ally as the examples are chosen from the writings of those whose works were considered as models of composition, and had no small share in directing the taste and style of their readers. How far it would be judicious to carry out a somewhat similar plan, by placing before learners false sentences purposely constructed, to test their ability in correcting them, is a point upon which much circumspection should be used.

The small number of inflections in our language and the simplicity of its structure rendering many rules in a great degree needless, a grammar that could be used generally for conveying a good knowledge of so important a part of education, might be comprised in a very few pages. This would not prevent the teacher from using the critical and instructive remarks to be found in many grammars, for the advantage of his pupils, as, perhaps, it is only by comparison in some instances, that we can judge of the right; and the perusal of works holding different views of subjects, conduces very often to that exercise of the judgment which leads to the adoption of the better method. For this reason, among others, the notes and critical remarks in Dr. Lowth's Grammar have rendered his work highly popular for nearly a century.

Your most obedient servant,

Oct. 21, 1845.

H. B.

ON INTRODUCING FAULTY SENTENCES INTO

GRAMMARS.

REV. SIR.-In answer to the question of “F." in the October number of the Educational Journal, as to the utility of inserting faulty sentences in a new edition of Dr. Lowth's grammar, I beg to send the following quotation from a recent work on composition;—

"Nothing is less in keeping with the practice in the common imitative arts, or more at variance with the common principles of philosophy, than that plan adopted in teaching Grammar and Composition which sets learners the task of correcting errors. Not to enter into any discussion on the point, it may suffice to state, that by the attention required to be given to each of the several examples of errors under a series of rules, both the eye and ear are familiarized to the wrong construction, or the faulty arrangement; and thus a degree of hesitancy and doubt is more likely to be formed in the mind respecting what is correct, than a habit of prompt and certain accuracy. Familiarity with what is wrong, in order to judge from such knowledge as to what is right, can scarcely ever fail to unsettle the mind,"

Your most obedient servant,

October 8th, 1845.

R. J.

[These two letters we were obliged to leave over from last month. We shall be glad to see the proposed new edition of Dr. Lowth's Grammar.—ED.]

ADDRESS TO THE PARENTS OF CHILDREN IN PARO

CHIAL SCHOOLS.

IN our last number we gave a set of Rules and Regulations for the use of parents who have children in parochial schools. A correspondent has since furnished us with the following excellent address, which may either be placed in their hands when they bring their children for admission, or distributed at their respective homes. It is scarcely necessary to remark how useful such a paper may be found, as embodying certain well-defined principles, to which all parties concerned may be recalled at once, without controversy or appeal. The address is published, either on paper or on card, by Edwards and Hughes.

TO THE PARENTS OF CHILDREN AT ST. MARGARET'S SCHOOL. MY GOOD FRIENDS,

You have wisely brought your children here to be instructed by the Church, and that, in accordance with the prayer of God's Priest at your marriage, you "may see them christianly and virtuously brought up :" try then to observe strictly the following recommendations :

1. Always send your children from home, clean and neat, before the hour for beginning school; because, when they arrive too late, you teach them, through your own bad example, habits of unpunctuality, and, above all, they learn, by their absence from the prayers, with which our daily work is hallowed, to neglect, in after life, to pray to God.

2. If, however, you cannot send them on account of sickness, or any other case of necessity, never omit afterwards either to bring them yourselves, or at least to send a note or other proof of the cause of their absence, to prevent them from learning to make idle excuses for themselves, or from having the temptation to tell falsehoods.

3. Be very cautious how you interfere with the discipline of the school, or with the means taken to correct your children when they offend; and do not look upon the master and mistress as hired servants, only paid to act as you please, but as persons deeply interested in your children's welfare.

4. If, however, you have any reasonable cause of complaint against them, be sure that you do not hurry away in a passion to abuse them, but go direct to the clergyman, under whose especial charge the school is placed, and by whose authority everything there is done.

5. By no means suppose that you have a right to speak angrily or disrespectfully to the teachers of your children; nay, on the contrary, they have the strongest claim to your gratitude and support.

6. Strive to discountenance every attempt your children make to bring home idle tales about their school, and endeavour to impress upon them, that their master and mistress stand, in your absence, in their parents' stead.

7. Take all the interest you can in what they learn, by occasionally finding time to ask them questions, for so you will not only encourage them to persevere in their work, but will obtain information in many cases for yourselves.

8. And yet, if you see them backward, do not directly find fault with the school, and prepare to remove them to another; as that backwardness most probably has arisen from their own idleness and inattention, or perhaps from their not being clever enough to get on: or again, may you not yourselves have prevented their improvement by neglecting to send them regularly to school, or by checking them through your indifference from trying to do well?

9. Avoid, then, in their presence, every sinful act; such as lying, swearing,

drunkenness, loose conversation, neglect of the Lord's Day, and the like; lest, by your bad example, you undo the good work begun at school, and destroy not only your own souls, but those of your little ones also.

10. Make them to understand that so much trouble is taken in their behalf entirely for their own benefit, and that the best thing you can give them is a good education.

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11. Remember, however, that this education does not only consist in their being "good scholars;" 'knowledge puffeth up," says the Apostle, (1 Cor. viii. 1.); but in their being trained to carry out, in holy lives, the solemn vows of their baptism, that is, in learning practically how to do their duty towards God and towards their neighbour.

12. Pray, then, for them fervently, as the most sacred trust that God has given you: pray that they may be obedient and faithful members of Christ's Church: pray that they may be true and honest citizens of the State: pray too for their teachers, your clergymen, and the school, and so shall it be your blessing to bring up your children in "the fear and nurture of the Lord, and to the praise and glory of His Holy Name."

The Editor's Portfolio.

THE PLAY-GROUND AND GALLERY IN THE TRAINING SYSTEM.

A PLAY-GROUND and a gallery, with the master as superintendent and trainer, is a new principle in popular education.

The play-ground and gallery are an indispensable platform in training the child. By training the child, we mean his intellectual, physical, and moral faculties and habits, simultaneously or combined; not the physical training merely in one place, the intellectual in another, and the religious in a third, but the whole each day, and under one superintendence. At home, training may be conducted to a certain extent at the fireside; but home training, highly valuable and important as it is, no more makes up for the school, than the school does for the family. The child who is exclusively trained at home, is not so well fitted for the duties of active life; he is ignorant of much that he ought to know, and which he ought to be trained to shun; more particularly, he is ignorant of himself; his real dispositions and character have not been fully developed, and that at a period of life when there is a reasonable hope of their being checked and regulated. The boy is only in real life when at play and at study among his companions in years and pursuits. Home training adds peculiarly to the moral, and the school to the intellectual; it is only when both are united, however, that the child is under complete training. This combination, with the master as superintendent, guide, director, and companion, forms moral school training, and is one of the great peculiarities of the Training System. Next in importance and influence to which is “picturing out in words" in the intellectual department. The physical exercises are not new, having been practised under what is termed the Infant School System, before the establishment of the Training System.

When we speak of the gallery, we mean not merely a gallery or flight of ascending steps for seating the whole pupils, but one used as it is under the system which we are attempting to analyse; and when we speak of a play-ground, we mean not merely an open space of 100 or 120 feet long, by 50 or 60 feet wide, for 100 or 120 children to amuse themselves in the fresh air, and for exercise; but one under the immediate superintendence of the master, for physical health—the cultivation of proper physical habits-the development of real

character, and in conjunction with the gallery for moral and intellectual training. A play-ground, without the master being present as superintendent, is literally a mischief-ground. The gallery, with its other arrangements, and the mode of managing it, saves fully as much time in conducting the ordinary elementary lessons, as is occupied in the direct moral training. The gallery, by enabling nearly the whole person of every child to be in view, affords the best opportunity of securing the attention of the whole scholars-developing their ideas, and receiving simultaneous as well as individual answers.

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The play-ground, or "uncovered school," permits the superabundant animal spirits or steam" to escape, while at the same time it adds to the health of the pupils, affords relaxation, and secures contentment with their other lessons in-doors, without the usual coercion which is necessary when there is no playground; at the same time, as we have already said, when freely at play, the real character and dispositions of the whole children are developed, which, in any case of fault observed by the master, on their return to the gallery, he can notice and analyse for the benefit of the whole, on the practical principles laid down in Stow's" Moral Training and the Training System."

It is as impracticable for a teacher to train morally and intellectually on the simple and natural mode of the system, without a gallery and a play-ground, as it would be for a mechanic to work without his tools. The having both of these auxiliaries does not form a training school without the trained master; and the master who is without these, is of course unsuccessful. The frequent deviations from this indispensable arrangement, are the causes why there are so many failures in schools having the system professedly in view, but which are only imitation training schools, being either without a trained master, or a play-ground and a gallery.

There is no doubt a great difficulty in procuring sufficient ground for the purpose, and it is extremely high-priced in the lanes and streets of a crowded city, where moral training is imperiously required; but independently of the moral improvement of the people, the actual cost would be less than is expended upon the police, bridewell, prison, houses of refuge, public prosecutions, and transportation of criminals. Moral school training, under God's blessing, would do much for society. We have no hope, indeed, that it would root out sin; but fifteen years' experience and observation of the practical working of the system, show that its establishment would greatly diminish crime and increase virtue.

The "sympathy of numbers," whether for good or for evil, is the most powerful practical principle in social life, and more particularly in large towns and villages. It is peculiarly so with the young, who are the most impressible of society. The conviction of the power of this principle (a principle which had been overlooked in popular education) fifteen or twenty years ago, led to the addition of a play-ground and a gallery to one or two schools, and the mode of communication and superintendence noticed in our late articles in Bible, secular, and elementary lessons, as models of an antidote to the demoralising influence of large towns. The results of this system in Glasgow and elsewhere, at home and abroad, where trained masters have gone from the Normal Seminary, of which these model schools formed the basis and an integral part, have been most satisfactory and encouraging.—Stow.

ROBERT RAIKES, OF GLOUCESTER.

[From the Monmouthshire Merlin.]

SIR,-Some time since I sent you an account of the manners and customs of the inmates of Christ's Hospital, in London, and of my experience in that celebrated foundation. I now proceed a few steps further in my pilgrimage,

and, with your favour, will give a relation of other matters, which may not prove uninteresting to some of your readers.

In the year 1795, I first beheld Mr. Robert Raikes, (of Sunday school notoriety,) the proprietor of the Gloucester Journal. He was in the habit of selecting his apprentices (at least those who were to be employed as compositors) from the ranks of scholars in Christ's Hospital, and as I was of the proper age for leaving school, I was recommended to the notice of that celebrated individual; and agreed to accompany him to Gloucester, where I was in due time articled to him as an apprentice. In the printing office I found two of my elder schoolfellows.

Mr. Raikes was in the habit of attending early prayer at the cathedral, and frequently took me with him. There I first met with the late James Wood, Esq., then familiarly called "Jemmy Wood," who regularly attended morning service. I was a bit of a favourite with him, and have some reason to remember him. On the occasion of a general illumination, to commemorate the victory of Camperdown, gained by Lord Duncan, this gentleman having ventured out to witness the sight, I met with him in the crowd, and was walking about the city with him, when some roguish fellows resolved to make merry with Jemmy, and having clubbed their stock of crackers, they surrounded him, and began to let off their combustibles; he seemed to be alarmed, and was beating a retreat from the scene of action, at the same time seizing me by the arm his persecutors followed him, still discharging their crackers, one of which found its way to the collar of my coat, and there exploding, burnt my ear severely; Jemmy, however, kept his hold, dragging me along until we reached his house, where he shortly gained admittance, but immediately shut the door and left me to my fate. I afterwards learned that he had escaped with only two or three holes burnt in his coat. I could relate many anecdotes

of this singular character-but, de mortuis nil nisi bonum.

It has been the subject of dispute whether Mr. Raikes was or was not the originator of the plan for Sunday schools; some aver that the Rev. Mr. Stock first drew attention to this subject, and that he opened the first school. Whether this be the fact I cannot say but at the commencement of my apprenticeship, Mr. Raikes' school was fully organised, and the scholars attended divine service at the church of St. Mary-de-Crypt; the master's name was Bullock, a shoemaker, and Mr. R. was in constant attendance. The pious vicar of St. John's, also, was not behindhand with his scholars. My master, however, possessed a great advantage in being the editor of a public newspaper; he, in this way, had an opportunity of making his plan known to the public, and in the course of time, various Sunday schools were opened throughout the kingdom.

Mr. Raikes' brothers were eminent Russian merchants; and having received advices from their relative, of what was going on in England, they submitted the plan of Sunday teaching to the Empress Catherine, who was so pleased with it, that, as a mark of her favour, she transmitted her portrait to Mr. Raikes. This portrait he was very fond of exhibiting.

My master was not only a friend to the poor children, but also their parents; he would lay up large quantities of meat for stewing, and three times a week, in winter, had soup served out from his premises in aid of their wants. On one occasion there was great murmuring among those who came to receive his bounty, as to there not being a sufficient quantity of meat given in the soup. Upon learning the subject of their discontent, he was greatly excited, and pulling off his coat, he threw it amongst them, saying, "You ungrateful wretches, take my coat," and walked into the house. The people instantly became ashamed of their conduct, and some of them following him with the coat, wished to ask forgiveness, but he would not at that time see them. He did not, however, discontinue the practice. For his exertions in the cause of education, it is understood that the honor of knighthood was offered to be con