candidates may catch its general scope; he then reads it more deliberately, so that it may be written down; and lastly he goes over it once more, that candidates may have an opportunity of correcting their errors and inserting the stops.

When an additional test of Orthography is required (as it is in all but the Foreign Office), the somewhat objectionable plan is adopted of requiring the candidate to correct the erroneous spelling in a printed paper altered for the purpose. Earl Russell and Mr. Hammond, Under-Secretary in the Foreign Office, recommend as the best way of overcoming the difficulties of this "bad spelling paper," 66 to learn your line by heart, and shut your paper up and write from your head, not from the paper." There is no rule as to the number of faults in spelling that will "pluck" a man, as they are of such different quantity. "Some of them," says one of the Examiners,

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are really almost such that one of them would prove very great ignorance in a man, while others are so slight, that you hardly know how to compare one with the other." No candidate has ever been rejected for less than eight or ten distinct errors in spelling; and there is a well-known case in which a candidate was not rejected until after much consideration, although his orthographical blunders amounted to thirty-one. The weight given to spelling is not so great in Competitive as in Pass Examinations. The column in the Reports of the Competitive Examinations, headed "General Intelligence," has reference solely to the intelligence shown in the Dictation and in correcting the Orthography paper, including also the Copying paper, where that is used.

(c) Arithmetic.-The Examination under this head includes two sets of papers-the Elementary, given to tide-waiters, weighers, doorkeepers, messengers, &c., and to candidates for temporary employment, and in certain offices-the higher commencing with reduction and ending with decimal fractions, given to candidates for permanent clerkships. The "test" does not extend the limits previously assigned, but the Examiners require "the correct execution of a certain proportion of the sums set, especially in the addition

of money." The difficulty of the long addition sums-an unfair test of arithmetical skill-may be best overcome by dividing them into portions of five or six lines each, and then adding these partial totals. The number of questions set in the "test" paper is usually under forty.

(d) Composition.-The aptness of a candidate in English composition is not in general tested by requiring him to compose a formal theme or essay; but some very simple and familiar subject is selected as the topic upon which he is to write, it may be, an imaginary letter to a friend. The subjects usually bear upon events of the day or of recent occurrence, as "The Death of the Prince Consort," "The Volunteer Review," "The Reception of the Princess Alexandra," or upon some book or place with which the candidate may happen to be familiar. The Commissioners "have found but few instances in which a candidate has shown great facility in composing even an ordinary letter." In assigning marks under this head, they have regard only to the exercise strictly so called, and not at all to the style in which the questions are answered in the other papers on Geography, History, or any other subject.

An important change was made last year by the War Office in the mode of admission to that department. Candidates who pass the test examination are appointed "temporary" clerks, and in order to become "established " clerks they have to compete-five for a single vacancy, and four each if several vacancies are to be filled up. Those who fail to pass the test examination cannot be nominated again until after the expiration of six months, and upon a second failure they are struck off the list. No candidate who fails in three competitive examinations will be sent up again.

4.-FINAL OR COMPETITIVE EXAMI-
NATION.

Of the 25,612 nominations under the new system, upwards of 20,000 were "absolute," or of one candidate only, and the qualifications required were merely sufficient to avoid rejection. Although

these "pass" examinations will long be the more numerous, and it may not be advisable to do away with them altogether, the competitive principle is gradually spreading, and in some Offices prevails exclusively. This principle has been twice affirmed by Resolutions of the House of Commons:

Resolution of 24th April, 1856.-" An address to thank Her Majesty for having caused to be laid before this House the Report of the Civil Service Commissioners: to state humbly to Her Majesty that the House has observed with great satisfaction the zeal and prudence with which the Commission has proceeded in applying a remedy to evils of a serious character, the previous existence of which has now been placed beyond dispute; and also the degree of progress which has been made, with the sanction of the heads of various Departments of the State, towards the establishment of a system of competition among candidates for admission to the Civil Service: to assure Her Majesty of the steady support of this House in the prosecution of the salutary measures which she has been graciously pleased to adopt: and humbly to make known to Her Majesty, that if she shall think fit further to extend them, and to make trial in the Civil Service of the method of open competition as a condition of entrance, this House will cheerfully provide for any charges which the adoption of that system may entail." (Lord Goderich.)

Resolution of 14th July, 1857.—“That in the opinion of this House the experience acquired since the issuing of the Order in Council of the 21st day of May, 1855, is in favour of the adoption of the principle of competition as a condition of entrance to the Civil Service; and that the application of that principle ought to be extended, in conformity with the Resolution of the House agreed to on the 24th day of April, 1856." (Lord Goderich.)

The usual plan was (and to a great extent still is) to nominate three persons to one vacancy, when the candidate who obtains the greatest number of marks in the examination is appointed. But it was soon found that this was a very uncertain mode of filling up vacancies, and to some extent unfair to the competitors. In their Third Report, the Civil Service Commissioners entered into the question at some length :

"With regard to the cases in which three candidates have been

examined for one situation, we must notice an unsatisfactory result which is likely to arise, and which in fact has arisen, from the number of candidates who are to compete together being so frequently limited to three. In such cases it may and does happen, from time to time, that one or two of the competing candidates fail to reach the positive minimum which would entitle them to a certificate, so that the actual competition is either reduced to two, or virtually ends in a simple pass examination. Thus, out of 22 competitions for situations in the Customs, there were ten cases in which only two, and eight in which only one, of the candidates examined were capable of passing. In the Inland Revenue, also, in 16 competitions there were two in which two, and ten in which only one, of the candidates examined could have passed, while in others three capable candidates competed for two situations, and four for three situations.

"In noticing these anomalies, we must admit that under any conceivable arrangement there will still remain differences in the average merits of one set of competitors and another set, and candates may gain or lose by being accidentally placed in a weak or strong body of competitors; but, at all events, this evil would be very much diminished by having one large, instead of several small, competitions."

They took up the subject again in the Fourth Report, and, to enforce their views, quoted two recent competitions for junior situations, of the same nature and in the same office, in which the marks given were as follows:

"It will be perceived that No. 2 in the first competition had much higher marks than No. 1 in the second, and that even No. 3 in the first examination just surpassed No. 1 in the second, although the subjects of examination and the examination papers were the same in both, and the examination took place simultaneously."

The practical conclusion to which the Commissioners arrived

was, that the number of candidates should be increased, so as to bear a larger proportion to the vacancies, three to one being insufficient. As yet they have not succeeded, to any great extent, in altering the number of competitors; but large competitions are more frequent and with the most satisfactory results. It is evident that the chance of obtaining the best men must be greater in one large competition than in several small ones, even when the same number of prizes and competitors is maintained. Thus, if 60 men go in to compete for 20 situations, the 20 successful competitors in one contest of the whole number would be almost certainly superior to the 20 victors in 20 separate competitions of three each, because the second and even the third man in one of the small competitions would occasionally be found superior to the first man in another.

In consequence of the proved failure of the competitive system, when thus worked, the House of Commons' Committee of 1860 recommended (as we have mentioned before) that no candidate should be allowed to compete for any vacancy, unless he had passed a preliminary "test" examination. This at once excluded the incompetent, put the competitors more on a level, and also increased the severity of the examinations.

The following table will show the progress made by the Competitive system during the last five years:

The most important competitive examination that has taken place since the establishment of the Commission was that for eight vacan