The Press.
London, England, 1855-06-16 00:00:00

THE FOREIGN LEGION.

As part of the Foreign Enlistment scheme commu-
nications have been forwarded to the Canadian
Gowernment from the Colonial office suggesting that
her Majesty shoul be enabled to make certain grants
of land in that colony to the officers and men of the
Foreign Legion when their period of service is ex-
pired. Such grants, it is believed, would tend very
much to facilitate enlistment, and the scale proposed
in a letter on the subject written by Mr. FREDERICK
PEEL is "00 acres to each private, 100 acres to
each non commissioned officer, 200 to each subal.
tern, and 000 to a few superior officers." As the
entire jurisdiction over all waste or unoccupied lands
has been given up to the Colonial Legislature,
the Imperial Government cannot, of course, tal
any step without the sanction of the Canadian
Parliament, but Mr. PEEL suggests that about a
million acres would suffice for the purpose in view,
and could easily be spared out of a new area, just
about to be settled containing eleven and a half
million acres, in Upper Canada, between the Ottawa
River and Lake Huron. He relies on the honour,
loyalty, and patriotism of the colonists to obtain this
boon. Some propositions on the subject it seems
were offered to the Canadian Legislature before the
close of the session, but the Assembly was pro-
rogued on the 28th of May without having come to
any definite decision on the matter.

JUNE 16, 1855.

Vrettebings in Varlianicat.

EDUCATION.

The debate on the bill of Sir J. Pakington—the
second of the three before the house—was resumed
on Monday. Mr. ADDERLEY, in supporting it,
alluded to the difficulties attending the introduction
of every measure on the subject. If it was a private
measure, it was said that the subject was too large.
for private legislation • if it we; a public measure,
they were told that educational provision must be
made for distinct localities. There was no shape in
which the question was not brought before the house,
and in each it was met by the most contradictory
arguments. At present they had three principles
before them—that of Mr. Henley, who would oe
content with the development of the existing system ;
that of Sir J. Pakington and Lord J. Russell, who
took the present system as far as it went, and would
assist it with public grants when private efforts
failed ; and that of Mr. M. Gibson, who abolished
the existing system altogether, and substituted a
system without religious instruction, founded upon
public rates. This last he dismissed as not in ac-
cordance with the feelings of the people of England.
Of the three principles he assented to the second,
and approved of the measure before them ex-
cepting the clauses for new schools, which he said
were incongruous with the rest. He replied at length
to the arguments used by Mr. Henley in the last
debate on the bill, answering the objection against
employing rates by asking why they should not be
employed for education as well as for lighting and
highways, and the objection that parents would not
like to send their children to charity schools by ob-
serving that it would apply with more force to existing
schools, when the clergyman went about, hat iu
hand, to solicit contributions. He adduced the ex-
amples of Canada and Austria, and demanded that
we should not leave the education of our own people
incomplete in the presence of the more perfect in
stitutions of other countries. He advised that the
bill, with that of Lord J. Russelt, should be referred
to a select committee, believing that from the two
something satisfactory would then be struck out.

Mr. EVELYN DENISON strongly urged the compulsory
attendance or the children at the schools, whatever
measure was adopted. Compulsion had worked well
in the schools established under the Factory Act,
and without it parents took away their children at
too early an age.
Lord J. MANNrits, in opposing the bill, examined
the reasons why children at present were kept aloof
from schools. One of the reasons alleged had been
the badness of the schools. It was stated, on the
contrary, by an eminent authority, that the schools
were so good as to induce the parents to remove
their children earlier than heretofore, believing that
they had learned enough. Poverty was another
reason. But the bill did not propose to provide
those children with better clothes who now abstained
from attending school on account of their rags. A
third reason was the indifference of the parents.
On them the hill would have no effect. There re-
mained the last and smallest class—those anxious to
send their children to school, but who were unable
to find the school-pence. He concurred that the
establishment of free schools would be unsuccessful :
they were distasteful to the pcor, and in some cases
those concerned in them were attempting to alter
the system. He felt convinced that the rating
principle would fail, and would substitute for
neighbourly and friendly action the strife of religious
differences and party conflict. Of the three bills he
preferred that of Mr. Gibson, as intelligible; but
be preferred befira all not to interfere with a system
which had already produced such great results, and
in which a remedy could be found for all the defi-
ciencies.
Mr. W. J. Fox said that it was well known that
many localities were already desirous of rating them-
selves for educationary purposes, and he instanced
Manchester. Schools established upon rates would
a) longer be looked upon as charity schools by those
who paid the rates. On the contrary, these last would
Teel a direct interest in seeing that the schools were
properly administered, and look on the privilege of
!tiding their children as a right which they had
purchased. He could see nothing satisfactory in the
present system. If the number of those utterly un•
taught was few, so was the number of those properly
taught. To prove this, be quoted some statistics
upon the large proportion of the population which
neither attended church nor chapel, and contrasted
America, where almost everyone was connected with
one or other of the religious denominations.
Sir J. PLNINGTON complained that the objections
both of Mr. Henley and Lord J. Manners did not
deal with the details of his bill, but were founded on
the assertion that no change was required, that the
country was doing well at present, and that they
must beware how they disturbed a system which bad
produced such beneficial results. After referring to
Lis former statements as to the amount of crime in