The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus

by American Anti-Slavery Society

RESULTS.

Besides an attendance upon the various schools, we procured specific information from teachers, missionaries, planters, and others, with regard to the past and present state of education, and the weight of testimony was to the following effect:

First, That education was by no means extensive previous to emancipation. The testimony of one planter was, that not a tenth part of the present adult population knew the letters of the alphabet. Other planters, and some missionaries, thought the proportion might be somewhat larger; but all agreed that it was very small. The testimony of the venerable Mr. Newby, the oldest Moravian missionary in the island, was, that such was the opposition among the planters, it was impossible to teach the slaves, excepting by night, secretly. Mr. Thwaites informed us that the children were not allowed to attend day school after they were six years old. All the instruction they obtained after that age, was got at night--a very unsuitable time to study, for those who worked all day under an exhausting sun. It is manifest that the instruction received under six years of age, would soon be effaced by the incessant toil of subsequent life. The account given in a former connection of the adult school under the charge of Mr. Morrish, at Newfield, shows most clearly the past inattention to education. And yet Mr. M. stated that his school was a fair specimen of the intelligence of the negroes generally. One more evidence in point is the acknowledged ignorance of Mr. Thwaites' teachers. After searching through the whole freed population for a dozen suitable teachers of children. Mr. T. could not find even that number who could read well. Many children in the schools of six years old read better than their teachers.

We must not be understood to intimate that up to the period of the Emancipation, the planters utterly prohibited the education of their slaves. Public sentiment had undergone some change previous to that event. When the public opinion of England began to be awakened against slavery, the planters were indured, for peace sake, to tolerate education to some extent; though they cannot be said to have encouraged it until after Emancipation. This is the substance of the statements made to us. Hence it appears that when the active opposition of the planters to education ceased, it was succeeded by a general indifference, but little less discouraging. We of course speak of the planters as a body; there were some honorable exceptions.

Second, Education has become very extensive since emancipation. There are probably not less than six thousand children who now enjoy daily instruction. These are of all ages under twelve. All classes feel an interest in knowledge. While the schools previously established are flourishing in newness of life, additional ones are springing up in every quarter. Sabbath schools, adult and infant schools, day and evening schools, are all crowded. A teacher in a Sabbath school in St. John's informed us, that the increase in that school immediately after emancipation was so sudden and great, that he could compare it to nothing but the rising of the mercury when the thermometer is removed out of the shade into the sun.

We learned that the Bible was the principal book taught in all the schools throughout the island. As soon as the children have learned to read, the Bible is put into their hands. They not only read it, but commit to memory portions of it every day:--the first lesson in the morning is an examination on some passage of scripture. We have never seen, even among Sabbath school children, a better acquaintance with the characters and events recorded in the Old and New Testaments, than among the negro children in Antigua. Those passages which inculcate obedience to law are strongly enforced; and the prohibitions against stealing, lying, cheating, idleness, &c., are reiterated day and night.

Great attention is paid to singing in all the schools.

The songs which they usually sung, embraced such topics as Love to God--the presence of God--obedience to parents--friendship for brothers and sisters and schoolmates--love of school--the sinfulness of sloth, of lying, and of stealing. We quote the following hymn as a specimen of the subjects which are introduced into their songs: often were we greeted with this sweet hymn, while visiting the different schools throughout the island.

BROTHERLY LOVE.

CHORUS.