The money thus provided almost by accident, became a new and valuable source for endowing secondary education; and on all hands claims of the most varied kind were made on it. Administered by bodies of non-experts, who had to learn their business by doing it, much of it was misapplied; mistakes, often of a ludicrous character, were made, and there was some excuse for those producers and consumers of spirits who thought the money would have been better applied in relieving the tax. But in spite of repeated appeals by specially interested persons, Parliament kept firm in the matter; the money must be given to County Councils, and they must learn to use it. How well many of them have learnt can best be realised by a series of visits to the polytechnics of London and the large provincial towns, to the laboratories constructed in public schools, to the ambulatory dairy classes in village schoolrooms, to the beautifully equipped laundries, kitchens, and dressmaking schools all over the country. Long before these Technical Instruction Acts were passed, isolated action had been taken. The Regent Street Polytechnic, long known as _the_ Polytechnic, was already in full work. It originated in a Young Men’s Institute, privately founded by Mr. Quentin Hogg, with the large aim of providing a place where a young man could develop all the sides of his nature, and ‘find a reasonable outlet for any healthy desire, physical, spiritual, social, or intellectual, which he possesses.’ For some years the Institute flourished in Long Acre, and it happened that, just when increased accommodation became necessary, the old Polytechnic, long the home of Pepper’s Ghost, the diving-bell, and other joys and terrors of our young days, came into the market. It was at once secured, and the result was an unprecedented rush for membership. Mr. Hogg, who was the life and soul of the Institute, made a point of himself seeing every boy on joining, and on the first night in Regent Street, he began to interview new members at five o’clock. There he was kept at his desk, unable even to get a cup of tea, till a quarter to one in the morning, and by that time a thousand new members had been enrolled. With such encouragement, it was possible to try fresh experiments, and for the first time trade-classes and workshop practice were added to the programme. The Polytechnic thus became a pioneer in technical work. The London Trades Council in 1883 recommended its system of trade teaching to the London trades; members of the Technical Instruction Commission gave it their warm commendation.