The Sun.
London, England, 1865-11-08 00:00:00

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LONDON, I VEDNESDAY, NOV. 8, 1865.

On Monday evening Lord STANLEY made some
remarks on physical education in opening the Liver-
pool new Gymnasium. Tho arrangements of this
place render it one of the finest and most perfect in
Europe, and the noble lord briefly adverted to the
circumstances under which it was raised. He truly
declared that it was very creditable to Liverpool
that such an attempt should have been successfully
made to promote the wellbeing of the ccmmunity
purely from disinterested motives. It is satisfac-
tory to find that the returns of the first six months
show that success so far attended the venture, and
as the result of this probationary period has'been so
happy there is every reasonable ground to hope that
for the future it may go on and prosper. Unusual
interest attaches itself to this undertaking on ac-
count of its being in some sort a nuisance, for it is
not tried on so large a scale anywhere else except in
Edinburgh. If this attempt prove successful and
satisfactory in the main, other places will follow the
example thus set, and beneficial results can hardly
fail to follow.

Lord STANLEY laid some stress upon the impor-
tance of the object of such institutions, and ex-
plained the mistake which some persons are apt to
make in thinking of these matters. They look upon
gymnasiums as a sort of a hobby to some individuals
very much after the fashion of a yacht club or an
Alpine club, or an amusement to employ time plea-
santly. This is not, however, the case, and more
practical results are expected to follow from this
effort. As the noble lord emphatically observed,
" a new phase of social existence is opening before
Europe, and especially England. The number of
those who reside in towns is greatly increased, and
as the population also increases at a rapid rate, it
stands to reason that more and more energy is re-
quired to provide necessary aids to health and exer-
cise." Without recourse to " statistics," that fatal
term which horrifies so many, and the meaning of
which so few will take the trouble to comprehend,
the noble lord contrived to make his reasons under-
stood for thus advocating the formation of this and
similar gymnastic undertakings. Those who watched
"the increase of houses in the town of Liverpool,
and witnessed the gradual disappearance of
the green fields, and the spread in their
place of streets and lanes, and who have
daily before their eyes the long lines of villas
which spring up at every adjoining railway station,
should require no proof from Parliamentary returns
to tell them how rapid and continuous is the increase
of that part of the population engaged in some one
of the many branches of commerce, and destined
for the most part to sedentary pursuits in crowded
localities." Of course the argument thus produced
may apply to all large cities, and in a lesser degree
to small ones, but perhaps nowhere with equal
force as to Liverpool. In this town the death-rate
stands nearly the highest in England, and such
surely should be an unanswerable argument as to the
necessity that exists for some strenuous efforts to be
made to counteract the hurtful influences of the
engrossing pursuits of trade and commerce. The
sad details of the great mortality that occurs in
Liverpool furnish abundant evidence that sanitary
regulations alone are not sufficient, and that some-
thing more is required. When all has been done
that can be done, when the inventions of science
are exhausted, and the skill and appliances of the
most able are employed, much will remain that
prevents the artificial existence of sedentary em-
ployments from being otherwise than injurious to
the human, frame. As it is appropriately

said here—" Even after all that has been

done that drainage, and water supply, and
wide streets, and parks can do, urban
life is never so healthy as that which is passed
in the pure air and active pursuits of the country."
The causes of this difference it is wise to consider,
and we shall find a very good definition of them in
this comprehensive address. The class of labourers
and artisans is not that with which the gymnasium
has to do, but those above them. The clerks, whose
time is passed for the most part in offices that are
close and crowded, are greatly in need of some im-
provement. The absence of muscular exertion is
very injurious to the constitution, and depressing
to the energies. Notwithstanding the diffe-
rence of constitutions there will still remain
much to consider as deleterious in a general view of
the case. It must appear evident to all who take
the time and trouble to dwell on such matters
that a life thus passed in continuous work in a close
atmosphere, from one week's end to the other, can-
not be otherwise than bad, even to those least cal-
culated to feel its effects or to suffer from the con-
finement. In a word, such an existence is not
healthy, and, as Lord STANLEY says, "by
healthy' we ought not to understand merely
the capacity to get on with the day's employ-
ment, or the absence of disease, but rather that
perfect condition in which life is an enjoyment in
itself, in which all simple and natural pleasures are
appreciated, and the little every-day anxieties of
our business sit lightly upon us." It is a mistake
very generally made in this generation that every-
thing should be subservient to making money.

While some never use their brains, and all run to
muscle, others never use their muscles except, as is
here quaintly put, to walk to business, to drive a
pen for hours, and to handle knives and forks at
dinner. The habit of life which these pursuits
en-
gender
is not likely to make, physically speak-
ing, the stuff out of which we wish the
middle classes of Englishmen to be made."
For these, then, this Gymnasium will be a
great boon, and ,the numerous class for whose
benefit it is provided is far more likely to profit by
it than they are to take a simple walk for exercise
and amusement ; besides people can go to these
rooms in the evening when outdoor exercise is not
so good or so attractive for many months of the
year.

Lord STANLEY concluded his admirable discourse
by giving some advice to the promoters of this
undertaking, which it is to be hoped that they will
profit by. He said, " Don't ride a hobby too hard;
the object of this kind of training is not to make
athletes out of men who have not to live by their
muscles, but to develope sound health and manly
constitution." It is to be hoped that a success com-
mensurate with its deserts will attend this
undertaking, so that others may follow the
wise example set by Liverpool, and so we may
find that the engrossing claims of business [have
not been allowed to sap to its foundations that
public health which is so great a blessing, and for
the loss of which all the pleasures of the world can-
not compensate.

Just at the close of the present Lord Mayor's
,enure of office he has distinguished himself by be-
coming associated with a very useful and nractical
movement. The condition of our middle-class
education has long been felt on all hands to be very
unsatisfactory, but all the efforts which have been
made to remedy it have as yet proved inadequate.
Many of our grammar schools and academies have
been raised in character and rendered more efficient
by the system of university examinations, but the
class below this are not yet well supplied. In the
great City of London the want is very apparent, and
according to the reports of those best qualified to
judge, the consequences are extensive and injurious.
Accordingly it has been suggested by a gentleman in fi
mately acquainted with City affairs, that some of the
surplus funds in the hands of the trustees of charities,
&c., should be devoted to the foundation of a school
or schools for the benefit of the lower middle classes.
Mr. ItooEns, the originator of this scheme, has long
busied himself in the education of the poor in a
populous part of the City, and has become familiar
with the wants of the class above them. He con-
sulted the LORD MAYOR on the point, and his lord-
ship immediately convened a meeting at the Mansion
House, with the view of giving practical effect to
the proposal, of which he heartily approved. There
was a goodly company of influential citizens
present, many of them trustees of funds
whose purposes have become altogether ob-
solete, and the general feeling of the meeting
was decidedly in favour of the suggestion.
It seems quite time that some project should be set
on foot which may turn those surplus funds to good
account. London is rich enough, but it is also poor
and populous enough to have plenty of unsatisfied
wants ; and when we remember the wretchedness,
and ignorance, and sickness all around us, we can-
not but feel regret at sums of three, or four, or five
thousand a year lying idle in so many directions.
At the same time the gentlemen who occupy the
position of trustees are awkwardly situated. They
hold the money in trust for purposes to which they
cannot possibly put them at the present day. Some
funds are for the repair of the roads and streets ;
but though the ratepayers might have no objection
to allowing the trustees to pay their rates for them,
such a proceeding would be, to say the least of it,
somewhat Quixotic. One fund is held in trust for
burning heretics, but it cannot exactly be put to
that use in the present day. In several instances
the trustees have devoted some of these surplus funds
to educational purposes, but there remains so very
much to be disposed of, and so large an amount of
ignorance to deal with, that it is no wonder that
many gentlemen should think of forming one
comprehensive plan, which, under due manage-
ment, might turn all this idle money
to the practical benefit of the country
by supplying a want which every one must acknow-
ledge is a very great and important one. It must
be observed that the scheme of Mr. ROGERS only
refers to a temporary appropriation of the funds,
for it is confidently believed that schools founded
on his principles would be chiefly self-supporting.
The Lord Mayor, in introducing the subject,
remarked that the national, parochial, and ward
schools in the City furnished education to the poor,
and the old endowed schools for those of the higher
classes, but there was a large class which came
under neither head. The children of the small
tradesmen, clerks, and respectable mechanics have
not the means to obtain admission into the endowed
schools, while the parochial schools do not give
them the education which their circumstances re

quire. The mere rudiments of knowledge are not
enough for boys who are to grow up to take part
in the busy trading and commercial life of the
centre of English activity, and yet, according
to the statements made by gentlemen who
should be well informed, they do not, in many cases,
even acquire these rudiments. The revelations of
the night schools have surprised those who believed
in the universal spread of education among the bet-
ter classes. Mr. ROGERS, who, as we have said, has
long taken an active part in promoting popular
education, declared that the City merchants would
be surprised to know the want of elementary learn-
ing shown by those who came to be taught in the

- evening schools. Mr. TITE, M.P., confirmed this
statement by saying that usually the class of young
men who applied for clerkships were ignorant
beyond belief. Mr. TITE observed that
he thought in no country did middle
class education cost more, or was it
worse when obtained. This, in a country which
boasts itself of its middle cl6ss, which does not dis-
dain the name of " a nation of shopkeepers," is
certainly a great anomaly. It is more than a mere
question for the day or the hour : its solution will
affect the future of the whole country. If our
social and commercial life goes on as it has chile
many of these untrained, ill-educated youths may
rise through the influence of character or accident,
or by the possession of those resolute and ambitious
qualities, which are not necessarily absent from
an uncultivated mind, to positions of con-
siderable importance. How, then, can they
keep pace with the wants of the time, how
assist in developing the institutions of the country ?
The time is past when society could be divided into
two broad classes, the workers and the thinkers.
The thinkers now must work if they would really
influence their kind ; the workers must think, if
they would not be left altogether behind in the race.
And to enable men both to write and to think at
this stage of the world's history a proper training
and thorough cultivation of the faculties is needed
when young. It matters less what actual amount
of learning is imparted than how it is im-
parted. It is of little moment that a boy
has all the dates and genealogies of his-
tory at his fingers' ends if he has not been
taught how to turn that knowledge to account, to
learn what history teaches, and to draw his own
inferences in dealing with the political problems
of his time. We do not want our junior clerks
to think themselves Prime Ministers, but we do
want that they should have an intelligent compre-
hension of any ordinary subject that is brought
before them. We want them to put their minds
into their business in a manner that is never done
by ignorant and obtuse persons, and therefore it is
satisfactory to find the gentlemen of the city coming
so promptly forward to establish new schools to
supply the educational wants of the lower middle
classes.

New Dance Music. Published by Cocks & Co.

Another roll of delightful dance music has jusi
come to hand from those popular music publishers
the Messrs. Robert Cocks and Co., of New Bur-
lington- street.

The Coldstream Guards' Waltz, by A. F. Godfrey,
the bandmaster of the Coldstreams, leads off with
its exhilarating strains, through the syncope'd beat
of which we might almost affect to hear the clink of
the spur and the rustle of the silk-expanding
crinoline.

Fleurs des Champs, par Frederic Lomoine, is, in
truth, as it calls itself—une Polka Elegante. It is
elegant even in its external decorations, with its
clustered effigies of golden-wheat ripe in the ear, its
cerulean cornflowers and its scarlet poppies flaunting
by the meadow style.
The Bright Smile Waltzes, by H. S. Roberts,
has about it an enlivening influence quite worthy
of its radiant title, and will be as welcome as flowers
in May to the light-footed habitues of the ballroom.

The Cuckoo Quadrille, by the same composer,
obtains its chief est charm, no less than its distinctive
title, from the graceful introduction of Abt's famous
melody—among the most popular melodies of the
day (or night)—that haunting air of " The Cuckoo,"
with which the lovely voice of Madlle. Liebhardt
has so charmingly familiarized the frequenters of
our fashionable concert-rooms, both here in town
and far and wide throughout the provinces.

My Library—By Pamphilius.

PUBLISHED BY WARD, LOCK, AND TYLER.

Pamphilius, author, among many other interest-
ing and inovuotive works, of a " Student's French
[Laminar," that has proved so wonderfully success-
ful that it has already run into its Seventh Edition,
and author, too, of a pleasant anecdotal Autobio-
graphy, that we well remember to have ourselves read
with pleasure, and to have afterwards, through these
columns, recommended (as the book deserved) to
the consideration of others—Pamphilius has here
commenced a new and congenial serial publication
of his own. "My Library," he calls it. Just as
the great Poet-Novelist-Dramatist of our day,
dubbed the most characteristic of all his fictions,
emphatically and almost lovingly, " My Novel." Not,
of course, that we would do more than bring the two
titles (as akin simply by the choice of the same pro-
noun) into the most momentary juxtaposition ! The
one work being a veritable magnum opus—the other
the most modest unassuming little adventure well
imaginable ! Pamphlius's "My Library" in effect
consists of a serial issue (apparently at uncertain in-
tervals) of little Sixpenny Volumes, thin enough to
be slipped readily into the side-pocket of one's
paletot, for the chance of a hap-hazard
reading, anywhere, everywhere almost, under
the green trees, or in the corner of a
railway carriage. Two of these little volumes
are already come to hand—one the " Economy
of Life"--the other " Patient Boys." A third is
announced as in preparation--the most attractive of
them all as yet in its title—namely, the " Genius and
Writings of a Popular Novelist," whoever that may
mean. Pamphilius, by the issue of this thoughtful
little series of volumes, can hardly fail to win the
respect of his readers or to earn more and more
widely their attention and encouragement.