inspector in reading, writing, and arithmetic—we
could commend harder penalties on proved
neglect of the most elementary training—but
no grant is allowed for the teaching of a child
more than eleven years old. It is also unreasonably
demanded that the little ones in the infant
schools, many of whom are only in the elements
of talking, should pass an examination, and show
themselves able to read narratives in
monosyllables, make letters on the black board, and
figures on a slate, before there shall be any
allowance made on their behalf. Again, the
grants of from fifteen to thirty pounds a year in
aid of salary to the certificated schoolmaster,
who works under inspection, are to be abolished.
The work of the training colleges is undermined,
and the further existence of the present pupil-
teacher system threatened by the substitution of
an apprenticeship readily terminable, in a school
faintly supported by the new mind of the government
that resolves to look to education in "the
three Rs," and to nothing else. Inspectors
are to attend only to proficiency in reading,
writing, and arithmetic; and teachers are to get
credit or aid from government only on that
account, while the public education of all
children beyond the age of eleven is
discountenanced.

It is argued that state help ought not to
supplant voluntary aid. A famous thing that is at
present to rely upon, for the instruction of a
people! As the Rev. J. Fraser, an assistant
commissioner, says of one specimen district which
comprises Hereford and Sherbome: "Think of
a duke owning all the property in a parish, the
ratable value of which is upwards of five
thousand pounds, yet not subscribing a sixpence to
the school, the whole cost of which has to be
borne by a clergyman with seven children, whose
living is barely a net four hundred pounds a
year! Think of a general in the army and a
member of parliament, who may therefore be
presumed to be a man with a competency,
drawing twelve hundred pounds a year from a
parish—four hundred pounds of it in great
tithes—and saying that he could not promise
anything regularly to the school, as though a
school could be maintained in a state of
efficiency on irregular promises! Think of a
nobleman of great wealth, and of opinions
favourable to the elevation of the poorer classes,
in return for an income of two thousand pound;
a year accruing from a parish, remitting three
guineas' subscription to the school, with the
bitter jest accompanying it, 'You know I let
you have your premises rent free, and I consider
that worth another twenty pounds a year!
Think of another peer contributing thirty-five
pounds a year to the support of the school in
the parish where his mansion stands, and in the
very next parish, from which he is said to derive
an income of four thousand pounds a year, and
which has twice the population, limiting his
liberality to a subscription of five pounds—just
one-seventh of the amount! Think elsewhere
of a proprietor of eighteen hundred pounds a
year subscribing three pounds to the school, but
(that he may not be out of pocket) receiving
back three pounds ten as rent for the room in
which it is held! Think of the united
subcriptions of the landowners in a parish of
eight thousand acres of the best land in
Hereordshire, whose rental must be at least twelve
thousand pounds a year, two of them peers of
the realm, and one a very wealthy peer, amounting
to eighteen pounds; the cost of the school
meanwhile (which is one of the largest and best
in Herefordshire) being upwards of one hundred
pounds a year, and the poor incumbent being
driven forth among his personal friends, quite
unconnected with the parish, to make up the
deiciency!"

The effect of the revised code would be to
reduce the pay and the social grade of the national
teacher; it would be to repress the present
tendency of improved national school discipline to
raise the character of education for the higher
classes of society; it would be, in short, to put
the clock back four or five hours because it is
as many minutes slow; to throw the cards up
in a winning game, out of wrath at the loss of a
trick; not to cut off the nose to spite the face,
but to chop off the head to spite the nose.

There are a dozen good ways of enforcing first
attention to essentials. No forfeitures or penalties
would be thought harsh in the case of a
school that set show before substance in its
elementary training; but let us not be afraid of
giving, at the same time, the best help we can
offer to the minds of those children of honest
parents who are least favoured by fortune.
Even if we thus enable D of the national school
to rise in life above C of the village private
school, so let it be. C is exactly where he would
have been, while D's advance is so much power
secured for his country. In a few generations,
inequalities in life that cannot be avoided, and
that belong to the working out of every great
principle, will have corrected themselves, and
we may hope that our country will thrive on
the blessing of a wide and general diffusion of
well-trained intelligence throughout the land.

RABBI BEN EPHRAIM'S TREASURE.

I.

THE days of Rabbi Ben Ephraim
Were two score years and ten, the day
The hangman call'd at last for him,
And he privily fled from Cordova.
Drop by drop, he had watch'd the cup
Of the wine of bitterness fill'd to the brim;
Drop by drop, he had drain'd it up;
And the time was an evil time for him.
An evil time! For Jehovah's face
Was turn'd in wrath from His chosen race,
And the daughter of Judah must mourn,
Whom His anger had left, in evil case,
To be dogg'd by death from place to place,
With garments bloody and torn.
The time of the heavy years, from of old
By the mouth of His servant the Prophet foretold,
In the days of Josiah the king,
When the Lord upon Jacob his load should bring,
And the hand of Heaven, in the day of His ire,
Be heavy and Lot upon son and sire,