“No; where the rector does not go, his people may not. We have tried every means to unite with them, but without effect. All the exertions here are for the good of the school, but in the other village for the good of the church. They want a teacher who will serve them in the school, the Sunday-school, and the choir.”
But on this parish controversy a few words were spoken to me by a diligent member of the Established Church. He said, “The rector thinks he ought to be one of the trustees of the British school, as a bequest upon which it is in part founded says that the clergyman of the parish shall be one of the trustees, but they say that they will wait until the trusteeship is vacant.” The place was filled, I understood, by the former rector, who, as I have said, was described as a tiny little man; a clever, very learned man; a stanch liberal in politics, over eighty years of age.
Afterwards, in Manchester, I met a person who spoke further on the subject of public schools. I give what he said, as drawn from my notes, on his own authority; for although it does not especially concern the parish of Haddenham cum Stonea, yet it does the general subject of English schools.
He said that the members of the Church of England support National or Church of England schools. The Roman Catholics support their own. The dissenters support unsectarian British schools, which receive all denominations. There is yet another class of elementary ones, namely, School Board schools. These boards are elected by the rate- or tax-payers. The schools are established in districts where there are not enough others to educate the children. It not unfrequently happens that a Church school or a British one which is unable to support itself, in spite of the government assistance before described, is turned over by its conductors to the school board. In Manchester this board has now in its schools about two-fifths of the children.
If the board wishes to establish a new school it has first to obtain leave from the committee on education of the Privy Council, belonging to the general government or to the ministry for the time being. The policy of the government is to prevent school boards from supplanting the sectarian schools; they are only allowed to supplement them, and no matter how poor the sectarian school may be, there is no way of getting it closed so long as Her Majesty’s inspector pronounces it efficient. The reports of the inspectors show that Board schools are improving more rapidly than others.
When by the act of 1870 these schools were first established they were regarded by the conductors of the others with contempt, especially by those of the Roman Catholic and Church schools; but such has been their progress within this brief period that they are now regarded with jealousy.
As to the prices charged by the Board schools, they must submit the payment of their proposed fees to the committee of Privy Council. The others mentioned may charge up to eighteen cents a week for instruction.
If a private school be inefficient, the school board may prosecute the parents of the children. But this applies to schools which teach pupils at less than eighteen cents per week; such as the old “Dame schools,” now nearly extinct, at least in Manchester.
MISCELLANEOUS.
Ways of living in England differ from those I am accustomed to in points before mentioned, such as the large number of meals, and the short hours of farm labor. A Lancashire youth complained that they clemmed or starved him in America on three meals a day. In this rural region those who can afford it take four, tea being in the afternoon and supper before going to bed.