The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1868-07-10
Tho Relics Of MDOthebOys" Hall.
ENGLAND.


ganzed scheme of national education can oe
completed and brought into general use. Inc
first blue book 'On the Education OF the Lower
Orders dates from the year 1917 Eduoa-
tional inquiries were frequent during the reign
of George " and the system pursued IN the
parochial and burgh schools OF Scotland
was infinitely contrasted with the anti
ouated and effete English grammar schools
and the disgraceful charter schools of
Ireland. But it was between 1880 and 1910
that educational investiga gatons-which had
received fresh impetus by the Reform move
ment-attracted an amount Of public attention
hitherto unknown. National Schools So
called, sprang up all over the kingdom. 'Bri-
tish and Foreign schools multiplied; pros
porous tradesmen boasted that they would pay
no more than threepence a week for their chill
dren's schooling, and Eton and Harrow were
for a time thrown into the shade by Kings
College and the school in Cover street. From
1910 to 1850 educational agitation languished,
but within the last decade and half the sub
iect has continued to be almost incessantly
discussed.
"Mr. Bryce, one of the Assistant Commits
sjoners in the recent inquiry--the reports of
which are in themselves good-sized library
has published some curious statements re-
garding what are termed ''cheap" boarding
schools, and his evidence may be studied with
considerable profit by those who would add
to their stock of information. Lancashire ap-
pears to be now the chosen county for cheap
schools Those Yorkshire schools, the very
mention of which reminds us at once of Dothe-
bows Hall and Mr.. Wackford Squeers, appear
to be well nigh extinct. The cheap Lanca-
shire school is generally placed in the country,
or in some small town, partly because house
rent is lower there than in the large centres
of population partly for the sake of seclusion.
'An unfriendly Observer Mr.. Bryce rather
maliciously remarks, might say that these
schools were fixed in out-of-the-way places
'fOr the sake of secresy.' In the opinion of
the Assistant Commissioner, they are not
primarily places of teaching, but places of
lodging and feeding. Lazy or unmanageable
boys children who are wholly or partially
orphans, or whose parents are abroad, are
consigned to these dismal receptacles in order
to get them out of the way.
"Mr. Bryce might have added that the
Cheap boarding school offers convenient Op-
pOrtunity for the disposal of illegitmate chill
dren. The average cost of board and educa-
tion at these schools is stated at twenty-five
guneas year, for which sum, Mr.. Bryce con-
tends, a private school.master cannot give
good food, comfortable accommodation, and a
thorough plain education. If the Assistant
Commissioner had taken the trouble to glance
at the advertisement columns of the newspa-
Der he would have found that thorough edu-
cation and food unlimited are frequently
offered for twenty, and even for sixteen pounds
a year. AT one school visited by Mr.. Bryce
the dietary of his boys was bread, and he ex-
hibited some of his loaves pressing them with
his thumb to show their elasticity. In his
prospectus he advertised 'an unlimited supply
of the best provisions.
''The official inquirer, however, sees no
reason to assume that boys in these cheap
schools are beaten or ill-tre ated; at least, he
naively adds, one hears of no cases of starva-
tion' STILL the cheap schoOl-boy is msera-
bly, lodged. One chamber inspected by the
have dressed and undressed standing on their
wretched pallets. Ia other instances the over
crowding was quite as ruthless, and the beds
were shOckiugly dirty. Mr.. Bryce found many
cheap schoolmasters who were themselves
utterly incompetent to teach, but who ex-
pected to get good usher for thirty pounds a
year with board and lodging. On testing the
qualifications of the boys in one cheap
school, it was found that of history or geo
graphy the pupils had no rational idea The
clumsiness and inaccurscy of their ciphering
bore witness to bad and stupid teaching.
GAS regards the discipline, Mr.. Bryce con-
fesses that he lacks trustworthy information.
The boys, he says, look cowed, feeble, and de-
jected. Whether it is want Of air, he con-
tinues, that makes them pale, or the want of
fresh vigorous life in this isolation where
they are kept always pretending to learn, yet
feeling, if they have any sense, that the whole
thing is sham, or whether they are naturally
poor specimens of boyhOod, sent away from
nome on that account, certain 1t Is that there
is something almost painful about the aspect
of boys in these paces-nO color in their
cheeks no animation in their answers no glee
in their sports Mr.. Bryce admits, in conclu-
sion, that he would have given great deal to
have ten minutes private converse with these
pallid and detected lads, or with some discon-
tented usher, who might have revealed the
secrets of the prison-h house. 1t may be limited
parenthetically, however, that the revelations
OF 'discOntented ushers' are not always to be
trusted
"Suoh is the not very rose-tinted picture
drawn by state official of the cheap board
ing-schOOls of provincial England. In bad
form he believes these establishments to be
not uncommon; in their worst form Mr. Bryce
Is glad to think that they are rare, but he
contends that they should be impossible. A
little philosophy is requisite as a corrective to
Mr.. Bryce's virtuOus indignation. The 'cheap'
bOarding-schoOl will not be impossible so
long as parents are foolish or stingy enough
to expect that for paltry pittance of twenty
or twenty-five pounds year their children
can be thoroughly taught, comfortably lodged
ana abundantly fed. The supply of inferior
boarding-schools only keeps pace with the de-
mand; and so long as parents choose to live
Ostentatiously, and to spend on their own plea
sures the money which should be devoted To
the education of their children, so long viii
boys and girls be packed off out of the Way TO
cheap and nasty schools.
meanwhile we are glad to perceive that
MIR. Bryce acquits the conductors of these
establishments of positive cruelty to the for
ioIn little fellows entrusted to their keeping.