be of great use throughout the country in restoring many of our best old English melodies to their popularity, and in improving the character of our vocal music in village churches, through the medium of the parochial schoolmaster and his pupils.

When the preparatory course was sufficiently advanced, a series of lectures on the construction and organization of elementary schools, and on the theory and art of teaching, were commenced. They have resembled those given in the German and Swiss schools under the generic term Pædagogik.

They have treated of the general objects of education, and the means of attaining them. The peculiar aims of elementary education; the structure of school-houses in various parts of Europe; the internal arrangement of the desks, forms, and school apparatus, in reference to different methods of instruction, and the varieties of those methods observed in different countries. The theory of the discipline of schools. Its practice, describing in detail the different expedients resorted to in different countries for the purpose of procuring order, decorum, propriety of posture and manner, regularity and precision in movements, and in changes of classes and exercises, and especially the right means of securing the reverence and the love of the children. This last subject naturally connects the consideration of the mechanical and methodic expedients with the consideration of the sources of the schoolmaster's zeal, activity, and influence, on which much has been said. To these subjects have succeeded lectures on the great leading distinctions in the methods of communicating knowledge. When the distinguishing principles had been described, the characteristic features of the several methods were examined generally, and certain peculiar applications of each were treated. The application of these methods to each individual branch of instruction was then commenced, and this part of the course has treated of various methods of teaching to read, especially giving a minute description of the phonic method. Of methods of teaching to write, giving a special account of the method of Mulhauser. On the application of writing in various methods of instruction. Of methods of teaching to draw, giving a detailed account of that of M. Dupuis. Of methods of teaching arithmetic, in which the method of Pestalozzi has been carefully explained, and other expedients examined. This brief sketch may indicate the character of the instruction up to the period of this report. Our desire is to anticipate as little as possible, but, on the contrary, to relate only what has been done. We have therefore only to add, that the instruction in Pædagogik is in its preparatory stage, and that the course will be pursued, in relation both to the general theory and practice, and to the special application of the theory and practice to the development of the village school, and of the training school, through the whole period of instruction, as that part of the studies of the pupils by which the mutual relations of these studies are revealed, and their future application anticipated.

We regard these lectures, combined with the zealous labor of the Hon. and Rev. Robert Eden, as the chief means by which, aided by the tutors, such a tone of feeling can be maintained as shall prepare the teachers to enter upon their important duties, actuated by motives which will be the best means of insuring their perseverance, and promoting their success.

The Brothers of the Christian Doctrine, who devote their lives a cheerful sacrifice to the education of the poorer classes of France, can be understood best by those who have visited their Novitiate and schools at Paris. From such persons we expect acquiescence when we say, that their example of Christian zeal is worthy of the imitation of Protestants. Three of the brothers of this order are maintained for a sum which is barely the stipend of one teacher of a school of mutual instruction in Paris. Their schools are unquestionably the best at Paris. Their manners are simple, affectionate, and sincere. The children are singularly attached to them. How could it be otherwise, when they perceive that these good men have no other reward on earth for their manifold labors than that of an approving conscience?

The régime of the Novitiate is one of considerable austerity. They rise at four. They spend an hour in private devotion, which is followed by two hours of religious exercises in their chapel. They breakfast soon afterward, and are in the day schools of Paris at nine. They dine about noon, and continue their

attention to the schools till five. They sup at six, and then many of them are employed in evening schools for the adults from seven to nine, or from eight to ten, when, after prayers, they immediately retire to rest.

No one can enter the schools of the Brothers of the Christian Doctrine without feeling instinctively that he is witnessing a remarkable example of the development of Christian charity.

With such motives should the teachers of elementary schools, and especially those who are called to the arduous duties of training pauper children, go forth to their work. The path of the teacher is strewn with disappointments, if be commence with a mercenary spirit: it is full of encouragement, if he be inspired with the spirit of Christian charity. No skill can compensate adequately for the absence of a pervading religious influence on the character and conduct of the schoolmaster.

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The technical instruction in that knowledge which it will be the duty of the pupils to communicate in elementary schools, occupies a much greater portion of the time in the preparatory course than that which will be allotted to such studies in the two subsequent years.

Every month will now bring into greater prominence instruction, theoretical and practical, in the art of teaching. The outlines only of a future course of instruction in this most important element of the studies of a training school have been communicated. Some of the principles have been laid down, but the application of these principles to each subject of instruction, and the arrangement of the entire matter of technical knowledge, in accordance with the principles of elementary teaching, is a labor to which a large portion of the future time of the pupils must be devoted.

Those studies which will prepare them for the performance of collateral duties in the village or parish have not been commenced.

The instruction in the management of a garden; in pruning and grafting trees; in the relative qualities of soils, manures, and the rotation of garden crops, is to form a part of the course of instruction, after the certificate of candidate is obtained.

A course on the domestic economy of the poor will be delivered in the same year, which will be followed by another on the means of preserving health, especially with regard to the employments, habits, and wants of the working classes. Some general lectures on the relations of labor and capital will close this course.

From the following extracts from the Report of the Founders of the Institution in 1843, it will be seen that they were induced, after three years' experience, to change one feature of their original plan, and, instead of tak ing boys of the age of fourteen, to select their candidates for admission from youths who had attained the age of eighteen or twenty years. This change has special reference to teachers designed for large schools in commercial towns and manufacturing districts. They also advise a course of prepara tory training, previous to their admission into a Normal School, similar to that pursued in Holland.

In Holland, the elementary schoolmasters of every great town form a society, associated for their common benefit. Their schools are always large, varying in numbers from three to seven hundred, or even a thousand children, who are often assembled in one room. Every master is aided by a certain number of assistants of different ages, and by pupil-teachers.

The course through which a youth passes from a position of distinction, as one of the most successful scholars, to that of master of a school, is obvious. He is apprenticed as a pupil- teacher (an assistant equivalent, in the first stage, to the most superior class of our monitors in England). As pupil-teacher he assists in the instruction of the youngest classes during the day, witnessing and taking part in the general movements of the school, and in the maintenance of discipline and order. He resides with his own family in the city, and before he is admitted apprentice, care is taken to ascertain that he belongs to a well-conducted house

hold, and that he will be reared by his parents in habits of religion and order. Every evening all the pupil-teachers of the town are assembled to receive instruction. The society of teachers provides from its own body a succession of instructors, by one of whom, on each night of the week, the pupil-teachers are taught some branch of elementary knowledge necessary to school-keeping. One of the most experienced masters of the town, likewise, gives them lectures on method, and on the art of organizing and conducting a school.

The society of schoolmasters meets from time to time to receive from each of its members an account of the conduct, progress, and qualifications of each pupilteacher in the town, not only in the evening class, but in the school duties of the day.

On the reputation thus acquired, and preserved, depends the progress of the pupil-teacher in the art of school-keeping. As his experience becomes more mature, and his knowledge increases, he is intrusted with more important matters and higher classes in the school. He undergoes two successive examinations by the Government Inspector, being first admitted candidate and afterward assistant master, and he is then at liberty to complete his course of training by entering the Normal School at Haarlem, from which he can obtain the highest certificates of fitness for the duties of his profession.

This appears to us a course of training peculiarly well adapted to the formation of masters for the great schools of large towns, and likewise for supplying these great schools, during the education of the pupil-teacher, with the indispensable aid of a body of assistant masters, without which they must continue to be examples of an economy which can spare nothing adequate to the improvement of the people.

The formation of a body of pupil-teachers in each great town, thus instructed by a society of schoolmasters, is an object worthy of encouragement from the Committee of Council, who might at least provide the fees and charges of apprenticeship, and grant exhibitions for the training of the most successful pupilteachers in a Normal School at the close of their apprenticeship, even if the Government were indisposed to encounter any of the annual charges incident to the plan.

Few words are requisite to render apparent the difference between the life of a pupil-teacher so trained, and that of a young novice in a Normal School. The familiar life of the parental household, while it exercises a salutary influence on the habits and manners of the young candidate, is not remote from the great scene of exertion in which his future life is to be spent. He is unconsciously prepared by the daily occurrences in his father's family, and by his experience and instruction in the day and evening school, to form a just estimate of the circumstances by which he is surrounded. He is trained from day to day in the management of the artful and corrupt children even of the dregs of the city, and enabled to apply such means as the discipline and instruction of a common school afford, to the improvement of the moral and intellectual condition of the children of the common people. He becomes an agent of civilization, fitted for a peculiar work by habit, and prepared to imbibe during the year or year and a half he may spend in a Normal School those higher maxims of conduct, that more exact knowledge, and those more perfect methods of which it is the proper source. From such a period of training, he returns to his native city, or is sent to some other town, strong in the confidence inspired by his prolonged experience of the peculiar duties he has to perform, either to take a high rank as an assistant master, or to undertake the responsibility of conducting a town school as its chief.

These are the views which have led us to conclude that the admission of boys into a Normal School, as distinguished from a Mother School, is not a fit preparation for the discharge of the duties of a schoolmaster in a large town.

We have gradually raised the age of admission from 14 to 16, and thence to 18 or 20 years, and we are now of opinion that few or none should be admitted into a Normal School under the latter age.

Besides the reasons already stated why youths under 18 should not be admitted into such a school, there are some arising out of the internal economy of a Normal School of sufficient importance to deserve enumeration.

If youths are admitted, none who have arrived at adult age should be per mitted to enter. The youth necessarily enters for a course of training which ex

tends over several years; the adult student commonly enters for a year and a half or two years. The attainments of all are meager on their admission. In the course of a few years, therefore, the youngest pupils are necessarily at the head of the school in their attainments and skill, which is a source of great discouragement to an adult entering such an establishment, and a dangerous distinction to a youth whose acquirements have suddenly raised him intellectually above all in his sphere of life. The tendencies of such a great disparity in the acquirements appropriate to the two classes of age are obviously injurious. We have experienced the consequences of this disparity as a disturbing force in the training schools, and to counteract these tendencies has required a vigilance and provident care, which has increased our labors and anxieties. Few things have been more pleasing than the readiness with which some of the oldest students who have entered the schools have taken their seats in the humblest positions, and passed with patient perseverance through all the elementary drudgery, though boys have held the most prominent positions in the first class, and have occasionally become their instructors. On the other hand, to check the conceit too frequently engendered by a rapid progress, when attended with such contrasts, we have suggested to the masters, that the humble assiduity of the recently entered adult pupil ought to secure an expressive deference and attention. The intellectual development of the young pupils is a source of care insignificant in comparison with that attending the formation of their characters, and this could be accomplished with greater ease and certainty if they were the sole objects of solicitude. But, as members of an establishment into which adults are admitted in an equality or inferiority of position, the discipline is complicated and the sources of error are increased.

For these reasons, we prefer to admit into a Normal School only students of adult age, reared by religious parents, and concerning whose characters and qualifications the most satisfactory testimonials can be procured. The inquiries preliminary to the admission of a student should in all cases, where it may be practicable, extend to his previous habits and occupations, to the character of the household in which he has resided, and the friendships he has formed. In all cases those young men are to be preferred whose previous pursuits warrant some confidence in their having a predilection for the duties of a teacher of the poor.

Our plans have therefore tended to the introduction of young men of 18 years of age and upward for a training of one year and a half, which we are led to regard as the shortest period which it is desirable they should spend in such a

school.

With this explanation of a modification of one feature in their original plan, the Report for 1843 proceeds to discuss the main objects of a Normal School.

The main object of a Normal School is the formation of the character of the schoolmaster. This was the primary idea which guided our earliest efforts in the establishment of the Battersea Schools on a basis different from that of any previous example in this country. We have submitted to your lordship the reasons which have led us to modify one of the chief features of our plan, but our convictions adhere with undiminished force to the principle on which the schools were originally founded. They were intended to be an institution in which every object was subservient to the formation of the character of the schoolmaster, as an intelligent Christian man entering on the instruction of the poor, with religious devotion to his work. If we propose to change the means, the end we have in view is the same. Compelled by the foregoing considerations to think the course of training we proposed for youths does not prepare them for the charge of large schools in manufacturing towns, we are anxious that the system pursued in Holland should be adopted, as a training preparatory to the examination of the pupil-teachers previously to their admission into a Normal School. Finding that the patrons of students and the friends of the establishment are anable, for the most part, to support a longer training for young men than one year and a half, we are more anxious respecting the investigation of their pre

vious characters and connections, and more fastidious as to their intellectual qualifications and acquirements.

When circumstances thus combine to prevent the residence of the students in the training school for a longer period than a year and a half, the inquiries as to previous character cannot be conducted with too much care, and the first month of training should, under any circumstances, be regarded as probationary.

Under these arrangements, also, the impression produced upon the characters of the students during their residence is of paramount importance.

They are commonly selected from an humble sphere. They are the sons of small tradesmen, of bailiffs, of servants, or of superior mechanics. Few have received any education, except that given in a common parochial school. They read and write very imperfectly; are unable to indite a letter correctly; and are seldom skillful, even in the first four rules of arithmetic. Their biblical knowledge is meager and inaccurate, and all their conceptions, not less on religious than on other subjects, are vague and confused, even when they are not also very limited or erroneous. Their habits have seldom prepared them for the severely regular life of the Normal School, much less for the strenuous effort of attention and application required by the daily routine of instruction. Such concentration of the mind would soon derange the health, if the course of training did not provide moderate daily exercise in the garden, at proper intervals. The mental torpor, which at first is an obstacle to improvement, generally passes away in about three months, and from that period the student makes rapid progress in the studies of the school.

These attainments, humble though they be, might prove dangerous to the character of the student, if his intellectual development were the chief concern of the masters.

How easy it would be for him to form an overweening estimate of his knowledge and ability, must be apparent, when it is remembered that he will measure his learning by the standard of that possessed by his own friends and neighbors. He will find himself suddenly raised by a brief course of training to the position of a teacher and example. If his mind were not thoroughly penetrated by religious principle, or if a presumptuous or mercenary tone had been given to his character, he might go forth to bring discredit upon education, by exhibiting a precocious vanity, an insubordinate spirit, or a selfish ambition. He might become, not the gentle and pious guide of the children of the poor, but a hireling, into whose mind had sunk the doubts of the skeptic; in whose heart was the worm of social discontent; and who had changed the docility of ignorance and dullness, for the restless impatience of a vulgar and conceited sciolist.

In the formation of the character of the schoolmaster, the discipline of the training school should be so devised as to prepare him for the modest respectability of his lot. He is to be a Christian teacher, following Him who said, "He that will be my disciple, let him take up his cross." Without the spirit of selfdenial, he is nothing. His reward must be in his work. There should be great, simplicity in the life of such a man.

Obscure and secluded schools need masters of a contented spirit, to whom the training of the children committed to their charge has charms sufficient to concentrate their thoughts and exertions on the humble sphere in which they live, notwithstanding the privations of a life but little superior to the level of the surrounding peasantry. When the scene of the teacher's exertions is in a neighborhood which brings him into association with the middle and upper classes of society, his emoluments will be greater, and he will be surrounded by temptations which, in the absence of a suitable preparation of mind, might rob him of that humility and gentleness which are among the most necessary qualifications of the teacher of a common school.

In the training school, habits should be formed consistent with the modesty of his future life. On this account, we attach peculiar importance to the discipline which we have established at Battersea. Only one servant, besides a cook, has been kept for the domestic duties of the household. The whole household work, with the exception of the scouring of the floors and cooking, is performed by the students; and they likewise not only milk and clean the cows, feed and tend the pigs, but have charge of the stores, wait upon each other, and cultivate the garden. We cannot too emphatically state our opinion that no portion of this