The Sun.
London, England, 1865-06-09 00:00:00

Teaching by Machinery.

A very ingenious mechanical contrivance for
aiding the ordinary educational process in the
acquisition of languages, music, arithmetic, &c., was
exhibited on Wednesday at Messrs. W. and R
Chambers' London establishment in Paternoster-
row, in the presence of Mr. S. Morley and several
ladies and gentlemen interested in the work of edu-
cation. The patent Metabolical Machine is the name
which Mr. Alfred Long, the inventor, has given to
this very simple but apparently very efficient piece
of mechanism, and in the explanatory lecture with
which he introduced it to his audience he described
it thus :

" This machine is constructed so as to present to the eye
an endless succession of musical combinations, or of sen-
tences in grammatical and idiomatic form. These are
produced by interchanges of the words or the bars, which
have been previously selected and arranged according to a
certain formula, and then written upon the faces of the
little cubes. The peculiar characteristic of the apparatus
is a contrivance which prevents the faces of the cubes
from presenting themselves in regular succession. An ir-
regular movet...ent being secured, a different variation of
the words or bars necessarily results from each revolution
of the machine on its axis. A complete sentence appears
at the windows on each occasion, and all the rest of the
words or the bars is excluded from sight. The working
of the machine exemplifies the process whereby children,
when taken abroad, reproduce foreign sentences in idiomatic
form. It shows that the intellect works mechanically in the
colloquial attainment of foreign languages; particularly in
relation to the idiomatic arrangement of the words. The
machine was devised to illustrate the method set forth in
Mr. Prendergast's work on the "Mastery of Languages."
The beginner commits to memory two foreign sentences
very perfectly. The English translations are inserted into
the machine, and whenever it revolves a different variation
of the words appears at the windows. The system requires
that the learner shall go on translating these variatiors
until he shall have obtained the " mastery" of them. Then
he may undertake another sentence ; but he must recapi-
tulate them in every lesson in order to prevent their escap-
ing from his memory. The exclusion from sight of all
words except those with which the learner is actually deal-
ing at the moment is of great importance, because it re-
moves all uncertainty and obviates the difficulty of retain-
ing in the memory the latter words of a spoken sentence,
while he is employing that faculty in recalling the foreign
words required for the beginning of it. A machine with
tw•o rows affords an additional exercise, for if the foreign
words are placed in one row, and the English in the other,
each revolution will give an opportunity for practising
double translation. The machine will soon recommend

itself by the rapidity and the economy with which it
works. To write out the variations of the sentences on
paper would be a very tedious operation, and to make them
viva coca from two written sentences would bo perplexing
and unsatisfactory. Tho apparatus is a sort of dumb-
waiter, from which the beginner helps himself without
bothering or being bothered by a talking one. One promi-
nent feature of the scheme is that it bars the beginner from
attempting to manufacture a sentence in a foreign language.
The sentence must be selected from books, or else received
from a native. No man, however learned he may be, can
make an idiomatic sentence in a foreign tongue until he
knows something about it ; and it is very irrational to
attempt it."
The apparatus is a novel application of the kaleidoscope
principle, and almost realises Swift's description of the art
of book-making in Laputa. The words are put into the
machine, and they are varied to form sentence after sentence
at the pleasure of the operator. Its adaptation to musical
composition was aptly illustrated by Dr. Gilbert on the
pianoforte. A number of the cubes, upon each of the sides
of which was written a different bar, which, read together,
harmonised into a regular theme or melody, were placed in
the machine, and varied at pleasure by turning the handle,
the same arrangement or tune as rarely recurring as the same
combination of pattern and colour in the kaleidoscope.
Mr. Samuel Morley, Mr. Prendergast, and other gentle-
men, put questions to the inventor as to the applicability
of the machine to instruction in languages and other pur
poses, all of which were satisfactorily answered, and two
ladies present stated that they used the invention in edu-
cational establishments with very great success.

DEATH OF SIR JOHN RICHARDSON, C. 8., F.R.S.

—We have to record the death of Sir John Richardson,
C. 8., F.R.S., who expired at Lancrig, Grasmere, on the
sth inst. The deceased gentleman, who had attained the
age of 77 years, was son of the late Gabriel Richardson,
Esq., provost of Dumfries.

NEW ACT ON CRIMINAL TRIALS.—On the let of
July a section in a new act of Parliament (the 28th
Victoria, cap. 18) will take effect in the law and practice on
criminal trials. It is recited to be expedient that the law
of evidence and practice on trials for felony and misde-
meanour and other proceedings in courts of criminal judi-
cature should bo more nearly assimilated to that on trials
at Nisi Prius. The following provision is to apply to every
trial for felony and misdemeanour commenced on or after
the Ist of July next :—" If any prisoner or prisoners, de-
fendant or defendants, shall be defended by counsel, but
not otherwise, it shall be the duty of the presiding Judge
at the close of the case for the prosecution to ask the
counsel for each prisoner or defendant so defended by
counsel whether he or they intend to adduce evidence,
and in the event of none of them thereupon announcing
his intention to adduce evidence, the counsel for the pro-
secution shall be allowed to address the jury a second time
in support of the case, for the purpose of summing up tho
evidence against such prisoner or prisoners, or defendant
or defendants, and upon every trial for felony and mis-
demeanour, whether the prisoners or defendants, or any of
them shall be defended by counsel, each and every such
prisoner or defendant or his or their counsel respectively
shall be allowed, if ho or they shall think fit, to open his
or their case or cases respectively, and after the conclusion
of such opening, or of all such openings, if more than one
such prisoner or prisoners, or defendant or defendants, or
their counsel shall be entitled to examine such witnesses
as he or they may think fit, and when all the e ,Tidence is
concluded, to sum up the evidence respectively, and the
right of reply and practice and course of proceedings, save
as hereby altered, shall be as at present." The sections
from 3 to 1 inclusive are to apply to all courts of judica-
ture, as well criminal as all others, and to all persons
having by law or by consent of parties authority to hear,
receive, and examine evidence. The provisions men-
tioned have reference to the discrediting of witnesses
and the cross-examination as to a previous statement
in writing, and how a previous correction of a witness
is to be given in evidence. A comparison of disputed
writing is allowed. The act is not to apply to Scotland.
SWIMMING.—It appears by a Parliamentary return
issued yesterday that 27 non-commissioned officers
and soldiers of her Majesty's land forces were drowned at
the various military stations of the United Kingdom during
the year 1864. On the 27th of March last a circular gene-
ral order was issued on the subject of gymnastic instruc-
tion for the army, which directs, among other things, that
swimming is to be taught as a military duty at all stations
where facilities for it exist, and a variety of details are
given, but it appears that " as regards swimming, arrange-
ments have not yet been matured for carrying the above
circular into effect."