The Sun.
London, England, 1861-04-19 00:00:00

EDUCATION, SCIENCE, AND ART.

This branch of the Civil Service Estimates
amounts this year to £1,358,996, an increase of
£30,584 over the previous year. The vote for
education has risen to £1,089,171, of which
£803,794 is for Great Britain. Th© number of
children found present in the elementry day-schools
inspected in the year 1860 was 962,932, an increase
of 82,801 over 1859 ; and there were, besides,
27;728 children inspected in Poor Law schools, and
6,172 in industrial schools, of which last number
1242 were detained under magisterial sentence, The
capitation grant was paid on 262,006 children. The
I number of certificated teachers in charge of schools
was 7,711, an increase of 833 over 1859 ; of pupil
teachers 15,535, an increase of 311 ; of students in
training colleges 2,826, an increase of 32. The
next vote is of £111,484 fn. the Science and Art
Department. The visitors to the South Kensington
Museum in 1860 were 610,696 in number, an in-
crease of 135,331. A sum of £17,000 was voted
last year for erecting better accommodation for the
collections, and it is now proposed to grant £15,000
on account of an estimate of £27,000 for buildings
to replace the wooden scboolsand provide residences
for officers on duty at night ; both votes were ad-
vised by the Select Committee that sat last year. It
is mentioned that the schools of art in the United
Kingdom in 1860 reached 86 in number with 90,625
students, an increase of 4,856 over 1859. Passing
over the votes of £100,414 for the British Museum,
£16,285 for Scottish Universities (a grant which is
more than doubled this year), and one or twc,
minor grants, we are brought to the vote for the
National Gallery, £12,134, including £6,000 for the
purchase of pictures. The chief purchase in the
past year is a " predella" (once forming part of an
alter-piece), consisting of five pictures by Fra Gio-
vanni. Of this work Vasari says, " The infinite
small figures, which are seen in a celestial glory,
are so beautiful that they seem to be truly (beings)
of Paradise, nor can the spectator who draws near
satiate himself with contemplating them." These
pictures have arrived safely in England. They
were purchased for the National Gallery in Octo-
ber for £3,500 ; but the additional expenses,
in consequence of the demands of the Roman
Government before allowing the exportations, were
unusually great. Those demands ostensibly founded
on the excellence and celebrity of the works, were
admitted to be also partly suggested by the state
of the Papal finances. The British Consul finally
paid £7OO for the permission of exportation. With
respect to the Gallery in Trafalgar square, we
learn that it is hoped it may be reopened within
the month of May. The number of visitors in
1860 was 684,639 ; but the alterations prevented
the gallery being open after the Bth of September.
The average number of students was 54 ; the pic-
tures most frequently copied by them during the
year were Reynolds's " Age of Innocence," Dyck-
man's " Blind Beggar," and Landseer's " Shoeing."

PREFERMENT OF THE REV. ALFRED POOLE.—
This gentleman, who was deprived of his licence as curate
of St. Barnabas, Pimlico, by the Bishop of Loudon, has
been promoted to the perpetual curacy of Dussage, Glou •
cestershire. Mr. Poole has tried all the courts of law to
compel his bishop to restore him to his curacy, but, as is
well known, the decision has been uniformly against him,
the final decision having been given only a week or two
back by the Judicial Committee of Privy Council. Ilitissage
is a hamlet in the parish of Bisley, of which the Rev. T.
Kelpie is vicar. It is a place of High Church tendencies,
and in it is a Sistrhood of Mercy, with a penitentiary.
Galignani says :—" It was at St. Germain-en-
Lay() that the Duke d'Auniale's pamphlet was printed, the
prefect, deceived probably by its title, having granted per-
mission for the publication. Bales of copies wore forthwith
forwarded to Paris, but theceizure was effected on the very
7hich the AM, comtaenced,"