INSPECTION AND EXAMINATION 157
duties of an inspector of elementary schools, and
they describe them in terms which, mutatis mutandis,
are still applicable. They certainly regarded in-
spectors as a great deal more than peripatetic
masters of method.” It is clear that in their view
‘““other and higher qualifications” were required
in a competent inspector than expertness in the
craft or technique of teaching, and that in the
selection of inspectors professional qualifications
could not be predominant.
In recent years the teaching experience of candi-
dates has certainly not been disregarded in the
selection of inspectors; many of them have had
long and distinguished records as teachers, and the
teaching profession is the main though not the
exclusive recruiting ground of the inspectorate.
Recently recruitment from the teaching profession
has been considerably embarrassed by the rise in
teachers’ salaries, consequent on the activities of
the “Burnham” Committees and by the liberal
provision of pensions for them. By its own action
in these respects the State has raised the market
against itself. At the same time the Board does
not take the view that selection for and promotion
in the inspectorate should be determined solely or
primarily by pedagogical considerations, or that the
best teacher necessarily makes the best inspector.
The more comprehensive the service of education
grows, the longer and wider the vistas which are
opened up, the more closely the different stages
and branches of education are organised in relation
to each other, and the broader the lines on which
it is administered, the more important it becomes