The Northern Daily Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1853-11-24 00:00:00

THE NORTILEEN taTLY TIMES.

SCRIPTURAL EDUCATION IN CONNA UGHT.

A meeting of those interested in the promotion of Scriptural
and industrial education in Connaught, was held in the
Myrtle-street chapel, at seven o'clock last evening. There
was a large attendance. The chair was taken by the Rev.
ALEXANDER CROMER.

The CHAIRMAN opened the proceedings by a brief explana-
tion of the objects for which the Connaught Industrial and
Scriptural Education Society had been formed, and showed
how necessary it was in that province of Ireland, where
popery so extensively prevailed. He said that mission pro-
prosed to make happy homes, and to prepare those whom they
instructed, to live as they should do in this life, and to be
ready for the life to come. In a future day, those who had
been instructed, would look back to those men who had
taught them and been with them, and manifested for them
kindness unspeakable as those whose hands had snatched them
from the misery of time, and prepared them for the glory of
eternity. (Applause.)

The Rev. Mr. ALBAN, superintendent of the Connaught
Scriptural and Industrial SchoOls, stated the objects and
progress of the society, and the reasons which had led them
to appeal that night to the sympathy and r.ssistance of the
people of Liverpool. He said that three years since, the
Rev. Dr. Dill had pleaded successfully for the same schools
in England. Of the sum which he received he gave him
(Rev. Mr. Alban) two-thirds, because the field of labour into
which he had been sent, was much larger than that which he
Dr. Dill then occupied. He gave him £lOB9 14s. 6d.
The sum raised in Liverpool was about £370. The schools
were originally supported by their friends in Scotland and
in the north of Ireland. They commenced with two schools
in 1846, which became twenty schools in 1848, and were
forty-five schools in • 1853, and they had fifty teachers
occupied in these schools. The rapid increase of these schools
and the necessity of bringing qualified teachers from Ulster,
who could teach reading, writing, and the sewed muslin
manufacture among the female children, increased the expendi-
ture. In the year terminating May, 1851, the subscriptions
received from Scotland and the north of Ireland, from associa-
tions, congregations, Sabbath schools, and individuals, amounted
to £745, while the expenditure for salaries,, .chool requisites,
school houses, aloehiog, and some food, because all the
..diouts began as ragged schools, and as a number of the poor
children had but one scanty meal in the four hours, they were
obliged to allow each of them d. worth of meal a day,
amounted to £978, which required £233 to be taken from
the English fund lodged in his hands;to supply the deficiency.
In the year 1852, £155 was required from the English fund.
In May, 1853, £353 was required from the Riglish fund,
because the contributions had fallen off. Last summer they
declined still more, and in order to pay up the salaries of
teachers, rents, school-houses, school requisites, and all other
expenditure connected with the work, during the half-year
it required £263 of the English fund to supply the deficiency.
There had been expended, therefore, of the .XlOB9 14s. 6d.
given into his hands three years ago by the Rev. Dr. Dill,
£lOO5 9s. 11d., leaving £B4 4s. 7d. of that sum, which was
by no means eqhal, he said prospectively, to meet the wants of
the present quarter. If the people of England withheld their
aid, one-third of the schools now in existence would cease to
exist. The schools were originated in 1846, by his friend
Rev. M. Brannigan ; they were literary industrial, and
pre-eminently Scriptural. They taught as much reading,
writing, and arithmetic, as they thought suited these poor
people. The sewed muslin manufacture was also introduced
amongst them, by which some of the girls were able to earn
from 3s. to ss. a week, which, although it might appear small
in England, was quite a purse in that part of Ireland. This
sewed muslin manufacture, which they had introduced, had
now grown so much beyond their limits, that the girls of
Connaught were new earning from to £15,000 to £20,000 a
year wages. The rev, gentleman then made. a strnug appeal
to the audience, to enable them to continue paying teachers
for these schools, without which the youth of Connaught
could never acquire that industrial education which would
enable them in future years to maintain themselves. He
then pointed out the religious advantages which sprang from
the religious teaching which saved these children from the
dominion of and concluded his address amid loud and
general applause.

The Rev. Mr. BARNETT described the degrading occupa.
tions in field labour, to which the female peasantry of Con-
naught "ere_subjestek ooe, of whom.he stated, had s.ctually
been seen by a lady, yoked with-a cow to a harrow, and driven
through the field ; and showed through the agency of their
schools, they had substituted for such humiliating and

unnatural employment, the pleasant and profitable occupation
with the needle in a comfortable room
The Rev. Mr. BRANNIGAN detailed' the acts of opposition
upon the part of the priests, which they had to encounter in the
work, and the threats. and altar denunciations of the priests
against all parties who allowed their children to frequent the
schools. He also narrated the verious burning of Bibles which
the priests had made, the miracles which they had threatened
to perform for the destruction of all who supported the schools,
and the controversies in which they had been engaged. Not-
'withstanding all those effects, he stated that he had in one year
alone 709 pupils in the schools in the district of Ballycastle.
Rev. Mr. JOHNSON addressed the meeting at some length,
contrasting the religious and social condition of the province of
Ulster with that of Connaught, and arguing that to the religion
of the former being almost exclusively Protestant was owing
its great superiority, and especially that of the county of
Antrim. to any other part of Ireland, as regarded social and
industrial advancement. The rev. gentleman concluded by an
eloquent appeal to his audience on behalf of the Connaught
schools.
The proceedings then closed with a prayer.