Two Years in Oregon

by Wallis Nash

Outside of the Episcopal Church, which, of course, possesses and uses its own liturgy, the services of the other Christian sects are almost exactly similar; I except also the Roman Catholics, who are present in the State of Oregon in considerable numbers, and whose organization of archbishop, bishops, priests, and sisters is as perfect as usual. But I have reference to Presbyterians, Congregationalists, Methodists, North and South, Baptists, Evangelicals—the order of their services is about the same, and unless by chance you were present on some occasion for enforcing the special doctrines of the sect, you could not determine to which belonged the particular church in which you might be worshiping.

The institution of the Sabbath-school is not similar to that pursued in England, at any rate. The church is opened at a special hour for Sabbath-school, and the children attend in numbers; the minister of the church holds a service for the special benefit of the young, but adults are also present. There is not the division into classes, and the enlisting of the efforts of teachers for those classes, which we have seen elsewhere.

CHRISTMAS FESTIVITIES.Christmas is chiefly marked by the Christmas-trees which are so commonly provided; the religious significance of the day is hardly enforced at all. But the great Christmas-trees arranged by a congregation, lighted up in the church or school-room, and hung with presents contributed by each family for its own individual members, and only brought to the common tree that the joy of donor and receiver might be alike shared in by friends, are a pretty and a happy sight.

And this is by no means confined to the towns. The various precincts of the county have each their headquarters at the common school-house, and in many of these Christmas-trees are provided; and, if the gifts are less in money cost than those hung round the city Christmas-trees, they are none the less worth if got by so many hours of country work, and brought over many a weary mile of muddy road, and treasured in the old trunk among the Sunday garments till the happy day came round, and the Christmas frost hung the fir-trees with their sparkling load, and glazed the old black logs and gray snake-fences with their glittering covering of ice.

A common notion prevails that education here is compulsory. It is compulsory in the sense that facilities by way of school-houses and trained teachers, and superintendence by committees and clerks, are provided by the State, and paid for by the counties from the county tax. It is not compulsory in the sense that so many hours of school attendance can be enforced against parents or children by the public authority. Much is done; a strong and general interest is shown; expense is not spared, even where expenditure is severely felt; but still many children both in town and country escape the educational net. There is a State Superintendent of Education; there are county superintendents; there are many schools and teachers; and there are universities and colleges, with good staffs of professors, and a very high and wide course of studies in all. But very much remains to be done.

There is far too much effort at variety rather than thoroughness in study. However hard both professors and students may labor, it can not be possible in a four-years' course to fill a lad, who has previously had but a common-school education, with a satisfactory knowledge of Latin, high mathematics, Euclid, history, English grammar and composition, chemistry, organic and inorganic, geography, geology, mechanics, electricity, polarization of light, and various other studies usually required for the master of arts honors examination in a British university. But this is attempted here.

And, moreover, this extensive course is carried on in the State Agricultural College as well as in the universities of the State. It can hardly be said that the name of "agricultural" is earned, since there is nothing in the studies here engaged in to distinguish this from any other high-class college in the State.

TEACHERS' INSTITUTES.The course followed in the common school is open to much the same criticism—too much of the ornamental, too little of the thorough and solid, being instilled. This is hardly to be wondered at when it is considered that the teachers in the common schools are taken principally from the students of the colleges or universities, whose learning is of the class above described. There is a great need of a normal school, where teachers can be specially trained for that work; as it is now, a young fellow is ready to "teach school" for a year or two for want of, or on his way to, his intended niche in life.

The scale of payments at the schools is moderate enough, but a large item of expense is in the school-books: they are dear, their use is compulsory, they have to be purchased by the scholars, and they are frequently changed by the Board of Education.

One great means by which it is sought at once to instruct, amuse, and infuse the school-teachers with common ideas and sympathies is by "teachers' institutes." In each county a time is fixed by the State Superintendent of Education, and for two or three days all, or as many as can be got together of the teachers in the county, are gathered in some central town, and for two or three days have constant meetings. This occurs annually.