Page:Macaula yʼs minutes on education in India, written in the years 1835, 1836 and 1837 (IA dli.csl.7615).pdf/85

Rh recast. If Sir B. Malkin will furnish a list of ten or twelve books of a scientific kind which he thinks would be suited for prizes, the task will not be difficult; and with his help I will gladly undertake it. When I say “suited for prizes,” I mean that prize books ought to be interesting and amusing. There is a marked distinction between a prize book and a school book. A prize book ought to be a book which a boy receives with pleasure and turns over and over, not as a task, but spontaneously. I have not forgotten my own schoolboy feelings on this subject. My pleasure at obtaining a prize was greatly enhanced by the knowledge that my little library would receive a very agreeable addition. I never was better pleased than when at fourteen I was master of  which I had long been wishing to read. If my master had given me, instead of Boswell, a critical Pronouncing Dictionary, or a Geographical class book, I should have been much less gratified by my success. In the list before us, these considerations are utterly neglected. I therefore recommend that the whole list be at once rejected, and that we proceed to frame a new one.—[Page 94.] 21st December, 1836.

Principal’s House.—I cannot agree to the proposition about house. I do not see why we should pay 60 Rupees a month, when we can have accommodation for nothing. I should be most happy to afford any convenience to Dr. Bramley, but I cannot consent to do it out of our funds.—[Book E. page 109.] 19th April, 1835.

Chemical lectures asat [sic] the Medical College.—I sent the box yesterday to Dr. Grant, as I felt some diffidence in my own judgment in a question of this kind. It may therefore seem rather strange that I do not acquiesce in Dr. Grant’s opinion. But I own that I am not quite satisfied by what he has said. I do not conceive that we ought to take into our consideration any question but this simple one. Would it be a good thing for the instruction of Medical science in this country that Dr. O’Shaughnessy should read lectures on chemistry to the Medical students? Whether Dr. Bramley was formerly convinced of the importance of chemical lectures or not, whether he changed his mind on the subject or not, whether he were a party to the existing plan or not, seem to me to be very unimportant questions. If he were a party to the plan, it is not on that account the less his duty to suggest amendments in it. On the contrary, the circumstance of his being a party to the plan, makes it peculiarly his duty to do all in his power to make the plan perfect. I do not find that Dr. Grant denied