£.—1

boys, and, up to the present, no Maori girls, who have become students at the University Colleges, and it seems accordingly a waste of effort to teach Latin and other purely academic subjects to those who should be taught in a practical way the principles that underlie agriculture, domestic work, and the other occupations of their future lives. The few who show sufficient ability to warrant their being taken for a considerable time away from their own people could, at a far less total expense, receive at the ordinary secondary schools the training necessary to prepare them for a university career. Quite recently a way has been opened up for giving a trial, so far as one locality is concerned, to a scheme proposed some three or four years ago for enabling Maoris, after finishing their school education, to find a field of action in which what they have acquired at school may be applied to the purposes of ordinary life; in which they may, in fact, find the uses of the training they have received by practising in a Maori settlement conducted on European lines the art of living in European fashion. The Native school at Pamoana, on the Wanganui River, has afforded the kind of opportunity necessary for trying the experiment. A large number of young people are on the ground, and already fairly well educated; the Maoris have given the necessary land, and very soon everything will be ready for making a beginning. It would be futile to attempt at the present stage to describe accurately the steps to be taken, but the information here given will probably suffice to show the general lines on which the little colony is to be founded. It may be added, however, that it is intended to make the settlement industrial, and, as soon as possible, self-supporting. The usual account of the schools and their progress will be found in the Inspector's report, and also paragraphs on subjects connected with Maori life in general, in so far as this is influenced by or influences education. Industrial Schools. In December, 1901, the total number on the books of all the industrial schools was 1,765, or 62 more than at the close of the year 1900. On the books of the Government industrial schools there were 1,227, an increase of 64 over the corresponding number for 1900; on the books of the private industrial schools there were 538, or 2 less than at the end of the previous year. The number in residence at Government schools was 293, and at private industrial schools 348, so that 641 was the total number of " inmates " actually in residence. The number boarded out was 419, one being from a private school and the rest from Government schools. There were 17 girls maintained in various corrective institutions, 13 boys and girls in orphan homes, 1 boy at the Blind Institute, Auckland, and lat the School for Deaf-mutes, Sumner. The total number of inmates dependent on the schools for maintenance was therefore 1,092, or 56 more than the number at the end of 1900. The remaining 673, although still subject to control and supervision, were not dependent on the schools for maintenance. They may be classified as follows : Licensed to reside with friends, 155 ;at service, 448; in hospital, 4 ; in lunatic asylum, 5; in the Costley Training Institution, Auckland, on probation, 2; in other institutions without payment, 13 ; in gaol, 6 ; absent without leave, 40—namely, 29 from service and 11 from the schools. There were six Government industrial schools in existence in 1901, and the numbers of inmates on their books at the end of the year were as follows: Auckland, 97 ; Receiving Home, Wellington, 69 ; Receiving Home, Christchurch, 226; Burnham, 281; Te Oranga Home, 46; Caversham, 508: total, 1,227. Those belonging to private industrial schools were distributed as follows: St. Mary's, Auckland, 130; St. Joseph's, Wellington, 76; St. Mary's, Nelson, 305; St. Vincent de Paul, Dunedin, 27 : total, 538.

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