CONTENTS

page

INTRODUCTION

Joseph Lancaster .... vii

Andrew Bell ...... xiv

Lancaster and Bell . . . . xxiii

Lancaster's Improvements .... xxviii

Bell's Experiment ..... xli

TEXTS

Lancaster's Improvements .... 1

Bell's Experiment . . . . . 57

NOTES 103

PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN

INTRODUCTION¹

JOSEPH LANCASTER

Joseph Lancaster was born in Kent Street, Southwark, on November 25th, 1778. His father's pension as an old soldier added to his earnings as a sieve-maker gave the family a position "decent and comfortable but still not so far raised above the poor as to open the prospects of ambition." The school that he attended was probably humble but it gave him one thing which more pretentious institutions often fail to give — a love of reading. He says, "I soon learned to read, soon read with delight; my book became my meat, drink, and diversion.... At the early age of eight years I recollect the spot where I perused over the sacred pages [of the New Testament] in secret retirement and delight."

Joseph's reading of one of Clarkson's writings on the slave trade led him at the age of fourteen to run away from home in order that he might go to Jamaica to teach the negroes. Brought back, he "looked forward to the Dissenting ministry," for which his natural disposition, pious upbringing, and eagerness to convert seemed to fit him; but before he had undergone the necessary training he "became a frequenter of the religious meetings of the society of Christians called Quakers and ultimately a member of that society."² Paid ministers being an abomination to that society he had to give up the idea of living by preaching, so he decided, as the next best thing, to live by teaching. He began by serving as usher in a boarding school and in a day school; then he resolved to be his own master.

¹ Part of this Introduction is reprinted from the British and Foreign School Society's Educational Record with the permission of the Committee.

² The minutes of the Horselydown Monthly Meeting show that he did not formally apply for admission till the end of the year 1799 and was not formally accepted till the beginning of the year 1801.

Lancaster opened his first school on New Year's Day 1798, in an outhouse on his father's premises. This soon proving too small, he rented three larger and larger and larger rooms in succession, and finally, in June 1801, moved into a room which he had had built to accommodate 350 boys¹ in Belvedere Place, Borough Road.

Lancaster had many of the qualities of a great schoolmaster — enthusiasm, self-confidence, ingenuity in devising methods, insight into the nature of children, an ardent love for them, and rare power of managing them. But these qualities alone do not account for the wonderful rapidity of his success. For the benefit or the pleasure of his pupils no labour was too severe, no sacrifice too onerous. For them he spent mind, body, and estate; on holidays he took parties of them into the suburbs; on Sundays he had parties of them to tea; during the hard winter of 1799-1800 he fed and clothed scores of them. If it be asked how a youth dependent for his own living on the fees of a school claiming to be exceptionally cheap could afford such a "luxury of doing good" the answer is that he could not afford it; that no man ever ran into debt with a lighter heart; that he was a skilful, persistent, and unblushing beggar²; and that he had joined a sect which combined in a greater degree than any other the will and the ability to give.

¹ The accommodation was doubled in 1805 and a room for 200 girls was soon afterwards added.

² His success in raising subscriptions would be incredible if it were not so well attested. In the list of subscribers to the third edition of his Improvements, published before his interview with the King had brought him into general notice, will be found the names of three dukes, three duchesses, four marquises, nine earls, twelve countesses, two viscounts, fourteen "lords," twenty-three "ladies," fifteen "sirs," thirty-six members of parliament, two archbishops, and nine bishops, besides such foreigners as a prince, a baron, a baroness, an ambassador, and a general.

Lancaster's success in attracting pupils nearly overwhelmed him. They were too many for him to teach alone and he had not the means of paying assistants. The idea therefore occurred to him of making the boys who knew a little teach the boys who knew less, and he thought that he had made one of the most useful discoveries in the history of civilisation. He did not know that monitors were prescribed in the statutes of some of the Elizabethan grammar schools or that they had been employed sporadically down the ages at home and abroad — and always abandoned sooner or later. It was probably in 1800 that the idea occurred to him, and when he published the first and second editions of his Improvements in 1803 he had done little more than apply it in the obvious manner. But he really possessed a fertile invention, so that when he published the third edition of the Improvements in 1805 he had evolved not only a new kind of teacher but also a new kind of teaching and a new kind of school management.

Lancaster's success in gaining the patronage of the great had its climax in August 1805, when he obtained an interview with George III, then making one of his periodical stays at Weymouth. He presented the King with a copy of the new edition of the Improvements with a petition¹ and also gave an oral account of his system. When he had finished, the King said, "I highly approve of your system and it is my wish that every poor child in my dominions should be taught to read the Bible; I will do anything you wish to promote this object." As a concrete expression of his approval the King became an annual subscriber of £100.

¹ Both now in the British Museum.

The royal patronage confirmed Lancaster's belief in the importance of his discovery and encouraged him to spend money in promulgating it. His recklessness, his extravagance, and his ostentation almost pass belief. He had built two schools with a subscription of barely £600; he had made himself personally responsible for several others as well as for a kind of training college at Maiden Bradley in Somerset; to prepare his best monitors to become masters he took them to live with him free of cost; and he set up a printing press and a manufactory for slates — neither of which ever paid. Francis Place says that he "sometimes kept one and sometimes two carnages. He seldom went from home but in a carriage, and generally had some of his lads¹ in one or two post-chaises following him, and, as if to waste his time, indulge his love of ostentation, and squander the money of other people, he used to take excursions,. . . dine sumptuously, and return in the evening. Sometimes these excursions occupied two or three days." When Lancaster drove to New Lanark to call on Robert Owen he had four horses to his post-chaise.

¹ Chiefly on his lecturing tours.

Such a course could lead to only one end. That end was reached the last week of May 1807, when Lancaster was arrested and immured in the King's Bench Prison. By a piece of legal finesse which a layman cannot explain he was released without paying his debts. To avoid being arrested again he spent the next six months in the country, lecturing on his system and establishing schools. He returned to London on January 19th, 1808. Three days later he met two friends whom interest in the education of the poor had led to seek his acquaintance — a hatter named William Corston and a surgeon-dentist named Joseph Fox. The result of their meeting is set forth in the following minutes:

London, January 22nd, 1808.

At a meeting held at Mr. William Corston's, No. 30, Ludgate Street — Present: Messrs. William Corston, Joseph Fox, and Joseph Lancaster — it was unanimously resolved, "That, with a humble reliance upon the blessing of Lord God Almighty and with a single eye to His glory; and with a view to benefit the British Empire; the persons present do constitute themselves a Society for the purpose of affording education, procuring employment, and, as far as possible, to furnish clothing to the children of the poorer subjects of King George III.; and also to diffuse the providential discovery of the vaccine inoculation in order that at the same time they may be instrumental in the hands of Providence to preserve life from loathsome disease; and also, by furnishing objects for the exercise of industry, to render life useful¹.

¹ Fox was one of the founders of the Jenner Society, which awarded him its gold medal for his efforts to promote vaccination. Corston had established a school of industry at his native Fincham, where girls were taught to make straw-plait to supersede the Leghorn article. It may be well to add that we hear no more of vaccination or straw-plait.

"That in order to prevent any impediment to the prosecution of this grand design, the persons present do constitute themselves Managers of this Society, to plan, prepare, and direct all its future operations; and that no business shall be brought before any meeting of subscribers who may probably come forward in aid of this Society but what has been recommended by this Committee of Managers."

The Committee met again a week later, when "Mr. J. Lancaster presented a statement of his debts amounting to more than £5000, in liquidation of a part of which bills. . . amounting to £2698 13s. 4d. have been drawn by Mr. J. Fox and accepted by Mr. W. Corston."

While Lancaster spent much of the next three years lecturing and establishing schools the Committee was trying to reduce his finances to order, to increase the income and diminish the expenditure. The Maiden Bradley school was closed, the responsibility of maintaining other schools was thrown on the local managers, the printing office and the slate manufactory were wound up. Still the men who had found the money to pay the original debts had not been repaid, while the success of Lancaster's lectures caused a growing demand for teachers. The Committee (to which small additions had been made from time to time) resolved therefore (in July 1810) that it was "essentially necessary to procure a more extensive co-operation from benevolent persons whose situations in life give them influence in order. . .to place the establishment upon a permanent footing." In December forty-four "benevolent persons" were chosen, many of whom are still remembered as zealous advocates of popular education.

The institution which the enlarged Committee was to render permanent was in form public but in fact private. The school was Lancaster's own; the debts were his own, though other people were trying to pay them. This was a thoroughly unsatisfactory arrangement. The Committee realised that the money it collected was given to it for the promotion of education; Lancaster thought that it was given to him for his own use — that the Committee had the privilege of increasing his income but not the right of regulating his expenditure. The strain of the arrangement was great while his activities were centred around the institution: it reached breaking-point when (in July 1812) he opened a middle-class boarding school on his own account at Tooting. The failure of this enterprise (and the Committee, with its dearly bought experience of him, could predict its certain and speedy failure) would make him insolvent; hence, if the Borough Road property were still in his name, nothing could save it from the grasp of his creditors and nothing could prevent the ruin of the institution. Lancaster, anxious that the fortune which he was going to make in the new school should not be seized for the debts of the old, saw the advantage of separating them. The minutes record that on October 2nd, 1812,

Joseph Lancaster, on account of his private engagements at Tooting, having proposed to this Committee to undertake the sole management of the public concern, promising at the same time to use every exertion in his power to promote it, and also to make over all his right and interest in the properly and premises, with the furniture, stock, utensils, and all the articles at the Borough Road of every description, provided that this Committee will exonerate him from all claims on account of such advances for the public work as are recorded on their minutes, the same is agreed to.

Though the arrangement had been proposed by himself, Lancaster complained loudly to everyone who would listen that the Committee had usurped his glory and "chowsed" him out of his property. Among those to whom he complained was Francis Place, who had been a generous supporter of the Borough Road school and had sent his son to the Tooting school. Place tried to mediate between him and the Committee but found him so utterly unreasonable that he gave up the attempt.

Lancaster appealed to the Duke of Kent, who took a very active interest in the Society. The Duke commissioned Joseph Hume to enquire into the whole business. Hume's report was presented to a meeting held at Kensington Palace on August 13th, 1813, with the Duke in the chair. Lancaster then scouted "the handsome terms which were offered him" but when, soon afterwards, the Tooting venture ended in bankruptcy he accepted the Committee's proposal to pay him £365 a year for undertaking the office of superintendent of the Borough Road school. He never made any pretence of performing the duties and, in April 1814, formally resigned the office. Soon afterwards, having obtained money from a Spaniard sent to England to "learn the system," he advertised that he had "removed the institution under his superintendence to schoolrooms... in the Westminster Road."

He believed that when he separated himself from the Committee the subscribers would follow him. Never did vanity receive a ruder shock. The Society continued to grow from strength to strength; his rival school was stillborn; his undignified boasts and complaints, his bitter, baseless libels on the men who had so generously helped him, disgusted the public, and he sank into complete obscurity and deep poverty. Hoping to begin a new life in the New World he left England in August 1818. Of his few triumphs and many tribulations in North and South America this is not the place to speak; here it is enough to say that he "finished joy and moan" in New York on October 23rd, 1838.

ANDREW BELL

Andrew Bell was born in the city of St Andrews on March 27th, 1753. His father was a barber of whose family nothing is recorded; the collaterals of his mother's family included a dean and a general. The father was famous for his mechanical skill and his proficiency at draughts, backgammon, and chess. The mother was eccentric till she became insane, and it is easy to trace in the son some of the features of both his parents.

We do not know what school Andrew Bell attended, but we do know that he was very unhappy in it. Learning then chiefly meant learning by heart, and though he was neither a dunce nor a drone, his verbal memory was weak and the master strove to strengthen it by frequent doses of the tawse. He says, "I never went to school without trembling. I could not tell whether I should be flogged or not." The senseless severity which he endured may have been one of the reasons which made him insist on a humaner discipline in his own schools.

In 1769 Bell entered the University of his native city, living partly on a small family bursary left by the collateral dean and partly on money made by "coaching." Mathematics and natural philosophy appear to have been his favourite studies.

When he left (presumably with a degree) he had no means of obtaining admission to any profession which needed training. It is true that teaching was supposed to need no training, but Bell resolved before becoming a poor dominie in Scotland to try his luck in America. Early in 1774 he sailed for Virginia. What he did during the first five years of his residence in that colony is not known, but his leaving no information respecting the period seems to show that his occupations were such as he thought beneath his later dignity. In 1779 he entered the family of a wealthy planter named Braxton as tutor at £200 a year. But "the political state of the province" prevented his enjoying this liberal salary long. In 1781 "he thought proper to return to his own country for a while."

Bell was one of those men who save out of the smallest income and are not satisfied with the largest. His American journal "is filled with memoranda of dealings in. . .currency and tobacco." When he left Virginia he had £30 in money and £232 7s. 7¾d. in bills, and the price of over 37,000 lb. of tobacco was owing to him.

He left Yorktown on March 15th. With him were two of Braxton's sons, whom he was to fix at some "genteel academy." "If a private tutor, a man of abilities and morality could be engaged at the college to attend and advise them, and read with them," the father would "wish such a one to be procured at an annual salary of £40," and if Bell "could sit down with them at the same college" he would be "both tutor, friend, and companion." They were fixed at St Andrews, where they remained till July 1784. Bell watched over them with the most devoted care, at the same time pursuing his own studies and conducting a class in mathematics.

When the youths had gone home he began seriously to consider the question of a career. He turned his eyes towards America again, and wrote to ask Braxton, "What prospects may I indulge from a revisitation to Virginia? Any academies erected? Any encouragement in the line of the Church? Shall I come out in holy orders?" Since he had gone out as a Presbyterian the Anglican Church had been disestablished in the United States. She could now scarcely support her native clergy and did not offer any encouragement to a foreign proselyte.

A son of the great Bishop Berkeley, who was staying at St Andrews, advised Bell to persevere in his intention of taking orders and sent him to that part of England where his friendship could be of most service. The convert was ordained on September 12th, 1784, by Barrington, Bishop of Salisbury, who was afterwards, as Bishop of Durham, to do so much for the Madras System. On December 12th he preached with such acceptance to the small congregation assembled in the Episcopal chapel at Leith that they chose him for their minister, with a stipend of fifty guineas, soon raised to £70.

As there was not more "encouragement in the line of the Church," Bell accepted the offer of a passage to India and the advice that he should go to that country "where there was every probability that he might turn his attainments and acquirements to account as a philosophical lecturer and in the way of tuition." That he might go out with proper dignity his University was asked to grant him a doctor's degree. The authorities made no difficulty about complying, but instead of the expected LL.D. or D.D. they gave him an utterly absurd M.D.!¹

¹ After he had attained wealth and fame the University granted him the desired LL.D., and the Archbishop a Lambeth D.D. Till then he used to write himself "the Reverend Doctor Andrew Bell."

He reached Madras on June 2nd, 1787, and wisdom was immediately justified of her child. In August he was appointed chaplain of one regiment and deputy chaplain of another; in October he was appointed deputy chaplain of two more; in 1789 he was appointed deputy chaplain of still another regiment, junior chaplain at Fort St George, chaplain at Vellore, superintendent of the undertaker's office, superintendent of the Military Male Asylum at Egmore, and "minister of St. Mary's Church at Madras"; and every course of philosophical lectures which he delivered brought in some hundreds of pounds.

The Asylum was a semi-official charity school for the orphan boys of soldiers. It was housed free in a redoubt at Egmore which had lost its military importance, and it was maintained partly by grants from the Company, partly by subscriptions, and partly by fines, unappropriated prize money, and other regimental waifs. It was originally intended for a hundred boys, but as the funds increased the number was gradually doubled. Bell charged nothing for superintending. As he loved managing and loved teaching, he threw far more energy into his work than the masters liked. They had taken to teaching because they could not find anything better to do, and their incapacity was equalled only by their obstinacy. Bell found both trying.

He was dissatisfied with the want of discipline, and the imperfect instruction in every part of the school; but more particularly with the slow progress of the younger boys, and the unreasonable length of time consumed in teaching them their letters. They were never able to proceed without the constant aid of an usher, and, with that aid, months were wasted before the difficulties of the alphabet were got over. Dr. Bell's temper led him to do all things quickly, and his habits of mind to do them thoroughly, and leave nothing incomplete. He tells us that from the beginning he looked upon perfect instruction as the main duty of the office with which he had charged himself; yet he was foiled for some time in all the means that he devised for attaining it. Many attempts he made to correct the evil in its earliest stages, and in all he met with more or less opposition from the master and ushers. Every alteration which he proposed they considered as implying some reflection on their own capacity or diligence; in proportion as he interfered, they , thought themselves disparaged, and were not less displeased than surprised that, instead of holding the office of superintendent as a sinecure, his intention was to devote himself earnestly to the concerns of the Asylum, and more especially to the school department. Things were in this state, when, happening on one of his morning rides to pass by a Malabar school, he observed the children seated on the ground, and writing with their fingers in sand, which had for that purpose been strewn before them. He hastened home, repeating to himself as he went "'Eurhka, I have discovered it"; and gave immediate orders to the ushers of the lowest classes to teach the alphabet in the same manner, with this difference only from the Malabar mode, that the sand was strewn upon a board. — Southey, Bell, i. 172.

Ushers who had no enthusiasm for teaching would resent being asked to try experiments, and unsympathetic Europeans would deeply resent being asked to try a device picked up from the natives. To the superintendent's eagerness the assistants offered a tacit resistance, but if Bell could not accomplish his purpose in one way he would in another — if he could not get what he wanted done by men he would get it done by boys. Thus (in 1791 or 1792) he was driven, as Lancaster some eight years later was driven, to employ monitors¹, and in both cases the use of monitors led to various changes in the methods of discipline and instruction.

¹ It must be remembered that in Bell's school the monitors were in addition to, and in Lancaster's instead of, assistants.

Bell was very happy in India. Both the civil and the military authorities were friendly; he liked his work; he was making money fast, and he thought the climate "delightful." But, delightful as it was, he found by 1794 that it was affecting his health and he began to turn his eyes towards England. On December 29th, 1795, the Government issued general orders stating that those officers "who from indisposition or from the urgency of their private concerns" were "compelled to return to Europe. . . should receive permission for that purpose without prejudice to their rank or loss of pay." Bell at once determined to avail himself of the permission, though he did not actually leave Madras till the next August.

He had been in Madras nine years and had saved £3000 a year, but he had no idea of retiring. He intended, after a recuperative holiday, to return and make a satisfying fortune. Soon after reaching London, however, he changed his mind and applied to the Directors for a pension, basing his application chiefly on the "disinterested conduct he had shown in refusing... to accept any salary or remuneration" as superintendent. In July 1797 the Directors granted him £200 a year.

Before leaving Madras, Bell had presented to the Directors of the Asylum an account of his work there. This, with the title An Experiment in Education,¹ was published in October 1797.

In August 1799 he was offered and accepted the post of "supply" minister of the Episcopal Chapel in Edinburgh. In November 1801, through the influence of a Scotch friend with the patron, Bell was presented to the rectory of Swanage, worth over £6oo a year. Lancaster visited him there at Christmas 1804, and the relations between the two men were quite cordial till Mrs Trimmer, towards the end of 1805, persuaded Bell that the Quaker was stealing his glory. Bell then tried to exchange Swanage "for some other preferment more eligibly situated" that he might be in a better position to protect his interests. He also sent a circular to the members of the Government asking for "an official post whence I may be enabled to rear in Europe the fabric of which I laid the foundation in Asia." There was no immediate result, but zealous Churchmen were becoming alarmed by Lancaster's success, and Bell was more than once invited from his "insulated village" to organise schools on the Madras System, In May 1807 he was given two years' leave of absence from his benefice so that he might devote all his time to the good work.

To encourage and reward his labours, Barrington, the only bishop zealous for popular education, gave him, in May 1809, the mastership of Sherburn Hospital near Durham, a sinecure office worth about £1200 a year and a house, though, much to Bell's annoyance, the statutes Compelled him to resign his rectory. In January 1812, when the National Society was organised, he was appointed superintendent of the schools and soon after he was made an honorary member of the General Committee.

In the summer of 1816 Bell made a tour on the Continent, examining wherever he went any school considered exceptional and generally finding fault with what he saw. In Paris he visited a school established on the English model by the Duchesse de Duras, where he found "about seventy boys in bad order, noisy, with all the Lancasterian nonsense, loss of time, dreadful clattering of hands and slates." The Abbé Gaultier, who had invented a system of instruction through games, was "most bigoted and prejudiced. His devices are tedious and lengthened, they want simplicity and effect." At Geneva, de Roche, who had been educated at Edinburgh, was "deeply wedded to his own opinions and resolute in arguing and disputing every point." He wished to improve on all who had gone before him and would not budge till he felt conviction, and it was "an Herculanean labour.. .to convince an Edinburgh man." The school at Lausanne, though the master (Froissard) had been trained at the Borough Road, was "less noisy and disorderly than some others."

Bell was charmed with Pestalozzi. "He has much that is original, much that is excellent. If he had a course of study, if he were to dismiss four-fifths of his masters, and to adopt the monitorial system and the classification of a Madras school, with the emulation, he would be super-excellent." There was some hope for de Fellenberg also, but the reformers generally were very obstinate and unwilling to learn from the only man who could teach them. "Every one wants to remake a discovery which has only been made after the world had existed almost six thousand years." Only Père Girard of Fribourg showed the temper of a disciple. "This liberal father felt the true spirit of the Madras System and had introduced none of the fooleries, noise, and nonsense which are found in the other schools or in the [Lancasterian] models from which they are chiefly taken." In January 1818 the Archbishop of Canterbury offered Bell a stall "of good value" in Hereford Cathedral "as a testimony of the esteem in which" his "public services" were held. Bell was not a man to refuse anything "of good value." He accepted promptly, but when he found that "more than half the emoluments" of the stall were derived from benefices which the Sherburn regulations precluded him from holding he decided that Hereford was no abiding city for him. He thought the Crown might "make arrangements to obviate those mishaps" to which he had been subjected.

His wishes were granted. In March 1819 the Prime Minister, Lord Liverpool, arranged that he should exchange the Hereford stall for one in Westminster Abbey.

Of Bell's doings during the next nine years there is little to record. He performed his duties as canon of Westminster; according to certain persistent critics he neglected his duties as master of Sherburn; he revised his old books and wrote others; he visited schools; and he went from one health resort to another seeking to renew his youth. Apart from his official residence at the Hospital, which he seems to have seldom occupied, he had no fixed home, but, in 1828, after a somewhat serious illness, he bought a house in Cheltenham.

In the autumn of 1830 "a slight indistinctness and thickness" in Bell's voice was perceptible. Like the woman in the gospel, he suffered many things of many physicians and was nothing bettered but rather grew worse, though he did not, like her, spend all he had. He ultimately lost his speech entirely and had to communicate by writing or by signs. There was, however, no diminution in the vigour of his understanding; indeed, the thought of "so much to do, so little done" seems to have excited him to feverish energy. He kept his secretary working early and late preparing materials for a ponderous biography worthy of its hero; he summoned men from all parts of the kingdom to visit him in hot haste, and he changed his mind from hour to hour. He was obsessed by two ideas, his ducats and his daughter — his money and his system. He wanted to leave the one in the way which would best promote the other, but he could not decide which was the best way. Almost as soon as he had signed a will he would add a codicil; then he would revoke both and make another will, another codicil, and another revocation again and again. He dreaded that the "funds laid up" to educate the young "by a new and stupendous engine" might be "directed to different purposes," such as "charity schools, hospitals, asylums," and, worst of all, "colleges and universities," the "asylums for the maimed, the halt, the blind," nay more, "the receptacles for the dead who cannot hear the new word of life which I have spoken, and must sleep on."

Death relieved Bell from his money and all his other troubles on January 27th, 1832. He was buried, where he wished and where he thought he ought to be, in Westminster Abbey.

LANCASTER & BELL

A copy of Bell's Experiment fell into the hands of Lancaster in the year 1800, and in the first edition of his Improvements he fully admits his indebtedness to it, saying, "I ought not to close my account without acknowledging the obligation I lie under to Dr. Bell of the Male Asylum at Madras, who so nobly gave up his time and liberal salary, that he might perfect that institution, which flourished greatly under his fostering care. He published a tract in 1798 [should be 1797]. . ..From this publication I have adopted several useful hints; I beg leave to recommend it to the attentive perusal of the friends of education and of youth.... I much regret that I was not acquainted with the beauty of his system till somewhat advanced in my plan; if I had known it, it would have saved me much trouble and some retrograde movements. As a confirmation of the goodness of Dr. Bell's plan, I have succeeded with one nearly similar in a school attended by more than 300 children."

On November 21st, 1804, Lancaster wrote to Bell, detailing the difficulties with which he had had to contend, asking for any original reports of the Orphan Asylum, and "for further information on the use of the sand, whether wet or dry, and how the boys were first taught their letters." On December 6th Bell replied in the most friendly spirit, saying, "I had before heard of your fame, and the progress which you had made in a new mode of tuition, and have long expected the pleasure of seeing you at Swanage." He was strongly urged to publish a "brief extract of" the Experiment and asked Lancaster to do him the favour of drawing his pen through every line which he thought might be spared, "taking care to efface whatever is not necessary to give an idea of the system of instruction." In the second edition Bell might have an opportunity of recommending Lancaster's institution, but, for this purpose, "I must see everything with my own eyes, and by hearing of your difficulties I shall best know what requisite information I omitted in the report of my system.... I am anxious to see your book, and still more to see yourself."

Lancaster accepted the invitation, and at Christmas went down to Swanage, where he spent some days. Whether anything occurred during these days to make Bell change his mind respecting the second edition of the Experiment it is impossible to say, but instead of condensing he nearly doubled its size. It was published at the end of April 1805, and soon afterwards, Bell, being in London, had fifty copies transmitted to Lancaster, who sent a deputation of his scholars to thank him. Bell then visited the school, where he spent an hour — and nothing else, for he emphatically refused to subscribe.

So far the relations between the two men had been most friendly, and Lancaster might have continued to praise Bell for inventing the monitorial system, and Bell might have continued to praise Lancaster for showing the possibilities of such a system, but for the intervention of Mrs Sarah Trimmer.

Mrs Trimmer (1741 — 1810) was the daughter of John Joshua Kirby, a friend of Gainsborough, Reynolds, and Hogarth, teacher of perspective to George III, and Clerk of the Works at Kew Palace. She married James Trimmer of Brentford, became the mother of six daughters, whom she educated entirely, and of six sons whom she helped to educate. In 1782, stimulated by the example of Mrs Barbauld, she published some of the lessons which she had been in the habit of giving her children. Their great success encouraged her to expand them into six volumes. In 1786 she opened Sunday schools at Brentford, and had an interview with the Queen, who wished to open similar schools at Windsor. The remainder of her life was devoted to promoting education, chiefly by her pen. Her industry was prodigious. She wrote for the nurseries of the wealthy; she wrote for the schools of the poor; she wrote for zealous clergymen, for benevolent ladies, for farmers, for cottagers, for servants. Her writings and her practical work gradually led the public to consider her what she had long considered herself — an authority on education. In course of time she also came to consider herself its heaven-appointed champion. If she did not actually call herself the "Guardian of Education" she gave that title to a magazine which she published. In the second edition of Bell's Experiment (probably sent to her for review) she saw the means of counteracting Lancaster's unsectarianism. Writing on September 24th, 1805, to tell Bell that a notice of his work would appear in the next number of her Guardian, she added — "From the time, sir, that I read Mr. Joseph Lancaster's 'Improvements in Education' in the first edition, I conceived an idea that there was something in his plan that was inimical to the interests of the Established Church, and, when I read your 'Experiment in Education,' to which Mr. L. referred, I plainly perceived that he had been building on your foundation.. . . Engaged as I have long been in striving to promote the interests of the Church by the exertion of my little talents for the instruction of the rising generation, and the prevention of the mischief that is aimed against them in various ways, I cannot see this 'Goliath of Schismatics' bearing down all before him, and engrossing the instruction of the common people, without attempting to give him a little check."

Bell replied on September 28th acknowledging her letter and describing Lancaster's visit to Swanage. He says, "I observed his consummate front, his importunate solicitation of subscriptions in any and every shape, his plausible and ostentatious guise, and in his third edition I think I can see something which indicates that he can now stand alone basking in the sunshine of royal countenance and popular applause." The monitorial plan "appears to me, who am an enthusiast, so simple, so natural, so beautiful, and so true, that it must, sooner or later, have obtained a footing; and all I ever expected by my humble Essay, printed rather than published, was that it might fall into hands which would bring the system forward sooner than might otherwise happen in the course of things. J. L. has certainly contributed to this consummation. How far he has directed it to the best purposes, and whether he has intermixed much quackery, conceit, and ignorance, is another question."

Mrs Trimmer replies on October 1st that "Of all the plans that have appeared in this kingdom likely to supplant the Church, Mr. Lancaster's seems to me the most formidable.. . . Mr. Joseph Lancaster's school is, in my estimation, a direct philanthropine," which must be something even worse than Swift's parallelopipedon. She states that she is about to write a book attacking the unsectarian system and explains her tactics. She will admit that the mechanical parts are good; will gently insinuate that they are stolen from Bell; and will prove that instruction which does not include the dogmas of the Church must be hostile to the Church.

Bell's reply is dated October 14th. He expresses the very sensible resolution of not entering "personally into any polemical discussion or controversial writings in defence" of his system, adding, with multitudinous metaphor, "It must rest on its own basis. I have cast my gauntlet: let them wield it who may. I know no one more equal to the task or better disposed to apply it to the useful and pious purposes to which it is fitted, than yourself. If founded, as I believe, on truth, it will last for ever."

Thus encouraged, Mrs Trimmer worked with ardour, and, before the end of November, published "A Comparative View of the New Plan of Education promulgated by Mr. Joseph Lancaster, in his tracts concerning the instruction of the children of the labouring part of the community; and of the system of Christian Education founded by our pious forefathers for the initiation of the young members of the Established Church in the principles of the Reformed Religion."

The publication of the Comparative View was the first overt act in a seven years' war. The Church party were the assailants; their weapons were books, pamphlets, sermons, review articles and newspaper letters; their tactics the flank attack suggested by Mrs Trimmer — admission that the "mechanical parts" of Lancaster's system were good but stolen from Bell, with assertion that the original parts were bad, especially the unsectarianism, which was fatal to true religion.

A contest about the merits of two systems, neither of which had any permanent value, seems now absurd:

Strange all this difference should be
'Twixt tweedle-dum and tweedle-dee.

It is certain that monitors had been used many times before Bell or Lancaster was born; it is certain that the idea of using them occurred independently to each. As for the methods of employing them in teaching and managing a school there is so little similarity between Bell's and Lancaster's that there can be little ground for a charge of plagiarism in either system. All they have in common is the sand-writing, the spelling lessons, the slates, and the ruling of copy-books by the pupils. Lancaster borrowed the first and second with full acknowledgment¹; Bell probably borrowed the third, but without acknowledgment; the fourth necessarily followed from the fundamental principle of both systems.

LANCASTER'S IMPROVEMENTS

Between the years 1803 and 1810 Lancaster published nine new works and half a dozen new editions. During those same years he was perfecting his system, conducting his school, travelling thousands of miles, delivering hundreds of lectures, calling on many possible patrons, collecting subscriptions, getting into debt, marrying, having domestic troubles, and breaking down in health; hence, though some of his works were only pamphlets and some only abridgments, and though several of the new editions were little more than reprints, the amount of his writing is remarkable. Still, it is easily explained. He wrote rapidly, never pausing to choose his words or polish his sentences; books were necessary for the diffusion of his system, and the energy to produce them was supplied by his inexhaustible belief in its merits.

The first book, which prepared the way for all the rest, is entitled: Improvements | in | Education, | as it respects the | Industrious Classes | of the | Community: | containing, | a short account of its present state, hints towards its improvement, | and a detail of | some practical experiments conducive to | that end. | By Joseph Lancaster. | London: | Printed and sold by Darton and Harvey, Grace- | church-street; J. Mathews, Strand; and | W. Hatchard, Piccadilly. | 1803. The size is extra crown 8vo; the Introduction contains three pages and the text 66.

¹ See Improvements, 3rd ed., 46, 58, 60.

The Introduction begins with a statement that "ignorance and incapacity often prevent" a poor man's "having proper views on the important subject of education, and when he has, slender resources as often prevent their being reduced to practice." It had therefore "long been acknowledged that education, as it respects those who are unprovided with it, ought to become a national concern; and... it would have become so had not a mere pharasaical¹ sectmaking spirit intervened to prevent it."

Thus, on his first public appearance, Lancaster, by accident or by design, placed in the very forefront that principle which was to bring him the warmest support and the bitterest opposition — the principle that common Christianity sufficed for common schools and that sectarian peculiarities should be left to parents or pastors². When he views the "desolating effects" of ignorance he exclaims —

Alas! my brethren and fellow Christians, of every denomination, you have been contending whose influence should be greatest in society, while a national benefit has been lost, and the poor objects of it become a prey to vice, to an extent, that all your praiseworthy, but partial benevolence, can never repair. A national evil requires a national remedy; let not this any longer be delayed: let your minds expand, free from every narrow principle, and let the public good become the sole object of your united Christian efforts.

¹ Any departure from the ordinary spelling or grammar is faithfully copied from the original. Pharasaical is repeated in the second edition, but corrected in the third. The text of the Improvements and of the Experiment is reprinted exactly.

² But for the unsectarianism of Lancaster the development of English elementary education would have been different; but for it he would not have been helped by Corston or Fox, or Alien, and there would have been no British and Foreign School Society; but for it Bell would not have been drawn from his retreat to establish rival schools and there would have been no National Society; fewer schools would have been opened, government grants would probably have been later and legislation on other lines.

Education, he maintains, "ought not to be made subservient to the propagation of the peculiar tenets of any sect, beyond its own number." "Reverence for the sacred name of God and the Scriptures of Truth," a love of veracity and a detestation of vice may be inculcated "without violating the sanctuary of private religious opinion." When the fruits of Christianity were produced the number of Christians was increased, "which is far better than the increase of party," so he wished "as every friend to mankind must, that names" might "perish, but truth prosper." The book itself is divided into three parts. Part I is "An introductory Account of the State of those Schools in which the Children of Mechanics, etc., are generally educated." "Initiatory Schools" are first mentioned.

These.. .abound in every poor neighbourhood about London; they are frequented by boys and girls, indiscriminately, few of them above seven years of age; the mistress is frequently the wife of some mechanic.. . .The subjects of tuition are comprised in reading and needlework. The number of children that attend. . .is very fluctuating and seldom exceeds thirty; their pay very uncertain. Disorder, noise, etc., seem more the characteristic of these schools than the improvement of the little ones who attend them.

"From the disgusting¹ scene — from these graves of early genius even in its cradle," Lancaster turns to "see what they would be under proper regulations." "By the excellent modes of preparatory education, frequent in the more respectable circles, much invaluable time is saved.. . . Why not realise this idea among the poor?" Lancaster was "an advocate for this class of schools" because women generally managed them and "the infancy of their pupils requires a combination of the school and nursery." "But it is of peculiar importance to the poor that these schools should be better regulated, as many children of that class have no education but what they obtain in them, and that at an early age when totally unfit for other employ." Under better regulations and "supplied with proper mistresses" the schools might teach, in addition to reading, "writing on slates and some small portion of arithmetic." The pupils being usefully occupied would not get into mischief, and the schools would no longer be "disgusting scenes of noise and riot."

¹ Lancaster uses disgusting in its etymological sense of distasteful, unpleasing, as Dr Johnson and Miss Austen, who were both fond of the word, used it.

The next section of Part I is headed "Second Class of Schools." "The masters of these are often the refuse of superior schools, and too often of society at large. The pay and number of scholars are alike low and fluctuating; of course there is little encouragement for steady men either to engage or continue in this line; it being impossible to keep school, defray its expences, and do the children regular justice without a regular income." It was equally impossible to obtain a regular income from the large number of parents who could not and the smaller number who would not pay regular fees, so that many masters used "as much chicane to fill their pockets as the most despicable pettifogger." Children were encouraged to scribble through their copybooks "to hasten the demand for fresh" ones; "in some schools the pens are scarcely ever mended;... in general the poor children are much stinted in this article" and Lancaster is "credibly informed that some masters use pinions in their rough state, neither dutched¹ nor clarified." When a man was perfectly honest his living was limited as well as precarious. He could not teach more than a certain number himself; in summer that number was exceeded so that an assistant became necessary till, at the approach of winter, the number decreased; the master's "income of course shrinks by their non attendance and perhaps poverty and misery stare him in the face. With these dreary prospects who would be a schoolmaster?"

¹ Dutch, "to clarify and harden quills by plunging them in heated sand or rapidly passing them through a fire." — O.E.D.

In the second edition the passage about pens is printed in italics.

Part II of the book is headed "Hints respecting the Formation of a Society for improving the State, and facilitating the Means of Education among the industrious Classes of the Community." Lancaster was "sometimes sorry to hear sensible, intelligent men talk of reformation" in education "by a compulsive law." He would like to see a society or committee established for the purpose, but it would succeed only if the members "were inclined to meet the poor as men, as brethren, and as Christians." He hastens to "add that a society for this purpose should be established on general Christian principles and on them only." In support of his opinion he extends the argument of the preface, ending with a hope that the country "at large may no longer suffer loss" by the members of the various religious denominations, "a set of the most valuable and useful men our nation can boast, employing themselves to little better purpose than to declaim or make wry faces at one another."

After giving a catalogue of "the principal evils attendant on the usual mode of education among the poor" (which should more logically have been given in Part I) Lancaster proceeds to point out what should be the objects of the proposed society.

The first "should be to provide suitable masters and mistresses for any schools they might chuse to establish, and to encourage such persons who have schools of their own, to do their duty by the societies (respectable) patronage, which properly bestowed, and avowed publicly, would (with its attendant benefits,) be very valuable, and conduce much to the credit of the teachers possessing it; so, on the other hand, it would tend to expel immoral and wicked teachers from the profession, as such must ever remain destitute of its protection."

To encourage respectable and capable men to become teachers by holding out to them something better than "the cheerless expectation of ending" a laborious life "in a workhouse or [debtors'] prison" "a friendly society might be formed. . . and its funds might be formed into a very respectable stock by the addition of public donations. . . whereby a moderate capital would accumulate till the stock was sufficient to defray the expence of sickness and funerals, and, perhaps, a liberal and honourable support for old age."

"In addition to this a fund might be established for the occasional relief of deserving teachers in distress"; "for encouraging the commendable exertions of teachers. . . gold or silver medals" might be given; "Bibles, Testaments, slates, spelling, writing and other books" might be bought at wholesale prices by the society and sold without profit to teachers; "the institution of a public library containing books on education would be well adapted for the information of teachers, many of whom are not able to purchase expensive publications on those subjects."

"It most probably would not be thought proper" for the society "to insist upon or enforce any particular modes of tuition, religious systems, or creeds. If a teacher was honest, assiduous, and careful, it is as much as any society ought to expect from him."

"An additional object would be worthy the society's notice, — to enforce as much as possible the regular attendance of the children at school, and that as near the appointed time as can be."

Part III of the book is headed "Some Account of the Rise and Progress of an Institution for improving the Plan, and facilitating the Means, of attaining primary Education amongst the industrious Classes of the Community, established in the Borough Road, Southwark; wherein near Three Hundred Children are educated, and trained to habits conducive to the Welfare of Society."

This is both the most novel and the most important, and one would naturally expect it to be the longest part. The fact that it consists of only twenty-two pages, half of which would suffice for the necessary explanations and descriptions, proves fully that at the end of 1802 Lancaster had made few innovations. The section begins with a history of his school. "The institution which a benevolent Providence" had "been pleased to make" him "the happy instrument of bringing into usefulness" was opened in 1798. "It was well attended by scholars, whose number soon exceeded eighty." "During several years the number of scholars continued to vary with the circumstances of their parents, who severely felt the exigencies of the times." "In summer one hundred and twenty was common; in winter they would sink to fifty or sixty. In a trying season of recent scarcity many of them were provided with dinners gratis, chiefly at the expence of a noble and generous minded body of friends."¹ "During several years" Lancaster had "essayed to introduce a better system of tuition into the school, and every attempt had failed." After the free dinners "the internal organisation of the school was gradually and materially altered for the better. The public reputation of it also increased to such a degree that more than two hundred scholars were admitted in about eight months."

¹ This might have been printed "Friends," i.e. Quakers.

The school was "attended by near three hundred scholars. The whole system of tuition is almost entirely conducted by boys; the writing books are ruled with exactness and all the writers supplied with good pens by the same means. In the first instance the school is divided into classes, to each of these a lad is appointed as monitor [the first mention of the word]; he is responsible for the morals, improvement, good order, and cleanliness of the whole class."

As the monitors "leave school when their education is complete" they were "instructed to train other lads as assistants" and successors. "To be a monitor" was "coveted by the whole school, it being an office at once honourable and productive of emolument: 'Solid pudding as well as empty praise.'"

From the monitors, Lancaster proceeds "to give some account of" his "improved methods of tuition." "The method of spelling" seemed "to be the most excellent." It is not fully or very clearly described, but it seems to be nothing more than the dictation of detached words. Lancaster goes into raptures over its excellence, and prints in full the calculation which proves that a hundred boys, spelling a hundred words a day, would spell two millions in a school year of two hundred days.

He does not claim that he has accomplished much, or that what he has accomplished is very wonderful. He simply says —

The system of rewards and the new method of teaching to spell are, I believe, original. Some attempts have been made to introduce a more easy and better mode of teaching the first rules of arithmetic, which has been very successful, but is not yet sufficiently mature to meet the public eye; when it is, if of apparent utility, it will be cheerfully at their service. A method of teaching to write has also been invented, and carried into effect at considerable pains and expence.. .but it is attended with so much trouble in the execution that I consider it to be more local, and not of that importance to the public, with the method of spelling which has been detailed.

He adds that he had "adopted several useful hints" from Bell's Experiment and regrets that he "was not acquainted with the beauty of his system till somewhat advanced in" his "own plan." If he had "known it it would have saved" him much "trouble and some retrograde movements."

The first edition of the Improvements, published early in 1803, was soon sold out and the type had scarcely been distributed before it had to be reset. Except for the alteration of a few words, the omission of a few sentences, and the insertion of one footnote and an Appendix of twelve pages, the second edition is an exact reprint of the first.

The Appendix says that —

during the short time that has elapsed since the appearance of the first edition. .. the institution.. . has continued to make fresh advances to maturity and usefulness, under the blessing of Divine Providence, The children have continued very healthy, improving in morals and learning to the satisfaction of many respectable persons whom benevolence has induced to visit the school. A considerable addition has been made to the school-room, which is now seventy-five feet long, by thirty-three wide.

Lancaster takes "this opportunity to give some account of our improved method of instruction in the elementary parts of arithmetic." Since the publication of the first edition "a very considerable improvement has taken place in the minor classes, as respects spelling." Dictation was only possible with those who could write "but in all large day-schools there are always a number of children who have not acquired this art, who are sent to school solely to learn to read. These mostly repeat their lessons in classes, or singly in rotation, and as usual nineteen are waiting, employed or unemployed, as they please, till the turn comes to repeat their lessons to the teacher, after which they occupy their time as before.. . . Dr. Bell was fully sensible of this waste of time in schools, and his method to remedy the evil was crowned with complete success." Lancaster had adopted this method, the famous printing in sand.

In 1803 Lancaster's school had not begun to attract public attention. Even the Quakers, whose generosity promoted its success, did not visit it; "none of" them "regarded it in any other light than a well conducted school with some few improvements in the modes of instruction." By 1805 the "modes of instruction" had grown into a complete system, and the school had become one of the sights of London, the resort of "foreign princes, ambassadors, peers, commoners, ladies of distinction, bishops and archbishops, Jews and Turks." As they were all "desirous of carrying home a memorial of the interesting scenes they had witnessed" a manual was indispensable.

A reprint of the second edition would not suffice, because its descriptions had been rendered wholly inadequate and partly obsolete by the marvellous development of the System. Lancaster, therefore, wrote what was practically a new work. The pamphlet of eleven thousand words was extended into a book of fifty-five thousand on an entirely different plan. The change of perspective is indicated by the change of name, the title of the third edition being Improvements | in | Education, | as it respects the Industrious Classes | of the | Community, | containing, | among other important particulars, An Account of the Institution for the Education of | One Thousand Poor Children, | Borough Road, Southwark; and of the New System of Education on which it is conducted. In the first and second editions the "Detail of some practical experiments" comes after "a short account of" the "present state" of education and "hints towards its improvement"; in the third edition the "practical experiments" (transformed into "the New System") are "the first in glory as the first in place," while the "present state" and the "hints" limp on irrelevantly at the end, and appear at all only because the author was reluctant to sacrifice anything that he had written.

The book opens with a dedication "to John Duke of Bedford and John Lord Somerville, in testimony of the cheerful, generous, and important Assistance they have repeatedly given to the Institution and System of Instruction described in the ensuing Pages."

The "Introduction" reproduces, with a few verbal alterations, that of the first edition, but the three pages are extended to seven. The added matter is an earnest appeal to Christians to "cultivate a spirit of unity, brotherly love, and peace."

The first section of the book proper is "A short history of the Free-School, Borough Road, George's Fields, and some account of its funds." From this we learn incidentally that the fee was 4d. a week, that the first subscribers who enabled the master to remit it in the case of poor children were "Thomas Sturge of Newington Butts and Anthony Sterry of the High Street, Borough," and that "the only person who assisted" him "in raising subscriptions was Elizabeth Fry, wife of Joseph Fry, of the Poultry, London." "The Duke of Bedford and Lord Somerville were the first who visited" the school and "entered closely into its detail." "They began the subscription for buildings needful to enlarge the schoolroom," and in "Third Month, 1803" the world at large was invited to imitate "the generosity of those two noblemen." "In the spring, 1804," Lancaster "proposed. . . extending the school from three hundred and fifty to seven hundred boys." "The extension. . .was made at a very trifling expence above the estimate" of £180 and "the proposed extention to one thousand boys" could be made for about £300. "Another design supported by a subscription began by the Duke of Bedford and Lord Somerville is a plan for training lads and young men as schoolmasters by a practical knowledge of these improved modes of tuition to be obtained in" his "institution and under" his "own eye." "Eight lads and several men are now¹ in a course of training."

¹ "Now" apparently means the spring of 1805.

In professing to give "some" account of the funds Lancaster happens to have chosen the right word. The expenditure side of the accounts shows such items as 25,000 pinions to be made into pens and afterwards used as pencil-cases; "Expence of 6 excursions: to Wandsworth, Clapham, Sydenham, Norwood, and Blackheath with 50, 80, or 124 Boys at a time, as a recreation and reward of attention to their learning"; "Several excursions with 180 boys to Clapham; 450 to the Green Park; to Greenwich, Sydenham and Kew, with select parties"; "300 toys, etc. as premiums"; "Five thousand toys," and "Several thousand toys as bats, balls, kites, etc., etc."; "Sundries for the encouragement of the children as gingerbread-nuts, apples, oranges, cherries, etc., etc., for scrambles"; "1500 commendatory tickets"; "130 leather ditto, lettered 'A Reward for Merit,' etc.": purses, silver pens, engraved half-crowns, star medals and books for the School Circulating Library, which in the first year consisted of "above 300 vols. calculated to improve the morals of youth which they are permitted the use of gratis according to merit."

From the finances we proceed to the "Principles on which the Institution is conducted," and then to the practical part which is reprinted in this volume.

The next section of the Improvements is headed "On Female Education and Employment," but it is not a necessary part of the book. It says nothing about Lancaster or his school or his system, and most of it was written by William Corston. Lancaster feels that he ought to introduce his friend, so, though he confesses that he has "not been much in the habit of attending to female education" and has "not had much experience" he pronounces a few platitudes. Corston writes like a man of business, not to propound any theories, but to describe his own very successful efforts to start straw-plaiting as an occupation for girls, and to combine instruction in reading and writing with the new industry.

The next chapter is "On the Religious Instruction of Youth," and the next three are practically a reprint of Parts I and II of the first edition.

The third edition of the Improvements was published by subscription. The "proposals" state that the price had been fixed at 5s. "in order to avoid the risk and participate in the economy arising from a large impression."

As the 3500 copies, which compose the present edition of this work, are all subscribed for, many persons would probably be glad to have the work, but have omitted to subscribe for it; and as not a copy can be had of any bookseller in the United Kingdom, it is proposed to leave the subscription open for a fourth edition; and J. L. will be much obliged to his friends in distant parts to promote it. It will be merely a transcript of the present work, J. L. having no more improvements in a fit state for public view at present.

Having determined to publish a fourth edition which was "merely a transcript" of the third, a business man would have kept the type "standing." It is characteristic of Lancaster that he allowed it to be distributed, and that, instead of having it reset quickly in a large establishment, he had it reset slowly by the apprentices in his own small establishment. The dedication to the third edition is dated "8th of 7th month, 1805," and that to the fourth edition "8th of 8th month, 1806." A precious year therefore was wasted during which the popular enthusiasm might have cooled if the King had not fortunately helped to keep it warm.

I do not possess a copy of the fifth edition, and, in fact, have not seen one. The sixth edition has the same dates as the fourth on the title page and the dedication and I have discovered no difference whatever between them, although they were not printed from the same type. Did Lancaster publish three editions in 1806? Or is the edition called the sixth really the fifth? Or is it mis-dated? And why was there no further edition required, although Lancaster continued till 1812 to push his system with the old enthusiasm and more than the old success?

These are questions easier to ask than to answer.

BELL'S EXPERIMENT

Strictly speaking, Bell wrote only one book, though that appeared under several titles and, between 1797 and 1814, grew from a modest duodecimo of sixty pages to a portly octavo of over nine hundred. When in January 1796 he obtained permission to visit England, he fully intended returning to India, but he determined to leave behind him a record of his "labours and experiments" at the Male Asylum. He therefore presented to Lord Hobart¹, the Governor of Madras and President of the Asylum, some extracts from the reports. With the extracts went a note stating that "Dr. Bell wishes to follow up these reports with some account of a system altogether new which he hopes. . .to see perpetuated under his Lordship's sanction and diffused abroad in the world under his Lordship's patronage." Encouraged by the opinion of the Governor that the promulgation of the system to the public "might be attended with the most beneficial effects," Bell proceeded with his account, which was laid before the directors of the Asylum on June 28th, 1796, printed soon after the author's arrival in England in February, 1797, and published in the following October. The title-page reads: An Experiment in | Education, | made at the | Male Asylum | of | Madras. Suggesting a System by which a School or Fa- | mily may teach itself under the Superintendance | of the Master or Parent. | By the Reverend | Dr. Andrew Bell, | late one of the Directors, and Superintendant of that | Establishment, Chaplain of Fort St. George, | A.M., F. As. Soc. London: 1797, demy 12^mo, pp. xii + 48.

¹ Afterwards Earl of Buckinghamshire. Hobart Town in Tasmania is named in honour of him.

After a dedication "to the Honourable the Chairman, the Deputy Chairman, and the Directors of the East India Company; the President in Council of Fort St. George; and to the Directors of the Male Asylum at Madras," comes the following preface:

In the education of youth three objects presented themselves to my mind: to prevent the waste of time in school; to render the condition of pupils pleasant to themselves; and to lead the attention to proper pursuits. In other words, my purpose was to make good scholars, good men, and good Christians.

In charge of a new institution, and, by situation, free from any bias or trammel that might warp the mind or shackle exertion, I tried every method, which a long and earnest attention to the nature and disposition of youth suggested, to accomplish these ends to my own satisfaction. After many attempts, with various success, I rested in a system, surpassing, in its effect, any expectation I had formed, and, "far exceeding the most sanguine hopes" of the directors of the institution, and others interested in the event.

The experiment, thus made at Madras, has appeared to those, who have witnessed the result, convincing and decisive in regard to charitable establishments; and the plan of education, there adopted, has, after the experience of several years, been, by those whose opinions are likely to have the greatest weight, recommended to similar establishments. How far such a system will apply to education in general, may be inferred from the tenour of the following report. That farther and similar trials may be made, and the success, in every instance, ascertained by experience, is the aim of this publication.

Nearly half the pamphlet consists of official letters and minutes, the Report proper occupying only 36 pages. Short as it is, it would be shorter still if the author had omitted every commonplace reflection, though it would be longer if he had described fully and clearly his innovations in the methods of instruction. Speaking of the circumstances which led him to employ monitors¹ he says (p. 8):

¹ Bell calls them "teachers."

The history of the school of the Male Asylum, from its first establishment, is a detail of difficulties. Among the teachers every thing was to be learnt relative to the conduct of a school. The boys were, in general, stubborn, perverse, and obstinate; much given to lying, and addicted to trick and duplicity. And those, who were somewhat advanced in age, or had made any progress in reading or writing, were, for the most part, trained in customs and habits incompatible with method and order. Among these, however, there were happily several who were industrious and attentive in a high degree; and would have taught themselves writing and arithmetic at any school at which they had happened to be placed.

I soon found that, if ever the school was to be brought into good order, taught according to that method and system which is essential to every public institution, it must be done either by instructing ushers in the economy of such a seminary, or by youths from among the pupils trained for the purpose. For a long time I kept both of these objects in view; but was in the end compelled, after the most painful efforts of perseverance, to abandon entirely the former, and adhere solely to the latter. I found it difficult beyond measure to new model the minds of men of full years; and that whenever an usher was instructed so far as to qualify him for discharging the office of a teacher of this school, I had formed a man who could earn a much higher salary than was allowed at this charity, and on far easier terms. My success, on the other hand, in training my young pupils in habits of strict discipline and prompt obedience exceeded my expectation; and every step of my progress has confirmed and rivetted in my mind the superiority of this new mode of conducting a school through the medium of scholars themselves.

One of my first essays, for I thought nothing beneath my attention that was to promote the welfare of the rising generation, and perhaps establish a seminary of public utility for ages to come, was to instruct beginners in the alphabet. I had, at first sight of a Malabar School, adopted the idea of teaching the letters in sand spread over a board or bench before the scholars, as on the ground in the schools of the natives of this country; a practice which, by the bye, will elucidate a passage in holy writ better than some commentators have done. But till I had trained boys whose minds I could command, and who only knew to do as they were bidden, and were not disposed to dispute or evade the orders given them, I could not fully establish this simple improvement, which has since recommended itself to every person who has seen it. The same obstacles I found in every attempt I made to give the shape and form of method to this school, to adopt such practices as were established in the best regulated seminaries, or to introduce, as I went along, such as appeared to me improvements in the usual mode of instruction.

After pointing out the advantages of teaching the alphabet by writing the letters with the finger in sand, Bell mentions but does not describe intelligently his method of teaching spelling. He does not even mention any other subject of instruction except writing, and of that he says only that "every scholar is made at the first to rule his own paper" and that "no teacher, or other person, is ever allowed, at any time or under any pretext, to write a single letter in the scholar's copy. . .book, but himself." From such scanty details no reader could learn and no plagiarist could convey much.

The fact that Bell had received no salary as superintendent of the Male Asylum was the foundation of his claim for a pension from the East India Company, and his original purpose in printing the Report was to strengthen that foundation by bringing his unpaid work to the notice of the directors. Only after some months of hesitation did he decide to offer for sale the copies left on his hands. In a letter to the printer he says:

Those 830 copies will, I apprehend, be a great deal more than sufficient for an edition; for I imagine that such an humble publication will produce little attention, less credit, and far less profit.

As a commercial transaction the pamphlet was a failure. The number sent with the author's compliments to men of position and influence must have exceeded the number sold, and the reason for the issue of a new edition was not the exhaustion of the old: there would have been no second edition of the Experiment if there had been no second edition of the Improvements.

That second edition (which appeared towards the end of April 1805) omitted those details and documents interesting to no one except the directors for whom the Report was originally written, while it contained a good deal of matter not included in the first.

The title-page reads: An | Experiment | in Education | made at the | Male Asylum at Egmore, near Madras. | Suggesting a System by which a School or Family may teach itself under the | Superintendence of the Master or Parent. | By the Rev. Dr. Andrew Bell, | A.M. F. As. Soc. F.R.S. Edin: | Rector of Swanage, Dorset; late one of the Directors and Superintendent [ of that Establishment, and Chaplain of Fort St. George. [ Second Edition; | To which is prefixed the Scheme of a School on the above Model, alike fitted | to reduce the Expense of Education, abridge the Labour of the Master, and | expedite the Progress of the Scholar. The Process of teaching the Alphabet | in Sand, of Reading, Spelling, and Writing, is explained; and a Board of | Education and Poor-Rates suggested. London: 1805, demy 8^mo, pp. 84.

In an Advertisement, Bell says (p. 5):

Aware of the natural and often just prejudice entertained by men of sagacity and experience against every novel attempt, I was apprehensive that the report of what had been done in India might be regarded in Europe as a speculative doctrine rather than a practical fact. To guard against this imputation, it was thought advisable to publish the entire despatches of the Government of Madras relative to the success of this institution. In consequence of this resolution, documents were introduced for the sole purpose of establishing the reality of the details recorded.

In the second edition Bell, "leaving. . .the original documents where they may readily be found," intended to confine himself "to facts and to the details of the system."

After the preface, reprinted from the first edition, comes the most important section of the new matter, "The Scheme of a School on the Model of the Male Asylum at Madras." Then comes a reprint of the greater part of the Report which formed the body of the first edition. This is followed by a "Postscript" containing "a description of the mode of writing on sand," an argument in favour of the establishment of a State Board of Education, one of the letters from the appendix to the first edition, and a copy of the Regulations of the Male Asylum.

In this Postscript (p. 62) first occurred the passage which enabled Lancaster to accuse his rival of "advocating the universal limitation of knowledge":

It is not proposed that the children of the poor be educated in an expensive manner, or even taught to write and to cypher. Utopian schemes, for the universal diffusion of general knowledge, would soon realize the fable of the belly and the other members of the body, and confound that distinction of ranks and classes of society, on which the general welfare hinges, and the happiness of the lower orders, no less than that of the higher, depends. Parents will always be found to educate, at their own expense, children enow to fill the stations, which require higher qualifications; and there is a risk of elevating, by an indiscriminate education, the minds of those doomed to the drudgery of daily labour, above their condition, and thereby rendering them discontented and unhappy in their lot. It may suffice to teach the generality, on an economical plan, to read their bible and understand the doctrines of our holy religion.

Bell's defenders found this passage most embarrassing, because even if they agreed with the sentiment, they held it not policy to have it thus set down. The passage was repeated without alteration in the third edition (p. 90). In the fourth edition (p. 292) "all of them be" was substituted for "even" and "All however may be taught" for "It may suffice to teach the generality."

The third edition, which appeared in 1807, is almost a new book with almost a new title: An | Analysts | of | the Experiment | in | Education, | made at Egmore, near Madras. | Comprising a System, alike fitted to reduce the expense of Tuition, abridge the labour of the Master, and expedite the progress of | the Scholar; and suggesting a Scheme for the better admini- | stration of the Poor-laws, by converting Schools for the lower | orders of youth into Schools of Industry. | By the | Rev. Dr. Andrew Bell, A.M.; F.A.S., F.R.S.E. | Rector of Swanage, Dorset; | Late Minister of St. Mary's, Madras; Chaplain of Fort St. George; and Director | and Superintendent of the Male Asylum at Egmore. London, demy 8^VO, pp. xii +119.

This edition is inscribed not to Lord Hobart but to Manners Sutton, Archbishop of Canterbury. In the dedication Bell says that his every wish in regard to his System is fulfilled. The boon, which he had "heretofore destined for general diffusion in future ages" seemed "already realized to the rising generation" — which means that it had obtained the patronage of two exalted Prelates and been more or less adopted by three or four charity schools.

In the Advertisement (p. ix) Bell explains why he calls the new edition An Analysis of the Experiment.

To provide against that confusion, which has arisen in the minds of some enquirers, from mingling tenets, derived from other sources, with the facts on the records of the Asylum, and from not discriminating between the system of the Asylum, and the detached practices there introduced; between the general principle, on which the School hinges, and the isolated expedients, which were contrived to forward individual steps in the process of teaching; it is now meant to analyze the system, to collect into one series, what relates to the scheme of the School, and the principles on which it is founded; and in a separate compartment to distinguish and detail the independent, subordinate, and auxiliary practices in teaching.

Part II contains a description of Bell's methods of instruction, which are more fully described in the fourth edition. Part III is a reprint of the greater part of the first edition. Part IV was intended to show that the system was "not less applicable to Schools of Industry, than to the charitable Institution in which it originated: and that by its means every School for the lower orders of youth" might, "without prejudice to their appropriate education, be rendered at the same time a School of Industry." Nor was "its intimate connection with the poor laws" overlooked "both as presenting a scheme not less adapted to their administration, than to the economy of a School; and as furnishing employment to the children of paupers, and supplying means for their education in religious principles, in habits of industry, and immediate usefulness."

In the fourth edition the name of the book is again changed. The label on the back calls it Elements of Tuition, but the full title is: The Madras School, | or | Elements of Tuition: comprising the | Analysis of an | Experiment in Education | made at the Male Asylum, Madras; | with its facts, proofs, and illustrations; | to which are added, Extracts of Sermons preached at Lambeth; a Sketch of a National Institution | for training up the Children of the Poor; and a Specimen of the mode of Religious Instruction | at the Royal Military Asylum, Chelsea. | By the Rev. Dr. Andrew Bell, | F. As. S.: F. R. S. Ed. Rector of Swanage, Dorset; | Late Minister of St. Mary's Madras; Chaplain of Fort St. George; and Director and Superintendent of the Male Asylum at Egmore. | London, 1808, demy 8^VO, pp. xvi +348.

The dedication to the Archbishop of Canterbury is reprinted with an introductory paragraph:

I should be wanting in grateful duty to your GRACE, as well as in honest justice to my subject, if I were to alter a word in my address on a former occasion, bearing date 5th February 1807. What was then prophecy is now history.

Bell was an eager advocate and practitioner of vaccination¹, but the merits of Jenner's discovery did not make him forget the greater merits of his own. Here is the comparison (p. vii):

Even in the mere point of the health of the body, and the preservation of the animal life of man, Vaccination, the most valuable discovery in the physical art, of which this country, or the world, can boast, falls short of this invention; which provides the means of supplying a remedy for the disorders of filth, idleness, ignorance, and vice, more fatal to children than the ravages of the Small-Pox.

But this is its least recommendation. It is the sanity of the mind, which is its glory — its moral, religious, and political tendency. . . and the greatest discoveries, heretofore made for the improvement of human life, sink into comparative insignificance.. ..

With such convictions on his mind, with such impressions on his heart, and with such an engine in his hands, — he fears not now to tell aloud, what eleven years ago he only whispered — when he put the original reports of the Male Asylum into the hands of his bookseller, and what he has never ceased to repeat to his friends, — "You will mark me for an enthusiast; but if you and I live a thousand years, we shall see this System of Tuition spread over the world." But it was from his ashes he then expected it to spring up. He did not expect to live, as he has done, to see it patronised, where he was most desirous of its being patronised; and established, where he was most desirous of its being established.

The System —

was transplanted into England in the year 1797, when it was partially adopted with good success in the oldest charity school in London, that of Aldgate, and in several parts of the kingdom, and is now established at the parochial schools of White Chapel and of Lambeth, and at the Royal Military Asylum, Chelsea. (p. 1.)

Lancaster boasted that under his System one master could teach a thousand children, but Bell was not to be outdone in boasting. Under his System "a single master, ... if able and diligent, could, without difficulty, conduct, ten contiguous schools each consisting of a thousand scholars."

¹ It is curious to note that one of the declared purposes of the Society formed on January 22nd, 1808 (which developed into the British and Foreign School Society), was "to diffuse the providential discovery of the vaccine inoculation in order that.. .they may be instrumental in the hands of Providence to preserve life from loathsome disease." — Joseph Lancaster, p. 38.

Part II, which deals with the Madras methods of instruction, is reprinted in this volume. Part III is headed "The fitness of the Madras System to the Education of the Poor and to the Diffusion of the Gospel." It consists of two chapters, the first an introduction to the second, which is a reprint of a pamphlet published the year before: Extract of a Sermon on the Education of the Poor under an appropriate System, preached at St. Mary's, Lambeth, 28th June 1807, for the benefit of the Boys' Chanty School at Lambeth, by the Rev. Dr. Andrew Bell. The reader of this sermon is not without excuse if he is sometimes uncertain whether the glory of God or the glory of the Rev. Dr Andrew Bell was foremost in the preacher's mind.

Part IV also consists of a reprint with an introductory chapter, the work reprinted being the original edition of the Experiment. In the introductory chapter Bell speaks of the "extreme mortification that the manner in which" this edition "was received produced on a mind deeply impressed with a sense of its importance." "The cool and phlegmatic manner in which" his "humble and lowly essay was at first received" almost made him think "all that was done in India a dream."

Part V is headed "Objections considered." Only three of the objections seem to require mention. The first was "the economy of the rod and the commutation of corporal punishment which... is treated as equally chimerical and dangerous"; the second was the use of emulation as a motive for action; and the third the system of trial by jury. To the first and second Bell will make no concession, but with regard to the third, while believing the jury to be a most valuable instrument of discipline, he gives his readers "perfect liberty to dispense with" it "if they retain a predilection for a more summary mode of correction."

Part VI, "Application and Conclusion," contains little that is new except the "Sketch of a National Institution for Training up the Children of the Poor," and the "Specimen of the mode of religious instruction at the Royal Military Asylum, Chelsea." The first calls for no comment and the second offends against so many pedagogical principles that comment would be tedious.

LANCASTER'S IMPROVEMENTS

(Third Edition. 1805)

On the Arrangement of the Institution, as connected with Improvements in Education

To promote emulation, and facilitate learning, the whole school is arranged into classes, and a monitor appointed to each class. A class consists of any number of boys whose proficiency is on a par: these may all be classed and taught together. If the class is small, one monitor may teach it; if large, it may still continue the same class, but with more or less assistant monitors, who, under the direction of the principal monitor, are to teach the subdivisions of the class. If only four or six boys should be found in a school, who are learning the same thing, as A, B, C, ab. &c. Addition, Subtraction, &c. I think it would be advantageous for them to pursue their studies after the manner of a class. If the number of boys studying the same lesson, in any school, should amount to six, their proficiency will be nearly doubled by being classed, and studying in conjunction. There are two descriptions of boys to be found in every school; those who are learning to read, and those who have learnt: to the last, reading is not a study, but a medium of religious or moral instruction. To the first, a progressive series of lessons, rising step by step, to that point, where children may begin to store their minds with knowledge for use in future life. This is the second object of instruction, and to which a series of reading lessons connected with those mechanical, or other pursuits in life, which they are likely to be engaged in, and with religious knowledge, is a valuable auxiliary.

CLASS. READING AND SPELLING LESSONS.

1.............................. A, B, C,

2.............................. Two Letters, or ab, &c.

3.............................. Three Letters.

4.............................. Four Letters.

5.............................. Five and six Letters, &c.

The three succeeding Classes are Boys who may read for Instruction,

6.............................. Testament.

7.............................. Bible.

8.............................. A Selection of the best Readers.

With these last three classes I use a particular series of reading, which is annexed; not as the most excellent, but the one I have been able to find, well adapted to their moral and religious improvement.

I now proceed to describe the method of tuition used in the first class.

Of the Method of teaching to read

FIRST CLASS

The first, or lowest class of scholars, are those who are yet unacquainted with their alphabet. This class may consist of ten, twenty, or a hundred; or any other number of children, who have not made so much progress as to know how to distinguish all their letters at first sight. If there are only ten or twenty of this description in the school, one boy can manage and teach them; if double the number, it will require two boys as teachers, and so in proportion for every additional twenty boys. The reader will observe, that, in this and in every other class, described in the succeeding plan and arrangement, the monitor has but one plain, simple object to teach, though in several ways; and the scholars the same to learn. This simplicity of system defines at once the province of each monitor in tuition. The very name of each class imports as much — and this is called the first A, B, C, class. The method of teaching is as follows: a bench is placed or fixed to the ground for the boys to sit on; another, about a foot higher, is placed before them. On the desk before them is placed deal ledges, (a pantile lath, nailed down to the desk, would answer the same purpose,) thus:

The letter A, shows the entire surface of the desk, which is supported by two, three, or more legs, as usual for such desks, and according to the size. B, is a vacant space, where the boys lean their left arms, while they write or print with the right hand. The sand is placed in the space C*. The double lines represent the ledges (or pantile laths) which confine the sand in its place: sand of any kind will do, but it must be dry. The boys print in the sand, with their fingers: they all print at the command given by their monitor. A boy who knows how to print, and distinguish some of his letters, is placed by one who knows few or none, with a view to assist him; and particularly, that he may copy the form of his letters, from seeing him make them. We find this copying one from another a great step towards proficiency. In teaching the boys to print the alphabet, the monitor first makes a letter on the sand, before any boy who knows nothing about it; the boy is then required to retrace over the same letter, which the monitor has made for him, with his fingers; and thus he is to continue employed, till he can make the letter himself, without the monitor's assistance. Then he may go on to learn another letter.

* The space C, is painted black; the sand mostly used, is whitish: when the children trace the letters in the white sand, the black ground shows them to more advantage.

The letters are taught in courses: they are arranged in three courses, according to their similarity of form. There are three simple examples, which regulate the formation of the whole alphabet. First, a line, as in the letters, I, H, T, L, E, F, i, 1: Second, depending upon the formation of an angle; as, A, V, W, M, N, Z, K, Y, X, — v, w, k, y, z, x: a circle or a curve; as, O, U, C, J, G, D, P, B, R, Q, S, — a, o, b, d, p, q, g, e, m, n, h, t, u, r, s, f, s, j. These courses of letters are soon acquired, on account of the similarity of form. The greatest difficulty in teaching the letters occur in those, the form of which are exactly alike, and are only distinguished by change of position; p, q, and p, d, are perpetually mistaken for each other; by making the two letters at the same time, the children readily learn to distinguish them. Then again, they are all employed printing at once; and it is both curious and diverting to see a number of little creatures, many not more than four or five years old, and some hardly that, stretching out their little fingers with one consent, to make the letters. When this is done they sit quietly till the sand is smoothed for them, by the monitor, with a flat-iron, as commonly used for ironing linen. The sand being dry, the iron meets no resistance, and thus, all the letters made in a very short time, by each boy, are, in as short a time, obliterated by the monitor; and the boys again apply their fingers to the sand, and proceed as before*.

Another method of teaching the alphabet is, by a large sheet of pasteboard suspended by a nail on the school wall; twelve boys, from the sand class, are formed info a circle round this alphabet, standing in their numbers, i, 2, 3, &c. to 12. These numbers are pasteboard tickets, with number 1, &c. inscribed, suspended by a string from the button of the bearer's coat, or round his neck. The best boy stands in the first place; he is also decorated with a leather ticket, gilt, and lettered merit, as a badge of honour. He is always the first boy questioned by the monitor, who points to a particular letter in the alphabet, "What letter is that?" If he tells readily, what letter it is, all is well, and he retains his place in the class; which he forfeits, together with his number and ticket, to the next boy who answers the question, if he cannot.

This promotes constant emulation. It employs the monitor's attention continually; he cannot look one way, while the boy is repeating his letters another; or at all neglect to attend to him, without being immediately discovered. It is not the monitor's business to teach, but to see the boys in his class or division teach each other. If a boy calls A, by the name of B, or O, he is not to say, it is not B, or O, but it is A; he is to require the next boy in succession to correct the mistakes of his senior. These two methods, of the sand and alphabet card, with their inferior arrangements detailed, are made use of daily in rotation, and serve as a mutual check and relief to each other.

* Having some old alphabets, which were of no use in the school else, they were nailed before each boy: this is not absolutely necessary, but contributes to expedite their progress. While the monitor is smoothing the sand, the employment of the class is unavoidably suspended: the time thus unoccupied is, indeed, but short; but the little printed alphabet often attracts the involuntary attention of the children, when waiting till the sand is ready for them. The example of one often spreads through the whole class; and they make quite a buzz, repeating their letters, till the monitor calls them again to make use of their fingers to shape in the sand.

The figures are taught in the same manner. Sand is a cheap substitute for books any where; but more so in those parts of the country where the soil is sandy, than in London. This method was taken in the outline from Dr. Bell, formerly of Madras; but he did not say, in his printed account of that institution, whether wet or dry sand was used. It for a long time involved our minor classes in much difficulty, having begun with the wet sand: we continued it some time. It required great care in wetting: if wetted either too much or too little, it was equally useless and inconvenient; it occasioned a deal of trouble to smoothe, and took double or treble the quantity of sand which it would have taken dry. All these difficulties my boys overcame in a short time; but every time we had a change of monitors in this class, we found it a troublesome qualification for him to attain the art of preparing it properly. All these difficulties were obviated by my hearing from Dr. Bell, that it was dry sand. This circumstance fully shows, how essential a minute detail is, to the ready practice of any experiment, and will be an apology for the length of this, on the art of teaching the A, B, C. We of course use no books for this class of children, nor indeed for several other classes, as will be seen in the sequel.

SECOND CLASS

The second class are chiefly boys who, having learnt to print the alphabet and figures in sand, and readily to distinguish the same on paper, are then advanced to this second, and comparatively superior, class. Their business is to spell short words, by writing them with their fingers in the sand, as the monitor dictates to them: a method clearly described in the account of the new method of spelling in the sequel: the monitor pronouncing a word, as, to, &c.; or a syllable, as, ba, &c. and each boy printing it on the sand with his fingers, and thus spelling it. The order of the desks, and smoothing the sand with the irons, is the same as in the first class. They also make the figures in the sand, to a great number. Besides this they have small slates, the method of obtaining which will be described hereafter. On these slates they learn to make all the alphabet in writing: this is done that they may not, when in the preceding class, be perplexed with learning the printed and written alphabet at once. Care is also taken, that the series of words, and syllables of two letters, which this class print in the sand, is so arranged as to contain all the letters of the alphabet; which, otherwise, being recently learnt, would be easily forgotten, unless kept in memory by daily practice. This arrangement of words, and syllables of two letters, will be published on a sheet by itself, for the use of persons concerned in the education of youth. The words are arranged by themselves, and syllables by themselves: words of two letters, being most familiar to the juvenile mind, are placed first. Syllables are what they cannot attach any sense to; and, in fact, have no sense or meaning, unless compounded into words above the comprehensions of children in this class. They have a card, with words and syllables of two letters, round which the whole class successively assemble, in subdivisions of twelve boys each. The first boy is required to spell a word by the monitor, in the same manner as the first boy, in the a, b, c, was required to distinguish a single letter; and precedency is awarded according to excellence, as before. In short, this method is the same as with the a, b, c, card, only it is combining the letters, instead of distinguishing them. The succeeding classes have no sand allowed them, but they write on a slate. They are taught to read and spell on the same plan; and therefore, the management of them will be best described by detailing the methods of reading, spelling, writing, arithmetic, emulation, competition, and reward. It is only to be observed, that the class which reads and spells in three letters, spells, by writing on the slate, words of three letters; the 4th, or four-letter class, writing words of four letters; and the 5th, or five-letter class, writing words of five letters on the slate; and the superior classes, words of three or four syllables; also, words with the meanings attached. Each class has cards, in the same manner as the first and second classes; all of which are made use of in a similar way, only varying as to the length of the words or syllables each class may be learning.

Improved Method of teaching Spelling by Writing

This method of spelling seems to be excellent: it being entirely an addition to the regular course of studies, without interfering with, or deranging them in the least. It commands attention, gratifies the active disposition of youth, and is an excellent introduction and auxiliary to writing. It supersedes, in a great measure, the use of books in tuition, while (to speak moderately) it doubles the actual improvement of the children. It is as simple an operation as can well be conceived. — Thus, supply twenty boys with slates and pencil, and pronounce any word for them to write, suppose it is the word "ab-so-lu-ti-on;" they are obliged to listen with attention, to catch the sound of every letter as it falls from their teacher's lips; again, they have to retrace the idea of every letter, and the pronunciation of the word, as they write it on the slates. If we examine ourselves when we write letters, we shall find, that writing is so much associated and connected with orthography, that we cannot write a word without spelling as we write, and involuntarily correcting any inaccuracy that may occur.

Now these twenty boys, if they were at a common school, would each have a book; and, one at a time, would read or spell to their teacher, while the other nineteen were looking at their books, or about them, as they pleased: or, if their eyes are rivetted on their books, by terror and coercion, can we be sure that the attention of their minds is engaged, as appearance seems to speak it is? On the contrary, when they have slates, the twentieth boy may read to the teacher *, while the other nineteen are spelling words on the slate, instead of sitting idle. The class, by this means, will spell, write, and read at the same instant of time. In addition to this, the same trouble which teaches twenty, will suffice to teach sixty or a hundred, by employing some of the senior boys to inspect the slates of the others, they not omitting to spell the word themselves; and, on a signal given by them to the principal teacher, that the word is finished by all the boys they overlook, he is informed when to dictate another to the class. This experiment has been tried with some hundreds of children, and it has been found, that they could all write, from one boy dictating the words to be written. The benefit of this mode of teaching, can only be limited by the want of hearing distinctly the monitor's voice; for, if seven hundred boys were all in one room, as one class, learning the same thing, they could all write and spell by this method, at the dictation of one monitor. I appeal to the candour and good sense of every reader, justly to appreciate the benefit and importance of this method of teaching. The repetition of one word by the monitor, serves to rivet it firmly on the minds of each one of the class, and also on his own memory; thus, he cannot possibly teach the class without improving himself at the same time. When we reflect, that by the advantage of this invention, a boy who is associated in a class of an hundred others, not only reads as much as if he was a solitary individual under the master's care, but he will also spell sixty or seventy words of four syllables, by writing them on the slate, in less than two hours: when this additional number of words, spelt by each boy daily, is taken into account, the aggregate will amount to repetitions of many thousands of words annually; when, not a word would be written or spelt, and nothing done by nineteen twentieths of the scholars in the same time. Thus, it is entirely an improvement and an introduction to their other studies, without the least additional trouble on the part of the teacher; without any extra time of attendance being requisite from the scholar; without deranging or impeding his attention to other studies, as is usually the case with the study of extra lessons; at least, more than doubling the advances of each individual towards a proficiency, at the same time; and, possessing all these advantages, it prevents idleness, and procures that great desideratum of schools, quietness, by commanding attention: for, as it requires much writing, but few boys can write and talk at the same time. In this, nothing is wholly committed to the pupil or monitor. Some Studies require a degree of mental exertion, that may or may not be made, and yet the ommission remain undetected; but this is so visible, that every boy's attention to his lesson may be seen on his slate; and detection immediately follows idleness, or an indifferent performance! That a thing, so simple in itself, should abound with so many advantages, is scarcely to be supposed, at a first glance; but, that it does, I am well convinced, by daily experience of its utility; particularly, the improvement it affords by so great a practice in writing.

* It will be seen in the article Reading, I do not approve of solitary reading, one by one: it has no emulation with it.

Boys who learn by the new mode, have six times the usual practice in writing; but, in the old way the expence is, at the first cost, 5½d. per month, for writing books, pens, and ink, each boy: this will be six times increased, if it is desired to give both classes of boys equal practice; the usual cost for sixty boys is 16l. 10s. per annum.

OLD WAY. NEW WAY.

Six times the usual If they have not slates charge for writing paper, already provided, sixty

&c...................... £. 99 slates will cost .......... £. 1

Allow a hundred slate pencils per annum, each boy, at 8d. per hundred 2

£ 3 Balance in favour of the new mode £. 96.

The many hundreds of respectable characters, nobility, clergy, gentry, merchants, and others, who have visited the institution, can bear witness, that the progress of the boys in writing, by this method of writing all they spell, is astonishing! Not of one, or a few boys, but of the whole school. By this practice of writing on a slate, they learn to humour their pencils, so as to write just like a pen, in making the up and down strokes of the letters. About one hundred and fifty boys have writing books, and their writing on the slate, is a fac simile of their writing in books: which they seldom do, more than four times in a week, and then only a single copy, which covers but a quarto page, each time. Slates are an article so great in request, on this plan, that it is proper to procure the best sort: those of a reddish cast allow the pencil to play with more freedom; those of the black kind, though neater in appearance, are generally hard and brittle; and the pencil is more apt to scratch than write thereon: yet, there are some of the black kind which are an exception to this observation. If any gentleman, in a country town or village, should be pulling down an old building that has been slated, the damaged slates from it would be a valuable acquisition to village children: for, by the friction of a little Portland stone and water, on the surface of the slate, they will obtain a good polish, and serve as well for use, as slates of ten times their value. I hope to see the day, when slates and slate-pencils will be more resorted to than they have heretofore been, and thus afford to every poor child a cheap and ready medium of instruction, in spelling, writing, and arithmetic.

A Method of teaching to spell and read, whereby one Book will serve instead of Six Hundred Books

It will be remembered, that the usual mode of teaching requires every boy to have a book: yet, each boy can only read or spell one lesson at a time, in that book. Now, all the other parts of the book are in wear, and liable to be thumbed to pieces; and, whilst the boy is learning a lesson in one part of the book, the other parts are at that time useless. Whereas, if a spelling book contains twenty or thirty different lessons, and it were possible for thirty scholars to read the thirty lessons in that book, it would be equivalent to thirty books for its utility. To effect this, it is desirable the whole of the book should be printed three times larger than the common size type, which would make it equal in size and cost to three common spelling books, value from eight-pence to a shilling each. Again, it should be printed with only one page to a leaf, which would again double the price, and make it equivalent in bulk and cost to five or six common books; its different parts should then be pasted on pasteboard, and suspended by a string, to a nail in the wall, or other convenient place: one paste-board should contain the alphabet; others, words and syllables of from two to six letters. The reading lessons gradually rising from words of one syllable, in the same manner, till they come to words of five or six letters, or more, preparatory to the Testament lessons. There is a circumstance very seldom regarded enough, in the introductory lessons which youth usually have to perform before they are admitted to read in the Testament. A word of six letters or more, being di-vi-ded by hy-phens, reduces the syllables, which compose it to three, four, or five letters each; of course, it is as easy to read syllables, as words of five letters: and the child, who can read or spell the one, will find the other as easily attainable.

In the Testament, the words of two and three syllables are undivided, which makes this division of the lessons a more natural introduction to the Testament. In the preparatory lessons I have used, the words are thus di-vi-ded.

When the cards are provided, as before mentioned, from twelve to twenty boys may stand in a circle round each card, and clearly distinguish the print, to read or spell, as well or better than if they had a common spelling book in each of their hands. If one spelling book was divided into thirty different parts or lessons, and each lesson given to a different boy, it would only serve thirty boys, changing their lessons among themselves, as often as needful; and the various parts would be continually liable to be lost or torn. But, every lesson placed on a card, will serve for twelve or twenty boys at once: and, when that twelve or twenty have repeated the whole lesson, as many times over as there are boys in the circle, they are dismissed to their spelling on the slate, and another like number of boys may study the same lesson, in succession: indeed, two hundred boys may all repeat their lessons from one card, in the space of three hours. If the value and importance of this plan, for saving paper and books in teaching reading and spelling, will not recommend itself, all I can say in its praise, from experience, will be of no avail. When standing in circles, to read or spell, the boys wear their numbers, tickets, pictures, &c. as described under the head, Emulation and Reward; and give place to each other, according to merit, as mentioned in the account of the two first classes.

In reading, they read lines or sentences, and sometimes paragraphs, in rotation. They are required to read every word slowly and deliberately, pausing between each. They read long words in the same manner, only by syllables: thus, in reading the word, Composition, they would not read it at once, but by syllables: thus, Com-po-si-ti-on; making a pause at every syllable. This deliberate method is adapted to prevent those mistakes, which boys so often make in reading, by pronouncing words wrong: adding, or taking syllables at random, from the words in their lesson, so as to make nonsense of it. A boy may read the word, He-te-ro-dox, in haste, he may call it Heterodoxy; or vary it in any way that haste induces him to misapprehend: but if he read it deliberately, He-te-ro-dox, pronouncing every distinct syllable by itself, he cannot possibly read it amiss. This method, also, accustoms the eye at once to read the syllables in every word, before the word is pronounced. For those who are apt to make blunders in learning to read, this mode will be found the best remedy. We are daily in the habit of speaking to each other: in so doing, we combine syllables into words, and words into sentences; by which we make ourselves understood. This is combination; but those who combine syllables or words improperly, do well to look back to analysis. Syllables are the component parts of words; those who can read syllables distinctly, will soon learn to combine them into words. Every sentence we express, is a combination of syllables and words; under the influence of these daily habits, there is more danger of inattention in learners, to the leading principles of correct reading, than to any other circumstance. I am much indebted to Doctor Bell, late of Madras, for the preceding information on the subject: I have reduced it to practice, and find it does honour to its benevolent inventor; to which I have added several valuable improvements, particularly that of the reading and spelling cards.

Extempore Method of Spelling

In this method of spelling the card is used instead of a book — the monitor assembles his whole class, by successive circles, or rather semicircles, of twelves or twenties; calling each scholar by numbers; so as to begin at number 1, and go regularly through the whole class. This preserves a regularity in their reading, and prevents any one scholar omitting a lesson. At first this is troublesome, and occasions some noise; because, in the minor classes, the monitors are obliged to call the boys to read or spell, by the list of their names; but, as a number is affixed to each name, the monitors soon become familiar with the names and numbers of boys in their respective classes, and this obviates the difficulty.

When the circle is formed around their card or lesson, the monitor points, with his pencil or pen, to the columns of spelling which form the lesson for the day. The first boy reads six words, by syllables: he does not spell the words by repeating each letter, but, by repeating, in a distinct manner, each syllable in every word. If he commits any mistake, the next boy is required to rectify it, without being told what the mistake is; if the second boy cannot correct the first, the third or fourth may: in which case, the scholar who rectifies the mistake takes precedency of him that committed it, and receives his insignia of merit at the same time. In no case is a monitor suffered to teach or tell the boys in his circle what the error is, unless they should all be equally ignorant: then it becomes his duty to do it. This is, in fact, each boy teaching himself; and the principal duty of the monitor is not so much to teach them, as to see that they teach one another. When the boys in the circle, have thus studied their spelling by reading it, the monitor takes the card into his own hand, and requires them to spell and pronounce such words extempore, as he repeats to them. In doing this, they correct each other's faults, and take precedence as before described.

This method of spelling is commonly practised in schools; but, for the method of studying the spelling lessons, I am indebted to Dr. Bell, believing it was his peculiar invention. A great advantage derived from this method, is, that it forms an excellent practical counterpart to the method of spelling on the slate. The boys usually spell this way in rotation; but, if the monitor detects any boy looking about him instead of looking at the lesson, he immediately requires him to perform a part of the lesson which he was inattentive to: he usually performs it ill; and thus his negligence immediately punishes itself, by his losing precedency in his class. It is very important, that in all these modes of teaching, the monitor cannot do as the watermen do, look one way and row another. His business is before his eyes; and, if he omits the performance of the smallest part of his duty, the whole circle are idle or deranged: and detection, by the master, immediately follows his negligence. In society at large, few crimes are ever committed openly; because, immediate detection and apprehension of the offender would follow. On the contrary, many are committed in privacy and silence. It is the same, in performing the simple duties of monitors in my institution: their whole performances are so visible, that they dare not neglect them; and, consequently, attain the habit of performing the task easily and well. This effect is produced from this one cause: that every thing they do is brought to account, or rendered visible in some conspicuous way and manner. What applies to the monitors strictly applies to the boys. There is not a boy, who does not feel the benefits of this constant emulation, variety, and action; for, they insensibly acquire the habit of exercising their attention closely, on every subject that comes before them; and this, without straining it too much.

ARITHMETIC

An Account of the improved Method of Instruction, in the elementary Parts of Arithmetic

It is necessary to premise a little respecting the usual mode of teaching arithmetic, which many of my readers will remember to be the method in practice at such schools as they frequented in early youth.

The sums are, in many instances, set in the boys' books, by the master or teacher, at the expence of much pains and labour; in other instances they are copied by the pupil, from Walkingame's, or some other arithmetic.

The boys are, or should be, instructed how to work their sums, in the first instance, by the master or teacher; they are then expected to do other sums of a like nature, by the example shown.

This is to be done by them, at their seats; and, when it is finished, the master or teacher should, and in most cases does, inspect it, to see if done correctly.

But this operation of adding or subtracting, for instance, is intellectual, not mechanical or audible; of course, we cannot ascertain how many times a boy repeats his sum before it is brought to his master for inspection: steady boys may do it five or six times, but the idle and careless seldom do it more than once; here is much time lost, and a remedy adapted to the case is not in the teacher's power.

Again, when sums are brought up to the master for inspection, each boy's must be individually attended to; here is another great loss of invaluable time. Perhaps, twenty boys have sums ready for inspection at once, and nineteen wait, sit, idle, or talk, while the twentieth is at his master's desk, with his sums. Nor is this all: if an incorrigible dunce happens to show up his sums first, and, as is often the case, adds new blunders to mistakes, he may easily delay his master, and the boys who are waiting to follow him in succession, for some time; and a few instances of this sort, arising from carelessness, inattention, or incapacity on the part of the scholars, will completely derange the business of a morning, and keep a number of their school-fellows unemployed.

Independent of this, it is disgusting to teachers of any description to be continually plodding over the same ground of elementary arithmetic. Sameness, in every instance, produces listlessness; and variety is ever productive of agreeable sensations, I have seen a respectable schoolmaster, well versed in the mathematics, have a dozen boys standing round his desk, waiting for him to attend to their sums, while he has been listening to a slow boy, repeating his sum, till he has bitten his lips with vexation.

To prevent this dulness, I have invented an entire new method of teaching arithmetic, that commences when children begin to make their figures. The following is the arrangement of the cyphering classes:

Class 1, Combination of figures.

2, Addition.

3, Compound ditto.

4, Subtraction.

5, Compound ditto.

6, Multiplication.

7, Compound ditto.

8, Division.

9, Compound ditto. 10, Reduction.

11, Rule of Three. 12, Practice.

The first object is to teach children to make their figures. In order to do this, the class learning to make figures are assembled under the monitor, in one part of the school, by themselves. It is to be observed, the same boys who are in one class, according to their proficiency in reading, are in another, according to their progress in arithmetic; that, when the school is cyphering, the classes are organized on the annexed plan of the cyphering classes; when they are reading, they are arranged on the plan of the reading classes, given in a preceding page. They always, on the commencement of school, come in, in their different reading classes; and, when cyphering, afterwards, separate to their several arithmetical classes: after having performed the cyphering, they return to their reading classes, before they go out of school. This changing about from class to class, in which three fourths of the whole school are concerned, is attended with but little bustle, and no confusion. It is usually done in less than five minutes; and the school-room is so large, it will take near that time to go round it. If there are any boys who cannot cypher, they remain under the monitor's care, for instruction in reading, whi