The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1843-07-18 00:00:00

THE LIVERPOOL STANDARD.

If Commons, during placed in the balance against a warehouse, a cask of
..nme singularly crotchaty displays, palm oil, or a bale of cotton!

gentleman, Mr. Dunlop, who acknowledges himself
to have been a " warm approver" of the system,
and to state no facts which are not founded upon
"unimpeachable evidence,"—there can be no longer
any doubt of the utter and irredeemable failure of
this boasted educational experiment. It is a failure
with respect to the effect produced upon the people,
for whose improvement it was devised ; and, from
the defective system, or no system, upon which it is
conducted, it can never contribute, by example or
training, to the adoption of a more efficient and
enlightened system in the schools of Ireland. It is
a failure, in fact, throughout every part of its ope•
ration!

Mr. Dunlop attributes this result mainly to
the inefficiency of the masters employed. They
are under-trained, or, more properly speaking, the
knowledge which they are trained to communicate,
and the mode of its communication, are alike unreal
and unsatisfactory. Their employment is an attempt
to " cram" the mind and the memory without
reaching the heart ; to convey the externals of
knowledge without its substance ; and the employes
are themselves mere parrot-like rehearsers by rote
of elementa y nothings. Nor is the latter circum-
stance surprising when we consider the materials
out of which the great bulk of the teachers are
formed, and the course of training which they un-
dergo, as described in the following graphic sketch,
from an ar icle upon the subject in the London
Times of Friday last, The teachers, we may pre-
mise, are described by the commissioners themselves
as, before training, " extremely ignorant, and unable
to teach the mere art of reading and writing."
" Two years" is the period set apart for their in-
struction and training; and in the following man-
ner is a portion of these two years occupied :
" During exactly 144 hours in four months,' the
ignorant' artists aforesaid in reading and writing are
' lectured' as follows :—ln the first SO hours 13 distinct
subjects are polished off, among which we find intel-
lectual," monitorial,' elliptic or suggestive,' and electic'
methods of teaching,' roots and derivations,' duties
of schoolmasters to the public' and 'to school patrons,'
geography, mathematical ! physical ! political !! ! ele-
ments of astronomy,'_ of`political economy "—cum
mull is aliis. In the next 32 hours, hydrostatics, pneu-
matics, and optics, to say nothing of arithmetic, me-
chanics, and plane geometry, are thoroughly disposed of ;
and in the last 32, such is the atmospheric velocity,' as
Mr. Dunlop remarks, of human thought, that electricity,
galvanism, magnetism, electro-magnetism, heat, steam-
engines, and chymistry, are each and all successfully
traversed. There is an agricultural course besides, but
we must really take breath, and spare our readers. Alas,
for the unhappy 'teacher ! The teacher taught l'—
" Grammaticus, rhetor, geometres, pictor, aliptes,
" Augur, scheenobates, medicos, magus, OMNIA NOVIT.'
" And all in 144 hours ! This is the training which is
to do ALL !"

Now let the reader picture to himself the state of
mental illumination, or mystification, which two
years of this locomotion, at railway speed, through
the world of knowledge% must produce upon the un-
happy mortal who has been dragged from his mud
cabin or his hedge school, to be made a " perfect
teacher" ! Why the ill-assorted rubbish of a ma-
rine store would be order and regularity itself com-
pared with such a man's mind. And yet to such a
class of crammed parrots is committed the " secular
education" of the youth of Ireland ! Can we wonder
that with such a system of " training" for the mas-
ter, the system of teaching for the scholar is grossly
inoperative, and calculated rather to darken than to
illuminate ? And this, be it remembered, is the
boasted perfect system of " liberalism" ! This is
the favourite " secular" system of the Blackburn's,
Hornby's, and Evans's of our own town !

STATE AND PROSPECTS OF THE CORN MARKET.--
Within the last fortnight we have had to notice a steady
upward movement of prices in most of our leading corn
markets, amounting, upon the average, to from 6s. to Bs.
per imperial quarter. In the Wakefield corn market the
price of wheat advanced, on Friday last, no less than 4s.
per quarter, making, with the advance of the two preced-
ing weeks, fully 9s. per quarter ; and in our own market
the advance of from 4d. to 6d. per 70 lbs' which we had
to note in our third edition last Tuesday, has been main-
tained during the week, in a market which may almost be
said to have been characterised by excitement. From the
best information we are able to gather, this feeling appears
to have arisen out of no fears for the safety, or the pro.
bable yield, of the approaching harvest ;- but rather from
an impression that,from the deficiency o the stocks offer-
ing and the backwardness of the growing crops, a supply
of foreign wheat, to some extent, will be required. It is
not at all anticipated, however, that extensive importa-
tions, if, indeed, any importations, to meet the emergency,
so far as it is at present foreseen, is likely to take place.
The temptation, under the present modified scale, is not
equal to the risk of importation; for without some most
untoward accident occurring to damage or greatly retard
the growing crops, there is no possibility of procuring any
thing from foreign depots to arrive before harvest. Added
to this hindrance of speculation, is the difficulty which
has been felt in keeping up the market, so as to act upon
the averages, in the face of the stocks which, either held
in warehouse or in bond, will come into consumption as
soon as any material advance in price is felt. An addi-
tional and novel action upon the market, likely to aid in
defeating any extensive operation upon the averages, is
likely to arise out of the working of the recent regulation
permitting foreign corn to be taken out of bond, on its
place being substituted by home grown, or duty paid,
wheat or flour. In such cases certificates are granted by
the Customs, which have changed hands amongst the
trade as a negotiable stock, at prices varying from 18s. Gd.
to 17s. per quarter ; and any change which brings the duty
much below these rates will, in all probability, drive the
holders to realise, as the difference of the duty and the
price paid for certificates will be much to increase the
risk and decrease the profit of holding.for advanced rates.
The general impression prevailing is, that any consider-
able rise will bring large stocks of free and bonded wheat
into the market ; and that the duty is not likely to drop,
lower than to 14s. or 12s. per quarter.

THE CHURCH.-It would be well in the present aspect
of affairs, when a large party are calling out for the do-
struction of a considerable branch of the Established
Church, if the clergy of that church-more generally would
impress upon their flocks what the church really is ; its
claims, and the advantages and privileges conferred on the
country by that institution. On Sunday evening, the
Rev. J. Baylee, at Trinity Church, Birkenhead, delivered
an eloquent and able discourse on this subject to a crowded
and most respectable congregation ; wherein he showed
from the Bible and Articles what the church really con-
sists of, and the blessings derived by those who compose
its members.

THE NEW STEAM-SHIP " HELEN MACGREGORu"—It
Will be found by an advertisement in another column that
a print will shortly be published of this fine vessel, from a
drawing by Mr. T. B. Horner, and executed by artists of
the first eminence. The beautiful prints of the Guadalupe,
steam-frigate, and other splendid vessels built at our port,
from drawings by the same talented gentleman, are a suf-
ficient guarantee for the spirit and nautical accuracy of
the forthcoming picture, to which it will form an appro-
priate companion. Mr. Horner, who is employed at Mr.
Laird's extensive iron ship-building establishment in North
Birkenhead, was a considerable time in the navy, and as a
modeller and draftsman of vessels, as well as u faithful de-
lineator of their " likenesses," has few equals. By the
the way, we have reason to be not a little proud of the col-
lection of portraits of large steam-ships, &c.,built within
the last few years at our own port, and so ably painted or
drawn by our townsmen, Mr. Walter, marine painter,
Mr. Horner, and others. Most of them may now be seen
at the Collegiate Exhibition, and are justly admired.
DANGER FROM L4RES IN SHEDS, &c.—By the recent
improvement act for the town, fires are not permitted to
be kept in sheds built of wood, or having wooden, and not
slate or metal roofs. The police officers, in consequence
of the numerous destructive fires that have occurred, hay.
received orders to look after such premises—of which three
are yet far too many—as well as yards, outbuildings, and
cellars, filled with combustible materials, such as " ma-
rine stores, rag depots," &c.—and on Saturday a con-
siderable number of persons were brought before the po-
lice magistrate, charged with having fires in sheds or build-
ings, built or roofed with wood, or partly so, renderin
them what is called in insurance parlance doubly hazard-
ous." Many of them were proved to be in the immediate
proximity of timber yards, valuably stored warehouses, or
the like. The parties were each fined in the mitigated
penalty of 40s. and costs, the extreme sum to which they
are liable on each repetition of the offence being £lO,
which Mr. Rushton declared his determination in future
to enforce. Two of the defendants stated that their pre-
mises had been inspected by the surveyor of the corpora-
tion appointed for this department, and that be had stated
to them that their sheds were such as fires might be kept
in. As he was not present to confirm or gainsay the as-
sertion, the fine was recorded against them conditionally,
until he should give his testimony in the court.

HARRINGTON AND HERCULANEUM Docits.---We are
glad to find that there is now a probability, almost amount;
ing to certainty, that a most magnificent plan will be
carried out on the South-shore, by which the evils con-
nected with our commercial management, and which are
so much to be deplored, will be fairly remedied. This,
too, will be done, without exciting those angry feelings
which have arisen from the determination of the Dock
Committee to resolve themselves into a company of ware-
house owners. The amalgamation of these two great es-
tates, and a powerful mercantile interest uniting with sub-
scribed capital to erect docks and warehouses, opens a new
era in the history of our town ; and will, undoubtedly, give
facilities to our commerce, security to goods and merchan-
dise, unity of management, combined with the reduction
of the fearful premiums of insurance, which every well-
wisher of the town must rejoice to see. We find, from
good authority, that many of the leading firms are taking
steps to carry out this most desirable object; and that in
a very few days a plan will be before the public, which
will embrace the advantages so much sought after, with
that security which is so greatly needed. Extensive fire-
proof buildings for the storage of cotton are now in pro-
gress of erection adjoining the Egerton Dock ; and we
hope, for the sake of our commerce, that no time will be
lost in completing these splendid works, before the cha-
racter of the town as a commercial entrepot irretrieva-