“The favourite subjects seem to be working the printing-press; penmanship of various kinds; drawing, etching, and painting; constructing maps, making surveys, and delineating mathematical diagrams; reading books on which they prepare themselves for answering questions; studying music; modelling animals and constructing machines; filling offices bearing salaries; learning orations, extracts from the poets, parts in plays, and dialogues; taking reports of lectures, trials, and debates; and composition, in prose and verse, in various languages. This department, which is now become so important a feature in our system, took its rise from the necessity of furnishing to boys who had no chance of obtaining marks by excelling their schoolfellows, opportunities of gaining them by working harder than those to whom nature had been more propitious. It appeared to us that, as in the common course of events this must be their lot in after-life, it would be well to accustom them to it in their early years; nor were we without hopes that their superior industry would enable them to press on the heels of their competitors, and to show them that talent alone would not be sufficient, at all times, to secure superiority. It seemed also of consequence to make imprisonment as rare as possible, both because it is attended with unavoidable disgrace—to which no mind can with safety be frequently exposed—and because, unlike labour, it is pain without any utility, except that of example, which appertains to all judicious penalty of whatever kind.... ... “One of the most valuable habits of life is that of completing every undertaking. The mental dissipation in which persons of talent often indulge, and to which they are, perhaps, more prone than others, is destructive beyond what can readily be imagined.... The habit of finishing ought to be formed in early youth. We take care to reward no boy for fragments, whatever may be their excellence. We know nothing of his exertions until they come before us in a state of completion.” A few years ago Sir Rowland Hill made the following record as regards this scheme of Voluntary Work:— “One sequel of this plan (it might be too much to call it a consequence), I mention with the permission of the gentleman concerned. Amongst those who adopted drawing as his chief occupation was a little boy who, up to that time, had shown no particular aptitude for any kind of study. Here, however, he succeeded so well as soon to attract no small attention. His power was fostered then and afterwards, and painting eventually became his profession. Of his eminence in the art I need not speak, the works of Thomas Creswick needing no eulogy.”