that the state of the children cannot be explained in any
other way.

Leaving explanations aside, however, there is the fact, not to be
gainsaid, that the children in general are slow of wit. One notes it in
the infant school first, and especially in the very youngest classes.
There, newly come from their mother's care, the small boys and girls
from five to six years old have often a wonderfully vacant expression.
There is little of that speculative dancing of the eyes, that evident
appetite for perceptions and ideas, which you will find in well-to-do
nurseries and playrooms. And whereas in the latter circumstances
children will take up pencil or paintbrush confidently, as if born to
master those tools, the village infant is hesitating, clumsy, feeble.
Upon the removal of a child to the upper or "mixed" school, a certain
increase of intelligence often seems to come at a bound. The
circumstance is highly suggestive. The "infant" of seven is suddenly
brought into contact with older scholars already familiarized with
particular groups of ideas, and those ideas are speedily absorbed by the
little ones, while the swifter methods of teaching also have their
quickening effect, for a time. But after this jump has been made and
lost sight of--that is to say amongst the older scholars, who do not
again meet with such a marked change of environment--one is again aware
of considerable mental density throughout the school. The children
resemble their parents. They are quick enough to observe details, though
not always the details with which the teacher is concerned, but they
have very little power of dealing with the simplest abstractions. They
are clumsy in putting two thoughts together for comparison; clumsy in
following reasons, or in discussing underlying principles. In short,
"thinking" is an art they hardly begin to practise. They can learn and
apply a "rule of thumb," a folk-rule, so to speak--but there is no flow,
nor anything truly consecutive, in the movement of their ideas.
Elsewhere one may hear children of six or seven--little well-cared-for
people--keep up a continual stream of intelligent and happy talk with
their parents or nursemaids; but to the best of my belief this does not
happen amongst the village children, at any age.

Observations of them at play, in the cottage gardens or on the road,
throw some light on their condition. It would appear that they are
extremely ill-supplied with subjects to think about. In