Clavering's (D. C.) Voyage to Spitzbergen Cosso's (Don Telesforo de Trueba y) Conquest of Peru Living Artists Croly's (Rev. J.) Life and Times of his late Majesty George IV. Ecan's (Pierce) Snuff-box, and the Leetel Bird Galt's (John) Life of Lord Byron Southennan Fleming's (John) Views of the Lakes of Scotland Ferbes's (John) Colloquial Arithmetic Foreign Exclusives in London Frget-Me-Not Friscatis Friendship's Offering Sells (Sir W.) Pompeiana Gentleman in Black Gag's (Rev. G. R.) Life of Sir T. Munro Feuerbach (Anselm Von) on the Legal Institutions of France nati, Life and Adventures of Giovanni Dictionnaire Technologique On the Advancement of Society in Knowledge Duncan's (Andrew) Edinburgh New Dispensatory 299 293 123 280 294 58 251 77 76 44 359 ib. 235 161 215 1 280 200 301 325 Journal of a Naturalist Journal of the Royal Institution of Britain Juvenile Forget-Me-Not 106 291 Lamb's (Charles) Album Verses · 227 Landseer's (Thomas) Sketches of Animals 151 Keightley's (Thomas) History of the War of Independence in Greece Kennedy's (late James) Conversations on Religion Knox's (Robert) System of Human Anatomy 313 Love, Life of Dr J. . 375 Lowrie's (W.) Questions on the Doctrines of the Bible 77 Lyell's (Charles) Principles of Geology 243 25 354 Landscape Illustrations of the Waverley Novels Lardner's Cabinet Cyclopædia 58, 110, 222 182 Lauder's (Sir Thomas Dick) Account of the Great Floods of 13 Letters on Demonology and Witchcraft • 43, 87 242 Lloyd's (H. E.) Memoirs of George IV. 346 Library, the Edinburgh Cabinet, Vol. I. and II. 214 Life of a Lawyer 112 Liston's (Robert) Elements of Surgery 359 Logan's (James) Scottish Gael 186 Monsieur Non-tong-paw 87 Olive Branch 360 Outcast, The 124 330 Moncrieff's (W.) Old Booty 43 Morell's (Rev. T.) Miscellaneous Works of Dr Doddridge 155 Morgan's (Lady) France 200 Morrison's (C.) Practical Arithmetic 227 Murray (John) on Pulmonary Consumption 225 Macnish's (Robert) Anatomy of Sleep 184 MacVicar's (J. G.) Elements of the Economy of Nature 29 Pembroke's (W.) Woman-a Satire ib. Periodicals for October 292 Pitcairn's (Robert) Account of the Families of Kennedy 186 Criminal Trials 275 Pollock's (Robert) Persecuted Family, and Ralph Gemmel Porter (George R.) on the Sugar Cane 165 Ravenstondale 101 Reid's (John) English Grammar. 362 Review of the Principles of Necessary and Contingent Truth 223 Review, the Westminster, No. XXV. 375 Narrative of Discovery and Adventure in the Polar Seas 168 Neilson's (Peter) Recollections of America 3 Nelson's (Rev. Thomas) Biographical Memoirs of Dr Oudney, 185 Northcote's (James) Life of Titian 373 Norton's (the Hon. Mrs) Undying One 357 241 332, 313 58 140 318 116 258 70, 121, 194 159 214 308 40 195 172 277 311 221 285 53 307 227 223 124 200 260 28 175 228 ib. ib. 316 288 21 252 260 19 210 259 107 29 110 183 318 30 57 56 ib. 23 65 375 175 26 208 90 213 293 353 109 37 332 30 226 27 EDUCATION IN SCOTLAND. Report of the Committee of the General Assembly for increasing the means of Education and Religious Instruction in Scotland, particularly in the Highlands and Islands. Submitted to the General Assembly, May, 1830. Edinburgh. WE have no intention to argue, at this time of day, the advantages of diffusing education through the whole body of the people. It is alike necessary in our crowded manufacturing districts, where the suffocating crowd engenders a moral rottenness, and in our lonely valleys, where the absence of human conversation petrifies or brutifies the heart. By awakening the intellectual powers, it, and it alone, raises man superior to his mere animal propensities, and gives him the mastery over them. There is not a more glaring error in the long catalogue of prejudices to which men cling with such desperate affection, than that which would persuade us, an uneducated community can be virtuous. They have, it is true, the common affections of humanity, and find a pleasure in their exercise; but even in this gentler mood they are pettish, wayward, and not to be depended upon; and let self once come in the way, and their humanity quickly disappears. We have now examined, sometimes with our own eyes, sometimes in books, most countries in Europe, and although we have found crime fostered and exaggerated by favouring circumstances, yet, amid all the anomalies of human society, we have found one principle always hold-the lower a community in the scale of intelligence, the lower it likewise stands in moral worth. Two very striking instances occur to us at this moment. The one belongs to our own country. The mining district of Leadhills, on the borders of Clydesdale and Dumfries-shire, was noted about the commencement of the eighteenth century for being inhabited by the most lawless and brutal race in the south of Scotland. A Mr Goldie (of the same family, we believe, into which the lady married who furnished Sir Walter Scott with the first hint of his Jeanie Deans) was appointed superintendent of the lead mines there, and conceived the idea of instituting a free school. The effects soon showed themselves. Since that time Leadhills, although situated in an almost inaccessible part of the country, and affording what has ever been esteemed one of the greatest encouragements to crime, a facility of escaping into a neighbouring jurisdiction, has given even less trouble to the county police than any of its neighboars. Our second instance is taken from an official report published in the Moniteur, concerning the administration of justice in criminal matters for France in 1828. According to this document, out of every hundred persons accused of criminal acts, on an average only forty were found to have received even the slightest degree of instruction, whilst the other three-fifths were uniformly found in a state of the most complete ignorance. A similar proportion holds among tlse who were acquitted. Among such as could neither read nor write, the proportion of acquittals was thirty-seven in the hundred; among PRICE 6d. such as could read with difficulty, thirty-eight; among such as had been tolerably educated, forty-four; and among such as had received a superior education, sixty-five. A These reflections have been suggested by the very interesting Report of the General Assembly's Committee for increasing the means of education and religious inseries of the Committee's Reports, since the period of its struction in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland. institution, is now before us, and we feel assured that we could not present our readers with any thing more interesting than a history of its labours. There is nothing of which Scotland is more justly proud than the education of her peasantry. There is no brighter gem in that crown of glory which hangs suspended over our national church, than her anxious care for the universal diffusion of knowledge. But there is one part of our land to which the benefits of this motherly solicitude had not been able to penetrate,-those mountain and island districts chiefly inhabited by the Celtic race. Not that the necessities of this part of our population were unknown, but that all endeavours to remove them had hitherto been fruitless. An attempt was made by the Ge.. neral Assembly, shortly after the Revolution, to secure the education of a number of the native Gael competent to act as ministers, but seems to have failed, for we hear no more of it. In 1704, the Commission of Assembly was appointed, and instructed to raise a fund by parochial and other contributions, with a view to increasing the means of education in the Highlands. After five years of fruitless attempts, the Assembly directed such sums as had been collected, to be transferred to the Society for the Propagation of Christian Knowledge, at that time recently established by a few private individuals, and erected into a corporation by a charter from Queen Anne. The society immediately applied these sums to the very object contemplated by the Assembly. Since 1725, a sum has been annually allowed by government for the support of missionaries and catechists in the Highlands and Islands, and administered by a Committee of the Assembly. In addition to these provisions, there were the regular parish schools; and at a later date, those instituted by the Gaelic School Society, which, however, confined themselves to elementary instruction in reading Gaelic. With all these aids, however, the provisions for education in the Highlands were extremely insufficient. It appeared from the returns obtained by Principal Baird in 1825, "that in the six synods of Argyle, Glenelg, Ross, Sutherland and Caithness, Orkney, and Shetland, containing 143 parishes, and a population of 377,730 persons, no less than 250 additional schools, and 130 catechists, were urgently called for." Dr Baird's attention was first directed to the state of our Highland population while acting as convener to a Committee of the General Assembly, nominated to revise and transmit to the several parishes the queries issued by the Commission of Parliament appointed in 1818, to enquire into the existing state of education throughout the United Kingdom. Struck by the picture which these returns presented of the destitute condition of our II land districts, he persuaded, in 1824, the Presby their attention. The Committee at the same time corresponded with the heritors, from whom they solicited the accommodations required: for the convenience of the schoolmasters. These consisted of—1st. A school-house; 2d. A dwell Edinburgh to overture the ensuing Assembly on the sub-were justly deemed to have the more immediate claims on ject. Not contented with this, he stirred up several other Presbyteries and Synods with which he corresponded, to follow the example thus set them. And finally, in order to create a popular inclination to the proposed measure, he prepared, a few weeks before the meeting of the Assembly, an abstract of the returns, so far as they illustra-ing-house, containing two apartments at least; 3d. A garted the more striking deficiencies in education and religions den; 4th. Fuel; 5th. Grass for the summer and winter knowledge throughout the Highlands and Islands. This maintenance of a cow. They were encouraged to demand abstract was printed and circulated largely among the so much, by the success which had attended similar apMembers of Assembly during the first days of the Ses-plications on the part of the Society for Propagating sion. These industrious preparations, seconded by a host Christian Knowledge. It had been found, too, that the of talent in the Assembly, were successful. A committee heritors, who had thus contributed in behalf of the Sowas appointed to digest a plan for the promotion of edu- ciety's schools, were led to take a warmer interest in their cation in such districts as should be found most to stand welfare. And it has since appeared, that the provision in need of assistance; and also, to ascertain what degree of such accommodations has the effect of increasing the of co-operation might be expected from heritors and other respect paid to the schoolmaster by the peasantry. inhabitants of the country on the one hand, and from government on the other. The Committee next set itself to prepare a set of elementary school-books in the Gaelic language. These are four in number, and are sold for 1s. 2d. The set of English school-books which was afterwards added costs 2s. 4d. Thus a scholar is enabled to procure, for 3s. 6d., all the books which he requires, from the time he commences the alphabet, till he finishes his course of elementary instruction. It is not to be thought that the Committee set about these operations exactly in the order here stated, or that only one of them occupied their attention at one time. We have merely mentioned their occupations thus systemde-atically and apart, in order to give the reader a clearer notion of what they effected. They were likewise busied, during that year, examining candidates for employment as teachers; framing regulations for the management of their schools; and devising a form of commission for their schoolmasters. But, above all, they were busy recommending and encouraging parochial collections in the churches and chapels of ease of the establishment, and soliciting general subscriptions from other sources. In stirring up the public mind, they were spurring a willing horse. They were enabled to report to the General Assembly, in 1826, that a fund had been realized, amounting to £5488-chiefly derived from parochial collections although not one-half of the parishes of Scotland had at that date found it convenient to contribute. They announced to the Assembly, at the same time, that they had, after due enquiry, selected forty stations for schools, in different districts, throughout the Highlands and Islands, where heritors had engaged to supply the requisite accommodations; and that they had already two schools in actual operation. The first of the Assembly's schools was established at Ullapool in the month of October, 1825. The first meeting of the Committee was held in the month of June, 1824. The first step taken was to devolve the active management of the business intrusted to them on a Sub-committee, consisting of a select few of their number. This was wisely done,-for, though the many may deliberate, it is only the few who can execute. This Sub-committee has been continued upon the successive re-appointments of its constituent, and has hitherto acted as the sole executive. Those gentlemen who have deserved so well of the Highlands ought to be held in memory, and what little we can contribute to that sirable end, shall not be wanting. The Sub-committee consists of the Rev. Principal Baird; Dr David Dickson, Dr Andrew Thomson, Dr John Lee; and John Tawse, Robert Paul, James M'Innes, and Robert Roy, Esquires. To these we may add the name of Mr Gordon, the indefatigable and intelligent secretary of the Committee. The Committee commenced its operations by preparing a set of queries, which were transmitted early in the summer to every clergyman in Scotland. The information sought was, in what districts the provisions for the education of the community were most deficient; and also, "how far heritors and other parishioners, forming the respectable and elevated classes, might be disposed to concur in supporting the proposed undertaking, upon a free charitable contribution, that should preserve it independent of any aid from government, like other institutions of a similar nature in Scotland." The returns to these queries established a fearfully low state of educational provisions in the Highlands and Islands; but at the same time, the existence of an ardent desire of knowledge on the part of the population, a liberal willingness on the part of the heritors to lend their assistance, and a fair hope that, for the present at least, any aid from government might be dispensed with. The Assembly, upon receiving, in 1825, the Committee's report of these circumstances, authorised them to ascertain the practicability of the plan they had recommended. The committee now corresponded extensively with the Highland clergymen respecting the most suitable stations for schools. By these gentlemen two sorts of exigencies were submitted to their notice. In the one case, owing to the want of any school whatever, the population of whole districts were unable to read or write. In the other, the common branches had been taught more generally; but the desire of the people, seconded by the recommendation of the heritors and ministers, was, that tuition in Latin, geography, and practical mathematics, should also be afforded to such as wished it. In both cases the Committee recognised the propriety of these suggestions, remembering (to use their own words)" the generous views entertained, centuries ago, by the legislature of this country, when, even at a less enlightened period, it enjoined the means of a classical education to be provided at every parish school." Those districts, however, which stood in the first case, In 1827, the Committee communicated to the Assembly the gratifying intelligence, that L.2151 had been added to their fund during the preceding year; that thirtyfive schools had been placed under the management of well-qualified teachers; and that eighty-six stations had been selected for the purpose of planting schools, as soon as accommodations should be provided. The Committee had by this time found themselves in a situation to turn their attention to those districts which were possessed of elementary schools, but were too poor to support a teacher of the higher branches of education, although the public mind was sufficiently advanced to be aware of their importance. The plan was adopted of offering to teachers qualified in the higher branches a salary exceeding by a trifle what was offered to mere elementary teachers; and on such terms a number of well-qualified individuals was soon obtained. The receipts of the Committee in 1827-8 amounted to somewhat more than L. 1600. The number of schools in active operation at the close of this year was not fewer than seventy. The receipts from May, 1828, to May, 1829, somewhat exceeded L.2700. After all the expenses incurred during the year had been paid off, there remained |
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