must not be forgotten, that if the entrance to public life had always been guarded by academic tests, more than one lord chancellor and chief justice who rose from being attorneys' clerks, would have been excluded from the service of their country, which would also have lost many others of its most famous men by the same means. The present commander-in-chief began his military career when about twelve years of age; and the late Duke of Wellington used to declare, that an academical education would have ex- cluded him from the army, as it certainly would have excluded Nelson from the navy. It is useless, however, to balance names in such an argument; it is sufficient to appeal to the reader's own experience, whether he has not known cases of success from small and rough beginnings, numerous enough to convince him that scholarly accomplishments have little to do with qualifying a man for practical affairs. More than one instance might here be cited of engineers who commenced their professional lives with wheelbarrows in hand, overcoming difficulties before the close of their careers which academies of science had declared to be insuperable. There is little doubt that men of this class, if educated in academic fashion, would have distinguished themselves in intellectual competitions. But the question is, what counterbalancing advantage would they have derived from having been put to these studies, at the expense of several years spent at a university, instead of being engaged during that period in the practical work of life. The balance is to be struck between the advantages, so far as regards eventual efficiency, of four or five years spent at a university in the cultivation of accomplishments, and the same number spent in actual practice in the world.

The advantage of scholarship and scientific knowledge to a man himself, must be wholly left out of this consideration; and when this is done, it will be found extremely difficult to come to a decision, considering how often eminence in that which is of little practical use is found to have been attained to the exclusion of that which is practically the most needed. Indeed, the popular prejudice against scholars and men of science, as regards their fitness for business, is not altogether without foundation; and many instances might be quoted to show, that a minute knowledge of the niceties of language, and habits of reasoning accurately from abstractions to abstractions, are far from being the best guarantees of practical ability. Mr Laing remarks, that the manner in which the French and German philosophers conducted the great public interests and affairs entrusted to them in 1848, shows that the mind formed in literary pursuits is not the best prepared to deal with men and realities in social economy or in affairs of state. It is not a matter of course that the eminent literary man, philosopher, professor, or author, must be a good minister of state, or a great financier, or even a man of practical views, unshaken steadfastness, and of reliability and political honesty. The history of Germany, and France since 1848, has not raised the character of literary men in the field of politics, or proved that they are not in their right places in their libraries and class-rooms."

(Observations on the Social and Political State of Denmark, &c., 1852.)

These considerations indicate the necessity for devising a test of qualifications more thorough than has yet been invented. It is abundantly clear, that the academic test should not be held sufficient of itself; and it appears that a modification of the plan at present proposed for the election of civil servants should be made, and that a moderate academic test should be applied to the candidates at an early age, a term of probation being fixed between the nomination subsequent to the examination, and the final confirmation of the appointment.

(J.F.M.)