The Sun.
London, England, 1854-12-27 00:00:00

REPORT
To THE RIGHT HON. SIR CHARLES WOOD,
BART., M.P., &c.
SIR, —We have attentively considered the sub-
ject about which you have done us the honour to
consult us, and we now venture to submit to you
the result of our deliberations.
We do not think that we can more conveniently
arrange the suggestions which we wish to offer
than by following the order which is observed in
the 39th and 40th Clause of the India Act of 1853.
The first matter concerning which the Board of
Control is empowered by the 39th Clause to make
regulations is the age of the persons who are to be
admitted into the College of llaileybury.
The present rule is that no person can be ad-
mitted under 17, and that no person can go out to
India after 23. Every student Must pass four
terms—that is to say, 'two years at the College;
consequently, none can be admitted after 21.
It seems to us that it would be a great improve-
ment to all sw students to be admitted to the Col-
lege up to the age of 23, and to fix 25 as the latest
age at which they can go out to India in the Civil
Srvice. It is undoubtedly desirable that the civil
servant of the Company should enter on his duties
while still young ; but it is also desirable that he
should have received the best, the most liberal, the
most finished education that his native country
affords. Such an education has been proved by
experience to be the best preparation for every
calling which requires the exercise of the higher
powers of the mind ; nor will it be easy to show
that such preparation is less desirable in the case of
a civil servant of the East India Company than in
the case of a professional man who remains in Eng-
land. Indeed, in the case of a civil servant of the
Company, a good general education is even more
desirable than in the case of the English professional
man; for the duties even of a very young servant
of the Company are more important than those
which ordinarily fall to the lot of a profes-
sional man in England. In England, too, a pro-
fessional man may, while engaged in active busi-
ness, continue to improve his mind by means of
reading and of conversation. But the servant of
the Company is often stationed, during a large part
of his life, at a great distance from libraries and
from European society, and will therefore find it
peculiarly difficult to supply by study in his ma-
ture years the deficiencies of his early training.
The change which we propose will have one prac-
tical effect, to which we attach much importance.
We think it desirable that a considerable number
of the civil servants of the Company should be men
who have taken the first degree in arts at Oxford
or Cambridge. At present the line is drawn as if
it had been expressly meant to exclude bachelors
of those Universities. It will, we believe, be found
that the great majority of our academic youth gra-
duate too late by a few months, and only by a few
months, for admission into Haileybury.
We propose to fix 18 as the lowest age at which
a candidate can be admitted into the college. We
are, indeed, of opinion that, except in very rare
and extraordinary cases, it is not desirable that a
lad should be admitted so early as 18. But we are
convinced that, except in very rare and extraordi-
nary cases, no lad of 18 will have any chance of
being admitted. Hitherto the admissions have
been given by favour. They are henceforward to
be gained bysuperiority in intellectual competition.
While they were given by favour, they were fre-
quently, indeed generally, given to persons whose
age was not' much above the minimum. A director
would naturally wish his son or nephew to be hand-
somely provided for at 19, rather than at 23, and to
be able to return to England with a competence at
44 rather than at4B. A majority of the studentshave,
therefore, been admitted before they were 19, and
have gone out before they,were 21. But it is plain
that, in any intellectual competition, boys of 18
must be borne down by men of 21 or 22. We may,
therefore, we believe, safely predict that nine-
tenths of those who are admitted to the College
under the new system will bo older than nine-tenths
of those who quit it under the present system.
We hope and believe that among the successful
competitors will frequently be young men who
have obtanied the highest honours of Oxford and
Cambridge. To many such young men a fellow-
ship, or a tutorship,. which must be held on condi-
tion of,celibacy, will appoat less attractive than a
situation' which enables'the person . who holds it to
marry at an early age.
The India Act next empowers the Board of Con-
trol to, determine the qualificationS of the candi-
dates for admission to Haileybury. It seems to us
to bo proper that every person who intends to bo
candidate should, at least six weeks before the ex-
amination, notify his intention to the Board of
Control, and should at the same time transmit a
list of the subjects in which he proposes to be ex-
amined, in order that there may be time to provide
a sufficient number of 'examiners in each depart-
ment. He should, at the same time, lay before
the board testimonials certifying that his moral
character is good. Whether the testimonials be or
be•not satisfactory, is a point which we conceive
may safely be left to the determination of the board.
The board is then authorised by the act to make
regulations prescribing the branches in which the
candidates for admission to Haileybury shall be
examined. Here arises at once a question of the
ravest importance. Ought the examination to be
confined to those branches of knowledge to which
it is desirable that English gentlemen who mean to
remain at home should pay attention ? or ought it
to extend to branches of knowledge which are use-
ful to a servant of the East India Company, but
useless, or almost useless, to a person whose life is
to be passed in Europe ?
Our opinion is, that the examination ought to be
confined to those branches of knowledge to which
it is desirable that English gentlemen who mean to
remain at home should pay some attention.
It is with much diffidence .that we venture to.
predict the effect of the new system, but we think
we can hardly be mistaken in believing that the in-
troduction of that system will be an event scarcely
lessimportant to this country than to India. The
educated youth of the United Kingdom are hence-
forth to be invited to engage in a competition in
which about 40 prizes Will, on an average, be gained
every year. Every one of these prizes is nothing less
than an honourable social position and a comfortable
independence for life. It is difficult to estimate the
effect which theprospect of prizes so numerous and so
attractive will produce. We are, however, familiar
with some facts which may assist our conjectures.
At Trinity College, the largest and wealthiest of
the colleges of Cambridge, about four fellowships
are given annually by competition. These fellow-
ships can be held only on condition of celibacy, and
the income derived from them is a very moderate
'one for a single man. It is notorious that the exa-
minations for Trinity Fellowships have, directly
and indirectly, done much to give a direction to
the studies of Cambridge,,and of all the numerous
schools which are the feeders of Cambridge. What
then is likely to be the elect of a competition for
prizes which will be ten times as numerous as the
Trinity Fellowships, and of which each will be more
valuable than a Trinity Fellowship ? We are in-
clined to think that the examinations for situations
in the civil service of the East India Company
will produce an effect which will be felt in every
seat of learning throughout the realm--at Oxford
and Cambridge, at the University of London and
the University of Durham, at Edinburgh and
Glasgow, at Dublin, at Cork, and at Belfast. The
number of candidateswill doubtless be much greater
than the number of vacancies. It will not surprise
us if the ordinary number examined should be
three or lour hundred. ' The great majority, and
among them many young men of excellent abilities
and laudable industry, must be unsuccessful. If,
therefore, branches of knowledge specially Oriental
should be among the subjects of examination, it is
probable that a considerable number of the most
hopeful youths in the country will be induced to
waste much time, at that period of life at which
time is most precious, in studies which will never,
in any conceivable case, be of the smallest use to
them. We think it most desirable that the exami-
nation should be of such a nature that no candidate
who may fail shall, to whatever calling he may
betake himself, have any reason to regret the time
and labour which he spent in preparing himseleto
be examined. .
Nor do we think that we should render any ser-
vice to India by inducing her future rulers to neglect
in their earlier years European literature and science
for studies specially Indian. We believe that men
who have been engaged up to 21 or 22 in studies
which have no- immediate connexion with the
business of any profession, and of which the effect
is merely to open, to invigorate, and to enrich the
mind, will generally be found, in the business of
every profession, superior to men who have, at 18
or 19, devoted themselves to the special studies of
their galling. The most illustrious English jurists
have been men who have never opened a lawbook
till after the close of a distinguished academical
career ; nor is there any reason to suppose that
they would have been greater lawyers if they had
passed in drawing pleas aad conveyances the time