But the Austrian government had not been contented with a mere improvement of the soil or of the modes of communication—it had employed extraordinary efforts in giving education to the people. We are to remember the difficulties which impede all such efforts in Romish countries. Where the priest regulates the faith, he must always be jealous of the education. But the German habits of the government predominated over the superstition of Rome, and a species of military discipline was introduced, to compel the young Italians to learn the use of their indolent understandings. Within a few years after the peace of 1815 a national school system was put in action in Lombardy. Within a few more years it had spread over the whole country, with such effect, that there was scarcely a commune without its public place of education. The schools for boys amounted to upwards of two thousand three hundred, and for girls to upwards of twelve hundred. Nearly a hundred of the schools for boys taught a very extensive course of practical knowledge. The higher classes learned architecture, mechanics, geography, drawing, and natural history, in the vigorous, useful way for which German education is distinguished. Still higher schools, or portions of the former, were placed in the chief towns, for the practical acquirement of the known ledge most important for servants of public offices. There the chief studies were history, commerce, mathematics, chemistry, and French, German, and Italian. Under this system, it is evident that very solid and valuable acquirements might be made; and those were solely the work of the Austrian sovereignty.
We give a slight abstract of the plan of education in the female schools, because it is on this point that England is still most deficient.
The female elementary schools had three classes.
In the youngest were taught spelling and writing, mental and written arithmetic, needlework, and the Catechism.
In the second were taught the elements of grammar, the four rules of arithmetic, and needlework, consisting of marking and embroidery, with religious instruction.
In the third were taught religion, sacred history, geography, Italian grammar, letter-writing, weights and measures, and the nature and history of coin.
All those acquirements were, of course, dictated by the necessities and habits of native life; but they compose a scale of practical knowledge which, while useful in their humblest capacity, would form an admirable ground-work for every attainment of the female mind. It is probably from some sense of hazard that we do not observe music among the objects of education: for doubtless singing must have been one of the habits of schools taught by a German system. We should also have desired to see some knowledge of domestic arrangements, of the culinary arts, and of making their own dress. However, it is probable that these obvious advantages, especially for the life of the peasantry, may have been added subsequently to the period from which our information is derived.
We should rejoice to see in England national institutions of this order established for the education of young females of every rank, thus withdrawing the daughters of the peasantry from those coarse drudgeries of the field which were never intended for them, relieving the female population of the manufacturing towns alike from the factory labour and the town habits, and training for the labouring population honest, useful, and moral partners of their lives. In the higher ranks, the activity, regularity, and practical use of all their occupations would be scarcely less essential; and we should see in the rising generation a race of accomplished women who had learned every thing that was of importance to make them the intellectual associates of the intelligent world, while they had acquired those domestic habits, and were entitled to avail themselves of those graceful and useful arts, which make home pleasing without feeble indulgence, hospitality cheerful without extravagance, and even time itself pass without leaving behind a regret for wasted hours.
The Lombard system had been subsequently applied to the Venetian provinces; where, twenty years ago, the number of schools had risen to between fourteen and fifteen hundred. The number of boys then attending the schools was upwards of sixty thousand. Higher still, there were eighty-six gymnasia or colleges, with three hundred professors, and attended by upwards of seven thousand students, with thirty-four colleges for females. Higher still were the twelve Lyceums, for philosophical studies; and, at the summit of all, the two universities of Padua and Pavia. The whole system being superintended by the general boards at Milan and Venice.
Whether all those regulations are applicable to our own country, may be a matter of question. But the grand difficulty experienced here, the power of making the parents avail themselves of those admirable opportunities, is easily solved by the German discipline. A register is kept in every commune, of all the children from six to twelve years old; and they are all compelled to attend the schools, except in case of illness, or some other sufficient cause. But the tuition is gratuitous, the expense and the schoolmaster being paid by the commune. Corporal punishment is wholly forbidden.