The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1847-08-03 00:00:00

INDUSTRIAL AND RAGGED SCHOOLS

The following passages, from various works, illustrative
of the effects of Ragged and Industrial Schools on the
pupils and on their connections may be read with interest.
The committee of ladies who manage the affairs of the
Aberdeen Girls' Industrial School, after a close examina-
tion into the working of that institution, stated in their
last report (for 1846) that the history of the school—
" Demonstrated the great moral fact, that the children
of the poor, and, it may be, of the careless and the worth-
less, can, at a small amount of labour and expense, be
brought within the sphere of all that is good, and estim-
able, and praiseworthy ; and, without being altogether
separated from their parents, made instrumentalin carry-
ing to their homes the saving truths of the Gospel; and
by practising the lessons of industry, and cleanliness, and
order, altering the character of these homes, and making
them the abodes of social happiness and domestic com-
fort ; proving that the feature of the Industrial School,
which many deemed the most objectionable, may, by the
Divine blessing, become the one which most enhances its
value. For, without breaking the family tie, the child is
permitted during the day to receive a sound, practical,
and religious education, allowing the parents to pursue,
without interruption and without anxiety, their respective
avocations, and to carry home at night, for the solace and
improvement of the family circle, the influence of the
school training, and thus strengthening and confirming
the natural affections, without exciting any feelings of de-
pendance and degradation ; because, although the child is
fed and educated at the expense of the school, she gives in
return for these benefits, all the labour of which she is
capable."
In our former article we showed how striking had been
the effect of the establishment of such schools in Aber-
deen, where they annihilated juvenile vagrancy. Take
the following passage from the evidence of the Rev. W.
Russell, before the Criminal Law Committee of the
House of Lords, as to the effect of a similar school in
Westminster _ . .

" I have seen in the worst parts of Westminster a now no less than nine congregations of different denomi-
Ragged School established. I had. the pleasure of taking nations in Girvan ; all this while the population has not
part in establishing one of these schools ; and out of a large increased above 700 or 900.—Edinburgh Witness.
number of the worst families in the district, where there The ruins of Kilcolman Castle, the residence of Spen-
had been from eighteen to twenty of the members of ser, in the north of Ireland, remain to this day. A
those families annually convicted, SUBSEQUENTLY NOT tourist thither, inquiring of a postillion whether he had
ONE OF THEIR CHILDREN BECAME AGAIN THE SUB- ever heard of Spenser at Kilcolman, was answered, "Is it
JECT OF A CRIMINAL PROSECUTION." Mr. Spenser, of Kilcolman, your honour ? " Troth, then,
Mathematical demonstration was never more complete I can 't just say that I ever heard tell of him ; but I sup-
than this, as to the effects of such schools as that whose pose he goes round by Doneraile way. for he never took
enlargement and extension we are anxious to pro- horses in Mallow in my time, sir."—Lady's Newspaper.
mote. In this town they are especially needed, since the VI
AA.OST MELANCHOLY OCCURRENCE.—On Friday last,
concurrent testimony of our excellent Recorder, of Mr. about mid-day, an Irishman, called Peter
Serjeant Adams, and of Mr. Stephens, the chief superin- three children,
tendent of our police, is to the effect that, excepting and six, the oldest and youngest boys, left the
being .
London, there are more juvenile offenders in Birmingham Newabbey shore, to gather
.cockles
on the bank opposite
his whole family, aged fourteen,Hairelewven,
than in any other large town in the country. This fact Carsethord. with
r ex- they trace partly to the injudicious and
partlyremainedthe to the pe-eboat could reach them tile three children were swept into
eternity ! Their father was rescued by Captain Blair,
cessarily made partly by one person and partly by ano-
otNhNe EfLot.o—wTinlgie :_ C, Irsthere T
just as the water was entering his mouth, and must also
t
her ; and the parts carried to and from the various work-
tWednesday
Mn.
have perished in a few minutes.—Dumfries Herald.
shops by boys who are beset by tempters to steal. What-
THE
conta°in'Cs
ever be the cause, there is no doubt of the fact ; and here Courant REMAINS
nt of
lies the strength of our case. Schools like to that which
we refer, are calculated to meet this great moral and social mortal remains of the late Mr. Daniel O'Connell arrived
lying
want of the town.. Shall they not be supplied. in Chester on Monday evening, and are now l • in the
i? nmnil Catholic
T' -'y o''' 'me kr- of ;-- • • Chapel of this city, whence they will be

-lie on, _Jjection that we know of is one akin to that
raised a few months ago by a cold-hearted few against
Parliamentary succour to the starving Irish : that it tends
to deprive the recipient of the'feelings of self-dependence.
Just or not, it may be truly said that this is an objection
which wont/ never occur to a man whose Christian feel-
ing was more than a name. It is not true, however, at
least so far as Industrial Schools are concerned, as an ad-
mirable passage from the Rev. T. Guthrie's " Plea for
Ragged Schools" will show. With this we quit the sub-
ject for the present :
" This is no scheme to relieve those whose vices have
brought them to ruin, or whose indolence keeps them in
poverty. We fully accord with this sentiment of the
apostle, 'He that will not work should not eat.' This is
both the judgment of Scripture and V reason. In very
mercy to this world, God has linked crime and suffering
together; and it were a short-sighted benevolence which,
interfering with that law of Providence, would dissolve the
connection. Let guilty parents suffer : they have eaten
sour grapes—let their teeth be set on edge. But has not
God said, ' What mean ye that ye use this proverb con-
cerning the land of Israel, saying, the fathers have eaten
sour grapes, and the children's teeth are set pu edge ?
As .I live, saith the Lord God, ye shall not have occasion
any more to use this proverb in Israel. Andthe question
which we put to a humane and Christian public is this :
.

removed on Sunday night, on their melancholy journey
for interment in Ireland. Mr. Gardner, of Chester, has
received orders to make a new coffin, as that in which the
body is now encased, and which was made at Genoa, is of
rather common workmanship. The corpse is to be em-
barked on board a steam-packet at Birkenhead for Dublin."
The Dublin Freeman of Tuesday says " The funeral will
certainly take place on Thursday, the sth of August."
SERIOUS CASE OF POISONING A SHIP'S CREW.—On
Saturday se'nnight, a very frightful occurrence took place
on board the Achilles, of Newcastle, lying at Gloucester.
On the previous day a new cook,, a black, had been re-
ceived on board, who on Saturday proceeded to maze
soup for dinner. Most reprehensibly, ajar of arsenic had
been left in the lazaret, and the cook mistaking this for

nour, useu ulinvn,La v,.v ovatiß, v+ .....v..
when prepared, the cook himself, the mate, the carpenter,
the captain's child, and a nurse girl partook. A custom-
house officer on board tasted the soup, but not liking it,
refused it. The other five were speedily taken alarmingly
ill. The nurse and child were soon placed out of danger
by the prompt remedies applied, but the three seamen
were for some time considered in extreme danger.
On Friday night, a thief at Northmoulton, near Exeter,
came by her death in a most extraordinary manner. A
woman named Wesmacott, wife of a schoolmaster in the
village, had gone out with an empty sack in her hand,

Are we, without any efficient effort to save them, to allow
these guilty parents to draw down into the same gulf with
themselves, their innocent and helpless offspring? We
do not propose to contaminate our hospitals with such
children. Surely it would be one thing to rear the chil-
dren of the wicked in affluence,—to provide them with a
finished education,—to house them in splendid palaces;
and another thing, to save them from the pangs of hunger,
and from the crimes to which hunger tempts them and
drives them,—to bless them with a simple education,
by which they may live decently in this world, and 13(
taught the way to a better. Let me put
get an answer. In the College Wynd
friars' parish, Edinburgh, I found a moL
three young children by her side, and
infant in her arms : she was a drunkard. But there wa,
no bed save some straw there ; there was no fire save
some slumbering cinders ; there was no bed in her house

and on the following morning she was found jambed and
quite dead in a corn mill, between the water wheel and
the wall. It appeared that the miller had latterly missed
corn from his mill, on several occasions, and had watched
a few nights previously, but without detecting the depre-
dators. There is an aperture above the axle of the water
wheel, through which the entrance must have been made ;
and, theref)re, on the night in question, he left the mill-
wheel slowly turning, to prevent the access of the thieves.
However, through this opening the woman ventured to
enter, and in the attempt came to her untimely and igno-

se, and

the Old Grey_

.
T, with scone
I pale sickly

PRESERVING LIFE AT SEA.—A very interesting expe-
riment took place on Monday week, in the river Tyne,
near Newcastle Quay, in the presence of the authorities
of the town, and a large concourse of spectators. It was
to test the efficacy of an invention to preserve life at sea
by means of tubes of vulcanized India rubber, lashed to
the inside of a boat under the thwarts. The inventor is

this trom

,peaking to her, by the 'Miserable object in her arms in-
cessantly saying something to its mother. On asking
what it said, she burst into tears, and told me it was ask-
ing for bread, and she had none to give it. They had not

A. H. Holdsworth, Esq. , of Dartmouth, who is well known
For his many valuable inventions, and contributions to
The agent of the patentees had a boat fitted
Ind holes bored through the bottom, fitted

with the tubes

broken their

uuy, a... 7.
troop a happy country parish, I was horrified at
such a scene, and sent out for a loaf of bread. They fell
on it like ravenous beasts. Now, the question I ask, and
to which I crave an answer, is this :—Should I have left
these children to die of hunger, because their mother Was

with plugs. On a signal given the rowers withdrew the
plugs, and the boat filled to the gunwale. They still rowed
on, with the inconvenience only of a cold bath. Several
hundred-weights of iron were added, but the boat still
maintained her buoyancy. The experiment was perfectly
successful.