The Commissioners here represent the con- | shame.' Conscientious scruples are to be science clause as made applicable to all en- looked upon with respect. We hope that dowed schools, and argue from endowed Mr. Henley, whose sound English sense, and schools to aided national schools. But the unwearied attention to the subject of educafact is, that it was not all endowed schools tion, make him a better exponent of the feelto which the clause applied, but only that ing of the country than any other man in the class of endowed schools in which the en- House of Commons, satisfied these scruples dowment instrument made no express men- of Mr. Lowe, by showing that the rule of the tion of the character of the religious teach- Society is (as the rule of any such Society ing which was to be adopted. This overmust be) that the children attending its throws the argument on which they show schools shall learn the formularies provided the wish but not the courage to make a by the religious body of which it is an organ, recommendation. Between all endowed and that it is not immoral nor anything else schools and all national schools aided by pub- than an act of charitable tolerance to allow lic funds there might seem to be an analogy; the parochial clergyman to make an excepbut between those endowed schools which do tion here and there to this rule, according to not require a specific religious teaching by his discretion. We think, however, that it their endowment instrument, and the national would have been better to express this meanschools which do require a specific religious ing more clearly. teaching by their trust deed, there is none. This enactment, as Mr. Senior remarks, is almost neutralised by the following proviso (which forms part of the very same section): Provided always that in the instrument regulating such endowment nothing be contained expressly requiring the children educated under such endowment to learn or to be instructed according to the doctrines or formularies of such church, sect, or denomi

nation.'

Mr. Senior and Mr. Lowe both assail the National Society as being the obstacle, by means of its 12,200 schools and its million children, to the general adoption of a conscience clause. We believe that they are right. The first term of union of the National Society is as follows:- The children are to be instructed in the Holy Scriptures, and in the Liturgy and Catechism of the Established Church. This clause once stood as follows: -All the children, without exception, shall be instructed in the Catechism.' The words 'all' and 'without exception' have been omitted, with the special object of giving the clergyman in each parish a discretion as to the exemption of individual children. This discretionary power displeases Mr. Lowe. He says that the words will not bear the construction which they have borne ever since the words 'all' and without exception' were omitted. The true construction, he says, is that no discretion is left with regard to individual exemption; and he represents himself as being put in a position hardly tolerable,' by the want of conscientiousness displayed by the Committee of the National Society. He and the committee are frequently brought into contact with each other, as they both have to deal with the same schools, and Mr. Lowe appears before us as the young partner hurried by his hardened colleagues into 'doing that which he always does with

The object of Mr. Lowe and of Mr. Senior is to induce the Committee of the National Society to allow the managers of schools in connexion with the Society to admit a Conscience Clause into their Trust Deeds. If this were allowable by the terms of union, the Committee of Council has an instrument of sufficient power in its hands to enforce the introduction of such a clause into the Trust Deeds of the schools of all villages and most towns. For in the 23rd article of the Codified minutes of 1860 there appear the following words: Aid is not granted to build new elementary schools, unless their Lordships are satisfied that the religious denomination of the new school is suitable to a sufficient number of the families relied upon for supplying scholars.'

We should be glad to learn what Minute it is on the authority of which their Lordships require to be satisfied on this head. This requirement appears for the first time in its present shape in the Code of 1860, which was designed merely to present a readable abstract of previous Minutes; but, in an abstract, limitations and conditions are often omitted, and laws are unintentionally represented as of universal, instead of limited application; and thus we believe that the regulation found its way into the Code as being an abstract of the Minute of December 3, 1839. But this Minute refers only to schools not connected with the National or the British and Foreign School Societies. The Minute of September 24, 1839, regulates the conditions of building grants made to schools in connexion with those two Societies, and here there is no such regulation to be found. But when it was determined, at the end of the year 1839, to give aid towards building other schools than those connected with these two Societies, the clause was introduced in order to discourage applications which, it was

The main defects of the actually existing system, as popularly alleged, are, we believe,

thought, might be made by a few fanatics. | these:-1. It gives to those who already have, Now, as is shown in the Correspondence be- and where help is therefore least needed. tween the Education Committee and the 2. It does not give to the poorest parishes, National Society on the subject of schools in where help is most needed. 3. It over-eduWales, their Lordships claim a right of cates a few boys, and leaves the junior classes deciding whether or no a school is suitable to and dull scholars uncared for. 4. It raises the religious feelings of the neighbourhood, up a class of over-taught and self-conceited although such school is in connexion with masters and mistresses, who are not content one or other of the two Societies. We with doing the humble work of a teacher of believe that they have no authority for doing poor children. What then would be the effect so, except such as is conveyed by a mistake of the Revised Code in respect to these? It of the clerk who codified the Minutes in would not remedy the first. On the contrary, 1860. If this is so, Mr. Lowe will see that the only schools which would not suffer finanthe hardly tolerable position' in which he cially are 'boys' schools which have been long finds himself arises from an unintentional established, and which include farmers' and encroachment on the part of the office which middle-class children,' that is, the British and he represents, and that his work is a very Foreign Schools, for which Mr. Lowe has so simple one-to give aid to all schools con- often expressed his predilection, and National nected with the National and British and Schools in thriving, well-to-do towns.* It Foreign School Societies, which fulfil certain would not remedy the second defect. On the monetary conditions, on their application, contrary, the schools which would suffer most and only to enter into the question of reli- financially would be precisely the schools sigious denomination and numbers with regard tuated in poor 'Peel' parishes and pauperto others.t ized rural districts. Schools in dense and corrupt parts of old cities and large towns, schools with semi-barbarous migrant population in manufacturing towns, schools in wild moorlands with scattered population, or in pauperized rural districts where the children are employed in numerous harvests, would lose from two-fifths to two-thirds of the support which they at present receive. Schools in rural parishes, with bad roads, a scattered population, non-resident proprietors, tenantry indifferent, much harvest work, and illendowed benefice for clergyman, will either be closed or become adventure schools.' These are not conjectures, but the results of carefully collected and digested returns from all parts of the country. Mr. Menet's conclusion is that the largest grants would be earned where they are least needed, and that therefore the assistance given would be in inverse proportion to the need.' An increase of the scale of the capitation grant would of course but exaggerate these inequalities. It is impossible, therefore, to look to the Revised Code to amend these two defects. Would it have a better effect in respect to the third fault? On the contrary, the direct tendency of the proposed scheme of examination must be not only to induce but to compel teachers to neglect all children attending irregularly, and to refuse admission to all who have not been trained from their infancy.

* See 'Fiftieth Report of the National Society.' Appendix xi.

The way in which this regulation works may be illustrated by the case of Llanbrechba, a parish of 900 inhabitants in Wales. In the spring of last year the incumbent made application for a grant towards building a school. Their Lordships required a statement of the proportion of Dissenters to the members of the Established Church. The incumbent replied that he could not ticket' the Dissenters, but stated that he had sixty children attending his day-school, and fifty attending his Sunday-school. Their Lordships replied, that as the school was in connexion with the National

Society, they required precise information as to the number of the families of labourers belonging to the Church of England. The incumbent replied as before. Their Lordships thereupon refused help, on the grounds that the parish could only maintain one school in efficiency, and that this school therefore ought to be on a broad and liberal basis, so as to admit, under the terms of the trust-deed, the children of members of all denominations. The incumbent replied, that this decision was directly in the teeth of the denominational system adopted and recognised by Parliament. Their Lordships replied, that they had no wish to interfere with the working of the denominational system; their refusal was grounded on economy alone: if they gave aid for erecting a school for eighty scholars, they might have an application from the Dissent ers, which they would be unable to refuse; and so the parish would be burdened with two schools, and public money would be wasted. 'What is really wanted,' they volunteered, is one school As to the fourth defect, the Revised Code towards which members of all religious denominations might contribute, and the benefit of which would certainly free us from an over-educated might be open to all-a periphrasis for a British class of teachers, for its effects would be to and Foreign School, or a school with a conscience-drive the present masters and mistresses into clause. The result, we understand, is, that the some other occupation; to cut off the raw parish is doing without the school, waiting till the Dissenters fulfil the expectations of their Lordships.

*Letter on Revised Code,' Appendix A.

material of new teachers; to cripple the resources of the training colleges; to discourage a second year's training in a student; to allow boys and girls of eighteen or nineteen, after completing their apprenticeship, to take charge of schools in agricultural districts without any training at all. But the question arises, whether the result, if required, might not be attained more easily and with less injurious consequences than by this plan. For, granting that the over-instruction exists, what produces it? The standard is fixed by the Christmas examination papers for students previous to their being certificated as masters and mistresses? And who supplies the examination papers? The Committee of Council. All that the Committee of Council then has to do is to lower the standard of the examination papers, which may be done with advantage, and the result is at once accomplished without discouraging a two years' residence at a training college, which has been so often. acknowledged by their Lordships to be the shortest time in which a moral character can be formed in lads and girls drawn from cottages,* and without putting boys and girls of eighteen or nineteen in charge of mixed schools-a raw untrained youth in sole charge of girls nearly as old as himself, and a young girl in sole charge of great rude lads whom she cannot possibly control.

We find, then, that of the four main defects imputed to the existing system, the Revised Code will exaggerate three, and will remove the other by substituting an insupportable evil. In addition, the new system has defects of its own. Schools would on the average lose two-fifths of the support at present accorded to them, those which are in poor districts suffering most, those in rich districts suffering least. Infant-schools would be closed. Managers would be wholly uncertain on what sum they would be able to count to reimburse themselves for payments previously made; they would be at the mercy of discontended masters, impatient inspectors, capricious or ill-tempered parents. No results would be paid for except in three secular subjects. A yearly examination would be trusted to for testing the amount of work which had been done in the school throughout the year. Schools examined in the summer would be in much better case than those examined in winter. Schools examined just after any harvest, or during the prevalence of any childish malady, would gain next to nothing. Irregular, dull, and backward children, and children beyond eleven years of age, would be neglected. The moral and religious cha

The

racter of schools would be lowered. teachers would, as a class, be demoralised by the constant temptation to refuse or neglect non-remunerative pupils, and to falsify their registers. Religious instruction would be degraded from the first place which it now holds in our national schools, to the position which it occupies in Mr. Lowe's and Earl Russell's favourite schools connected with the British and Foreign School Society. A line would be drawn by authority between secular and religious teaching. Pupil-teachers, where retained, would be less carefully taught, and more likely to abandon their profession. Training colleges would suffer great pecuniary loss. Actual teachers would be unjustly treated. Future teachers would be trained for but one year; many would be not trained at all. Expenditure would be increased by the necessity of increasing the number of inspectors.

Then where does the strong point of the Revised Code lie concealed? Is there any? We believe there is, and we believe that it will be our true wisdom to sift out the wheat before we throw away the chaff; for the New Code does strive to embody a principle which is of the utmost importance, and to give expression to a feeling which is deeply seated in the country, and which is shared by all sober-thinking men. The object of schooling is to obtain results, and the results to be desired in the schooling of the poor are a sound unambitious education, free from extravagance, and fitted for the state of life to which the poor belong. We do not quarrel with the Revised Code for aiming at results, but with the plan devised by it for testing results.

We say with confidence that such an examination as takes place at present under an inspector who knows his duty is a real test of the 'results' produced by a school. The inspector notes the tone, and order, and discipline of the school-a 'result' more valuable than a thousand long-division sums. He notes whether the children have clean faces, smooth hair, ready smiles. He notes the appliances and apparatus of the school. He notes the ability and willingness of the teachers. He notes the success or failure of every class in reading, in writing, and in arithmetic; and still more in religious knowledge; and if any go beyond these subjects, he notes that too. Finally he notes (for he has become familiar with this recondite branch of knowledge) the progress made by the girls in plain sewing. These are all results' intellectual, religious, moral, physical, mechanical; and the 'results" contemplated by the Revised Code, as compared with them, are as ditch-water to the

See Circulars, November 26, 1853, and April ocean. Yet a hint may be well taken from

10, 1858.

the Revised Code. The fault of the present

system is, that there is not an immediate con- | for an afternoon-school-a proposal of Mr. nection between the amount of results which Fraser's, the adoption of which appears to the test discovers, and the amount of money have made him a warm advocate for the paid to the school. A very simple enactment Code. But this is not what is wanted. It is will do all that requires to be done. It is not desirable that any young enough to this: let notice be sent to the managers of attend the day-school should attend the nightschools, that henceforth no capitation will be school, and there shame the ignorance of their paid to schools in which the inspector reports untaught but willing elders. Nor, on the that religious knowledge, reading, writing, other hand, is it desirable that boys and girls and arithmetic are below 'fair,' and that one-should attend school but once in the day. fourth of the capitation will be lost in case any one of these four subjects is so reported; and further, that the augmentation grants to the masters will in like manner be withheld or curtailed. Such a regulation would secure all the good proposed to be secured by the Revised Code's examination, and would avoid its many evils. Results would then be fairly tested, and payment would be according to results.

There are yet two other points in which hints may be taken from the Revised Code. It has been remarked that the masters and mistresses who have obtained a first-class certificate are not always the best teachers. This may readily be met by placing all who successfully pass the examination for certificates on a level, so far as payment is concerned, at the commencement of their work, and giving them means of raising themselves solely by exhibiting practical success in their calling. The place which they won in the class-list might still be noted and made public, but only as an honorary distinction. Students who have left the training institution at the end of the first year might be placed a degree lower than those who have completed their course. We may also express our approval of the fourth-class certificate, which it is proposed to substitute for registration.

The other subject to which the Revised Code most properly directs our attention is the means of making night-schools more efficient. The way in which this is attempted to be done by the provisions of the Code would be found, we fear, to be impracticable; though any effort at solving a difficulty which the present system leaves in effect untouched is welcome. We do not believe it possible that a master could teach in the morning and afternoon schools, besides giving instruction to pupil-teachers, and, in addition to this, hold an evening-school, without ruining his health in the course of a few years. The permission to teach the pupil-teacher at the night-school is really a permission not to teach him; for what amalgamation can there be between the studies of the rough, unlettered young men who present themselves at nightschools, and of a boy capable of teaching in a day-school? A probable result would no doubt be the substitution of a night-school

The attendants at the day-school and the attendants at the night-school must be different, as they differ in age, though they belong to the same class. Let them be regarded as separate schools, and let adequate help be given when they are under satisfactory management, according to the need of each, and not according to the relation which they bear each to the other. The Committee of Council created the masters of day-schools; by a similar machinery they may create masters of night-schools. A practical plan of this sort would soon multiply night-schools, as it has already provided day-schools; and we have sufficient confidence in the zeal of the parochial clergy to believe that the one set of schools would be under their management and control as much as the other.

ART. IV.-1. The Story of Burnt Njal; or
Life in Iceland at the end of the Tenth
Century. From the Icelandic of the Njal's
Saga. By George Webbe Dasent. 2 vols.
8vo. Edinburgh, 1861.

2. Iceland; its Volcanoes, Geysers, and Gla-
ciers. By Charles S. Forbes. London,

1860.

3. The Oxonian in Iceland; or Notes of Travel in that Island in the Summer of 1860. By the Rev. Frederick Metcalfe. London,

4.

1861.

Oxford Essays. London, 1858.

Ar the entrance to the Arsenal in Venice stand a pair of colossal lions, brought from Athens in 1687, when that city was taken by the Venetians under Francesco Morosini. The lions, which are of antique workmanship, and have been celebrated in verse by Goethe, stood originally in the Piræus; and on the body of one of them is carved a Runie inscription, which has recently been deciphered and explained by the learned Northern archæologist, M. C. C. Rafn. It records the capture of the Piræus by Harald Hardrada;. that famous 'King of Norse' to whom his namesake, Harold of England, promised seven feet of ground, or somewhat more, as