The Dallas daily herald. [volume] (Dallas, Tex.) 1873-1887, 1876-08-13

SUNDAY MORNING ::::: AUGUST 10.
PRACTICAL EDUCATION.

our intelligent readers will not com
plain
! am n farmer My son is now cigh.
teen years OF age He began to attend
school Mt the age Of six, and has attend
ed two terms or six months, in each
year from that time until now, He is
a boy Of good health and of at least
average mental abilities, and has never
been considered less studious than his
school. fellows and classmates. His
teachers have been az competent rs the
average Of those employed in country
districts. His time in schools has been
spent exclusively upon the seven rudl-
mentary branches taught III the com
mon district schools-spelling reading
writing, arithmetic, geography, gram
mar, and the history Of the United
States He is, nevertheless, poor
spellcr, reader, and writer, knows little
of arithmetic and grammar except the
rules, and has only smattering Of &C.
ography and history. ! found out these
things by asking him questions and
setting him to do things for me. | take
an agricultural paper, and one evening
| asked John (my sons namc) to take
pen and paper and write for me short
article for the newspaper on the culture
of corn, about which thought | had
some ideas worth communicating
sat in my easy chair and dictated what
had to say, and John wrote it down
When the article was finished | told
John to put my initials to it and SEND
it to the Office Of the paper Tive
weeks aiterward, when the paper came
looked for my article, but found in
stead the following editorial note
"lf our correspondent B. j. T., knew
one-tenth part AS much about oHhogro
phH punctuation, Paragrphtg, and the
use of copitai letters as he docs about earn
cRhuc,' his article would have been
gladly inserted His ignorance of those
matters, 50 important to editors and
printers seems us remarkable rs his
knowledge Of the subject treated Of
We advise him to write again, and get
some intelligent schoolboy to copy his
article for him before sending it to us 7
My reflections ON reading this gentle
hint must be left to the imagination.
Was not my John an Intelligent
school.boy p ! would look further in
to the matter asked him to point
out Salt Lake City on the map. lie
did so. BY what name are the inhab.
itants Of that city known He could
not tell. Is there anything peculiar in
their religious notions and customs ?
Not that he knew Of How much soon.
er does the sun rise in Boston than in
San Francisco lie did not know
Why should it rise aay sooner lie
could not say, Though only a farmer
| am fond of Shakespeare, and asked
John to read me scene from King
Lear. 1t could not be called reading,
and, in much pain, soon desired him
to stop. How many different sounds
are there III the word eighth EcC, Of
course. Did the colonies, prior to the
Revolution, have the same form of GOV.
eminent ? Yes. What was it called ?
Colonial government How many dit
fercnt kinds of national government
have we had since the Revolution I
Two, Democratic and Republican,
John" said |, to-day sold II load OF
hay weighing one thousand seven hun
drcd and fifty pounds, and received pay
for it ut the rate of sixteen dollars and
fifty cents per ton; how much none,
did get p He took his slate and
went to work, while | read fresh cop\
ofTnE HERALD, In an hour had finish
ed the paper, but John had not linishc,
his sum. He said there were SO man,
fractions in it, and he couldn't find
rule that would fit exactly. The mex
evening told John that had a littl
sum in practical farming for him to tic
| rented forty acres of land to Nh
Jones, he to put it in corn and ALLOW
me one.third of the crop for the use O
the land. Jones raised two thousnn,
four hundred bushels, the total cost o
which when cribbed was three hundre,
and iilty-tive dollars. What did Jones
corn cost him per bushel in the crib
What was the cost of the whole Gro,
per acre and per bushcl2 And if sci
my share at fifty cents per bushel, how
much shall get per acre as rent ? JOIN
labored on it all the evening, but di,
not get correct answers to all the cues
tons, then gave him all of the item
OF cost and profit, and desired him t,
open an account with that lorty-acrc 10
in due form, and prepare correct bal
anco-sheet of the same, He did no
know what meant.
Finding that my poor boy had YER,
little to show for his twelve wears q
delving in the seven elementary com
mon school branches; that he was n 200
feader and worse writer and speller
that he knew nothing augmentation
and could not with the matter furnish
ed him prepare a few pages of mann
script well enough to save them from
the editors waste-basket that his stocl
OF history and geography was meare
in the extreme; while his knowledge n
arithmetic, beyond the verbiage of th,
tpyt.bOOk wng nunonal 10 ,;,,,.i - :,