The Sun.
London, England, 1861-09-26 00:00:00

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ment has also been effected in the dispart sight.
which has been increased in the screwed portions,
besides which a plain part of the sight has been re-
cessed into the gun. In the elevating eye A change
has also been effected by substituting a lance-pin
with a spring catch for the washer and small pin
which were employed to retain the elevating eye pin
in its proper position. The lever and tappet pins
have been altered and so made that they may now be
inserted on either side of the holes in the levers and
tappets, while at the same time they are prevented
being shaken out by having the lower portion within
the levers and tappets opened, to act as a spring.
The cartridges are in future to be made up with
lubricating wade inside, and the shell plugs fitted
with string loops. Two of the improved 12-pounder
Armstrongs have just been received at the Ordnance
stores, Chatham, and others will be forwarded
from Woolwich as fast as they can be supplied
from the Armstrong gun factory.
Capt. Caffin, C. 8., Director of Stores, yesterday,
accompanied by Mr. Stewart, Chief Military Store-
keeper at Portsmouth, inspected the great depot
powder magazines in the Southampton watery.
The Himalaya screw troopship, Capt. John Sec-
A detachment of eligible young men from C.lpt.
Davies's recruiting station at Liverpool yesterday
arrived at the Woolwich division of the Roya..l
Marines, and wore enrolled for service,

THE NAVY.

-..4P--

VALETTA, Sept. 20.—Her Majesty's gunboat
Wanderer, 4, Commander Seymour, arrived on the
18th inst. from Devonport and Gibraltar. Her Ma-
jesty's ship Sanspareil, 70, Capt. G. Bowyer, left
yesterday on return to England. She took the fol-
lowing passengers :—Capt. Cowell, 3d Buffs; En-
sign Hall, 22d Regiment ; Mrs. and Mrs. Coxon,
Mrs. Stokes, Mrs. Tudor, Mrs. Mills, Mrs. Cloyne,
Miss Yair, 1 corporal, 5 soldiers, 2 soldiers' wives,
and 13 children. The screw steamer Malacca, Capt.
T. S. Gilpin, having on board a portion of the Malta
and Alexandria electric telegraph cable, which is
to be laid from the cable end in the Gulf of Syrtis
to Bengazi, left for Bengazi yesterday, to meet the
Rangoon at that place. The Rangoon is at present
engaged in laying the portion of the cable intended
to unite the Alexandria end with Bengazi. On the
submersion of these two sections the whole line from
Alexandria to Malta will be complete.
eombe, sailed from Portsmouth yesterday morning
for Gibraltar, Malta, and Corfu with detachments
of troops, as already detailed in The Sun, calling
at Queenstown. She afterwards put back, and
anchored in St. Helen's Roads, owing to the wild
state of the weather.
The Alert, 17, screw, Commander W. R. Pearse,
sailed from Spithead yesterday for Devonport,
where she will be dismantled, pay off her crew, and
bo put out of commission.
The Pelican. 17, screw, Commander Brock, also
sailed from Spithead yesterday for foreign service,
calling at a western port for final orders.
Her Majesty's screw steam corvette Archer, 13,
Capt. Craufurd, from the West Coast of Africa,
arrived at Green hithe yesterday, and discharged her
powder. She will proceed this morning to Wool-
wich to be stripped and paid off. The Archer was
commissioned at Woolwich in May, 1858, for the
African station, soon after her return from North
America and the West Indies, in command of Capt.
Edmund Heathcote. Having undergone but slight
repairs since 1853, she will now require a thorough
overhaul.

On Wednesday next Gen. Dacres will inspect the
Royal Artillery at Purfleet, and on the following
Friday he will proceed to the station at Warley for
the same purpose, when the half-yearly inspection
of the General's district will be completed.
Lieut.-Col. Greenwood, C. 8., who died at Chel-
tenham on the 22d inst., in his 67th year, served in
the China expedition, for which he received a
medal. He entered the Royal Artillery in 1812.
By the death of Gen. Dennis Herbert, one of the
senior Generals in the army, a pension for distin-
guished and meritorious service is placed at the dis-
posal of his Royal Highness the Duke of Cambridge.

2HE NEW MINUTES ON EDUCATION,

The paddlewheel steam-sloop Firebrand, Com-
mander Bruce, from North America and the West
Indies, having been received in basin at Woolwich
and surveyed, is ordered to be ready again for sea
about the 18th of October. The work of caulking
and cleaning commenced yesterday in basin, and
the crew are to be granted 14 days' leave of
absence.

The extraordinary concord and harmony that
prevail among all classes in the country do not
afford a prospect of very lively or exciting discus-
sions during the recess of Parliament. Austria
and Hungary are at a deadlock. The Emperor of
the French is weaving Penelope's web; his even-
ings undo his mornings, and one half of his policy
contradicts the other. He gives France Free Trade,
but deprives her of confidence. He delivers Italy
from Austria, but debars her from union and self-
government. Of rifled ordnance and armour-plated
ships there is little more to be said, and the public
seems inclined to leave the struggle between the
Northern and Southern States to work itself out
without a word of sympathy for either party. The
void thus created seems likely to be filled by a new
educational controversy. The Minute of the Privy
Council, recently noticed in our columns, has created
a sensation perhaps not wholly unlooked for by
those who propounded it. To us, looking at the
subject from the point of view of the general public,
andregarding with some degree of dismay the enor-
mous progress of this item of our expenditure, the
minute appeared by no means unreasonable. That
Government should interfere less with the manage-
ment of schools, that it should make its assistance
conditional rather on results actually obtained than
on the means employed to obtain those results,
seemed to us an obvious improvement. We were
glad to find that assistance was henceforward to be
given to schools of a poorer and humbler class than
those which had hitherto received it, and we were
not unwilling that something should be lopped off
from the excrescences and superfluities in order to
provide for this most useful and charitable work.
Alas t we little knew the red-hot ashes on which
we had placed our unconscious feet. We did not
sufficiently consider that, though to us these things
were matters of calm and abstract speculation,
there were others, and those counted by thousands,
whom they touched in the very tenderest point—
in respect to their pecuniary interest. The sum of
£lOO,OOO a year annually voted by Parliament is
distributed among a vast number of persons, and
any change in the rules under which that distribu-
tion is effected must affect, and not always benefi-
cially affect, the condition of the recipients. LI the
instance of the new iviinute the change seems to
have been peculiarly unpalatsille. An outcry has
arisen from every quarter of the coeessrv, attesting
at once the manner in which it is pervaae4 by the
expenditure of the Government, and the difiacuiky
of effecting the slightest alteration in subsidies dis-
pensed from a central source.
The best service that we can render to the pub-
lic under such circumstances is to place them in
possession of the history of the present system of
Education, of its defects and merits, and of the rea-
sons which have driven-a department, ;which has
elm erre) she we itcolipcouliazij canzzioua to nnnoiliato
public favour, to brave the storm of unpopularity
which is now arising against it The Education
Department of the Privy Council dates from 1839,
but can hardly be said to have come into full play
till 1846, when the system of pupil teachers and of
annual grants was first thoroughly digested and
brought into working order. In expenditure its
progress has been rapid indeed ; for, beginning in
1839 with £30,000, it has reached in 1861 to the
sum of £803,000, having increased for several years
at the rate of £lOO,OOO per annum. The principle
of this system has been that the State should origi-
nate nothing, but assist the exertions of private
benevolence, requiring in exchange such conditions
as it thinks proper in order to secure the requisite
efficiency. This assistance, however, has never been
given to any schools except those in which religion
is taught, and in this respect the Privy Council
system may with propriety be termed religious.
But, though limiting its aid to schools where
religion is taught, and refusing absolutely to
assist secular schools, the Privy Council has
never made its grants to support religions in-
struction. The duty which it has undertaken has
been to take care that those religious bodies to whom
it extended the assistance of the State should not
neglect the secular instruction of their schools ;
and a system of inspection was organized, with a
view of ascertaining that this secular teaching was
not neglected. Agreements have been entered into
with each of the religious bodies whose schools
receive aid from the Privy Council, for the purpose
of regulating their relations to the central body.
These agreements remain in full force, and are in
no degree affected by the Minute which is the
subject of the present controversy. The principle
of the Privy Council, we have said, was to assist
voluntary effort, but from this principle it has
deviated in three instances. The first of these is
the Capitation Grant, which is given for every child
attending school a certain number of times, with-
out any corresponding payment on the part of
the managers of the school. The second devia-
tion from this rule is the support of Training
Colleges, thirty-six in number, which are supported
almost wholly at the expense of the State, and
cost the country the sum of £122,000 a year. The
third deviation is in the case of the pupil teachers,
or apprentices, the whole of whose salary is de•
frayed by the State, without any assistance from
private funds. Every certificated schoolmaster
receives, in addition to his salary from the managers
of the school, a grant in augmentation of that salary
from the public purse. It has been repeatedly an-
nounced that this system is to be regarded as merely
tentative, and that it does not commit the Govern-
ment or the country to its ultimate adoption in case
it shall not be found to work satisfactorily. This
is the Eden into which the evil principle has found
its way, embodied, if we are to believe the complaints
that we hear, in the form of the recent Minute of
the Privy Council.
An impression was created—probably' by, the form
in which the Minute is drawn—that it would come
into immediate effect, that no opportunity would
be given for addressing the Legislature, and that
before the next Session of Parliament the system
would be finally and irrevocably changed. This,
however, appears to us to be a mistake. The Minute
does, indeed, contain the rules under which it is
intended that Government aid shall ultimately be
granted to schools, and has in that respect a brief
and peremptory appearance, which vanishes upon
sent. closer impection. The grant to every school is paid
date of
The Ordnance Select Committee, of which
president,l annually, and the Minute provides that each school
J. shall be paid once under the existing /miles after the
St. George, CM., Royal Artillery, is the the Minute. Long before the second pay-
ment can arrive, which must in the earliest case be
h tying decided c.n making some important alters-
more than a year from the date of the Minute—
tions in the equipment of the 12 pounder (81 cwt.) ) that is, from the 29th of July in 1861—Parliament
Arinslrong guns, orde'F have been received at would have had the fullest opportunity of consider-
g übject, and should the M. b
Chatham, Woolwich, and the other military stations n the s
of preventing it from takingineuff*eect.e
same time, it is cle Atistahpe-
proved,
for The proposed alterations to be applied to all future
tteaet in. some minor points the
issue::: of these cle,,criptions of guns. The breech Minute would havear
to
omsmediately operative,
tangen t hag been altered from steel to gun and we are therenfoerloesgealadon con-
metal,thiseepatrhtatorfuthrtehseurbjecttrovers has been
by an official declaration that the Minute shall have
and fro ,z 1 a rectangular to a hexagonal form,
the upper portio'n being at the same time completely
no effect till after
the month of March, 1869 remcdelled, inclucling the leaf, cross-head, horizon- need therefore be no apprehension the, t therefullest
tal and vertical verniei:s, elevating and deflecting opportunity will not be given for the discussion by
screws, &c. The ratchet s;oht has" •
lindergone consi- Parliament of this Minute. There is no doubt an
in any eat
inconvenience of transition,
apted towhich it is
derable improvement by having h '
its Ca. impossible to obviate. There is the uncertainty
the best advantage for • -orr ele-
the fingers when GOA 2, whether the proposal will or will not meet with the
',Med. The trunnion• 'lied approbation of Parliament, and there is the difficulty
and made sight has also been remodt_
• ' arising from a long notice of an intended change.
„more substantial, while at the same twa,
18 Bemired to the interested in schools may reasonably corn-
the body
gun, instead of being let through • •
roub Thosethat their exertions are paralysed during this
Y of the trunnion. Considerable improve-1
prove- p

In order to facilitate the operation of berthing
the iron frigate Defence, 22, in No. 3 dock at
Chatham, the blocks on which she will be placed
have been reduced to a uniform depth of only three
and a half inches throughout, thus giving nearly e
foot more water between her keel and the blocks.
As the Defence at present lies, her greatest draught
of water aft is a few inches less than 23 feet, but,
as at the highest spring tides a depth of nearly 25
feet can be obtained in the dock she will occupy,
there will be sufficient water to dock her with per-
fect safety. It is, however, a matter for considera-
tion whether after she has been fitted with her stores,
and her iron masts are on board—for the Admiralty
have decided on having her masted before she is
docked—her draught of water will not be so in-
creased as to render the procest of undocking her
one of some difficulty. The work of ?Laing the De-
fence afloat is still rapidly proceeding, upwards of
100 mechanics from the dockyard, and those em-
ployed by the contractors, being engaged on her,
the wen working from daylight in the morning
until a late hour at night. Whatever delay, there-
fore, may take place in docking the Defence, no time
will be lost in getting her ready for sea, as the works
to be effected in her interior can be carried on quite
as well as she lies afloat in the harbour as if she
were in dock, though, of course, in the latter case
greater facilities exist for completing her equipment.
In addition to the dockyard mechanics, a number of
workmen of various trades will shortly be taken on
at the dockyard, to be specially employed in com-
pleting the Defence, the Admiralty being desirous
of sending her to sea as early as possible to join the
Warrior.

A naval court-martial was held yesterday at
Sheerness, on board the Formidable, 84, flagship of
Vice-Admiral W. J. Hope Johnstone, for the pur-
pose of trying E. S. Young, acting assist.-engineer
belonging to her Majesty's ship Cumberland, but
serving on board her Majesty's gun-vessel Lee, for
absenting himself without leave from about Sept.
2, 1861, until about Sept. 14, 1801. The uhttrge WtAb
fully proved, the offender being sentenced to be
severely reprimanded, and also to forfeit out of his
pay the sum of 125., the same sum not exceeding the
amount of two days' pay, and also the further sum
of £lB, such last-mentioned sum not exceeding six
days of his said pay for every 25 hours of absence
from his duties.

The following appointments have been made at
the Admiralty :—Lieut. B. L. Lefroy, to command
the Doterel, commissioned ; Lieut. F. H. H. Hutch-
inson, to the Medea; Lieut. N. B. Smith, to the
Pelican ; Lieut. P. Blakiston, additional, to the
Marlborough, for disposal ; C. B. Ityall, master, to
the Indus, for service in the Styx ; Henry R.
Berners, sub-lieutenant, to the Narcissus ; Allan
R. Woodruff, naval cadet, to the Orestes ; J.
Hood, chief engineer, to the Medea; C. A. Strat-
ford, acting engineer, to the Medea ; J. H. Binns,
engineer to the Fisgard for the Rifleman ; David
Millar, first-class assist.-engineer, to the Majestic
for the Goshawk; P. Hutchinson, first-class assist.-
engineer, to the Himalaya; W. Birks, acting first
class assist.-engineer, to the Asia, as supernumerary
for hospital treatment; W. M'Laurin, acting first-
class assist.-engineer to the Medea; J. Austen, sur-
geon, to the Medea; W. J. Aplin, assist.-surgeon, to
the Warrior ; W. Barclay, second-class assist.-engi-
neer, to the Medea; J. Sumner, acting second-class
assist.-engineer, to the Medea; W. J. Sullock, act-
ing second, class assist.-engineer, to the Indus, for
service i n the Thais ; W. J. Wise, acting second-
class assist.-engineer, to the Asia, for the Fire
Queen ; G. Edwards, acting assist.-engineer, to the
Asia, for the Eche; A. M. Mould, second master,
to the Plover ; H. H. Hannay, second master, to
the Dasher; H. Mortimer, master's-assist., to the
Medea; W. H. Buck, master's-assist., to the Victory ;
E. H. C. Smith, master's-assist.,to the Malacca; D.
F. Guy, assist-paymaster, to the Victory, as super-
numerary ; E. H. Key, clerk, to the Firebrand ; and
B. Drayson, assist.-clerk, to the Formidable.