The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1874-08-22 00:00:00

RAILWAY STATISTICS of the UNITED
KINGDOM.

The statistical abstract of the United Kingdom just
issued presents a series of tables showing the growth
of the railway system, the extent of the lines, the
total capital, number of passengers, traffic receipts,
working expenses, and net traffic receipts. In
England and Wales at the end of last year, there
were 11,369 miles of railway lines open; the total
capital paid up, including shares, loans, &c., was
upwards of £490,000,000; and the total number of
passengers conveyed, including season ticket-holders,
stood at upwards of 400,000,000. The total traffic
receipts of the year amounted to £47,000,000, the
working expenses were nearly 1.20,000,000, and the
net traffic receipts £23,000,000. The increase on all
these beads since 1859, at which date the tables
commence, has been steady, though very gradual.
The length of line then open was 7,309 miles,
and thus the average increase of mileage of new
line every year since that date has been about
300. It is, however, curious to notice the tluctua
tions in this respect, as since 1867 the figures
have varied materially, the new line sometimes reach-
ing 700 miles, and then falling to 300. The paid-up
capital has risen by an average of nearly £1,500,000 a
year. The average annual increase in the number of
passengers conveyed since 1859 has been close upon
20,000,000. Then it stood at 124,000,000, and now it
stands at 401,000,000. The rate of increase has varied
materially. In 1870 the increase was 21,000,000, in
1871 it was 33,000,000, in 1872 44,000,000, and last year
29,000,000; but this large rate is of course, in taking
the average, counterbalanced by the smaller rate of
increase of the earlier years. The average annual
rate of increase in the traffic receipts of the fourte.n
years has been under £2,000,000 a year. The working
expenses have more than doubled in the fourteen years,
as they stood at £11,000,000 in 1860, and last year
amounted to nearly £26,000,000. In Scotland the mileage
opened has risen from 1,428 in 1859 to 2,612 last year,
showing an increase of scarcely 100 miles per annum.
The capital has risen from £37,500,000 to £69,000,000 •
the number of passengers conveyed has been more than
doubled, having risen from 15,500,000 in 1859 to
37,500,000 in 1873. The traffic receipts have also more
than doubled, as they were upwards of £6,000,000 last
year as compared with £2,700,000 in 1859; and the
working expenses have risen from £1,306,128 in 1860
to £3,518,084 in 1873. In Ireland the mileage open is
less than in Scotland, but has increased at nearly the
same rate. It stood at 1,200 miles in 1859, and is now
upwards of £2,000. The capital has risen far less
rapidly, and is now only half as much again
as in 1859. Then it stood at £19,000,000 and
now it amounts to £29,000,000. The number of
passengers has risen largely, but rot to the same
extent as in England and Scotland; and last year,
as compared with 1872, the figures remained almost
stationary. On 1859, however, there is a great rise, as
then the numbers were 9,500,000, and now they are
nearly 16,500,000. The Irish traffic receipts have
doubled, having risen from £1,250,000 to £2,500,000.
The total working expenses have increased from
£623,136 to £1,421,387 in the fourteen years. The
total number of miles of railway open at the end of
1873 in the United Kingdom was 16,000. The total
capital at the same date stood at £588,000,000. The
nlimber of passengers conveyed last year was
455,634,767. or about 28,000 per mile; but while the
gross number had far more than doubled in the four-
teen years, the average number per mile was only
exactly double the number of 1859. The total traffic
receipts last year were £55,500,000, an average of
£3.462 per mile; and the working expenses amounted
to £30,750,000.

THE BISHOP OF MANCHESTER ON
EDUCATION.
On Saturday Pr. Prager, Lord Bishop of Manchester,
opened new schools at Eecleston, near Preston. The schools
are erected close to the old Church scholastic establish-
ment, and are intended to meet the increaaed educational
requirements of the locality. The opening ceremony was
held in the afternoon, when the High Sheriff and many ladies
and gentlemen were present.
The Bishop said he understood that those schools
had been erected in consequence of a certain appre-
hension which existed as to the possibility of a School
Board being required and formed in the parish. At
the outset he might state that he was not an enemy to
School Boards or to School Board schools. Ile, how-
ever, did not think that extra organization, unless it
was wanted, was of any use—it cumbered the ground.
In rural Aistricts such asthat he certainly thought that
School Boards might be the means of engendering a
certain amount of party spirit, either political or theo-
logical. If the formation of a School Board was inimical
to harmony in a parish, he should deprecate such an
establishment. He most certainly was of opinion
that voluntary agency, where it was hearty and
earnest resulted—in such an important matter as
education—more satisfactorily than the mere mechani-
cal, red-tape agency of elected Boards, which very
often devolved all their duties upon a certain paid
officer, who did not throw any very great amount of
heart or zeal into the cause. He was much inclined to
think that the work prospered best in the hands of
zealous' intelligent voluntaryist% (Hear, hear.) Again,
School Board schools under one of the clauses of the
Education Art, 1870, laboured under a special difficulty
of their own. It was almost impossible to give in a School
Board school anything like a definite religious instruc-
tion. Ile religious Instruction given was not to be
according to the tenets. formularies, or catechisms of
any one particular religious denomination, and the end
of it, he was afraid, would be that if any religious in-
struction was given at all it would be either of the
indifferent kind or else really a sham—that was to say,
it would be the teaching of a particular religious deno-
mination disguised, not put out in the language of the
accepted formularies of a denomination, but translated
into the language of the teacher, which he thought
would be hardly a fair way of meeting the difficulty.
It gratified him as a clergyman to find that the general
feeling of the country had manifested itself very dim-
! tinctly in favour it retaining religious teaching in their
! elementary schools. (Hear, hear.) It was part of a
work which was to be carried on under confessed difficul-
ties, but they must remember that difficulties made them
test their resolution and their professions a little more
carefully, and lie did think that these difficulties which
stood in their way in retaining the religious elements,
as they were called, in their schools would set them
serhoiely thinking whether as Churchmen and as
chriet.ans they were not bound to do more than they
hail hitherto done in this respect. He for one was not
at all satisfied with the amount of what had been called
the religious teaching in their schools up to this present
time. It had been a great deal too mechanical, too formal,
and in many cases it had been unaccompanied
with the personal influence on the part of the
teacher which was required. On referring to the
reports of their diocesan inspectors he frequently
found that they made it a matter of regret that in
some schools the religious teaching of the higher
classes was delegated to pupil teachers. Now, he did
humbly submit that a pupil teacher 16 or 17 years of
age was hardly the proper person to give religious les-
sons. They might teach the children historical religious
facts, but not the fundamental principles of religion.
Pupil teachers might teach the children, for instance,
how old Abraham was when he died, or facts of a cog-
nate character, but they could not induce a religious
tone or mould the character by the impulses of Chris-
tianity.§That could not be effectually accomplished ex-
cept by religious-minded people, and he thought himself
that any conscientious master or mistress would feel
that they were not actively fulfilling their duty in this
respect unless they did personally place before their
pupils those high principles which purified and en-
nobled human nature. It was in consequence of these
statements of the diocesan inspectors that they in the
diocese of Manchester had made considerable effort,
spending something like £BOO a year in the work of
diocesan instruction. They had two excellent officers ,
who went about examining the schools, ascertaining what MURDER AT A SCHOOL.
was their real condition in respect of religious know-
ledge, and marking the religious tone of the schools.
The Bishop, having instanced a school at Blackburn re- ! The American papers contain accounts of the
l
ported to be as near perfect as possible, went on to say murder of a schoo teacher named John Delmater,
at Walde, Josephine county, Oregon. On Tuesday,
that on seeing such a report he asked why should all June, 30, at the school house at Briggs Ranch, five
schools not be like it—schools where not only secular
miles from Waldo, Mrs. Briggs, accompanied by her
knowledge was imparted, but where the first principles ion David the former armed with a huge cudgel an i
of Christianity were well grounded' Now a great , the latter - -
with a Henry rifle, visited the school house,
deal had been made of what was called the religious
Mrs.
difficulty. It had been trumpeted forth as though it Briggs accused the teacher of improprieties
was the most serious obstacle in the way of the educa- towards her daughter, Caroline, a young girl aged
about seventeen. Mrs. Briggs told Delmater that
tion of the children of this land, and the clergymen of she was geins. to kill him and commenced beat-
the Church of England bad been represented in some •
h' IC the cudgel. 'She then told her son
quarters as a parcel of bigots, who if they could not David to him. The boy, a lad about 18,
have the children taught in their own way would not fired three shots, but they all missed their mark.
hove them taught at all, and whose only object was a
miserable system of proselytizing. how, he might In the scuffle which then ensued Delmater managed'
possibly encounter some opprobium and some rep g
lies severe-
how from the eudgel in the hands of
to etpossession of the gun, but receiving a
by saying that he utterly denied that that had been
d
the motive which actuated the clergy and the laity Mrs. Briggs, he was oblige to drop it. He then
started to run, when the boy again fired, the shot
of the Church of England. The other day he was
taking effect and inflicting a mortal wound from the
reading a summary of last year's report to the Com- e
effecte of which Delmater died fourteen hours after.
mittee of Council upon Education, and he found that
wards. The school children, who had scattered when
there Were about 10,500 schools at this present
the incise commenced, gave the alarm. Mrs. Briggs
moment under the inspection of the Department of
Education in England. Of thie 11r00schools only about and her eon were arrested, and a preliminary exami-
-520 were Board schools; so that it did not seem that nation was had before Justice M'll wain, of Waldo,
who refused to admit them to bail, but committed them
all over England, including all our great towns, Board
to the gaol at Kirbyville to await further examinati; in.
Schools had made any considerable headway. Of these
Delmater was a young man about thirty years of age.
10,500 schools, about 8,500 were schools belonging to
Previous to his death, he made his will, and in his
the Church of England. Now, that represented to
dying
.deposition before Justice APllwain denied the
them the proportion of the work which the Church of
alleged intercourse with the young lady. The feeling
England had taken upon herself to do. Out of every
!
ten schools in the land eight belonged to the Churc against Mrs. Briefs and her son is very bitter, an
d
h
there are threats o lynch law.
of England. In their schools before it became law,
he believed, the conscience clause was the recognized
principle upon which they were establisheL Cer-
tainly there had been some unwise clergymen, but
they were all liable to mistakes. After defending the
Church Catechism from certain statements which had The Dearer News of July 22nd says :—Captain W.
been made in regard to it, he said that it taught him C. Manning gives some interesting particulars of his
the highest Christian principle, and could not do harm, visit to the village of a curious race of people in North-
After referring to the basis of instruction which was western New Mexico, just south of the border line
about to be adopted in that school, he went on to oh- between that territory and Colorado. A strong wall
serve that he was an old school Commissioner. He had surrounds in Within are houses for about 4,000
three times iu his life has been employed by Govern- people. The populatien leis dwindled, bonsiver, to
ment as I lommissioner on subjects more or legs con- about 1,500. The itinTluge resembles Chieese. Sine of
erected widh education. Ile had seen in the course of the minor custonis correspond to those of the Chinese.
these inquiries in different parts of England, the , The women are ot the true Celestial type—almond eves,
United States of America and Canada such things as ! protuberant bodies, little feet, &c. They dress their
costly buildings, elegant outside, but in which there hair and themselves in Chinese fashion. Their religion
was next to nothing which could be really called elm is barbarously magnificent. Montezuma is their deity.
cations], and he had seen unpretentious-10i king His coming is looked for at sunrise each day. Immor-
buildings in which education was effectively conducted. tality is part of their creed. The priests have heavily
Bricks and mortar would not educate people and make embroidered robes used for unnumbered years. The
them religious, and he should like this to be borne in ceremonies of worship are formal and pompous. The
mind. Let children be taught to do their duty and to ' morality of this strange people, so far at least as
fit themselves for the end which awaited them all. He foreigners are concerned, is irreproachable. It is pro-
wished to say another thing, and that was this--that bable that they keep a record of events by means of
the man who did his duty honestly and uprightly in tying peculiar knots in long cords. This, if true,
the station of life in which God had placed him on seems to establish some kinship or rem de acquaint-
the earth was making the best preparation that a anceship with them and the Aetecs. Their govern-
man could make for a transference to a higher state ment is a conservative republic. Power is invested in
hereafter. It was a dangerous thing for them to divide a council of thirteen caciques. Six of them are selected
themselves, as it were, by walla of demarcation, for life Old men are generally chosen, in order that
and say that half their life should be devoted to their terms of office may not be inordinately long.
things of this life and half to the great hereafter. The remaining seven are selected from time to thue.
That was not the true Gospel. Looking at the educa- One of them is the executive. Another is a sort of
tinn of England, he must say that they were far below vice-president. There is a war chief, a chief of police,
the level of many other nations. We were not so well &c. These seven caciques are usually young men.
educated as Sweden, as ani of the States if Germany, l'hey serve but a few months. Suffrage is universal.
as some of the cantons of Switzerland ; and the simple Woman is not a beast of burden among them, as she is
reason of it was not because our schools were inferior with all Indian tribes. She is held in high respect.
or that because our teachers were more wanting or less Her twice are confined to those of housekeeping. This
competent for their duty, but because the children isolated community has maintained its traditions un-
were sent to school so late and taken so early and kept broken for at least three and a half centuries.