[38] On this subject the prevailing opinions in different countries disagree, as they do also on some of the others.
[39] Late Secretary of the Massachusetts Board of Education. Reference is here especially made to his Fifth Annual Report, bearing date January 1, 1842, from which, with his consent, what follows under this head has been substantially drawn.
[40] The New York Free School State Convention, held in Syracuse the 10th and 11th of July inst. (1850), unanimously adopted an Address to the People of the State, written by Horace Greeley, in which the following passage occurs, inculcating the same sentiment: "Property is deeply interested in the Education of All. There is no farm, no bank, no mill, no shop—unless it be a grog-shop—which is not more valuable and more profitable to its owner if located among a well-educated than if surrounded by an ignorant population. Simply as a matter of interest, we hold it to be the duty of Property to itself to provide Education for All."
[41] In Connecticut the statutes provide "that no child under the age of fifteen years shall be employed to labor in any manufacturing establishment, or in any other business in the state, unless such child shall have attended some public or private day school where instruction is given by a teacher qualified to instruct in orthography, reading, writing, English grammar, geography, and arithmetic, at least three months of the twelve months next preceding any and every year in which such child shall be so employed. And the owner, agent, or superintendent of any manufacturing establishment who shall employ any child in such establishment contrary to the provisions of this act, shall forfeit and pay for each offense a penalty of twenty-five dollars to the treasurer of the state." In Massachusetts the forfeiture is fifty dollars. Similar provisions exist in other American, and in several European states.
[42] This statement was made eight years ago. More such patents may have been taken out within this time.
[43] Quoted from the Report to the Secretary of State for the Home Department, on the Training of Pauper Children, London, 1841.
[44] Fred. Hill, author of National Education, whose testimony is quoted at the head of this article.
[45] See evidence taken by Edwin Chadwick, Esq., Secretary to the Poor-Law Commissioners, a quotation from whose report heads this article.
[46] The writer would here remark, in reference to extracts made from various authors, that, for the sake of abridging, he has often, as in this case, left out parts of a paragraph, but never so as to modify the meaning. Some ideas, not connected with the subject in hand, are omitted, but none are changed.
[47] The escrivanos, who figure so largely in Spain, are the representatives of the lowest class of attorneys. Nothing can be done without them, and they are not unfrequently almost the sole authority in a place capable of reading and writing. Notwithstanding the miserable state of the rural districts, they contrive to make money, and many of them rise from this humble office to much higher places in the state. Their wretched appointments are, consequently, objects of competition. I witnessed the execution of one at Seville by accidentally entering the Plaza, where the Capuchins were bawling out the last words for his repetition, announcing to the crowd that they had done their duty, and he died in the true faith. He had been superseded in some village in the vicinity, and assassinated his rival.—Cook's Sketches in Spain, vol. i., p. 197.