United States or Greenland ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !


Following the immemorial custom of the country of Revolutions, which is the worst country in the world for red-tape and routine, the examinations were held in July during the hottest days of the year, as though it were deliberately intended to finish off the luckless candidates, who were already staggering under the weight of cramming a monstrous list of subjects, of which even the examiners did not know a tenth part.

But it was impossible to compress all the work into that time. I was anxious to get my first mission, and I presume I did a great deal of cramming. My study was not all in Berlin. I spent most of my time there at Koenigergratzerstrasse 70 and at the Zeughaus, the great museum of the German General Staff. But there were side trips to the big government works at Kiel and Wilhelmshafen.

But, all were alike in form, veritable facsimiles of the picture of the Great Harry of the time of Henry the Eighth, which I remember seeing in an old book on history when I was cramming up for my examination and looked at every work I could come across in order to increase my store of knowledge.

"No, my friend," replied the musketeer; "I am off, and that quickly. I will sup with you, go to bed, sleep five hours, and at break of day leap into my saddle. Has my horse had an extra feed?" "Eh! my dear master," replied Planchet, "you know very well that your horse is the jewel of the family; that my lads are caressing it all day, and cramming it with sugar, nuts, and biscuits.

In the face of this exposure, the agitation for cramming the society down the throats of the public goes on more desperately than ever. By this means, Mr Nogoe manages to hold on till Christmas, and then pocketing his salary, resigns his office in favour of Mr Dunderhead, who has hitherto figured as honorary Vice-Something, and who enters upon office with a gravity becoming the occasion.

Oh, hurry!" "Coming," he answered. "But here are wings to fly with." She saw him putting a number of small objects into his pockets. He moved to another point and she could not see what he was doing, could only guess that still he was stuffing something into the provision bag and further cramming his pockets.

"I should think," she said, "that you must be writing a love letter if it isn't a sonnet judging by the trouble it's making you. They told me downstairs that you were cramming history, but I was sure it would take more than a mere history cram to keep you away from that music. Isn't it lovely?" "Yes," said Betty. "Would you like shan't we go down and dance?"

The conventional belief in the efficacy of cramming boys with moral platitudes and all kinds of commonplace facts and theoretical knowledge is so ingrained that there is a natural reluctance to ascribe any evil effects to the process of education. I am contented, however, to let the facts speak for themselves.

Mere cramming of the memory with facts about arithmetic, grammar, geography, languages, etc., has comparatively little effect in producing noble and useful lives. Bahá’u’lláh says that education must be universal:— It is decreed that every father must educate his sons and daughters in learning and in writing and also in that which hath been ordained in the tablet.

The dangers of cramming and of making scholars study at home instead of letting their little brains rest were never heard of in those days. We carried our school-books home in a strap every night and committed to memory our next day's lessons before we went to bed, and to do that we had to bend our attention as closely on our tasks as lawyers on great million-dollar cases.