joined their own, nor the direction of London, nor in what quarter the sun was in the middle of the day; nor the direction of east, west, north and south. These were boys just about to leave school, and who will be said to have "received their education" at a school supported at some expense by a large resident landowner. In a fourth, the mistress confessed she "could not teach much figures;" and in speaking, she made frequent faults in grammar. She was the mistress of a handsome school-house, built by a neighbouring proprietor. In a fifth, a girl of 11 years old could not repeat the Lord's Prayer, and the answers of all the elder to the questions put to them at my request by the mistress and monitors, were as far from correct as if they had been read at hazard from an index. The state of proficiency in the adjoining boys' school was also very low; and in both instances the excuse given was, that the monitors did not remain long enough to be of any effectual assistance. These five cases embody characteristics that I found very common in the rest, with but few exceptions; and I am sorry to have to observe that in many, where the intellectual state of master or mistress and pupils was the worst, the anxiety was the greatest to procure in the "Visitors' Book" some testimony as to the state of the school. Whenever I found any opinion expressed there, it was generally in praise of what had been exhibited. These were pointed to as satisfactory testimonials, and no doubt seemed thenceforward to rest on the mind of the teacher as to the efficiency of the plan he pursued and its result. These opinions are often expressed after a very cursory examination; frequently after such an one only as the master may find convenient to display. Where the individual pronouncing the favourable opinion is known, and his opinion is of weight, it is pointed to as long as the school exists. If he is unknown, and his competency to form a correct judgment may admit of a question, the master seems to think himself entitled to the benefit of the doubt. The "Visitors' Book" is at the proper times produced to the trustees, or the persons who chiefly support the school, and appears to be admitted by them as the voucher for the care and attention of the master during their absence; more probably as a dispensation from all personal superintendence and inquiry, except at formal and periodical visits. Hence an

anxiety to "show off" on the appearance of every stranger, of which the following may be cited as an example. At a girl's school of about 100 children, the twenty eldest were ranged in a square, and the monitor, a girl about 15 years old, was ordered by the mistress to examine them. She stood boldly forth, and immediately in a loud and commanding tone asked "Who told a lie on Joseph ?" The answers, from those who did answer, corresponded in boldness," Moses:"-" Pharaoh." The "Visitors' Book" was duly produced at the close of the exhibition.

My opinion was frequently asked, by persons who most lamented the present backward state of elementary education in the county,

as to the practicability of improving it, the pecuniary difficulties which stood in the way being kept in mind. These difficulties are unquestionably great in the localities where the landowner is not resident; a condition which must be the rule in a county where the property is chiefly held in large masses. In contributing to these objects, the farmer or large occupier is rarely found to supply the place of the landlord. The difficulties are also great in those cases, very common in Norfolk, where several very small parishes adjoin each other; each desirous of having its own school, and consequently being able to furnish only a very small stipend to the master or mistress, whose qualifications will therefore be of an inferior kind. I found in one instance that the first-named difficulty had been met by the clergyman, to whom I am indebted for the following statement, having induced most of the occupiers in his parish to subscribe to the Parochial School in the form of a voluntary assessment, the sum being in proportion to the amount of their holdings. The parish contains, according to the census of this year, 488 persons. The number of acres is 2600. The occupiers are 10, of whom seven have assessed themselves for the school, Their farms are from 80 to 330 acres. There are 68 children at the school; of whom eight are the children of occupiers, and nine of tradesmen, making together one-fourth of the whole number. Of the landowners seven are resident, and are annual subscribers; eight non-resident, and are not annual subscribers. The fact of eight children of farmers being sent to the school is in all respects a valuable result. If the subscriptions are such as to have aided in producing, with the superintendence of the clergyman, such a school as obtains the confidence of all classes, something more has been effected than simply to raise the first steps of elementary instruction. Where the difficulty of improving the Parochial School arises from several small adjoining parishes having each its own school, attended by 30 or 40 children, and where accordingly it is impossible to obtain funds for the support of a properly qualified master for each, it would in many be practicable to procure the services of such a person to superintend three such schools, giving to each two days in the week. An adequate salary, which could not be raised in one parish, would be comparatively light when distributed over three. The present masters or mistresses would be retained. They would be improved in efficiency by the example of the properly trained teacher, who would impart an influence to the mode of instruction and conduct of the school which would be continued during the days of his absence. He would take part in the Sunday-school instruction; and for that purpose would devote the third division of his six days of labour, the Friday and Sunday, to each school in its turn. This arrangement would also be applicable to a scattered population, when the distance to one large central school would be such as to exclude the younger children. In two parishes near each other the co-operation of the farmers had manifested

itself in an agreement not to employ any child under 12 years old. In one of these parishes the population was 247; the children between 4 and 12 were 60 of these all were present at the school but two, and those were accounted for. In the other parish all the children between those ages were present. In another instance the chief occupier in a parish provided a school for instruction in reading, writing, and ciphering, and encouraged his labourers and others to send their children. The school was well attended. He subsequently ascertained that those who had left the school, and had been at regular work for a few years, had forgotten all they had learnt. He then caused an evening-school to be opened. It was attended by 20 of the previous pupils, and by eight adults. He has recently learnt from their own confession that they had again lost the power of reading with facility, in consequence of their not having access to books in which they might be tempted to seek amusement and relaxation after their day's labour. He therefore now purposes to re-open the evening-school gratuitously, and to provide it with appropriate books, maps, and other instructive objects, in the hope that by giving them this opportunity of finding in the winter's evening warmth, light, and rational resources (the want of which in their own cottages so often drives them to the public-house or the blacksmith's shop), he may in some degree contribute to their improvement. Where the pecuniary difficulty arises from the scantiness of the weekly wages of the labourer unassisted by the produce of a garden of adequate size, or by opportunities of doing task-work, and where consequently the temptation is great to send his children as soon as possible to field labour, the remedy can only be furnished by the employer. The allotment system in aid of the weekly earnings had been introduced into some parishes, and was said to be working favourably. The allotments were seldom more than a quarter of an acre, which was considered to be as much as a man and his family could manage by their own labour after the regular hours of work. It was not, however, doubted that as much as an acre, exclusive of his cottage-garden, might be held by a cottager with benefit to himself and his family, and without detriment to his employer, provided he was placed under an engagement to do part of the work with hired labour. When the allotment is restricted to a quarter of an acre, or a little more, he is rarely able to turn into money any part of its produce. An acre would enable him to realise a small sum annually. The acquisition of this sum would weaken the temptation to make a profit by the labour of his youngest children, would permit him to meet the cost of keeping them longer at school, and would, in raising the standard of comfort for the whole family, render them more cautious of falling into imprudent habits, and exposing themselves to the risk of descending in the scale of society. That a skilful and intelligent labourer could make a satisfactory profit from an acre cannot admit of dispute. If given to the most trustworthy as a reward

for good character, it would act usefully as a stimulus to the rest. It would be given only during good conduct, and to no more adults than the farm would habitually employ; consequently there would be no danger of attaching to the soil an undue number of small tenants. Possessing this resource, the labourer would no longer feel himself depressed to the lowest scale on which he can exist in independence; his anxieties for the well-being of his family would be diminished; his power of providing his cottage with what is essential to the comforts, conveniences, and decencies of life would be enlarged; his children would be better clothed and better instructed; he himself would be restored to the hope, which now seems to visit every other class of society around him except his own, of laying up something against the day of need; and one step would be taken towards re-uniting that social bond which the enclosure of common-lands and the prevalence of large farms have contributed so much to sever. The condition of the agricultural labourer appears to be attracting a closer attention; associations are numerous for "promoting and rewarding good conduct, and for the encouragement of industry and frugality." District provident societies have been formed, and receive liberal aid from honorary members, for “insuring relief during sickness, providing an endowment for children, and a payment at death." Measures are taken by individual employers for their encouragement. In one instance a form of agreement was shown to me, signed by every labourer on a large farm, and pledging him to subscribe to a benefit and a medical club. In another every labourer was obliged to undertake to send all his children to school until they could read and write to the satisfaction of the employer. In both these instances the ordinary rate of wages, and the opportunities of earning more by task-work, were such as to enable the labourer to comply with these regulations. But another difficulty, unconnected with the pecuniary considerations above named, is found to obstruct the success of the present efforts to increase and prolong the attendance of children at the elementary schools of the rural districts. The farmer complains that the boy who has, up to the age of 12 or 13, attended school regularly for six hours a-day, is not so strong and apt and useful at his labour as the boy who has been habituated to it from a much earlier age. The objection is probably in many cases perfectly legitimate, and arises from the very confined scope of the instruction given, and the almost total absence from it of everything having a practical reference to the exigences and employments of rural life. It is found that under proper management half the number of hours devoted to intellectual teaching can produce a development of mind and an amount of acquirement equal to all that can be demanded of the agricultural labourer, and far beyond what is now commonly attained by him; while appropriate industrial occupations, with which the rest of the time is engaged, train the hand and faculties to useful and skilful labour, cultivate habits of attention and

regularity, improve the physical strength, and better dispose the mind for a renewal of exertion, by preventing its being continued during school hours to the period of fatigue. The instances in which this system is more or less carried out are sufficiently well known. In the part of the country now under consideration it may be seen at work to a certain extent, in a day-school in Hoxne near Diss. It may be mentioned that the industrial work at Lady Byron's School at Ealing now includes, in addition to gardening, the management of pigs and of a cow, shoe-mending, basketmaking, carpentering, bricklaying, painting and glazing. The numbers at that school are at present 60 day-scholars, and 43 boarders. The industrial occupations applicable to a day-school only would probably vary in the three last-mentioned particulars from that above cited, and would adapt themselves to the wants and circumstances of the locality.* The making of strong nets,

* The name of Pestalozzi is now so commonly and so exclusively associated with one of the valuable principles on which he insisted-that of making it a primary object of education to draw out and strengthen all the faculties, the physical as well as the intellectual and moral-that it appears to be overlooked that in enforcing this he was only reviving and giving a more extensive application to what had been the enlightened practice of former times, and the principle of all the most philosophical writers on the subject of education down to his own day.

The public and private education of Athens and Rome was eminently one designed to develop all the faculties-in the language of Milton, "to fit a man to perform justly, skilfully, and magnanimously, all the offices, both private and public, of peace and of war."

Fénélon was of opinion, that it was of the first consequence "that this should be well heeded. Let them be diligently informed and convinced of the advantage of moderate and orderly labour, and of the due bending and unbending of the faculties, both of body and mind, and instructed in the right use of proper exercises." Milton, in his "Letter on Education," embraces this principle. Locke insists on the physical part of education, as a matter of primary importance. After giving directions how to educate the child so as to "set the mind right," he recommends those exercises to be systematically practised that “unbend the thought and confirm the health and strength," and to that end he requires "manual arts" to be taught, "which are both got and exercised by labour," (Locke's Works, vol. 8, p. 195.) Dugald Stewart thus defines the essential objects of education (Philosophy of the Human Mind, vol. 1, p. 20) :—“They are, first, to cultivate all the various principles of our nature, both speculative and active, in such a manner as to bring them to the greatest perfection of which they are susceptible; and secondly, by watching over the impressions and associations which the mind receives in early life, to secure it against the influence of prevailing errors; and, as far as possible, to engage its prepossessions on the side of truth." That the teacher may rightly fulfil his duty, in developing and improving the faculties, and in calling forth and regulating the affections of those committed to his charge, it is essential that he should have some acquaintance with the principles of the human mind. In general his utmost aim at present, corresponding with the extent of his capacity, is to lead the intellect through some of the lower processes of elementary teaching. Even this branch of duty opens to him a field of usefulness on which he is seldom prepared to enter. "To instruct youth in the languages and in the sciences is comparatively of little importance, if we are inattentive to the habits they acquire, and are not careful in giving to their different faculties, and all their different principles of action, a proper degree of employment. Abstracting entirely from the culture of their moral powers, how extensive and difficult is the business of conducting their intellectual improvement! To watch over the associations which they form in their tender years; to give them early habits of mental activity; to rouse their curiosity, and to direct it to proper objects; to exercise their ingenuity and invention; to cultivate in their minds a turn for speculation, and at the same time preserve their attention alive to the objects around them; to awaken their sensibilities to the beauties of nature, and to inspire them with a re