IRISH SCHOOLS 
 
 FOR 
 
 IRISH BOYS 
 


IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
HOME EDUCATION: 
 
 OR 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH GR AMMA R 
 SCHOOLS FOR IRISH BOYS. 
 
 BY 
 
 MAURICE C._JJIME, M.A., LL.D. 
 
 (barrister- at-law), 
 
 HEAD-MASTER OF FOYLE COLLEGE, LONDONDERRY ; 
 
 Author of “Morality ” “An Introduction to the Latin Language “Unbelief," 
 “ Self-education," “A Schoolmaster's Retrospect of Eighteen and a Half 
 Years in an Irish School" <Lc. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, & CO., Stationers’ Hall Court. 
 DUBLIN: 
 
 SULLIVAN, BROTHERS, 27 Marlborough Street. 
 
 1887. 
 
 PRICE THREE SHILLINGS AND SIXPENCE. 
 
 [ All rights reserved.] 
 
l~b 
 
 fatjb 
 
 • Hsj 
 
 u Then stay at home.” 
 
 — Two Gentlemen of Verona , ii. 7. 
 
TO 
 
 ALL MIDDLE-CLASS PARENTS AND GUARDIANS 
 IN IRELAND , 
 
 NO MATTER TO WHAT RELIGIOUS SECT OR 
 POLITICAL PARTY BELONGING, 
 
 Zhls TEssay, 
 
 WRITTEN SOLELY FOR THEIR EDIFICATION, 
 I BEG, 
 
 WITH THE GREATEST POSSIBLE RESPECT, 
 
 TO DEDICATE. 
 
 b 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2015 
 
 https://archive.org/details/homeeducationoriOOhime 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Preface 
 
 CHAPTER 
 
 I. Very Few of our Distinguished Living Irishmen Edu- 
 cated in England. Approximate Number of Irish 
 Boys Educated Yearly at English Schools . 
 
 II. Analysis of the List of Distinguished Irishmen Edu- 
 cated as Boys in English Schools — Results of such 
 Analysis not Particularly Favourable to the Merits 
 of these Establishments 
 
 III. Nearly all our Distinguished Living Irishmen Educated 
 
 in Ireland 
 
 IV. The Success of Old Irish Scliool-boys in England a 
 
 Particularly Strong Testimony in Favour of the 
 
 Irish School System 
 
 Y. How the Writer Arrived at the Several Percentages 
 of the Distinguished Irishmen Educated, as Boys, 
 (a) in Ireland; (j 3 ) in England; and (7) partly in 
 the one Country, partly in the other 
 
 VI. The Names of Some Distinguished Living Irishmen 
 who were Educated, as Boys, Exclusively in 
 
 Ireland 
 
 VII. “Nearly all Distinguished Living Englishmen were 
 
 Educated in England J ’ 
 
 VIII. Position of Schools, Geographical or Social, of small 
 Consequence in re the Education of Boys 
 
 IX. The Writer’s Personal Knowledge of Irish Boys who 
 were at English Schools, with Special Reference 
 to (a) their Classical and Mathematical Attain- 
 ments ; (p) their Religious and Moral Characters, 
 with the Opinions of some English Authors on 
 this subject ; (7) their Manners .... 
 
 X. Testimony of English Educationists as to the Positive 
 Inefficiency of English Schools .... 
 
 PAGE 
 
 xi 
 
 1 
 
 7 
 
 20 
 
 24 
 
 30 
 
 34 
 
 77 
 
 84 
 
 98 
 
 132 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 viii 
 
 CHAPTER PACK 
 
 XI. The Opinions of some Irish Schoolmasters upon the 
 same Subject as that Discussed in the Foregoing 
 
 Chapter 159 
 
 XII. Classes in Irish Schools Usually much Smaller than 
 
 in English Schools 147 
 
 XIII. Many Worthless Private and Small Proprietary 
 
 Schools in England : none in Ireland . . . 149 
 
 XIV. Entrance Examinations in English Schools, why 
 
 Objectionable. Objections to Preparatory Schools 163 
 XV. “ Superannuation Examinations ” in English Schools, 
 
 why Objectionable 176 
 
 XVI. The Force of Fashion in Impelling Irish Parents to 
 
 send their Sons to School in England . .180 
 
 XVII. “ But is not an English Accent worth Acquiring ? ” 188 
 
 XVIII. “ Has not the Prefectorial System that Obtains in 
 so many English Schools much to Recommend 
 it?” On “ Schoolboy Honour ” . . . 198 
 
 XIX. “The Friendships Formed by an Irish Boy at an 
 English School sure to be Useful to him After- 
 wards” 251 
 
 XX. Advantage to an Irish Boy Educated at an English 
 School, Resulting from the Truer View of Eng- 
 land and the English, and the Broader Sym- 
 pathies, which an Education at an English School 
 is supposed by some to be sure to Engender . 257 
 
 XXI. On the Fees for Boys in English and Irish Schools 
 
 Respectively 262 
 
 XXII. High Fees Spent on Irish Boys at English Schools 
 
 not always a Judicious Expenditure of Money . 2 66 
 
 XXIII. Efficiency of Irish Schools in regard to Teaching 
 accounted for: (i.) Irish Boys and Masters com- 
 paratively Poorer : Poverty a Great Stimulus to 
 Exertion ; (ii.) Fewer Holidays ; (iii.) Teachers in 
 Ireland better qualified ; (iv.) More Masters in 
 proportion to Number of Boys : therefore 
 Smaller Classes ; (v.) Boys’ Moral Conduct more 
 faithfully attended to in Irish Schools : less 
 bullying ; (vi. ) the Intermediate Examinations ; 
 
 (vii.) Effect of the greater popularity of English 
 Schools conducive to the Educational well- 
 being of Schools in Ireland ; (viii.) Nature of 
 Irish Boys better understood by Teachers in 
 their own Country 272 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 IX 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 XXIV. Advantages to Ireland, from an Educational Point 
 of View, of the Intermediate Examinations : (i. ) 
 
 They encourage Sound Teaching to the exclusion 
 of Cramming ; (ii.) They encourage the pushing 
 on of the many Boys who are not clever rather 
 than of the few who are : (iii.) The Curriculum 
 falls fairly in with the regular University 
 Examination Courses of every School ; (iv.) 
 
 Only idle Boys do not wish to go in for the 
 Intermediates ; (v.) Number of Grammar 
 
 Schools thereby increased ; (vi. ) English Com- 
 position and Literature, Physical Geography, 
 Book-keeping, French, and Drawing, better and 
 more generally taught than formerly ; (vii.) A 
 great boon to Assistant-Masters ; (viii.) The 
 Board of Examiners a thoroughly trustworthy 
 one ; (ix.) Educational Value of the Inter- 
 mediates tested by subsequent examinations ; 
 
 (x.) They encourage the learning of a few Sub- 
 jects well rather than of Many indifferently. 
 Arithmetic, a most useful branch of knowledge, 
 necessary for a “pass ” in Mathematics ; (xi.) No 
 means of testing a Boy’s Educational Progress 
 in England so efficacious as the Intermediates 
 
 in Ireland 283 
 
 XXV. Especial Disadvantages in Cases of Illness Insepar- 
 able from the Absence of Irish Boys at English 
 Schools 309 
 
 XXVI. Concluding Remarks. Questions on the Essay . 312 
 

 
 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 There are few questions of more practical importance 
 to the middle-class Irish parent — whether lay or 
 cleric, schoolmaster or otherwise — than this : To what 
 school shall I send my sons, where they will he 
 at once plentifully and wholesomely fed, religiously 
 brought up, carefully taught, and conscientiously and 
 happily looked after during their after-school hours — 
 and all this at a moderate cost ? “ The interests of the 
 child,” eloquently wrote Father Hayden, in an impres- 
 sive letter to the Freeman in October 1 8 8 1 , “must be 
 the permanent object of the parents’ solicitude and 
 care. These interests comprise the physical, mental, 
 and moral training of the young. To lose sight of 
 this purpose is to expose the future of the children to 
 great peril. To make it the primary object of pursuit 
 is to ensure the happiness of parent and child, as far 
 as human foresight can effect it. The task of select- 
 ing an educational establishment for children is one of 
 the greatest responsibilities that can fall to a parent’s 
 lot, for in the six or seven years passed within the 
 precincts of a boarding-school, the physical, mental, 
 and moral endowments must receive a permanent bias, 
 the effect of which will be palpable even to the latest 
 years of life ” [quoted from Letters named in footnote, 
 p. ioo]. 
 
PREFACE . 
 
 xii 
 
 The question is of especial importance now-a-days, 
 when, for one reason or another, there is so little 
 money in our country. If, then, I can show that all 
 that is looked for can be secured — and, that, not 
 merely at a moderate but at an exceedingly moderate 
 cost — in our own country, I shall regard my little 
 venture as by no means barren of good fruit. 
 
 The English schools to which I especially refer in 
 the following pages are the private and small pro- 
 prietary schools — the third, fourth, fifth, sixth, and 
 seventh-rate schools of that country. These are the 
 schools to which most of our middle -class Irish boys 
 are sent — schools of mushroom growth ; showily dis- 
 playing themselves with all their flimsy unsubstan- 
 tial perfections to-day, gone for ever to-morrow. It 
 happens that this very half-year two little Irish boys 
 went to a certain Irish school direct from two English 
 schools. In one of these English schools the terms were 
 £yo a year, exclusive of Mathematics, for which £g 
 extra were charged. In the other the terms were £20, 
 Mathematics included. As financial speculations they 
 have both failed, and now are closed for ever. Cases of 
 the kind in England are not uncommon. 
 
 There are no Intermediate schools in England, 
 however, which are wholly excluded from consideration 
 in the following pages. 
 
 And now a few captious objections to my Essay I 
 shall venture to anticipate. 
 
 There are some persons who will probably say : 
 “ But surely an Irish schoolmaster is the last person 
 in the world who could give a candid opinion on the 
 questions discussed in these pages — questions in which 
 he is so much personally interested.” 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 xiii 
 
 In reply to this let me observe, in the first place, 
 that the head-masters of Irish Grammar-schools happen, 
 many of them, to have sons of their own to educate ; 
 and the question with which I entered on these pre- 
 fatory remarks is, accordingly, one on which the 
 Irish schoolmaster has quite as good reason at least 
 to wish to form a just opinion as any one else 
 in the country. He obviously will not educate his 
 own sons at an Irish Grammar-school, no matter who 
 its head-master may be, if he have reason to think 
 that it would be best for them in the long-run to 
 receive their education at an English one. Secondly , 
 who is there except an Irish schoolmaster who could, 
 or at least who would, write a treatise like this ? If 
 we were to wait till some one not a schoolmaster would 
 do so, we should have, I am afraid, to wait for ever. 
 And, thirdly , there will be found throughout my treatise 
 more facts stated than mere opinions given. If I have 
 stated as facts things which are not facts, or have 
 overstated, understated, or discoloured facts, this must, 
 of course, detract materially from the value of my 
 Essay as an argument. But if I shall not be found 
 to have committed any of these errors, then it would 
 seem to me that I shall have succeeded in establishing 
 this, that the Irish middle-class parent, who sends 
 his sons for their education to school in England, 
 especially to one of the small proprietary or private 
 venture schools there, is doing far from what is con- 
 ducive to his sons' best interests. 
 
 Knowing, as I do, as a matter of fact, that (a) the 
 vast majority of distinguished living Irishmen were 
 educated, as boys, in Ireland; and that (/ 3 ) of the 
 thousands of Irish boys who have been educated 
 
XIV 
 
 PREFACE . 
 
 during the last half-century at English schools exceed- 
 ingly few have risen out of obscurity, I desire to bring 
 these points clearly out in these pages. Should I suc- 
 ceed in doing this, I shall have succeeded in achiev- 
 ing one object I had in view in writing this essay. For 
 I shall have succeeded in showing that an excellent 
 education, at admittedly a low cost, can be secured at 
 schools in our own country — apparently a better educa- 
 tion than can be procured at any price in England. 
 And should this be so, it is, of course, a reason why 
 Irish parents should send their sons to Irish in place 
 of to English schools, in whose favour we can bring 
 forward, as a proof of their excellence, no practical 
 argument comparable to this one in point of weight. 
 
 Others may, perhaps, object that I have, no doubt, 
 made out a very fair case on behalf of the educational 
 powers of our Irish schools. “ But/' they may ask, 
 “ who ever meant to deny these powers to them ? ” 
 Many, I would say in reply, to judge of people by 
 their conduct — the only means of judging of them that 
 we possess — and, indeed, to judge of them sometimes 
 by their words. 
 
 That “ self-praise is no commendation ” may be 
 urged by another class of objectors. Of this method of 
 arguing weak persons who have the worst side in a 
 debate are particularly fond. These are especially 
 prone to abuse or sneer at their opponents when they 
 are unable to refute them by fair argument. In 
 answer to the taunt conveyed by this objection I 
 should say, that the question is not by any means a 
 mere question of self-praise or no self-praise. It is 
 this : Are the facts stated throughout this treatise 
 true or not true ? and are the conclusions fairly drawn ? 
 
PREFACE . 
 
 xv 
 
 If the facts are true, and if the conclusions are fairly 
 drawn, then I deprecate any attempt to detract from 
 their weight by the firing off at me of an old proverb. 
 Nor am I aware that there is in my Essay any self- 
 praise whatever. If the verdict should be given in 
 favour of our Irish schools, it will be given, I suppose, 
 only on the merits. 
 
 We schoolmasters are not responsible for the facts 
 in consequence of which our schools are educationally 
 so efficient. It is not our doing, for instance, that we, 
 teachers and pupils, are all poorer in Ireland than 
 teachers and pupils of similar schools are in England, 
 and that, therefore, we must work the harder. It is not 
 our doing that the Intermediate system is a thoroughly 
 sound one, and that the Intermediate examinations are 
 a great stimulus — a stimulus such as does not exist 
 in England — -to Irish teachers to teach, and to Irish 
 boys to learn with especial diligence ; and so on with 
 regard to the other reasons given in Chapter XXIII. 
 for the efficiency of our Irish schools. The mentioning 
 of these facts connected with our Irish schools — their 
 comparative impecuniosity, and the Intermediates, for 
 example — facts for which we schoolmasters are not 
 personally answerable, cannot, I maintain, be justly 
 called self-praise, even though these facts should be 
 regarded themselves as materially conducive, each of 
 them, to the efficiency of Irish schools and Irish school- 
 masters. 
 
 It is as an Irishman, not as a professional Irish 
 schoolmaster, I enter the lists to do battle on be- 
 half of schools that are notoriously slighted by the 
 middle-class, not to speak of the upper-class, parents 
 of Ireland — slighted, as I hope to show, to the detri- 
 
XVI 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 ment, generally, of those who slight them, and of their 
 sons as well. 
 
 That the ceaseless exodus of Irish schoolboys to 
 England means the ceaseless withdrawal of a great 
 deal of money from Ireland, is obvious ; and that the 
 ceaseless withdrawal of a great deal of money from 
 Ireland is an injury to the country, i.e. } to its inhabi- 
 tants, is assuredly obvious also. 
 
 If I do not succeed in making all this clear to some 
 at least of my readers, it will not be my fault : I spent 
 nearly all my leisure hours since last March in making 
 up my case. But it would certainly be my fault if, feel- 
 ing as I do so strongly on the subject, I did not do my 
 best to make it clear to them. Should I succeed in 
 persuading any one that my view of the subject is the 
 correct one, then good — obvious good — must come of 
 it, I believe, to all concerned. Harm certainly cannot ; 
 unless it be in the shape of some little loss of money 
 to English railway companies, English tradespeople, 
 English shopkeepers, English teachers. 
 
 I trust that no one will notice in a censorious spirit 
 the omission of this or that distinguished living Irish- 
 man from the list of names in Chapter VI. The list 
 is not intended to be exhaustive. It is designed merely 
 to corroborate the statement heading Chapter III. ; 
 and this it certainly has done. That it is a bright and 
 representative list no one can fairly deny. 
 
 To give an exhaustive list of all the living Irish- 
 men of note who were educated in Ireland would be 
 not only unnecessary for my argument, but it would 
 require a great deal of time — more time than I can at 
 present conveniently devote to such a task. To pro- 
 duce the present list, wholly inadequate though it 
 
PREFACE . 
 
 XVII 
 
 be, evenings upon evenings, nights upon nights, spent 
 over “ Thom's Directory,” and the writing of hundreds 
 of letters and circulars, were necessary. 
 
 To one point in regard to the names that I have 
 entered on the list I should like to draw the reader's 
 attention. It is this — that they are so numerous as 
 they are. For two reasons the largeness of the 
 number is surprising. In the first place , several of 
 those to whom I wrote, asking them to kindly tell me 
 where they were educated as boys, took no notice of 
 my application; and, this, though in nearly all the 
 letters I wrote on the occasion I enclosed an addressed 
 postcard for the reply. I have been on this account 
 forced to omit the names of several noteworthy Irish- 
 men, not feeling quite sure where they were educated 
 as boys, whether in Ireland or England. And then, 
 in the next place , it must not be forgotten how very 
 large is the number of promising Irish boys who have 
 been educated in England, some at public, some at 
 private schools, others privately, during the last half- 
 century. Obviously, if these had been all educated 
 in Ireland, the number of distinguished home-educated 
 Irishmen now living would be far larger than it is. 
 How little have English schools, how much, by com- 
 parison, have schools in Ireland, done for Irish boys ! 
 
 It seems to be almost marvellous how Irish school- 
 masters have managed to exist at all, seeing the way 
 in which their schools have been for so many years 
 slighted by nearly all men of good means and posi- 
 tion in Ireland. That our schools have managed 
 somehow to exist, and some of them even to thrive, is 
 assuredly a strong tribute to their intrinsic worth. 
 
 It may be furthermore objected, that while, no 
 
PREFA CE. 
 
 xviii 
 
 doubt, a good case has been made out in favour of 
 Irish schools, still an equally good case, if not a better 
 one, might be made out by English schoolmasters in 
 favour of their English schools. To this I should say 
 in reply, that in writing this Essay it was not my 
 object to detract in any way from the merits of good 
 English schools. Good schools, wherever they are, 
 whether in England, Ireland, or elsewhere, are good. 
 By “ good schools ” I mean schools in which a boy’s 
 whole nature — moral and religious, intellectual, and 
 physical — is carefully developed ; in which he is 
 wholesomely fed, skilfully taught, and religiously 
 trained ; and from which he is turned out a fine, 
 manly, honourable, virtuous, well-mannered lad at 
 seventeen or eighteen years of age. Far be it from 
 me to think of suggesting that there are not numbers 
 of such schools in England. My great object is to 
 prove that in our Irish schools there is excellent 
 work done, for the reasons stated in Chapter XXIII. ; 
 that they are far cheaper — that is, that the best schools 
 in Ireland are far cheaper than the best schools in 
 England ; that of the numberless Irish boys educated 
 in England a wonderfully small percentage comes in 
 any way to the front; and that of the distinguished 
 Irishmen of the present generation, at home, in the 
 colonies, or in other countries, the vast majority were 
 educated, as boys, exclusively in Ireland. My Essay 
 is mainly defensive : that it is not merely defensive I 
 regret. The comparisons — and comparisons are pro- 
 verbially odious — I obviously could not avoid, seeing 
 the design with which the Essay was composed. The 
 worst things, however, it contains concerning English 
 schools are quotations from English publications. To 
 what better authority could I have resorted ? 
 
PREFACE . 
 
 xix 
 
 “ But is it not at the English Public Schools/* an 
 objector may ask, “that the aristocracy of Great 
 Britain and Ireland are for the most part educated ? 
 And what men more God-fearing, more moral, braver, 
 more refined, than the noblemen and leading country 
 gentlemen of Great Britain and Ireland ? But how,” 
 he may continue, “ can this be, if the schools of 
 England are as bad as they are represented in this 
 Essay to be ? ” In the first place, I reply, there are in 
 England schools and schools ; and I beg to repeat, 
 that it is with the third-rate, fourth-rate, and still 
 lower-grade schools of England that this Essay is 
 principally concerned — these being the schools at 
 which the vast majority of Irish boys who are edu- 
 cated in England, are, unfortunately, educated. I do 
 not think I can be charged with any excess of 
 patriotism if I believe that the best schools in Ireland 
 are superior, from an educational point of view, to the 
 third-rate, and still lower-grade, schools of England. 
 If it were only to Eton, Harrow, Eugby, Winchester, 
 Marlborough, Shrewsbury, Charterhouse, Cheltenham, 
 Clifton, and some dozen of other equally excellent 
 schools in England, that Irish boys were sent, this 
 Essay would never have been written. 
 
 It is true that I have not always, in the following 
 pages, kept these schools distinct from the Do-the- 
 Boys’ Halls which are are so extensively patronised 
 by Irish middle-class parents. That I have not done 
 so arises not from the fact that I fail to appreciate 
 the immense superiority of the many excellent English 
 schools that there are to schools of the “ Eoslyn ” and 
 “ St. Winifred’s ” type, but from the fact that there 
 are certain faults and defects common alike to both 
 
XX 
 
 PREFACE . 
 
 the best and the worst of English Grammar Schools 
 — such, for example, as too few assistant-masters, over- 
 large classes, inadequate supervision, and the evils 
 resulting therefrom ; and that I found it, accordingly, 
 unnecessary, when commenting on these several defects 
 and faults, to distinguish by a hard and fast line 
 between the good schools and the bad ones. 
 
 In the second place, granting that the noblemen 
 and foremost country gentlemen of Great Britain and 
 Ireland are, as a class, the best, bravest, most virtuous, 
 most polite, most learned in the world, it does not 
 follow from this that their many excellent qualities, 
 goodness, bravery, purity, and the rest, are the result 
 of their school education. There are many great 
 Englishmen who have achieved their greatness in 
 spite of, rather than in consequence of, the education 
 they received at school. There are others who, though 
 they are said to be old pupils of this school or of that, 
 were in reality but for a very brief period at any 
 school, and acquired almost all the mathematical and 
 classical knowledge that they possess either from 
 private tutors or at private schools. Lord Dufferin, 
 for instance, is generally said to have been educated 
 at Eton. Yet were he himself to be asked where he 
 was educated, he certainly would not give the simple 
 answer, “ Eton.” What answer Lord Dufferin did 
 give when asked the question, will be found on page 
 i 5 of this Essay. The influence of home on a boy is 
 illimitable, and schoolboys spend, for the most part, 
 about three months every year at home in the human- 
 ising society of their mothers, sisters, and friends. A 
 boy — the worthy son of worthy parents — who is 
 naturally good, clever, manly, energetic, and well- 
 
PREFACE . 
 
 xxi 
 
 mannered, is not easily spoiled. His goodness, 
 cleverness, manliness, energy, courteousness, will be 
 pretty sure to bring him eventually to the front, 
 especially if his parents are rich and influential, no 
 matter whether he be educated at an English Public 
 School for 300, or at a small Irish school for 50 
 guineas a-year. Nor is this a mere question of theory : 
 it is one of fact. The reader has but to turn to 
 Chapters YI. and VIII. to see how many distinguished 
 men have come from undistinguished schools. These 
 chapters make it clear that “ a good thing 55 may 
 indeed, “ come out of Nazareth.” * With the follow- 
 ing lines — with those of them, at least, that point to 
 the impossibility of permanently corrupting a naturally 
 good man, who can wholly disagree ? — 
 
 uvdgwnoig b ’ at) 
 
 b fJbh 7 rov 7 }^bg ovbsv dXXo nX^ xux'og, 
 b b’ IffdXbg iaQXog, ovbs (iv/utpogag utto 
 <pvo/v dXXa ygqcrog sffT as/.f 
 
 And lastly , a school assuredly cannot fairly claim 
 credit for all the success of all its old pupils equally. 
 There are some successes, such as brilliant university 
 honours gained by boys direct from school, the full 
 credit for which it would be worse than folly to deny 
 their schools — honours which they could not possibly 
 have gained if they had not been ably, judiciously, 
 and conscientiously educated for many years. There 
 are other successes, however, achieved by men which 
 can only be by courtesy attributed to the training they 
 
 * For great Englishmen who were not educated at any of the Eng- 
 lish Public Schools, see pp. 94-96. 
 t Hec., 595-598. 
 
 C 
 
XXII 
 
 PREFACE . 
 
 received at school. If, for example, a man who as a 
 schoolboy never distinguished himself at all, and who 
 subsequently passed unhonoured through his university, 
 obtaining not without difficulty his B.A. degree therein, 
 becomes, when middle-aged, a sagacious, hard-working, 
 ready-witted Cabinet Minister, his success is mani- 
 festly but in small measure due to the training he 
 received at school.* 
 
 But yet another objection : “ Surely, the head-master 
 of Foyle College must be a Nationalist; ” I can imagine 
 some one exclaiming, in his desire to condemn this Essay 
 as a whole, and not finding it easy to prove flaws in 
 the statements of facts, or fallacies in its arguments. 
 There is not an opinion expressed in the Essay that 
 the head-master of Foyle College did not hold quite as 
 strongly on his first entering on his professional life, 
 twenty years ago, as he does now. Nor is there an 
 opinion expressed in it that might not be entertained 
 by the most devoted of Loyalists and the staunchest of 
 Conservatives in this country ; nay, which has not 
 been for years past entertained by a considerable 
 number of them. No Essay could be freer from 
 sectarianism or political bias of any kind than this. I 
 write not as a partisan of this or that sect, or of this 
 or that party in the state, nor even as a schoolmaster. 
 I write simply as one who, having been long conver- 
 sant with educational matters in Ireland, thinks that 
 he can speak about them with a certain amount of 
 authority. What I have written I have written solely 
 in the interest of that large class of persons to whom 
 
 * There has been many a Cabinet Minister, probably within the 
 reader’s memory, to whom, in regard to his school and college days, 
 the sketch I have drawn here would in all respects apply. 
 
PREFA CE. xxiii 
 
 the Essay has been dedicated. To their self-interest and 
 intelligence and true regard for their children’s interests 
 I have appealed throughout. And great will be my 
 satisfaction should I ever have reason to think that 
 my appeal has not been wholly in vain. 
 
 I publish my Essay as a protest : I publish it to 
 show the weakness and folly of the middle-class Irish 
 parent’s sending his sons to school in England. “ I am 
 well aware ” — and I trust I shall be forgiven for thus 
 temporarily appropriating and quoting on my own be- 
 half these words of the eloquent Archdeacon of West- 
 minster : — “ I am well aware that it is not free from 
 literary and artistic faults. But as these faults are 
 not the result of carelessness, and still less of that 
 indifference which looks lightly on the publication of 
 a book, I would earnestly deprecate that severe criticism 
 which magnifies a trivial inaccuracy into a grave error, 
 and a solecism into something like a crime.” 
 
 Death, never idle, has removed from the scenes of 
 their earthly labours, even while the proof sheets of 
 this little volume were passing through the printers’ 
 hands, some whose names had been only just recorded 
 by me in the several lists in Chapter VI. Amongst 
 those thus “ gone before ” — their names still appear 
 in the lists — are the venerable Dr. Apjohn, Sir Samuel 
 Ferguson, Dr. Lalor, Dr. Curtis, Mr. Hamill, Mr. 
 Dowdall, Dr. Croskery, and Sir John Lentaigne, D.L. 
 Two of the most estimable of our old Foyle College 
 Boys have been also recently taken from us by the 
 same ruthless destroyer, namely, the Bev. Dr. Maclvor, 
 ex-F.T.C.D., and Dr. J. A. Eames — the latter called 
 away almost without notice, in the very prime of life. 
 
 * Eric , or Little by Little : Preface to the First Edition. 
 
XXIV 
 
 PREFACE . 
 
 M 0 great man-eater ! 
 
 Whose ev’ry clay is carnival, not sated yet ! 
 
 Unheard-of epicure ! without a fellow ! 
 
 The veriest gluttons do not always cram ; 
 
 Some intervals of abstinence are sought 
 
 To edge the appetite : thou seekest none.” * 
 
 Nor is it only the changes wrought by death that 
 have taken place since the completion of my lists. In 
 consequence of the recent change of Government there 
 have been many official promotions, &c., made of late. 
 Thus, he who was Lord Chancellor of Ireland when I 
 sent my MS. to the printers is Lord Chancellor no 
 longer. Another Irishman — another, too, be it noted, 
 who was educated, as a boy, exclusively in Ireland — 
 rules in his stead.t The reader will kindly bear these 
 facts in mind when reading Chapter YI . 
 
 * “The Grave.” — Blair . 
 
 t This is the second time Lord Ashbourne has been Chancellor : he 
 was Chancellor first in 1885. Other Lord Chancellors who were 
 also exclusively educated as boys, in Ireland, are these : Right 
 Hon. Sir Edward Sullivan, Bart. (1883-85) ; Right Hon. Hugh Law 
 (1881-83); Right Hon. J. T. Ball (1875-80); Right Hon. Lord 
 O’Hagan (1868-70, and again in 1880-81); Right Hon. Abraham 
 Brewster (1867-68) ; Right Hon. Erancis Blackburne (1852-53, and 
 again in 1866-67) ; Right Hon. Sir Maziere Brady, Bart. (1846-52, and 
 in 1853-58, and again in 1859-66) ; Right Hon. Sir Joseph Napier 
 (1858-59). Thus there was no Irish Chancellor from 1846 up to the 
 present tjme who was not educated exclusively in Ireland. Two 
 Englishmen successively preceded Sir Maziere Brady, viz., Lord Camp- 
 bell (1841) and Sir E. B. Sugden (1841-1846). The latter, Chan- 
 cellor also in 1835, was preceded by the great Lord Plunket, who was 
 twice Lord Chancellor (1830-34 and 1835-41). The following extract 
 is from a friend’s letter lately received by me : — “ Lord Plunket, the 
 grandfather of the Hon. David Plunket and the present Archbishop of 
 Dublin, was educated at Portora. He was born next-door neighbour to 
 Dr. Magee, ex-E.T.C.D., Archbishop of Dublin (author of “ The Atone- 
 ment ”). They both saw the light in the tenement now occupied by 
 Cooney, the oyster-man, in Enniskillen — close to the lane whereby you 
 
PREFACE . 
 
 XXV 
 
 Believing as I do, and that most firmly, that the 
 standard of schoolboy morality in England is much 
 lower than it is in Ireland, I have laid, in Chapters 
 IX. and XIV., considerable stress upon this point of 
 difference ; corroborating my opinion by quotations 
 from books about English schools, written by English- 
 men, and other evidence. 
 
 Had I been satisfied with merely bringing vague 
 charges against the morality of English schools, 
 uncorroborated in any way, I should have rendered 
 myself, I felt, fairly liable to the accusation of making 
 charges which I could not prove. To have waived, 
 on the other hand, the morality discussion altogether 
 would certainly have been to have omitted the most 
 fundamental element in the question discussed. The 
 only proper course, then, that was open to me I have 
 adopted. Of English school immorality I have treated 
 unreservedly, i.e. } unreservedly for an Essay intended 
 for general circulation. Should any one think it 
 “ painted ” too “ black, 5 ’ let him reflect that the 
 real painters are the Englishmen whose confirmatory 
 opinions I so often quote. 
 
 Throughout the following pages I have used in- 
 discriminately, and as synonymous, the expressions, 
 “ Grammar Schools,” “ Secondary Schools,” and “ In- 
 termediate Schools.” By a Secondary or Intermediate 
 School I mean the ordinary Grammar School — the 
 school that lies midway, from an educational point of 
 
 go to Paget Square. Rev. Henry Francis Lyte, author of several 
 hymns (one of them the beautiful hymn * Abide with me,’), and of ‘ The 
 Spirit of the Psalms,’ was also educated at Portora. He was born at 
 Ednam, near Kells, June I, 1793, won a scholarship in Trinity 
 College, Dublin, in 1813, and died at Nice in 1847.” For some of the 
 home-educated Provosts, T.C.D., see pp. 82-83. 
 
XXVI 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 view, between the Primary or Elementary School and 
 the University. 
 
 To all who assisted me in the compilation of the 
 names in the lists in Chapter VI. I beg to tender my 
 sincere thanks. Especially do I thank Colonel C. 
 Raleigh Chichester, for his courtesy in sending me his 
 eloquent and instructive little book, Schools * Though 
 I did not receive it until I had already revised all the 
 first proof-sheets of my own Essay, yet I found in it 
 so many passages corroborative of the views I had 
 myself expressed that — the delay and expense entailed 
 by the alterations, &c., notwithstanding — I gladly 
 availed myself of the opportunity thus afforded me of 
 strengthening my own opinions by quoting passages 
 from his book. Of course, neither Colonel Chichester 
 nor I expect to effect by our pens any great or sudden 
 reformation in school matters. We can only do our 
 best, and hope, and pray. As Colonel Chichester’s book 
 has assisted me, so, possibly, mine may assist some 
 future writer on the same subject ; who, in his turn, 
 may be of help to some one else. And thus, in the 
 end, the efforts we have made to effect the reform we 
 desire may not be fruitless. 
 
 I am, of course, prepared to hear that my Essay 
 has been written all to no purpose ; that it is all 
 lost labour on my part; that as long as there is 
 such a thing as fashion, so long will parents continue 
 to send their sons to fashionable schools in England, 
 and so forth. When one sows the seed, he cannot 
 count to a certainty on its growing. He can only 
 hope, and pray, and trust, and do his best. I have 
 
 * Published by Burns & Oates, London ; James Duffy & Son, 
 Dublin (1882). 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 XXVll 
 
 done my best now : more I could not do ; less I 
 might have done, but not with a clear conscience. 
 “ Though we cannot out- vote them,” said Dr. Johnson, 
 “ we will out-argue them. They shall not do wrong 
 without its being shown both to themselves and to the 
 world” * 
 
 m. c. h. 
 
 Cluain Fois, Buncrana, Co. Donegal, 
 
 December i, 1886. 
 
 P.S . — To any one who will kindly tell me of any 
 mistakes, whether of omission or commission, made by 
 me in chapter VI., I shall be grateful. To have 
 avoided all errors would have been nearly impossible, 
 seeing how defective and vague in many instances 
 were the sources of my information. To the names 
 in Chapter VI. the following should have been 
 added: — D. H. Madden, Q.C. (private tuition); Ser- 
 jeant Campion, Q.C., Bencher (Endowed School, Fer- 
 moy) ; The Hon. Fred. M. Darley, Chief- Justice, New 
 South Wales — salary ^*3500 a year (R. School, Dun- 
 gannon) ; Colonel Crozier, R.E., Director of Public 
 Works, Woolwich Arsenal (Portarlington) ; Rev. T. 
 W. Belcher, M.D., D.D., Rector of Frampton-Cotterell, 
 Bristol (Endowed School, Bandon) ; Thomas W. Grim- 
 shaw, M.A., M.D., Registrar - General for Ireland 
 (Schools in Newry, Carrickfergus, and Dublin) ; Hon. 
 Wm. Tyrrell, Judge of the High Court, Allahabad 
 (Dr. Flynn’s School, Harcourt Street, Dublin) ; Rev. 
 Canon Thornhill, Rathcoole Rectory, Dublin, author of 
 
 Johnsoniana [Handy Aldine Series], p. 222. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 xxviii 
 
 “The iEneid of Virgil in Blank Verse ” (Clonmel En- 
 dowed School). Of this translation the reviewer in the 
 Academy , August 31, 1886, observes : — “Canon Thorn- 
 hill's work is not only, so far as I can judge, the best 
 verse translation of Virgil I have ever read, but one of 
 the very best classical translations in the language." 
 
 April 7, 1887 
 
IRISH SCHOOLS FOR IRISH BOYS 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 VERY FEW OF OUR DISTINGUISHED LIVING IRISH- 
 MEN EDUCATED IN ENGLAND. APPROXIMATE 
 NUMBER OF IRISH BOYS EDUCATED YEARLY AT 
 ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 By distinguished men, I mean men who have become 
 eminent amongst their fellows by reason of the success- 
 ful pursuance of some worthy occupation, whether pro- 
 fessional, scientific, artistic, commercial, or of any other 
 kind. Thus I regard our leading Members of Parlia- 
 ment, Judges, Queen’s Counsel, Church Dignitaries, 
 County Surveyors, Fellows and Professors of the 
 Universities, Medical Doctors, Indian Civil Servants, 
 Military Officers, all as distinguished — yes, all as 
 distinguished, but, of course, more or less so, each 
 according to his own individual worth ; these having 
 outstripped their fellows, and being clearly eminent 
 amongst them, by reason of the successful pursuance 
 of their proper callings.^ 
 
 The number of distinguished living Irishmen, then, 
 who have been educated in England — letting my 
 
 * Cf. the derivation of the word “distinguished.” Primarily, it 
 means “separated,” “distinct” — scl., by means of special marks or 
 colours. 
 
 A 
 
2 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 definition of the word “ distinguished ” stand — is a 
 mere nothing actually; and it seems especially small 
 when one takes into account the vast numbers of 
 Irishmen, now in their prime so far as age is con- 
 cerned, who have been educated in England. 
 
 It has been computed by one well conversant in 
 these matters, that for many years past some 1500 or 
 1600 Irish boys have gone yearly to school in Eng- 
 land : that this computation is not far from being 
 correct I shall assume throughout these pages. What 
 becomes of these eventually is a mystery: they certainly 
 are not, as a body or as individuals, distinguished in any 
 way. Nobody, for instance, would ever dream of say- 
 ing that such and such Irishmen, residing in Ireland, 
 must manifestly have been educated in England, so 
 religious and moral are they ! such splendid scholars ! 
 so highly cultured ! so refined ! so polite ! Nor is it 
 only in Ireland that we search in vain, or almost in 
 vain, for distinguished Irishmen who were educated in 
 England. When we turn our eyes to England, or 
 the colonies, their conspicuous absence there also 
 strikes us as astonishing. 
 
 Of the very few living Irishmen educated in Eng- 
 lish schools who have come “ to the front,” it may 
 indeed be fairly said, in the words of Cowper, 
 
 “ Such rare exceptions, shining in the dark, 
 
 Prove rather than impeach the just remark ; 
 
 As here and there a twinkling star descried, 
 
 Serves but to show how black is all beside.” * 
 
 So far as my present knowledge of the subject goes, 
 of distinguished living Irishmen only 9.6 per cent., 
 
 Tirocinium. 
 
MEAGRE OUTCOME OF ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 as I shall presently explain, were educated, or even 
 partly educated, at English schools. But England 
 cannot lay claim to even the entire of this 9.6 per 
 cent, of distinguished living Irishmen ; for nearly one- 
 half of these were educated at Irish as well as at 
 English schools. 
 
 What has become of the vast number of Irish boys 
 who w T ere educated in England, and must be now, 
 those of them who are alive, in their prime, it is 
 impossible to say. Is it possible that they were not 
 properly grounded when boys at school, and that their 
 religious and moral characters were not properly 
 attended to, and that it is to these defects in their 
 early training that their present obscurity is due ? It 
 surely cannot be that they were nearly all stupid ? 
 
 Almost all the distinguished Irishmen in Great 
 Britain, the colonies, or in other countries, were edu- 
 cated as boys exclusively in Ireland. 
 
 The more one looks into the question, the more 
 difficult it is to make out what on earth has become of 
 the swarms of Irish boys who have been going for 
 years and years past to England for their educa- 
 tion. 
 
 I am certainly inclined to think that, in putting 
 down the number of Irish boys who go yearly to 
 school in England at 1500 or 1600, we are under- 
 estimating it. There are some English schools at 
 which the number of Irish boys is over forty : there 
 are few — none, I believe, of any public worth — at 
 which there are not some. Then the number of Irish 
 boys at wholly insignificant English schools; Bectories 
 wherein they are treated by the Incumbents “ as 
 members of the family ; ” grinding establishments ; 
 
4 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 and attending the larger schools as day-boys, who can 
 ascertain ? * 
 
 And some twenty- five or thirty years ago, when the 
 men, now in their prime, were still but schoolboys, 
 the number of Irish boys at English schools was at 
 least as large as it is at present. An Irish gentle- 
 man told me the other day, that at the school at which 
 he was educated in England there were somewhat 
 over ioo Irish boys. As my friend is a County Court 
 Judge of nearly twenty years’ standing, the time that 
 has elapsed since he was at school is probably even 
 more than twenty-five or thirty years. He further 
 informed me that at the same time there were three 
 other English schools at which there were even more 
 Irish boys than there were at that where he was. The 
 names of these schools he mentioned to me. 
 
 What has led me to compute the number of Irish 
 boys w r ho go yearly to school in England at 1500 or 
 1 600, is the following passage from an article by the 
 Recorder of Dublin in the December number of the 
 Dublin University Review , 1885 : — 
 
 “ While thus 700 or 800 boys form the whole pupil 
 constituency of the higher-class boarding-schools fre- 
 quented by the sons of Irish Churchmen, here and there 
 throughout the Blue Book are references repeated, com- 
 plaints complex and crying as to the numbers of Irish 
 boys who go to boarding-schools in England. How 
 many are they? The Report does not profess to 
 ascertain them even approximately, but we may form 
 some conception from the volume of complaint ; from 
 the number of instances which each of us can reckon 
 
 * As regards the impossibility of ascertaining the number of Irish 
 boys receiving their education in England, see footnote, p. 270. 
 
MEAGRE OUTCOME OF ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 5 
 
 within his own circle and acquaintance ; from the 
 swarms of boys in the cross-Channel steamers when 
 the Midsummer holidays have commenced and are 
 ending. When, a few days since, I said to a friend, 
 very competent to form an opinion, that the numbers 
 who went to England were, perhaps, equal to those, 
 700 or 800, in the Irish schools, he said he thought 
 we might safely multiply these by two.”- 
 
 Then there are, of course, hundreds of Irish parents 
 residing in England, India, and other countries — 
 whether from choice or necessity — connected with the 
 Home and Foreign Civil Service, the Army, Navy, 
 &c., whose sons are being educated in England. Add 
 these Irish boys to those who go from Ireland every 
 year to England to school, and how large will the 
 number of Irish boys educated in England appear ! 
 
 In short, nearly all our Irish Peers, Bishops, 
 Baronets, Knights of the Garter, the Thistle, the 
 Bath, St. Michael and St. George, and the Star of 
 India, Knights Bachelors, Judges, Privy Councillors, 
 Governors of Colonies, Lieutenants of Counties, lead- 
 ing doctors, leading lawyers, leading shopkeepers, and 
 leading merchants send their sons to English schools. 
 
 In fact, the few boarders that there are in Irish 
 schools consist, to speak generally, of the sons of the 
 country gentry and professional men in Ireland whose 
 means are small, and who are too sensible of the 
 importance of a sound education to send their sons to 
 those schools in England — the only schools there to 
 which they could afford to send them — the terms of 
 which are lower than the ordinary school terms in 
 Ireland. 
 
 4665 boys only entered their names as competitors 
 
6 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 at the last Intermediate Examinations. Probably two 
 or, at the most, three times this number would repre- 
 sent the total number of Irish boys receiving in 
 Ireland what is known as a “ liberal education.” # 
 
 There were, nevertheless, according to my calcula- 
 tions, as the reader will see for himself in Chapter V., 
 rather over seventeen times as many of the most dis- 
 tinguished Irishmen alive educated in Ireland as in 
 England, exclusively. f 
 
 Of the educational outcome of their schools Irishmen 
 have thus clearly no reason to feel ashamed. 
 
 * Since hazarding this calculation, I have ascertained from “ Thom ” 
 that in 1881, when the census was last taken, there were attending 
 “ Superior Schools” in Ireland in all 11,303 males, of all denomina- 
 tions and ages — about the number at which I have independently 
 arrived. 
 
 + Supposing that there are about five times as many boys educated 
 at schools as there are privately in Ireland — and there are probably 
 more — then the total number of Irish boys receiving in Ireland a 
 higher education will be about 13,500. Now, should I be right in 
 computing the number of Irish boys at English grammar-schools at 
 1500, it follows that, if the schools are as efficient in the one country 
 as in the other, there ought to be nine times as many of the distin- 
 guished living Irishmen educated in Ireland as in England. But in 
 point of fact there are, according to my computation, seventeen times 
 as many. If this computation be correct, it is clear that education 
 in Ireland is much more adapted to prepare Irish boys to fight suc- 
 cessfully the battle of life than education in England. 
 
( 7 ) 
 
 CHAPTER IT. 
 
 ANALYSIS OF THE LIST OF DISTINGUISHED IRISH- 
 MEN EDUCATED AS BOYS IN ENGLISH SCHOOLS— 
 RESULTS OF SUCH ANALYSIS NOT PARTICU- 
 LARLY FAVOURABLE TO THE MERITS OF THESE 
 ESTABLISHMENTS . 
 
 The total number of distinguished living Irishmen 
 who were educated exclusively in England I have 
 estimated, as I shall explain in Chapter V., at 5.2 
 per cent, of the whole number. But from this 
 number, conspicuously small though it be, a con- 
 siderable deduction must be made, so as to arrive at 
 a trustworthy conclusion, and not give credit where 
 credit is not fairly due, or withhold credit where credit 
 is due. 
 
 I. The 5.2 per cent., then, to begin with, let us divide 
 into two portions, and then proceed to criticise each 
 of these somewhat in detail. Let the divisions be : (i.) 
 those who, direct from their schools, entered Oxford 
 or Cambridge University, and (ii.) those who entered 
 Trinity College, Dublin. 
 
 (i.) Of the former I cannot say much with any know- 
 ledge. It may, however, be generally stated, without 
 injustice to English schools, that of the Irishmen 
 who have within recent years entered Oxford or 
 Cambridge, direct from any English school, few so 
 distinguished themselves as to justify one in classing 
 
8 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 them among the distinguished Irishmen of the pre- 
 sent day — probably not i per cent, of them. I doubt 
 much if the most ardent admirer of the English school 
 system could raise the percentage to 3. One thing 
 certainly is clear : the majority of Irishmen who have 
 within the last twenty years, let us say, distinguished 
 themselves at Oxford or Cambridge were educated at 
 Irish, not English schools. As instances of these, we 
 may mention Messrs. Allen and Larmor, both educated 
 at the Academical Institution, Belfast, who were 
 elected Senior Wranglers of the University of Cam- 
 bridge in 1878 and 1880 respectively; Professor 
 ltidgeway, Professor of Greek, Queen’s College, Cork, 
 Fellow of Caius College, Cambridge ; also Messrs. 
 Taylor, Cullinan, Collins, Edgeworth, 0 . Wilde, Leech, 
 Graham, Orpen, Adair, Gabbett. Numbers of other 
 names occur to me of Irishmen educated at Irish 
 schools who, within my own memory, distinguished 
 themselves at Oxford and Cambridge, besides the 
 above-mentioned. Nearly all of these had been for 
 some time, previously to their going to Oxford or 
 Cambridge, undergraduates of Trinity College, Dublin. 
 
 The Irishmen who go direct to Oxford and Cam- 
 bridge from English schools, certainly do not dis- 
 tinguish themselves at these Universities as much as 
 do their countrymen who go to them from schools in 
 Ireland ; and their comparative failure is all the more 
 remarkable when the number of the former as com- 
 pared with that of the latter is taken into account. 
 
 (ii.) Let us now consider for a moment the Irish boys 
 educated at English schools who return to their own 
 country after the completion of their school-days, and 
 enter Trinity College, Dublin. How do these distin- 
 
RESULTS OF ENGLISH SCHOOLS CRITICISED . 9 
 
 guish themselves at the Dublin University ? Badly, as 
 a rule, so far as Classics and Mathematics are con- 
 cerned. If one of them happen occasionally to distin- 
 guish himself in Trinity College, it is generally in 
 some subject which he began to learn almost for the 
 first time after he entered Trinity. There are some 
 subjects, eg.. Logic, in the Trinity College curriculum 
 v 7 hich are not prescribed for the student till his second 
 undergraduate year : there are others — e.g., Mechanics, 
 Hydrostatics, Optics, and Astronomy — which are not 
 prescribed till his third year. If, then, any Irishman, 
 who is now, say, forty years of age or upwards, dis- 
 tinguished himself in any of these subjects in Trinity, 
 his school, no matter whether Irish or English, could 
 scarcely without injustice claim the distinction as due 
 in any way to the actual teaching which he received 
 thereat ; for these subjects were hardly taught at all 
 at schools twenty years ago. The same thing may 
 also be said, though in a somewhat modified form, of 
 the Irishmen who, twenty or twenty-five years ago, let 
 us say, distinguished themselves at Trinity in Mathe- 
 matics. Twenty-five years ago the student may be 
 almost said to have commenced Mathematics in Trinity 
 College ; and so at that time one student started on 
 his course almost as well equipped as another, if only 
 well grounded in elementary Mathematics, so far as 
 the winning of Honors in Mathematics was concerned. 
 To the distinctions, therefore, won by students in 
 Mathematics five-and- twenty years ago — students who 
 would now be in the very prime of their life — their 
 schools, whether in Ireland or England, could not 
 without impropriety lay much claim. 
 
 I have at present open before me a Trinity College 
 
10 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 Calendar of the year i860, and what do I find is the 
 course for Honors in Mathematics at the Hilary term 
 in that year ? I find standing out in simple solitary 
 grandeur, “ Euclid, Bk. VI.” To the foregoing in- 
 formation, I must admit, there is the following pre- 
 liminary note: — “It is to be remarked, that at all 
 examinations for Honors, candidates are liable to be 
 examined in the ordinary subjects of examination of 
 the course in which they present themselves for 
 Honors, in addition to those specified below. 55 On 
 turning back a page or two to see what the “ ordinary 
 subjects 55 were in which students were “liable to be 
 examined 55 in addition to “ Euclid, Bk. VI., 55 I find 
 that they are specified to be “ Elrington’s Euclid, Bks. 
 I. II. III., Arithmetic. 55 The first examination for 
 Mathematical Honors in T. C. D., it will thus be seen, 
 was not particularly extensive at this time — to judge 
 by appearances. The second, or Trinity term examina- 
 tion course, was not much more extensive. It con- 
 sisted of, for Honors (I again copy from the Calendar 
 specified), “ Algebra (not including the general theory 
 of Equations). 55 For the ordinary course, which 
 students were also expected to know before going in 
 for this Honor examination, the prescribed subjects 
 were — I am quoting now also direct from the Calendar 
 — “ Euclid, Bks. I. II. III. VI., and Defs. Bk. V. 
 (omitting Props. 27, 28, 29 of Bk. VI.) 55 — a not, 
 apparently, very formidable one, it will be admitted. 
 
 A boy of seventeen or eighteen years of age at that 
 time, who possessed the average head-class Irish school- 
 boy knowledge of Arithmetic, Algebra, and Euclid, and 
 was attentive, clever, and industrious, might have 
 reasonably hoped to obtain Mathematical Honors in 
 
RESULTS OF ENGLISH SCHOOLS CRITICISED, n 
 
 the first two terms in Trinity College if — for the 
 examinations were certainly much harder in reality 
 than in appearance — he studiously attended his mathe- 
 matical lectures, and, in addition to attending lectures, 
 went for a month or so previously to the examination 
 to a grinder ; and there is no lack, and never was, of 
 good grinders in the Dublin University. 
 
 In the case of Classical Honors it is very different. 
 A student who obtained then, or obtains now, Honors 
 in Classics from the beginning of his Trinity College 
 course, must have been carefully taught Classics before 
 he entered the University; and for every such dis- 
 tinction in Classics his school has consequently every 
 right to take credit to itself. I have never known an in- 
 stance of a student’s beginning, so to speak, to learn 
 Classics in Trinity College, and distinguishing him- 
 self thereat ; though I have known several instances 
 of students beginning — I may almost say beginning 
 — to learn Mathematics, all beyond the usual school- 
 boy modicum, in Trinity College, and subsequently 
 distinguishing themselves thereat most brilliantly. 
 
 If an inquiry were made into the amount of ma- 
 thematical knowledge possessed at the time of their 
 entrance into Trinity College, Dublin, by the large 
 majority of men, now in their prime, who obtained 
 there mathematical Gold Medals and Senior Modera- 
 torships, I have no doubt that it would be found 
 that it, for the most part, amounted to little more 
 than that of the usual five books of Euclid, with 
 simple “ cuts ; ” Algebra up to quadratic equations ; 
 a little Trigonometry, and the ordinary rules of Arith- 
 metic. This amount of mathematical knowledge is 
 not very extensive. No senior schoolboy of average 
 
IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 ability and industry could be expected to possess 
 much less. The sixth-class boys of our National Model 
 Schools generally possess as much — always, indeed, if 
 we omit the Trigonometry. And yet, starting with this 
 amount of mathematical knowledge as a foundation, 
 a young Junior Freshman, T. C. I)., may, I submit, 
 if well grounded in it, and clever and diligent, arrive 
 ultimately at the highest mathematical Honors the 
 University confers — Scholarship, Senior Moderatorship, 
 and even Fellowship. 
 
 Mathematics, indeed, is not a subject into which even 
 the clever schoolboy of seventeen or eighteen years 
 of age is capable of going deeply. It is an essentially 
 thinking and reasoning subject ; and therefore it is 
 suited rather to the mind of an adult than to that of 
 a boy. In this respect Mathematics differs widely, 
 as a school subject, from Classics ; the latter being to 
 a large extent a memory subject, and the better 
 adapted, consequently, to the intellect of the young. 
 
 On the whole, therefore, it must, I think, be ad- 
 mitted that the student of ability and energy who 
 entered Trinity College twenty-five years ago, let us 
 say, and therein achieved success in Mathematics, 
 owed his success but in small measure to the 
 teaching he received as a boy at school, no matter 
 whether the school at which he was educated was 
 in Ireland or in England. 
 
 In short, the Irishmen who, after having com- 
 pleted their school-days in England, entered Trinity 
 College, and therein obtained success in Mathematics, 
 owed, for the most part, their success, not to their 
 schools, but to (a) Irish grinders ; (/ 3 ) College Lec- 
 tures ; and ( 7 ) the wise arrangements of the Board. 
 
RESULTS OF ENGLISH SCHOOLS CRITICISED . 13 
 
 For, in consequence of these wise arrangements, stu- 
 dents were from the beginning encouraged to aspire 
 hopefully to mathematical Honors; and the various 
 examinations in Mathematics were graduated so judi- 
 ciously that the student, who may have begun with 
 but a low second Honor at his first examination, 
 found no great difficulty in achieving, term by term, 
 higher and still higher Honors, even till at the end 
 he obtained a Gold Medal and Senior Moderatorship. 
 The student who did so, rising thus in repute as a 
 scholar, examination by examination, having begun 
 with a very little and ending with a great deal, 
 owed, as far as his mathematical Honors were 
 concerned, to his school very little, to the Dublin 
 University, its lecturers and its grinders, a great 
 deal. 
 
 So far, then, for the two classes of Irishmen, now 
 in their prime, who were educated exclusively at 
 English schools, viz. (i.) those who entered Oxford 
 or Cambridge, and (ii.) those who entered Trinity 
 College, Dublin. On the college distinctions of the 
 former their English schools, as we have seen, do 
 not appear to have much reason for congratulating 
 themselves, nor on those of the latter either. For, 
 first, very few of these distinguished themselves in 
 Classics : a boy who knows Classics well always 
 reflects credit on his school. And, secondly, for 
 the very few who distinguished themselves in Mathe- 
 matics — and these are the two great University 
 subjects — their English schools can take but little 
 credit, seeing that all the Mathematics they were 
 required to know — or, indeed, for the most part, 
 did know — at the time of their entrance into Trinity, 
 
H 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 amounted to, for their first examination, only four 
 books of Euclid, with “ deductions/' and Arithmetic. 
 
 This amount of Mathematical knowledge our head- 
 class National Schoolboys, as we have stated, usually 
 possess — boys whose school - fees amount to some 
 twenty shillings a year, or less. 
 
 That an English schoolboy, whose school-fees, if 
 all put together, would constitute a small fortune, 
 should know no more Mathematics, when beginning 
 to read for Honors in Trinity College, than our National 
 School-boys of the same age, affords but little reason 
 to his school for self-congratulation. 
 
 II. 4.4 per cent., as I shall point out in Chapter 
 V., of our most distinguished Irishmen of the present 
 day were educated, so far as my present knowledge 
 enables me to form an opinion on the subject, partly 
 at English, and partly at Irish schools. In the dis- 
 tinctions which have been gained by many of these, 
 their English schools do not appear to be justified in 
 taking very much credit to themselves. For it would 
 seem that several of them succeeded not so much 
 in consequence of as in spite of the education 
 which they received in England — while they all 
 clearly must have learned something, at least, at 
 their Irish schools, or with their Irish tutors, as 
 well as in England. Not a few of these have 
 written themselves to tell me that they learned 
 little or nothing at their English school or schools. 
 This is the cry of at least the half of the Irishmen 
 who were educated at schools both in England and 
 Ireland, and have subsequently risen to high positions. 
 As samples of the letters that I received to this 
 effect, the following will suffice. One of our most 
 
RESULTS OF ENGLISH SCHOOLS CRITICISED. 15 
 
 distinguished Irish Prelates, an ex-Eellow, T.C.D., 
 thus writes to me : — “ When I was thirteen, I 
 was sent to an English school, where I learned little 
 or nothing during the year I spent at it. I remem- 
 ber I came away persuaded that I had no taste or 
 capacity for Mathematics. My teacher, finding that 
 I did not learn the demonstrations of propositions 
 in Euclid by heart, and was actually guilty some- 
 
 B 
 
 times of speaking of the angle 
 
 A 
 
 BCA as 
 c 
 
 if it was the same thing as the angle A C B, had pro- 
 nounced that judgment upon me. . . . Returning 
 to Dublin, I had the benefit of the best private 
 tuition that my father could procure for me, while 
 I was preparing to enter college. To that I owe 
 whatever success has attended me through life.” The 
 Bishop obtained his Fellowship at a singularly early 
 age. 
 
 The following is the letter which I received from 
 Lord Dufferin in answer to my query, where was he 
 educated as a boy ? — 
 
 “Viceregal Lodge, Simla, India, 
 August 18, 1886. 
 
 “ Sir, — I hasten to reply to your letter of the 21st of July, 
 but I am afraid that I am not entitled to appear in your 
 lists ; for, though I lived a good deal in Ireland during my 
 childhood, and indeed until called upon to serve abroad, 
 my education was given to me at English schools, first at a 
 private school at Hampton, and then at Eton. Between 
 leaving Eton, however, and going to Oxford, I lived for 
 three years in Ireland with a private tutor, and certainly 
 acquired more knowledge in that interval than at any other 
 
j6 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 period. I do not know whether you will consider that 
 this brings me into the category of those Irishmen who at 
 all events have been partially educated in Ireland. — I have 
 the honour to be, Sir, your obedient servant, 
 
 “Dufferin.” 
 
 A Professor of one of the ancient classical languages 
 writes to me from one of the Queen’s Colleges as 
 follows : — “ I really owe almost everything to my 
 father, who began my education very early, and 
 taught me most thoroughly, without, however, over- 
 working me. He died when I was only 8^ years old, 
 but I had already read a quantity of Virgil and of 
 Sallust, as well as some easier authors. Then I was 
 sent to the E. A. Institution in Belfast for fifteen 
 months, after which w^e all went to England. There 
 I was unfortunately sent to a private school, which 
 was carelessly carried on though it had been very 
 highly recommended, and I learnt very little in it.” 
 
 Another Irishman wTio has risen to a high rank in 
 the medical profession in England writes to me : — 
 “ In the English school to which I was next sent I 
 learned, I must confess, at least one thing. I learned 
 to be a good boxer, for I was the only Irish boy at the 
 school.” 
 
 The gifted Bishop of Derry and Eaphoe assured 
 me the other day that he ascribes any success that 
 attended his studies as a schoolboy in England to the 
 admirable foundation for learning laid in him before 
 he went to school by his father’s Curate, the Eev. 
 Thomas Eollestone, in the old Eectory of Aghadoey.'* 
 
 * Another gifted Irishman who was also, for a portion of his early 
 boyhood, a pupil of this excellent teacher and scholar, Mr. Rollestone, 
 was the celebrated James M‘Cullagh, F.T. C.D., Professor of Mathe- 
 
RESULTS OF ENGLISH SCHOOLS CRITICISED. 17 
 
 Another writes : — “ All I learned in the English 
 school I was in was a knowledge of evil.” 
 
 The foregoing accounts may be regarded as typical 
 
 raatics, 1835, and of Natural Philosophy, 1843, in the Uuiversity of 
 Dublin. 
 
 In his “Brief Memoirs of all the Bishops of Derry,” Mr. Maturin 
 observes in his account of the Hon. and Right Rev. William Knox, D.D., 
 Lord Bishop of Derry, 1803-31, “that, of the twenty Prelates who 
 filled the See of Derry for two hundred years, from the period of the 
 Reformation till the commencement of the present century, two only 
 — King and Ashe — were natives of the Irish soil, while one was a 
 Scotchman , and the other seventeen Englishmen , who thus obtained the 
 ‘ lion’s share of the spoil.’ ” 
 
 Both the Bishops referred to by Mr. Maturin were educated as boys 
 in Ireland. Bishop King (1691-1702) was educated at the Royal 
 School, Dungannon : he was elected a scholar of Trinity College, 
 Dublin, in 1667. 
 
 Bishop King was afterwards made — in 1702 — Archbishop of Dublin. 
 He was a munificent benefactor to Trinity College, having contributed 
 ^1000 towards the founding of “a Divinity Lecture, for the better 
 instruction of such Bachelors of Arts as intend to enter into Holy 
 Orders.” 
 
 Though Archbishop King was the first Irishman who had been made 
 Bishop of Derry since the Reformation, the Right Rev. Michael Ward, 
 D.D., a native of Shropshire, who was Bishop of Derry 1680-81, may 
 be said to have been educated exclusively in Ireland. According to the 
 Dublin University Calendar for 1877, he “entered College at the age 
 of 13, was elected a Fellow, in 1662, at 19,” and was “Provost 
 1674-5.” Harris remarks of him that, “ besides his accomplishments 
 in learning, he was esteemed a person of fine conversation, and of great 
 sagacity in dexterously managing proper conjunctures.” Another 
 Englishman, the Right Rev. John Hartstong, Bishop of Derry 1714- 
 1717, was also educated as a boy exclusively in Ireland — at the schools 
 of Charleville and Kilkenny. 
 
 Bishop Ashe (1717-1718) was elected a Scholar of Trinity College, 
 Dublin, in 1674, a Fellow in 1679, and afterwards Professor of 
 Mathematics ; and eventually he was placed at the head of his 
 College, as Provost, in 1692. 
 
 “ Bishop Ashe,” writes Mr. Maturin, “ appears to have been held in 
 the highest esteem by the accomplished Addison, then Secretary of 
 State, who, in a letter to Dean Swift, shortly, after the death of Bishop 
 Ashe, ‘condoles with him upon the loss of that excellent man, the 
 
 B 
 
i8 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 of others that I have received to the same effect. As 
 the authors of these are men of mature years, sobriety 
 of judgment, and distinguished in their several callings 
 in life, they cannot, I take it, but be regarded as trust- 
 worthy authorities in regard to the subject of their own 
 education. 
 
 It is clear that, if I were enabled to add to my list 
 of distinguished home-educated Irishmen the names of 
 those Irishmen who admit that almost all they know 
 they learned either before they went to school in 
 England, or after they returned from their English 
 schools to Ireland (like the Church dignitaries whose 
 letters I have quoted), the percentage of distinguished 
 Irishmen who were educated exclusively in Ireland 
 would be larger than even 90.4. 
 
 There is another set of Irishmen all credit for whose 
 
 Bishop of Derry, who has scarce left behind him his equal in humanity, 
 agreeable conversation, and all kinds of learning.’ ” Bishop Ashe was 
 born in the County Roscommon. 
 
 Bishop Knox (1803-1831) was also educated in Ireland as a boy. 
 The marble monument erected to his memory in the Chancel of 
 Derry Cathedral, bears the following inscription : — 
 
 “ Sacred to the Memory of the Honourable and Right Reverend 
 William Knox, D.D., Lord Bishop of Derry. 
 
 This Monument has been raised by the Clergy and Laity 
 of all denominations of his Diocese, 
 to perpetuate the remembrance of that tolerant and Christian spirit 
 which, for twenty-seven years, marked his Episcopate — 
 that munificence which reared and fostered the Public 
 Institutions of this city — and that unaffected benevolence 
 which, animating and adorning his life, secured the gratitude, 
 and even the affection, of all classes of society. 
 
 He died the 10th July 1831, in the 71st 
 year of his age.” 
 
 Bishop Knox’s successor in the Bishopric, the Hon. and Right Rev. 
 Richard Ponsonby, D.D. (1831-1853), was also educated exclusively 
 in Ireland — as a boy, at Kilkenny College, and subsequently at 
 Trinity College, Dublin. 
 
RESULTS OF ENGLISH SCHOOLS CRITICISED. 19 
 
 distinguished careers we must also forego, as it was 
 not in Ireland that they were “ exclusively ” educated. 
 It is those who were for a brief period — no matter how 
 brief — at school in Scotland or on the Continent.* 
 
 Even without either of the foregoing classes of 
 Irishmen, however, it seems to me that the percent- 
 age of distinguished living Irishmen who were edu- 
 cated exclusively in Ireland, is satisfactorily large. 
 90.4 per cent, is no small proportion of them ; and this, 
 as I shall presently explain, is the percentage of them, 
 that, according to my computation, was educated ex- 
 clusively in their native country. 
 
 It was only right, however, that of the 9.6 per 
 cent, of our distinguished living Irishmen who were not 
 exclusively educated in Ireland (small, ridiculously 
 small, though this percentage be, even as it is), there 
 should have been some analysis made, so that not only 
 the truth but the whole truth should be known in 
 regard to it. 
 
 How this percentage dwindles down when looked at 
 with the eye of truth ! 
 
 * As representatives of these I may mention Mr. J. H. Owen, Archi- 
 tect to the Board of Public Works ; Dr. G. J. Stoney, D. Sc., F.R.S., 
 late Secretary of Queen’s University ; and his brother, the well-known 
 engineer. The following letter I received from Dr. G. J. Stoney on the 
 subject : — “ My brother, B. B. Stoney, LL.D., F.R.S., and I received 
 a home education in Ireland from the time that he was nine, and I 
 eleven, until we entered Trinity College, Dublin. Before that we had 
 been for about a year at schools in Edinburgh and Paris.” Mr. Owen 
 was one year in Rouen, six at Mr. Huddert’s, Dublin, previous to 
 entering Trinity. Virtually, of course, it was in Ireland these Irish- 
 men were educated — and several others also, whose names I have been 
 obliged on similar grounds to omit from the lists. That England had 
 no share in their education is, at all events, clear. 
 
( 20 ) 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 NEARLY ALL OUR DISTINGUISHED LIVING IRISH- 
 MEN EDUCATED IN IRELAND . 
 
 Almost all the leading professional men of Ireland — 
 barristers, physicians, clergymen, engineers, &c. — were 
 educated in Ireland ; almost all the Professors and 
 Fellows, T. C. D. ; the large majority of the Queen’s 
 College Professors ; almost all the Gold and Silver 
 Medallists, and Scholars, and ex-Scholars, T. C. D. ; 
 nearly all the noteworthy Irishmen in the army ; 
 nearly all the distinguished Irishmen in the Indian 
 Civil Service and in the Colonies — in short, nearly 
 all the distinguished living Irishmen at home, in the 
 colonies, or in any other countries, were educated, as 
 boys, exclusively in Ireland.* 
 
 And is it not a great thing to be able to say this 
 
 * “In Ireland,” I say, rather than at Irish schools, because there 
 are some distinguished Irishmen who were educated, as boys, “in 
 Ireland,” although never at school. These I naturally do not wish to 
 exclude from my calculations, seeing that it was in Ireland they were 
 educated — in Ireland , by either their own fathers or private tutors. 
 And the great point after all, so far as my argument is concerned, is 
 this : that these distinguished Irishmen cannot be reckoned amongst 
 the very few Irishmen of note who were educated in England. All 
 the distinctions which they have attained is notably due to the excel- 
 lence of that early education which they received in Ireland. For 
 definition of the word “distinguished,” see first paragraph, Chapter I. 
 
EXCELLENT OUTCOME OF IRISH SCHOOLS. 21 
 
 — to be able, too, to feel, as one says it, that he can 
 prove it — considering the constant drain of so much 
 of our young Irish talent and energy to England, the 
 incessant depletion of it that is always going on ! 
 When, this depletion notwithstanding, Irishmen are in 
 a position to make without fear of contradiction this 
 proud assertion, what would they not be able to say 
 if only the fifteen or sixteen hundred Irish boys who, 
 it has been computed, go year after year to England 
 for their education were kept at home to be educated ! 
 With such an increase to the talent and energy of 
 her schools, with the means that her schoolmasters 
 would thus have of supplying themselves with some- 
 thing more than just the bare necessaries of teaching — 
 and this in general is all they can do at present — 
 with the hopefulness with which such an increase to 
 the number of their pupils would inspire her teachers, 
 Irishmen would soon be able to say, not merely that 
 “ almost all/’ but that actually all the distinguished 
 Irishmen at home and abroad were educated in Ire- 
 land, and that Ireland was a country famous, as of 
 yore, for the efficiency of its schools. 
 
 Of the very large majority of distinguished Irish- 
 men who have come from Irish schools it may, 
 however, even as it is, be said with truth — and of the 
 privilege of saying so no casuistry can deprive us — 
 that they never crossed the English Channel until 
 their school-days had passed away for ever. 
 
 We have said that nearly all the distinguished 
 living Irishmen that there are, whether at home or 
 abroad, were educated, as boys, in Ireland. But we 
 might have said even more than this ; we might have 
 said that very few old Irish schoolboys fail in making 
 
22 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 out a fairly good position for themselves, by some 
 honourable means or another, in life. 
 
 The number of old English schoolboys — many of 
 them Oxford and Cambridge graduates — who are 
 gaining their livelihood by means of all sorts of 
 menial occupations in all our colonial cities, is appal- 
 ling. They will be found among the ranks of cab- 
 drivers, ’bus conductors, porters, waiters, hangers-on 
 at theatre doors, newspaper “ boys,” and the like, to 
 almost any number, in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, 
 South Africa, and India. “ Large numbers are found,” 
 writes Mr. Py croft in his Oxford Memories (vol. ii. 
 p. 39), “in the Colonies as mere day labourers, and 
 live among the most pitiable of the waifs and strays.” 
 Exceedingly few home-educated Irishmen are reduced 
 to such doleful straits. The following paragraph is 
 from a letter which I lately received from an Assistant- 
 Commissioner in India : (is not the last sentence, that 
 in italics, a very remarkable one ?) “ I feel certain,” 
 
 observes my friend, “ that a boy is better educated in 
 Ireland than in England, and at from one-third to 
 one-half the cost. It is the want of supervision in 
 the case of lazy and dull boys which is so fatal in 
 large English schools. A clever boy will make his 
 way anywhere if industrious, but by far the greater 
 number of boys have but moderate abilities, and are 
 fiendishly lazy ! I see around me no end of nice 
 young fellows who have failed in all their examina- 
 tions at home, and have come out here on spec, only 
 too thankful to take appointments which twenty-five 
 years ago no gentleman would have looked at. I 
 have not met one Irish educated boy as yet ( on the 
 loaf 1 ” 
 
EXCELLENT OUTCOME OF IRISH SCHOOLS . 23 
 
 “ But,” some objector may urge, “ the Irish boys 
 who frequent English schools are not, as a general 
 rule, a hard-working set. They are, for the most part, 
 boys whose parents are of independent means, and 
 who consequently ‘take it easy/ ” and so forth. This I 
 am prepared to grant. Whatever be the reason for it, 
 industry certainly does not appear to be amongst the 
 characteristic features of English schools. Industry 
 is, however, one of the chief characteristics of Irish 
 schools. Moral : If you mean your sons to be 
 industrious at school, and to become distinguished 
 afterwards, send them to one of the schools which are 
 pervaded, as are those in Ireland, by an atmosphere 
 of diligence ; not to one of the schools in England, the 
 characteristic feature of which is ignoble idleness. 
 
 “ But/’ the objector may continue, “ Irish boys may 
 be possibly cleverer, as a body, than English boys ; 
 and it is probably to their superiority in cleverness 
 that the remarkable successes which so many of them 
 achieve in after life should be ascribed.” If it be 
 really true (I am far from assuming that it is) that 
 Irish are cleverer than English schoolboys, it is evi- 
 dent that the more quick-witted Irish boy who is 
 taught for years in the same class with boys most of 
 whom are less bright, less intelligent than himself, is, 
 so far as his intellectual progress is concerned, at a 
 considerable disadvantage — another reason, evidently, 
 why Irish boys ought not to be sent to English schools 
 for their education.* 
 
 Compare with this observation the last three paragraphs, p. 76. 
 
( 24 ) 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE SUCCESS OF OLD IRISH SCHOOLBOYS IN ENG- 
 LAND A PARTICULARLY STRONG TESTIMONY IN 
 FAVOUR OF THE IRISH SCHOOL SYSTEM. 
 
 I. In regard to our most distinguished fellow-country- 
 men at present resident in England, it may be fairly 
 said, generally, that an Irishman’s success in England 
 tells more strongly in favour of his abilities, educa- 
 tion, and industry than would his success in his own 
 country. In England — and this I say with all respect 
 to Englishmen’s singular love of justice and fairplay — 
 Englishmen, other considerations being the same, will, 
 and naturally so, always be preferred to Irishmen. 
 Therefore, when we see Irishmen going over to Eng- 
 land, and there forcing their way gradually upwards 
 at the Bar, the ministry, the medical profession, and 
 every other professional calling, we may rest assured 
 that the talents and diligence of those who thus rise 
 must have been indeed pre-eminent, for they certainly 
 started at a considerable disadvantage. When they 
 succeed in England, it must be because they are 
 possessed of real merit, sterling good qualities — merit 
 and good qualities that cannot be kept secret, that 
 cannot be overlooked, that force themselves on the 
 notice of all who come in contact with their fortunate 
 possessors. And this becomes all the more evident when 
 
SUCCESSFUL IRISHMEN IN ENGLAND . 
 
 25 
 
 one reflects on the fact, that many of our most dis- 
 tinguished Irishmen, now residing in England, com- 
 menced life there with everything against them but 
 good health, good characters, well- trained minds, a 
 sound knowledge of their work, whatever it was which 
 they undertook to do, and industry. Poor, unfriended, 
 and without family connections in England, most of 
 them, at the beginning of their careers, were also 
 without that cool, respect-commanding self-possession, 
 so characteristic of the true-born Briton. God and 
 themselves were all they had to depend on. All the 
 more creditable then, assuredly it must be admitted 
 by all, is the success attained by so many of them 
 in the face of such difficulties, such defects ; more 
 creditable alike to themselves and to those schools in 
 “ the old country ” at which they were educated as boys. 
 Yes, ten times more creditable than if they had started 
 on their life-voyage upon familiar waters, among their 
 own kith and kin, and had the wind and tide from 
 the beginning in their favour. 
 
 Nothing speaks more strongly in favour of Irish 
 schools than the successful careers in England of so 
 many of their old boys. 
 
 English people are not easily carried away by mere 
 pretensions to learning, hollow promises, vain showi- 
 ness, and the like. Englishmen who have appoint- 
 ments to give away and work to dispose of are not, 
 as a rule, particularly credulous, easily imposed on, 
 ardent, impressionable. And assuredly no unfriended 
 Irishman has ever attained in England to the first rank 
 of his profession — clerical, medical, legal, or any other — 
 without real ability, much energy, thorough knowledge 
 of, and close attention to, his business, and the power 
 
26 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 of concentrating readily his thoughts upon the sub- 
 ject, whatever it may be, that lie wants to master. 
 Sound, careful teaching in one’s boyhood is what 
 especially gives this power of concentration and 
 attention to business, which is so indispensably 
 necessary to self-education, self-advancement. This 
 sound, careful teaching can be readily procured for 
 one’s son in Ireland. It is undoubtedly to this sound 
 education in their early lives that the distinguished 
 Irishmen at present in England owe entirely their suc- 
 cess — success which, all honour to them, they have 
 achieved in spite of numerous difficulties ; difficulties 
 that to those less soundly educated as boys would have 
 been possibly insurmountable. 
 
 Is it not extraordinary that our Irish schools 
 should yearly send forth into the world so many lads 
 enabled to win fame and fortune for themselves even 
 in England ? The competition for all posts of honour 
 and emolument and trust in England must be enor- 
 mous. How is it that any of these posts are ever 
 won by old Irish schoolboys ? still more, how is it 
 that so many of them are ? If we are not to suppose 
 that the average Irishman is naturally cleverer and 
 more diligent than the average Englishman, we are 
 forced to conclude that, all consideration of favouritism 
 being laid aside, the former is the better educated 
 of the two, be the cause of this better education 
 what it may. If this be so, what a splendid testimony 
 it is in favour of Irish education ? 
 
 Whatever be the cause of the Irishman’s success in 
 England, one thing at all events is certain : he does 
 succeed there. Yes ; the young Irishman whose only 
 education hitherto had been in Ireland, goes over to 
 
SUCCESSFUL IRISHMEN IN ENGLAND. 
 
 2 7 
 
 England, without a friend there, without a fortune, 
 without family associations of any kind, and, notwith- 
 standing his Irish 'manners and accent, and his friend- 
 lessness, he makes friends for himself, gets employment, 
 and wins his way to high, honourable, and lucrative 
 positions ; and that over the heads of thousands of 
 young Englishmen, and of many Irishmen, too, edu- 
 cated in England — he whose only education was, like 
 his manners and his accent, Irish ! 
 
 Can it be that it is to his Irish education he owes 
 all his success ? The question is full of interest to 
 every Irish parent with a son old enough to send to 
 school. If one’s son is more likely to succeed even 
 in England, not to say Ireland, if educated as a boy 
 in Ireland, then it is clearly not wise in his parents to 
 send him to an English school. 
 
 “ But surely,” it may be objected, “ there must be 
 many distinguished Irishmen in England, who were 
 educated not at Irish but at English schools, whose 
 names have never reached you.” This I am prepared, 
 for argument’s sake, to grant ; but who can they be ? 
 If their names have never reached me or any of those 
 English friends of mine to whom I wrote asking for 
 information on the subject (see p. 32) — these being all 
 men of experience, ability, and right willing to assist 
 me — can these omitted persons justly be regarded as 
 many in number or really “ distinguished ” ? * 
 
 * Among our distinguished home-educated countrymen, resident in 
 England, are the following : — The Bishop of Peterborough, Eight 
 Hon. Sir Charles Bussell, M.P., Lord Wolseley, Sir Frederick Burton, 
 Sir William MacCormac, Dr. Quain, Dr. Villiers Stanford, Eight 
 Hon. David Plunket, M.P., Hon. Sir J. C. Mathew, Professor Tyndall, 
 Dr. W. H. Bussell, Sir Eobert Montgomery, and Mr. W. G. Wills — 
 stars each of them, it will be admitted, in his own department. 
 
28 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 II. The number of Irishmen educated at Irish schools 
 who have won for themselves by their talents, industry, 
 and knowledge of their work, respectable positions in 
 England, in every calling of life, is immense. 
 
 I have lying before me on the table “ Crockford’s 
 Clerical Directory” and “Churchill’s Medical Directory” 
 — the former containing in its 1305 pages the names 
 of all the Episcopalian clergymen in Great Britain and 
 Ireland ; the latter, in the English part of it, containing 
 8 5 1 pages. If any one is anxious to see how many 
 Irishmen have come fairly to the front in England at 
 the medical or the clerical profession, he has but to 
 glance through these books ; and he will be surprised 
 at the large number of them — home-educated Irish- 
 men, resident in England — who have “Trin. Coll., Dub.,” 
 appended to their names. Of these we may fairly 
 assume that 95 per cent., at the least, were educated 
 as boys in Ireland. For we may surely assume that 
 not more than, at the most, 5 per cent, of our Irish 
 middle-class boys go to English schools for their 
 education, then enter Trinity College, Dublin, and then 
 go back to reside in England. 
 
 It is, of course, open to any one to challenge my 
 statistics. Let him who does so, however, not rest 
 content with merely cavilling at them, but fairly put 
 them to the test. This might be done in this way : 
 Let the first hundred of the fairly successful doctors 
 and clergymen, graduates T. C. D., residing in England, 
 whose names appear in these directories be each 
 requested to kindly state where, if an Irishman (for 
 T. C. D. numbers amongst its graduates several English- 
 men), he was educated as a boy, whether in England 
 or Ireland — an addressed post-card being sent in every 
 
SUCCESSFUL IRISHMEN IN ENGLAND . 
 
 29 
 
 case for the reply. I have no doubt that the con- 
 clusion arrived at, as the result of such an experi- 
 ment, would tally with the results that I have arrived 
 at already in regard to the most distinguished amongst 
 them. Of the most distinguished of the Irishmen 
 now living in England I have already disposed very 
 satisfactorily, as it seems to me. These, our most 
 distinguished countrymen, were nearly all, as I have 
 shown, educated as boys in Ireland. In my last 
 remarks I have referred merely to those Irishmen who 
 have earned for themselves respectable, comfortable, 
 mediocre positions in England, as incumbents, dis- 
 pensary doctors, &c. Of these the large majority — 
 9 5 per cent, at the least — were probably educated in 
 Ireland. 
 
 What stronger testimony could there be in favour 
 of our Irish education, if only the testimony be trust- 
 worthy ? Let him who impugns it take care that his 
 objections be real and substantial, and not merely 
 frivolous and captious. Let him give his reasons for 
 any objections he may raise. 
 
 One thing, at all events, is certainly clear — as I 
 shall explain and establish in the following chapter- — 
 that is, that of our most distinguished living Irishmen, 
 all the world over, at least 90.4 per cent, were educated, 
 as boys, in Ireland. In regard to the ordinary Irish- 
 men in respectable though not in very distinguished 
 positions, now resident in England, I feel quite satisfied 
 in my own mind — though, as I admit, I have not 
 endeavoured to put the matter to the test in the same 
 way — that it is exceedingly probable that of these at 
 least 95 per cent, were educated, as boys, in Ireland. 
 
( 30 ) 
 
 CHAPTER Y. 
 
 HOW THE WRITER ARRIVED AT THE SEVERAL PER - 
 CENT AGES OF THE DISTINGUISHED IRISHMEN 
 EDUCATED , AS BOYS , (a) IN IRELAND ; (p) IN ENG- 
 LAND ; AND (y) PARTLY IN THE ONE COUNTRY , 
 PARTLY IN THE OTHER. 
 
 I may be asked bow it is that I have concluded that 
 of our most distinguished living Irishmen there were, as 
 stated by me in the preceding pages (7, 14, 19) — 
 
 Educated in Ireland exclusively . . 90.4 per cent. 
 
 ,, ,, England . 5*2 » » 
 
 „ partly in England, partly in Ireland 4.4 „ „ 
 
 Total . . . 100 
 
 Well, I shall make a clean breast of it. To begin 
 with, I procured a copy of “ Thom's Directory” for 
 1886, and I marked in it the names of all the Church 
 dignitaries, and some other noteworthy clergymen ; 
 all the Judges, all the County Court Judges, all the 
 Benchers, who are not County Court Judges or Judges ; 
 all the county infirmary doctors ; all the superin- 
 tendents of lunatic asylums ; all the county sur- 
 veyors, the medical practitioners in Dublin who are 
 lecturers and professors, all the principal Univer- 
 sity Fellows and Professors, and others who have made 
 
SEVERAL PERCENTAGES , HOW ARRIVED AT. 31 
 
 some reputation for themselves, whose names appear in 
 that portentous volume — with certain exceptions. The 
 exceptions were made in regard to those members 
 of any of the foregoing classes of whose places of 
 education I was already informed — whether by friends 
 or common report. For example, I did not mark the 
 name of the Dean of Derry, for I knew beforehand 
 that he was educated in England ; nor that of Sir 
 Andrew S. Hart, Vice-Provost, T.C.D., as he is, I know, 
 an old Foyle College boy. 
 
 Perhaps the most remarkable Irishmen who were not 
 educated in Ireland, are Mr. Parnell and Mr. Mahaffy. 
 
 The next thing I did was this : I wrote to every 
 member of each of the foregoing classes (Church digni- 
 taries, Judges, &c.) whose name was marked by me, 
 asking each to kindly tell me where he was educated 
 as a boy. In nearly all my applications I enclosed a 
 post-card, addressed to myself, for the reply, so as to 
 diminish, as far as I possibly could, the trouble I felt 
 I was imposing. 
 
 What I did with the replies was this : I divided 
 them into three classes : (a) that of those who were 
 educated as boys in Ireland exclusively ; (/3) that of 
 those who were educated in England exclusively; and 
 (y) that of those who were educated partly in the one 
 country, partly in the other. And I then totted up 
 the number of names on these several lists. 
 
 The next thing I did was this : I jotted down the 
 names of all those leading distinguished Irishmen with 
 whose place of education I was already familiar, putting 
 down, as in the former case, the names of those who 
 were educated exclusively in England in one list ; of 
 those who were educated in England plus Ireland 
 
32 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 in another ; and of those who were educated in Ire- 
 land exclusively in a third ; and then I totted up the 
 names on each of these lists. 
 
 The next thing I did was this : I wrote to two or 
 three friends who are in Holy Orders in England, to two 
 or three of my friends at the Bar there, and to two 
 or three of them who are at the medical profession, 
 asking each, as a personal favour, to oblige me by 
 giving me the names and addresses of ten or twelve 
 (if he knew so many) of the principal Irishmen in 
 England who, having emerged as clergymen, barristers, 
 medical doctors, or otherwise, out of obscurity, have 
 won their way to high positions in that country. As 
 soon as the names of these Irishmen who- have thus 
 distinguished themselves in England were furnished 
 to me, I wrote to each of them, asking him to be so 
 kind as to tell me where he was educated as a boy. 
 And I then, in the same way, made three lists of these 
 — a list of those who were educated in Ireland ex- 
 clusively, of those who were educated in England exclu- 
 sively, and of those who were educated partly in the 
 one country, partly in the other. 
 
 The net result of my inquiry was this : I found 
 that of the most distinguished living Irishmen residing 
 in England and Ireland there were, as shown by the 
 lists when on a certain date I closed them — 
 
 Educated in Ireland exclusively . . .521* 
 
 „ „ England „ .... 30 
 
 „ partly in Ireland, partly in England 25 
 
 Total . .576 
 
 * These 521 are not, be it noted, inclusive of the officers of the 
 I. C. S. and the Army, referred to on pp. 71-74 ; nor of the Irishmen 
 living abroad, recorded on pp. 64-71. 
 
SEVERAL PERCENTAGES , HOW ARRIVED AT. 33 
 
 I promised to make a clean breast of it, and I have 
 done so. This is the way that I arrived at the 
 several percentages, viz., 90.4, 5.2, and 4.4. 
 
 In regard to those who did not reply to me, it may 
 assuredly be safely assumed that at least as large 
 a proportion of them was educated in Ireland as of 
 those who did reply. 
 
 It may, perhaps, be urged that we should not lay 
 too much stress upon the remarkably large percentage 
 of distinguished Irishmen who were educated, as boys, 
 exclusively in Ireland, unless it can be, at the same 
 time, shown that a really large number of Irish 
 boys are yearly educated in England. That a really 
 large number of Irish boys are, and have been for 
 years past, educated yearly in England is denied by 
 no one.* That of the 576 most distinguished living 
 Irishmen, at home and abroad, rather over 90 per 
 cent, w^ere educated exclusively in Ireland I have 
 pointed out. That, therefore, all question as to the 
 exact number of Irish boys who are educated in 
 England being laid aside, a positively excellent edu- 
 cation can be had in Ireland, is manifest — a conclusion 
 that surely cannot but give satisfaction to those Irish 
 parents, at least, whose means are at present some- 
 what straitened. 
 
 The grammar-school education of Ireland must be, 
 indeed, good, seeing how abundant and good is the 
 fruit it yearly produces. 
 
 * “Very many boys who might take advantage of a Royal School 
 education are sent to schools in England,” formally record the En- 
 dowed Schools (Ireland) Commissioners, 1881, in their Report, vol. i. 
 p. 29. 
 
 C 
 
( 34 ) 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE NAMES OF SOME DISTINGUISHED LIVING IRISH- 
 MEN WHO WERE EDUCATED , AS BOYS , EXCLU- 
 SIVELY IN IRELAND . 
 
 The names of the school or schools where each was 
 educated is appended to the name only in cases where 
 (a) the person to whom I wrote asking whether he was 
 educated in England or Ireland especially mentioned 
 in his reply the school or schools in Ireland at which 
 he was educated; and (/3) where I knew of the place 
 of education either from my own personal knowledge, 
 or having been informed of it by friends, or by report. 
 According to the same system, the words “ private 
 tuition ” have been added by me in sundry cases. In 
 regard to the order of the names, first come the names 
 of those residing in Ireland : then the names of those 
 residing in England (or Scotland ) : next comes a list 
 of Irishmen living now, or who lived till lately, abroad ; 
 and, lastly, a supplementary list of some Cork Queen’s 
 Coll, graduates. 
 
 Except that I have put the Judges and Church 
 Dignitaries in List I. in some sort of order, I have 
 made no attempt to classify the names in the lists, not 
 thinking that from the classification of them any benefit 
 worth speaking of would accrue. 
 
NAMES OF DISTINGUISHED IRISHMEN. 
 
 35 
 
 In publishing these names I have had one, and 
 only one, object in view, namely, to show what Irish 
 teachers in their own country are able to accomplish : 
 
 doccys uno ruv xa girZv avrtiv s^ryvoofficds dvrovc. 
 
 Few of the day-schools referred to in the following 
 lists exist now. They were, to speak generally, all 
 started by the gentlemen who are mentioned as their 
 Headmasters ; and when these died, so, too, did their 
 schools. This is especially true of the day-schools in 
 Dublin. There have been many famous day-schools 
 in that city from time to time ; but when those who 
 instituted them passed away, their schools in general 
 ceased to exist. 
 
 Right Hon. Lord Monck, P.C., G.C.M.G., LL.D., (private school).* 
 Right Hon. Lord Fitzgerald, P.C., Baron of Kilmarnock, Lord of 
 Appeal in Ordinary (Day-school, Williamstown, Co. Dublin).f 
 
 * The following is the note appended to Lord Monck’s name in 
 Thom's Directory (1886) : — “A Commissioner of National Education, 
 Was Governor-General of Canada 1861-67, and of the Dominion of 
 Canada 1867-68. A Commissioner of Church Temporalities in Ireland 
 1869-81. Was M.P, for Portsmouth 1852-57. A Lord of the 
 Treasury 1855—58.” 
 
 f Lord Fitzgerald’s letter to me on the subject I subjoin : it is 
 interesting for many reasons. It is especially interesting as a memento 
 of the good old times when Protestant and Catholic boys learned 
 happily together in the same schoolroom. It was certainly not the 
 want of good schools in Dublin and its neighbourhood, conducted by 
 masters of their own denomination, that induced so many Protestant 
 boys to go to Mr. Munday’s. The letter will also recall the days when 
 multum non multa was the grand principle acted on by the school- 
 master in the education of his pupils, and a thorough grounding of 
 them in classics was the main object of his professional life. How 
 many of the present-day schoolboys have read at thirteen, inter alia , 
 part of the Bucolics, and four books of the ASneid ; the Jugurthine 
 
IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 Right lion. John Naish, Lord Chancellor of Ireland, P.C., Judi- 
 cial Commissioner, Educational Endowments (Tullabeg Col- 
 lege, Tullamore, and Clongowes Wood College, Naas). 
 
 Right Hon. Lord Justice Fitzgibbon, P.C. (private tuition).* 
 
 War ; the Epistles and part of the Odes of Horace ; Lucian ; and part 
 of Homer? This is the letter : — 
 
 “Dear Mr. Hime, — M y earliest place of education was at Mr. 
 Munday’s school, Sea Fort, near Williamstown, Co. Dublin, where I 
 was sent with an elder brother before I had quite reached six, and 
 remained until thirteen. 
 
 “ Although under Catholic management, Sea Fort School had a large 
 proportion of pupils of the Established Church, of the best local 
 families. When 1 joined it, about one-fourth were Protestant. 
 
 “Mr. Munday was a good scholar in English, Classics, and in Ancient 
 and Modern History, and was assisted by teachers — especially by a very 
 good resident classical teacher, a scholar of T. C. D. 
 
 “ On Mr. Monday’s death the school passed into the hands of the 
 Rev. Mr. Cahill, then a very popular preacher, who changed its locality 
 to the vicinity of Black Rock, Co. Dublin. It did not prosper under 
 his guidance, and died after a few years. 
 
 “ When I left it I had read, inter alia , Yirgil (part of Bucolics and 
 four books of the iEneid) ; Sallust (Jugurthine War) ; Horace (Epistles 
 and part of the Odes) ; and, in Greek, Lucian, and part of Homer. 
 
 “We had then none of the ‘helps’ that now smooth the way of the 
 beginner. The road was then rough indeed. — Yours faithfully, 
 
 “ Fitzgerald.” 
 
 The following is an excerpt from the note appended to Lord Fitz- 
 gerald’s name in Thorn’s Directory (1886) Made Q.C. 1847; a 
 Bencher of the King’s Inns, Dublin, 1855; Solicitor-General for Ire- 
 land 1855-56 ; Attorney-General for Ireland 1856-8, and again 
 1859-60; M.P. for Ennis 1852-60; Third Justice of the Queen’s 
 Bench in Ireland, 1860-82 ; a Commissioner of National Education 
 in Ireland, Governor Hibernian Military School, and a Visitor of the 
 Queen’s Colleges.” 
 
 * The following is an excerpt from the note appended to Lord 
 Justice Fitzgibbon’s name in Thom’s Directory (1 886) : — “Appointed 
 Q.C. 1872; Law Adviser, Dublin Castle, 1876; Solicitor-General 
 1877; Privy Councillor, Ireland, 1879; Commissioner of National 
 Education 1884; Judical Commissioner Educational Endowments 
 1885.” 
 
NAMES OF DISTINGUISHED IRISHMEN. 
 
 37 
 
 Right Hon. Lord Chief Baron Palles, P.C. (Clongowes Wood 
 College, Naas).* 
 
 Right Hon. Lord Chief Justice Sir Michael Morris, P.C. (Galway 
 Grammar-School). 
 
 Right Hon. A. M. Porter, Master of the Rolls, P.C. (Royal Aca- 
 demical Institution, Belfast). 
 
 Right Hon. Vice-Chancellor Chatterton, P.C. (Hamblin and Porter’s 
 School, Cork). 
 
 Right Hon. Justice Lawson, P.C. (Portora Royal School). + 
 
 Right Hon. Baron Dowse, P.C. (Dungannon Royal School). 
 
 Hon. Justice O’Brien (Middleton College). 
 
 Hon. Justice Harrison (Diocesan School, Ballymena ; Belfast 
 Academical Institution ; and Collegiate School, Belfast). 
 
 Hon. Judge Andrews (Belfast Academical Institution). 
 
 Hon. Justice Murphy (Middleton College). 
 
 Hon. Judge Boyd (Portora Royal School). 
 
 Hon. Judge Townsend (private tuition and Dublin day-school). 
 
 Hon. Judge Monroe, P.C. (private tuition). 
 
 Hon. Judge Miller (Armagh Royal School). 
 
 Right Hon. John Thomas Ball, P.C., ex-Lord Chancellor (Dr. 
 Smith’s Day-school, Dublin). 
 
 Right Hon. Lord Ashbourne, P.C., ex-Lord Chancellor (Preparatory 
 School, Carlow, and private tuition). 
 
 Right Hon. Lord Justice Barry, P.C., (Middleton College). 
 
 * The following is the reply which I received from Chief Baron 
 Palles in answer to my letter asking him where he was educated : — 
 “I was educated in Clongowes Wood College, Co. Kildare, and Trinity 
 College, Dublin. I did not receive any part of my education, either 
 general or legal, in England. ” 
 
 t The following is an excerpt from the note appended to Judge 
 Lawson’s name in Thom's Directory (1886) : — “ Called to the Irish Bar 
 in 1840; appointed Queen’s Counsel 1857; Sergeant-at-Law i860; 
 a Bencher of the King’s Inns 186 1 ; a Commissioner of National 
 Education 1861 ; was Commissioner of Church Temporalities in Ireland 
 1869-81 ; Professor of Political Economy, T.C.D., 1841-45 ; Solicitor- 
 General for Ireland 1861-65 5 Attorney -General for Ireland 1865-66 ; 
 Commissioner for the Custody of the Great Seal, 1874 ; Third Justice 
 of the Court of Common Pleas in Ireland, 1868-82. Was M.P. for 
 Portarlington 1865-68.” 
 
8 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 lion. Judge 0’ Hagan (Day-school, Newry; Jesuits’ School, then 
 in Hardwicke Street, Dublin ; Vicinage, Belfast). 
 
 Bight Hon. Jonathan Christian, P.C., ex-Lord Justice of Appeal 
 (private tuition). 
 
 Bight Hon. Henry Ormsby, ex- Judge of the Chancery Division of 
 the High Court of Justice in Ireland, P.C. (private tuition). 
 
 Bight Hon. Samuel Walker, Q.C., M.P., P.C., Attorney-General 
 (Portarlington School). 
 
 The MacDermot, Q.C., Solicitor- General (private tuition). 
 
 Bight Hon. Hugh Holmes, Q.C., M.P., P.C., ex- Attorney-General 
 (Dungannon Boyal School). 
 
 John Gibson, Q.C., M.P., ex-Solicitor-General (Portora Boyal 
 School). 
 
 His Honor Judge F. B. Falkiner, Q.C., Becorder of Dublin (Dr. 
 Burke’s School, Bective House, Dublin). 
 
 Sir Samuel Ferguson, LL.D., Q.C., Knt., Pres. B.I.A. , Deputy 
 Keeper of Public Becords (Academical Institution, Belfast). 
 
 Sir William B. Kaye, Q.C., Knt., Under-Secretary to the Lord- 
 Lieutenant (Bective College). 
 
 His Honor Judge James Hamilton, Q.C., Becorder of Cork (Foyle 
 College). 
 
 His Honor Judge David Boss, LL.D., Q.C., Becorder of Belfast 
 and Co. Court Judge of Antrim, Commissioner of National 
 Education (private tuition). 
 
 Charles Hare Hemphill, Q.C., First Sergeant (Dr. Wall’s School, 
 Hume Street, Dublin). 
 
 William Byan, Q.C. 
 
 His Honor Judge B. Carson, Q.C., Co. Court Judge, Donegal 
 (Fo\de College). 
 
 Sir Francis William Brady, Q.C., Co. Court Judge, Tyrone (Bev. 
 J. Huddart’s School, Mountjoy Square, Dublin). 
 
 His Honor Judge Arthur Hamill, Q.C., Co. Court Judge, Bos- 
 common (Academical Institution, Belfast, and Carlow 
 College). 
 
 His Honor Judge William F. Darley, Q.C., Co. Court Judge, Car- 
 low (Bev. William White’s School, S. Frederick Street, 
 Dublin). 
 
 His Honor Judge James A. Wall, Q.C., Co. Court Judge, Tipperary 
 (Dr. O’Beirne’s School, Carrickfergus, and Belfast Academical 
 Institution). 
 
NAMES OF DISTINGUISHED IRISHMEN. 
 
 39 
 
 His Honor Judge Theobald A. Purcell, Q.C., Co. Court Judge, 
 Limerick (Rev. Dr. Flynn’s School, Harcourt Street, Dublin). 
 
 His Honor Judge Richard Wilson Gamble, Q.C., Co. Court Judge, 
 Armagh (Rev. Dr. Wall’s School, Hume Street, Dublin). 
 
 His Honor Judge George Waters, Q.C., Co. Court Judge of 
 Cavan, Waterford, and Leitrim (Hamblin and Porter’s School, 
 Cork). 
 
 His Honor Judge Thomas Lefroy, Q.C., Co. Court Judge of Down 
 (private tuition). 
 
 His Honor Judge R. Ferguson, Q.C., Co. Court Judge, Cork, 
 W. R. (private tuition). 
 
 C. Rolleston-Spunner, Q.C., ex-Co. Court Judge. 
 
 David R. Pigot, Master of the Court of Exchequer (private tuition 
 and a Dublin school). 
 
 Arthur Courtenay, Master of the Common Pleas (private tuition, 
 and Mr. Bassett’s School, Dublin). 
 
 Wm. R. Bruce, Master of the Queen’s Bench Division (Rev. J. 
 S. Porter’s School, Belfast, and Belfast Academical Insti- 
 tution). 
 
 J. Fox Goodman, Master of the Crown Office (Dr. Lardner Burke’s 
 School, Dublin). 
 
 C. J. O’Donel, B.L., Police Magistrate, Dublin. 
 
 J. A. Byrne, Q.C., Police Magistrate, Dublin (Carlow Diocesan 
 School). 
 
 George Keys, Q C., Police Magistrate, Dublin (Dungannon Royal 
 School). 
 
 R. P. Carton, Q.C. (Belvidere College, Dublin, and Clongowes 
 Wood College, Naas). 
 
 His Grace the Archbishop of Armagh, Lord Primate of Ireland 
 (Feinaglian Institution, Dublin, and private tuition). 
 
 The Lord Bishop of Down and Connor (Dr. John Browne’s School, 
 Dublin, and Rev. E. Geoghegan’s School, Hume Street, 
 Dublin). 
 
 The Lord Bishop of Cork (Rev. Dr. Flynn’s School, Dublin). 
 
 The Lord Bishop of Cashel (Dr. Bell’s School, Clonmel). 
 
 The Lord Bishop of Killaloe (Ennis College). 
 
 The Lord Bishop of Kilmore (Galway Grammar School). 
 
 The Lord Bishop of Ossory (private tuition). 
 
 The Lord Bishop of Clogher (Foyle College). 
 
 His Grace the Most Rev. Dr. M‘Gettigan, Archbishop of Armagh, 
 Primate of Ireland (in Derry). 
 
40 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 Most Rev. Dr. Leahy, Bishop of Dromore (Bloomfield School, 
 Dublin). 
 
 Most Rev. Dr. Delany, Bishop of Cork (Day-schools in Cork). 
 
 Most Rev. Dr. Browne, Bishop of Ferns (St. Peter’s College, 
 Wexford). 
 
 His Grace the Most Rev. Dr. Walsh, Archbishop of Dublin 
 (Catholic University School, Dublin). 
 
 His Grace the Most Rev. Dr. Croke, Archbishop of Cashel 
 (Cliarleville Endowed School). 
 
 Most Rev. Dr. MacCormack, Bishop of Achonry (Ballinasloe 
 Classical School and St. Jarlath’s College, Tuam). 
 
 Most Rev. Dr. Fitzgerald, Bishop of Ross (Dr. Riordan’s Seminary, 
 Middleton). 
 
 Most Rev. Dr. Nulty, Bishop of Meath (Diocesan Seminary, 
 Navan). 
 
 Most Rev. Dr. Carr, Bishop of Galway (private tuition, and St. 
 Jarlath’s College, Tuam). 
 
 Most Rev. Dr. Conaty, Bishop of Kilmore (Cavan College). 
 
 Most Rev. Dr. Conway, Bishop of Killala (Killala Classical 
 School). 
 
 Most Rev. Dr. Logue, Bishop of Raphoe (Mr. Campbell’s School, 
 Buncrana). 
 
 Most Rev. Dr. Donnelly, Bishop of Clogher. 
 
 Most Rev. Dr. MacCarthy, Bishop of Cloyne and Queenstown. 
 
 Most Rev. Dr. Higgins, Bishop of Kerry (The College, Killarney).* 
 
 Rev. John Gwynn, D.D., ex-F.T.C.D., ex-Dean of Deny, Arch- 
 bishop King’s Lecturer, T.C.D. (Portora Royal School). 
 
 Very Rev. Robert Humphreys, A.M., Dean of Kilfenora (Middle- 
 ton College and Ennis College). 
 
 Very Rev. William Skipton, A.M., Dean of Killala (Foyle 
 College). 
 
 Very Rev. Samuel 0. Madden, D.D., Dean of Cork (Academic 
 Institute, Harcourt Street, Dublin). 
 
 * To the Deans and Archdeacons of the Roman Catholic Church I 
 did not write asking for information as to their places of education, 
 nor to the Presbyterian or other Dissenting Ministers, for I was 
 informed, on excellent authority, that these were very nearly all 
 educated, as boys, exclusively in their own country. Had their names, 
 then, been taken into account by me in my calculations, it is evident 
 that the percentage of noteworthy home -educated Irishmen would 
 have been considerably larger than even 90.4. 
 
NAMES OF DISTINGUISHED IRISHMEN. 
 
 4i 
 
 Very Rev. Thomas Hare, D.D., Dean of Ossory (Dr. Herman’s 
 School, Seapoint, Blackrock). 
 
 Very Rev. John Morgan, D.D., Dean of Waterford (Middleton 
 College). 
 
 Very Rev. William C. Townsend, D.D., Dean of Tuam (Edge- 
 worthstown School). 
 
 Very Rev. John R. Dowse, A.M., Dean of Ferns (Diocesan School, 
 Wexford). 
 
 Very Rev. F. Swift, A.M., Dean of Clonmacnoise (Rev. Dr. 
 Flynn’s School, Harcourt Street, Dublin). 
 
 Very Rev. James Byrne, A.M., ex-F.T.C.D., Dean of Clonfert 
 (Diocesan School, Carlow). 
 
 Very Rev. J. F. Robbins, A.M., Dean of Killaloe (Rev. J. Stud- 
 dert’s School, Dublin). 
 
 Very Rev. G. A. Chadwick, D.D., Dean of Armagh (Day-school, 
 Dublin). 
 
 Very Rev. T. Le B. Kennedy, D.D., Dean of Clogher (Dublin). 
 
 Very Rev. H. H. Dickinson, D.D., Dean of the Chapel Royal 
 (Rev. Dr. Flynn’s School, Harcourt Street, Dublin). 
 
 Very Rev. Thomas Bunbury, A.M., Dean of Limerick (Dr. 
 Coglilan’s School, Queenstown, and private tuition). 
 
 Very Rev. Horace T. Fleming, A.M., Dean of Cloyne (private 
 tuition, and Dr. Browne’s School, Bandon). 
 
 Very Rev. J. Morgan Reeves, A.M., Dean of Ross (private 
 tuition). 
 
 Very Rev. Wm. Warburton, D.D., Dean of Elphin (private tuition 
 and Belfast Academical Institution). 
 
 Very Rev. John W. Murray, LL.D., Dean of Connor (Dr. Wall’s 
 School, Hume Street, Dublin). 
 
 Ven. Wm. Creek, D.D., Archdeacon of Kilmore (Newry Academy 
 and private tuition). 
 
 Ven. H. Jellett, D.D., Archdeacon of Cloyne (Carlow Diocesan 
 School.) 
 
 Ven. M. T. De Burgh, A.M., Archdeacon of Kildare (Belmont 
 School, Stillorgan, sub ferula Dr. John Smyth). 
 
 Ven. Fitzmaurice Hunt, A.M., Archdeacon of Ardagh (Clergy 
 Sons’ School, Edgeworthstown). 
 
 Ven. John Bowles, A.M., Archdeacon of Killaloe (Hamblin and 
 Porter’s School, Cork). 
 
 Ven. John Ribton Gore, A.M., Archdeacon of Achonry (Castle- 
 dawson School, Williamstown). 
 
42 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 Ven. John Cather, A.M., Archdeacon of Tuam (Omagh School and 
 Foyle College). 
 
 Ven. Garrett Nugent, A.M., Archdeacon of Meath (Hamblin and 
 Porter’s School, Cork). 
 
 Ven. Wm. Edward Meade, D.D., Archdeacon of Armagh (Middle- 
 ton College). 
 
 Ven. Alexander M. Kearney, A.M., Archdeacon of Elphin (private 
 tuition). 
 
 Ven. R. d’A. Orpen, A.M., Archdeacon of Ardfert (private tuition). 
 
 Ven. Mervyn Arclidall, A.M., Archdeacon of Cork (private tuition 
 and private school, Co. Wexford). 
 
 Ven. George R. Wynne, A.M., Archdeacon of Aghadoe (private 
 tuition). 
 
 Ven. Wm. C. Gorman, A.M., Archdeacon of Ossory (Dr. Wall’s 
 School, Hume Street, Dublin, and private tuition). 
 
 Ven. Henry J. Woodroffe, A.M., Archdeacon of Ross (Mr. Smith’s 
 School, Dublin). 
 
 Ven. S. Finlay, D.D., Archdeacon of Clogher (Rev. R. D. Allen’s 
 School, Croghan House, Killeshandra). 
 
 Ven. S. O’N. Cox, A.B., Archdeacon of Raphoe (Rev. J. P. Sar- 
 gent’s, North Great George’s Street, Dublin). 
 
 Ven. Lewis H. Streane, A.M., Archdeacon of Glendalough (pri- 
 vate tuition).* 
 
 Ven. Theophilus Campbell, D.D., Archdeacon of Dromore (Rev. 
 J. P. Huddert’s School, Dublin). 
 
 H. P. Jellett, Q.C. (Rev. J. Payne Sargent’s School, Dublin, and 
 Clergy Sons’ School, Edgewortlistown). 
 
 John Toleken, M.D., ex-S.F.T.C.D. (Hamblin and Porter’s School, 
 Cork). 
 
 Wm. Homan Newell, C.B., LL.D., Commissioner of National 
 Education (Kilkenny College). 
 
 The Right Hon. Lord Rosse, LL.D., T.C.D., D.C.L., F.R.S., Chan- 
 cellor of Dublin University, Commissioner of National Educa- 
 cation (private tuition). 
 
 Rev. John Hewitt Jellett, D.D., Provost of Trinity College, Dublin, 
 Commissioner of National Education (Kilkenny College and 
 Middleton College). 
 
 * In the letter in which he informed me where he was educated, 
 Archdeacon Streane gave me the following information with regard to 
 his son : — “ My son, now Fellow, Dean, and Lecturer of Corpus College, 
 Cambridge, was home-educated by me. He is Hebrew Lecturer.” 
 
NAMES OF DISTINGUISHED IRISHMEN . 43 
 
 Rev. George Salmon, D.D., D.C.L., F.R.S., S.F.T.C.D., Regius 
 Professor of Divinity, T.C.D. (Hamblin and Porter’s School, 
 Cork). 
 
 Rev. T. Stack, D.D., S.F.T.C.D, (Day-school, Dublin). 
 
 Rev. Samuel Haughton, M.D., LL.D., D.C.L., S.F.T.C.D., F.R.S., 
 President R.I.A. (Carlow Diocesan School). 
 
 Sir Andrew Searle Hart, LL.D., S.F.T.C.D., Knt.. Vice-Provost 
 (Foyle College). 
 
 E. T. Bewley, LL.D., Q.C., Regius Professor of Feudal and English 
 Law, T.C.D. (Rev. Dr. Flynn’s School, Harcourt Street, 
 Dublin). 
 
 Rev. II. R. Poole, D.D., F. T.C.D. (Endowed School, Bandon). 
 
 Rev. Joseph A. Galbraith, S.F.T.C.D. (Rev. John Payne Sargent’s 
 School, Dublin). 
 
 Thomas Maguire, LL.D., F. T.C.D., Professor of Moral Philosophy, 
 T.C.D. (Rev. Dr. Flynn’s School, Harcourt Street, Dublin). 
 
 George F. Shaw, LL.D., F.T.C.D. (Rev. J. P. Sargent’s School, 
 N. Grt. George’s Street, Dublin). 
 
 Robert Y. Tyrrell, M.A., F.T.C.D., Regius Professor of Greek, 
 T.C.D. (Mr. Heazle’s School, Hume Street, Dublin, and 
 private tuition). 
 
 John Kells Ingram, LL.D., S.F.T.C.D., Librarian, Trinity College 
 (A Day-school, Newry). 
 
 Rev. J. W. Stubbs, D.D., S.F.T.C.D. (Bective College, Dublin). 
 
 Rev. George T. Stokes, B.D., Professor of Ecclesiastical History, 
 T.C.D. (Galway Grammar School). 
 
 Hastings Crossley, M.A., F.R.U.I., Professor of Greek, Queen’s 
 College, Belfast (Dungannon Royal School). 
 
 John Casey, LL.D., F.R.S., F.R.U.I. (Mitchelstown School). 
 
 Wm. Snow Burnside, M.A., F.T.C.D., F.R.S., Professor of Mathe- 
 matics, T.C.D. (private tuition). 
 
 Arthur W. Panton, M. A., F.T.C.D. (Rev. J. Andrew’s School, Black- 
 liall St., Dublin, and Rev. Dr. Stackpoole’s School, Kingstown). 
 
 George F. Fitzgerald, M.A., F.R.S., F.T.C.D., Professor of Natural 
 Philosophy, T.C.D. (private tuition). 
 
 William K. Sullivan, Ph.D.. D.Sc., President of the Queen’s 
 College, Cork (Day-schools in Cork). 
 
 John C. Malet, M.A., F.R.S., F.R.U.I. (private tuition, and Dr. 
 Stackpoole’s School, Kingstown). 
 
 Edward Dowden, LL.D., Professor of Oratory and of English 
 Literature, T.C.D. (private tuition). 
 
44 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 Benjamin Williamson, M.A., F.T.C.D., F.R.S., Prof, of Nat. Phil. 
 (Endowed School, Bandon, and Kilkenny College). 
 
 George L. Cathcart, M.A., F.T.C.D. (Mr. Rudkin’s School, and 
 Mr. North’s School, Dublin). 
 
 Sir Robert P. Stewart, Knt., Mus. D., Professor of Music, T.C.D. 
 (private tuition). 
 
 L. C. Purser, M.A., F.T.C.D. (Portora Royal School). 
 
 Rev. J. Leslie Porter, D.D., LL.D., President of the Queen’s 
 College, Belfast (private tuition).* 
 
 T. W. Moffett, LL.D., President Q. Coll., Galway (private tuition). 
 
 Rev. T. Abbott, B.D., F.T.C.D., Professor of Biblical Greek, and 
 of Hebrew, T.C.D. , sometime Professor of Moral Philosophy 
 (Mr. Sargent’s School, Dublin, and private tuition). 
 
 George J. Allman, LL.D., F.R.S., Professor of Mathematics, 
 Queen’s College, Galway (Dr. Walls, Hume Street, Dublin). 
 
 Sir Thomas A. Jones, Knt., President of the Royal Hibernian 
 Academy (private tuition). 
 
 William S. McCay, M.A., F.T.C.D. (Foyle College and Portora). 
 
 W. H. S. Monck, M.A., Chief Clerk Bankruptcy Court, sometime 
 Professor of Moral Philosophy, T.C.D. (private tuition). 
 
 John B. Bury, M.A., F.T.C.D. (Diocesan School, Monaghan, and 
 Foyle College). 
 
 Anthony Traill, LL.D., M.D., F.T.C.D. (Dr. Young’s Collegiate 
 School, Belfast). 
 
 Francis Tarleton, LL.D., F.T.C.D. (private tuition). 
 
 John H. Bernard, F.T.C.D., (Bray College, and St. John’s College, 
 Newport, Tipperary). 
 
 * Iu reply to my letter Dr. Porter wrote to me : — 
 
 “ I am an advocate of home education. . . . 
 
 “ Both my sons have been educated wholly in Irish schools (Belfast), 
 and I have no reason to be ashamed of their progress. The elder 
 gained first Honors throughout his whole course in the Queen’s 
 University — ‘ double firsts’ with B. A. Going direct from home he 
 took ninth place (out of upwards of 200) in the Civil Service (India) 
 Examination, and is now Magistrate and Collector, N.W, Provinces, 
 India. 
 
 “My other son (aged 18) has just entered the Royal University, 
 taking a first-class Exhibition and first classical Scholarship at the 
 January Examination. I mention these facts to show that I prefer, 
 and think I have reason to prefer, Irish school education.” 
 
NAMES OF DISTINGUISHED IRISHMEN. 45 
 
 Robert Crawford, M.A., Professor of Civil Engineering, T.C.D. 
 (Day-school, Ballyshannon, and Foyle College). 
 
 H. Brougham Leech, LL.D., Professor of Jurisprudence and 
 International Law, T.C.D. (Dungannon Royal School). 
 
 Rev. James Maclvor, D.D , ex-F. T.C.D., some time Professor of 
 Moral Philosophy, T.C.D. (Foyle College). 
 
 James Apjolm, M.D., F.K.Q.C.P.I., ex-Professor of Mineralogy 
 and Chemistry, T.C.D. (Erasmus Smith’s School, Tipperary). 
 
 Rev. R. M. Conner, F. T.C.D. (Bandon Endowed School). 
 
 E. P. Culverwell, F.T.C.D.* 
 
 W. R. W. Roberts, F. T.C.D. (private tuition). 
 
 Rev. Joseph Carson, S.F.T.C.D., D.D. (Dr. Coghlan’s School, 
 Queenstown). 
 
 Rev. T. T. Gray, M.A., F. T.C.D. (Dr. Wall’s School, Portarling- 
 ton). 
 
 E. P. Wright, M.D., Professor of Botany, T.C.D. (Dublin). 
 
 Sir William Stokes, M.A., F.R.C.S.I., Knt., Vice-President, Royal 
 College of Surgeons ; Surgeon to Richmond Hospital, Ireland 
 (Royal School, Armagh ; Mr. Rudkin’s Day-school, Dublin ; 
 and private tuition).+ 
 
 Sir Charles A. Cameron, M.D., F.R.S., President of the Royal 
 College of Surgeons, Ireland, and Vice-President of the Insti- 
 tute of Chemistry, Great Britain (Schools in Dublin). 
 
 F. R. Cruise, M.D., President of the King and Queen’s College 
 
 of Physicians, Ireland (Belvidere College, Dublin, and Clon- 
 gowes Wood College, Naas). 
 
 Robert McDonnell, M.D., F.R.S., F.R.C.S.I., President of the 
 Academy of Medicine in Ireland (private tuition). 
 
 * (i With the exception of a month or two at a private school,” 
 writes Mr. Culverwell to me, “ 1 was educated by private tutors until 
 fifteen, when I entered the Royal College of Science (where the pre- 
 sent Royal Astronomer was Professor of Mathematics) ; and having ob- 
 tained the diploma for civil engineering there, I entered T.C.D. when 
 eighteen.” 
 
 + With the following paragraph Sir William’s reply to me con- 
 cluded : — 
 
 “ I feel sure that the statistical record you are preparing will be 
 not only of interest but of use in inducing parents to educate their 
 sons in their own country.” 
 
46 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 Sir George H. Porter, Knt., M.B., F.R.C.S.I., Surgeon to the 
 Queen in Ireland (private tuition). 
 
 Wm. Colles, M.D., F.R.C.S.I., Surgeon in Ordinary to the Queen 
 in Ireland, Regius Professor of Surgery, T.C.D. (Feinaglian, 
 Luxemburg, Dublin). 
 
 Wm. Moore, M.D., Physician to the Queen in Ireland (Dr. Stack - 
 poole’s School, Kingstown). 
 
 Edward H. Bennett, M.D., Professor of Surgery, T.C.D. (Hamblin 
 and Porter’s School, Cork). 
 
 John Magee Finny, M.D., Vice-President of the King and Queen’s 
 College of Physicians (Hamblin and Porter’s School, Cork). 
 
 Arthur Wynne Foot, M.D., F.K.Q.C.P.I., Professor of the Theory 
 and Practice of Physic in the School of Surgery, Dublin (Dr. 
 Wall’s School, Portarlington). 
 
 J. T. Banks, M.D., F.K.Q.C.P.I. (Ennis College). 
 
 Ed. Mapother, M.D., Vice-President of the Royal College of Sur- 
 geons, Ireland (Rev. Dr. Fleury’s School, Dublin). 
 
 Wm. I. Wheeler, M.D., ex- President of the Royal College of 
 Surgeons (Rev. Dr. Fleury’s School, Dublin). 
 
 J. B. Quinlan, M.D., F.K.Q.C.P.I. (Belvidere College, Dublin, and 
 Kingstown School). 
 
 G. E. Carre, M.B., Superintendent of the Lunatic Asylum, Omagh 
 (Foyle College). 
 
 Rev. Matthew Leitch, M.A. (Belfast), Professor of Biblical Criti- 
 cism, Assembly’s College, Belfast (Portora). 
 
 John McCallum, M.A. (Belfast), Head Inspector of National 
 Schools. 
 
 E. D. Gray, M.P., of the Freeman's Journal (private tuition). 
 
 Sir T. F. Brady, Knt., Inspector of Fisheries, and Hon. Sec. of the 
 Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (Mr. Cos- 
 tello’s Day-school, Dublin). 
 
 T. D. Sullivan, M.P., of the Nation , author of Poems, &c. (Day- 
 school, Bantry). 
 
 J. J. Clancy, M.P., of the Nation (Summer Hill College, Athlone). 
 
 Sir Ralph Cusack, M.A., Knt, (Middleton College). 
 
 J. R. Kirkpatrick, M.D., L.R.C.S.I., F.K.Q.C.P.I., Professor of 
 Midwifery, T.C.D., and King and Queen’s College of Physi- 
 cians, Ireland (private tuition). [Dr. Kirkpatrick’s three 
 brothers were also educated exclusively in Ireland : the eldest, 
 Lord Portarlington’s agent — at Portora ; the next, Governor 
 
NAMES OF DISTINGUISHED IRISHMEN. 
 
 47 
 
 of Milbank Prison ; and the next, Head of the Crown Land 
 Department, Canada — both these, privately.] 
 
 E. F. Litton, Q.C., Land Commissioner (private tuition). 
 
 Rev. R. Ross, present Moderator of the General Assembly (private 
 school, Eglinton, Derry).* 
 
 J. A. Eames, M.D., F.R.C.S.I., Superintendent of the Cork Lunatic 
 Asylum (Foyle College). 
 
 Sir William Miller, M.B., L.R.C.S.I., Knt., three times in succession 
 Mayor of Derry, Surgeon to the City and County of Derry 
 Infirmary (Foyle College). 
 
 Edmund Murphy, J.P., Government Valuator (Day-school, 
 Dublin). 
 
 George Posnett, Esq., J.P., Government Valuator (R. A. Institu- 
 tion, Belfast). 
 
 Sir Edward Cecil Guinness, Bart., M.A., D.L. (private tuition). 
 
 Arthur Kavanagh, Lieutenant and Custos Rotulorum of the Co. 
 Carlow (private tuition). 
 
 Lombe Atthill, M.D., L.R.C.S.I., F.K.Q.C.P.I., ex-Master Ro- 
 tunda Hospital (Portora). 
 
 George H. Kidd, M.D., F.R.C.S.I., Obstetric Surgeon to the Coombe 
 Lying-in Hospital. 
 
 John K. Barton, M.D., F.R.C.S.I., Surgeon to the Adelaide 
 Hospital (Dr. Flynn’s School, Dublin). 
 
 Rev. James Monahan, D.D., Rector of St. Mary’s, Treasurer of 
 Christ’s Church Cathedral (Foyle College). 
 
 Andrew Reed, LL.D. (Q.U.I.), B.L., Inspector-General of the 
 Royal Irish Constabulary. 
 
 Lieut. -General R. H. Sankey, R.E., C.B., Chairman of the Board of 
 Public Works (Rev. Dr. Flynn’s School, Dublin). 
 
 T. J. Bellingham Brady, LL.D., Assistant Commissioner of Inter- 
 mediate Education (Belvidere College). 
 
 Arthur Hill Curtis, LL.D., Assistant Commissioner of Intermediate 
 Education (Rev. Dr. Flynn’s School, Harcourt Street, Dublin). 
 
 Colonel Waring, M.P. (private tuition). 
 
 Henry R. Swanzy, M.B., F.R.C.S.I., Professor of Ophthalmic and 
 Aural Surgery, R.C.S.I. (Rathmines School). 
 
 C. E. Fitzgerald, M.D., Surgeon Oculist in Ordinary in Ireland to 
 Her Majesty (private tuition). 
 
 * The Moderator’s son, John Ross, one of the most rising young 
 
 barristers at the Irish Bar, was educated at Foyle College. 
 
48 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 James Little, M.D., F.K.Q.C.P.I., Professor of Practice of Medi- 
 cine, R.C.S. (The Academy, Cookstown; and Armagh Royal 
 School). 
 
 Rev. Tlios. Croskery, D.D., Professor of Theology, Magee College, 
 Derry (Day-school, Downpatrick).* 
 
 Rev. Edmund Maturin, A.M., ex-Scholar and Gold Medallist 
 T.C.D., Rector of Malin, Co. Donegal (private tuition).+ 
 
 Sir Charles Gavan Duffy, Knt., K.C.M.G. + 
 
 * “The works Professor Croskery has published are of prime excel- 
 lence. His treatise, entitled, ‘ A Catechism on Plymoutliism,’ has been 
 translated into several European languages. A second work which he 
 published on * Plymouth Brethrenism ’ was considered by competent 
 judges to be the best book of the kind. In his ‘ Irish Presby- 
 terianism ’ the history, character, and present position of the Presby- 
 terian Church in Ireland are traced, and described with masterly com- 
 prehensiveness and skill, and it deserves to rank as a text-book of Irish 
 Presbyterianism. Dr. Croskery -was also a prolific contributor to the 
 leading quarterlies and monthlies. More than twenty years ago he 
 began to write for the Edinburgh Review. He has since written many 
 articles to the same magazine, chiefly on Irish questions, as well as 
 articles on theology, politics, literature, and history to Fraser , the 
 British Quarterly Review , the British and Foreign Evangelical Review , 
 the London Quarterly Review , the Princeton Review , the Presbyterian 
 Review , and others. During twenty years of his life there was no 
 busier pen than Professor Croskery ’s, and, among other work, he was 
 engaged by the editors of the ‘ Pulpit Commentary ’ to write a com- 
 mentary on all the Pauline Epistles. Dr. Croskery loved work, and 
 laboured successfully, despite his enfeebled health. While still in the 
 prime of his intellect, with his enthusiasm unspent, and in the midst 
 of his usefulness, he has been called away to his rest.” — Londonderry 
 Standard (Oct. 4, 1886). 
 
 t Author of “ Brief Memoirs of all the Bishops of Derry,” “Thoughts 
 on the Infallibility of the Church,” “ Lectures on the Origin of 
 Christianity in England and Ireland,” &c. Mr. Maturin’s father, Rev. 
 Henry Maturin, D.D., ex-F.T.C.D., Rector of Clondavadogue, was also 
 educated exclusively in Irelaud. 
 
 J The following letter, written to me from Nice (July 14, 1886), 
 will interest the reader : — 
 
 “Dear Sir, — I was educated exclusively in Ireland — first, at the 
 once famous school of the Rev. John Blakeley, Presbyterian minister 
 in Monaghan ; and I afterwards attended lectures at the Belfast Insti- 
 tution. Though a Catholic, I was sent to these Presbyterian schools 
 
NAMES OF DISTINGUISHED IRISHMEN. 
 
 49 
 
 George Fottrell, Solicitor, Clerk of the Crown, County and City 
 of Dublin (Jesuits’ Day College, Belvedere, Great Denmark 
 Street, Dublin). 
 
 Justin McCarthy, M.P. (Day-schools, Cork). 
 
 T. M. Healy, M.P. (National Schools of Bantry and Lismore, and 
 Christian Brothers Schools, Fermoy). 
 
 John Dillon, M.P. (Dublin). 
 
 T. P. O’Connor, M.P. (Summer Hill College, Athlone). 
 
 William Johnston, M.P. (Downpatrick Diocesan School, and private 
 tuition). 
 
 William O’Brien, M.P. (Diocesan College of Cloyne, Co. Cork). 
 John H. Brett, C.E., Co. Surveyer of Antrim (Rev. Dr. Price’s 
 Academy, Waterford). 
 
 James Price, M.I.C.E., M.A.I., C.E.* 
 
 G. F. DufFey, M.D., F.K.Q.C.P.I. (Dr. Stackpoole’s, Kingstown). 
 
 because there was no Catholic school in the county where I was born 
 much above the condition of a poor school. 
 
 “ I did not go to the Dublin University because of the religious tests 
 that existed there. — Yours faithfully, C. Gavan Duffy.” 
 
 Catholics were admitted to degrees in T.C.D. in 1794? to Fellow- 
 ships and Foundation Scholarships in 1873. 
 
 A writer in the St. James's Gazette of Sept. 14th, 1886, reviewing Sir 
 C. Gavan Duffy’s “The League of North and South — an Episode in 
 Irish History,” 1850-1854, thus begins: — “Sir Charles Gavan Duffy” 
 the some time brilliant member for New Ross, and the eloquent editor 
 of the Nation) “ is one of the ablest men, and quite the most brilliant 
 writer, among those now living who have striven at one time or 
 another for the cause of the national independence of their native 
 country.” The following excerpt is from the note to his name in 
 Thom's Directory (1886) : — “ Sir Charles Gavan Duffy was called to the 
 Irish Bar in 1845. Editor of the Nation newspaper 1842. Was a 
 state prisoner along with O’Connell in 1844, and O’Brien in 1848. 
 M.P. for New Ross 1852-6. Was elected a member of the first Parlia- 
 ment of Victoria. Became Minister of Public Works in 1857, President 
 of the Board of Land and Works in 1858 and 1861 ; appointed Chair- 
 man of a Royal Commission to devise the best means for effecting a 
 federation of the Australian Colonies. In 1871 became Prime Minister, 
 Speaker 1877, Chairman of Inter-Colonial Conference of Cabinet 
 Ministers from N. S. Wales, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, 
 and Victoria, to urge the removal, by Act of the Imperial Parliament, 
 of restrictions on the right of Inter-Colonial Legislature.” 
 
 * In his reply to me, Mr. Price writes : — “ I was entirely educated 
 
 D * 
 
50 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 Sir J. Ball Greene, C.B., C.E., Commissioner of Valuation, and 
 Chief Surveyor of Boundary, Ireland (in Dublin principally). 
 
 W. 11 . Le Fanu, Commissioner of Public Works, Ireland (private 
 tuition). 
 
 Robert Manning, M.I.C.E., Engineer to the Board of Works, 
 Ireland (private schools in Kilkenny and Waterford).* * * * § 
 
 R. A. Gray, C.E., M.I.C.E., Co. Surveyor, Dublin (Diocesan 
 School, Elphin).+ 
 
 F. Villiers Clarendon, C.E., Surveyor of Buildings, Board of 
 Works, Dublin (Luxemburg, Dublin). 
 
 P. Burtchall, C.E., Co. Surveyor of Kilkenny (Feinaiglian, Luxem- 
 burg, Dublin ).+ 
 
 James Barton, B.A., M.E., C.E., Dundalk (Rev. D. Flynn’s School, 
 and other schools in or near Dublin). 
 
 Howard Grubb, F.R.S., F.R.A.S., M.E., T.C.D., Astronomical 
 Instrument Manufacturer. § 
 
 in Ireland — School and College (T.C.D.) I have nine sons all educated 
 in Ireland. Seven of these have passed through T.C.D. , or are still in 
 their course.” 
 
 * In his reply to my letter Mr. Manning observes : — * ‘ Fifty years 
 ago there was scarcely a school of any kind in the South of Ireland in 
 which Greek, Latin, French, and Mathematics were not taught. I 
 have found the little knowledge of Classics I possess to have been of 
 the greatest service to me even in my utilitarian profession.” With 
 this letter compare that from Sir C. Gavan Duffy, given in footnote, 
 p. 48 ; also the excerpts from Dr. Maclvor’s pamphlet, pp. 90-93. 
 
 f “ At the same school,” writes Mr. Gray to me, “ was also educated 
 the late Sir William Wilde, M.D., F.R.C.S.I., M.R.I.A., Surgeon Oculist 
 in Ordinary to the Queen in Ireland.” 
 
 X In his reply to me Mr. Burtchall gives me the names of the 
 following living old boys remembered by him as having been educated 
 at “ Lux ” : as the names he gives do not appear in the list I gladly 
 record them : — “ Sir John Lees, Bart., Isle of Wight ; Hamilton Law ; 
 Henry Burtchall ; Henry Davison, C.E., Armagh ; Sir William 
 O’Malley, Bart. ; John Cooke, J.P. ; the Earl of Charlemont ; Henry 
 O’Malley ; N. Acheson O’Brien ; Sir Croker Barrington, Bart., and 
 his brother ; William B. Srnythe ; Denis Godley, C.B. ; T. D. Trench 
 C.E. ; Sir Gilbert King, Bart. ; Geo. Woods Maunsell, D.L. ; Robert 
 Warren, D.L. 
 
 § “ My education,” writes Mr. Grubb, “ was exclusively in Ireland. 
 I entered the late Dr. Flynn’s school just before his death ; afterwards 
 attended Mr. North’s ; entered Trinity College, and passed at once 
 
NAMES OF DISTINGUISHED IRISHMEN. 51 
 
 Thomas Drew, F.R.I.A., M.R.I.A., Professor of Architecture, 
 Royal Hibernian Academy.* * 
 
 Joseph R. Kirke, Professor of Sculpture, Royal Hibernian 
 Academy (private tuition). 
 
 William J. Fitzpatrick, LL.D., F.S.A., M.R.I.A., Professor of 
 History, Royal Hibernian Academy. + 
 
 Aubrey de Vere (private tuition). 
 
 Standish O’Grady, B.L. (Tipperary Grammar School). 
 
 H. Harley, Chief Clerk k and Inspector of Mails, G.P.O. (Bective 
 College). 
 
 J. H. Nunn, Solicitor to Trinity College, Dublin (Rev. W. White’s 
 School, S. Frederick Street, Dublin). 
 
 Rev. Robert Browne, D.D., President of St. Patrick’s College, 
 Maynooth (St. Colman’s College, Fermoy). 
 
 Henry H. Head, M.D., F.R.C.S.I., F.K.Q.C.P.I. (Dungannon 
 Royal School). 
 
 into the Engineering School, which I attended at the same time as I 
 was actively engaged in business. I had to give this up before my 
 licentiate examination, owing to pressure of business due to the great 
 Melbourne Telescope ; but T.C.D. afterwards presented me with the 
 degree honoris causa.” 
 
 * The following is the reply I received from Mr. Drew in answer to 
 my query : — 
 
 “ First I got some instruction from my father, who was a good 
 scholar and schoolmaster. Next from a real specimen, last surviving 
 of the old Irish pedagogue who had been my father’s schoolmaster, 
 A.D. 1809. Last and chiefly, at the Collegiate School, Belfast, kept, 
 about 1850, by Dr. James Young, an excellent scholar, with A. Traill, 
 F.T.C.D., as a class-fellow. 
 
 “ I have the highest respect — looking back and by comparison — for 
 the sound education given at Belfast forty years ago. You might 
 swell your lists with the names of many really noteworthy men who 
 had their education at the Belfast Academical Institution, the Belfast 
 Academy, &c.” 
 
 t In his letter to me Professor Fitzpatrick writes : — 
 
 ‘‘I received my earlier education from Joshua Abel of Dublin, a 
 Quaker noted for scientific and literary attainments. Subsequently I 
 was placed at the R.C. College of Clongowes Wood, Co. Kildare, where 
 Christopher Palles, John Naish, John O’Hagan, and (previously) 
 Father Prout (Fras. Mahony) also studied. . . # The letters by which 
 you addressed me are purely honorary. Some years ago I was elected 
 a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London.” 
 
IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 52 
 
 Professor Hull, LL.D., Director of the Geological Survey of Ire- 
 land, Professor of Geology, R.C.S.I. (Clergy Sons’ Schools, 
 Edgewortlistown and Lucan).* 
 
 George F. Armstrong, B.A., Professor of History and English 
 Literature, Queen’s College, Cork (Preparatory School, Rev. 
 D. Flynn’s School, and Rev. R. North’s School, Dublin). 
 
 Thomas Nedley, M.D., Physician to the Lord Lieutenant. 
 
 II. Mackintosh, M.D., Professor of Comparative Anatomy, School 
 of Physic, Ireland. 
 
 Rawdon MacNamara, F. R.C.S.I., M.D. (private tuition). 
 
 J. Hawtrey Benson, M.D., F.K.Q.C.P.I. (Mr. Rudkin’s and Mr. 
 Heazle’s Schools, Dublin). 
 
 J. Emerson Reynolds, M.D., F.R.S., Professor of Chemistry, T.C.D. 
 
 G. W. Hatchell, M.D., F.R.C.S.I., Inspector of Lunatic Asylums 
 (Heazel and Mortimer’s Academy, Hume St., Dublin). 
 
 R. D. Lyons, M.D. (Hamblin and Porter’s School, Cork). 
 
 Samuel Gordon, M.D., F.K.Q.C.P.I. (Rev. Dr. Bell’s School, 
 Clonmel). t 
 
 Walter G. Smith, M.D., F.K.Q.P.C.I., Professor of Materia Medica 
 and Pharmacy, School of Physic in Ireland (Dublin Day- 
 schools). 
 
 Joseph Lalor, M.D., Res. Med. Superintendent of the Richmond 
 Lunatic Asylum (Clongowes Wood College) + 
 
 J. A. Scott, of the Irish Times (Mr. Wm. O’Callaghan’s School, 
 Gr. Gardiner Street, Dublin). 
 
 * “ I am much interested by the inquiries you are engaged in,” 
 writes Professor Hull to me ; “ I have always maintained that the boys 
 can get as good an education in Ireland as elsewhere — perhaps more 
 practical and thorough than in England. My honorary degree of LL.D. 
 was conferred by Glasgow University.” 
 
 t Dr. Gordon in his reply informs me, that three of his schoolfellows 
 were the Rev. W. Archer Butler ; the present Bishop of Cashel ; and 
 the late Ven. William Lee, S.F.T.C.D., Archdeacon of Dublin. “I 
 cannot fancy,” he adds, “a better school than that at which I was 
 educated. When I left it I knew Greek, Latin, Hebrew, French, 
 Italian, and English well.” 
 
 + Dr. Lalor is another of those who have died (see preface p. xxiii.) 
 since the completion of my lists. His successor, as Superintendent of 
 this, the premier asylum of Ireland, is Dr. Conolly Norman. Dr. 
 Norman was also educated, as a boy, exclusively in Ireland. 
 
NAMES OF DISTINGUISHED IRISHMEN . 53 
 
 Robert P. Gelston, M.D., F.R.C.S.I., Surgeon to the Limerick Co. 
 Infirmary, and Visiting Physician to the Limerick Lunatic 
 Asylum (Rev. D. Flynn’s School, Dublin). 
 
 Philip C. Smyly, M.D., F.R.C.S.I. (Rev. D. Flynn’s School, 
 Dublin). 
 
 Edward Thompson, M.B., Co. Tyrone Infirmary (Mr. Potterton’s 
 School, Newry, and Rev. Dr. Weir’s School, Raphoe). 
 
 S. M. Palmer, F.R.C.S.I., Armagh Co. Infirmary (Kilkenny 
 College). 
 
 W. C. Townsend, M.D., Physician to the Co. Hospital and the 
 Lunatic Asylum, Cork (Charleville Endowed School). 
 
 H. Minchin, M.D., F.R.C.S.I., Surgeon to City of Dublin Prisons 
 (Rev. James Elliott’s School, Sligo ; Edgeworthstown School ; 
 and Rev. W. Jones’s School, Dublin). 
 
 J. W. Moore, M.D., F.K.Q.C.P.I., Physician to the Meath Hospi- 
 tal (Dublin High School, St. Stephen’s Green).* 
 
 R. H. Moore, F.R.C.S.I., Surgeon Dentist in Ordinary to the Lord- 
 Lieutenant (schools in Delgany, Co. Wicklow, and Dublin). 
 
 Sir W. F. Lennox Conyngham, K.C.B. (Dungannon Royal School, 
 and private tuition). 
 
 # ‘ ‘ Dr. Moore succeeded Dr. Stokes as Physician to the Meath 
 Hospital. He was until recently Senior Physician to the Cork Street 
 Fever Hospital, Dublin. He has been Lecturer on Practice of Medi- 
 cine in the Carmichael College, Dublin, since February 1875. He is 
 Registrar of the King and Queen’s College of Physicians, of which he 
 was Vice-President in 1881-82. Since 1873 be has been Acting 
 Editor of the Dublin Journal of Medical Science , to which he has con- 
 tributed several original papers of interest. He has, like his father, a 
 knowledge of several languages, including Swedish and Norwegian, and 
 has translated several medical papers from the Scandinavian journals. 
 For many years he has been an Honorary Fellow of the Swedish 
 Society of Physicians. He is an expert in Meteorology, and a Fellow 
 of the Royal Meteorological Society, and represents in Dublin the 
 Meteorological Department of the Royal Society. He is one of the 
 four co-authors of the ‘Manual of Public Health for Ireland, 1875,’ 
 and has contributed numerous papers to the journals, of which the 
 more important are — ‘ Mean Temperature in Relation to Disease ! ’ 
 (Dublin Journal of Medical Science , vol. 48), and ‘ Pythogenic Pneu- 
 monia ” — conjointly with Dr. Grimshaw, the editor of Stokes’ work 
 on ‘ Fever.’ ” — History of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland , by 
 Sir Charles Cameron. 
 
54 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 Rev. John Egan, D.D., F.R.U.I., Commissioner of Intermediate 
 Education (private school and St. John’s College, Waterford). 
 
 Sir Richard B. McCausland, M.A., Knt., formerly Recorder of 
 Singapore (Armagh Royal School). 
 
 General Montgomery, C.S.I. (private tuition). 
 
 Rev. James Pooler, D.D., Canon of St. Patrick’s Cathedral (Armagh 
 Royal School).* 
 
 Rev. M. W. Jellett, LL.D., Canon of Christ Church (Armagh and 
 Dungannon Royal Schools). 
 
 Rev. William Maturin, D.D., Grangegorman, Dublin (private 
 tuition). 
 
 Rev. F. F. Carmichael, LL.D., Magdalen Asylum, Dublin. 
 
 Rev. Launcelot Dowdall, M.A., Dalkey (Dungannon Royal School, 
 by his father, who was then the head-master). f 
 
 W. Thomson, M.A., M.D., F.R.C.S., Senator R.U. (private tuition). 
 
 Rev. J. A. Carr, LL.D., Editor of the Irish Ecclesiastical Gazette , 
 Rector of Whitechurch (Rev. D. Flynn’s school, Dublin) 
 
 Rev. Thomas Mills, A.M., Editor of the Church Advocate , Rector 
 of St. Jude’s, Dublin (Erasmus Smith’s School, Co. Longford, 
 and private tuition). 
 
 Sir John Lentaigne, C.B., D.L., Inspector of Reformatory and 
 Industrial Schools, Commissioner of National Education 
 (Clongowes Wood College). 
 
 Right Hon. W. H. Cogan, P.C., Commissioner of National Educa- 
 tion (private tuition). 
 
 Sir James P. Corry, M.P., Commissioner of Intermediate Education 
 (Dr. Blair’s School, Belfast). 
 
 Right Hon. Sir P. J. Keenan, P.C., C.B., K.C.M.G., Resident Com- 
 missioner of National Education (Diocesan Seminary, now 
 called St. Malachy’s College, Belfast). 
 
 G. V. Patton, LL.D., of the Daily Express (Dr. Flynn’s, Dublin). 
 
 * In his letter to me Canon Pooler observes : — “Mr. John Twigg, 
 Q.C., a great Chancery lawyer, is also an old Armagh Boy; also his 
 brother Canon Twigg (Swords), a distinguished University man, hold- 
 ing a high position in the Diocese of Dublin.” 
 
 t In a notice of Mr, Dowdall’s death in the Irish Ecclesiastical 
 Gazette there occurs this passage : — “ The epitaph in Bristol Cathedral 
 on the tomb of Rev. Mr. Eagles might justly be repeated concerning 
 Mr. Dowdall, who might truly be designated as ‘scholar, poet, and 
 divine.’” (Oct. 9, 1886.) 
 
NAMES OF DISTINGUISHED IRISHMEN. 
 
 Rev. Gerald Molloy, D.D., Rector of the Catholic University (St 
 Vincent’s College, Castleknock, and Maynooth College). 
 
 Rev. C. P. Meehan, M.R.I.A., St. Michael’s and St. John’s, 
 Dublin (Hedge School, Ballymahon, Co. Longford). 
 
 W. Wilkins, M.A., Head-master of the High School, Dublin, 
 author of Songs of Study (Dundalk Grammar School). 
 
 Rev. Robert King, M.A., Diocesan School, Ballymena, author of 
 Church History of Ireland * 
 
 * The following extracts are from the Rev. R. King’s letter : — 
 
 “In boyhood 1 was a disciple at no mean school — the only one that, 
 unendowed and private, contributed six Fellows to T.C.D., viz., John 
 Meade, J. A. Malet, J. Toleken, S. Butcher (Bp. Meath), W. Atkins ; 
 George Salmon, D.D. ; also the eminent Judge Willes of England. 
 
 The Right Rev. Ollifle, Roman Catholic Archbishop of Calcutta, 
 
 was from the same school — brother, I think, to a very eminent M.D. 
 on the Continent (who once received ^iooo fee from a Royal person- 
 age).’ 
 
 “ The heads of that school were Daniel Hamblin and his brother-in- 
 law Charles Porter, ex-Sch., LL.D., &c. The house, No. 53 South 
 Mall, Cork, was built by mj^ father, and I was born in it, at the corner 
 of the Mall and Queen St. It had, in my time, 200 pupils, of whom 
 50 were boarders — no playground beyond the dimensions of a flagged 
 space (covered, low), sufficient for a tolerably spacious gymnasium. 
 
 “Daniel Hamblin was no great scholar, but an immense disci- 
 plinarian — * Every inch a schoolmaster,’ as some one has described 
 him. His ‘ ferula ’ was, physically and symbolically, such as made a 
 formidable impression on the juvenile palm and mind. Charles Porter 
 was an exceedingly neat, accurate, and estimable scholar, and would 
 undoubtedly, as well as his late brother, the Rev. Thomas Porter of 
 Desertcreaght (Tullyhoy), have been, in these days, an F.T.C.D. or 
 F.R.U.I. 
 
 “ Charles Porter was not merely a classical scholar, but a very nice 
 English one, and an accurate naturalist. From him I learned in school, 
 besides Homer, Livy, &c., any amount of matters connected with Com- 
 parative Anatomy, that of the horse in particular, with all about farcy, 
 glanders, &c., Botany, Linnean and Natural Systems, Agriculture, Soils, 
 Field Crops, Garden-work, Vegetables, Trees, botanical names and 
 characters, timbers, &c. And for Science, ‘ Davy ’ Douglas was simply 
 unsurpassable for thorough work and accuracy. 
 
 “ ‘ D. D.’ was one of the Ushers (as assistant-masters were then 
 styled), otherwise tutors-assistant. He occupied the place of mathe- 
 matical and principal English assistant for many years previous to and 
 
56 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 W. J. Chetwoode Crawley, LL.D., F.R.G.S., Queen’s Service 
 Academy, Dublin. 
 
 Sir Joseph Neale M‘Kenna, Knt., M.P., J.P., D.L., Barrister at- 
 Law (Dr. Finn’s School, Dublin). 
 
 Lord Wolseley, K.P., G.C.B., K.C.B., G.C.M.G., K.C.M.G., LL.D., 
 D.C.L. (Rev. Abraham Jones’ School, Rathmines, Dublin).* * 
 The Lord Bishop of Peterborough (Kilkenny College). 
 
 Hon. Sir J. C. Mathew, Judge of the High Court, Lornjon (Hamblin 
 and Porter’s School, Cork). 
 
 Sir Charles Russell, Q.C., M.P., Solicitor-General for England 
 (Mr. Nolan’s Day-school, Newry, and the Vincentian College, 
 Castleknock). 
 
 Sir Thomas Crawford, M.D., K.C.B., Director-General, Army 
 Medical Department, London.f 
 
 after 1832, without any university training ; but at a later period 
 entered, and, I suppose, graduated in T.C.D.” 
 
 There were also, another correspondent writes to me, educated at 
 this famous school, besides those mentioned in the lists: — “Mr. A. 
 Chatterton, General Gamble, and General Bird,” — also Dr. Walter 
 Bernard, M.R.C.S.E., F.K.Q.C.P.I., of Derry. 
 
 * In answer to my query as to where he was educated, Lord Wolseley 
 wrote to me : — “ I was entirely educated in Ireland, in which country 
 I was born and spent all my childhood.” 
 
 The following is the note appended to Lord Wolseley ’s name in 
 Thom's Directory (1886): — “Adjutant-General to the Forces, 1882; 
 Commander- in-Chief, Egyptian War, 1882. Served in Burmah, 
 1852-53 ; in Crimea, 1854-55 ; Knight Legion of Honour andMedjidie; 
 in Indian Mutiny at Siege of Lucknow, and defence of Alumbagh ; 
 Dep. -Assist. Quartermaster-Gen. in Crimea, 1855-56 ; Bengal, 1858-60 ; 
 China, i860; and Assist. Quartermaster-Gen. and Dep. -Quartermaster- 
 Gen. in Canada, 1867-70. Commanded the Red River Expedition, 1870 ; 
 Assist. Adj.-Gen. at Head-Quarters, 1871-73 ; commanded the Ashan- 
 tee Expeditionary Force, 1873-74 ; Commissioner to Natal, 1875 j Insp.- 
 Gen. of Auxiliary Forces, 1874-76 ; Member Indian Council, 1876-78 ; 
 High Commissioner and Commander-in-Chief at Cyprus, 1878-79 : 
 Governor and High- Commissioner, Natal, and commanded the troops 
 during the closing operations of the Zulu campaign, 1 879-80 ; Quarter- 
 master-Gen. of the Army, 1880-82.” 
 
 + The following extract is from the reply I received from Sir Thomas 
 Crawford : — “ In my time, boys of the middle classes had many diffi- 
 culties to contend with in the matter of education, particularly in the 
 
NAMES OF DISTINGUISHED IRISHMEN . 
 
 57 
 
 Richard Quain, F.R.C.S.E., F.R.S., Surgeon-Extraordinary to the 
 Queen ; also his cousin, Richard Quain, M.D., F.R.S., author 
 of “Quain’s Dictionary ” (Rev. J. Armstrong's School, Mallow). 
 Sir William MacCormac, Knt., F.R.C.S.E., Surgeon to St. 
 
 Thomas’s Hospital, London (Royal Belfast Institution).* * 
 Admiral Sir Francis Leopold McClintock, Knt., F.R.S., D.C.L., 
 LL.D. (T.C.D. and Cantab), late A.D.C. to the Queen.f 
 J. N. Dick, L.K.Q.C.P.I., Deputy Inspector-General of Hospitals 
 and Fleets (Nutgrove School, Rathfarnham). 
 
 inland counties of Ireland ; but, thanks mainly to the clergy of the 
 Irish Episcopal and Presbyterian churches in the County Monaghan, 
 Ross and myself, as well as my friend Temple of Monaghan, now one 
 of my most efficient officers in India, and many others, were fairly 
 equipped for fighting successfully the battle of life.” 
 
 * The following is an excerpt from the note appended to Sir William 
 MacCormac’s name in Thom's Directory (1886) : — “ Was a distinguished 
 student in the Queen’s University, Ireland ; elected Surgeon to Royal 
 Hospital, Belfast, 1864; served in the Franco- German War at Metz 
 and Sedan. For services rendered in foreign countries has received 
 Legion of Honour, Crown Order of Prussia, the Ritter-Kreuz First- 
 class of Bavaria, Third-class Medjidie and Cross of Commander of 
 Takova of Servia. Is author of several celebrated works, which have 
 been translated into French, German, Dutch, and Russian.” 
 
 + Admiral Sir F. Leopold McClintock was knighted on account of 
 his successful services, when commanding the Fox , in discovering the 
 traces and fate of the Franklin expedition to the Arctic Regions in 
 1857, 1858, and 1859. The following is the reply in full which I 
 received from him in answer to my query : — “ The most direct answer 
 to your question would be, ‘in the Navy,’ as I joined it before I was 
 twelve years old. Previously, I had been at Dundalk school, Dr. 
 Darley being Head-master — the same who was afterwards Bishop of 
 Kilmore.” It is, no doubt, true that a Navy officer can be hardly 
 said with truth to have been educated at any civil school. Yet much 
 good or evil may come to one— yes, good or evil that may last a life- 
 time — according to the kind and character of the school in which he 
 spends the first two or three years of his school-life. Had the educa- 
 tion of Sir Leopold McClintock been mismanaged while at the Dun- 
 dalk school — as has been that of so many Irish boys at so many 
 English schools — is it not even possible that he might never have 
 got into the Navy at all ? It is certainly satisfactory to feel that the 
 only school which can classify Sir Leopold amongst its “ old boys,” is 
 in Ireland. 
 
58 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 Rev. R. W. Forrest, D.D., St. Jude’s Vicarage, Kensington 
 (Hamblin and Porter’s School, Cork). 
 
 Rev. James Drummond, LL.D., Professor of Theology, Manchester 
 New College, London (Rev. Dr. Flynn’s School, Dublin). 
 
 Rev. R. F. Littledale, D.D., D.C.L., St. Mary the Virgin, Soho, 
 
 (Bective House, North George’s Street, Dublin). 
 
 Rev. E. J. Brewster, M.A., St. Mary’s Hall, Oxford, LL.D., T.C.D. ; 
 Barrister- at-law ; late Vicar of Leyton, Essex ; formerly Chair- 
 man of Quarter Sessions, Melbourne, Australia ; and Member 
 of Legislative Council, New South Wales (Drogheda School 
 of Erasmus Smith — under Rev. G. Needham). 
 
 Rev. C. I. Black, B.A., ex-Schol. T.C.D., Burley-in-Wharfe- 
 dale, Author of many Poems, and Theological Essays 
 (Portora). 
 
 Rev. J. A. Cross, B.A., ex-Schol. T.C.D. , Little Holbeck, Author 
 of “ Bible Readings,” &c. (Hamblin and Porter’s School, 
 Cork; Mr. Heazle’s, Dublin). 
 
 Rev. T. Plunket Moony, M.A., ex-Schol. T.C.D., St. Denys, 
 Southampton (Diocesan School, Monaghan). 
 
 Captain Eyre Massey Shaw, M.A., T.C.D., C.B., D.L. for Middle- 
 sex ; sometime Superintendent of the Borough Forces of 
 Belfast ; Chief Officer of the Metropolitan Fire Brigade (Dr. 
 Coghlan’s School, Queenstown).* 
 
 * The following is from the Pictorial World of Nov. 29, 1879 : — 
 “As an instance of the thoroughness of the way in which Captain 
 Shaw does his w r ork, we may mention that he has corresponded with, 
 or personally visited, all the Fire Brigades in the world of any import- 
 ance, and in 1875 drilled a force in Egypt for the Khedive, and made 
 a report on the protection of Cairo, Alexandria, Ismalia, and Port Said ; 
 very little of which advice, however, has been acted upon. Captain 
 Shaw has written several very useful works bearing upon the subject of 
 fire : ‘Records of the late London Fire Engine Establishment,’ ‘Fire 
 Protection,’ ‘A Complete Manual of the Organisation, Machinery, and 
 General Working of the Fire Brigade of London,’ ‘Fires in Theatres,’ 
 and ‘ Fire Surveys,’ and, besides this, heaps of reports on fires in 
 London, as he describes them himself. These same reports, though of 
 the briefest description, show how the work of the Brigade is done. 
 Captain Shaw, then, is a man of whom we may well be proud, and if 
 w T ar has her triumphs and heroes, peace may fairly claim her share, 
 
NAMES OF DISTINGUISHED IRISHMEN. 
 
 59 
 
 Sir Robert Montgomery, K.C.B., K.C.S.I., LL.D., Member of the 
 Council of India (Foyle College). 
 
 Rev. T. Teignmouth Shore, M.A., Berkeley Chapel, Mayfair, 
 London (Bective College, and Dr. Lardner Burke’s, Dublin). 
 W. G. Wills, B.A., Dramatist (Clergy Sons’ School, Lucan, and Dr. 
 Price’s School, Waterford). 
 
 Professor Tyndall, F.R.S., LL.D., D.C.L. (Leiglin Bridge and 
 Bagnalstown Schools). 
 
 Right Hon. David R. Plunket, LL.D., Q.C., M.P. (Rev. Dr. 
 
 Flynn’s School, Harcourt Street, Dublin).* * 
 
 Oscar Wilde, B.A. (Porto ra Royal School). 
 
 R. Heim Collins, Q.C. (Dungannon Royal School). 
 
 W. Digby Seymour, LL.D., Q.C. (Rev. J. P. Sargent’s School, 
 Dublin, and the Clergy Sons’ School, Edgeworthstown). 
 
 J. Napier Higgins, Q.C. (Clonmel School). 
 
 The Right Rev. J. Dowden, D.D., Donnellan Lecturer, T.C.D., in 
 1884 ; Lord Bishop of Edinburgh (private tuition, and School 
 in Cork). 
 
 C. Villiers Stanford, Mus. Doc., Trinity College, Cambridge. 
 Thomas W. Hime, B.A., M.B., F.R.S.S., Medical Officer of Health, 
 Bradford (Portora Royal School). + 
 
 and amongst the heroes of this latter class, the name of Captain Eyre 
 Massey Shaw, C.B., stands out with exceptional brightness.” 
 
 * The following is the note appended to Mr. Plunket’ s name in 
 Thom's Directory (1886) : — “ Was Law Adviser to the Irish Government 
 in 1868. Solicitor-General for Ireland, 1875-77. Held office of H.M. 
 Paymaster-General for a short time in 1880, and was then sworn of 
 the Privy Council in England. Formerly Professor of Constitutional 
 and Criminal Law at the King’s Inns, Dublin. First elected Member 
 of Parliament in 1870. Re-elected on his being appointed First Com- 
 missioner of Works at the General Election, 1885.” 
 
 f The following is from the Bradford Observer of April 13th : — 
 
 “ Our Medical Officer of Health is acquiring a European fame. No 
 sooner has he gained renown in Paris by his conduct of the ‘ Bradford 
 patients ’ to M. Pasteur, than the German Government is adding a 
 sprig to his laurel wreath. It has officially asked to be supplied with 
 some copies of Dr. Hime’s Report on the Health of Bradford, made to 
 the Town Council. That report, which was very favourably noticed in 
 a leading article in the Lancet , was a most comprehensive document, 
 and in its permanent printed shape forms a ‘ state paper ’ which does 
 credit to the Bradford Corporation. The section upon ‘ Mortality at 
 
6o 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 Francis Edgeworth, M.A., Author of “Mathematical Psychics,” 
 &c. (private tuition). 
 
 W. H. Lloyd, M.D., Deputy Inspector-General of Hospitals and 
 Fleets, late Medical Officer on board H.M.S. Bacchante (Kil- 
 kenny College). 
 
 William J. Fames, M.D., Deputy Inspector-General of Hospitals 
 and Fleets (Foyle College). 
 
 J. Shiel, Metropolitan Police Magistrate, London (private tuition). 
 
 Rev. J. W. Loftie, Assistant Chaplain, Chapel Koyal, Savoy 
 (School in Wicklow). 
 
 James T. Bottomley, M.A. (Belfast), Lecturer in Natural Philo- 
 sophy in the University of Glasgow. 
 
 Charles F. W. Cranstoun, M.D. (Belfast), Demonstrator, &c., St 
 Thomas’s Hospital, London. 
 
 S. Dill, M.A. (Belfast), Head-master of Manchester Grammar 
 School. 
 
 Sir B. W. Foster, M.D., Knt., Fellow of the Royal College of 
 Physicians ; late M.P. for Chester ; now President of the Brit. 
 Med. Association, and Senior Professor of Medicine in Queen’s 
 College, Birmingham (Drogheda Grammar School). 
 
 W. H. Russell, LL.D., Editor of the Army ancl Navy Gazette , 
 Special Correspondent of the Times (Dr. Geoghegan’s Day- 
 School, Dublin). 
 
 John Perry, M.E. (Belfast), City and Guilds’ Technical College, 
 Finsbury. 
 
 school Age ’ has especially attracted attention, and has been quoted at 
 length in the Practitioner of this month. That a periodical which con- 
 tains only original articles should have reprinted such a lengthy docu- 
 ment is sufficient proof of the high value set upon Dr. Hime’s opinions. 
 A pamphlet on * Cholera,’ also by Dr. Hime, has just been reprinted 
 separately by the Royal Artillery Institution, from the Annual Pro- 
 ceedings of that Institution of which it forms a part.” 
 
 Dr. Hime is thus referred to in the Graphic of Jan. 24th, — in which 
 number there is a picture of the poor Bradford folk whom he escorted 
 to Paris to be operated on by M. Pasteur : — 
 
 “ Dr. Hime was untiring in his attention to his helpless family, and, 
 moreover, seemed to have the gift of tongues, as he was always wel- 
 comed with a smile by the polyglot crowd outside M. Pasteur’s room, 
 and his kindly words of encouragement in French, German, and 
 Italian were greatly appreciated by the poor patients.” 
 
NAMES OF DISTINGUISHED IRISHMEN. 
 
 61 
 
 Gerald F. Yeo, M.D., F.R.C.S.E., Professor of Physiology, King’s 
 College, London (Dungannon Royal School). 
 
 Sir Wm. McArthur, K.C.M.G., F.R.G.S., ex-Lord Mayor of 
 London.* 
 
 * This is the letter I received from Sir William McArthur : — 
 
 “ 79 Holland Park, London, 
 
 2 Jth March 1886. 
 
 “ My Dear Sir, — I have latterly been so much from home that I 
 have not been able to reply sooner to your kind inquiry. You ask me 
 to inform you where I was educated as a boy. 
 
 “ I regret to say I had not the advantages with which lads of the 
 present day are favoured. My father was a Wesleyan minister, and 
 in his itinerant life (never stopping longer than three years in any town), 
 his family had to put up with such schools as the place afforded. Still 
 I had not much cause for complaint. My memory takes me back to 
 the town of Stranorlar, in the County of Donegal, when I was a lad of 
 about eight years of age, and where the only school was kept by a 
 gentleman of the name of M‘Granahan. The late Isaac Butt was 
 a pupil of his about the same time ; and Mr. M‘Granahan’s son, a 
 Presbyterian minister, who died lately, told me that in after years his 
 father took great credit to himself for having had us both under his 
 care. Butt was an exceedingly clever fellow. Had he taken care of 
 himself, he might have been Lord Chancellor of Ireland. His career 
 in Trinity College was a very brilliant one. My brother (two years 
 younger than myself) and he were fellow-students there. Had the 
 former lived he would have made his mark in the world. With but 
 few advantages in an educational point of view, he took the first place 
 on his entrance over 1 30 candidates, and shortly after got first sizarship 
 over 120. He was cut off in his eighteenth year. 
 
 “ My father lived at that time in Omagh, and when Butt and I were 
 together in the House of Commons, he reminded me of the letters which 
 he used to carry from my brother, w r hen coming down to Stranorlar 
 to visit his friends. But to return to Mr. M‘Granahan : he had an 
 admirable plan for stimulating and encouraging his scholars at a very 
 moderate expense. He laid in a stock of illustrated tracts, and every 
 month the lad who was first in his class was called up before the school, 
 and had the privilege of selecting a tract as a reward for good conduct 
 and ability. I have a vivid recollection of the pride I once felt when 
 it was my good fortune to gain a prize in every class in which I was 
 placed. 
 
 “ I left school at a very early period. At twelve years of age I was 
 sent to business, and had to complete as best I could, by my own exer- 
 
62 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 A. McArthur, F.R.G.S., J.P., M.P. for Leicester — brother of the 
 last-mentioned (Day-school, Stranorlar). 
 
 Rev. E. M. Johnstone, ex-Chaplain and Naval Instructor, some- 
 time tutor to the Prince of Wales’ sons. 
 
 Lieut. -General Lowry, C.B. (Grace Hill Academy, and Royal 
 School, Dungannon). 
 
 Admiral May (Foyle College). 
 
 Jeremiah McCarthy, M.D., F.R.C.S., Board of Exam., R.C.S., 
 Eng. ; Surg. Loud. IIosp. (Rev. D. Flynn’s School, Dublin). 
 
 Rev. Marcus Falloon, M.A., Hon. Canon of Chester. 
 
 Professor Mincliin, Professor of Mathematics in the Royal Indian 
 Engineering College, Coopers Hill (Mr. Bell’s School, Dublin). 
 
 Rev. Charles Croslegh, M.A., Chaplain of the Royal Indian En- 
 gineering College, Coopers Hill (Armagh R. School). 
 
 T. W. Snagge, Q.C., County Court Judge (Day-schools, Dublin). 
 
 Surgeon -Major Dobson, M.A., M.B., F.R.S., Curator of the Museum, 
 Netley Hospital (Portora Royal School). 
 
 Rev. E. M‘Clure, M.A., Editorial Secretary, S.P.C.K. 
 
 Rev. Nugent Wade, Canon of Bristol. 
 
 Rev. John C. MacDonnell, Canon of Peterborough, ex-Dean of 
 Cashel (Middleton College). 
 
 Rev. Andrew R. Fausset, D.D., Canon of York, and Author of many 
 Theological and Classical Works (Dungannon Royal School).* 
 
 tions, the smattering of education I had previously received. I had 
 the advantage, however, in the home where I was placed, of an excel- 
 lent library, which I turned to good account, being a hard-working 
 and industrious student. One book, with which, doubtless, you are 
 acquainted, ‘ Elegant Extracts,’ I used to revel in, and thus early be- 
 came acquainted with all our best poets. 
 
 “I need not dwell more upon my early days. I commenced business 
 in Londonderry, without knowing any one in the city or county ; I was 
 successful, and soon took an active part in promoting measures which 
 have since largely contributed to the interests of the place. In 1857 
 I came to London, a total stranger, knowing only one young man in 
 the city. I have great cause for thankfulness to a gracious Provi- 
 dence at the success which has attended my efforts, and the position I 
 have attained. — With kind regards, I am, dear sir, yours very faith- 
 fully, William McArthur.” 
 
 * Canon Fausset in his letter to me observes: — “Sir Francis 
 Reilly of Scarva, Co. Down, was first my schoolfellow at Dungannon 
 
NAMES OF DISTINGUISHED IRISHMEN. 63 
 
 Rev. Robert Rogers, ex-Schol. and Sen. Mod. T.C.D., Rector of 
 Downham, Norfolk (Portora Royal School). 
 
 William Allingham, Poet and Essayist (Day-school, Ballyshannon, 
 and Killeshandra Boarding-School, Co. Cavan). 
 
 William Downes Griffith, Q.C., County Court Judge (Day-school in 
 Dublin, Gracehill School, Ballymena, Portora Royal School). 
 
 Whitley Stokes, B.L., ex.-Legal Member of the Legislative Council 
 of India (better known, perhaps, as a philologist). 
 
 Sir Frederic W. Burton, Knt., R.H.A., F.S.A., Director of the 
 National Gallery of London since 1874 (Dublin Day-school, 
 and private tuition).* * 
 
 Rev. Annesley W. Streane, Corpus Christi Coll., Cambridge [see 
 footnote, p. 42]. 
 
 Professor William Graham, M.A., Author of 44 The Creed of 
 Science,” &c. (Educational Institution, Dundalk). 
 
 Rev. E. J. Hardy, M.A., Chaplain of the Forces, Gosport 
 (Portora). 
 
 Alexander Mac Alister, M.D., M.A., F.R.S., Professor of Compara- 
 tive Anatomy and Physiology in the London University (Mr. 
 Richmond’s School, Dublin). 
 
 James Rowley, M.A., Professor Modern History and Literature, 
 
 University College, Bristol (Dungannon Royal School). 
 
 under Dr. Darley (afterwards Bishop of Kilmore) : then he read with 
 me in Trin. Coll, and obtained all through first Honors, and a high 
 University Scholarship. He transacted the law business of the Suez 
 Canal Shares purchase ; was the confidential law adviser of Lord 
 Cairns and of the Speaker of the House of Commons ; was offered 
 ^1200 a-year on the Council of India, which he declined ; but received 
 the Star of India and Knighthood, and the highest commendations 
 from Lords Shaftesbury, Granville, &c.” 
 
 * 44 Some of the most distinguished, learned, and at the same time 
 best men I have ever known as intimate friends,” writes Sir Frederic 
 to me, 44 came out of old 4 Alma Mater ’ on the banks of the Liffey. . . . 
 I have always felt convinced that in so often sending their sons to be 
 educated in England, the Irish gentry have made a mistake. ... If 
 we Anglo-Irish could only hit the happy medium, and keep touch with 
 both countries, without loss of our individuality, we should be in the 
 right place, I suppose.” In 1855 Sir Frederic was elected Associate, 
 and in 1858 Member of the Society of Painters in Water-Colours of 
 London. 
 
64 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 Win. Johnstone FyfFe, M.D., Dep. Surgeon-General (retired), 
 Medical Officer, Clifton College (Foyle College). 
 
 Tlios. Brett, B.L., Lecturer in Equity to Incorporated Law Society, 
 England, 1886-87, joint-author of “Clarke and Brett’s Con- 
 veyancing Acts ” (Portora). 
 
 [In regard to some few in the following list to whose names no place 
 of education is attached, it is but right to state plainly that I am not 
 sure they were in every instance educated, as boys, exclusively in Ire- 
 land — though I have every reason to believe that they were. But to 
 verify the tongue of report, or assertions of friends on the subject, in 
 the case of all the distinguished Irishmen who reside in far-away lands, 
 I found impossible. There are only a few in the following list who 
 are not Graduates of either T.C.D. or the late Q.U.I.] 
 
 Sir Robert Hart, British Envoy Extraordinary to the Emperor of 
 China, and Director-General of the Customs of the Chinese 
 Empire (Wesley College, Dublin).* 
 
 James Kernan, Judge of the Supreme Court of Madras. 
 
 Thomas Uppington, Prime Minister of the Cape Government. 
 
 D. 0 . Sullivan, Queen’s Advocate of Madras. 
 
 Edward Dwyer, Judge of the Cape Government. 
 
 Judge Bipton Curran, M.A., Jamaica (Portora). 
 
 Judge Gilmour M‘Corkell, India (Foyle College). 
 
 * The Recorder of Belfast, in sending me a list of a few distinguished 
 Irishmen of his acquaintance, alluded to Sir Robert Hart in the 
 following terms : — “He was for some time the British Ambassador to 
 China ; but for some good reason, no doubt, he gave up this appoint- 
 ment. He is one of the foremost men of the East, and I think I 
 might say of the world.” As a financier. Sir Robert Hart is indeed, I 
 have been told, second to none. 
 
 The following is an excerpt from the note appended to Sir Robert 
 Hart’s name in Thom's Directory (1886): — “Was Secretary to the 
 Allied Commission for the Government of Canton, 1858 ; joined the 
 Chinese Customs Service as Deputy Commissioner, 1859 ; was made 
 M.A. of the Queen’s University, honoris causa , 1875. I s a Chevalier 
 of the Order of Yasa in Sweden ; Commander of the Legion of 
 Honour in France.” 
 
 Mr. Harry Furniss, so well known on account of his connection with 
 Punch , is another old Wesley College boy. 
 
NAMES OF DISTINGUISHED IRISHMEN . 65 
 
 Sir John Edge, Knt., B.A., LL.B., T.C.D., Chief Justice of the High 
 Court of Judicature at Allahabad (Rev. Dr. Dawson’s School, 
 Curraghmore, Tullow, and Dr. Stackpoole’s, Kingstown).* 
 
 Colonel Quin, Assist-Commissioner, N.W.P. India (Dungannon 
 Royal School). 
 
 R. Wall, Q.U.I., Commissioner of Excise and Stamps, Nynee-Tal. 
 
 Hon. Judge Field, LL.D., Calcutta. 
 
 Hon. Judge Pigot, B.A., Calcutta. 
 
 Alexander E. Orr, Chairman of the Arbitration Committee, New 
 York (Derry). 
 
 William F. P. Stockley, B.A., T.C.D., Professor of French and 
 English Literature in the University of New Brunswick 
 (Rathmines School). 
 
 Hutcheson M. Posnett, LL.D., Professor of Classics and English 
 Literature in the University of Auckland, New Zealand (Rath- 
 mines School). 
 
 E. Y. Boulger, B.A., Professor of English Literature in the Uni- 
 versity of Adelaide (Rathmines School). 
 
 Judge Barclay, Calcutta (Academical Institution, Belfast). 
 
 Professor Russell, Professor of Mathematics and Astronomy, Pekin 
 College (Academical Institution, Derry, and Academical Insti- 
 tution, Belfast). 
 
 Professor Leeper, LL.D., Warden of Trinity College, Melbourne. t 
 
 * As Judge, Sir J. Edge’s salary is £6000 a year. Judge Edge was 
 called to the Irish Bar in 1864, and two years subsequently to the 
 English Bar, at which for many years past he had a considerable 
 practice: was made Q.C. in 1886. 
 
 + The following is the reply which I received from the Rev. Canon 
 Leeper, St. Audoen’s, Dublin, in answer to my letter asking him where 
 his distinguished son was educated : — 
 
 “ My son Alexander was educated in Dr. Stackpoole’s school, 
 Kingstown. He was Scholar (1st in his Junior Freshman year) of 
 T.C.D., and subsequently Scholar of St John’s, Oxford. He obtained 
 the Berkeley Gold Medal, the Vice-Chancellor’s Prize for Greek prose 
 in 1868, and four prizes for Latin and Greek prose and verse com- 
 positions. He was also the Proxime Accessit for the Gaisford Prize 
 at Oxford. He is translator of thirteen Satires of Juvenal into English 
 prose, and a second edition is called for. He is Warden of Trinity 
 College, Melbourne, and obtained his LL.D. from T.C.D. stip. con . 
 He has recently founded a Hostel for ladies studying in his College, 
 
 E 
 
66 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 George Fletcher Moore, B.L., Sole Judge of the First Civil Court, 
 and Acting Colonial Secretary for a time of Western Australia 
 (Foyle College). 
 
 Right Rev. E. Sullivan, D.D., Lord Bishop of Algoma, Canada 
 (Endowed Schools of Youghal, Clonmel, and Bandon). 
 
 Right Rev. John T. Lewis, D.D., Lord Bishop of Ontario (Hamblin 
 and Porter’s School, Cork). 
 
 Chief Justice Hagarty, Ontario (Rev. J. P. Huddart’s School, 
 Dublin). 
 
 Hon. Justice Patterson, Toronto, Canada (private tuition, and 
 Belfast Academical Institution). 
 
 Hon. Judge G wynne, Ottawa, Canada.* * 
 
 Hon. Sir Louis Stuart Jackson, High Court of Judicature, Cal- 
 cutta (Portora Royal School). 
 
 which, it is hoped, may rival Girton. It is the first of the kind started 
 in Australia. I was myself educated by private instruction in Dublin, 
 and at Dr. Brough’s School, Carlow.” 
 
 * The following extracts are from Judge Gwynne’s reply to me : — 
 
 “ My father, the late Rev. William Gwynne, D.D., conducted for 
 many years a large school at Castleknock, near Dublin, where there is 
 now a college for the education, I believe, of priests of some ecclesi- 
 astical Roman Catholic order. 
 
 “ At the age of six years, from an educational course of my own 
 prescription — which consisted chiefly in the pursuit of butterflies, 
 and in climbing up and running along the top rung of a two-inch- thick 
 plank rail fence about four feet high, which separated the school-house 
 from the playground, and was in sight of his seat in the school, and 
 from suchlike healthy exercises, well calculated to develop the mental 
 and muscular powers — he took me into the school, where he had me 
 instructed in the art of designing and manufacturing pot-hooks and 
 hangers, in which I attained a certain degree of proficiency. In due 
 course of time he introduced me to the classic authors of a remote 
 antiquity, in whose works, rather than in those of the sages of modern 
 times — be they German, or French, or English — it was then universally 
 believed that all knowledge worthy of acquisition was to be found. 
 Wisdom with her hand-maidens, the Arts and Sciences, having been 
 buried out of sight in the dark ages were — naturally enough, I suppose 
 — sought for in the dead languages from which, to my grief, I found 
 that they could not be exhumed without great labour and most 
 persevering industry, accompanied, as it appeared to me, with a cer- 
 tain natural taste for, and an organic adaptation to digest matter so 
 
NAMES OF DISTINGUISHED IRISHMEN . 67 
 
 Very Rev. M. Boomer, LL.D.* * 
 
 Rev. Canon Hincks, Galt, Ontario (Royal Academical Institution, 
 Belfast). 
 
 Rev. Canon Henderson, D.D., Principal of the Diocesan Theo- 
 logical College, Montreal (Foyle College). + 
 
 long since dead that its original flavour was quite lost and was difficult 
 to digest. 
 
 “ My father, having had a singularly strange wish that I should take 
 my degree of B.A. before I should attain the age of eighteen, made 
 me enter Trinity College at fourteen.” 
 
 The concluding paragraph of Judge Gwynne’s letter will especially 
 interest my Derry readers, with whom “ Gwynne’s Institution ” has 
 been for so many years a household word : — 
 
 “ I have long wished to visit Londonderry, where an old gentleman 
 once lived, I believe, who was a cousin of my father’s, and who 
 assumed the office of becoming my sponsor at the baptismal font with- 
 out sufficiently appreciating the duty attached to the office — which 
 I understood to have been to provide for the temporal and spiritual 
 welfare of his godson. He died rich, but might have died poor so far 
 as my temporalities were concerned. He did, however, some good by 
 dying, and founding at Londonderry an educational establishment of 
 some kind ; and, although in doing so he robbed, as I look upon it, his 
 loving godson, still I should like to see the monument in perpetuation 
 of his memory and my great loss.” 
 
 * “The Very Rev. M. Boomer, LL.D., was educated at the Belfast 
 Royal Academic Institution, of which he was a Foundation Scholar for 
 five years, and at Trinity College, Dublin, having graduated from the 
 latter in 1838, and there receiving the honorary degree of Doctor of 
 Laws in i860. He came to Canada in 1840, and for thirty years 
 was the Rector of Galt, Ontario. When he entered upon his Mission 
 work there, there were but three Episcopal families in the parish, and 
 neither school-house nor church. When he left, a large stone church 
 and fine parsonage were built, and there were nearly 1000 members of 
 the church, and an endowment of $1000. In 1872 Dr. Boomer was 
 called to London, Ontario, by the Bishop of Huron, and appointed 
 Dean of Huron, and Principal of Huron Divinity College, and Rector 
 of the Chapter-House Congregation.” — Extract from the Canadian 
 Biographical Dictionary of Eminent Men. 
 
 t Canon Henderson informs me that the following were also edu- 
 cated in Ireland: — Rev. Canon Du Montin, Rector of St. James’s 
 Cathedral, Toronto ; Yen. Archdeacon Lander, Ottawa ; and Rev. C. 
 E. Cartwright, B.D., Kingston, Ontario. 
 
68 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 IT. W. Gillman, J.P., Cork, ex-Auditor, General and District 
 Judge, Ceylon (Hamblin and Porter’s School, Cork). 
 
 Ven. J. Bedford Jones, LL.D., Archdeacon of Ontario (Hamblin 
 and Porter’s School, Cork). 
 
 Very Rev. James Carmichael, D.C.L., Dean of Montreal (private 
 tuition, and Dr. Stackpoole’s). 
 
 Ven. J. Wilson, Archdeacon of Peterborough, Ontario (Wilson’s 
 Hospital, Co. West Meath). 
 
 Rev. John Vicars, B.A., Cannington, Ontario (Ennis College). 
 
 Hon. Raymond West, LL.D. (Galway),* F.R.G.S., Judge of the 
 High Court, Bombay, Vice-Chancellor of the University of 
 Bombay, t 
 
 Hon. Coleman P. MacAulay, M.A. (Galway), Financial Secretary 
 of the Government, and Member of the Legislative Council of 
 Bengal. 
 
 James O’Kinealy, M.A. (Galway), Judge of the High Court of 
 Judicature, Bengal. 
 
 Anthony P. MacDonnell, M.A. (Galway), Officiating Secretary to 
 the Government of Bengal, Revenue and General Department. 
 
 His Excellency Robert J. Creighton, Minister of State to the 
 King of the Sandwich Islands. 
 
 E. Divers, M.B. (Galway), Professor of Chemistry in the College 
 of Engineering, Tokio, Japan. 
 
 George M‘Mahon, M.A. (Galway), Professor of Modern Languages, 
 Royal College, Mauritius. 
 
 George Thompson, B.A. (Galway), Doveton College, Calcutta. 
 
 William King, D.Sc. (Galway), Departmental Superintendent, 
 Geological Survey, India. 
 
 Humphrey Evatt, B.A. (Galway), Surveyor - General, Sierra- 
 Leone. 
 
 J. McLeavy Brown, B.A. (Belfast), Assistant Chinese Secretary 
 British Legation, Chinese Secretary to the British Embassy 
 to Europe and the United States (1868). 
 
 * “(Galway),” thus used, means the Queen’s Coll., Galway: so 
 “ (Belfast),” Queen’s Coll., Belfast. 
 
 f Judge West was borrowed from the Indian Service last year by 
 the British Government, and sent to Egypt as “ Procureur General des 
 Finances,” to reorganise the financial affairs of Egypt. An article in 
 the Times recently pointed out his remarkable success in that great 
 task. He has now returned to his judicial position at Bombay. 
 
NAMES OF DISTINGUISHED IRISHMEN. 69 
 
 Andrew Burroughs, B.A. (Belfast), Assay Master of Mint, Cal- 
 cutta. 
 
 John M. Coates, M.D. (Belfast), Principal, and Professor of 
 Medicine, Medical College, Calcutta. 
 
 John Gamble, B.A. (Belfast), Late Professor of Languages, Eagles- 
 wood Military Academy, New Jersey, U.S., Head-master 
 Collegiate Academy, Canton, Ohio, U.S. 
 
 Thomas D. Ingram, M.A., LL.D. (Belfast), Professor of Law and 
 Jurisprudence, Presidency College, Calcutta. 
 
 John H. McFarland, M.A. (Belfast), Head-master of Ormond 
 College, Melbourne. 
 
 Alfred Nesbitt, B.A. (Belfast), Professor of English Literature in 
 the Mohammedan Anglo- Oriental College, Aligarh. 
 
 J. Lawrence Rentoul, M.A. (Belfast), Professor of Theology, 
 Ormond College, Melbourne. 
 
 D. W. Barbour, M.A. (Belfast), Financial Secretary, Bengal 
 (R.A.I., Belfast). 
 
 John E. Oram, M.E. (Galway), ex-Professor of Mathematical 
 Science, King’s College, Windsor, N<wa Scotia. 
 
 Rev. J. G. Norton, M.A., Rector of the Cathedral, Montreal.* 
 
 Dr. Hearn, Chancellor of the Melbourne University (Portora). 
 
 William A. Talbot, Woods and Forest Department, India (Foyle 
 College). 
 
 Hon. Judge Meredith, D.C.L., Quebec. 
 
 John Bradshaw, LL.D., Inspector of Schools, and Fellow of the 
 University, Madras (Portora). 
 
 * The following is the letter I received from Mr. Norton in reply to 
 my question asking him where he was educated as a boy : — 
 
 “The Rectory, 
 
 Christ Church Cathedral, Montreal, Canada, 
 April 2,0th, 1886. 
 
 “ My Dear Sir, — I was educated in Ireland, at the late Rev. R. D. 
 Allen’s school, Croghan House School, Killeshandra, County Cavan. 
 Mr. Hugh Murphy was his mathematical assistant in my time. Mrs. 
 Allen managed the housekeeping. No school could be more honestly 
 and faithfully conducted than it was in every respect, and I look back 
 with much gratitude and affection to those whom God in His goodness 
 then placed over me. Mr. Murphy had a very kind and happy way of 
 teaching Mathematics, which gave me a good start in T. C. D. — Yours 
 very faithfully, J. G. Norton.” 
 
70 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 M. H. Gault, M.P., Montreal. 
 
 T. F. Gillespie, M.P., Chatham, N.B. 
 
 Robert Deey Spedding, N.W.P., India. 
 
 Theodore Cook, LL.B., Principal of the Engineering College, 
 Poonah. 
 
 Rev. John Hall, D.D., New York. 
 
 Hon. James Quinton, B.A., B.C.S., Member of the Board of 
 Revenue, N.W. Provinces and Oudh ; Member also of the 
 Legislative Council of Indian Government (Portora Royal 
 School, Enniskillen).* 
 
 Rev. Joseph Wilson Henry, Rector of Gympie, Queensland (Foyle 
 College). 
 
 Allen, Thomas Taylor, Remembrancer of Legal Affairs and Member 
 of Council of Lieut.-Governorof Bengal (Diocesan School, Cork).+ 
 
 Busteed, Henry E., M.D., Surgeon-Major, Madras Army, Assay 
 Master of the Mint, Calcutta (Private Day-school in Cork). 
 
 Busteed, Thomas M., B.A., Chief Judge, Small Cause Court, Madras 
 (Retired), (Private Day-school, Cork). 
 
 Colan, Thomas, M.D., Deputy Inspector-General of Hospitals and 
 Fleets, Senior Medical Officer on Arctic Expedition under 
 Admiral Sir G. Nares. [The Second Medical Officer was also 
 a Student of this College, and has since greatly distinguished 
 himself, and, like Dr. Colan, was wholly educated in Ireland.] 
 (Private School in Cork.) 
 
 Gould, Michael, B.A., LL.B., Administrator- General of the 
 Presidency of Madras (Private Day-school, Cork). 
 
 Hennessy, Sir John Pope, K.C.M.G., Governor of Mauritius 
 (Private Day-school, Cork). 
 
 Mongan, James, B.A., sometime British Consul at Tien - Tsin, 
 China (Private School, Dublin). 
 
 O’Brien, Michael, B.A., some time Professor of English in the 
 Tungwen College (Imperial College of Interpreters), Peking 
 (Private School, Dungarvan, Co. Waterford). 
 
 0 ’ Callaghan, Francis, Public Works Service of India, an Engineer 
 of very high reputation in India (Santry School, Dublin). 
 
 * Salary, ^4500 a year. 
 
 t This and the following thirteen names were forwarded to me by 
 
 the President of the Queen’s Coll., Cork ; they are those of graduates 
 
 of that college. 
 
NAMES OF DISTINGUISHED IRISHMEN. 
 
 7i 
 
 O’Meara, Patrick, B.E., Member of the Institution of Civil Engi- 
 neers, Author of papers of acknowledged merit (Clongowes 
 Wood College). 
 
 O’Ryan, Owen, D., Litt. , Licencie of the University of France, 
 Professor of Modern Languages, Queen’s College, Cork 
 (Endowed School, Tipperary). 
 
 O’Sullivan, Stephen, M.D., F.R.C.S.I., Professor of Surgery, 
 Queen’s College, Cork, Surgeon to the North Infirmary and 
 General Hospital, Cork (Private School, Cork). 
 
 Walker, Frank, Public Works Service, India, Superintending 
 Engineer, N.W. Province (Private School, Ballingarry). 
 
 Wilson, Edward D. G., M.A., LL.D., Senator of the Royal 
 University of Ireland, Second Editor of the London Times 
 (Middleton School, Co. Cork). 
 
 On looking over the Trinity College and Queen’s 
 College Calendars for 1884, I find that 132 Trinity 
 College students passed the Indian Civil Service 
 examinations between July 1856 and April 1881; 
 and that during this same space of time, 2 1 passed 
 from the Belfast Queen’s College — total, 153. Of 
 the Trinity College students I find that the follow- 
 ing distinguished themselves by obtaining first places: 
 — John Geoghegan (1857); Robert Hime (1859); 
 Edward Sinkinson (1867); William Barry (1871); 
 James Holt (1878); Michael Fenton (1881); and 
 Thomas Wilson (1881), second place. Of the twenty- 
 one successful Queen’s College Belfast students, E. S. 
 Stack (1870) obtained first place, and William John 
 Mulligan (1859) second place. 
 
 When one reflects on the number of Irish students 
 who pass the Civil Service examinations direct from 
 the Galway and Cork Queen’s Colleges, and from 
 schools like the Kingstown School, and from Dublin 
 and Belfast “ grinders,” it will be seen what a very 
 
72 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 fair share of the highest Civil Service appointments in 
 India have fallen to the share of young Irishmen.* 
 
 On taking up an old Trinity College Calendar, that 
 for i860, I find that, during the four years pre- 
 ceding the publication of this Calendar, seventy-two 
 Irish lads passed, direct from Trinity College, the exa- 
 minations for the Eoyal Military Academy, Woolwich. 
 Of these, fifty-four succeeded ultimately in getting into 
 the Eoyal Artillery, and eighteen into the Eoyal Engi- 
 neers. The number of young Irishmen who passed the 
 Woolwich examinations from schools, grinding estab- 
 lishments, and the Queen’s Colleges, during the same 
 four years, may be safely, I think, put down at, at least, 
 seventy-two more.t 
 
 On glancing through the “ Official Army List,” I 
 observe among the officers who have won the Victoria 
 Cross the names of seven who, I happen to know, 
 were educated exclusively in Ireland. There may be 
 many more than these seven — indeed it is certain 
 that there are. The seven Victoria Cross-men that I 
 refer to are : — Brigadier-General Eogers, Colonel 
 Leet, Surgeon-Major Temple, Surgeon-Major Eeynolds, 
 
 * The names of the Belfast, Galway, and Cork Queen’s College 
 students who passed these examinations will be found recorded in 
 the annals of their respective colleges. 
 
 + It may fairly be assumed — to prove it to demonstration would 
 be most difficult— that at least 97 per cent, of both the successful 
 Indian Civil Service and Woolwich candidates direct from Ireland 
 were educated as boys exclusively in Ireland. It certainly does not 
 seem very probable that more than two or three per cent, of these, at 
 the very most, could have been educated at English schools in the first 
 instance, then withdrawn from these, and brought back to Ireland 
 to prepare for these examinations. Of the home or Irish-school edu- 
 cated Irishmen who spent a year or so in London preparing for them, 
 I am taking no account in the present calculation. 
 
NAMES OF DISTINGUISHED IRISHMEN . 
 
 73 
 
 Colonel H. G. Moore, C.B., Colonel L. O’Connor,* and 
 Lieutenant-General Olpherts, C.B. 
 
 The Army List simply abounds with the names of 
 Irishmen who have won for themselves, by their dash 
 and coolness in danger, honourable mention — Irishmen 
 who were educated exclusively in their own country, 
 and who consequently speak with an Irish accent. Of 
 the best military appointments that there are many 
 are held by Irish officers who were educated entirely in 
 their own country. It is an old Portora boy, Major 
 H. W. L. Hime, R.A., F.S.S. — late Secretary of the 
 Royal Artillery Institution, Woolwich — whose name 
 is first recorded among the essayists who won the 
 “ Royal United Service Institution ” gold medal. He 
 had previously won, by another essay, the “ Royal 
 Artillery Institution ” gold medal. The Hon. Colonel 
 Albert H. Hime, C.M.G., Colonial Engineer, Natal, 
 was also educated exclusively in Ireland, partly at 
 Portora. His brother, Colonel Frederick Hime, R.E., 
 who has been for the last five years Commanding 
 Royal Engineer at Weymouth, was educated as a boy 
 exclusively at home.t 
 
 On looking through a list of distinguished students 
 of the Queen’s College, Galway, I find that within 
 recent years seventy-one of them passed the examina- 
 tions for the Army Medical Service, and twenty-four 
 of them for the Naval Medical Service. According to 
 the Belfast Queen’s College Calendar for the year 1885, 
 forty-four of the students from the College passed the 
 
 * Col. O’Connor has a distinguished-service reward of ;£ioo a year. 
 
 t In the Official Army List, Colonel Fred. Hime has this record of 
 services attached to his name : — “ China War , i860 — actions of Sinho 
 and Tangku, storming and capture of Taku forts, surrender of Pekin. 
 Medal with two clasps.” 
 
74 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 examinations for the Army Medical Service. When 
 one takes into account the scores of young men who 
 have passed these same examinations from Trinity 
 College, Dublin, the Eoyal College of Surgeons, and the 
 other Medical Schools of Ireland, he will be struck 
 with admiration at the large number of young Irish- 
 men, educated in Ireland, who have distinguished them- 
 selves by becoming Army and Navy Medical Doctors. 
 
 The foregoing names will be regarded by the reader 
 merely as samples of hundreds of others that might 
 be mentioned. But why mention more ? If Irish 
 schools can supply Great Britain and Ireland, the 
 Colonies, America (and even other countries), with 
 young men who grow into luminaries as Statesmen, 
 Bishops, Deans, and Archdeacons; Judges and 
 Barristers ; Historians, Poets, and Newspaper Editors ; 
 Surgeons and Physicians ; Engineers and Architects ; 
 Military and Navy Officers ; Painters and Musicians ; 
 Mathematicians, Classical Scholars, Physicists ; Mer- 
 chants and Financiers ; metaphysicians ; dramatists, it 
 follows that they can still more supply the various 
 countries of the world with the lesser lights in 
 every vocation of life — yes, and they have done so. 
 Numerous examples of these I have given. Why 
 then, I ask again, mention more names ? 
 
 The names of most of the most distinguished Irish- 
 men who have been educated, as boys, in Ireland, 
 resident now in Ireland or England, have been entered 
 by me in the lists. So, too, have the names of those 
 of our countrymen who, if not in the very first rank, 
 are at all events in the second or the third. My 
 object was to make my list as representative as 
 possible, and show that large numbers of Irishmen in 
 
NAMES OF DISTINGUISHED IRISHMEN . 75 
 
 every profession — those in the front rank no less than 
 those in the second and third, those in the second and 
 third no less than those in the first — were educated as 
 boys exclusively in their own country. Have I not 
 done this ? If I have, I have done all that I desired 
 to do. 
 
 To have recorded the names of all the living clergy- 
 men, barristers, solicitors, County Surveyors, classical 
 scholars, mathematicians, military officers, members 
 of the Indian C.S., County Infirmary doctors, Lunatic 
 Asylum Superintendents, &c., born and resident in Ire- 
 land, and exclusively educated here, would have made 
 my list needlessly large : they nearly all were. And 
 the same may be said of all the leading Irishmen in 
 England, America, the Colonies, or elsewhere : they 
 were nearly all educated exclusively in the land in 
 which they were born. Should not the Irish parent 
 be encouraged by the statement — a statement which 
 cannot be in any way controverted, account for the 
 truth of it as one may ? 
 
 “ But,” some one may ask, “ is it not possible that 
 these successful Irishmen who were educated as boys in 
 Ireland are all above the average in ability and energy 
 — geniuses in short — men who would have succeeded 
 under any circumstances, no matter where educated ? ” 
 A glance at the lists will show that the geniuses 
 therein recorded are but very few. Indeed, the 
 number of geniuses alive in any one country at any 
 one time is always extremely limited. To assert 
 that those whose names appear in the lists are above 
 the average in ability and energy, is to assert a truism. 
 Of course they are : who would dream of denying it ? 
 If they were not, their names would not — evidently — 
 
76 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 have been deemed worthy of a place in the lists at all. 
 Besides this, it may, I suppose, be taken for granted 
 that the number of the Irish boys at school in Eng- 
 land who are geniuses, and above the average in 
 ability and energy, is quite as large, proportionately, 
 as is that of the boys of this kind who are at school 
 in Ireland. 
 
 There must have been many and many a clever 
 Irish boy among the thousands who have been educated 
 during the last fifty years, say, in England ; and yet 
 how exceeding few of these — naturally clever though 
 so many of them must be — would be worthy of an 
 honoured place in any list of distinguished Irishmen ! 
 
 Assuredly if the Irish boys who have been for years 
 and years past going to school in England had been 
 well and wisely trained and taught in the schools in 
 which they spent the best years of their young lives, 
 the percentage of distinguished living Irishmen who 
 were educated in England would now be something 
 more than 5.2.* 
 
 Yes ; far, far more — and all the more so, if, as has 
 been assumed in the last paragraph, p. 23, the Irish 
 is naturally cleverer than the English schoolboy. If, 
 indeed, this be so, how comes it to pass that Irish 
 boys so seldom show any signs of their superiority in 
 cleverness, unless when educated in their own country? 
 
 * And this percentage, miserably low though it be, as it is, would 
 be, of course, much lower if the Ecclesiastical Dignitaries, referred to 
 in footnote, p. 40, were to be taken in my calculations into account. 
 
( 77 ) 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 “NEARLY ALL DISTINGUISHED LIVING ENGLISHMEN 
 WERE EDUCATED IN ENGLAND .” 
 
 “But could not English schoolmasters/' it may be 
 objected, “ also produce a very brilliant list of names 
 of distinguished men who were educated in England?’ 7 
 Yes, no doubt they could. How strange, indeed, 
 if they could not, seeing the thousands and thousands 
 of boys who receive their education every year in 
 England ! In England, I say, rather than in English 
 schools ; for in England, as in Ireland, many a dis- 
 tinguished member of society was educated, as a boy, 
 not at school but at his own home, by his father or by 
 a private tutor. A large proportion of distinguished 
 Englishmen were never at any of the great Public 
 Schools at all.* 
 
 It is the custom of English parents to educate their 
 sons in England; they do not send them, as Irish 
 parents do, to another country to be taught. When, 
 then, one takes into account the enormous number of 
 English boys of ability, and energy, and ambition, and 
 excellent moral character, who are educated yearly in 
 England, it would be absurd to suppose for a moment 
 that out of this vast number there should not be found 
 hundreds capable of distinguishing themselves at the 
 
 * For some verification of this statement see pp. 94-96. 
 
78 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 Universities in the first instance, and subsequently in 
 whatever station of life they may happen to be placed, 
 whether by chance or design. 
 
 Were we to take account of the sons of our nobility 
 alone, how many of these are there at English schools ! 
 How few, how exceedingly few, at Irish ! I doubt if 
 there are half-a-dozen at all our schools in Ireland all 
 put together. 
 
 My contention in this essay is not that English 
 boys are not properly educated at English schools. 
 It is that the Irish boys who are educated at them 
 somehow or another do not happen to do much credit 
 to their school education. That the Irish boys who are 
 educated at English schools seldom or never, indeed, 
 distinguish themselves in any way, is but too evident : 
 this point has been made clear in the first chapter of 
 this essay. 
 
 It is obvious that if even the half, yes, or the 
 quarter of the Irish boys educated at English schools 
 — the thousands of them who must be now in their 
 prime — had been effectively educated as boys, it could 
 not now be truthfully stated that nearly all Irishmen 
 of any note at home, in our Colonies, or in any other 
 countries, were educated in our own small island. 
 
 When one takes into account the thousands and 
 thousands of English boys who year by year receive 
 their education in England, he cannot, indeed, but be 
 surprised at the smallness of the percentage of 
 them who distinguish themselves very much among 
 their fellows as statesmen, or professional men, or 
 by their literary, mathematical, artistic, or scientific 
 attainments. 
 
 “ Doubtless there are ” (in England) “ the very 
 
SUCCESSFUL ENGLISHMEN , WHERE EDUCATED . 79 
 
 highest opportunities,” to use the words of the Recorder 
 of Dublin, “ for those who choose to be scholars.” * 
 “ But this,” he continues, “ is only for those who 
 choose.” That very few of them, in proportion to 
 their numbers, do “ choose to be scholars ” must, it is 
 to be feared, be admitted by all. 
 
 In regard to the expression “in proportion to their 
 numbers,” very few of my readers have probably any 
 adequate conception of what this proportion is. 
 
 Does it not seem almost incredible — incredible, at 
 least, at first sight — that there are not as many 
 boarders (Protestant) in all the schools in all Ireland 
 put together as there are in this or that couple of 
 schools — several might be named — in England ? 
 
 If the reader wish for statistics as to the number 
 of boys in our several Irish schools, he will find them 
 in the Report of the Endowed Schools Commissioners 
 (Ireland), 1881. He will find, for example, on 
 reference to that Report, that in 1880 the entire 
 number of boarders in the twenty schools that, I 
 suppose, may be fairly regarded as the best known 
 of bona fide Irish boarding-schools (for Protestants) 
 amounted only to 752. The schools to which I refer 
 are the three Royal Schools (Enniskillen, Armagh, 
 and Dungannon), the four Erasmus Smith Schools 
 (Ennis, Tipperary, Drogheda, and Galway), the Belfast 
 Institute, Kingstown, Middleton, Parsonstown, Portar- 
 lington, the Sligo Diocesan School, Dundalk Grammar 
 School, the Academical Institution (Londonderry), 
 Wesley College (Dublin), the Academical Institution 
 (Coleraine), Kilkenny College, Raphoe, and Foyle 
 College. 
 
 * These words occur in the article referred to, p. 4. 
 
8o 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 752 boarders altogether in these twenty Irish 
 boarding-schools in 1880 ! and I fear there are not as 
 many now. 
 
 Compare with this the fact that in the follow- 
 ing twenty Intermediate schools of England — Eton, 
 Harrow, Rugby, Winchester, Marlborough, Shrewsbury, 
 Cheltenham, Clifton, Uppingham, Hailey bury, Sher- 
 borne, Dulwich, Repton, Rossal, Bristol, Westminster, 
 Bedford Grammar School, Highgate, Wellington College, 
 Ardingley — the number of boarders on the rolls in 
 1884 was 9370.* 
 
 What a contrast ! The average number of boarders 
 in our twenty Irish schools referred to is scarcely 
 3 8 ; while in the twenty foregoing English schools 
 the average attendance in each is 468. 
 
 The number of boys in all the English boarding- 
 schools put together, private, proprietary, and endowed, 
 is, as the reader may easily imagine for himself, 
 enormous. 
 
 What prizes and honors of all kinds ought they 
 not to win amongst them ! That they win amongst 
 them nothing in comparison to what they ought to 
 win, when their vast numbers are taken into account, 
 must assuredly be the opinion of all who reflect calmly 
 on the subject. 
 
 The following is the entire passage in which the 
 
 * The separate numbers are : — Eton, 960 ; Harrow, 500 ; Rugby, 
 430; Winchester, 370; Marlborough, 580; Shrewsbury, 180; Chelten- 
 ham, 750 ; Clifton, 650 ; Uppingham, 350 ; Haileybury, 400 ; Sher- 
 borne, 325; Dulwich, 850; Repton, 300; Rossal, 300; Bristol, 300 ; 
 Westminster, 225 ; Bedford Grammar School, 450 ; Highgate, 250 ; 
 Wellington College, 600 ; Ardingley, 600. These numbers I have taken 
 from Captain Bisson’s “ Our Schools and Colleges,” except in the 
 case of Ardingley College, of whose numbers I was otherwise informed. 
 
SUCCESSFUL ENGLISHMEN, WHERE EDUCATED . 81 
 
 words quoted on p. 78 from the Recorder of Dublin’s 
 essay occur : the words themselves I have italicised : — 
 “ Passing by the living, we should not forget that 
 Whiteside and Napier, Cairns, O’Hagan, and the 
 Lawrences had ended their school-days before they 
 visited England. And there is in our schools, what- 
 ever be their drawbacks, a tradition of hard work 
 which the English schools have not. Doubtless , for 
 
 those who choose to be scholars , there are the very highest 
 opportunities there ” (that is, in England); <( but this is 
 only for those who choose: but that the atmosphere as 
 a rule is not a working one is too clearly proved by 
 the numberless complaints of the boys who have 
 brought home to Ireland proficiency in athletics only.'* 
 And there is one other great tradition of Irish schools — 
 which in all events and changes may they ever still 
 retain — of education and culture based upon religious 
 principle.” t 
 
 * In his essay on “Public Schools,” written over seventy years ago, 
 Sydney Smith, in a similar strain, alludes to the over-stress laid upon 
 “ proficiency in athletics ” in the public schools of his time. “ Of what 
 importance is it in after life,” he asks, “ whether a boy can play well 
 or ill at cricket, or row a boat with the skill and precision of a water- 
 man ? If our young lords and esquires were hereafter to wrestle together 
 in public, or the gentlemen of the Bar to exhibit Olympic games in 
 Hilary Term, the glory attached to these exercises at public schools 
 would be rational and important.” 
 
 + The great Irishmen named by the Dublin Recorder in the pas- 
 sage in the text, as samples of those who “had ended their school- 
 days before visiting England” — “Whiteside and Napier, Cairns, 
 O’Hagan, and the Lawrences ” — were, no doubt, stars in their genera- 
 tion ; but they were not the only stars of whom the same remark 
 might be made. Of nearly all the Irishmen whose names shine out 
 from the pages of our history since the beginning of the last century 
 it might be said with equal truth : “They had ended their school-days 
 before visiting England.” Lord Lawrence and his two distinguished 
 brothers, Sir Henry, C.B., K.C.S.I. (killed at Lucknow), and General 
 
 F 
 
82 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 Sir George St. Patrick, C.B., K.C.S.I., were old Foyle College boys. 
 Lord Lawrence, as the readers of his recent life by Mr. Bosworth 
 Smith will remember, was Viceroy and Governor- General of India 
 from 1863 to 1868. Two other distinguished old Foyle College boys 
 have also lately passed away, the Rev. and Right Hon. Lord O’Neill 
 (Shane’s Castle), and the Very Rev. A. Boyd, 1 ).D., Dean of Exeter. 
 
 The present Provost of Trinity College was already a Fellow of some 
 standing when he paid his first visit to England. As at once a mathe- 
 matician, preacher, and platform speaker, the Provost is, nevertheless, 
 second to no one in Ireland. Dr. Jellett’s predecessor as Provost, 
 T.C.D., was the Rev. Humphrey Lloyd, S.F.T.C.D. (1867-81). Dr. 
 Humphrey Lloyd was educated, as a boy, at Mr. White’s School, 
 Dublin. The Rev. Richard MacDonnell, D.D., S.F.T.C.D., preceded, 
 as Provost, Dr. Lloyd (1852-67), and he, too, was educated exclusively 
 as a boy in Ireland. So also was Dr. MacDonn ell’s predecessor, Rev. 
 Frank Sadleir, D.D., S.F.T.C.D. (1837-52). Dr. Sadleir used to say of 
 himself that at nineteen he had read all the British Classics. Dr. Sad- 
 leir was preceded in the Provostship by Dr. Bartholomew Lloyd, D.D., 
 S.F.T.C.D., Dr. H. Lloyd’s father (1831-37). This most enlightened 
 and useful of Provosts was educated at the Endowed School of New 
 Ross, sub ferula Rev. John Alexander, of which school his own grand- 
 father (also called Bartholomew) had been for some time head master. 
 Both Dr. Lloyd and his distinguished son presided each during his 
 provostship over the Royal Irish Academy. 
 
 In the Dublin University Magazine , No. lxi., for January 1838, there 
 is a most interesting article titled, “ The Late Provost,” in which 
 the numerous reforms effected in T.C.D. by Dr. B. Lloyd are described, 
 written by the gifted Rev. W. Archer Butler, the then Professor of 
 Moral Philosophy, T.C.D. From this article I extract the following 
 passages: — “We have been informed, on the best authority, that at 
 his Fellowship examination in physics, he” (the late Provost) “an- 
 swered every question proposed to him, and in the mathematical 
 examination, every question but one — an instance, we believe, almost 
 solitary in the history of university successes.” The article concludes 
 thus: — “We heartily trust that among our readers we can number 
 none who are wholly incapable of feeling interest in a subject ” ( i.e ., 
 the late Provost, and his efforts to promote the welfare of the Dublin 
 University) “so obviously of importance to every enlightened lover 
 of his country’s welfare ; or who would covet for real topics, more 
 transient and perishable, the pages which are here allotted to the 
 feeble but faithful commemoration of learning, zeal, and practical 
 wisdom, united to form one of the most valuable public servants it has 
 ever been our fortune to know and to lament ! ” 
 
 Rev. Samuel Kyle, D.D., S.F.T.C.D., preceded, as Provost, the Rev. 
 
SUCCESSFUL ENGLISHMEN , WHERE EDUCATED. 83 
 
 Bartholomew Lloyd (1820-1831). In 1831 he was consecrated Bishop 
 of Cork and Ross. Dr. Kyle was educated, as a boy, at Foyle College. 
 His portrait, a beautiful engraving, hangs up in the Foyle College 
 Dining Hall. It was presented as a gift to the present head-master 
 by the Bishop’s son, the late Dr. W. Cotter Kyle, Secretary to the 
 Endowed Schools Commissioners. So much for the Provosts, T.C.D., 
 since 1800. There was another old Foyle College boy in days anterior 
 to Dr. Kyle’s time who had also the honour of being Provost of 
 Trinity College, namely, the Rev. Dr. F. Andrews, LL.D., 1758 — the 
 same who was sometime M.P. for Derry. Nor was Dr. Kyle the only 
 Bishop who was educated as a boy in Foyle College. In Foyle College 
 there was also educated that most gifted divine, the Right Rev. John 
 Jebb, D.D., Bishop of Limerick; there, too, the following Fellows, 
 T.C.D., in addition to those already mentioned in the lists in Chapter 
 VI., and in this footnote : — Rev. Hugh Graffan, D.D., 1724; Rev. R. 
 Law, D.D., 1754 ; Rev. T. Torrens, D.D. 1765 ; Rev. W. Richardson, 
 B.D., 1766; and the Rev. W. Hamilton, 1779. [For the places of 
 education of some of the recent Lord Chancellors of Ireland, see p. 
 xxiv., footnote +, and pp. 36, 37.] 
 
 Another distinguished Old Foyle College Boy is Lord Chief- Justice 
 May. He has been a generous subscriber to the Foyle College Prize 
 Fund, and presided — the venerable Vice-Provost of Trinity College 
 sitting next to him — at the last Old Foyle College Boys’ dinner. As 
 Lord Chief- Justice May was at Shrewsbury, however, as well as at 
 Foyle College, his name does not appear in the lists in Chapter VI. 
 

 ( 8 4 ) 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 POSITION OF SCHOOLS, GEOGRAPHICAL OR SOCIAL, 
 OF SMALL CONSEQUENCE IN RE THE EDUCATION 
 OF BOYS . 
 
 On reading attentively over and reflecting calmly on 
 the list of distinguished Irishmen given in Chapter VI., 
 and on their places of education (which I have named 
 whenever I knew them), one is forced to the conclu- 
 sion that, after all, it makes little or no difference, in 
 regard to their ultimate success in life, where fairly 
 talented and industrious boys are educated, if only 
 they are religiously brought up and well grounded at 
 the beginning of their career as learners. 
 
 That boys are religiously brought up and well 
 grounded at Irish schools is generally admitted as an 
 incontrovertible fact. Proofs of it, at all events, should 
 the proposition be foolishly called in question, are not 
 far to seek. 
 
 So far as progress in learning is concerned, every- 
 thing nearly depends on these four conditions : — (a) 
 fair ability ; (/3) good religious and moral training ; 
 ( 7 ) sound instruction ; (S) industry. I am not now, 
 be it observed, speaking of geniuses. If we come to 
 speak of geniuses, the social position of the school 
 becomes a question of absolute insignificance. 
 
 The world is simply full of examples of men who 
 
POSITION , ETC., OF SCHOOLS . 
 
 85 
 
 have risen to the highest pinnacle of success in every 
 department of life, though practically uneducated as 
 boys — men who have risen in spite of all sorts of ima- 
 ginable obstacles, poverty, ill-health, opposing friends, 
 no teaching, friendlessness, tedious uncongenial daily 
 work, and what not. The force of genius is irresis- 
 tible ; it cannot — no, it cannot, be kept back. Good 
 schooling, or bad schooling, or no schooling at all, it 
 makes, where genius exists, absolutely no difference. 
 Genius cannot be suppressed. 
 
 To feel how true is this observation, one has but to 
 glance through the lives of the eminent men of the 
 world, past and present. The greatest divines, lawyers, 
 engineers, physicians, linguists, mathematicians, scien- 
 tists, poets, painters, merchants, whom the world has 
 ever seen, have risen, risen higher, still higher, in spite 
 of a load of obstruction, which they had constantly 
 to bear at the beginning — yes, and very frequently to 
 the very end, of their careers. But nothing — no, 
 nothing could stop them in their upward path. There 
 is not a profession or calling of any kind whatever 
 at which men, while labouring under all sorts of 
 disadvantages, have not become eminent. One has 
 but to glance through the pages of Smiles’ “ Self-Help ” 
 or any Encyclopedia of English Literature, Science, or 
 Art, to see numberless examples of this fact. How 
 many men have won for themselves honour and re- 
 spect, as mathematicians, linguists, naturalists, &c., 
 who learned all that made them famous by themselves, 
 unaided ; during the hours stolen from sleep or their 
 meals; their books, those borrowed from, or which 
 they were allowed to read, as a favour, at a poor 
 man’s bookstall ; their light the flickering street-lamp, 
 
86 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 or perhaps only the dim twilight coming in through the 
 railings of a prison-window ! Yes, men have risen 
 to the first rank of every profession, though with 
 nothing to help them, with everything against them — 
 everything but genius.* 
 
 * Thomas Edward, the Banff naturalist, is an instance of the force of 
 genius breaking through all barriers standing in the way of one’s beloved 
 studies. Edward was born in 1814, at Gosport, Portsmouth, where 
 his father, a private in the Fifeshire Militia, was stationed after re- 
 turning from the Peninsular War. The elder Edward, who was a 
 handloom weaver, subsequently settled in Aberdeen. Early in life 
 Thomas showed indications of a great love of animals, insects, and 
 creatures of every description. He made extensive excursions in 
 search of specimens, and many amusing anecdotes are told to illustrate 
 his extreme fondness for even the most repulsive subjects in the animal 
 creation. To his mother he was a source of constant trouble, for she 
 disliked many of the creatures with which the boy constantly came 
 home — in his pockets, in his cap, or concealed about his body. On one 
 occasion he took off his shirt to wrap a bee’s nest in it. Edward was 
 an unmanageable boy, with no love of books. He had been expelled 
 from three schools before he was six years old, partly on account of a 
 habit of playing truant, and partly because he alarmed his fellow- 
 scholars by bringing jackdaws, worms, and beetles into school with 
 him. Edward was sent to work at a tobacco-factory at the age of six, 
 and subsequently to Grandholm Wool Mill. He had there the oppor- 
 tunity to indulge to the full his love of natural objects. At eleven he 
 was apprenticed to a shoemaker, and at the age of eighteen he had 
 gone through many severe trials. He joined the militia, but his love 
 of insects proved fatal to his military ambition. When at drill one 
 day a butterfly fluttered past, and Edward, forgetting discipline, broke 
 from the ranks, pursued, and captured the insect. He was brought 
 back a prisoner, and subsequently discharged. In his twentieth year 
 Edward went to work as a shoemaker at Banff, and there he pursued 
 so successfully his researches in Natural History that he added a great 
 deal to the scientific store of knowledge. When he married, at twenty- 
 three, his wages were 9s. 6d. a "week, and he had to work till late all 
 the year round ; but he often spent nights in the fields and caves 
 searching for insects and strange flowers. For fifteen years Edward 
 carried on most of his researches by night, and he had many narrow 
 escapes through the eagerness with which he pursued his object. He 
 completed a splendid collection, and in 1846 exhibited it in Aberdeen. 
 
POSITION , ETC., OF SCHOOLS. 
 
 87 
 
 It was not, however, to geniuses I referred when I 
 said that it makes little or no difference where good, 
 clever, studious boys are educated, so far as their 
 ultimate success in life is concerned. I then referred 
 mentally only to boys of ordinary ability and industry. 
 These will get on, I believe, at any school where 
 there is thorough teaching, and sound, careful religious 
 and moral training, in this country or any other. 
 
 Sound religious training, industry, ability, and 
 thorough teaching are the great requisites for success. 
 Teach a well brought up boy carefully and soundly in 
 this country or any other, at home or at school, and he 
 will ultimately come to the front, if attentive and 
 diligent — come to the front, of course, I mean in pro- 
 portion to whatever ability and other self-helpful 
 qualities he may possess. It is not every one, it is 
 plain, who can attain the highest rank. One’s success 
 cannot but be in proportion to his talents and oppor- 
 tunities : 
 
 Non cuivis homini contingit adire Corinthum* 
 
 The exhibition was a failure, and he had to sell the collection for £ 20 
 to defray the expenses. He set to work to form another collection, 
 and was most successful. His researches add greatly to the know- 
 ledge of Natural History, as he embodied the new facts in papers written 
 to scientific magazines. In 1866 Edward was elected a member of 
 several leading scientific societies. Latterly he acted as curator of 
 Banff Museum. After the publication of his biography by Mr. Smiles, 
 Edward’s genius was publicly recognised by a presentation of £333 
 made to him in Aberdeen, and he was awarded by the Queen a pension 
 of ^50 a year. He died, after a long illness, on April 27, 1886. 
 
 For another instance of a man’s forcing his way upward, in spite of 
 all sorts of obstacles at the beginning of his career, see the letter from 
 Sir William McArthur, published in footnote, p. 61. 
 
 * Hor. Ep. I. xvii. 37. The Bishop of Peterborough, in distributing 
 the prizes at the School of Art in Peterborough on the 20th of last 
 March, said that “ work to be successful must be thorough and done 
 
88 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 But to the front every one sooner or later, more or 
 less, will come, in proportion to his zeal, industry, in- 
 tegrity, and ability, no matter where taught, whether 
 in this country or any other — if only well brought 
 up, well grounded in the beginning, and anxious to 
 succeed. 
 
 Countless is the number of those who, though no 
 geniuses, have arrived at high positions in every 
 department of life — men whose early education was 
 carried on, in some cases, at small, obscure schools ; 
 in others at no school at all. Many of our most dis- 
 tinguished Irishmen were educated by private tutors 
 or their fathers at their own homes. It is clearly not 
 the social status or endowment of a school that makes 
 the difference. A school may be very fashionable and 
 splendidly endowed, but yet very inferior as a place of 
 education : 
 
 “ All that glisters is not gold. 
 
 Gilded tombs do worms enfold.” * 
 
 Neither does it matter whether a school is situated 
 in this, that, or any other country. Given good 
 religious and moral training, sound teaching, and a 
 clever, industrious boy ; and the boy, humanly speak- 
 ing, will be sure to succeed — according to his merits. 
 
 upon wise and true lines. There was no royal road to art, any more 
 than there was to science or practical mechanics. He believed that 
 the great secret of success — supposing there was a certain amount 
 of aptitude — was in having a fixed purpose, a steady application, a high 
 aim, and careful thought for the purpose in which one was engaged. 
 The higher one raised his eyes, the higher his steps would rise. He 
 did not believe in genius without work ; but he did believe a great 
 deal in work where there was no genius.” 
 
 * Merchant of Venice, ii. 7. 
 
POSITION , ETC., OF SCHOOLS . 
 
 89 
 
 One has only to open his eyes and look at all the men 
 in his neighbourhood who are honourably earning by 
 means of their daily work enough to support their 
 families in respectability and comfort, affording them 
 most of the conveniences and some of the luxuries of 
 life, and ask himself where they were, each of them, 
 educated as boys. And he will find that they were 
 almost all educated somewhere or another in Ireland- 
 some in one school, some in another ; and some at 
 home, where they were taught either by their fathers 
 or by private tutors. 
 
 Now, if this is a fact — and I challenge the reader to 
 controvert it if he can — does it not prove almost to 
 demonstration my point, namely, that it really makes 
 little or no difference where a clever, hard-working 
 boy is educated, if only he be religiously brought up, 
 thoroughly well grounded in the elements of learning, 
 diligent, and fairly clever ? 
 
 It is, indeed, strange that of the Irishmen who were 
 educated, as boys, at schools in England, so very few 
 should have come to the front in any way. Their 
 failure must presumably arise from one or another, or 
 all, of these things : want of zeal and diligence ; or of 
 ability ; or of proper grounding in Mathematics and 
 Classics ; or of sound religious and moral training 
 when they were at school. It seems to me absurd 
 to attribute the failure of the large number of Irish 
 boys educated in England to any natural inferiority in 
 point of ability, industry, or zeal. We have, therefore, 
 plainly no choice left to us but to attribute it to some 
 radical defect in the English school system — a defect 
 especially injurious to the full development of their 
 Irish pupils’ minds and morals. 
 
9 ° 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 That English schoolboys are not generally well 
 taught is the conclusion — account for the fact that 
 they are not as one may — at which one must arrive 
 who contemplates (a) certain examination statistics — 
 see Chapter X. ; (/ 3 ) the facts stated in Chapters I., III., 
 IV., YI. ; and (7) the candid admissions of many vera- 
 cious and able boys and men, who spent — or rather mis- 
 spent, as they themselves assert — a considerable por- 
 tion of their boyhood at one or another of the English 
 schools, learning little or no Mathematics or Classics, 
 and not being properly looked after in regard to their re- 
 ligious and moral characters [Cf. Chaps. IX. (a) and XI.] 
 
 The Eev. James Maclvor, D.D., Eector of Ardstraw, 
 in this diocese, published in 1869 a pamphlet called 
 “ Some Papers on Intermediate Education in Ireland.” 
 The author’s principal object in publishing these papers 
 was to try to induce the Board of National Education 
 (Ireland) to introduce Classics as a subject into the 
 Irish National School course. 
 
 With the view of showing the great practical utility 
 of instruction in Classics to boys, no matter what their 
 position in life might be, Dr. Maclvor points to the 
 large number of educated men who, without money 
 or high-born connections to assist them, rose from 
 almost nothing into good positions by means of the 
 sound grounding in Classics and Mathematics, which 
 they received as boys in the parish of Ardstraw. 
 
 The account he gives of these self-made men is 
 most interesting ; for “ self-made ” one may fairly call 
 the very large majority of them. His list it is impos- 
 sible to read without feeling more and more assured 
 that, as I have been endeavouring to prove, it indeed 
 makes little or no difference where a boy is taught, 
 
POSITION , ETC ., OF SCHOOLS. 
 
 9i 
 
 whether at Eton or a small National School in Ireland, 
 if only, at one and the same time, he (a) have brains, 
 (/ 3 ) be diligent and anxious to succeed, (7) be soundly 
 grounded, and ($) be religiously brought up. 
 
 The following passages from the pamphlet in ques- 
 tion (pp. 17, 18, 19, and 33) will be found especially 
 instructive, and this no less from the point of view in 
 which I regard the facts stated therein than from Dr. 
 Maclvor’s, with whose conclusions, I may add, I 
 thoroughly agree : — 
 
 “In some other countries,” writes Dr. Maclvor, 
 “schooling is a leisure or an accomplishment — an 
 aesthetic appendix of one’s line of life. Here it was 
 itself a line of life — a recognised mode in which those 
 who had capacity set it before them to earn their 
 livelihood. To one son a man gave his farm or shop, 
 or tried to get for him a commission ; to another, or to 
 all the rest, if they had brains, he gave ‘ education.' 
 If they could not carry on the pace, and actually reach 
 the profession — if, in fact, they turned out ‘ weeds ’ — 
 they could, at all events, become philomaths in turn, 
 or ‘ Irish tutors ’ — a race more known and used than 
 much admired, either on the stage or off it, for cen- 
 turies in Europe. . . . But the number of those who 
 did not turn out ‘ weeds/ but made good their way into 
 a profession, would probably astonish many an English- 
 man. I may instance my own parish — a large moun- 
 tain district, of few or no resident gentry ; of a shrewd, 
 manly population of small farmers and sturdy cottiers, 
 and of no resources except agriculture, emigration, and 
 the school. When I had occasion, ten years ago, to 
 advocate this measure in print, I hazarded the state- 
 ment that no less than sixty natives of it had reached 
 
92 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 the professions in the generation preceding the Board’s 
 work. But when it was necessary, last year, to fight 
 more sharply, and to quote chapter and verse for all 
 one said, I made more careful inquiries and wrote 
 down the names ; whereupon our list speedily grew 
 to 160, 260, 360. The actual list sent in to the 
 Board contained 387 ; and twenty new names arrived 
 before the Board had given its decision. Since then 
 I have heard of many others, and have no doubt but 
 that exhaustive inquiries would raise our list to 600 
 or more. Yet there is no educational endowment in 
 the parish, nor any reason why its people should 
 excel — and probably they do not excel — those of the 
 districts around. If, instead of taking the long, 
 straggling parish, I had taken an equal number of 
 square miles around my own house, we should have a 
 much larger list and twice the number of distinguished 
 names. 
 
 “ Take a second instance from the other extremity 
 of the island. I received it the other day from an 
 eminent Roman Catholic Prelate, and venture to 
 read it in his own words : — ‘ There can be no doubt 
 that the union of Classics with English would be 
 most useful, and is much required. Porty years 
 ago many of our youth knew Greek better than 
 English/ This is the Irish chimera. Now for its 
 practical side. The Bishop goes on : — ‘ In addition 
 to the interesting facts you mention, I can say 
 that the assistant - classical teacher whom I have 
 now teaching in the room below me had a school 
 in a thatched cabin in the village of Ardfert for 
 about thirty years. During that time he gave a 
 classical education to about 250 young men, who 
 
POSITION , ETC., OF SCHOOLS. 
 
 93 
 
 are now priests on the home and foreign missions, 
 besides a considerable number who are in the medi- 
 cal and other professions. Of the many who passed 
 through this school, he tells me that not more than 
 six or seven remained at the plough — a proof that 
 classical education is the upperward path. One day, 
 as I stood with this old man on St. Brandon’s Hill 
 at Ardfert, and looked on a large plain around, 
 dotted with good farmhouses, ‘ See/ said he, ‘ I have 
 taken a priest out of every brick chimney within 
 your view/ This man’s name is Pierce ; he is an 
 A-B. of Trinity College, Dublin/ 
 
 “ The third list represents, in part , the fruit of 
 this old-fashioned instruction : a list, namely, of those 
 natives of the parish who, since the year 1800, 
 have actually reached the professions. And we say, 
 ( in part ; ’ for our list is most incomplete : more 
 careful inquiries, we are satisfied, would increase it 
 twenty-five per cent, or more. 
 
 “ It contains, however, between three and four hundred 
 names , and many of these, the Board will observe, 
 not only reached the professions, but attained to 
 some eminence therein. Our Clerical List contains 
 a Dean of Maynooth and several Protestant Eectors ; 
 our Medical List includes three who have won the 
 honours of knighthood. And all this, we add, not 
 without some pride, is from a parish whose only 
 resources are agricultural, whose resident gentry are 
 few or none, and where the average size of the farms 
 is under twenty acres of but middling land — of land 
 reclaimed with difficulty from rock, or bog, or moun- 
 tain.” 
 
 “ But surely the manners and accent of the men 
 
94 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 who sprang thus, as may be said, from nothing, and 
 have been educated in this homely, imperfect way, 
 must be very bad,” some one may say. There are 
 no reasons whatever why they should be, in the first 
 place ; and then, in the second, in point of fact, they 
 are not. Some of the men referred to by Dr. Maclvor 
 have as good manners and accent as any one could 
 desire. However, even if one grant, for argument's 
 sake, that there is some truth in the remark, does 
 it matter much ? If a man's education is such that, 
 in spite of certain defects in his manners, and in 
 spite of even an “ Irish brogue,” he can, nevertheless, 
 attain fame, and fortune, and respect by honourable 
 industry, we may surely well overlook — the world 
 certainly will — minor defects of manner and accent — 
 defects that have clearly not militated against his 
 high character, happiness, and success. 
 
 The parent who sees his son respected and, with 
 unblemished reputation, rising gradually in the social 
 scale, steadily achieving, by honest effort, in Burns' 
 stimulating words, 
 
 “ Tlie glorious privilege 
 Of being independent/’ 
 
 may reasonably feel proud of him ; ay, even though 
 he may speak with an Irish accent, and fall far short 
 of manners and address such as a Lord Chesterfield 
 would approved 
 
 Of men famous in the history and literature of our 
 country the following were educated either at private 
 
 * People, by the way, are by no means agreed, it would seem, as to 
 what actually constitutes good manners. When Lord Chesterfield" s 
 Letters to his son were published, Dr. Johnson declared, ‘‘They 
 teach the morals of a , and the manners of a dancing-master.” 
 
POSITION , ETC., OF SCHOOLS. 95 
 
 schools or at home. I take the names from Sydney 
 Smith’s Essay on “ Public Schools.” * 
 
 Spenser, Pope, Shakespeare, Butler, Rochester, 
 Spratt, Parnell, Garth, Congreve, Gay, Swift, Thomson, 
 Shenstone, Akenside, Goldsmith, Samuel Johnson, 
 Beaumont and Fletcher, Ben Jonson, Sir Philip 
 Sidney, Savage, Arbuthnot, and Burns among the 
 poets ; Sir Isaac Newton, Maclaurin, Wallis, 'Flamr 
 steed, Saunderson, Simpson, and Napier, among men 
 of science; Clarendon, Hume, and Robertson, “the 
 three best historians that the English language has 
 produced.” “ Public schools have done little in Eng- 
 land for the fine arts, as in the examples of Inigo 
 Jones, Vanbrugh, Reynolds, Gainsborough, Garrick, 
 &c. Harvey, Cheselden, Hunter, Jenner, Meade, 
 Brown, and Cullen, among the great medical writers 
 and discoverers ; Bacon, Shaftesbury, Hobbes, Berkeley, 
 Butler, Hartley, and Dugald Stewart, among the great 
 writers on morals and metaphysics ; Dr. Priestley, Dr. 
 Black, and Mr. Davy, “the greatest discoverers in 
 chemistry ; ” the Duke of Marlborough, Lord Peter- 
 borough, General Wolfe, and Lord Clive, “the only 
 Englishmen who have evinced a remarkable genius in 
 modern times for the art of war;” Lord Coke, Sir 
 Matthew Hale, Lord Chancellor Hardwicke, and Chief 
 Justice Holt, among the lawyers; Lord Burleigh, 
 Walsingliam, the Earl of Stafford, Thurloe, Cromwell, 
 Hampden, Lord Clarendon, Sir Walter Raleigh, Sydney, 
 Russell, Sir W. Temple, Lord Somers, Burke, Sheridan, 
 Pitt, among statesmen ; Cudworth, Chillingworth, 
 Tillotson, Archbishop King, Selden, Conyers Middle- 
 ton, Bentley, Sir Thomas More, Cardinal Wolsey, 
 
 * Contributed to the Edinburgh Review in 1810. 
 
96 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 Bishops Sherlock and Wilkins, Jeremy Taylor, Isaac 
 Hooker, Bishops Usher, Stillingfleet, and Spelman, 
 Dr. Samuel Clarke, Bishop Hoadley, and Dr. Lardner, 
 among scholars and men of letters. “ Nor must it be 
 forgotten/' continues the writer, “ in this examination, 
 that none of the conspicuous writers upon political 
 economy which this country has as yet produced, have 
 been brought up in public schools." .... “ In by 
 
 far the greatest number of cases, we cannot think 
 public schools favourable to the cultivation of know- 
 ledge, and we have equally strong doubts if they be 
 so to the cultivation of morals." * 
 
 Those who desire to know something about the 
 education of the “men of our time," ought to read 
 the book bearing this title, brought out by Boutledge 
 & Co. This book will show them that many English- 
 men “ of light and leading ” amongst our contempo- 
 raries were educated either at home or at private 
 schools. 
 
 * So Sydney Smith. Like him, Dr. Arnold (and what more com- 
 petent authority could there be?) would have hesitated to recom- 
 mend the sending of a boy to an English public school, personally 
 interested though he was in the good name and prosperity of these 
 establishments. In 1840 — by which time he had been already twelve 
 years at Rugby — he writes thus [Stanley’s “Life of Dr. Arnold,” vol. ii. 
 p. 199] : — “ I have many delightful proofs that those who have been 
 here, have found at any rate no such evil as to prevent their serving 
 God in after life ; and some, I trust, have derived good from Rugby. 
 But the evil is great and abounding, I well know ; and it is very fearful 
 to think that it may be to some irreparable ruin.” “It is very start- 
 ling,” he wrote two years previously, “ to see so much of sin combined 
 with so little of sorrow.” . . . “Amongst the poor,” he adds, . . . 
 “ poverty, sickness, and old age are mighty tamers and chastisers. But 
 with boys of the richer classes one sees nothing but plenty, health, 
 and youth ; and these are really awful to behold, when one must feel 
 that they are unblessed.” [Vol. ii. p. 1 2 1 . ] 
 
POSITION , ETC., OF SCHOOLS . 
 
 97 
 
 Almost all Scotchmen, it need scarcely be said, 
 are educated in their own country.* 
 
 If I am right in my contention — and facts would 
 certainly seem to show that I am — that it really 
 makes no difference where a hoy is educated, if only 
 his religious principles and morals be carefully attended 
 to and his grounding sound and thorough, then it is 
 clearly judicious for the Irish parent to send his 
 son to an Irish in place of to an English school. 
 In the first place, by his so doing his sons will, as 
 facts make clear, gain in the matter of sound religious 
 and moral, Classical and Mathematical, training: in the 
 second, the saving in money on their education will be 
 very considerable : in the third, he will have the satis- 
 faction of reflecting that what money he does thus 
 spend on them, will be spent in his own country — and 
 that the better off one’s country is, the better off is 
 one’s self : and, lastly, he will probably, as I shall 
 presently point out, secure for them a happier boyhood.t 
 
 * The following delightful reply I received from Dr. D. J. Cunning- 
 ham, Professor of Anatomy and Surgery, T.C.D., in answer to my 
 query where was he educated : — “ Being a Scotchman, I was educated 
 in Scotland.” 
 
 f "Who that has read many biographies has not been struck by the 
 number of great Englishmen who never looked back but with pain 
 upon their schooldays ? 
 
 G 
 
( 98 ) 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE WRITER'S PERSONAL KNOWLEDGE OF IRISH 
 BOYS WHO WERE AT ENGLISH SCHOOLS , WITH 
 SPECIAL REFERENCE TO (a) THEIR CLASSICAL AND 
 MATHEMATICAL ATTAINMENTS ; (/3) THEIR RELI- 
 GIOUS AND MORAL CHARACTERS , WITH THE 
 OPINIONS OF SOME ENGLISH AUTHORS ON THIS 
 SUBJECT ; ( 7 ) THEIR MANNERS. 
 
 (a) Their Mathematical and Classical Attainments. 
 
 I have had from time to time under my charge in all 
 some fifty Irish boys who had been, previously to 
 coming to me, at English schools ; and truth obliges 
 me to say that of the attainments of these boys, for 
 their age, I was forced to form a low opinion generally. 
 As a rule, they knew, for their age, little or no Mathe- 
 matics, little or no Greek, and merely the ordinary 
 schoolboy modicum of the Bible, Latin, English, and 
 French. 
 
 Should it be asked, as it lately was in the columns 
 of a Dublin journal, “ Are there many Irish boys wdio, 
 having learnt little or nothing at some English school, 
 have been removed therefrom on this account by their 
 parents or guardians, and sent, as a forlorn hope, to 
 some school in their own country, there to acquire, at 
 almost the eleventh hour, by dint of careful teaching, 
 
THE WRITER'S PERSONAL EXPERIENCES. 99 
 
 knowledge enough to enable them to pass some easy 
 examination ? ” I would unhesitatingly answer, Yes, 
 many ; and these, too, boys from every kind of Eng- 
 lish grammar-school, from the most fashionable and 
 aristocratic of the great public schools to the ephe- 
 meral private school, which is every now and again in 
 the market in the agent's hands. 
 
 “ How is it ascertained,” it may be asked, “ that 
 these boys have learnt little or nothing at their Eng- 
 lish schools ? ” It is their parents or guardians them- 
 selves who say so ; and subsequent events invariably 
 prove the correctness of their judgment in this 
 respect. # 
 
 * In the chapter of his “ Prseterita 99 [George Allen] recently issued 
 under the title of “Christ Church Choir” (pp. 361-362), Mr. Ruskin 
 records his recollections of Christ Church, Oxford. It was an institu- 
 tion of this College that the best weekly essay of the undergraduates on 
 some brief Latin text should be read aloud in hall on Saturday after- 
 noon. Mr. Ruslan’ s on one occasion was adjudged the best ; and he 
 describes here how he was received after reading it by his “cousins of 
 the long table.” 
 
 “ Not in envy, truly, but in fiery disdain, varied in expression through 
 every form and manner of English language, from the Olympian sar- 
 casm of Charteris to the level-delivered volley of Grimston, they ex- 
 plained to me that I had committed grossest lese-majeste against the 
 order of gentlemen- comm oners ; that no gentleman-commoner’s essay 
 ought ever to contain more than twelve lines, with four words in each ; 
 and that even indulging to my folly, and conceit, and want of savoir 
 faire , the impropriety of writing an essay with any meaning in it, like 
 vulgar students — the thoughtlessness and audacity of writing one that 
 would take at least a quarter of an hour to read, and then reading it 
 all, might for this once be forgiven to such a greenhorn, but that 
 Coventry wasn’t the word for the place I should be sent to if ever I 
 did such a thing again. . . . Perhaps my essays really diminished in 
 value, or perhaps even the tutors had enough of them. All I know is, 
 I was never asked again to edify the Saturday’s congregation.” 
 
 The lads thus humorously, but no doubt quite truthfully referred 
 to were, taking them as a body, the grown-up boys of the English 
 schools of the first rank. The idle college man was in his time the 
 
IOO 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 “ But are there not many Irish boys removed from 
 one Irish school and sent to another under similar 
 circumstances ? ” No, hardly any; at least so far as 
 my own personal experience enables me to form an 
 opinion on the subject; and this is my fortieth half- 
 year as a schoolmaster. 
 
 “ Circumstances,” writes Dr. Cruise (President this 
 year of the King and Queen's College of Physicians), 
 “ which are of no interest to detail here, led me some 
 years ago to commit the mistake of sending my three 
 eldest sons to English Colleges. I have mended that 
 error long ago, and extract from it the consolation of 
 knowing that I never could have realised how great my 
 error was had I not made it. Mine is not an isolated 
 case. I know several instances where parents have 
 removed their boys from English to Irish Colleges, 
 and were thoroughly satisfied with the result." * 
 
 Dr. Cruise’s experience in this matter is by no 
 means unique. If all parents who have gone through 
 the same ordeal w T ere equally candid, and could only 
 be induced to publish in a book their experiences, with 
 circumstantial details, what an instructive and in- 
 teresting volume it would be ! 
 
 A boy was removed, some five years ago, from an 
 Irish school and sent to an English one, the fees of 
 which were nearly twice as high. He was a decidedly 
 promising boy. His father used at first gravely to 
 tell his friends how his son had “a marble basin- 
 stand ” in his English school, and how at dinner there 
 
 idle schoolboy. To what reflecting Irish parent, who is really anxious 
 about his son’s best interests, can the glimpse of English University 
 life thus given to us by Mr. Buskin be particularly reassuring ? 
 
 * “ Letters on the Selection of a College for the Education of Irish 
 Boys” (to the Freemans Journal). M. H. Gill & Son, Dublin, 1883. 
 
ENGLISH SCHOOL MORALITY . 
 
 IOI 
 
 were napkins for the boys. The white marble basin- 
 stands, though, were what especially seemed to gratify 
 him. The boy is now nearly nineteen. He wishes 
 to go to Oxford ; but, alas ! his knowledge of Greek 
 is nil. He was not asked to learn Greek in the school 
 with the white marble basin-stands. His knowledge 
 of Latin and of Mathematics is scarcely that of the 
 Junior Grade Intermediate boy in Ireland. The case 
 is by no means an uncommon one. His father never 
 speaks now of basin-stands or napkins. 
 
 ( f $) Their Eeligious and Moral Characters. 
 
 In regard to the moral characters of the boys who 
 have come from English schools to this of which I am 
 now the head-master, or who went to the Monaghan 
 Diocesan School while I was there, my opinion is that 
 they were in general far more disposed to break 
 bounds, to smoke, and to do other forbidden things, 
 than the boys who came to me from any schools in 
 Ireland. 
 
 Those who sincerely desire to have some insight 
 into the evils of an English school ought to read, with 
 mind unprejudiced, “ Eric, or Little by Little,” by the 
 Yen. Archdeacon Earrar (A. & C. Black, Edinburgh), 
 and reflect, as they do so, that its author must have 
 been thoroughly acquainted with the subject of his 
 book — his knowledge of English schools and school- 
 boys being, even at the time he published it, by no 
 means inconsiderable. What an ordeal has the English 
 schoolboy to go through ! How few do — how few can, 
 go through it unscathed ! 
 
 The following extracts (see pp. 104-106) from the 
 
102 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 above-mentioned book will give some slight insight 
 into what this ordeal is. 
 
 “ Abominable passages ! ” some one on reading them 
 may exclaim. “ Abominable, 1 ” indeed, I repeat ; but 
 it was not the author of this essay, be it remembered, 
 w’ho wrote them. 
 
 “Eric, or Little by Little,” was written by one who 
 was in his time an assistant-master at Harrow, and 
 subsequently, head-master of Marlborough College. 
 It was written too, apparently, for boys no less than 
 for their parents. It was written, in fact, for the 
 public at large, there being no restriction of any kind 
 put upon the title-page or in the preface as to the class 
 of persons who are to read it. Furthermore, Eoslyn, the 
 school described, is just the typical English Grammar 
 School. “ Typical English Grammar School,” I say, 
 for we are bound to regard the school described in 
 “Eric” in this light. * 
 
 Archdeacon Farrar has written other books about 
 English school life. He has written, for instance, 
 “ St. Winifred’s, or the World of School.” In this 
 book, too, there is much to disquiet one. One house, 
 we are told, is, term after term, in the hands of 
 precociously bad big boys, and worse than worthless 
 monitors. These boys, monitors, and all, subscribe their 
 pocket-money for cards, tobacco, “ false keys to get out 
 after lock up,” brandy, suppers, and the like — suppers, 
 “ the scenes of drinking, gluttony, secret fear, endless 
 squabbles, and joyless excitement” (pp. 373, 391). 
 
 * One school only Archdeacon Farrar tells us it is not. “The 
 scenery, indeed,” he tells us, “with which it (Roslyn) is surrounded 
 may be recognised by many ; but I hope that such readers will let their 
 discovery end there. If not, they will be doing great injustice to a 
 school of which,” &c. &c. ( Preface to First Edition.) 
 
 1 
 
 
ENGLISH SCHOOL MORALITY. 
 
 103 
 
 And all this iniquity without a pause, for two or three 
 years at a time, unreproved by a monitor, undiscovered 
 by a master. 
 
 All the books that I have read about English 
 schools were written by Englishmen, who were in their 
 time English schoolboys, and some of them English 
 masters. 
 
 If English schools are condemned, then, they are 
 condemned out of the mouth of Englishmen — and who 
 better judges than Englishmen of the merits of Eng- 
 lish schools ? Irishmen rarely see anything blame- 
 worthy in these establishments. Some Irishmen, in- 
 deed, actually resent as a personal affront any depre- 
 ciatory comments made about these schools by a fellow 
 countryman. To thoughtful Englishmen, however, 
 English schools, how blind soever to their faults and 
 defects we in Ireland may be, appear, as we shall pre- 
 sently see, aught but perfect in regard of the morals, 
 diet, teaching, or manners of the boys. 
 
 What could exceed the virtuous indignation of 
 Cowper against the schools of his own country ! He 
 was for eight years at Westminster School. “ They 
 are become,” he writes, now just a hundred years ago, 
 in his preface to “ Tirocinium,” “ a nuisance, a pest, 
 an abomination ; and it is fit that the eyes and noses 
 of mankind should, if possible, be opened to perceive 
 it.” Hard words these, indeed ! Except, however, so 
 far as the advance of civilisation may possibly have 
 improved it, has the tone of morality in English 
 schools, let us ask ourselves, really changed for the 
 better since Cowper’s time ? If so, what proofs of 
 such improvement can be adduced ? That English 
 schools have not altered much, if at all, for the better, 
 
104 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 so far as purity is concerned, within the last hundred 
 years there are only too many reasons to fear. Mr. 
 Lyttelton’s pamphlet, referred to on pp. 113, 114, 
 represents them in exceedingly gloomy colours. So, 
 too, does the fact that the adults of England certainly 
 do not appear to have improved in their morality since 
 the beginning of the century ; and the morals of the 
 men of the present generation clearly indicate the kind 
 of moral training they received as boys at school. 
 
 The following are the passages from “ Eric ” referred 
 to ; I copy from the tenth edition : — 
 
 I. 
 
 “ Eric found the life of the ‘ boarders’ room ’ far 
 rougher than he had expected. Work was out of the 
 question there, except during the hours of preparation, 
 and the long dark winter evenings were often dull 
 enough. Sometimes, indeed, they would all join in 
 some regular indoor boys 5 game, like ‘ baste the bear ’ 
 or ‘ high-cockolorum ; ’ or they would have amusing 
 ‘ghost-hunts,’ as they called them, after some dressed- 
 up boy among the dark corridors and staircases. This 
 was good enough fun, but at other times they got 
 tired of games, and could not get them up, and then 
 numbers of boys felt the idle time hang heavy on 
 their hands. When this was the case, some of the 
 worst sort, as might have been expected, would fill up 
 their leisure with bullying or mischief ” (Part I. chap, 
 viii. p. 80). 
 
 II. 
 
 “ It was an ill day for General Wildney when he 
 sent his idolised little son to Eoslyn ; it was an ill 
 
ENGLISH SCHOOL MORALITY. 105 
 
 day for Eric when Duncan first asked the child to 
 frequent their study.” * 
 
 “ It was past nine at night, and the lower school 
 had gone to bed, but there was Wildney quietly sitting 
 on Eric’s knee by the study-fire, while Duncan was 
 doing Arnold’s verses for him, to be shown up next day. 
 
 “ ‘ Bother these verses,’ said Duncan. ‘ I shall have 
 a whiff. Do you mind, Eric ? ’ 
 
 “ ‘ No ; not at all.’ 
 
 “ ‘ Give me a weed, too,’ said Wildney. 
 
 “ ‘ What ! young ’un, you don’t mean to say you 
 smoke ? ’ asked Eric, in surprise. 
 
 “ ‘ Don’t I, though ? let me show you. Why, a 
 whole lot of us went and smoked two or three pipes 
 by Riverbend only yesterday.’ 
 
 “ ‘ Phew ! ’ said Eric ; ‘ then I suppose I must smoke 
 to keep you in countenance ; ’ and he took a cigar. It 
 was the first time he had touched one since the day at 
 the Stack. The remembrance made him gloomy and 
 silent. ‘ Tempora mutantur,’ thought he, ‘ nos et 
 mutamur in illis ’” (Part II. chap. ii. p. 213). 
 
 “Ill day for General Wildney,” indeed! Ill day 
 for Eric ! Ill day for Duncan ! Ill day for every 
 boy at Rosyln school, and at all other schools of the 
 kind ! Ill day for all parents, as well as for General 
 Wildney, when they first send to such schools their 
 idolised sons ! And the denunciation of these schools 
 comes, be it again observed, from an English source, 
 even from the sometime assistant-master, the sometime 
 head-master, of an English public school. Will Irish 
 parents never take the warning given to them by 
 Archdeacon Farrar in this book ? 
 
 * “The child” is described (p. 212) as “a very bright, engaging, 
 spirited boy.” 
 
io6 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 III. 
 
 “ A little pebble struck the study window. 
 
 “ ‘ Hurrah ! ’ said Wildney, clapping his hands, 
 ‘ here’s the grub.’ 
 
 “ They opened the window and looked out. Billy 
 was there, and they let down to him a long piece of 
 cord, to which he attached a basket, and, after bidding 
 them ‘ Good night, and a merry drink/ retired. . . . 
 
 “ Meanwhile the boys had opened the basket, and 
 spread its contents on the table. They were bread, 
 butter, a large dish of sausages, a tart, beer, and alas ! 
 a bottle of brandy” (Part II. chap. v. p. 263). 
 
 IV. 
 
 “ As usual, the cribbing at the next weekly exami- 
 nation was well-nigh universal, and when Mr. Gordon 
 went out to fetch something he had forgotten, merely 
 saying, 4 1 trust to your honour not to abuse my 
 absence/ books and papers were immediately pulled 
 out with the coolest and most unblushing indifference ” 
 (Part II. chap. vi. pp. 270, 271). 
 
 Of this we may feel sure, that Archdeacon Farrar, 
 whatever he has done, has not exaggerated the immorali- 
 ties that disgrace schools of the Roslyn type. And yet 
 these are the very schools in which Irish boys will be 
 found in the greatest abundance. There are a great 
 number of schools of the Roslyn class in England. 
 
 We cannot suppose that one who was for five years 
 
ENGLISH SCHOOL MORALITY. 
 
 107 
 
 head-master of Marlborough College, and who had been 
 previously an assistant-master at Harrow, who is now 
 Eector of St. Margaret’s, Archdeacon of Westminster, 
 Chaplain in Ordinary to the Queen, &c., could have 
 kept in constant circulation this history of English 
 school-life, if it were not in his opinion a true history. 
 We cannot suppose Archdeacon Farrar guilty of circula- 
 ting this book as a mere sensational novelette. Indeed, 
 he himself claims for his book, in the preface to the first 
 edition, “ the merit of truthfulness.” 
 
 “ In all humility,” he writes in this preface, “ I claim 
 for the story a higher merit than that of style — the 
 merit of truthfulness. If the pictures here painted are 
 not always such as it would have been most pleasant 
 to contemplate, they owe the darker shades of their 
 colouring not to fancy, but to life. To the best of my 
 belief, the things here dealt with are not theories, 
 but realities ; not imaginations, but facts.” We must 
 believe that he was convinced of the truth of this 
 fearful history when he published it in 1857, and that 
 he is now, too, convinced of its truth, as he has not 
 withdrawn it or altered its general tone in any way 
 since he first published it twenty-nine years ago. The 
 book is now in its twenty-second edition. # 
 
 * “ I have not thought it right,” writes Archdeacon Farrar in his 
 preface to the nineteenth edition of “ Eric ” (December 1880), “ to alter 
 in any way the structure of the narrative, but I have so far revised it 
 as to remove a few of the minor blemishes.” This edition of “ Eric ” 
 I have only just seen. I only met with it subsequently to my writing 
 the matter in the text. In regard to the second passage from “ Eric ” 
 which I have quoted, I observe that three words occur in it in the 
 first eighteen editions of the work, which are omitted in the nineteenth 
 and subsequent editions. What these words are the curious reader can, 
 if so disposed, find out for himself. Why, one can hardly help wonder- 
 ing, were these words thus designedly omitted in the nineteenth edition ? 
 
io8 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 Wliat a sad history of a promising boy — falling ; 
 polluted ; polluting ; temptations, and sins of every 
 kind; hardship, illness, death! “Dead, dead ere his 
 prime ! ” Such is the sum and substance of Erics 
 career. 
 
 What a different story might there not have been 
 to tell of the poor lad had he been sent to an Irish 
 instead of to an English grammar-school ! 
 
 In Irish grammar-schools the masters — this is the 
 rule — perform the supervision duty themselves instead 
 of deputing it to boys. In few Irish grammar-schools, 
 therefore, could the vile scenes enacted so long at 
 Roslyn have systematically taken place, thanks entirely 
 to the Irish method of honest, honourable supervision 
 of the boys during their after-school hours — a duty 
 which masters in Irish schools deem it one of their 
 highest privileges, one of their most serious responsi- 
 bilities to perform efficiently. 
 
 And “Eric Williams,' ” let us remember, was no bad 
 or ill-conditioned boy by nature. On the contrary, he 
 was a most promising boy. “ Eew could look at the 
 boy’s bright blue eyes and noble face,” his biographer 
 
 In the extract from the preface to this edition which I have just quoted 
 the author informs us that he has only “ so far revised it (the narrative) 
 as to remove a few of the minor blemishes.” For my part, I cannot 
 admit that, so far as mere style is concerned, the words in question 
 were a blemish of any kind, major or minor ; and Archdeacon Farrar 
 certainly suggests that he has made no alteration except in regard to 
 style. Does he regard them as too prurient, too awfully suggestive, too 
 significant of the prevalence of vice of the most odious kind in Rosyln 
 and such-like schools of England? Archdeacon Farrar’s peculiarly 
 deliberate omission of the words, after their appearing in eighteen 
 editions, is assuredly calculated to make one tremblingly fear, that his 
 reason for so advisedly omitting them was not merely because he 
 regarded their appearance as one of the “minor blemishes” of the 
 book. 
 
ENGLISH SCHOOL MORALITY. 
 
 log 
 
 tells us (p. 80), “ without taking a deep interest in 
 him” Again (p. 381), “Eric, even in his worst days, 
 was, as I well remember, a lovable and noble boy, . . . 
 something unspeakably winning and irresistibly attrac- 
 tive about him;” and more to the same effect. Such was 
 the little boy who, fresh and innocent, was sent to this 
 English school, and kept there, his deterioration being 
 gradual, and perhaps, therefore, not very perceptible 
 to his friends at home, for years and years of his short 
 life — kept there to his ruin. What a word to have to 
 apply to the effect that his school experiences had on 
 him ! But the word, alas ! is strictly appropriate. He 
 was simply ruined at his English school, as many a 
 noble Irish boy has been before him, and, doubtless, 
 will continue to be, so long as the present habit of 
 sending boys to schools like Boslyn continues. 
 
 We may well suppose that, if the English school 
 system had undergone, in the authors opinion, any 
 change for the better during the interval that has 
 elapsed since the first publication of the book, twenty- 
 nine years ago, he would not have failed to have 
 noticed it in a preface to the latest (the twenty-second) 
 edition, if not in a preface to some earlier one. But 
 no such notification has been made. We must, there- 
 fore, feel that Archdeacon Farrar holds now the same 
 opinion in regard to English schools like Boslyn which 
 he held in 1857; an( l what a low opinion that is, he 
 does not leave us in any doubt. But no other opinion, 
 indeed, could he hold; for no amelioration in the 
 moral tone of English schools has taken place since 
 Archdeacon Farrar first wrote “Eric.”* 
 
 * Dr. Clement Dukes, Physician to Rugby School, in his book “ The 
 Preservation of Health,” p. 147, calmly takes it for granted that the 
 
I IO 
 
 ENGLISH VERSUS IRISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 Nor have we any reason to expect that the moral 
 tone of English schools should be better now than it 
 was when Cowper wrote his “ Tirocinium,” or Arch- 
 deacon Farrar his “ Eric.” The system pursued in 
 these schools is the same now as it was at the dates 
 referred to — the system mainly consisting of the 
 leaving of boys to prefects, and themselves, and their 
 own devices, without any supervision, for a consider- 
 able portion of every twenty-four hours. From the 
 same tree it would be absurd to expect a different 
 kind of fruit this year from that which it bore last 
 year, and the year before, and the year before that 
 again. 
 
 Furthermore, it is not easy to believe that there 
 would be such an enormous demand for “ Eric,” and 
 for “Tom Brown’s Schooldays,” if these books described 
 things that do not, could not, take place. 
 
 Whatever objects Archdeacon Farrar had in publish- 
 ing his account of Roslyn school, with one at least 
 we must credit him — the desire to do good. His only 
 object, he himself tells us in the preface to the fourth 
 edition, was “the vivid inculcation of inward purity 
 and moral strength, by the history of a boy who, in 
 spite of the inherent nobleness of his disposition, falls 
 into all folly and wickedness, until he has learnt to 
 seek help from above.” This lesson, alas ! poor Eric 
 
 moral tone of society is no better now than it was a huudred years ago. 
 His words are : — “ But it will be said, if this virtue of continence be 
 simply one of education, why is it that in these days, when, if anything, 
 the young are over-educated, it is as little practised as it was a century 
 ago, when education was so much more neglected?” Dr. Dukes’ 
 answer to the question is this : — “ Because the education which takes 
 place is far more intellectual than moral ; and intellectual education — 
 when vice does arise — rather tends, as is shown in history, to increase 
 the heinousness of all immorality and crime.” 
 
ENGLISH SCHOOL MORALITY. 
 
 in 
 
 did not learn in time to save himself from those vices 
 and follies which brought him to an early grave, by 
 which time he had helped to corrupt, both by precept 
 and example, many a Eoslyn school-boy. 
 
 Archdeacon Farrar obviously did not desire to 
 describe a school such as is seldom or never to be met 
 with. What would be the good of describing such a 
 school as that ? He evidently meant to describe the 
 trials, difficulties, troubles, and dangers of the ordinary 
 commonplace English school, and to warn boys against 
 these ; to show how a boy through yielding to tempta- 
 tions commonly to be met with would be sure to fall, 
 like Eric, “ little by little.” The author wished, appa- 
 rently, his book to serve as a warning to Irish and all 
 other parents of the evil results following the no- 
 supervision system of the ordinary English Grammar 
 school. 
 
 Let Irish parents keep in mind that the things 
 dwelt on in this book are, in its authors own words 
 “not theories, but realities; not imaginations, but 
 facts ; ” that the only merit he claims for his story 
 is “ the merit of truthfulness.” 
 
 What a thorough condemnation of the English 
 school system is “ Eric ! ” — a condemnation, too, pro- 
 nounced by an Englishman, well known and much 
 respected, and intimately acquainted with the inner 
 working of English schools ! No one, indeed, could 
 write more authoritatively on English schools than the 
 author of this book. 
 
 If an Irishman in Ireland had written this book, 
 he would have been sure to have been accused of 
 prejudice against England, ignorance of his subject, 
 and so forth. But an Englishman is not similarly 
 
1 12 
 
 ENGLISH VERSUS IRISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 open to these charges. What Archdeacon Farrar 
 writes concerning the disastrous results of the English 
 school system may be unquestionably regarded as 
 worthy of all credit. 
 
 It certainly will not be Archdeacon Farrar’s fault 
 if Irish parents continue to send their sons to be 
 ruined “ little by little ” to schools of the Roslyn type 
 — that is, to the ordinary Grammar or Intermediate 
 School of England 
 
 The moral of “ Eric,” or at least part of its moral, 
 is only too obvious : it is plainly this : — All you 
 upper and middle-class parents of Ireland who love 
 your children, hearken — listen to the solemn warn- 
 ings of an experienced Englishman. The morality of 
 English schools is at a very low ebb. There is no 
 supervision duty in them, or next to none. The 
 boys are left almost entirely to their honour ; and 
 their honour, alas ! is often dishonour ; light with 
 them is often darkness, darkness light. Boys, as 
 you may have learned from another experienced 
 Englishman, the author of “ Tom Brown’s School- 
 days,” may be roasted nearly to death, and drinking 
 may go on among these boys (left thus “ to their 
 honour ”) to an alarming extent, and the masters 
 know nothing about it. Think, my friends, of the 
 gradual “ little by little,” sad fall of this bright young 
 boy, Eric Williams — as bright and promising a little 
 fellow as there could be, at the time he first went, to 
 his bane, to Roslyn School. And Roslyn School is no 
 worse, remember, than hundreds of other Intermediate 
 schools in England. As for unfortunate Eric Williams, 
 he was, if not above, certainly not below the average 
 English schoolboy in point of promise. Yet how he 
 
ENGLISH SCHOOL MORALITY . 
 
 ii 3 
 
 went from bad to worse, “ little by little ” — falling, 
 ever falling, while at school ! And how many Erics 
 are there at these schools ? Take heed, therefore, all 
 Irish parents. Whatever you do with your sons, do 
 not send them to schools in England like Roslyn — 
 and such schools there abound — unless at least you are 
 prepared to see them falling like Eric, and like hun- 
 dreds of other boys, before and since ; corrupting and 
 being corrupted, “ by slow degrees, by more and more.” 
 
 Three years ago the Hon. Edward Lyttelton, an 
 assistant-master at Eton, was shocked by the dreadful 
 amount of vice which, his experience assured him, 
 prevailed at English schools ; so much shocked that 
 he determined to make a great effort, cost what it 
 would, to reduce it. He thought carefully over the 
 matter with himself ; conversed with others about it. 
 More he consulted by means of letters ; and at last 
 he resolved to publish his views on the painful 
 subject. 
 
 Mr. Lyttelton’s pamphlet (“ Causes and Prevention 
 of Immorality in Schools”) is full of interest to any 
 one interested in the question discussed.^ “ A public 
 schoolmaster, to whom he submitted the original draught 
 of his essay, wrote to him about it some thoughtful re- 
 marks, which were ultimately published by him in an 
 appendix to his work. “ My experience tells me,” writes 
 this schoolmaster, “ that certainly as many as five boys 
 out of six — probably nine out of ten — who enter 
 public schools from preparatory schools have know- 
 ledge of evil beforehand, and that in no vague way.” 
 In what a condition, in respect of morality, the English 
 
 * Ifc can be procured at the Office of the Moral Reform Union, 2 
 Leinster Place, Porchester Terrace, W. 
 
 H 
 
1 14 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 public schools must be, will become manifest to the 
 reader who reflects on the foregoing statement. [For 
 other quotations from this pamphlet, see pp. 1 69, 1 70.] 
 
 Owing to the Entrance Examination system which 
 prevails so extensively in England, nearly all the boys 
 who go to English public schools have been previously 
 at some preparatory school or another. 
 
 What loving Irish parent, who truly reverences his 
 sons, would like to send them to an English school, 
 whether preparatory or otherwise, if this English 
 public schoolmaster’s opinion, which I have just 
 quoted, be correct ? The opinion quoted is endorsed 
 by many other schoolmasters, medical doctors, and 
 others conversant with English school-life. 
 
 The following passage to the same effect is from 
 the same pamphlet: — “ Sir W. Jenner would rate the 
 number of boys” (who indulge in vice) “at 80 per 
 cent., if asked to form an estimate.” Sir W. Jenner’s 
 reference is, of course, to boys in England : he is con- 
 sulting physician to the University College Hospital 
 (London). The opinion upon this subject which he 
 formed a quarter of a century ago he still retains. 
 
 Thus Dr. Pusey : — “ In all cases I have known of 
 evil against the Seventh Commandment, it has begun 
 either at the first school or the second, at about eight 
 or twelve years of age.” And again : “ The first thing 
 which showed me its extent was, that one at a public 
 school, with whom I remonstrated about it, said that 
 all the boys in the school ” — well, were guilty of a 
 vile, immoral practice [extracts from same pamphlet]. 
 
 Some Englishmen say that in regard to morality 
 English schools have much improved within the last 
 half-century. Others, however, take a very different 
 
ENGLISH SCHOOL MORALITY. 115 
 
 view, and assert that the English schools of the pre- 
 sent day are as bad, in point of morality, as ever they 
 were at the worst of times. That they are in any- 
 thing but a satisfactory condition in this respect there 
 are only too many reasons for believing, 
 
 I have just opened a volume of the late Lord O’Neill’s 
 Sermons* in which there is a brief “Memoir ” of the 
 author by the Yen. Archdeacon Hamilton. Lord 
 O’Neill went as a boy from Foyle College (where he 
 was for six years, from 1823 to 1829) to one of the 
 great public schools in England for a short time. 
 The school in question was probably no worse, at the 
 time, than any other public school in England : it may 
 have been even better than any of them. What it 
 was at the time Lord O’Neill went to it will be seen 
 from the following passage in the Memoir referred to : — 
 “From Foyle College he was sent to the then cele- 
 brated school of Dr. Butler at Shrewsbury. Of the 
 character he maintained there I can give no better 
 description than that written from memory by his 
 cousin, William Hart, a distinguished Indian civilian, 
 who had also been with him at Foyle College. 
 Writing to one of the family on Lord O’Neill’s death, 
 after describing generally the low moral tone of the 
 schoolboys, he says, ‘One of them (Lord O’Neill) was by 
 far the most steadfastly high- principled, and in every 
 way admirable boy I ever met — a boy of wonderful 
 courage and fortitude, both moral and physical, which 
 I had more opportunities than perhaps any one now 
 living of seeing tested by severe trials, and who went 
 unspotted through what was little better than a hotbed 
 of falsehood and all sorts of vice ’ ” (p. xii.). 
 
 * Published by Kegan Paul, Trench, & Co., 1885. 
 
u6 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 Much has been written, in connection with certain 
 trials which took place last year, about the moral 
 character of “ London society.” When one reflects 
 calmly on the subject, can he feel that the moral tone 
 of London society is anything approaching what it 
 ought to be ? — that there is no ground whatever for 
 the allegation made by one journal some few years ago, 
 “ that the degradation of the moral tone of society ” 
 (in England) “ is no imaginary or exaggerated assertion, 
 but a proven fact ” ? The Englishman “ of the world ” 
 is but the grown-up English schoolboy. There is no 
 better test of the morals of a school than the conduct 
 of its boys, old and young, past and present. 
 
 The Purity Societies, which are springing up now 
 everywhere throughout England, prove that, in the 
 opinion of very many good, wise, and able Englishmen, 
 these Societies are sorely needed to assist in keeping 
 virtue from being, as they avowedly think her in danger 
 of being, absolutely dethroned in that country. 
 
 If proof were wanted that the tone of morality in 
 Irish is far higher than it is in English schools, one 
 might mention the fact that the tone of morality 
 among adults in Ireland is far higher than among 
 adults in England— as a glance at the reports of the 
 divorce cases, the illegitimacy statistics of the two 
 countries, and the like, makes clear. Seldom or never 
 does an Irishman, educated exclusively in Ireland, 
 figure on account of his immorality in any cause 
 cttebre* 
 
 “ The child is father of the man.” t The moral man 
 
 * “ The Irishman is certainly cleaner than his English . . . equal,” 
 writes Mr. Mahaffy, v. i. p. 254, in the Commissioners ’ School Report (1881). 
 Cf. footnote, p. 122. + Wordsworth — “My heart leaps up,” &c. 
 
ENGLISH SCHOOL MORALITY . 117 
 
 has generally been a moral boy. No man finds it so 
 easy to keep his passions in proper subjection as he 
 who did so all the time he was a boy at school. Let 
 loose reins be but given to one’s worst passions when 
 he is a boy, and it will be found a fearfully difficult 
 thing to draw in the reins and tighten them when the 
 age of manhood comes. The most moral men there 
 are are men who have kept themselves pure from the 
 beginning. Most men who are addicted to excesses 
 of any kind were addicted to excesses also when boys. 
 The passions that are early stimulated are unnaturally 
 stimulated ; and passions that a boy unnaturally stimu- 
 lates are usually his curse and bane when he grows up 
 to man’s estate, and, as too frequently happens, never 
 cease to be so. Hence the all-importance of one’s 
 being brought up in the purest possible moral atmos- 
 phere during the impressionable years of boyhood. 
 Habit is, indeed, a second nature : 
 
 Quo semel est imbuta recens servabit odorem 
 Testa diu.* 
 
 Hence the all-importance of selecting for one’s son a 
 school in which — whatever else it may be deficient in 
 — there is a good moral tone among the boys. In 
 comparison with a boy’s religious and moral character 
 all else fades into absolute insignificance. 
 
 It is always the good boy who is most diligent. It 
 is always the good and diligent boy who is the most 
 successful. It is always the good and diligent and 
 successful boy who is the happiest and whose prospects 
 are the brightest. 
 
 At all hazards then, at any sacrifice — yes, even 
 * Hor. Ep. i. 2, 67. 
 
IIS 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 though a so-called English accent has to be sacrificed 
 for it, let Irish parents refuse to send their sons to 
 schools in which the most competent English authori- 
 ties assert the moral tone is low. 
 
 The leading men who compose what is known as 
 “ Society ” in London were, the large majority of them, 
 educated at English schools. What the moral tone 
 of this “ Society ” is, requires but little comment. 
 Notoriously ill-living men are amongst its conspicuous 
 ornaments. A member of this “ Society ” may be as 
 immoral as immoral can be, and yet be most popular, 
 and, apparently, even respected by the rest. There 
 must be no scandal, no breach of the peace — that is 
 all. A scandal is what “ Society ” in England cannot 
 endure. Adultery and fornication are borne with, 
 good-naturedly tolerated, acquiesced in. But a row of 
 any sort is intolerable, unendurable.* 
 
 * “ It has often occurred to me that Society in London, or that par- 
 ticular section of Society which is the brightest, the most diverting, and 
 which makes itself most heard of, resembles an Agapemone. The 
 relations existing between the blithe and joyous persons of whom this 
 household consists may be the most curious imaginable. Husbands and 
 wives may all be a little mixed ; but then, though there is fusion, there 
 is no confusion. They understand each other so well. They have 
 tacitly agreed to enjoy themselves according to their own taste. 1 Fay 
 ce que voudras ’ is their motto. There was a time when the upshot of 
 it all would have been elopements, duels, the breaking*up of homes, 
 and Heaven only knows what else. That sort of thing is sneered at 
 by Society to-day as obsolete, melodramatic, childish. The dominating 
 idea is not the cultivation of virtue, but the prevention of scandal. 
 Every one, Society argues, has a clear interest in suppressing anything 
 which might lead to social disturbance. Externally, therefore, the 
 proprieties must be respected. No handle must be given which the 
 profane vulgar may seize upon to Society’s detriment. If things wrong 
 in themselves are to be done, in Heaven’s name let them be done 
 quietly and decently. If the world will talk, let the lie direct be given 
 to its base assertions and rumours by presenting to the public a front 
 
ENGLISH SCHOOL MORALITY . 
 
 “9 
 
 A writer in the last April number of the Vanguard , 
 commenting, in the leading article, on a recent cause 
 cilzbre , gravely remarks : — “ The glimpses we get of 
 everyday life in which the respondent and those who 
 surrounded her moved, affords a sad indication that 
 the tone of public opinion in such an orbit as she 
 traveled is lamentably low. This leads us to fear 
 that many of our wealthy and high-born wives and 
 maidens must be in constant peril.” * 
 
 Oan the public opinion formed at their schools by 
 the sons of ill-conditioned parents be reasonably 
 expected to be particularly pure, remarkably exalted ? 
 
 Irish parents, who contemplate sending your sons 
 to English schools, think, and think, and think again, 
 whether “ the game is worth the candle ; ” whether an 
 English accent of some sort and the polished English 
 msnners, supposed by some to be acquired by all Irish 
 boys who go to English schools, may not be acquired 
 at the cost of pure morality and sound teaching ; and 
 
 of social decorum and unity. . . . Offences will come, but woe unto him 
 or her by whom they come ; and Society regards as, in some sort, an 
 enemy and a traitor to itself, the man or woman who puts it openly to 
 the blush. Let all things by all means be done decently and in due 
 order, that is Society’s motto ; and those who do not obey it are held 
 to have introduced a foe into the camp.” 
 
 The foregoing paragraph is from “Society in London (pp. 54, 55), by 
 a Foreign Resident” [Chatto & Windus], ninth edition, 1886. 
 
 It is scarcely necessary to say that “ Society ” and the schools of 
 England act and react on each other. The school system leads to a 
 low tone of morality in men : the low tone of morality in men induces 
 them to regard with more or less indifference a low tone of morality in 
 schools ; while sons, of course, inherit their fathers’ propensities. The 
 men of whom Society is composed are but the natural outcome of the 
 English school system. This outcome, in respect of morality, cannot 
 appear to any thoughtful Irish parent particularly admirable. 
 
 * The Vanguard is “the monthly organ of the Church of England 
 Purity Society.” 
 
120 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 whether, should this be so, these advantages may not 
 be acquired at too dear a price. 
 
 God grant that Irish school morality may ever re- 
 tain its present undoubted excellence ! Brains one 
 cannot give his son, nor industry, nor enthusiasm. 
 But we might all, surely, try to secure for our children 
 a thoroughly sound, religious, and moral education. 
 Irish parents who send their sons to schools of the 
 Boslyn class, so graphically described by Archdeacon 
 Farrar, or to schools of the kind described by the author 
 of “Tom Brown s Schooldays” (pp. 207, 2 1 7, 2 19, 225, 
 226), or to the English preparatory schools in wlich, 
 according to a public schoolmaster, as stated on p. : 1 3, 
 “ probably nine out of ten boys have knowledge of 
 evil, and that in no vague way,” have assuredly e\ery 
 reason to strongly suspect that a good religious and 
 moral education their sons are by no means likely to 
 receive in any of these schools. 
 
 An Irish gentleman removed two of his sons lately 
 from one of the most prosperous and popular of Eng- 
 lish schools, one of the two boys suffering at the tine 
 from that disease the contracting of which the Con- 
 tagious Diseases Act (Men) was designed to prevent. 
 Some other boys at the school, the stricken lad assured 
 his father — and his story may well be believed — were 
 suffering from the same awful disorder. 
 
 “ What a terrible statement to make ! ” some one 
 may exclaim. “ What a terrible state of things to 
 justify such a statement !” is rather what one ought 
 to exclaim. For the fact that justifies the statement, 
 I, be it noted, am not responsible. My informant is 
 a gentleman in a high social position in this country, 
 and his word I cannot doubt. “ But why repeat the 
 
ENGLISH SCHOOL MORALITY . 
 
 1 2 1 
 
 story ? ” I repeat it to try and strengthen my case, 
 which is, that the Irish parent who sends his son to 
 an English school like the one now referred to, runs 
 the risk of injuring — humanly speaking, past repair — 
 his moral character, and possibly even, as in this case, 
 his physical health. Believing as I do, and that most 
 sincerely, in the goodness of my cause, I feel bound 
 not to allow myself to be tempted by any suggestions 
 of false shame or absurd prudery into leaving anything, 
 consistently with truth, unsaid, that would be likely 
 in any way to induce those to whom my essay is 
 dedicated to pause, and ponder, and pause again, before 
 placing their sons — and so jeopardising at once their 
 moral, and their intellectual, and their physical faculties 
 — at any English school wherein the supervision of the 
 boys is not properly attended to during their after- 
 school hours. 
 
 It may be fairly said that, though I have, no doubt, 
 shown that there must be a good deal of immorality 
 in English schools, I have produced no evidence to 
 show that Irish schools are at all superior in this re- 
 spect. To prove that they are would be impossible, 
 there being no statistics to refer to. But this much 
 I can say with a clear conscience : once only have I 
 heard of any scandal, resting on any evidence — good 
 or bad — connected with Irish schools, conducted on 
 Irish educational principles in regard to supervision, 
 &c., during the twenty years that I have been a school- 
 master. Nor, except in the case referred to, has any 
 Irish schoolmaster — and I reckon many of them among 
 my intimate friends, and am, officially, acquainted with 
 many more of them, having been once the Secretary 
 and Treasurer, and subsequently the President, of the 
 
122 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 Schoolmasters’ Association — ever given me to under- 
 stand, even by a hint, that impurity was one of the 
 prevailing juvenile vices against which, so far as he 
 was a judge, Irish schoolmasters had specially to 
 contend. How many scandals connected with English 
 schools — now with this one, now with that — have 
 been whisperingly circulated during the last twenty 
 years ! * 
 
 (7.) Their Physical Health. 
 
 The boys who have been from time to time placed 
 under my charge, having been previously at English 
 schools, have certainly never been in any respect 
 physically superior to those of my pupils who came to 
 me direct from their homes or from other Irish schools. 
 As cricketers, football-players, gymnasts, &c., they 
 have never particularly shone — and I can recall now 
 the appearance and characters of some fifty of them. 
 No doubt the First XI.s and First XV.s in large 
 English schools are far superior to the First XI.s and 
 First XV.s in small Irish ones. How could it be 
 otherwise ? Similarly, the First XI.s and First XY.s 
 in large Irish schools are of course, superior to the 
 First XI.s and First XY.s in small Irish schools. 
 In effect, in whatever schools there are most boys to 
 select from, in these the XI.s and XY.s will be 
 naturally the best. But given two schools, an English 
 and an Irish one, of the same size, that the Irish boys 
 will be physically well able to hold their own with 
 
 * “ Gross offences against morality are very rare in almost all the 
 Irish schools and cause but little difficulty to the masters.” So writes 
 Mr. Mahaffy in the recent Endowed Schools (Ireland) Commissioners' 
 Report , p. 254; and who will accuse Mr. Mahaffy of any prejudice in 
 favour of Irish Schools? Cf. footnote *, p. 116. 
 
THE WRITER'S PERSONAL EXPERIENCES. 123 
 
 those of the English school we have no reason what- 
 ever to doubt. [Cf. footnote, p. 3 1 9.] 
 
 In regard to the diet of the boys in English schools, 
 one hears very little in praise of it, but a good deal, 
 every now and again, in dispraise of it — of its in- 
 sufficiency, its sameness, and its quality. 
 
 Witness the occasional letters addressed to news- 
 paper Editors by some much-enduring English parent 
 — the irksomeness attending, and the unpleasantness 
 sometimes consequent on, the writing of such letters 
 notwithstanding. Witness, too, the following testi- 
 mony — I quote it from Colonel Chichester’s Schools :■ — 
 
 “ Even in the matter of food there was at Eton 
 much to amend. . . . ‘ Practically it comes to this, that 
 not only do little boys eat mutton five days a week, 
 but it must be shoulders of mutton ? ’ — ‘ Yes, and fat 
 ends of the loin. Many a little boy has got up at 
 seven, and, what with fagging and his duties of con- 
 struing and so on, has not got his breakfast till ten.’ 
 [Rev. C. K. Paul, answers to queries 5775 and 5784, 
 Pub. Schools Com., 1 864.] Boys enter as early as seven 
 years of age.” 
 
 I was assured some short time ago by one who had 
 been for six years a pupil at one of the leading public 
 schools in England, and who was well acquainted with 
 the menage of the principal Irish Grammar Schools, 
 that the diet in the latter was decidedly superior to 
 that in the English school at which he had been so 
 long a pupil — at once superior in quality and variety 
 and more comfortably served. In the English school 
 with which he was so well acquainted the boys, he 
 said, but seldom, for example, got for their dinner a 
 sufficiency of good fresh vegetables, or gravy of any kind. 
 
124 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 And yet the fees paid in most Irish schools are 
 scarcely one-fifth of the fees of that particular English 
 school on the diet of which my correspondent reflected. 
 The truth is, Irish schoolmasters dare not, even if 
 they would, be indifferent about the diet of their 
 pupils : they are too well looked after by the parents 
 and guardians of their pupils to admit of carelessness or 
 excessive economy in regard to so vitally important an 
 element in the education of their boys as their food. 
 They would not have a boy left with them — such is 
 the present popularity of schools in England — if the 
 parents and guardians of their pupils were not fully 
 satisfied in their own minds that their diet was in all 
 respects perfectly satisfactory. 
 
 (8.) Their Manners. 
 
 In regard to the manners of the Irish boys who 
 came to me from English schools, there was nothing 
 whatever remarkable about them. Some of them, just 
 like some of my other pupils, struck me as having 
 pleasing manners, some as having the reverse. 
 
 Sydney Smith’s opinion of the manners of the 
 English public schoolboy is not high ; and he certainly 
 ought to be a good judge upon this point, being him- 
 self an old Winchester boy, and moving always in 
 good society. Being an Englishman, too, we must 
 suppose him impartial. Were he alive now, it may 
 be asked, would his opinion of the manners of the 
 English public schoolboy be better than it was in 
 1 8 i o ? In his essay on “ Public Schools,” already 
 referred to, p. 95, he writes: — “This system,” i.e ., the 
 English public school system, “ gives to the elder 
 boys an absurd and pernicious opinion of their own 
 
THE WRITER'S PERSONAL EXPERIENCES. 125 
 
 importance, which is often with difficulty effaced by a 
 considerable commerce with the world. The head of a 
 public school is generally a very conceited young man, 
 utterly ignorant of his own dimensions, and losing all 
 that habit of conciliation towards others, and that 
 anxiety for self-improvement, which results from the 
 natural modesty of youth. Nor is this conceit very 
 easily and speedily gotten rid of ; we have seen (if we 
 mistake not) public school importance lasting through 
 the half of after-life, strutting in lawn, swelling in 
 ermine, and displaying itself, both ridiculously and 
 offensively, in the haunts and business of bearded 
 men. . . . If, by a knowledge of the world, is meant 
 a knowledge of the forms and manners which are 
 found to be the most pleasing and useful in the world, 
 a boy from a public school is almost always extremely 
 deficient in these particulars ; and his sister, who has 
 remained at home at the apron-strings of her mother, 
 is very much his superior in the science of manners.” 
 
 I do not, however, think that a boy’s manners are 
 ever much affected by the school he is at. A boy’s 
 manners, no matter where he may be at school, are 
 usually exceedingly like those of his parents, from 
 whom he inherits so many faculties and traits of all 
 kinds, and in whose company he usually spends from 
 thirteen to fifteen weeks’ vacation every year : — 
 
 Fortes creantur fortibus et bonis : 
 
 Est in juvencis , est in equis patrum 
 Virtus ; nec imbellem feroces 
 Progenerant aquilce columbam .* 
 
 * Hor. Od. iv. 4, 29. 
 
 Brave are the children of the brave and good ; 
 
 In steers, in steeds, their sires’ own spirits move ; 
 
 Nor do fierce eagles nourish in their brood 
 
 The unwarlike dove. 
 
126 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 The parents who send their sons to Irish grammar- 
 schools belong, as a rule, to our educated middle 
 classes ; and Irish schoolboys accordingly, as a rule, 
 are well-mannered and polite ; and naturally so, seeing 
 that they are the sons of gentle and well-educated 
 parents. If, indeed, Irish schoolboys were, as some 
 of their detractors, who know nothing about them, 
 groundlessly allege, generally disposed to be rough and 
 rude, how is it that our Irish clergymen, barristers, 
 physicians and surgeons, engineers, Fellows and Pro- 
 fessors, &c., are not also generally rough and rude ? 
 And this they certainly are not. How strange that 
 they are not, if Irish schoolboys, as a rule, are, seeing 
 that these clergymen, barristers, doctors, &c., were 
 themselves nearly all in their time Irish schoolboys, 
 and are now, to speak generally, but Irish school- 
 boys grown to man’s estate ! * 
 
 There are few more ridiculous assumptions than 
 that Irish schoolboys are rude and rough. Indeed, 
 it is worse than ridiculous, for the consequences that 
 flow from the spreading and maintaining of it are so 
 pregnant with mischief. Why should Irish boys be 
 such ? If they are, what then of their fathers and 
 their mothers and their sisters ? Are these also rude 
 and rough ? If they are not, how then account for 
 the alleged fact, that their young kinsfolk are, the 
 
 * The Irish middle-class gentleman, it may be observed, is not in 
 the least like the typical Irish gentleman that the English play-writer 
 loves to represent, or rather to misrepresent, to us on the stage. He 
 is no more like him than is the English gentleman of the present-day 
 stage, who slaps his friends on the back, smokes and wears his hat in 
 the drawing-room, and is inflicted with an obnoxious mother-in-law 
 and a suspicious, suspected wife, in the least like the English gentle- 
 man of real life. 
 
THE WRITER'S PERSONAL EXPERIENCES. 12 7 
 
 boys who frequent our Irish schools ? The allegation 
 is utterly without foundation ; it is a falsehood, that 
 shrinks positively into absolute nothingness the moment 
 it is looked at with the eye of truth. 
 
 Are we, indeed, in cold blood to admit that our 
 children cannot grow up nicely-mannered unless sent 
 for their education to England ? Why, would not 
 such an admission be manifestly tantamount to con- 
 demning as bad the manners of the thousands of Irish 
 ladies and gentlemen, old and young, who were never, 
 or only for a few days or weeks at a time, out of Ire- 
 land in their lives ? Facts of which we are all cog- 
 nisant, facts to which we cannot close our eyes, 
 prohibit, of course, an admission that is reducible to 
 so palpable an absurdity. 
 
 “ But, generally speaking, it must be admitted,” 
 some one may say, “that schoolboys in England are 
 more mannerly than schoolboys in Ireland.” There are 
 schools and schools. In some schools in England, no 
 doubt, the boys are more “ mannerly ” than in some 
 schools in Ireland — this I am prepared to grant. But 
 then, on the other hand, the boys in some schools in 
 Ireland are, it must also be admitted, more mannerly 
 than those in some schools in England. Thus, the 
 admission on the one side may be regarded as fully 
 equivalent to that on the other. All depends on the 
 kind of school, be it in England or Ireland, one chooses 
 to send his sons to. There are plenty of schools in 
 England at which the manners of the boys are, like 
 their morals, exceedingly indifferent. 
 
 And this is certain : the manners of the professional 
 and business men and country gentlemen of England 
 are, ceteris paribus , not superior to those of the home- 
 
128 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 educated professional and business men and country 
 gentlemen of Ireland. Must not this seem strange to 
 him who would fain persuade you that the schoolboys 
 in the former country are, in the mass, superior in 
 deportment and manners to those in the latter ? 
 
 And then in regard to the lower orders of the people 
 in the two countries, who that is well acquainted 
 with the artisan and labouring classes, and small 
 farmers of Ireland and England respectively, has not 
 been struck with the immense superiority, in point of 
 courtesy, of the former to the latter ? The members 
 of these classes are in Ireland naturally polite. Is it 
 possible that the members of the middle classes in 
 Ireland are naturally rude ? The question is too 
 absurd to require a serious answer. But if they are 
 not, why so much nonsensical talk about the propriety 
 of sending our sons to a people not naturally more 
 polite than our own, with the design that they may, by 
 associating with them, learn to be polite ? 
 
 “ But must it not be, of necessity, a great advantage 
 to an Irish boy, so far as his manners are concerned, 
 to meet and associate with the hundreds of young 
 English gentlemen he is sure to meet with in any of 
 the good English schools ? ” 
 
 This depends very much upon circumstances. Some 
 boys may be improved by such association ; some 
 may not. To a nervous, timid boy, whether Irish or 
 English, I can imagine nothing less calculated to give 
 charm of manner than constant intercourse with a 
 hundred or two hundred English schoolboys, seeing that 
 it is one of the chief characteristics of English schools 
 (may we never grudge it to them !) that during their 
 play-hours the boys are left without any supervision, 
 
THE WRITER'S PERSONAL EXPERIENCES . 129 
 
 and can do then, consequently, pretty much as they 
 like. What boys, so neglected, do like is certainly 
 not always what is right, courteous, or humane. 
 
 It will be remembered how Dr. Johnson replied to 
 a gentleman who told him that he was sending his 
 son to an English public school in the hope of curing 
 him of shyness. “ Sir,” he exclaimed, “ this is a pre- 
 posterous expedient for removing his infirmity; such 
 a disposition should be cultivated in the shade. Placing 
 him at a public school is forcing an owl upon the day.” 
 Somewhat to the same effect writes Archdeacon 
 Farrar in “St. Winifred’s,” p. 32 : “Seeing that Eden 
 was naturally a shrinking and a timid lad, his guardian 
 had urged that he should be sent to St. Winifred’s, with 
 some vague notion of making a man of him. He 
 might as well have thrown a piece of Brussels lace 
 into the fire with the intention of changing it into 
 open ironwork.” 
 
 It cannot be expected that, if the boys in the 
 English school at which the Irish boy is placed, are, 
 the majority of them, the sons of exceedingly common- 
 place parents, the Irish boy will be much improved in 
 manners by associating with them, 
 
 “ But one’s sons will meet with none but gentlemen 
 at a good English school.” Such exclusiveness, I 
 reply, for schoolboys is neither desirable, nor, even if 
 desirable, attainable. Vulgar as well as well-bred 
 Englishmen have sons to educate, and money, too, 
 wherewith to pay for their education. What a dire 
 blow, indeed, it would be to the prosperity of English 
 schools, if all the boys who are not “ gentlemen ” were 
 to be suddenly withdrawn therefrom ! 
 
 One thing is certain — be the cause of it what it may 
 
 1 
 
IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 13 ° 
 
 — the Irish boys who have been from time to time 
 placed under my charge, having been previously at 
 school in England, have not been, as a body, superior 
 in point of manner or address — while they have been 
 in many instances inferior — to those who came to me 
 either direct from their own homes or from other Irish 
 schools. 
 
 And, after all, why should it be necessary for us 
 to send our children to English schools in order to 
 learn good manners ? ” “ Good-breeding/’ as Lord 
 
 Chesterfield himself observes, “ is the result of much 
 good sense, some good - nature, and a little self- 
 denial.” Surely “ good sense, some good-nature, and a 
 little self-denial ” can be learned by one’s children in 
 their own country. Hard, indeed, would be the lot of 
 Irishmen, truly strange their case, if these grand com- 
 ponents of good manners could not be acquired by their 
 children, unless sent in quest of them to England.* 
 
 And — in spite of the marble basin-stands and dinner 
 napkins, referred to at p. ioo — are we really justified 
 in assuming that the attention paid, in even expensive 
 English schools, to the decencies and amenities of life, 
 
 * Swift’s definition of good-manners would evidently correspond with 
 Chesterfield’s. “Pride, ill-nature, and want of sense,” writes the Dean, 
 “ are the three great sources of ill manners : without some one of these 
 defects, no man will behave himself ill for want of experience, or what, 
 in the language of fools, is called knowing the world.” 
 
 And thus Goldsmith : “Politeness is the result of good sense and 
 good-nature. A person possessed of those qualities, though he had 
 never seen a court, is truly agreeable ; and if without them, would 
 continue a clown, though he had been all his life a gentleman usher.” 
 
 And Addison not dissimilarly : “ If a man has common sense and 
 something friendly in his behaviour, it conciliates men’s minds more 
 than the brightest parts without this disposition.” Is there any lack 
 of Irishmen with “ common sense and something friendly in their 
 behaviour ” — Irishmen who were educated exclusively in Ireland ? 
 
THE WRITER'S PERSONAL EXPERIENCES. 131 
 
 is exemplary ? Not so, according to Mr. Mahaffy. 
 Witness the passage from the Irish Endowed Schools 
 Commissioners' Report (written by him), quoted on p. 
 3 1 1. Witness, too, the following passage from the 
 same report (p. 259), written by the same authority : — 
 “ The English schools are not wanting in some of the 
 faults noticeable in this country. The great day 
 schools are by no means as clean and tidy as might 
 be expected from the habits of the nation, and a 
 considerable reform in this direction would make them 
 much more cheerful and wholesome for the inmates. 
 A dusty atmosphere cannot possibly be a very healthy 
 one, and the problem of keeping schoolroom floors 
 clean and schoolroom furniture neat, has not been 
 solved by these schools” (of England).* 
 
 * I have said, p. 129, that what boys who are unsupervised by a 
 master like, is not always right, courteous, or humane. The following 
 excerpt from Mr. Pycroft’s Oxford Memories (vol. i. p. 2) would seem 
 to corroborate that opinion— would not what Mr. Pycroft has written 
 of the fagging at Eton fifty years ago apply always to the fagging 
 system wherever it exists ? — “ As the fate of the fag depended on the 
 character of his senior, naturally his usage was as bad as might be ex- 
 pected from the rough training this petty tyrant, while yet a fag, had 
 himself received. Cruelty begat cruelty, and few would believe the 
 misery which in those days any poor, weak and nervous boy has been 
 known to endure. . . . Some boys I knew who were as unfitted for so 
 hard a life as a consumptive patient is for the frozen regions.” 
 
( 132 ) 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 TESTIMONY OF ENGLISH EDUCATIONISTS AS TO THE 
 
 POSITIVE INEFFICIENCY OF ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 The following excerpts are from “ Payne’s Lectures on 
 the Science and Art of Education” (pp. 296-302).* 
 It is only on English schools and schoolboys that Mr. 
 Payne in these passages reflects, as both the references 
 that occur in them and the context itself clearly show. 
 His opinion of English schools as places of education 
 is, as will be observed, exceedingly low. Being him- 
 self an Englishman, and having made a special study 
 of the subject on which he writes, Mr. Payne may be 
 safely trusted as a competent, credible witness in all 
 matters relating to English schools and school-boys. 
 
 “ ( 1 .) The youths examined,” writes Mr. Payne, “ for 
 the Civil Service are the products of the ordinary 
 teaching of middle-class schools plus the cramming by 
 wdiich it is supplemented, in view of a competitive 
 examination. We find Sir John Shaw Lefevre, an 
 examiner of such candidates, complaining bitterly, in 
 1861, of their incredible failures in Orthography, their 
 miserable Writing, their ignorance of Arithmetic, and 
 remarking, ‘ It is comparatively rare to find a candidate 
 
 * Edited in 1880 by his son Dr. J. F. Pa} r ne, M.D., Fellow of Mag- 
 dalen College, Oxford [Longmans, Green, & Co.] Dr. Payne does not 
 appear to think that secondary education in England has improved 
 since the date of his father’s Lectures. 
 
TESTIMONY OF ENGLISH EDUCATIONISTS. 133 
 
 who can add correctly a moderately long column of 
 figures. 5 Only a short time back, it was reported that 
 out of 1972 candidates who in the course of four 
 years failed in the examination, 1866 were rejected 
 for bad spelling ; and in the last Report of the Civil 
 Service Commissioners, we see that out of 11,424 
 candidates, nearly if not quite all middle-class pupils, 
 5696 failed to pass the examination. 
 
 “ (2.) At the first local examination under the 
 Oxford scheme, 50 per cent, of the candidates failed 
 in the simple preliminary examination, all being picked 
 pupils expressly prepared for the competition. The 
 proportion of failures has, I believe, since settled 
 down to something less than one-third. [The ‘ plucked 5 
 candidates referred to in this paragraph clearly did 
 not come from Irish schools.] 
 
 “(3.) In 1869, a petition was presented to the 
 House of Commons by the Council of Medical Educa- 
 tion, complaining that ‘ the maintenance of a sufficient 
 medical education is very difficult, owing to the defec- 
 tive education given in the middle-class schools. 5 At 
 the same time, a similar petition was presented by the 
 Bristol Medical Association — a body numbering 4000 
 members ; and another by the University of London, 
 which stated that their examiners had been obliged 
 for the previous ten years to reject 40 per cent. — since 
 1869, even 5 5 per cent. — of the candidates sent up for 
 matriculation from middle-class schools. 
 
 “ (4.) Not a month ago, the report of the examina- 
 tion in Arts of the Apothecaries 5 Society showed that 
 at their recent examination nearly 40 per cent, of 
 the candidates sent up were rejected. The candidates 
 in this case were of the average age of seventeen, and 
 
134 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 most of them had probably been submitted to strenuous 
 cramming, to prepare them for the examination. This 
 consisted of very easy pieces of Latin, taken from a 
 book announced three months before; of short and 
 easy pieces of English for re-translation ; of a similar 
 paper in French ; of a few elementary questions in 
 Latin and French grammar; of a paper on the first 
 and second books of Euclid, without problems or 
 exercises ; of a paper on Arithmetic to decimals, and 
 one on Algebra to simple equations — all matters which 
 form the staple of instruction in middle-class schools. 
 A writer in the Pall Mall Gazette , May i, 1880, 
 comments on this examination : — ‘ It is not a little 
 startling that of the pupils of the upper ranks of 
 the schools at the age of seventeen, and after special 
 training for the purpose, nearly one-half are found 
 to have spent their lives thus far in a vain attempt 
 to acquire the first elements of languages and figures. 
 If this were a special and solitary case, it would 
 be surprising as a phenomenon, but we learn that it 
 is something very like the rule. The experience of 
 the examiners at the College of Surgeons ’ [in Eng- 
 land] ‘ is of a nearly equally discouraging character ; ’ 
 and he adds, ‘ It will not, we believe, be doubted 
 that such a percentage of rejections of young men 
 specially trained for the examination of this simple 
 kind is far from creditable, and betokens serious un- 
 soundness in our educational system.’ If, however, 
 we have any doubts on this point, they may be dis- 
 pelled by reference to the voluminous report of the 
 Schools Inquiry Commission” [England]. “Failure! 
 failure ! is the clear verdict they pass on the average 
 results of the teaching both in endowed and private 
 
TESTIMONY OF ENGLISH EDUCATIONISTS. 135 
 
 middle-class schools. As to the former, the general 
 Report, after quoting in detail numerous instances, thus 
 sums up its judgment: — ‘ The foregoing account shows 
 that the instruction given in the endowed schools 9 
 [England] ‘ is very far removed from what their 
 founders could have anticipated, or from what the 
 country has a right to expect. The districts assigned 
 to our Assistant Commissioners ’ [England] ‘ embrace 
 almost every diversity of character and population, yet 
 the results appear very uniform/ Again, ‘ This un- 
 satisfactory condition of secondary education is the 
 natural consequence of the clearly proved absence, in 
 a large number of cases, of the conditions of educa- 
 tional success. Untrained teachers and bad methods 
 of teaching, uninspected work by workmen without 
 adequate motive, . . . could hardly lead to any other 
 result/ 
 
 “ Of special Eeports I can quote only one sentence, 
 from Mr. Fitch’s, on Yorkshire endowed schools : — 
 ‘ Three-fourths of the scholars whom I have examined 
 in endowed schools, if tested by the usual standard 
 appropriate to boys of similar age under the Revised 
 Code, would fail to pass the examination either in 
 Arithmetic or any other elementary subject ’ (Report, 
 p. 133). The general Report on 'private schools/ 
 though brief, is significant : — ‘ It appears to be too 
 certain that a great proportion of the private schools 
 are inefficient. All our evidence points to this con- 
 clusion with remarkable unanimity’ (p. 654). A 
 few special notes on private-school teaching may be 
 given. Mr. Bryce says : ‘ Not in more than three or 
 four private schools in the whole country 9 [England], 
 ‘ did I find that the main object of the teachers was 
 
136 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 to invigorate the mind by these robust studies (i.e., Latin 
 and Mathematics) ; ’ and he speaks of the teaching of 
 practical subjects as being ‘ loose, confused and irra- 
 tional/ and ‘of the want of anything which can give 
 tenacity and clearness to the scholars mind/ Then 
 we find Canon Norris, when asked what he conceived 
 to be the general state of middle-class education [in 
 England], replying, (Evidence vol. i. p. 491), ‘My 
 impression is that it is extremely unsatisfactory — most 
 unsatisfactory/ [Cf. footnote, p. 175.] 
 
 “ Professor Rawlinson, as an examiner of boys sent 
 up to the local examinations, after premising that 
 these boys are ‘ the pick of the middle-class ’ [in 
 England], says, ‘I certainly think that the general 
 condition of middle-class education must be very bad 
 indeed if this is the best/ and particularly complains 
 of ‘ the want of sound elementary grounding/ Then, 
 lastly, Mr. Moseley — a man of the highest authority 
 in matters of education — gives the same general testi- 
 mony, and speaks of the main defects in middle-class 
 teaching as ‘ the want of culture ; the want of exer- 
 cising the understanding of the children ; that it 
 (teaching) is altogether a mechanical thing ; ’ and that 
 the great want of all is ‘ to provide another and a 
 better class of schoolmasters; men specially trained, 
 not only to know those subjects, but also to teach them/ 
 The entire evidence indeed, and the uniform tenor of 
 the reports furnished by the Assistant Commissioners 
 is to the same effect. . . /* 
 
 “ The languages, the mastery of which is, by the 
 
 * The remaining words of the paragraph — they are omitted as not 
 being pertinent to the present discussion — are these : “ While Miss 
 Buss, Miss Beall, and other high authorities on female education, tell 
 
TESTIMONY OF ENGLISH EDUCATIONISTS. 137 
 
 theory, to secure intellectual training, and all its con- 
 sequent benefits, are not generally mastered — their 
 rudiments even are not generally mastered — at the 
 public schools. The proofs of this assertion are to be 
 found abundantly in the report and evidence furnished 
 by the Public Schools Commission of 1864 ” [England], 
 “ and are such as cannot possibly be gainsaid or set 
 aside. Several distinguished public tutors and exa- 
 miners of Oxford and Cambridge, having the oppor- 
 tunity of examining young men on their entrance to 
 the University course” [England], “declare that the 
 average of youths admitted from the public schools are 
 ‘ badly grounded ; 9 are ‘ in knowledge absolute igno- 
 ramuses,' ‘ have everything to learn, and little desire 
 to learn anything/ ‘have few intellectual tastes/ have 
 ‘very unawakened minds, and habits of mental indo- 
 lence and inaccuracy/ require ‘ their shortcomings to 
 be supplemented by the University teaching/ which 
 is therefore ‘ hampered 9 by interference with its own 
 proper work, evince ‘surprising ignorance on points 
 not strictly academical/ are ‘ deplorably ignorant of 
 English literature, English history, and English com- 
 position/ ‘read worse than the majority of pupil- 
 teachers in elementary schools/ and ‘ often spell flag- 
 rantly ill/ 
 
 “ These, then, it appears, are the average practical 
 results of the noble theory which promised so much, 
 and the results, be it remembered, in the case of those 
 
 us that the average quality of the teaching and the average results 
 obtained in girls’ schools are still more unsatisfactory.” 
 
 The reader may, perhaps, not be aware that Miss Welsh, the 
 distinguished President of Girton, is an Irish lady, and was educated 
 exclusively in Ireland, first by private tuition, and subsequently at a 
 private school, Belfast. 
 
38 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 who go from the public schools ” [England] “ to enter 
 on the University course, being a selection — about 
 one-third — of the total number who leave those schools. 
 It would be interesting to ascertain the mental con- 
 dition and furniture of those who never enter the 
 Universities at all. 
 
 “Now these statements, so damaging to the theory 
 of public-school teaching ” [England], “ and so condem- 
 natory of the methods by which it is carried out, have 
 never, as far as I know, been challenged ; their sub- 
 stantial accuracy, with regard to the average of the 
 pupils, has indeed been tacitly acknowledged, or, if any 
 reply has been attempted, it has consisted in fallaciously 
 pointing to brilliant exceptions, and calling on us to 
 regard them as the rule. Here, however, I . . . con- 
 tend that a system of machinery, which only now and 
 then accomplishes its object, and, as a rule, works im- 
 mensely under its theoretical power, must be looked 
 upon as a failure, and that, therefore, speaking gene- 
 rally, the public-school system, as regards its average 
 teaching, is in this predicament. Efficient instruction, I 
 repeat, implies the success of the great majority of the 
 pupils, not the success of the small minority.” 
 
 On reading over the foregoing excerpts three things 
 specially strike me as fruitful sources of reflection, 
 namely — (a) If English schools are as bad, or even 
 half as bad, as they are described, how bad they must 
 be ! (/3) If the detractors were not Englishmen, but 
 
 Irishmen, what charges of envy, hatred, malice, and 
 all uncharitableness would there not be brought against 
 them ! ( 7 ) If Irish schools were to be similarly con- 
 
 demned by educationists of authority, how they would 
 be made feel the effects of the blow ! 
 
( 139 ) 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 THE OPINIONS OF SOME IRISH SCHOOLMASTERS 
 UPON THE SAME SUBJECT AS THAT DISCUSSED 
 IN THE FOREGOING CHAPTER . 
 
 Being anxious to find out what was the opinion of 
 my Irish brother schoolmasters concerning the edu- 
 cation of those of their pupils who had been for some 
 time, previously to coming to them, pupils at English 
 schools, I wrote recently to several of them to in- 
 quire what it was. The following excerpts from some 
 of the letters I received in response to my application 
 will show that the opinion of the Recorder of Dublin 
 (v. p. 8 1 ) as regards the inferiority of the teaching in 
 English, as compared with that in Irish schools, is 
 endorsed by many practical teachers who have had 
 excellent opportunities of forming an opinion on the 
 subject. 
 
 Mr. Payne’s opinion, and that of the educational 
 authorities he quotes from, is thus, as will be ob- 
 served, endorsed by the independent testimony of Irish 
 teachers. 
 
 I have suppressed all names, so as to avoid every- 
 thing approaching to personalities. The writers of the 
 letters I quote from are all head-masters of one or 
 another well-known school in Ireland. 
 
140 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 One schoolmaster wrote to me : — 
 
 “ I do not think I have had more than eight or ten boys 
 from English schools ; but certainly those eight or ten were 
 all most distinctly below the average of our own boys, not 
 only in actual attainments, but in the knowledge of how to 
 learn. Of course, however, it was because they were not 
 doing well that they were removed, and they were probably 
 below the average in England also. But then, on the other 
 side, they nearly all did improve very considerably under 
 the close individual attention which, with our smaller 
 numbers, we are able, and, by our precarious existence, are 
 forced to give.” 
 
 Another writes : — 
 
 “ My experience of English-taught boys — and I have 
 had several, especially of late — is that in Latin they are, as 
 a rule, well taught ; not at all so well taught in Greek ; and 
 more or less neglected in Arithmetic and Algebra ; while 
 they are often quite ignorant of the rudiments of Euclid. 
 Many of those who have come to me from English schools 
 were naturally dull boys, so I cannot say that their former 
 schools were to blame for the low position they took here. 
 Some of them, however, were distinctly clever boys ; but 
 their ignorance of Mathematics has injured their whole after 
 course here. Compared with boys that come to me from 
 some schools in Ireland, the English-taught boys who join 
 this school are about two Forms lower, age and capability 
 being given equal. One of my assistants lately, in a vaca- 
 tion, had a pupil to prepare for the 5th Form of ,* on 
 
 his promotion from the Form below ; and all that was re- 
 quired in Mathematics was the four rules in Algebra and 
 Euclid, Bk. 1 ! The Euclid being found to be beyond the 
 lad’s capacity, my master was told that half a dozen props. 
 
 * The name suppressed is that of a great English public school. 
 
OTHER IRISH SCHOOLMASTERS' EXPERIENCES. 141 
 
 were enough to qualify — exactly the same amount of 
 Mathematics as is required for the 2nd Form here ! ” 
 
 Another writes : — 
 
 <£ I have had as pupils any number of Irish boys who, 
 having failed to learn anything in English schools, came 
 here at the eleventh hour. My overgrown Irish block- 
 heads came from such eighth-rate schools as ” [Here 
 
 are mentioned eight private or small proprietary English 
 schools — schools that overflow with Irish boys.] “ I never 
 got an Irish boy from any good English school, except two 
 
 from School. My brother was recently on a visit to 
 
 a master in School ” [in the large school named there 
 
 are about fifty Irish boys] u during term, and seeing the 
 arrangements, asked, ‘ But when is the learning done ? 9 
 ‘Well/ said his host (an Irishman), ‘as to the learning, 
 you see, these boys of ours are of well-to-do families, and 
 are not expected to learn very much/ In college I knew 
 men of Irish birth from .* They were all very medi- 
 
 ocre men indeed as regards collegiate success, while the 
 account they gave of sexual immorality in these places was 
 frightful.” 
 
 Another writes : — 
 
 “ I have had as pupils about half-a-dozen boys who had 
 been educated in leading English public schools, who came 
 to me finally to learn something ; and I have no hesitation 
 in saying that they were complete educational failures, and 
 that in some cases their ignorance was perfectly astound- 
 ing. The champions of English schools may say these were 
 failures at English schools ; but I may ask, Did ever any 
 one hear of a failure at an Irish public school being sent to 
 
 * The names of several leading English schools — schools highly 
 favoured by Irish parents — are here suppressed. 
 
142 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 an English public school in order to be converted into a 
 success ? ” 
 
 Another schoolmaster (the head of one of the largest 
 and most successful of Irish day-schools) writes to the 
 same effect : — 
 
 “ The boys that have come to us from English schools 
 have, perhaps, been failures there; they certainly had 
 learned but little. In Latin their progress was slight ; in 
 Greek and Mathematics hardly any.” 
 
 Another schoolmaster writes : — 
 
 “ In common with most Irish schoolmasters, we have had 
 Anglo-Irish schoolboys, who had simply learned nothing 
 during their English career. What with holidays (con- 
 tinuous and sporadic, whole and half), cricket, football, et 
 hoc genus omne , I am convinced from all I hear that they do, 
 as a whole, only about 50 per cent, of the work done here. 
 Of course there are brilliant exceptions. But I am strongly 
 of opinion that no such work is done in English schools as 
 is done here for, let us say, the Intermediate examina- 
 tions.” 
 
 “It is a curious fact,” observed a schoolmaster at the 
 Christmas meeting of the Schoolmasters’ Association, 1885, 
 “that about the worst characters I have ever come across, 
 either in schools or colleges, were Irish boys who had been 
 sent across to English schools — I could specify one school 
 in particular, advertisements of which are still familiar 
 features in Irish newspapers — and had then, after a few 
 years, been brought home again, proficients in deadly vice, 
 and perhaps cricket and racquets, but in little or nothing 
 else.” 
 
OTHER IRISH SCHOOLMASTERS' EXPERIENCES. 143 
 
 And thus another to the same effect : — 
 
 “ My school, as no doubt you are aware, has always been 
 a comparatively small one. There is no material for a large 
 day-school, and all the gentry send their sons to England, 
 where in hardly any instance have they done any good. 
 With respect to your question, I have had several cases of 
 boys who, after having wasted from three to six years at 
 English schools, not second-rate or inferior establishments, 
 but the most eminent and the most expensive, have been 
 sent to me to try and do something for them, so as to 
 enable them to enter one of the Universities or get into 
 some profession. I will just give you two or three cases, 
 concealing the names for the sake of their families. 
 
 “ I. A boy named H had been six years at . 
 
 His father sent him to me to work him up for Trinity, 
 saying he had been six years at that well-known English 
 school and was unable to translate a line of Virgil. He 
 did well afterwards. 
 
 “ II. A boy named B was three years at ” [a large 
 
 proprietary English school is here referred to]. “ He did 
 no good there. I kept him for three years, and entered 
 him in Cambridge, where he obtained an exhibition and a 
 scholarship. 
 
 “ III. A boy named M [his father was a major in the 
 
 th Begiment, then quartered in India] was left by his 
 
 father at a large private establishment in England, with the 
 object of eventually entering Woolwich, but after being there 
 for five years, he could hardly manage a proposition in 
 Euclid, and of course failed. He was too old then for 
 Woolwich. I worked him up for the army, where he suc- 
 ceeded well. 
 
 “ IV. Some time ago Dr. wrote to me to ask me if 
 
 I could do anything for his nephew, who had been at 
 
 ” [an English school that numbers scores of Irish boys 
 
 among its pupils is here referred to] “ for two years, with 
 
144 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 the view of preparing for the Navy ; that the Admiral had 
 desired him to come up for examination in three months, 
 but that he ‘ knew nothing ;* that ‘ no book had been placed 
 in his hands for months and months except a Latin 
 Grammar/ and that ‘ he thought he had never washed his 
 hands all the time he was in England.* I succeeded in 
 passing the boy respectably through his examination.’* 
 
 Mr. Mahaffy declares — and his declaration is so 
 noteworthy that I quote it, even though Mr. Mahaffy is 
 not a schoolmaster — that in one important particular 
 the instruction in English is inferior to that in Irish 
 schools. These are his w T ords — quoted from p. 261 
 of the Commissioners' School Report (Ireland) 1881 : — 
 
 “Both of these** (Cheltenham and Marlborough) “and 
 the other English schools,** he assures us, “ were inferior 
 to the Irish schools in not cultivating a habit of free and 
 elegant viva voce translation from Greek and Latin. This 
 habit is perfectly compatible with the most accurate 
 scholarship, nay, is generally its most perfect index. It 
 is, moreover, the only sound preparation for young boys in 
 the invaluable acquirement of prompt and ready utterance, 
 — the first condition of public speaking.** 
 
 “ Inferior to Irish schools ! ” — striking words, it 
 will be admitted ! and from such an authority ! 
 
 The foregoing excerpts are assuredly worthy of the 
 gravest consideration, especially when taken in con- 
 nection with the evidence to the same effect, supplied 
 by Englishmen (see preceding chapter). 
 
 To the statements contained in these excerpts and 
 those from Mr. Payne’s book there may be added 
 the fact that I have had on my staff of assistant- 
 masters in all about a dozen Oxford or Cambridge 
 men ; besides two London University men, and three or 
 
OTHER IRISH SCHOOLMASTERS’ EXPERIENCES. 145 
 
 four Germans, who had been, in nearly every instance, 
 either masters or boys at English schools before com- 
 ing to me. In the case of the Englishmen, they had 
 been, for the most part, both boys and masters at 
 English schools. These young men cannot, therefore, 
 but be regarded as fair judges of the relative amount 
 of work done in schools in Ireland and England, respec- 
 tively — at least, if Foyle College may be taken as a fair 
 specimen, in regard to the amount of work done each 
 week, of the ordinary Irish Grammar School ; and I am 
 not aware that it is in this respect in any way ex- 
 ceptional. There has been but the one opinion on the 
 subject ever expressed by them : it was always this : 
 that there was far more real downright work done by 
 both masters and boys in Irish schools than in English 
 schools. The very unanimity of their opinion in re- 
 gard to this matter of itself adds weight to it. 
 
 “ But is not the Irish schoolmaster who declares that 
 his school has done a great deal more for such-and- 
 such Irish boys than the English schools at which they 
 previously were, rendering himself fairly liable/’ it 
 may be asked, “ to the charge of self- advertising ? ” 
 No ; certainly not. To take for an example the 
 schoolmaster whose letter has been last quoted. He, as 
 I happen to know from my personal knowledge, has 
 no desire whatever to advertise himself. He has now 
 been carrying on the arduous work of a schoolmaster 
 for some half-century, and is, I rather fear, quite 
 indifferent whether boys go to the school of which he 
 is the head-master or not. This in the first place. In 
 the second place, even if the writer in question did 
 wish to advertise himself, it surely is not to a brother 
 schoolmaster like me he would attempt to show him- 
 
 K 
 
146 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 self off — least of all to a brother schoolmaster who 
 happens to be, as in the present instance, perfectly 
 aware for many years past of his powers as a teacher. 
 I11 the third place, my friend’s letter could not possibly 
 have been meant as an advertisement to others, inas- 
 much as the writer knew in advance that I had no in- 
 tention whatever of publishing his letter with his name 
 affixed to it. And, lastly, the question is not one of 
 advertising one’s self or not advertising one’s self. The 
 question is “ Irish versus English Grammar-Schools for 
 Irish Boys ” — a question of the utmost practical impor- 
 tance to every Irish parent — a question even of national 
 importance. And it is monstrous to suppose that the 
 most telling witnesses that could possibly be produced 
 An the discussion of the question should remain silent 
 from a sense of morbid delicacy, or should be called 
 to order should they dare, even when asked, to express 
 their honest convictions, and relate, for the sake of truth 
 and for the edification of all concerned, the result of 
 their experiences in this matter. In taking part in 
 such a debate they are perfectly in order. Pusillanimous, 
 indeed, must that Irishman be who, for fear of being 
 unjustly sneered at as a self-advertiser, would hesitate 
 to give evidence in so important a case. Something 
 must be endured in the cause and for the sake of 
 truth, and in order to do good. Fortunate will it be 
 for that schoolmaster who will never have to endure 
 more in so good a cause than a groundless sneer. 
 
( 147 ) 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 CLASSES IN IRISH SCHOOLS USUALLY MUCH 
 SMALLER THAN IN ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 A class in an Irish secondary school is seldom, taking 
 one class with another, composed of more than twelve 
 or thirteen boys at the most. In some English schools 
 — schools even of the highest character — a class 
 may consist of as many as fifty boys, or even more. 
 A class of twenty boys in an Irish school would be 
 considered a decidedly large one. 
 
 For teaching purposes, small classes are better than 
 large ones; for it is manifestly easier to pay proper 
 attention to each individual boy in a small than in a 
 large class. It is quite impossible for any teacher in 
 the ordinary normal grammar-school, in which there is 
 seldom more than one hour each day allowed for each 
 lesson, to attend properly to each individual boy — espe- 
 cially when teaching translation or the higher mathe- 
 matics — in a class composed of more than twelve or 
 thirteen boys. A class of eleven or twelve boys is quite 
 large enough for a teacher who is not possessed of 
 exceptional energy and tact and skill in teaching. In 
 very large classes the dull, and lazy, and backward boys 
 — and there must be some such in every class — must 
 always, of necessity, be more or less neglected : so also 
 
14B 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 must the brightest and cleverest boys in them. So as 
 to have full justice done to them, both these sets of boys 
 would require for themselves all the time out of the 
 hour they could possibly get. They would require 
 this, I mean, more than those of their class-fellows 
 who are neither particularly bright nor particularly 
 stupid. To such boys in classes of seventeen, not to 
 say of forty or fifty, with but an hour allowed for 
 each lesson, it is impossible — especially when instruct- 
 ing them in advanced Classics and Mathematics — to 
 pay proper attention.^ 
 
 * In one of the most successful of the English public schools there 
 is only one master for every seventeen boys ; in another, one only for 
 every twenty-one boys. In most English schools, however, there are 
 far more boys for each master than in these now referred to. 
 
 Since writing this chapter I have come across the following pas- 
 sage in Mr. Joyce’s “Hand-book of School-Management/’ (pp. 24, 25). 
 I am supported, it will be observed, by this experienced teacher (he is 
 the head-master of the Central Model Schools, Dublin) in my views as 
 to the practical advantage of not having more than “ eleven or twelve 
 boys ” in a class. 
 
 “ Ten or twelve pupils,” writes Mr. Joyce, “will be quite sufficient 
 number for each draft” (i.e., a division of a class — “all the pupils 
 who stand together at the same circle to read the same lesson ” ), “ and 
 some drafts might be much smaller, especially among the junior 
 pupils, and in small schools, where it is often difficult to find even a 
 dozen children so nearly equal in proficiency as to be fit to read the 
 same lesson and work the same arithmetic. The chief reason for 
 limiting the draft to this number, ” adds Mr. Joyce, “is, that at the 
 reading lesson each individual pupil may have sufficient time for 
 reading. If the draft be very large, it will be impossible to accom- 
 plish this, and at the same time to explain and examine on the subject 
 matter, within the time usually allowed for a reading lesson.” Mr. 
 Joyce thinks, however, that in teaching “geography, grammar, certain 
 portions of arithmetic, &c.,” the drafts may be larger; but not so “at 
 reading and some other lessons of like nature.” 
 
( 149 ) 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 MANY WORTHLESS PRIVATE AND SMALL PRO- 
 PRIETARY SCHOOLS IN ENGLAND: NONE IN 
 
 IRELAND. 
 
 There are many worthless private and small proprie- 
 tary schools in England prospering financially, such as 
 find no place whatever in Ireland ; and these too, 
 strange to say, are the very schools which appear to 
 have most attraction for the middle-class Irish parent 
 and guardian. There are some schools in England the 
 pupils of which nearly all come from Ireland — such 
 schools thus evidently receiving no honour in their 
 own country. A worthless private or small proprie- 
 tary grammar-school has never yet prospered in Ireland. 
 And there is, fortunately, less chance of such a 
 school’s flourishing in Ireland now than ever there 
 was — so severe a test of a school’s worth are the yearly 
 recurring Intermediate examinations. 
 
 Let us be thankful that, with all her faults, Ireland 
 has never furnished a satirist or philanthropist with 
 ground for writing a Nicholas Nickleby* 
 
 * “ The picture it ( Nicholas Nickleby ) presents of imposture, ignorance, 
 and brutal cupidity, is known to have been little, if at ail, caricatured ” 
 (Chambers's Cyclopaedia of English Literature , voi. ii. p. 645). Though 
 I describe this chapter as “ Do-the-Boys Halls,” I am, nevertheless, 
 aware that Messrs. Squeers & Co. starved the bodies as well as the 
 minds of their pupils, whereas the schoolmasters now referred to “ do 
 the boys ” by starving the latter only. 
 
150 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 Though there are Head-masterships in England 
 which lead to Archdeaconries, Deaneries, and Bishop- 
 rics — though there are schools there which, save in 
 their enormous charges, are an honour to our country, 
 which would be an honour to any country, yet there 
 are also schools there which, so far as learning of any 
 kind is concerned, are completely worthless — nay, 
 worse than worseless ; for priceless time is spent in 
 them, and money is spent on them, from which there 
 is no return. And what a loss to our country that 
 thousands of her sons should, year after year, per- 
 sistently misspend their boyhood, squander their sub- 
 stance, and waste their talents ! What a gain to the 
 country, on the other hand, it would be if, instead of 
 misusing, her sons were, for the time to come, to 
 profitably use their time, their money, and their 
 talents ! 
 
 So far as a large number of private schools is con- 
 cerned, schoolmastering in England is at present a 
 mere trade, a stock -jobbing sort of business ; wherein 
 men who are mere speculators (some of them, it must 
 be regretfully admitted, in Holy Orders, but not of any 
 University repute) invest their capital, in the hope of 
 Inaking a fair interest thereby, and with this object, 
 the making of money, alone in view. A man of this 
 stamp purchases, with the help of an educational 
 broker, a Head-mastership — and there are generally 
 some vacant Head-masterships in the market — -just as 
 he would Egyptian, Mexican, or any other Stock, in 
 the same spirit and with the same hopes : 
 
 Gestit enim nummum , &c.* 
 
 Hor. Ep. II. i., 175. 
 
DO-THE-BOYS HALLS . 
 
 151 
 
 Himself illiterate, and possibly even scornful of 
 learning, such a head-master has to depend for the 
 financial success of his scholastic venture — the only 
 kind of success he cares for — on all sorts of things 
 other than the proper education of his pupils. Chief 
 among these will come their pupils’ contentedness 
 with their surroundings. So as to secure this desired 
 contentedness, he will trouble them as little as possible 
 with lessons ; give them as many half and whole 
 holidays as he possibly can without arousing suspicion 
 in the minds of their parents ; encourage to the utmost 
 limit of discretion athletics and matches of all kinds 
 with other schools — in short, study how the school- 
 days of his “ young friends ” may be passed by them 
 with as much pleasure, and as little study, as is 
 practicable, consistently with prudence. 
 
 So far as the teaching is concerned — and they are 
 fully alive to the fact that there must be some teach- 
 ing in every school if it is to be carried on at all — 
 Head-masters of this kind have to depend entirely on 
 their assistants, of whose literary or scientific qualifi- 
 cations they are unfortunately, as a general rule, no 
 judges. One master at least with a University degree 
 — especially if they have not such degree themselves 
 — they think it desirable to have upon their staffs, 
 were it only for appearance’ sake ; and so the services 
 of one such assistant-master are usually procured, at 
 as low a salary, of course, as they can be possibly 
 procured for. A B.A. degree is all that is looked for, 
 and (as all schoolmasters know) masters with B.A. 
 degrees of some sort, who are neither good teachers 
 nor scholars, can be procured for almost any price. 
 Masters without B.A. degrees can be obviously 
 
152 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 procured for less ; and it is of such the hulk of the 
 assistant-masters in the schools I am describing usually 
 consists. Some of these masters, indeed, during their 
 first half-year receive no salary at all. I have met 
 with such. They give instruction for so many hours 
 a day in exchange for their board and residence. They 
 teach because they have not the ability or necessary 
 qualifications — any one at all may teach in these 
 countries — to earn their livelihood in any other way. 
 How valuable the assistance of such masters for the 
 most part is — men who do not teach from a high sense 
 of duty, nor from the love of teaching, nor for religion's 
 sake, like many of our Eoman Catholic teachers, but 
 who take to teaching as a last resource — I leave to the 
 imagination of my readers. 
 
 In contrasting our Irish schools with English schools 
 of this kind, the inferiority of the masters in the latter 
 should be always taken into account. There are no 
 grammar-schools in Ireland in which the masters are 
 not, one and all of them, assistant as well as head, 
 properly qualified, so far as learning is concerned, for 
 their work : there are many grammar-schools in Eng- 
 land in which they certainly are not. Young men 
 without either University degrees or Honors find little 
 or no difficulty in obtaining masterships in Intermediate 
 schools in England ; men without University degrees or 
 Honors find it almost impossible to obtain masterships 
 in Intermediate schools in Ireland. The assistant- 
 masters in English Intermediate schools who are 
 undistinguished undergraduates, may be reckoned by 
 the hundred. In Ireland, where there is so very much 
 stress laid upon sound teaching, an undistinguished 
 undergraduate finds it all but impossible, I repeat, to 
 
DO-THE-BOYS HALLS. 
 
 153 
 
 obtain a mastership, no matter how low the salary 
 which he may ask in return for his assistance. There 
 is so much expected from schoolmasters in Ireland in 
 the matter of teaching that they simply cannot afford 
 to keep indifferent scholars as their assistants. 
 
 So far I have contrasted Irish and English assistant 
 masters only in respect of scholarship. In regard to 
 religious principles, morals, and manners, the former, 
 if they are not superior, are certainly by no means 
 inferior, as a class, to the latter. To suppose that 
 they are would be, indeed, almost tantamount to 
 supposing that all educated middle-class Irishmen are 
 inferior in these respects, i.e., in religious principles, 
 moral character, and deportment, to all middle-class 
 educated Englishmen (it is the educated middle-classes 
 in both countries that supply us with assistant-masters) 
 — and this is a supposition the absurdity of which is, 
 at a glance, patent to all.* 
 
 * And yet, these facts notwithstanding, there are Irishmen who 
 calmly assume, and boldly assert, that Irish assistant-masters are, 
 as a class, inferior to English assistant-masters. I know one such 
 — an exceedingly influential country gentleman of about sixty- 
 five years of age. He is never weary of running down Irish schools 
 whenever an opportunity for so doing offers itself, on the ground 
 that the assistant-masters in them are “ a bad lot — all snobs, all 
 immoral.” If you ask him why he has so low an opinion of them, 
 he will tell you that he speaks “ advisedly ” on the subject ; that he 
 
 was himself at school in the N. of Ireland (a school, by the way, 
 
 from which he was removed when but thirteen years of age, and over 
 half a century ago) ; and that there was there a most shocking master, 
 the vilest creature in all the world, and so forth. I once reminded 
 this gentleman that he was arguing “ from the particular to the uni- 
 versal ; ” that it did not follow, even if his opinion concerning this 
 master’s character should happen to be absolutely infallible, that all 
 assistant-masters in all Irish schools were bad fellows, because this 
 
 particular assistant -matter in school in the N. of Ireland, over 
 
 fifty years ago, was. I added, that I had once myself met with an 
 
154 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 The terms charged in these worthless schools, except 
 for unadvertised extras, are seldom high — high, I 
 mean, compared with those of the respectable grammar- 
 schools of either England or Ireland ; and consequently 
 many parents, especially parents living a very long 
 distance off, attracted by their advertised advantages, 
 send their sons to them. Sometimes they are actually 
 invited so to do by the head-master, or a paid agent 
 of his, in person. Some of these scholastic “ tra- 
 vellers ” visit regularly Belfast and other Irish towns 
 once or twice every year, for the purpose of recom- 
 mending their own or their employers’ schools, inter- 
 viewing parents, securing Irish referees — in short, of 
 “ touting.” 
 
 Some such schoolmasters (it is deplorable to have 
 to degrade the word “ schoolmaster ” by applying it to 
 such as these), if clever economists, in a few years 
 make a good deal of money — their masters’ salaries 
 being extremely low — and then, having made what 
 they think enough for their purposes, retire, selling 
 their good-will, &c., to some other educational specu- 
 lator of the same stamp as themselves. 
 
 How wretched the teaching in some of these schools 
 
 English assistant-master — a clergyman, too — who was seldom sober ; 
 with one who was an extreme Ritualist, and with a third who looked 
 on any man who believed in the Bible as a fool ; and I pointed out to 
 him that it would be at once illogical and unfair of me to look on these 
 three as fair specimens of English assistant-masters. But it was all 
 in vain : with Cato-like pertinacity my friend reiterated his opinion 
 that Irish assistant- masters were “a bad lot — all snobs, all immoral.” 
 To this story there might be an amusing side, only for the fact that 
 this gentleman has done a great deal of harm to our schools. It is 
 incredible how much injury one single individual in a good social 
 position like him, can do, if so disposed, in a small Protestant non- 
 commercial community like ours, to struggling schools such as Irish 
 Intermediate schools, for the most part, are. 
 
DO-THE-BOYS HALLS. 
 
 155 
 
 must be, and how few the intellectual victories they 
 have to boast of, may be inferred from the fact that in 
 their advertisements one frequently reads how that 
 this boy, that, or the other, has “ matriculated,” or has 
 passed his “ matriculation examination.” This word 
 “ matriculated ” is a very grand one for a very meagre 
 performance — the “ passing ” of “ a matriculation 
 examination,” or “ matriculating,” simply meaning 
 the not being “ stuck ” or " plucked ” at an Entrance 
 examination into some University. Now, the not 
 being stuck or plucked at such examination is, as all 
 University men are aware, nothing whatever for either 
 teacher or pupil to be proud or to boast of. The 
 passing of an Entrance examination with distinction 
 is one thing ; the mere passing of it, quite another. If 
 all parents and guardians were supposed to be aware 
 of this fact, schoolmasters, we may be sure, would 
 not advertise that such and such pupils of theirs had 
 “ passed their matriculation examination.” Eor in this 
 case such a bait would not take. As long, however, 
 as only about five per thousand of the inhabitants of 
 England attend the Higher schools, and as long as 
 any man at all is allowed to call himself a schoolmaster 
 and open a school in these countries, so long will the 
 race of worthless schoolmasters endure, and so long 
 will these continue to attract boys to their schools by 
 means of clap-trap advertisements : 
 
 Plures annabunt thynni et cetaria crescent * 
 
 * Hor. Sat. II. v., 44. 
 
 In some of the German states rather over 60 per thousand of the 
 population are receiving a higher education. “ In England,” writes Mr. 
 Bird in his interesting book, “Higher Schools in Germany and England” 
 (1884), “higher education is the luxury of the few. In Germany it 
 
156 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 It is clear that these head-masters either must 
 know, or they must not know, that a student’s 
 matriculating in any University is not a distinction 
 which any schoolmaster, who was self-respecting and 
 respected, would dream of advertising as anything to 
 be proud of. If this they do know, then the ad- 
 vertisers of such a performance must be regarded as 
 deliberately imposing on a credulous, ignorant public. 
 If this they do not know, then they are evidently men 
 who are all-ignorant of Universities and University 
 examinations. In neither case do they appear to be 
 very suitable men to be at the head of English 
 secondary schools. 
 
 In Ireland, with all our misfortunes, these vile 
 venture schools and schoolmasters do not exist : for 
 their absence let us be thankful. Strange to say, 
 however, there are no parents who patronise them to 
 such an extent as Irish parents. In Ireland, as we 
 have said, there are the Intermediate examinations to 
 test and advertise, for the benefit of the public — and, 
 
 can be got by all who want it. In an English town nearly all the 
 children are in the elementary schools, if they are at school at all ; in 
 a German town half of them are in the higher schools” (p. n). On 
 p. 94 of this same book Mr. Bird informs us that “ in a German town, 
 taken almost at random, 64 per thousand of the population are 
 receiving a higher, and 66 per thousand an elementary education.” 
 Assuming (same page) that 130 children (i.e., the 64 and 66 just 
 referred to) out of the thousand in England also go to school, “where 
 are they?” he asks; and on p. 116 he answers, “125 are at the 
 elementary, and 5 at the higher schools.” In Ireland, in 1881, when the 
 census was last taken, out of the then population of 5,174,836 the total 
 number of students, of all denominations and both sexes, attending the 
 higher schools was 20,405, or somewhat under 4 per thousand of the 
 entire population. Interesting Parliamentary returns have been 
 recently issued, showing that at the General Election of 1885, out of a 
 total of 4,633,187 electors for Great Britain and Ireland, there were no 
 less than 186,542 illiterates. 
 
DO-THE-BOYS HALLS . 
 
 157 
 
 that, without the head-masters having any hand, act, 
 or part in the advertisements — the teaching capabilities 
 of every school. And little or no chance of prospering 
 has any Irish school just now, unless it can prove 
 itself able to hold its own at these grand national 
 semi-competitive, semi-qualifying annual examinations. 
 
 The Oxford and Cambridge local examinations have 
 taken no such root in English as the “ Intermediates ” 
 have in Irish soil. They are far less popuiar — chiefly, 
 no doubt, because there are no valuable state-offered 
 prizes and exhibitions awarded to the boys who pass 
 them, nor any valuable result-fees for the school- 
 masters. And consequently, as a test of the various 
 merits of the many higher schools in England, these 
 Oxford and Cambridge local examinations fall im- 
 measurably short of the benefit conferred in this 
 respect by the “ Intermediates ” upon Ireland. 
 
 In a country like England where there are no 
 Intermediate examinations (as in Ireland), and where 
 the secondary schools are not under Government con- 
 trol, and the boys obliged to rise regularly from class 
 to class or else leave the school (as in Germany), that 
 a school-boy is learning little or nothing is seldom 
 found out till it is too late to do much more for his 
 education. The discovery is made, for the most part, 
 only when the boy, already sixteen or seventeen years 
 of age, presents himself at his first qualifying or com- 
 petitive examination; or is, perhaps, required by his 
 father to give him some assistance in his office in 
 writing a letter or two, or in settling an account ; or 
 when some other critical occurrence in his life takes 
 place. In Ireland, on the contrary, a boy’s school 
 progress may be annually tested, from the time he is 
 
158 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 eleven or twelve years of age, even until he has 
 passed his examination for the senior grade course, by 
 the Intermediate Education examiners. 
 
 All speculative venture schools of the kind I have 
 been describing are most injurious to the welfare of 
 our country, seeing that parents waste, worse than 
 waste, their money on them, and that their sons 
 waste, worse than waste, their time in them. All 
 such schools, therefore, ought assuredly to be put down 
 by the strong arm of the law. 
 
 If teaching were made a regular profession, and 
 none but properly qualified men allowed to teach, 
 manifestly the number of these venture schools would 
 at once sensibly diminish, and the enormous amount 
 of mischief which they do to us as a nation be, in 
 consequence, proportionately reduced. 
 
 “ But how,” it may be asked, “ can such schools find 
 patrons ? how prosper, being so utterly worthless ? ” 
 
 Well, in the first place , though there are in these 
 schools, taking them altogether, thousands and thou- 
 sands of boys, they are not by any means all pros- 
 perous. On the contrary, many of them lead a 
 struggling, precarious, “ hand-to-mouth ” sort of exist- 
 ence. 
 
 In the next place , their faults and defects are not of 
 such a glaring, startling nature that he who runs can 
 read them. On the contrary, to the unobservant eye 
 the school — with its “ swimming-baths;” and “ spacious 
 dormitories ” with their “ cubicles ; ” its graduate assis- 
 tant-master ; and Ph.D. teacher of foreign languages 
 and calisthenics ; its drill-sergeant, whose Christian and 
 surname are frequently given in full ; and “ situated,” 
 as such a school always is, “ in its own grounds,” and 
 
DO-TH E-BOYS HALLS . 
 
 159 
 
 so forth — may appear an extremely eligible place. 
 It surely will, if well recommended by some one who, 
 however ill capable of judging of the real merits of a 
 school, speaks strongly in its favour, alleging as his 
 ground for doing so that he, the speaker, has his own 
 son Willie or Tom there. The inexperienced widow 
 or commercial man or farmer is certainly not always 
 able to diagnose the qualifications of a head-master. 
 To many, as we have already suggested, the fact that 
 a man has a degree or has “ matriculated ” is, of itself, 
 quite sufficient to make him seem capable not only of 
 managing a school, but of managing it on the most 
 enlightened possible principles. To most people, too, 
 one degree has pretty much the same import as 
 another ; whereas, in respect of honourable distinction, 
 and as a proof of personal merit, one degree may differ 
 as widely from another, even though having the same 
 name with it, as the North Pole does from the South. 
 The head-masters in question are, moreover, for the 
 most part, shrewd, expert business men, possessed of 
 much tact and plenty of good common sense. But 
 not of such a kind assuredly are all the tens of thou- 
 sands of middle-class parents and guardians from 
 whom they draw their pupils. These are not always 
 shrewd and sensible ; neither, as a rule, are they edu- 
 cationists ; and consequently they are not always able 
 to discriminate between the well-educated, the half- 
 educated, and the uneducated schoolmaster. Neither 
 are they usually rich, and it must be remembered that 
 the fees charged in these schools are seldom high. 
 
 Then, in the third 'place , there is really not very 
 much value set upon a good education in these coun- 
 tries. There is no advantage given to the Secondary 
 
i6o 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 schoolboy in these countries, for example, that can be 
 at all compared, in respect of intrinsic practical value, 
 with the advantages attaching to the Leaving and the 
 Military certificates — the two great privileges of the 
 German Secondary school-boy. 
 
 And, fourthly — another reason why these worthless 
 schools are countenanced by the British parent — in 
 England there are, for its size and population, ex- 
 tremely few schools at once well conducted, well 
 inspected, efficient, and inexpensive, for the British 
 parent to select from. The Secondary schools of 
 England, to which parents may send their sons with 
 entire confidence that their religious, moral, intellectual, 
 and physical faculties will be all carefully developed 
 on the soundest possible principles, are, indeed, few 
 and far between. 
 
 The following advertisement of an English school 
 requires no comment: it is from a leading English 
 paper : — 
 
 “ Unmanageable or backward boys, or youths (up to 
 twenty years), made perfectly tractable and gentlemanly in 
 one year, by a clergyman near town, of thirty years’ ex- 
 perience, whose peculiarly persuasive system and high 
 moral and religious training soon elevate children of 
 peculiar tempers and dispositions (because not understood) 
 to the level of others. A most liberal education, including 
 modern languages, successful preparation for every examina- 
 tion and vocation in life, and every gentlemanly comfort, 
 on moderate terms.” 
 
 Advertisements like the foregoing must prove of a 
 tempting nature. Otherwise, as is manifest, school- 
 masters would not go to the expense and trouble of 
 
DO-THE-BOYS HALLS. 
 
 ]6i 
 
 inserting them. Hundreds of Irish boys, as we have 
 seen, go to English schools every year. I have myself 
 reason to know that it is in consequence of such 
 advertisements that many an English school is selected 
 by the Irish parent. 
 
 I remember once having under my charge a little 
 Irish boy who had been at an English school for a 
 year, the terms of which were “ £2^ a year (inclusive).’' 
 The child had been evidently starved in both mind 
 and body in it ; and “ not much wonder,” one may 
 exclaim. Yet there were “ lots ” of other Irish boys, 
 the little fellow assured me, at that school. The 
 father of this boy was a Justice of the Peace and a 
 Grand Juror of his county ; and I dare say spoke, rather 
 magniloquently than otherwise, to his less potential 
 neighbours, of the importance to boys of an English 
 accent and nice manners ; of useful friendships ; and 
 of his many, his grave objections to Irish schools. 
 
 The following advertisement from an English school- 
 master appeared in one of the English sporting journals 
 at the beginning of this year’s cricket season — 
 
 “ Head-master of a flourishing school could receive one 
 or two boys, promising cricketers, at thirty guineas a year. 
 Good all round education and comfortable home.” 
 
 “We may shortly expect to see,” runs a note in the St. 
 James's Gazette for April 27 th, commenting on this advertise- 
 ment, “ we may shortly expect to see in school advertise- 
 ments for pupils such announcements as ‘ None but good 
 cricketers need apply,’ or ‘ A preference given to medium- 
 paced bowler,’ or ‘Fees not so much an object as smart 
 fielding and a safe defence.’ I11 this advertisement even 
 the promising cricketers have to pay thirty guineas, but in 
 a year or two a brilliant bat should get his board and 
 
 L 
 
1 62 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 schooling for nothing. To the question, 1 What should we 
 do with our boys!’ we would say, ‘Make cricketers of 
 them but the advice hardly seems to be required.” 
 
 How very English is the foregoing advertisement ! 
 After all, perhaps, Irish schoolmasters should be con- 
 gratulated that their circumstances do not permit of 
 their disgracing themselves by inserting in the papers 
 such advertisements as the above. The hardness of 
 the battle which they have to fight in order to gain 
 their daily bread, and which 99 per cent, of their 
 pupils will in due time have to fight too, absolutely 
 prohibits such wretched displays of ignorance, and 
 appeals to ignorance, as the advertisement by “ Head- 
 master of a flourishing school ” in the sporting journal 
 referred to. The struggle for existence in Ireland is 
 too severe to permit of her schoolmasters adapting 
 their arrangements to the requirements of pupil- 
 cricketers. Only one Irish schoolmaster, within my 
 memory, ever tried this plan of attracting boys to his 
 school. He was a complete failure. 
 
 “ Promising cricketers ” who have good business 
 openings ready for them to step into the moment they 
 leave school, and whose parents do not expect them 
 to pass “ with honors/’ or without them, any examina- 
 tions, are plentiful enough, by all accounts, in English 
 schools ; but in Ireland such boys are rarities. There 
 is hardly a boy at school in Ireland to whom a sound 
 education is not, from a mere monetary point of view, 
 a matter of the utmost consequence. This is the great 
 fact which Irish schoolmasters have always before 
 their minds in all their arrangements. This is, no 
 doubt, one reason why we do not find any Do-the- 
 Boys Halls flourishing in Ireland, 
 
( 163 ) 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 ENTRANCE EXAMINATIONS IN ENGLISH SCHOOLS , 
 WHY OBJECTIONABLE. OBJECTIONS TO PREPA- 
 RATORY SCHOOLS. 
 
 “ Are there not Entrance examinations to be passed by 
 boys before being admitted into English schools ? ” 
 
 No; not in the schools that are specially contem- 
 plated in this treatise. In the principal schools in 
 England there are, no doubt, Entrance examinations. 
 At Eton the Entrance examination consists of mathe- 
 matics, Latin (translation, grammar, parsing, prose and 
 verse composition), Greek (grammar and translation), 
 English (outlines of history and geography), French. At 
 Harrow there is Scripture as well as the above-mentioned 
 subjects. In Rugby the Entrance examination consists 
 of mathematics, Latin, Scripture, French, geography, 
 geology, botany, Greek (or German). And so on in 
 regard to the other leading public schools. In each 
 there is an Entrance examination — the examination of 
 one school differing but slightly from that of another. 
 
 “ Is it not conducive to the intellectual well-being of 
 a school that little boys on first going to it should be 
 obliged to know so much ? ” 
 
 No. To be enabled to pass a stiff Entrance examina- 
 tion the little boy must have been, no doubt, taught 
 somewhere or another- — anywhere, it would seem, except 
 
1 64 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 in the school to which he is seeking to gain admission. 
 The head-masters of the large schools in question, since 
 they insist on little boys knowing so very much before 
 they themselves take charge of them, necessitate, so 
 far as in them lies, the existence, even the prosperity, 
 of preparatory schools. 
 
 A preparatory school is, as the name itself implies, 
 one to which little boys are sent to be prepared for the 
 larger schools. But what is gained, so far as the 
 intellectual well-being of the larger schools is con- 
 cerned, by the all but obligation under which these 
 little boys lie of going to preparatory schools, thereat 
 to acquire the elementary knowledge which they could 
 acquire just as well, if not better, at the larger schools, 
 if only the head - masters of these schools had not 
 apparently combined not to impart it ? 
 
 It seems to me that it would be better for the 
 educational well-being of English schoolboys if they 
 were always enabled to acquire an elementary know- 
 ledge of classics, mathematics, and modern languages in 
 a large well-managed grammar school, in place of being 
 forced, as now, to go, in order that they may acquire it, 
 to a preparatory one. Assuming that this knowledge, 
 somewhere or other, sooner or later, they must acquire, 
 the only question is, Where are they to acquire it ? “ At 
 a preparatory school,” it is the fashion with some people 
 to say. “ At the school in which they are destined after- 
 wards to finish their education, or else at home,” is 
 the answer to the question which I, for my part, should 
 unhesitatingly give. I have been assuming all along 
 that these Entrance examinations are really as formid- 
 able as they look; that they are exceedingly strict, 
 and for little boys difficult ; that they are in all respects 
 
ENTRA NCE EX A MINA TIONS. 
 
 165 
 
 bond fide . If they are not, then the less said about 
 
 their advantages to English schools the better. That 
 it cannot, however, be particularly difficult to pass 
 them I am disposed to suspect ; so very few Irish boys 
 who try to pass them are returned on their parents’ 
 hands as failures — labelled, Plucked at the Entrance 
 
 EXAMINATION: CAKNOT, THEREFORE, BE ADMITTED INTO 
 
 this English school. Personally I have never come 
 in contact with any Irish boys branded with this un- 
 happy character. 
 
 I was surprised one morning, years and years ago, by 
 receiving a letter from the Head-master of one of the 
 great English public schools, informing me that, since 
 
 a certain one of my pupils was to go to school 
 
 after the termination of the next midsummer holidays, 
 it would be extremely desirable that he should be pre- 
 pared, for the remainder of the time he would be under 
 my charge, in the books — he enclosed the list — ap- 
 pointed for the Entrance examination course at — — . 
 
 I replied that, even if I looked on the books appointed 
 by him for the Entrance examination — and I did not — 
 as well chosen, I could not possibly undertake to alter 
 our own school course in the way that he proposed. The 
 boy in question was one of the least promising in my 
 school. He was not “ plucked ” at the Entrance exami- 
 nation at . My faith in the strictness of these 
 
 examinations has been extremely slight ever since. 
 
 A certain large proprietary school in England was 
 very prosperous some few years ago, so much so that 
 eager parents had to enter their sons’ names for it terms 
 and terms in advance ; and some of those who did so 
 seemed very proud of their foresight. The numbers of 
 the pupils at this school have since fallen off very much. 
 
IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 1 66 
 
 So long as there were more applicants than vacancies, 
 the Entrance examination at it was, I believe, fairly 
 strict. Its strictness, they say, is a thing of the past. 
 When the numbers of applicants fell off, so it appears, 
 did the strictness of the Entrance examination. Per- 
 haps, if the dormitories begin to fill again, the Entrance 
 examination will once again become something of a 
 reality : this it is not now.* 
 
 * Another rule, by the way, in the observance of which the head- 
 masters of some English schools seem to me a little lax, is that about 
 the getting of good characters of pupils seeking admission into their 
 schools before admitting them. Three of my boys have been on diffe- 
 rent occasions admitted into English schools direct— two from this, the 
 third from the Monaghan Diocesan School — without any “characters.” 
 True, a clerk at the school had in each case applied to me before the 
 admission of the boy for a character of him — sending on each occa- 
 sion a printed form to fill up, with instructions that it should be 
 filled up and returned as soon as possible. The form in each case con- 
 tained many questions, some of them most thoughtless ones, I thought, 
 
 e.g „ Was truthful all the time lie was at your school ? Was he 
 
 industrious all the time ? &c. The forms I never either filled up or 
 returned, thinking then, as I think now, that if the head-master of an 
 English school has a favour to ask of the head-master of an Irish one, 
 be the latter ever so obscure, he should not ignore the fact that it is a 
 favour he wants, or write to him through a clerk, or send him any 
 printed circular, as inquisitorial as an income-tax paper, to fill up and 
 return. No one, I assume, will doubt that if A ask B, who is a perfect 
 stranger to him, to tell him what is his private opinion of C, A is 
 asking B for a favour. For my own part, I have been always under 
 the impression that the schoolmaster should put on the parent of the 
 pupil seeking admission into his school the onus of procuring a char- 
 acter of him from his former schoolmaster, in place of applying to 
 the former schoolmaster direct himself. 
 
 It must not be concluded from this, that these boys did not deserve 
 good characters. They did — and they got them too. In one case the 
 English schoolmaster himself wrote to me about the character — the 
 boy being already over three weeks at his school — and received it by 
 return of post. In the other cases the fathers of the boys wrote to me 
 — the boys being already a month at their English school ; and these, 
 too, received what they asked for by return. 
 
 Whether these boys should have been expelled, or otherwise removed 
 
PREPARATORY SCHOOLS. 
 
 167 
 
 “ But is it not better to send a little boy to a 
 preparatory school in the first instance rather than 
 plunge him all at once into a big grammar school ? ” 
 
 No; I do not think so. Boys of sixteen and seven- 
 teen years of age are, as all schoolmasters know by 
 experience, the most sensible and trustworthy boys in 
 every well-managed school. Hence it is from among 
 boys of this age that the prefects, praepostors, or moni- 
 tors, whichever name be preferred, of every school are for 
 the most part selected. Woful truly must the state of 
 a school be in which the senior boys are not on the side 
 of right ! 
 
 In preparatory schools boys of sixteen or seventeen 
 years of age do not, of course, exist. In one of these 
 the eldest boy may be a youth of about twelve or 
 thirteen, possibly fourteen, years of age. And if this 
 youth be vicious and ill-disposed, whether from bad 
 early training, inherited evil qualities, or from any 
 other cause* the little boys in that school are, indeed, 
 in a pitiable plight. A boy of this kind, especially if 
 strong in body, is capable of doing irremediable mis- 
 chief. To begin with, he may be a dreadful bully ; and 
 who is there, if he be so, to stop his bullying ? Then, 
 by both precept and example he may lead on his 
 young companions to do the most sinful things : he 
 may enlarge to them, on every convenient opportunity, 
 upon the most abominable subjects. He may be, in 
 short, a curse and a bane in the school. There is no 
 
 from their schools, had I not eventually written in their favour excel- 
 lent testimonials, I am not in a position to say. This much at all 
 events is certain : there would have been an awkwardness about their 
 removal after being already a month or so at school, that could not 
 have arisen if the head-masters in question had not been guilty of the 
 laxity and rudeness on which I reflected at the beginning of this note. 
 
1 68 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 boy, as we have seen, older than himself to suggest to 
 him a better mode of life; to show him the evil of his 
 ways ; or to keep him in order, should he refuse the 
 well-meant advice, by the strong arm of righteous 
 force. Few persons, not connected with schools, have 
 any conception of the evil that an ill-conditioned boy of 
 thirteen or fourteen, with the mind of a baby and the 
 passions of a man, is capable of doing. But is not such 
 a boy sure to be expelled in the end from any well- 
 regulated school? it may be asked. No; such a boy 
 is not “ sure to be expelled in the end from any well- 
 regulated school.” But what if he be ? Will his 
 expulsion at once purify the school ? or bring back 
 happy innocence into the hearts of his unfortunate 
 school-fellows who were bullied so long by him, who 
 have been so much corrupted ? Sow but once wild 
 oats in a field, and it will be found all but impossible 
 to eradicate them. This is literally true. And even 
 after this young bad boy has been expelled, who, pray, 
 is to be his successor as head of the school ? Is his 
 successor sure to be any better ? One thing is certain : 
 he will not be much older. And then, what of the 
 expelled boy himself ? How very little has he gained 
 by his sojourn in this preparatory school ! Is it not 
 possible that, if he had been sent, as a little boy, to 
 one of the large grammar schools where he would have 
 been one of the comparatively little boys, and kept 
 accordingly, to some extent, in order by his seniors, he 
 might have grown up a steady good lad, instead of 
 being expelled, with a bad character — his prospects of 
 happiness and success materially diminished ? 
 
 At this moment I have lying beside me on the table 
 several private letters, pamphlets, published and un- 
 
PREPARATORY SCHOOLS. 
 
 169 
 
 published, and a book or two, all of them written by 
 Englishmen of well-known experience in the scholastic 
 world, all bearing testimony to the melancholy fact 
 that some of the worst juvenile vices, practised in 
 public schools, were first learned by the boys who 
 practise them, while they were still but little more 
 than children, in preparatory schools ; and that nearly 
 all preparatory schoolboys practise these vices. 
 
 The following passages from Mr. Lyttelton’s essay 
 (already referred to on p. 113) tell a dismal story: — 
 ‘‘A clergyman tells me that he can remember in his 
 private school of about fifty boys an almost universal 
 corruption, with hardly any concealment, and the whole 
 matter openly talked of.” And again, to the same 
 effect : “ I cannot resist the conclusion that the practice 
 
 of ” (reference is here made to an odious vice) 
 
 “ among schoolboys is prevalent to a most dangerous 
 and deplorable degree, and that in a great number of 
 cases, perhaps the majority, it is learnt at the private 
 school. . . . Some learn it, almost as early, from evil 
 associates at home, either elder brothers, or schoolboys 
 on a visit in the holidays, or any chance acquaintance. 
 Now, one of these boys entering a private school, which 
 may be perfectly innocent, would corrupt the whole 
 place in a few months. Among little boys there is no 
 reserve, and no public opinion. Their curiosity is just 
 awakening, and everything prepares the way for the 
 introduction of foul practices, especially when these 
 have been taught by some public school-boy.” . . . “ I 
 have recently heard of some cases of incredible precocity 
 in vice,” continues Mr. Lyttelton, “in boys fresh from 
 a private school. But, apart from extreme instances, 
 it seems certain that boys at the present day, when 
 
170 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 they enter the public school, have almost always learnt 
 something of evil practices, though they may not have 
 been seriously entangled in them. One of the very few 
 masters I know of,” he adds, “ who habitually warns 
 
 boys both as to and ” (reference is here 
 
 made to two deadly sins not uncommon, it would 
 appear, in English schools), “ told me that, after twelve 
 years’ experience, he had a strong impression that they 
 all knew what he meant, though they were only just 
 come to a public school. A master of twenty years’ 
 experience says that ‘all the worst cases’ he knows 
 ‘ have been brought from a private school.’ ” 
 
 In a school wherein boys are prepared for the Uni- 
 versities there will naturally be found much more 
 common-sense, much more knowledge of the conse- 
 quences of evil, much more power of self-restraint, than 
 in a preparatory school, wherein the head boy may be 
 scarcely yet in his ’teens. 
 
 In all schools, whether preparatory or advanced, 
 there will, of course, be some boys much less naturally 
 well disposed than others. 
 
 The amount of mischief which one or two ill-disposed 
 boys can do is much greater in a preparatory than in 
 an advanced school. In both kinds of schools alike all 
 the boys will, no doubt, know the difference between 
 right and wrong. But there is this difference : there 
 will be more strength to resist sin among the elder boys 
 than among the little ones. The elder boy will have in 
 himself, I mean, more strengtli to resist sin — those sins 
 to indulgence in which schoolboys are especially prone. 
 Nor is this all: those who are opposed to sin in the 
 school wherein there are senior boys, will have more 
 courage in preventing and stopping its encroaches. 
 
PREPARATORY SCHOOLS. 17 1 
 
 Little fellows of twelve will generally be far more afraid 
 to oppose by word or deed two or three evil-disposed 
 school-fellows, who are physically stronger than them- 
 selves, than would schoolboys of fifteen or sixteen, to 
 oppose their evil-disposed companions. The bigger boy 
 would be less easily intimidated. The little boy will, 
 therefore, I maintain, be, as a general rule, more fortu- 
 nately circumstanced in regard to moral character in a 
 well-managed school where there are senior boys, than 
 in one in which there are only little ones. 
 
 The boys most disposed to bully in most schools are, 
 as a general rule, little fellows. A boy of twelve can 
 tease another little fellow of twelve who is weaker than 
 himself, even to the depth of misery ; and he often will do 
 so, if not restrained by his seniors. There are plenty of 
 five and ten minutes occurring in every period of twenty- 
 four hours, during which the supervision of masters 
 must be more or less withdrawn, or considerably 
 relaxed, even in schools where constant supervision 
 is the order of the day. These are the times when 
 one little fellow can torture wretchedly a companion 
 less strong than himself. 
 
 A friend of mine was once at a preparatory school, 
 and he remembers to this day with horror one thing 
 that w r as sometimes done in it. The perpetrators were 
 the biggest boys in the school. The rest of the school 
 looked on these as enormously big and strong fellows. 
 They were really only about fourteen. The detestable 
 conduct of the young wretches at the head of the school 
 was, of course, unknown to the masters, while there 
 were no senior boys to put a stop to it by sheer force, 
 or, if this they could not do themselves, report it openly 
 to a master. The rest of the boys stood in as much 
 
172 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 dread of them as a flock of sheep does of the pursuing 
 cur. My friend and his brother victims had no idea of 
 combining against these dreadful boys ; they dared not 
 report them. A sound thrashing administered to the 
 young persecutors by a senior boy would not only have 
 saved them themselves from much wrong-doing (and 
 they were not, perhaps, bad boys at heart), but some 
 boys in the school from many a bad quarter of an hour. 
 
 “ Report it openly,” I have said in the foregoing para- 
 graph — not privately. Underhand tale-telling should 
 not for an instant be tolerated ; but open reporting is 
 a very different thing. To report openly a grievous 
 offender, after due, earnest, repeated-warnings that such 
 report would be made if he did not discontinue his 
 offences, is the part of a courageous, manly, upright 
 boy: to fear to do so — injury to this or that particular 
 boy, as well as to the moral tone of the whole school, 
 being the foreseen necessary consequence of such fear 
 — is the part only of a coward.* 
 
 * The following excerpt is from Col. Chichester’s Schools : — “ The 
 principle ( i.e ., ‘of never telling’) is untrue and mischievous. In the 
 first place, it raises a false standard. It prescribes a certain rule of 
 conduct for a boy which, in after life, it would be worse than ridiculous 
 for him to carry out. Suppose a mau is assaulted in the streets by a 
 rough, or insulted in his club by one of its members, would he not, 
 and ought he not, in both cases, to at once apply to those who would 
 give him redress ? And why should that be wrong in a boy of twelve 
 which would be right in a man of thirty ? That it is useful to a boy 
 to bear suffering without complaint may now and then be true ; but it 
 is certainly not useful to another boy to be able to inflict it with 
 impunity. Again, to teach a boy that it is dishonourable to complain 
 to a master of undeserved ill-treatment is to teach him that which is 
 untrue ; for it is not, and cannot be, a dishonourable thing to do. The 
 evil must predominate over the good where a false doctrine of any sort 
 is taught. Here,” continues Col. Chichester, “ a remark of the late 
 Dr. Ward, from an article by him in the Dublin Review for October 
 1878, may have its use : ‘This aspect of public school morality is, to 
 our mind, especially odious. Talk of manliness being fostered ! 
 
PREPARATORY SCHOOLS. 
 
 173 
 
 However much men may differ among themselves as 
 to the propriety of a boy’s openly reporting to the 
 master ill-treatment suffered by himself, there is not 
 likely to be much difference of opinion as to the pro- 
 priety of his reporting, especially if he be a trusted 
 senior boy, ill-treatment suffered by one or more of his 
 schoolfellows. In fact, the trusted senior boy who 
 would look on and see, without every effort to stop it, 
 ill-treatment suffered, ever and again, by this boy or 
 that among his schoolfellows, would be alike unworthy 
 of the confidence reposed in him, neglectful of his duties 
 as a prominent member of his school community, and 
 void of, and indifferent to, that true manliness of 
 character which it should be every schoolmaster’s great 
 object to encourage among his pupils. If such a boy 
 can put down bullying, &c., without calling in a master’s 
 aid, so much the better. Let him by all means do so. 
 But if this he cannot do by himself, unaided by the 
 masters, then let him call on them for their aid. There 
 is no other course left for him to adopt. Beports to a 
 master should, no doubt, be looked on as the last re- 
 source ; but such reports — however indiscreet they may 
 occasionally be — can never, if made openly and after 
 due warning, be justly thought dishonourable. Ho 
 boy ever made, in a proper spirit, a report of this nature 
 to the Head-master, without at once strengthening his 
 own character, benefiting others, securing the respect of 
 those about him, and improving generally the moral tone 
 of his school. The practice of vicious habits among the 
 
 What can be more characteristically childish than the common stuff 
 about “ tell-tales and sneaks ? ” what can be more childish than the 
 state of mind which, instead of sympathising with the just exercise of 
 legitimate authority, sympathises rather with wanton rebellion against 
 that authority ? ’ ” 
 
174 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 boys should be dealt with by the senior boys on similar 
 principles. The practice of such habits should be put 
 down somehow — without any reporting if possible ; if 
 not, by reporting them, provided always that such 
 reports be made publicly, and after due warning to the 
 offender or offenders reported. 
 
 I am assuming all along that in the ordinary advanced 
 school the boys are ordinarily well conducted. If not, 
 it can obviously make little or no difference, so far as 
 the purity and happiness of a little boy is concerned, 
 whether he be sent to one at ten or eleven years of age 
 direct from home, or at thirteen or fourteen from a pre- 
 paratory school. In neither case will he be able to 
 escape constant contact with much sin : in either 
 case he is much to be pitied for having been sent 
 to an ill-managed school, whether preparatory or other- 
 wise. 
 
 So far, then, as bullying and early contracted vicious 
 habits are concerned, the little boy in the preparatory 
 school is — my own experience as well as that of others 
 assures me — worse off than is the little boy of the same 
 age at the ordinary well-managed grammar-school. 
 
 And why should he not be taught Latin grammar 
 and the other subjects in the usual Entrance examina- 
 tion course of the ordinary grammar-school at the 
 ordinary grammar-school itself, instead of being almost 
 constrained to go to a preparatory school to learn 
 them ? There is no reason why he should not be ; there 
 are many why he should. In the Entrance examination 
 system, therefore, there is nothing, in my opinion, to 
 approve, while there is much to condemn, seeing that 
 it almost necessitates the sending of little boys to pre- 
 paratory schools. It has all along, be it again observed, 
 
PREPARATORY SCHOOLS. 
 
 175 
 
 been assumed by me that Entrance examinations, where 
 they exist, are no mere forms, but bond fide in all 
 respects. 
 
 In the Eoyal School of Enniskillen, which for many 
 years was regarded, and rightly so, as the first school 
 in Ireland, there were no Entrance examinations. Boys 
 of ten and eleven were sent to this school knowing just 
 as much as, but no more than, little boys of this age 
 usually know — there to be taught those subjects which 
 boys are required to learn before they are admitted into 
 the corresponding grammar-schools of England. And 
 very excellently were they taught them. The boys in 
 this school, as soon as they went to it, began their Latin 
 grammar, and they remained at the school till they 
 were prepared to enter Trinity College, where they 
 very often obtained the highest honours offered then 
 for classical scholarship. In this respect the old Ennis- 
 killen school system, as I look calmly back on it after 
 many years of teaching — and I was for five years myself 
 a pupil at the school — I can see nothing to find fault 
 with, and a great deal to cordially commend. 
 
 On the whole, the Irish parent has, in my opinion, 
 much reason to congratulate himself that, in case he 
 educate his sons in Ireland, he will not be obliged to 
 send them in the first instance to a preparatory school. 
 In the Irish grammar school in which they as little 
 boys begin their education, classical and mathematical, 
 in this same school they may continue and end it.* 
 
 * “The Head-master of the City of London School,” writes Mr. 
 Mahaffy in Commissioners ’ School Report (p. 262), “ particularly pointed 
 out to me the great ignorance of the boys sent to him, when tested by 
 the easiest possible Entrance examination. He considered this evil to 
 arise from small and obscure preparatory schools in London, managed 
 by incompetent persons, where the boys were taught nothing soundly.” 
 
( 176 ) 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 “SUPERANNUATION EXAMINATIONS ” IN ENGLISH 
 SCHOOLS , WHY OBJECTIONABLE. 
 
 “ But are there not superannuation examinations in 
 English schools ? And are not boys compelled to leave 
 school unless fit to be promoted in due time into a 
 higher class ? Is not this an excellent plan ? ” 
 
 There are no such examinations in the schools to 
 which Irish boys are mostly sent. In the principal 
 English schools no doubt boys are expected to rise into 
 a higher class at a certain time. Very little, however, 
 is required of them ; and so it happens, that of the 1500 
 or 1600 Irish boys who go to English schools every 
 year exceedingly few are obliged to leave simply because 
 they are not fit for promotion when the rest of their 
 class-fellows are.* 
 
 The superannuation or promotion rule seems to me, 
 indeed, to be quite out of place in any country in 
 which the secondary schools are conducted on no fixed 
 principle, and in which every schoolmaster may do 
 pretty much what seems best in his own eyes, the 
 schools not being under Government control. 
 
 In Germany it is different: there all schools are 
 
 * The reader will form some idea of the difficulty of these examina- 
 tions from the allusion made to them in the latter part of the letter 
 quoted on p. 140. 
 
SUPERANNUATION EXAMINATIONS. 1 77 
 
 carried on according to a regular systematic plan, and 
 are under Government control. There, consequently, if 
 by reason of idleness, or for any other such cause, a boy 
 is obliged to leave one school, he will not be admitted 
 into another of the same kind. The consciousness of 
 this fact doubtless exercises a wholesome influence on 
 the general conduct of the German school-boy, and 
 induces him to put his shoulder more energetically to 
 the wheel than he otherwise would be disposed to do. 
 But of what use is the superannuation rule in a 
 country like England ? In England a boy, if removed 
 from one secondary school, will be received with 
 open arms into another — this other being, in point 
 of efficiency and training power, possibly even supe- 
 rior to that from which he had been removed. Every 
 schoolmaster knows this, and so does every school- 
 boy. 
 
 Nor is this all. Why should a boy who is really 
 good and honourable be forced to leave a school because 
 he has failed to get promotion, whether from over-love 
 of games, stupidity, or any other cause, along with the 
 rest of his class-fellows ? Why expel a boy, or, if this 
 word be considered too harsh, insist on a boy’s leaving 
 his school, because he is, let us say, stupid? Why 
 should not stupid boys be taught by this school-master 
 as well as by that ? Should a stupid boy be over- 
 pressed ? Is the head-master of an Endowed School 
 justified in saying, “ Give me all the bright and clever 
 and well-prepared boys. Do you take all the others : 
 with the latter I will have nothing to do ? ” If a 
 boy’s moral influence among his school-fellows is 
 decidedly salutary, is it wise to insist upon his removal, 
 
 M 
 
178 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 be he never so stupid ? These are questions which I 
 beg to propose to the consideration of all persons, most 
 of all to that of the advocates of the superannuation 
 examination system in schools. 
 
 It can never be well for any schoolmaster to manage 
 his school in absolute bondage to arbitrary rules. 
 Assuming that in English schools the rule in regard 
 to promotion does exist, and is on all occasions rigidly 
 enforced, then, I maintain, injury must often be done 
 by the enforcing of it, not only to this or that indi- 
 vidual boy, but to the school as a whole. An English 
 schoolmaster ought to be perfectly free to abide by the 
 rule or to relax it, at his discretion — to act, in short, 
 according to circumstances in the matter. 
 
 I have known big boys who were of the greatest 
 possible benefit to a school — honourable, manly, amiable, 
 straightforward, helpful to the masters, but yet so 
 stupid at lessons (they were stupid at nothing else) as 
 to be unable to get promotion with their class-fellows. 
 Why should such boys have been compelled to leave 
 a school in which they were exercising a decided 
 influence for good ? That they were not clever was not 
 their fault : they did their best at their lessons : boys 
 and masters all knew this. Their example was in no 
 way harmful. Their class-fellows were mostly a year 
 or two younger than they were — that was all. To force 
 boys of the kind to leave a school, because their classical 
 and mathematical attainments are below a certain 
 arbitrarily fixed intellectual standard, seems to me to 
 argue some extraordinary mental or moral defect in the 
 schoolmaster who is responsible for their compulsory 
 withdrawal. 
 
SUPERANNUATION EXAMINATIONS. 
 
 179 
 
 If the rule in regard to promotion be not consistently 
 enforced, then, of course, the less said about it, and the 
 great benefit it is supposed to confer on the English 
 public schools, the better. In the minor English schools 
 there is no such rule at all. 
 
( i8o ) 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 THE FORCE OF FASHION IN IMPELLING IRISH 
 PARENTS TO SEND THEIR SONS TO SCHOOL 
 IN ENGLAND. 
 
 “ Supposing that the Recorder of Dublin is right in 
 regard to the ‘ numberless complaints of the boys who 
 have brought home to Ireland proficiency in athletics 
 only/ * is it not extraordinary/' it may be asked, 
 “ that so many hundreds of Irish boys should notwith- 
 standing be yearly sent to English schools for their 
 education ? ” 
 
 Yes ; most extraordinary. But there is no end to 
 the number of extraordinary things which, in civilised 
 no less than in uncivilised communities, men and women 
 allow themselves to be forced to do by the tyranny of 
 fashion. “We laugh heartily/' writes Greville, “to 
 see a whole flock of sheep jump because one did so ; 
 might not one imagine that superior beings do the same 
 by us, and for exactly the same reason ? ” 
 
 It is the leading men in Ireland who are most con- 
 spicuous in preferring English to Irish schools. They 
 set the example to the rest. It is they who lead the 
 fashion. 
 
 “ ’Tis a common proof, 
 
 That lowliness is young ambition’s ladder, 
 
 See quotation from the “ Irish Schoolboy Exodus,” p. 81. 
 
FORCE OF FASHION. 
 
 181 
 
 Whereto the climber-upward turns his face : 
 
 But when he once attains the utmost round, 
 
 He then unto the ladder turns his hack, 
 
 Looks in the clouds, scorning the base degrees 
 By which he did ascend.” * 
 
 It seems marvellous that Irishmen who, humanly 
 speaking, owe so much to Irish schools so far as they 
 themselves are concerned, should treat them with such 
 contumely where their sons are concerned — and all the 
 more so, when one reflects that Irish schools have cer- 
 tainly not deteriorated in regard to their training and 
 teaching powers within the last fifty years. On the 
 contrary ; if anything, they have advanced in point of 
 general efficiency during this period. How differently 
 do men of position and distinction in England treat the 
 schools at which they were themselves educated ! In 
 England a parent sends his son to the school at which 
 he himself was when a boy ; and he, the parent, probably 
 was sent there because it was there that his father was 
 educated, and his grandfather before him — and, this, 
 although possibly neither he himself nor his father or 
 grandfather made while at school any progress in 
 mathematics, classics, modem languages, or anything 
 else. Neither does the parent, under the circumstances, 
 pause to consider who may be the present head-master 
 of his old school : with his particular name he does not 
 especially concern himself. It is to the school where 
 he spent his own boyhood he desires to send his son — 
 be the head-master Dr. Brown, Jones, or Smith. What 
 does it matter what his name is ? The parent takes it 
 for granted that, whoever he is, he would not be at the 
 head of such a school unless he were in every respect 
 fit for the post. 
 
 Jul. Cses., ii. I. 
 
182 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 It is not so in Ireland. Irish school-boys may enter 
 a University and gain all sorts of honours direct from 
 their school : from the University they may enter upon 
 their professions, rising rapidly into judges, bishops, 
 famous engineers, and doctors of well-known worth. 
 In due time they have to consider to what schools they 
 will send their sons — when the only question with them 
 is, not “ to what school,” but “ to what English school ” 
 they should send them. It never dawns on them, to 
 judge from results, when this important point comes 
 before the family circle for consideration, that there are 
 in existence any schools in Ireland wherein still, even 
 as in their own boyhood’s days, classics and mathema- 
 tics and the other school subjects are taught to boys 
 effectually. 
 
 There is a strange absence of esprit-de- corps in Ireland 
 among the upper and middle classes — certainly among 
 the upper and middle classes of that Church to which 
 I myself belong. And it is to this absence of esprit- 
 de-corps, no doubt, that we must ascribe in a large 
 measure the way in which “the climber-upward,” 
 “ when he once attains the utmost round,” so often 
 “ Unto the ladder turns his back, 
 
 Looks in the clouds, scorning the base degrees 
 By which he did ascend.” 
 
 But, perhaps, the most strange thing of all in connec- 
 tion with this matter is this, that if you ask one of these 
 gentlemen why it is that he does not think of sending 
 his sons to an Irish school, he will tell you something 
 about the superiority of English schools in all matters 
 pertaining to accent and manners. This always seems 
 to me to be a reflection on the manners and accent 
 of those very persons themselves, if solely educated in 
 
FORCE OF FASHION. 
 
 183 
 
 Ireland, who allege this as a reason for not sending 
 their sons to school in Ireland. 
 
 I once asked a distinguished Irish lawyer, practising 
 at the Irish Bar, who was speaking in this way, whether 
 he should not be content if his sons should speak with 
 as good an accent and have as good manners as himself. 
 My friend's manners were charming, and his accent was 
 that of a refined and educated gentleman. He had been 
 educated entirely in Ireland — never having been in 
 England in his life, until he went over to eat his law 
 dinners at the Middle Temple. My friend merely 
 smiled at my question. His sons were sent to an Eng- 
 lish school. In making his choice he was acting, he 
 no doubt felt, as his compeers were all acting : he was 
 going with the multitude ; and in doing so he felt he 
 was acting on what is generally supposed to be “ the 
 safe side.” He yielded to the tyranny of fashion. 
 What a number of things does fashion, which may or 
 may not be founded on what is reasonable, lead men to 
 do and not to do ! 
 
 Irish parents will probably continue to the end of the 
 chapter to send their sons to English schools, if they can 
 afford the expense — stolidly indifferent as to the quality 
 of the education which in these schools they are likely 
 to receive. But this does not prove that it is right or 
 wise so to do. It is possible to follow the example of 
 this, that, or some other person, even as it is that of the 
 multitude, and yet go wrong. 
 
 Many of the distinguished Irishmen on the lists in 
 Chapter VI. are now old men, fathers of sons who can 
 now no longer be called young ; others in the list are 
 the fathers of boys still young enough to be at school — 
 and of these many are at English schools. Many of the 
 
1 84 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 now elderly sons of the old men first mentioned were 
 educated at English schools. Those who were have not 
 as yet by any means equalled their fathers as men of 
 mind and action. How the boys who are now at English 
 schools will turn out, it is, of course, impossible to say. 
 They may be superior to their fathers ; they may not 
 be. But with the facts mentioned in Chapters I., II., 
 III., IV., &c., staring us in the face, we should certainly 
 not be justified in expecting of them much. 
 
 Some years ago an Irish schoolmaster was asked by 
 a stranger to furnish him with some documentary evi- 
 dence as to the teaching powers of his school. Irish 
 schoolmasters are by no means independent of the 
 public, like many of their great brethren in England : 
 this one was not, at all events. And so he determined 
 to supply the inquiring parent with the evidence he 
 sought for. He bethought himself at once of one of his 
 old pupils, on whose education he had spent a great 
 deal of time and thought and care for seven consecutive 
 years, and who had rewarded all his labours and anxie- 
 ties by gaining at the university, to which he went direct 
 from school, the most brilliant and valuable honours 
 throughout his entire undergraduate course, and a Fellow- 
 ship shortly afterwards. “ He,” joyfully said the school- 
 master to himself, “ will be only too pleased to give me 
 the testimonial I ask for.” But in this he was mistaken. 
 His old pupil assured him that he really could not give 
 the requested testimonial. The reasons he gave for his 
 refusal were these : (i.) that he had already been well 
 grounded bv his good father before he went to school — 
 at the age of nine ; (ii.) that he had not learned so much 
 from the Head-master himself as from the two assistant 
 masters, Mr. and Mr. , by one or other of 
 
FORCE OF FASHION. 
 
 185 
 
 whom he had been taught — ably and carefully, he felt 
 bound to admit — nearly all the time (seven years) he was 
 at school ; (iii.) that it was not till he had been a year in 
 the university — in short, till he was seventeen, that he 
 could write continuous Greek prose at all fluently ; (iv.) 
 that he had been obliged to learn while at school three 
 books of which he did not think much, viz., Alvarez' 
 “ Prosody ” and Arnold's “ Greek and Latin Prose Com- 
 positions ; ” (v., and lastly) that Psychology was not 
 taught in the school — and that till Psychology was 
 taught in schools he did not think that schoolboy edu- 
 cation could be ever perfect; and that, therefore, &c. 
 The poor schoolmaster thought to himself that he might 
 have had something to say to the first four alleged 
 grounds for the refusal of his request. But there was 
 evidently, he felt, no getting over the Psychology diffi- 
 culty. Psychology! From the very thought of it he 
 shrank back in dismay. 
 
 It must not, however, be thought that all old Irish 
 schoolboys are thus-minded. Some of them are, let us 
 remember with gratitude, in all that concerns their old 
 schools and schoolmasters, generous and just, tender 
 and true ; worthy of all honour, all respect. 
 
 We have looked at one picture — a not particularly 
 attractive one. Let us look at another. The following 
 extract is from Bosworth Smith's “ Life of Lord Law- 
 rence " : — 
 
 “It was on Christmas Day in 1850, in Anarkulli, in the 
 Punjab; Lord Lawrence, Sir Henry Lawrence, and Sir 
 Robert Montgomery were sitting together, when Sir Henry 
 turned abruptly to his brother and said, ‘ I wonder what 
 the two poor old Simpsons are doing at this moment, and 
 whether they have any better dinner than usual to-day.’ ” 
 
1 86 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 [The Simpsons, I may explain parenthetically, were formerly 
 assistant-masters in Foyle College. They were twins, and 
 in by no means affluent circumstances. Assistant-masters in 
 Irish schools had, I suspect, a rougher time of it then than 
 they have now.] “ With the impulsive generosity which 
 formed so prominent a part of his character, Sir Henry 
 exclaimed, ‘Til tell you what we will do. The Simpsons 
 must be very old, and nearly blind, I should think ; they 
 cannot be well off ; let us each put down ^50, and send it 
 to them to-morrow, as a ‘Christmas box from a far-off 
 land/ with the good wishes of three of their old pupils, now 
 members of the Punjab Board of Administration at Lahore.’ 
 4 All right/ said John, ‘I’ll give ^50.’ 4 All right/ said 
 
 Montgomery, 4 I’ll give another.’ The cheques were drawn, 
 and exchanged on the morning for a draft on England, 
 which was duly despatched. The kind message, with its 
 enclosure, found its way safely across the ocean. Weeks 
 passed by, each spent in hard work and rough work, and 
 the subject was nearly forgotten, when one morning amongst 
 the pile of letters brought in by the dawk there was one 
 bearing an Irish post-mark. It was from the old Simpson 
 brothers at Londonderry. The characters were written in 
 a tremulous hand, and in many places were almost illegible 
 from the writer’s tears, which had evidently fallen almost 
 faster than he wrote. Thanks to Sir K. Montgomery’s 
 memory, the main points of that letter, though it has un- 
 fortunately got mislaid, are recalled. It began — 4 My dear 
 kind boys ; ’ but the pen of the old man had afterwards 
 been drawn through the word 4 boys/ and there had been 
 substituted for it the word 4 friends.’ It went on to thank 
 the donors, in the name of his brother as well as himself, 
 for their most generous gift, which he said would go far to 
 keep them from want during the short time that might be 
 left to them ; but far above the actual value of the present 
 was the preciousness of the thought that they had not been 
 
FORCE OF FASHION. 
 
 187 
 
 forgotten by their own pupils in what seemed to be the 
 very high position to which they had all three risen. Poor 
 old fellow, he did not know what the ‘ Board of Adminis- 
 tration’ meant, but he felt sure it was something very 
 important, and he added, with childish simplicity, that he 
 had looked out the Punjab in the old school' atlas which 
 they had so often used together, but he could not find 
 either it or Lahore ! ‘ Oh,’ said Sir Henry to Dr. Hatha- 
 
 way, 4 if you could only see, as I see it now, that grimy old 
 atlas, growing still more grimy by its use during the thirty 
 years which have passed since I knew it, and the poor old 
 fellow trying to find in it what it does not contain ! ’ ” 
 
 But, alas, the Lawrence brothers and Sir Bobert 
 Montgomery are not Irishmen to be met with every day ! 
 
 One distinguished Irishman, resident in Ireland, in 
 answer to my query where was he educated, replied, 
 “ At Cheltenham College,” ignoring the fact, as I sub- 
 sequently ascertained, that before he went to Chelten- 
 ham he had been for some years at Dr. Stackpoole’s 
 once famous school at Kingstown. The old story : he 
 scorned what seemed to him “ the base degrees.” 
 Whatever this gentleman learned by his sojourn in 
 England, he evidently did not learn what he might so 
 well have learned there — patriotism, straightforward- 
 ness, and self-respect. It was the dread of being 
 unfashionable that, no doubt, prompted the uncandid, 
 weak reply. 
 
 A wealthy and learned Irish lawyer, who had ac- 
 quired all his knowledge as well as all his wealth in 
 Ireland, being recently asked where his son was being 
 educated, promptly replied, “ Oh, in England, of 
 course ! ” So great is the force of fashion. 
 
 Such stories might be multiplied to any extent. 
 
( 1 88 ) 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 “ BUT IS NOT AN ENGLISH ACCENT WORTH 
 ACQUIRING ?" 
 
 No, certainly not ; at least, if an English accent means — 
 and I do not know what else it can mean — the intona- 
 tion and the tone of voice in pronunciation, as well as 
 the pronunciation x^elf, of some Englishman or another 
 in some part of England or another. “ Some Englishman 
 or another in some part of England or another,” I say, 
 because I have never heard of one accent being specially 
 called “ the ” English accent more than another. How- 
 ever, even if there should be — and I frankly admit my 
 ignorance on the subject — one English accent more cor- 
 rect than another, I should nevertheless give the same 
 answer to the question that I have given, viz., a decided 
 No. No; the English accent is not worth acquiring. 
 Hundreds and hundreds of Irishmen — statesmen, digni- 
 taries of the Church, lawyers, doctors, artists, soldiers, 
 scholars, and the rest — have risen to fame and fortune 
 in both ancient and modern times, though speaking 
 with what is called an “ Irish brogue ” — or rather mis- 
 called, for it is absurd to apply the word “ brogue ” to 
 the accent of the educated classes in Ireland.* 
 
 * “A brogue,” says Dr. Jamieson, “is a coarse and slight kind of 
 shoe made of horse-leather, much used by the Highlanders, and by 
 those who go to shoot upon the hUls ; ” and be derives the word from 
 
AN ENGLISH ACCENT . 
 
 189 
 
 No one would think of inventing a word that would 
 apply especially to the accent of the lower classes of 
 England, and of then applying this word to the accents 
 of the upper and middle classes of that country. 
 “Jeames” and Sairy Gamp did not speak with the 
 same accent as Thackeray or Charles Dickens — and 
 yet each of the four personages named spoke with “ an 
 English accent.” But though the difference between 
 the accents of the uneducated and educated classes in 
 Ireland is quite as wide as that between the accents of 
 the uneducated and educated classes in England, people 
 nevertheless stupidly persist in using the one and the 
 same word “ brogue ” to describe the accent of all 
 persons in Ireland who do not happen to speak with an 
 English accent. Some people, inde'Ctf, appear to regard 
 this misapplication of the word as humorous, and smile 
 every time they misapply it at their little joke. 
 
 In all countries — in Ireland no less than in the rest — 
 the accents of the rich and of the poor, of the high and 
 the low, of the educated and of the uneducated, are 
 different. There is no more fear of the sons of middle- 
 class parents in Ireland learning to speak with the 
 accent of the Irish lower orders than there is of the sons 
 of middle-class parents in England learning to speak 
 with the accent of the English lower orders. And that 
 middle-class parents in England are not afraid of their 
 sons learning to speak with the accent of their own 
 lower orders, is made manifest by their conduct; for 
 they do not hesitate to educate their sons in their own 
 country. Obviously, if they were afraid of their sons 
 “ catching ” the accent of their own lower orders, they 
 
 the Irish Gael, Brog, a shoe — hence the application of the term to the 
 intonation in pronunciation of those in Ireland who wore the brogue. 
 
190 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 would send them for their education, after the prevailing 
 Irish fashion, to schools in other countries, so as to 
 avoid the contagion. 
 
 But, perhaps, some one may say that the accent of 
 the middle and lower classes in England is preferable 
 to the accent of the middle and lower classes in Ireland, 
 class for class, respectively. It is difficult to imagine 
 any one saying this except for the purpose of special 
 pleading, and making good his case at all hazards. 
 
 As to which of these accents is preferable, that of the 
 middle or lower classes in England, or of the middle 
 or lower classes in Ireland, class for class, respectively, 
 it is entirely a question of taste. There is no standard 
 of perfection in the matter of accent — apart, I mean, 
 from that of mere pronunciation — to enable one to arrive 
 at a decision. Every one, therefore, has a perfect right to 
 choose for himself which of these two accents he prefers ; 
 and, that, without any fear of having a justifiable charge 
 brought against him of having violated any well-known 
 and authoritative law of criticism or canon of good 
 taste. 
 
 Some Irish people, no doubt, there are, who affect to 
 see nothing good of any kind in Ireland or the Irish. 
 Such as these may deceive themselves, in their pre- 
 judice, into thinking the accent of the middle or lower 
 classes in England superior, respectively, to that of the 
 middle or lower classes in Ireland. But, as I have said, 
 it is difficult to imagine how they can make such a 
 choice. To my mind, the accent of, let us say, the 
 Cockney or of the Somersetshire labourer, the Lanca- 
 shire miner, or Yorkshire farm-servant, is infinitely 
 worse than that of the most illiterate and poorest 
 peasant in any part of Ireland — so much worse that I 
 
AN ENGLISH ACCENT. 
 
 191 
 
 cannot understand any person, with the least taste or 
 ear for melody, making any comparison between them. 
 What accent in England — I care not to what rank the 
 speaker belongs — can be compared for sweetness with 
 that of the Kerry people ? 
 
 Irish parents ought to know that they cannot reason- 
 ably expect their sons to learn to speak with an equally 
 pure English accent, if sent indiscriminately to schools 
 in Hampshire, Lancashire, Middlesex, Somersetshire — 
 or any other shire in England in which the people speak 
 with a distinct accent of their own. 
 
 It should be hardly necessary to say that even edu- 
 cated Englishmen do not always speak with the same 
 “ English accent.’’ There have been many distinguished 
 Englishmen whose accent was exceedingly peculiar. 
 
 And surely, whatever may be said in favour of a good 
 English accent, nothing whatever can be said in favour 
 of a bad one by even the most English-accent-loving of 
 Irish parents. 
 
 A bad accent — which practically means, I presume, 
 a mispronunciation of English words and a false into- 
 nation in the pronunciation of them, coupled with an 
 uncultured and unrefined tone of voice — is certainly 
 not to be desired for one’s son, whether this bad accent 
 be a bad English or a bad Irish one. 
 
 If the Irish parent is obliged to make a choice 
 between the two, I know of no reasons why he should 
 give the preference to the bad accent of the country 
 that is not his own. 
 
 That a good English accent cannot possibly be 
 acquired in any school in which there are as many 
 Irish boys as English, still less in one in which there 
 are more Irish boys than English — and all the less so 
 
i 9 2 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 if the majority of the boys in the school are of a some- 
 what vulgar type — cannot be too emphatically insisted 
 on by any one answering the contemptible question at 
 the head of this chapter; for contemptible I cannot 
 help regarding it. Yet, even though it be so, it could 
 not, I felt, be wisely evaded in a treatise of this kind. 
 
 Why should an Irish parent desire that his son 
 should speak with any sort of an English accent, good 
 or bad ? Why, most of all, should he do so if he does 
 not speak with an English accent himself, and if he 
 be obliged to confess, if pressed upon the subject, that 
 his Irish accent has never in any way militated against 
 his own social or professional interests, or his happiness 
 as a man ? 
 
 One cannot go to a dinner party, ball, or assemblage 
 of any other kind in any part of Ireland — north, south, 
 east, or west — without meeting with many folk, grand- 
 parents and children, young men and maidens, who 
 speak with an unquestionably Irish accent ; but who 
 thinks the less of any of them on this account ? Brogue 
 or no brogue, the boys grow into men, the men become 
 honoured and distinguished; the maidens are wooed, 
 and won ; the brides become the mothers of sons and 
 daughters to be proud of — yes, all this, though all 
 speaking, young and old, male and female, with a 
 so-called Irish “ brogue ” 
 
 And then it seems to me to argue such a want of 
 respect for country, not to speak of self-respect, for the 
 inhabitants of one country to be ambitious to speak 
 with the accent of another — the inhabitants of that 
 other speaking the same language as themselves. The 
 middle-class Irish father might assuredly be content to 
 think that his sons speak with the same accent as their 
 
AN ENGLISH ACCENT . 
 
 193 
 
 mother and as their grand-parents spoke with, and as he 
 himself speaks with. Some of the most respected and 
 popular of living Irishmen speak with an Irish accent ; 
 nor are they ashamed of it. Why should they be ? 
 With their present accent they have raised themselves, 
 by means of their ability and honourable exertions, 
 into conspicuous and honourable positions. The very 
 thought of such men as these being ashamed of their 
 accent ! Who can think of such a thing without a 
 smile ? 
 
 It should not be, of course, for a moment assumed — 
 and yet how often it is assumed ! — that an Irishman’s 
 accent must be necessarily vulgar because it points to 
 the Emerald Isle as the land of his birth. 
 
 An Englishman’s accent points in general to England 
 as the land of his birth ; but an Englishman’s accent 
 is not considered necessarily vulgar on this account. 
 Who ever heard of an Englishman who, being ashamed 
 of his accent, sent his sons to school in any other 
 country than his own that they might learn to speak 
 with a better one ? 
 
 An Irishman may speak with a decidedly Irish 
 accent, and yet his grammar may be faultless; his 
 diction classical — free alike from affectation, solecisms, 
 grandiloquence, and slang ; his style excellent ; his 
 manner of speaking impressive, eloquent, persuasive; 
 his tone of voice gentle and refined ; and his pronun- 
 ciation perfectly correct. 
 
 In regard to the pronunciation of English words, 
 there is no reason whatever why, when there is a 
 difference of opinion as to the pronunciation of this 
 word or of that — and no standard of pronunciation can 
 be so fixed as to settle definitely the pronunciation of 
 
 N 
 
194 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 every word — the educated Irish gentleman should not 
 be as good an authority as any no better educated 
 gentleman in England. 
 
 Speaking of Sheridan’s Pronouncing English Dic- 
 tionary, which had just been published at the time, Dr. 
 Johnson asks, “ What, sir, entitles Sheridan to fix the 
 pronunciation of English ? ” And he goes on to say, 
 “ If he says he will fix it after the example of the best 
 company, why, they differ among themselves.” * 
 
 What reasonable cause to lament or mourn over 
 his lot has an Irishman, because he is unable to 
 pass himself off — so very Irish is his accent— as a 
 pure son of English soil ? Should the Irish alone of 
 nations be ashamed of their accent ? 
 
 To all this may be added, that a brief sojourn in Eng- 
 land is by no means sure to secure an English accent. 
 Eew Irishmen speak with an English accent, who, 
 having lived in Ireland until they went to school in 
 England, returned to reside in Ireland after they had 
 left school; and it is just as well that they do not. 
 
 It is an egregious error, yet a very common one, to 
 conclude that an Irish boy is sure to “pick up” an 
 English accent, so as to retain it as “ a joy for ever,” 
 simply by sojourning in England for five or six, or 
 even seven years ; and this he is obviously all the less 
 
 * The example which Johnson gave of this difference “of the best 
 company among themselves ” as to the proper pronunciation of English 
 words is amusing. “When I published the plan of my Dictionary,” 
 he said, “ Lord Chesterfield told me that the word great should be pro- 
 nounced so as to rhyme to state ; and Sir William Yonge sent me 
 word that it should be pronounced so as to rhyme to seat , and that 
 none but an Irishman would pronounce it grait. Now here were two 
 men of the highest rank, the one the best speaker in the House of 
 Lords, the other the best speaker in the House of Commons, differing 
 entirely.’’ 
 
AN ENGLISH ACCENT. 
 
 195 
 
 likely to do, if (a) lie spends his vacations in Ireland, 
 and if (/3) — a not unusual circumstance — there are at 
 his “ English” school almost as many Irish boys as 
 English — possibly, even more. It requires a musical 
 ear and a considerable power of mimicry, conscious or 
 unconscious, to contract, so as to retain it, any one 
 else’s manner of speaking. These qualities are not 
 possessed by everybody. Irish boys who do not possess 
 them do not readily pick up the 'English accent ; while 
 those who do are naturally just the very persons who 
 most quickly lose it, falling soon back into their own 
 old Irish accent when they return to their own country 
 from their English school. 
 
 I know many elderly gentlemen who were educated 
 at English schools. Some of these do not now possess 
 even a trace of that English accent with which they 
 once, to some extent, spoke, and for the acquisition of 
 which their fond parents sacrificed so much, paid so 
 dearly. 
 
 It is certainly better not to speak with an English 
 accent at all than to speak with a partly English, partly 
 Irish one. Incongruities, whether in speech, or a poem, 
 or a painting, or dress, or anything else, ought to be 
 avoided ; unity and simplicity to be aimed at : 
 
 Humano capiti cervicem jpictor equinam 
 Jung ere si relit , &c.* 
 
 A semi- Irish, semi-English accent — the English 
 element in the mixture being excessively faulty, and 
 both elements decidedly prominent — has no charms 
 for any one possessed of the least good taste or 
 common-sense. To none can such a hybrid compound 
 be less attractive than to the educated English gentle- 
 
 * Hor. A. P. i., &c. 
 
1 96 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 man. To what educated gentleman, indeed, can vile 
 adulteration of speech be pleasing ? 
 
 And then, throughout all this discussion, the Irish 
 parent who is ambitious of an English accent for his 
 sons, ought to remember, and take heart as he does so, 
 the facts stated in Chapter III., namely, that nearly all 
 the living Irishmen of distinction were educated as boys 
 in Ireland. How few are there, it may be asked, of 
 those whose names are given in Chapter YI. who do not 
 speak with more or less of an Irish accent ? How many 
 of them speak with a most pronounced one ! And yet 
 what matters it ? An Irish accent has not, as is evident, 
 prevented large numbers of Irish schoolboys in the 
 past from rising to the highest position, social and 
 political, in the country, as judges, bishops, Members of 
 Parliament, and what not: it does not prevent them 
 now ; and it will not, we may be sure, prevent them in 
 the future. 
 
 Let the Irish middle-class parent, then, look forward 
 with confidence to his sons' future careers, as he con- 
 templates the goodly array of Irish names given in 
 Chapter YI., and rest assured that his own sons, too, 
 may, in due time, succeed in life quite as well as did any 
 of those whose names are recorded in that chapter, 
 if only they have as much ability and industry ; yes, 
 even though they may now be receiving their educa- 
 tion at an Irish school, and may be, consequently, 
 pretty sure to speak with an Irish accent all the days 
 of their life. 
 
 “ Little aberrations ” (in accent), as Dr. Johnson ob- 
 served, “ are of no disadvantage ” — no ; nor great ones 
 either, as is shown by the splendidly successful careers 
 of many Irishmen, who have been quite remarkable for 
 
AN ENGLISH ACCENT . 
 
 197 
 
 such aberrations, but who have been good and great, 
 loved and respected, “ for a’ that.” * 
 
 * This observation was made by Dr. Johnson, it is true, when speak- 
 ing of the Scotch accent. But it is, obviously, equally true in regard 
 to the Irish accent. This extract from the paragraph in Johnsoniana 
 in which the quoted observation (which I have italicised) occurs, will 
 interest the reader : — “Sir Alexander Macdonald said to him, ‘I have 
 been correcting several Scottish accents in my friend Boswell. I doubt, 
 sir, if any Scotchman ever attains to a perfect English pronunciation.’ 
 J OHNSON — ‘ Why, sir, few of them do, because they do not persevere after 
 acquiring a certain degree of it. ... . Sir, when people watch me 
 narrowly, and I do not watch myself, they will find me out to be of a 
 particular county. In the same manner, Dunning may be found out to 
 be a Devonshire man ; so most Scotchmen may be found out. But, sir, 
 little aberrations are of no disadvantage A ' 1 
 
( 198 ) 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 “HAS NOT THE PREFECTORIAL SYSTEM THAT OB- 
 TAINS IN SO MANY ENGLISH SCHOOLS MUCH TO 
 RECOMMEND IT ? ” ON “ SCHOOLBO Y HONO UR.” 
 
 I gladly take this opportunity of entering my protest 
 against the governing of boys by means of prefects — 
 the essential feature of the English Grammar School 
 system. The prefectorial system seems to me to be 
 essentially and radically wrong, for the three following 
 reasons : — 
 
 (i.) In the first place, its chief characteristic consists 
 in the bribing of boys to do their duty — and, that, by 
 means of ill-chosen bribes. Senior boys ought to be 
 taught to do their duty towards their younger school- 
 fellows and each other because it is right for them so to 
 do ; and not because they will have this privilege granted 
 to them, or that point of discipline relaxed in their 
 favour, if only they will be so good as to do what they 
 are plainly bound to do — rewards or no rewards — by the 
 obligations of Christianity. Of one thing, at least, senior 
 boys should certainly be taught to have no manner of 
 doubt, namely, that it is their duty, whether they are 
 rewarded for it or not, to do their best to keep all their 
 younger schoolfellows out of sin and trouble — to use, 
 in short, all the talents with which a merciful God in 
 His goodness endowed them, and all their opportunities, 
 aright. These duties are, in fact, especially imposed by 
 
PREFECTORIAL SYSTEM . 
 
 199 
 
 their masters upon Prefects; but all senior boys are 
 Prefects in the eyes of God — who Himself imposes upon 
 them these very prefectorial duties, which accordingly 
 they certainly should not be paid for performing, and 
 which they cannot without sin neglect. Their very 
 seniority and superiority in the school imposes upon 
 them, whether they like it or not, extra duties of a 
 prefectorial nature towards the other boys in the school. 
 To punish in some way senior boys for neglecting these 
 duties, is right and proper ; to reward them for attend- 
 ing to them is at once injurious to the boys in practice 
 and utterly wrong in principle. Perhaps, we should 
 here mention that by “ senior boys ” we mean leading 
 and influential boys — leading and influential, no matter 
 whether from their age and size, or from their mental 
 and moral qualifications. All boys, even the very 
 smallest, can exercise upon their companions some in- 
 fluence for good : from those who have most influence, 
 no matter from what source acquired, most should 
 certainly be expected, quite independently of whether 
 they are called Prefects or not. They are Prefects, at 
 all events, in the sight of God — and should be required 
 to act as such by their schoolmasters — from the very 
 fact of their leading position in the school ; and they 
 will most assuredly be accounted amongst those who 
 knew their master’s will and did it not, who neglected 
 their opportunities, and buried their talents in the 
 ground, if they shirk their responsibilities, and refuse 
 to do their duties, simply because they are not, for- 
 sooth ! rewarded for doing them — not regularly ap- 
 pointed, and called by the name of “ Prefects.” 
 
 (ii.) And then, in the second place, in schools where 
 the prefectorial system prevails there is always sure to 
 
200 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 be a kind of feeling obtaining amongst the many boys 
 who are not Prefects, that the Prefects, and they alone, 
 are at all called upon to uphold discipline, that they 
 alone ought by right to be steady and industrious — 
 honoured and rewarded as they are for being so; but 
 that, as to the rest of them, from them — not being Pre- 
 fects — little or nothing should be expected ; and that 
 they surely may with a clear conscience break the rules 
 of the school as much as ever they choose, and give 
 as much trouble as ever they like, so far as any question 
 of honour or duty is concerned. 
 
 (iii.) Thirdly, in Prefect-governed schools there are 
 always some masters who are convinced, who choose to 
 be convinced — the wish is often father to the thought — 
 that Prefects will do nothing wrong, and who act accord- 
 ingly — with disastrous consequences, of course, to the 
 morale of the school. Prefects, alas ! are not always 
 trustworthy : one who is not may do endless harm. 
 
 These three objections to the prefectorial system — 
 namely, that (i.) it suggests to the senior boys a wrong 
 motive for well-doing ; that (ii.) it affords to the majority 
 of boys a constant excuse for neglecting to do any duties 
 that are avoidable; and (iii.) that where it obtains masters 
 are too apt to live in a FooTs Paradise — seem to me to 
 be insurmountable. There are other objections to the 
 system besides these three — objections connected with 
 the difficulty of properly carrying it out in detail. 
 What thoroughly salutary privileges by way of reward, 
 for example, should be granted to Prefects ? Should Pre- 
 fects be allowed to enforce obedience to their legitimate 
 orders ? If so, by what means should they enforce it ? 
 If by means of corporal punishment, should they be 
 allowed to administer this punishment uncontrolled 
 
PREFECTORIAL SYSTEM . 
 
 201 
 
 by the masters ? If not, how far should the masters' 
 control over them and it extend ? If, on the other 
 hand, they are forbidden to enforce obedience to their 
 legitimate directions by means of corporal punishment, 
 how are they to enforce it ? Upon these and other 
 such-like perplexing questions, however, we do not 
 think it necessary to enlarge — so crushingly fatal to 
 the entire Prefectorial System seem to me the three 
 grand objections to which I refer. 
 
 There should be, above all things, plenty of Masters in 
 every school, and, according to the number of the boys, 
 one or more of these always on duty after school-hours. 
 It is a very bad practice to leave boys altogether alone 
 by themselves during play-hours, when getting up, when 
 going to bed, and during those many other spare ten- 
 minutes and quarter-hours, most critical and eventful 
 spaces of time, which invariably occur every day. By 
 a strict observance of this rule boys will be prevented 
 from doing many wrong and foolish things, from which 
 otherwise they will not keep themselves clear. An 
 assistant-master's duties on these occasions should, 
 however, be almost nominal. The mere presence of 
 one for whom the boys feel genuine respect (anybody 
 else is more or less useless) will be, of itself, always 
 quite sufficient to prevent many thoughtless, mis- 
 chievous, sinful acts from being done ; much unprofit- 
 able conversation from being indulged in— conversation 
 alike injurious to the talkers themselves and to the 
 listeners. And, furthermore, such presence w T ill posi- 
 tively improve the general tone of the boys, bringing 
 along with it everywhere a wholesome influence. 
 
 A master's bedroom should open off every dormitory. 
 In no dormitory should there be cubicles : on this all 
 
202 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 school doctors of any experience are agreed. “ Some 
 means ought to be devised,” writes the author of the 
 letter quoted in the Preface to “ Tom Brown’s School- 
 days,” “ to enable schoolboys to go to bed in quietness 
 and peace. . . . No good, moral or physical, to those 
 who bully or those who are bullied, can ensue from 
 such scenes as take place in the dormitories of schools.” 
 And again, to the same effect, writes Mr. Hughes him- 
 self (Part I. chap, iii.) : “ Were I a private schoolmaster, 
 I would say, ‘ Let who will hear the boys their lessons, 
 but let me live with them when they are at play and rest.’” 
 
 Cruelty to animals, cruelty to each other, wanton 
 mischief, fighting, and things much worse, cannot be 
 committed in the presence of a master, or when a 
 master’s presence may be expected at any moment. 
 In fact, nearly all the trouble and sorrow which boys 
 bring upon themselves and upon one another is the 
 result of leaving them too much alone, and of there 
 being too few efficient masters. 
 
 I protest against the habit — generally prevailing, I 
 believe — of allowing boys, Prefects or otherwise, to 
 roam, at will almost, through whatever town or village 
 the school may be situated in or near. Wherever this 
 practice of letting boys “ down town,” as it is called, 
 obtains as a system, there faults most assuredly will be 
 committed by them ; detection and remorse will ensue ; 
 and punishments will be frequently deserved. Let this 
 constant source of wrong-doing and consequent punish- 
 ment be but stopped, and boys will be saved from much 
 sin, from much unhappiness. That the system is one 
 pregnant with mischief I know from my personal know- 
 ledge of schools in which it prevails, as well as from the 
 recorded experiences of many schoolmasters. 
 
SCHOOLBOY HONOUR: 
 
 203 
 
 I know of one school, the senior pupils of which, when 
 “ down town,” systematically pawned books, drank beer, 
 played billiards, &c. — at once injuring themselves, physi- 
 cally, intellectually, and morally ; setting a deplorable 
 example to the younger boys, and disgracing their 
 school. These boys had been left to their — dishonour. 
 
 “ But what ! ” one may ask in surprise, “ would you 
 not trust to a boy's honour ? Dr. Arnold did so, and 
 you see what a grand school Rugby was.” 
 
 No; I emphatically say, I should not trust to the 
 honour of boys en masse — if by “ trusting to boys' 
 honour ” is meant (and this is the meaning that the 
 phrase is generally supposed to convey) that boys 
 should be left to themselves for several hours regularly 
 every day, to do this thing or refrain from that, as they 
 themselves, or rather as their temporary leader, may 
 happen for the moment to think fit and proper. My 
 reasons for refusing my accord to this absurdly belauded, 
 but most shamefully negligent, method of managing 
 boys are as follows : — 
 
 First of all, in every school there are boys who seem 
 to have grown up without any definite views as to 
 what honour is supposed by true Christian gentlemen to 
 signify — and I suppose it will be granted to me that 
 boys' honour, unless it be that of the true Christian 
 gentleman, is dishonour. Now, it is well known how 
 any one boy ignorant of or indifferent to the full signifi- 
 cation of the word, especially if strong in body and 
 agreeable in manner, may corrupt a whole school — even 
 as one drop of ink may discolour a tumblerful of the 
 purest water. Mischief is very infectious. Vice spreads 
 amazingly by contact. I have known of half a dozen 
 little boys, of whom each one was, individually, a gentle- 
 
204 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 manly, good, well brouglit-up little fellow, being guilty, 
 as a body, or when under bad guidance, of acts of cruelty 
 and mischief, from which any one of them, unaided and 
 unabetted and uninspired by his fellows, would have 
 shrunk with horror.* 
 
 If, then, even good boys, when left “ to their honour,” 
 will do when in company with each other, and un- 
 guarded by a master, what they know well to be wrong 
 and cruel, and what they in their hearts detest, how 
 much more will they do so if, as must often happen, 
 they may have a bad boy to tempt and lead them 
 on ! 
 
 Schoolboys’ life, like man’s life, is full — yes, brimful 
 
 * To show what terrible influence for evil a big brutal boy may have 
 in a school in which the masters depute to boys the supervision duty 
 which they certainly should themselves perform, I have copied from 
 “Eric” (Part II. chap, i.) the following passage: — “He (Brigson) 
 systematically, from the first, called evil good, and good evil. . . . 
 Never did some of the Roslyn boys to their dying day forget the deep, 
 intolerable flood of moral turpitude and iniquity which he bore with 
 him. . . . Big, burly, and strong . . . being low in the school, he naturally 
 became the bully and the Coryphaeus of all the lower forms — the bully, 
 if they opposed him, the Coryphaeus if they accepted his guidance. . . . 
 He taught both by precept and example, that towards masters neither 
 honour was to be recognised nor respect to be considered due. To 
 cheat them, to lie to them, to annoy them in every possible way — to 
 misrepresent their motives, mimic their defects, and calumniate their 
 actions — was the conduct which he inaugurated towards them ; and for 
 the time that he continued at Roslyn the whole lower school was a 
 Pandemonium of evil passions and despicable habits. ... At Roslyn, 
 owing mainly to the wickedness of one depraved boy, and the weak 
 fear of man which actuated others, all was disunion, misery, and 
 deterioration. The community, which had once been peaceful, happy, 
 and united, was filled with violent jealousy and heartburnings ; every 
 boy’s hand seemed to be against his neighbour ; lying, bad language, 
 dishonesty, grew fearfully rife, and the few who, like Owen and 
 Montague, remained uncontaminated by the general mischief, walked 
 alone and despondent amid their uncongenial and degraded school- 
 fellows.” 
 
SCHOOLBOY HONOUR: 
 
 205 
 
 of trials, difficulties, and dangers. Hence, trusting to 
 a schoolboy’s honour is pretty much the same thing as 
 leaving him in the midst of all kinds of troubles and 
 snares and temptations, to avoid, resist, or yield to 
 them, just as his good or evil principles and companions 
 have, for the time being, the ascendency over him. 
 
 And secondly , what is honour ? Does honour always 
 mean one and the same thing ? Does it always mean 
 one and the same thing even in the same school at 
 different epochs of its existence ? No ; certainly not. 
 And surely this is another grave objection to leaving 
 boys to the guidance of this will-o’-the-wisp, this shift- 
 ing, phantom, Proteus-like idea called, or miscalled, 
 “ honour.” * 
 
 * A propos of the changeful nature of the schoolboy-honour standard 
 the following passage from “ Tom Brown’s Schooldays ” (Part I. chap, 
 viii.) may be quoted : — “ Boys follow one another in herds like sheep, for 
 good or evil ; they hate thinking, and have rarely any settled principles. 
 Every school, indeed, has its own traditionary standard of right and 
 wrong, which cannot be transgressed with impunity : marking certain 
 things as low and blackguard, and certain others as lawful and right. 
 This standard is ever varying , though it changes but slowly and little 
 by little ; and, subject only to such standard, it is the leading boys for 
 the time being who give the tone to all the rest, and make the school 
 either a noble institution for the training of Christian Englishmen, or 
 a place where a young boy will get more evil than he would if he were 
 turned out to make his way in London streets, or anything between 
 these two extremes.” 
 
 Sydney Smith expresses his opinion of schoolboy honour in the 
 following passage : — “ It is certainly of eminent use,” he writes, . . . 
 “ to a young man . . . that he should have lived among boys. But it is 
 only so when they are all moderately watched by some superior under- 
 standing. The morality of boys is generally very imperfect ; their 
 notions of honour extremely mistaken ; and their objects of ambition 
 frequently very absurd. The probability then is, that the kind of 
 discipline they exercise over each other will produce (when left to itself) 
 a great deal of mischief ; and yet this is the discipline to which every 
 child at a public school is not only necessarily exposed, but principally 
 confined . — “ Essay on Public Schools.” 
 
206 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 There are epochs in all schools, times occurring only 
 too frequently, when many boys call dishonour honour, 
 and honour dishonour ; when “ they put light for dark- 
 ness, and darkness for light ; sweet for bitter, and bitter 
 for sweet.” 
 
 “ The obvious truism, that a schoolboy is an immature 
 being,” said Mr. Sidgwick, last February, in his Lecture 
 on Form Discipline [Rivingtons], “ is one which needs 
 repeating even now. He differs from a full-grown man 
 chiefly in the fact that his moral ideas are even more 
 muddled, and that he is even more at the mercy of that 
 obsolete and mysterious thing, the traditional code of his 
 fellows around him. No boy will give evidence against 
 his comrades — as we saw the other day in a very painful 
 case — even to stop manslaughter. The code forbids.” 
 
 And, if we are to take the author of “ Tom Brown’s 
 Schooldays ” as our authority, the habit of leaving boys 
 at Rugby so much to themselves seems to have been 
 very far from being crowned with success. Tom Brown, 
 no doubt, turned out well in the end ; but then it must 
 not be forgotten what kind of a boy he was. He 
 came of a good stock, and inherited all his fine old 
 father’s excellent qualities — justice, honesty, pluck, 
 endurance. If Tom Brown, indeed, had not turned 
 out well, the school in which he spent five or six years 
 of his early life would have had a terrible crime to 
 answer for. Nor let it be forgotten that, during Tom’s 
 first two or three years at Rugby, he was in no way an 
 exemplary character. I waive entirely all those mis- 
 adventures of his into which he was led by his high 
 spirits and love of fun and frolic. But I cannot 
 waive the fact, that it is on record that for several years 
 of his early life he was in the habit of rising from 
 
SCHOOLBOY honour: 
 
 20 7 
 
 his bed in the morning, and retiring to it at night, 
 without as much as ever offering up to God one solitary 
 prayer. What if Tom Brown had died just then ? 
 Indeed, except for the entirely chance arrival of young 
 Arthur, Tom Brown would probably have been, if not 
 actually expelled, at least, at Dr. Arnold's special re- 
 quest, removed from Rugby, with anything but a good 
 character. It was from the new boy Arthur, not (as 
 we gather from the author, “ an Old Boy ” and a genuine 
 admirer of Dr. Arnold) from the head or assistant- 
 masters of Rugby, that Tom first imbibed that respect 
 for religion which brought him safely at last out of his 
 thoughtless irregularities, his prayerless state, and helped 
 to make him the excellent young man he seems to have 
 eventually turned out. 
 
 And what about those great bullies in Rugby, Flash- 
 man and the rest of them, who nearly roasted to death 
 poor Tom himself ? * They were all left to their 
 honour; yes, left to their honour — in the orthodox 
 usual way in English schools, and with the usual 
 results — to conduct themselves like young Christian 
 gentlemen. But did they do so ? What of the effects 
 of their habitual tyranny on the bullies themselves as 
 well as on those they bullied ? And what about the sin 
 of intemperance in the school ? Were not boys left to 
 their honour to avoid drunkenness ? Yet “ nips ” — in 
 spite of their honour — even in the football field, while 
 Dr. Arnold unsuspectingly looked on, were, it is hinted, 
 not uncommon ; no, not uncommon, it would seem, 
 even among the leaders of the school, f And poor 
 
 * For extract from “ Tom Brown’s Schooldays ” relative to this 
 atrocious act of bullying, see footnote, p. 314. 
 
 t Let any one who finds it hard to believe this read the following 
 passage (Part I. chap, v.) from “ Tom Brown’s Schooldays : ” — 
 
208 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 young Flashman ! Was he not finally found drunk in 
 a cart by one of the assistant-masters, and expelled the 
 next morning, as so much rubbish, from the school in 
 consequence ? And by this time he had been already 
 for many years at Eugby, injuring, alas! his school- 
 fellows both by precept and by example, as well as 
 ruining himself — and all, beyond a doubt, because he 
 and his companions were “ left to their honour/’ 
 
 In regard to the bullying that may go on at an English 
 school — all owing to the want of proper supervision — 
 the reader will probably remember how that, some 
 eight or nine years ago, at one of the great public 
 schools in England, an unfortunate little boy, so as to 
 escape his tormentors, put a horrible end to himself. 
 What makes this case especially memorable is the fact 
 that the boy had over and over again actually threatened 
 to commit suicide unless removed from the scene of his 
 wretchedness, his constant wretchedness — wretchedness 
 by day, wretchedness by night. Nor should we forget 
 
 “At this moment Griffith, the itinerant vendor of oranges from 
 Hill-Morton, enters the close with his heavy baskets ; there is a rush 
 of small boys upon the little pale-faced man, the two sides mingling 
 together, subdued by the great goddess ‘Thirst,’ like the English and the 
 French by the streams in the Pyrenees. The leaders are past oranges 
 and apples, but some of them visit their coats, and apply innocent- 
 looking ginger-beer bottles to their mouths. It is no ginger-beer 
 though, I fear, and will do you no good. One short mad rush, and 
 then a stitch in the side, and no more honest play ; that’s what comes 
 of those bottles.” 
 
 During the football match alluded to above, “ the Doctor,” we are 
 informed (same chapter), “ and some of the family are there looking 
 on.” Cf. footnote, p. 96. 
 
 The Rev. James Pycroft, in his recently published book, “ Oxford 
 Memories : a Retrospect after Fifty Years,” says that the brother of a 
 nobleman now living who was killed in a school-fight at Eton, “ was 
 even primed with brandy by his eager backers” (vol. i. p. 3). 
 
“ SCHOOLBOY HONOUR. 
 
 209 
 
 the death of a little boy last year at a leading school 
 in London, which was brought on, it was stated, by 
 repeated blows inflicted on him by his schoolfellows. 
 
 At one of the leading public schools of England boys 
 were, not long since, habitually bullied so terribly that 
 their parents and guardians, yes, even those of them 
 resident in Ireland — much devoted though these be to 
 everything connected with English schools and school- 
 masters — began at last to feel somewhat uncomfortable, 
 and to enquire whether there was any ground for the 
 sad reports that reached them at times from various 
 quarters concerning the bullying that went on thereat. 
 Boys disposed to bully are most ingenious in their 
 devices for making other boys’ lives a burden to them. 
 The following was one of the devices adopted, with this 
 laudable object in view, by the bullies at the school in 
 question. They used to rapidly drag any of the boys 
 whom they disliked — for greatness of intellect or deli- 
 cacy of constitution the thoughtless young ruffians had 
 no regard whatever — now this boy, now that, back- 
 wards down the entire several flights of stairs leading 
 from the top dormitory to the basement story, the 
 heads of their wretched victims thumping and bumping 
 all the way on every step, their painful cries drowned 
 by the coarse jests and diabolical merriment of their 
 unrestrained tormentors. These boys, to be sure, had 
 been left to their honour not to do these things, in 
 accordance with the generous and manly principle of 
 managing boys so prevalent in England. Their honour ! 
 To have placed an assistant-master in charge of them 
 during their recreation hours — recreation hours spent 
 by them so profitably — would, of course, have been un- 
 spirited and unmanly, obstructive to the development 
 
 0 
 
210 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 of the moral characters of all concerned, of the bullies 
 no less than the bullied — harmful to their physical 
 health, injurious to their intellectual progress. Then 
 just think of expense ! The saving to English school- 
 masters in respect of masters’ salaries resulting from 
 this spirited leaving-boys-to-their-honour plan must 
 be enormous. And then, of course, if schoolboys had 
 always a master acting as guide, philosopher, and friend 
 to them, it would look as if they were not worthy of 
 being “left to their honour,” deserving of confidence. 
 How deserving they are of confidence, how securely 
 they may be left thus, in the mass, “ to their honour,” 
 the boys in the school alluded to proved — did they 
 not ? — to demonstration. 
 
 In the Irish Commissioners' School Report , 1881, p. 
 261, Mr. Mahaffy reflects on the fact that “many of 
 
 the boys ” at (the name of the school — an English 
 
 one — can be seen on reference to the Report) “ were 
 very pale, and had distressing coughs ; others showed 
 an abnormal development of brain ; and altogether the 
 general appearance of the scholars, though interesting 
 and suggestive of talent, was not normal or cheerful.” 
 “ Not normal or cheerful ” — I should think not, if, at 
 least, their lives, through the vile cruelty of their com- 
 panions, were made most miserable to them, albeit this, 
 be it noted, is not the reason suggested by Mr. Mahaffy 
 for their paleness. “ Showed an abnormal development 
 of brain ” — most abnormal, no doubt, if they had been 
 much subjected to the dragging-down-the-stairs treat- 
 ment just referred to. “Were very pale, and had dis- 
 tressing coughs ”■ — nothing very surprising in this, for 
 were they not “ left to their honour ” ? Archdeacon 
 Farrar has eloquently described to us how the St. 
 
SCHOOLBOY HONOUR . 
 
 211 
 
 Winifred boys, when left similarly “ to their honour/' 
 used to let each other down by sheets from their dormi- 
 tory windows on cold nights, when the lights were out 
 and the doors all locked, in order to go to a poacher's 
 cabin in the neighbourhood of the school, there to pur- 
 chase, for their nocturnal revelry, brandy, tobacco, and 
 such-like things. Is it not possible that the boys who 
 were so very pale, &c., in the school alluded to may 
 have taken a similar advantage of the systematic con- 
 fidence with which they were treated by their masters ? 
 Mr. Mahaffy ascribes — one glance showed it all to him 
 — “the very pale, not normal or cheerful general appear- 
 ance/' and the “ distressing coughs " of so many of these 
 interesting, talented scholars to over-study. 
 
 As another example of the kind of moral tone that 
 may prevail in a school in which the boys are left, 
 during play-hours, &c., to prefects and their honour, or 
 dishonour, I quote the following passage from Colonel 
 Chichester's “ Schools " — it is an excerpt from an article 
 that appeared in the Saturday Review of April 22nd, 
 1882 : — 
 
 “We are acquainted with a school, not a public one, in 
 which, ten years ago, the boys, whose rooms are in different 
 parts of the building, waged a ferocious and interminable 
 war against each other, with clubs and other rude weapons. 
 These young savages had, however, mitigated their bar- 
 barous mode of life by contriving a sort of sanctuary — a 
 certain portion of a certain dry ditch was regarded as 
 neutral ground; and in this ditch brothers, cousins, and 
 friends could meet by stealth, without being obliged to 
 half murder one another ... 4 So-and-so seems a nice 
 little beggar/ we once remarked, in what we conceived to 
 be appropriate language, to a small boy, at the same school 
 
212 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 as our friend. * Is lie a nice little beggar/ said the other. 
 ‘ lie does not go on grinds.’ It appears that our friend 
 had been forbidden, by his family, to pursue other boys, 
 who scatter little pieces of paper across country, and are 
 known as hares. . . . But our young friend was so per- 
 suaded that to go on grinds was a universal duty that he 
 refused to allow any redeeming qualities in a boy whose 
 doctor forbade him to go. This is a pretty fair example 
 of fourth form savagery, with its simple convictions and 
 Spartan code.” 
 
 The more one knows of schoolboys, the more satisfied 
 one will be that, as a body, they are utterly unfitted to 
 be left to themselves for hours and hours together every 
 day. Among boys so neglected bullying and vice are 
 ever sure to be conspicuous vices. 
 
 “ I have known times at Eton,” says a witness whose 
 evidence before the Education Commissioners (1864) 
 is quoted by Colonel Chichester, ‘‘when ‘the Chris- 
 topher’ (a neighbouring public-house) has been per- 
 fectly full of boys on a Sunday after 4 p.m.” (Rev. C. C. 
 James, 5084). Yet these boys, too — like those at Rugby 
 just referred to — were, presumably, left to their honour 
 not to frequent public-houses on Sunday evenings. It 
 ought not to surprise us that boys should occasionally 
 leave English schools at the age of eighteen, seventeen, 
 and even sixteen, already “confirmed drunkards ” — fatal, 
 but necessary and even foreseen, results of the no-super- 
 vision or leave-boys-to-their-honour system, call it 
 which you will. 
 
 It is monstrous that such things should happen — and, 
 of course, a thousandth part of the ill-deeds that go 
 on at these schools, w 7 here “ leave-the-boys-to-their- 
 honour” is the principle that prevails, never reaches 
 
SCHOOLBOY HONOUR .” 
 
 213 
 
 the light ; but happen these ill-deeds will and must, so 
 long as boys are not properly looked after by well- 
 salaried efficient masters, one or more according to the 
 exigencies of the case, during their after-school hours. 
 
 “ A timid and nervous boy is from morning till night 
 in a state of bodily fear,” declares the writer of the letter 
 in the Preface to “ Tom Brown’s Schooldays ” already 
 referred to. “ He is constantly tormented when trying 
 to learn his lessons. His play-hours are occupied in 
 fagging.” . . . “ Why,” asks the writer, “ should the laws 
 of civilisation be suspended for schools ? Why should 
 boys be left to herd together with no law but that of 
 force or cunning ? What would become of society if 
 it were constituted on the same principles ? It would 
 be plunged into anarchy in a week.” * 
 
 But “supposing that the Prefects do, in general, 
 neglect their duties,” it may be urged, “ still the strength 
 of character which a boy acquires who passes through 
 — himself almost his only master — so many dangers, 
 troubles, and trials as Tom Brown did, will be sure to 
 
 * Lamb, in his “Essays of Elia,” thus describes some of the moni- 
 torial cruelties to which he was himself subject, when in “ Christ’s 
 Hospital five-and-thirty years ago : ” — 
 
 “ The oppressions of these young brutes are heart-sickening to call to 
 recollection. I have been called out of my bed, and waked for the 
 purpose, in the coldest winter nights — and this not once, but night after 
 night — in my shirt, to receive the discipline of a leathern thong, with 
 eleven other sufferers, because it pleased my callow overseer, when 
 there has been any talking heard after we were gone to bed, to make 
 the last six beds in the dormitory, where the youngest children of us 
 slept, answerable for an offence they neither dared to commit, nor had 
 the power to hinder. The same execrable tyranny drove the younger 
 part of us from the fires, when our feet were perishing with snow ; and ? 
 under the cruellest penalties, forbade the indulgence of a drink of water, 
 when we lay on sleepless summer nights, fevered with the season, and 
 the day’s sports.” 
 
214 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 be much greater than it would have been, had his boy- 
 hood been more vigilantly watched over, and subjected 
 to a less fiery ordeal ; his experience will be increased 
 thereby; his knowledge of the world and of himself 
 augmented ; his sympathies enlarged ; and his whole 
 nature, as it were, purified.” Granted. But the end 
 does not justify the means. The ordeal is too severe, 
 too perilous. And where one boy made of good stuff, 
 like Tom Brown, may possibly have been benefited, 
 though I doubt it, by the running of this evil course, 
 how many, like unfortunate Flashman, may have fallen 
 and been ruined in body, mind, and spirit, during the 
 too trying process! And let it be remembered that 
 there are probably, there is reason to fear, as many 
 Flashmans as Tom Browns at every school — that is, as 
 many boys who, if they get into bad company, will be- 
 come bullies and viciously dissipated, and generally de- 
 moralised, as boys who will retain their characters, in 
 spite of all obstacles, unsullied and uninjured, or who 
 will “pick themselves up” after falling, and return to 
 the paths of righteousness. Under more favourable 
 circumstances might not even Flashman have grown up 
 something better than a mere coward and a sot ? Nay, 
 under favourable circumstances, might he not have be- 
 come even a respected and amiable and useful member 
 of society ? The author of " Tom Brown’s Schooldays,” 
 no doubt, dismisses him ignominiously and unpityinglv, 
 all in a minute, from his “true history.” Nevertheless, 
 for my own part, I am bound to confess that my feel- 
 ings on reading of his summary exit from his old school, 
 at the age of seventeen, were full of sadness, and my 
 comments somewhat as follows : — “ What an unhappy 
 ending to a boy’s school life ! What must his poor 
 
SCHOOLBOY HONOUR. 
 
 215 
 
 father and mother think of it all ? Flashman’s habits 
 are by this time much corrupted ; his character gone ; 
 and all because he was left so much to himself — to 
 his ‘honour!’ What a pity of boys who are subjected 
 to such a system — an unreasonable, obviously foolish, 
 plainly mistaken system — one which presents to the 
 inexperienced so much to commend it, but which is in 
 reality so utterly rotten and hollow at the bottom ! 
 Why don’t head-masters keep to assist them, after 
 school-hours, I asked myself, plenty of capable as- 
 sistant-masters — no matter at what cost to themselves 
 -assistant-masters who, by a kind word now and then, 
 or by a mere look, nay, who even by their very presence, 
 would bring along with them, wherever they went, a 
 healthful influence ? ” 
 
 The following excerpts are from Sydney Smith’s 
 essay on “ Public Schools.” What he says on the 
 subject of fagging, and of the public schoolboy’s sup- 
 posed advantage in his alleged superior knowledge of 
 the world is as applicable to the English public school 
 system now as it was at the time when Sydney Smith 
 wrote : — “ At a public school (for such is the system 
 established by immemorial custom), every boy is alter- 
 nately tyrant and slave. The power which the elder 
 part of these communities exercises over the younger 
 is exceedingly great — very difficult to be controlled — 
 and accompanied, not unfrequently, with cruelty and 
 caprice. It is the common law of the place, that the 
 young should be implicitly obedient to the elder boys ; 
 and this obedience resembles more the submission of a 
 slave to his master, or of a sailor to his captain, than 
 the common and natural deference which would always 
 be shown by one boy to another a few years older than 
 
2l6 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 himself. Now, this system we cannot help considering 
 as an evil, — because it inflicts upon boys, for two or 
 three years of their lives, many painful hardships, and 
 much unpleasant servitude. . . . 
 
 “ It is not the life in miniature which he is to lead 
 hereafter — nor does it bear any relation to it : — he will 
 never again be subjected to so much insolence and 
 caprice; nor ever, in all human probability, called 
 upon to make so many sacrifices. . . . 
 
 “ Such a system makes many boys very miserable ; 
 and produces those bad effects upon the temper and 
 disposition, which unjust suffering always does produce ; 
 — but what good it does, we are much at a loss to con- 
 ceive. Reasonable obedience is extremely useful in form- 
 ing the disposition. Submission to tyranny lays the 
 foundation of hatred, suspicion, cunning, and a variety 
 of odious passions. We are convinced that those 
 young people will turn out to be the best men, who 
 have been guarded most effectually, in their childhood, 
 from every species of useless vexation ; and experienced, 
 in the greatest degree, the blessings of a wise and 
 rational indulgence. But even if these effects upon 
 future character are not produced, still, four or five 
 years in childhood make a very considerable period of 
 human existence ; and it is by no means a trifling con- 
 sideration whether they are passed happily or unhappily. 
 The wretchedness of school tyranny is trifling enough 
 to a man who only contemplates it, in ease of body 
 and tranquillity of mind, through the medium of twenty 
 intervening years ; but it is quite as real, and quite as 
 acute, while it lasts, as any of the sufferings of mature 
 life. . . . 
 
 “ If there exists in these places of education a system 
 
“ SCHOOLBOY HONOUR. 
 
 217 
 
 of premature debauchery, and if they only prevent 
 men from being corrupted by the world, by corrupting 
 them before their entry into the world, they can then 
 only be looked upon as evils of the greatest magnitude, 
 however they may be sanctioned by opinion, or ren- 
 dered familiar to us by habit. . . . 
 
 “ Is it any injury to a man of thirty or thirty-five 
 years of age — to a learned serjeant or venerable dean 
 — that at eighteen they did not know so much of the 
 world as some other boys of the same standing ? They 
 have probably escaped the arrogant character so often 
 attendant upon this trifling superiority ; nor is there 
 much chance that they have ever fallen into the 
 common and youthful error of mistaking a premature 
 initiation into vice for a knowledge of the ways of 
 mankind ” [cf. extract from this same essay, p. 125]. 
 
 Above all things it is necessary that when boys are 
 going to bed and getting up there should be masters on 
 duty with them, for whom they feel heartfelt respect 
 — others will not suit ; masters who, by a word in 
 season, will keep them from ever getting into that 
 frightfully prayerless state in which the boys were in 
 Tom Brown’s dormitory at Rugby, according to the 
 author of his “ Schooldays,” on that eventful night 
 when little Arthur first knelt down in it, to the sur- 
 prise of all and the disgust of many, in fear and 
 trembling, to say his prayers. 
 
 From a boy who says no prayers — no real, hearty 
 private prayers — for days, nay, for weeks, even terms, 
 together, no great good can be expected. 
 
 The following extract is from the account of “ poor, 
 little, lonely ” Arthur’s first night at Rugby : — 
 
 “ The light burned clear, the noise went on. It was 
 
2 I 8 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 a trying moment for the poor little lonely boy ; however, 
 this time he didn’t ask Tom what he might or might 
 not do, but dropped on his knees by his bedside, as he 
 had done every day from his childhood, to open his 
 heart to Him who heareth the cry and beareth the sor- 
 rows of the tender child and the strong man in agony. 
 
 “ Tom was sitting at the bottom of his bed unlacing 
 his boots, so that his back was towards Arthur, and he 
 didn’t see what had happened, and looked up in wonder 
 at the sudden silence. Then two or three boys laughed 
 and sneered, and a big brutal fellow, who was standing 
 in the middle of the room, picked up a slipper, and shied 
 it at the kneeling boy, calling him a snivelling young 
 shaver.” [“ Tom Brown’s Schooldays,” Part II. chap, i.] * 
 
 The boys, no doubt, who successfully encounter alone, 
 or all but alone, every obstruction, may have an ad- 
 vantage afterwards over those who need, and have, the 
 encouragement and help of some one to look after 
 them. But these latter ( i.e ., the somewhat weak and 
 easily-led boys) are always the large majority in every 
 school. And surely no one will maintain that their 
 interests should be sacrificed for the sake of a somewhat 
 small minority whose already strong wills and fine 
 characters may, it is hoped, gain a little extra strength 
 and excellence by their being allowed to fight all by 
 themselves their battles successfully, or lose them — as 
 the case may be — from their eleventh or twelfth year 
 even till the period when, at the age of eighteen or nine- 
 teen, they go forth young men from school. 
 
 “A firm character,” writes Sydney Smith, to this 
 
 * “ At the very sight of a knot of vicious or careless boys gathered 
 round the great schoolhouse fire, 4 It makes me think,’ he would say, 
 4 that I see the devil in the midst of them*’ ” — Stanley’s Life of 
 Arnold, vol. i. p. 97. 
 
“ SCHOOLBOY HONOUR: 
 
 219 
 
 same effect, “ survives this brave neglect ; and very 
 exalted talents may sometimes remedy it by subsequent 
 diligence : but schools are not made for a few youths of 
 pre-eminent talents and strong characters ; such prizes 
 can, of course, be drawn but by a very few parents. . . . 
 In a forest, or public school for oaks and elms, the trees 
 are left to themselves ; the strong plants live, and the 
 weak ones die ; the towering oak that remains is ad- 
 mired ; the saplings that perish around it are cast into 
 the flames, and forgotten. But it is not, surely, to the 
 vegetable struggle of a forest, or the hasty glance of a 
 forester, that a botanist would commit a favourite plant ; 
 he would naturally seek for it a situation of less 
 hazard, and a cultivator whose limited occupations 
 would enable him to give to it a reasonable share of 
 his time and attention.” * 
 
 “ It was no light act of courage in those days,” writes 
 the “ Old Boy,” in the same chapter from which the 
 above quotation, pp. 217-218, is taken, “ for a little 
 fellow to say his prayers publicly, even at Bugby.” 
 A few years later,” he continues (but he writes now 
 solely, it would appear, from hearsay), “ when Arnold’s 
 manly piety had begun to leaven the school, the tables 
 turned ; before he died, in the schoolhouse at least, and 
 I believe in the other houses, the rule was the other 
 way.” “ But poor Tom,” we are especially informed 
 (and what Irish parent would like his own son to have 
 undergone the ordeal ?), “ had come to school in other 
 times. The first few nights after he came he did not 
 kneel down because of the noise, but sat up in his bed 
 till the candle was out, and then stole out and said his 
 prayers, in fear lest some one should find him out. So 
 
 * “ Public Schools.” 
 
220 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 did many another poor little fellow. Then he began to 
 think that he might just as well say his prayers in bed, 
 and then that it didn’t matter whether he was kneeling, 
 or sitting, or lying down. And so it had come to pass 
 with Tom, as with all who will not confess their Lord 
 before men ; and for the last year he had probably not 
 said his prayers in earnest a dozen times.” Is there 
 any evidence that he “ said ” them at all — “ in earnest ” 
 or otherwise ? None, so far as any information on 
 the subject, supplied to us by the author of his 
 “ Schooldays,” enables us to judge; and we have no 
 other. 
 
 We all know, as a matter of fact, that the most 
 virtuous men are, in general, those who came least in 
 contact with sin, and knew least about it, when they 
 were little boys. The boy is more easily tempted than 
 the man ; less able to perceive the fallacies in the 
 reasoning of him who tempts him ; less able to com- 
 prehend the full dire effects and consequences of vice. 
 Shield but the boy from wrong-doing so far as you can, 
 and when he has grown up to man’s estate, he may be 
 safely trusted — in point of fact he then must be trusted 
 — to look after himself. The so-called “ knowledge of 
 the world ” will be acquired quite soon enough. Why 
 anticipate it ? Why insist on a little inexperienced 
 boy’s entering “ the world ” before his time ? Yet this 
 is what actually is done by those who advisedly subject 
 their sons to the prefectorial system at schools, on the 
 ground that the boy who has been thrown in the midst 
 of sore temptations and difficulties when at school, is 
 more likely to resist successfully these temptations, and 
 overcome these difficulties, when grown up, than he 
 who was less subjected to them during his schooldays. 
 
SCHOOLBOY HONOUR . 
 
 221 
 
 An expectation more unreasonable, or one less likely to 
 be realised, there can hardly be conceived. 
 
 The question is, after all, one rather of fact than of 
 theory. It is this : Do boys who have been acclima- 
 tised to vice from their tenth or eleventh to their 
 seventeenth or eighteenth year, usually turn out better 
 men than those who were carefully kept, so far as was 
 possible, out of the way of sin and sinful influences ? 
 There can be but one answer to the question : the accli- 
 matising of boys to sin has never — can never — do them 
 good. Some few of the best of living men possibly, 
 no doubt, were brought up, as boys, in a most abomin- 
 ably polluted atmosphere; but that they rank among the 
 best of men now is not the result of the odiousness 
 of the atmosphere that surrounded them when young. 
 How many of their companions, who began life along 
 with them, were ruined in mind and body during the 
 acclimatisation process ? No ; if boys who have been 
 brought up in the midst of evil influences and vicious 
 practices become good men, that they do become such 
 is altogether in spite of, not in consequence of, their 
 ill-advised, unhappy early training. “ Acclimatisation 
 to vice does not render any one impervious to its attacks, 
 any more than does acclimatisation in the natural 
 order preserve from disease.” * 
 
 “ Education, according to Plato,” and is there any one 
 who will be disposed to quarrel with his explanation of 
 the term ? “ is to place youth in happy circumstances, 
 
 * “ It has been statistically proved that the European in, say, India 
 is less liable to suffer from climate (imprudences apart) the first day 
 he lands than on any subsequent day, and that each succeeding year 
 finds him less able to resist its influences.” — “Schools,” by Lieut. -Col. 
 Chichester. 
 
222 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 in which no sights or sounds of evil, or allurements of 
 passions, can hurt the character or vitiate the taste. 
 They are to live in an atmosphere of health ; the breeze 
 is always to be wafting to them the impressions of truth 
 and goodness.” * 
 
 To keep the school over which he presides as far as 
 possible free from vice, raising its tone, on all possible 
 occasions, by every legitimate means, should be the 
 grand object with every schoolmaster. How does the 
 acclimatising of his pupils to vice during their boyhood’s 
 days tally with this principle ? 
 
 Is the difficulty of resisting temptation any less now 
 than it was eighteen and a half centuries ago, when our 
 Lord Himself instructed us in our daily prayer to pray, 
 “ Lead us not into temptation ” ? If not, is it right, is 
 it wise, in the face of such a warning, deliberately to 
 place our young sons in the midst of foreseen difficulties, 
 temptations, and troubles of all kinds, on the ground, 
 forsooth, that it is well to acclimatise them to vice ? 
 Are parents and guardians, how wise soever they may 
 be, advisedly to run counter to the unmistakable sug- 
 gestions and directions of the all- wise God ? 
 
 If, however, on the other hand, the defender of the 
 prefectorial system should admit that he is quite pre- 
 pared to drop the knowledge-of-the-world argument, 
 and to concede that to keep boys as far as possible 
 removed, when in their most plastic state, from the 
 paths of sin, is a matter of the utmost importance to 
 them, then he must assuredly at the same time concede 
 that, having this great object in view, it must be best to 
 supervise them during play-hours, preparation time, meal 
 hours, &c., by means of efficient masters rather than of 
 
 * “The Republic,” IntrocL, by B. Jowett, M.A., Master of Balliol. 
 
SCHOOLBOY HONOUR: 
 
 223 
 
 Prefects, seeing that the latter, no matter how willing, 
 how anxious, must be, generally speaking, less able than 
 the former to attain the wished for end.* 
 
 I have systematically conducted my school on the 
 plenty-of-supervision principle since I first became a 
 schoolmaster — twenty long years ago; and, excepting 
 the expense of it, I have never perceived any objection 
 of any kind to the method which I adopted so long 
 ago, and have rigidly pursued ever since. 
 
 “But do not the boys dislike it?” No; the boys^ 
 i.e., 95 per cent, of them, do not dislike it. They either 
 like the presence of a master, or they are indifferent to 
 it, not caring one way or another. If the supervision 
 master is all that he ought to be, the boys are in- 
 variably pleased to have him as their companion alike 
 in school and out of school. If he is not what he ought 
 
 * The following excerpts, from De Candolle’s Histoire des Sciences et 
 des Savants depuis deux Siecles (pp. 150, 295, 333), on the importance of 
 religious training may be here appropriately quoted : — 
 
 “ In clerical families, their manner of life, their quiet regularity, 
 their residence, largely in the country, their counsels to their children, 
 the absence of various causes of dissipation, the habitual vigilance of 
 the father and his domestic example of study, surpassing the advantages 
 of other families, give all the greater force to the transmission of 
 faculties appropriate to the cultivation of the sciences.” The learned 
 author gives lists of distinguished and eminent scientists and scholars 
 who were the sons of pastors — Agassiz, Berzelius, Boerhaave, Encke, 
 Euler, Linnaeus, Olbers, and a host of others. Among historians and 
 philosophers he names Hallam, Hobbes, Emerson, Sismondi, and others. 
 A glance through any biographical dictionary reveals scores, if not 
 hundreds, of children and grandchildren of clerics in every range of 
 literature, science, and philosophy. The disposition of sons to follow 
 the callings of their fathers makes divinity conspicuously hereditary 
 in such world- wide known theological luminaries and pulpiteers as 
 Jonathan Edwards, Archbishop Whately, Robert Hall, Lightfoot, the 
 Wesleys, Lowth, Stillingfleet, the Beechers and Spurgeons — a list that 
 might be multiplied indefinitely, to which every reader will add from 
 
224 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 to be — if, for example, he is not sensible, amiable, dis- 
 creet, able to maintain discipline, worthy of respect, 
 interested in boys' amusements, then the more the pity : 
 a new master ought to be appointed in his stead. But 
 there is certainly no reason to find fault with the sys- 
 tem because those who are charged with the important 
 duty of carrying it properly out are occasionally either 
 unwilling or unable so to do. 
 
 And why should boys object to a masters presence 
 during their play-hours, preparation hours, &c. ? They 
 do not want to do wrong, do they ? If they do, a master 
 clearly ought to be with them, to prevent the contem- 
 plated wrong-doing. If they do not, a master — a big 
 wise brother in their midst — must be always a source 
 of either actual pleasure or a matter of supreme indif- 
 ference to them. If in all respects a fit and proper 
 person to have the charge of boys, he will be sure to 
 be the former. 
 
 personal knowledge. How many poets have been the fruit of clerical 
 matrimony ? — Young, Cowper, Thompson, Coleridge, Montgomery, 
 Heber, Tennyson, Lowell, and many others of note. Look at the 
 clerical contributions to intellectual philosophy in such distinguished 
 sons as Dugald Stewart, Cudworth, Reid, Brown, Boyle, Abercrombie, 
 and Bentham. Literature has been a wide field for ministers’ sons 
 to cultivate, as is evidenced by Swift, Lockhart, Macaulay, Sterne, 
 Hazlitt, Thackeray, Bancroft, Holmes, Kingsley, Matthew Arnold, 
 and a hundred others. To architecture this class contributed Sir 
 Christopher Wren; to art, Sir Joshua Reynolds; to heroism, Lord 
 Nelson. The daughters of the clergy may not be overlooked — Madame 
 Trollope, Mrs. Barbauld, Jane Taylor, Elizabeth Carter, the Brontes, 
 and Mrs. Stowe. How many sons of ministers have been eminent in 
 civil life ? — Henry Clay, Burr, the Everetts, down to our last presidents, 
 Arthur and Cleveland. The sons of clerical families,” adds M. De 
 Candolle, “ have actually surpassed during two hundred years, in their 
 contributions to the roll of eminent scientists, the similar contributions 
 of any other class of families, not excepting those that belong to the 
 directly scientific professions — physicians, surgeons, and chemists.” 
 
SCHOOLBOY HONOUR: 
 
 225 
 
 As to the trifling minority — the black sheep in the 
 flock, to whom the master’s presence is an offence — the 
 boys who cannot bully, or break bounds, or smoke, &c., 
 just because the master will not allow them to bully, 
 break bounds, smoke, &c., are we really to study the per- 
 sonal feelings of these boys in this matter? and, in 
 order that they may be able to indulge unchecked, at 
 their pleasure, in these things, remove the obstacle 
 opposed to their doing so ? Or ought we not, rather, 
 for the sake of these boys, above all, to have a master 
 always in charge of them, so as to prevent them from 
 growing up undisciplined, tyrannical, self-willed, brutal 
 — a curse to themselves, a curse to others ? 
 
 I care not from what point of view the question be 
 looked at, it seems to me perfectly clear that the mise- 
 rably economical plan of leaving boys to themselves — 
 their honour or their dishonour — for hours and hours 
 every day, is, theoretically, an outrage on common sense ; 
 while in practice it never has succeeded. And it is my 
 conviction that it never will, never can succeed, so 
 long as boys are boys. 
 
 It is, I believe, generally admitted that Dr. Arnold’s 
 fourteen years at Bugby constituted the golden age of 
 that celebrated school. 
 
 What it was during some portion of this golden age 
 we are informed by one who both ought to know as 
 being an “ Old Boy,” and who was certainly more pre- 
 pared to eulogise than to disparage the truly good and 
 able head-master concerning whom he writes. No 
 supervision ; bullying of the grossest kind ; the boys 
 divided into either “ slaves or despots ” ; * a vast deal of 
 
 * The quotation is from a letter quoted in the preface to the sixth 
 edition of “Tom Brown’s Schooldays.” See footnote, p. 327. 
 
 P 
 
226 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 idleness; prayerlessness; deceit; drunkenness; and other 
 vices — such faults and defects, we are informed by this 
 panegyrist of Dr. Arnold, prevailed at Rugby during, 
 at least, a considerable period of its golden age. 
 
 As “Tom Brown’s Schooldays” has gone through many 
 editions, and as the terrible tale of bullying, prayerless- 
 ness, &c., is told in its last edition even as in the first 
 — the Rugby school system having undergone no change 
 in the interval, — we must infer that its author had no 
 reasons for withdrawing any of the painful descriptions 
 with which the first edition of his book abounds. 
 
 Rugby in the time of Dr. Arnold was, no doubt, a 
 famous school ; yet to the unsophisticated Irish school- 
 master the manner in which Tom was urged to take 
 care of Arthur seems somewhat peculiar. House- 
 keepers in Irish schools are not usually trusted with 
 the same responsibility as “Mary” at Rugby. I say 
 nothing of the danger to Arthur of entrusting him to 
 the tender mercies of such a boy as Tom Brown was at 
 the time when he, Arthur, went first to Rugby. The 
 following passage from Part i., chap, i., of the book will 
 give some insight into the position occupied by the 
 Rugby matron : — 
 
 “ As the boys turned to leave the room, the matron 
 touched Tom’s arm, and said, 'Master Brown, please 
 stop a minute, I want to speak to you/ 
 
 “'Very well, Mary. I’ll come in a minute. East, 
 don’t finish the pickles ’ 
 
 “ ' Oh, Master Brown,’ went on the little matron, when 
 the rest had gone, 'you’re to have Gray’s study, Mrs. 
 Arnold says. And she wants you to take in this young 
 gentleman. He’s a new boy, and thirteen years old, 
 though he don’t look it. He’s very delicate, and has 
 
“ SCHOOLBOY HONOUR 
 
 227 
 
 never been from home before. And I told Mrs. Arnold 
 I thought you’d be kind to him, and see that they don’t 
 bully him at first. He’s put into your form, and I’ve 
 given him the bed next to yours in Number 4 ; so East 
 can’t sleep there this half.’ ” 
 
 This is certainly not the way, as I have suggested, in 
 which beds and bedrooms are arranged in Irish schools, 
 propensities to bullying counteracted, and kindly dis- 
 positions inculcated. But then, to be sure, in poor 
 Ireland schoolmasters and their assistants have to 
 attend to these things themselves. They are not yet 
 sufficiently enlightened to be able to perceive that 
 matters of this nature can be safely left to matrons, 
 butlers, and prefects. On yet another occasion the 
 matron “ Mary ” figures prominently : it was when Tom 
 had fainted after being roasted [see footnote, p. 314]. 
 
 After all, it must be admitted, the cost of a matron 
 is a mere nothing compared with that of plenty of com- 
 petent masters. And “why,” it may, no doubt, be 
 asked, not without some reason, “ should an English 
 schoolmaster go to the expense of engaging and keeping 
 on his staff plenty of good assistant - masters, if the 
 parents and guardians of his boys are not exacting on 
 this point, and are satisfied that what we unenlightened 
 Irish schoolmasters think should be performed by our- 
 selves and our assistants, should in English schools be 
 performed by ‘ Marys ’ and by Prefects ? ” 
 
 Perhaps, I should add that I certainly do not see 
 any objection to leaving a boy to his “ honour,” or rather 
 to his religion and common-sense and his honour all 
 combined, with whose character you are thoroughly 
 acquainted, and in whose breast you know the grand 
 principles of religion, common-sense, and honour, all 
 
228 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 together reign. But the habit of trusting boys en masse 
 to their honour is wholly and absolutely unjustifiable. 
 
 To trust to the honour of this or that boy, or this or 
 that set of boys, now on this occasion, now on that, is 
 right and wise — to do so is, indeed, almost necessary ; 
 but this is a very different thing from leaving boys, as 
 a body, for certain regular hours every day, always to 
 their honour. To ask boys to study by themselves thi3 
 evening, and leave them to their honour to do so, 
 because the master who presides over their study is 
 unwell ; to leave them to their honour to play to-day, 
 without infringing any of the usual out-of-door rules — 
 their regular supervision master having asked leave to 
 see a friend off in the steamer; to lend boys your 
 horses to go to a hunt, trusting to their honour that 
 they will return by a certain hour, and bring the horses 
 in cool ; to leave your garden gate open, while the boys 
 are playing this game of racquets, and let them go in to 
 look for lost balls, trusting to their honour that they 
 will not pull flowers or eat fruit; these things, and 
 hundreds of things of like nature, boys can be now and 
 again safely trusted to do — only not as a matter of 
 course and of routine. To let a boy do something 
 special by special license is one thing ; to let him do it 
 as a matter of course and of right, quite another. I 
 have given examples of certain things which boys occa- 
 sionally can be asked, or trusted to their honour, to do, 
 without probably any evil consequences attending the 
 trust reposed in them. But were all the boys to be 
 left to their honour always to do these things, as a 
 matter of course and routine, then sooner or later evil 
 would be sure to result. The bad boys would grow 
 tired of being good, weary of exercising so much self- 
 
SCHOOLBOY HONOUR: 
 
 229 
 
 restraint ; they would win over to their side the weak- 
 minded and weak-kneed ; they would become an 
 influence — an immense influence, for evil in the 
 school; the bullies would bully; the fruit would be 
 eaten; your horses would be ill-used, and so forth. 
 As long as the world, the flesh, and the devil exercise 
 among men a potent influence, so long will schoolboys, 
 if left together to themselves and their own devices 
 for hours at a time, and as a matter of course and 
 routine, be led away by temptations and do much that 
 is wrong. 
 
 Try and make boys worthy of trust ; try and show 
 them that the honour of the Christian gentleman and 
 that of the ordinary schoolboy are frequently totally 
 different things ; and that, whenever there is a difference 
 between these two “ honours/’ the schoolboy’s honour 
 will be assuredly dishonour — sheer, downright dis- 
 honour. Try and make all this perfectly clear to 
 them ; and when you have succeeded in doing so, then 
 you can safely, no doubt, trust them to their honour 
 — then, but not till then. 
 
 It is difficult to make any proposal to which an ugly 
 name may not be given ; on which ugly name — though 
 this is notably to beg the question — an argument is 
 always sure to be founded. I may be, for instance, 
 asked at present, whether I should recommend a system 
 of espionage. Certainly not. Above-board supervision 
 is not espionage. And such supervision is absolutely 
 necessary if boys are to be kept from sin, and mischief, 
 and misery, and punishment. How monstrous that 
 boys should be left unguarded at an age when they so 
 much need care and watchfulness ! A baby is watched 
 — and the watching is never called “ espionage” — for 
 
230 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 fear of its sucking the tube of its bottle, falling out of 
 its cradle, or doing some other disastrous thing. A little 
 child of three or four or five years of age is watched — 
 and who calls the watching “ espionage ” ? — for fear 
 of his turning the spout of the kettle on himself, falling 
 into the fire, or out of the window, and so forth. The 
 stirring boy of six or seven or eight is watched — and 
 who objects to the watching as “ espionage ” ? — for fear 
 of his falling down a precipice, or into a deep pool, &c. 
 But a schoolboy of nine or ten, or eleven or twelve, 
 or in his Teens, is to be allowed to run wild without 
 any supervision for two or three hours every day, or even 
 longer, though at the most venturesome and troublesome 
 of ages; though surrounded by venturesome and tempting 
 companions ; when feeling strange and powerful promp- 
 tings from within to evil ; when daringness is frequently 
 one of his chief characteristics — and this, forsooth, for 
 fear he should be subjected to “ espionage ” ! This is, of 
 course, not really the reason (though it is too often 
 alleged to be) why the no-supervision system is advocated 
 by so many English schoolmasters. It can never be for 
 the good of boys that they should be left to themselves 
 for hours together day after day without a friend to look 
 after them, and keep them from mischief and sin, and the 
 punishment that follows sin. The true reason why boys 
 are left thus so much to themselves in so many English 
 schools is, beyond a doubt, economy. No assistant-master 
 will take outdoor duty with boys without an extra salary. 
 Some masters will not undertake it on any condition. 
 But the difficulty may be avoided ; yes, the difficulty 
 may be avoided — but how? By leaving the boys to 
 “ their honour.” This leaving of the boys to “ their 
 honour ” during their after-school hours is an essential 
 
SCHOOLBOY honour: 
 
 231 
 
 part of the English public-school system. To apologise 
 for this part of the system on the ground of economy I 
 can understand ; but how any one can speak of it with 
 positive admiration is past my comprehension. [See 
 second excerpt from Mr. Py croft's book, footnote, p. 31 1].* 
 There are two schools, with the management of which 
 I happen to be acquainted — conducted, each of them, 
 reputedly on the “ English Public-School" principle: 
 one of them, indeed, is called by some an “English 
 Public School," though not one of the old foundations. 
 In this school there are on the staff two “ spies," men of 
 inferior rank, whose regular duty it is to report to the 
 head-master the boys whom they detect going into for- 
 bidden places — certain shops, for example, certain 
 streets, the theatres. In the other school the head- 
 master does not consider it to be inconsistent with his 
 honour, or his dignity, or his self-respect, to have false 
 keys for his pupils’ school desks or “ lockers," with the 
 
 * “ There are very strong reasons for believing,” writes Colonel 
 Chichester in his little book, “Schools,” p. 17, “that both these peculiar 
 features of Protestant English public schools, namely, absence of super- 
 vision and fagging, result from past private greed, which, subsequent 
 to the Reformation, diminished the supply of masters and servants 
 alike, so as to divide a larger income amongst those who had the 
 handling of the purse. It is an instance of the curious perversity of 
 which the human mind is capable that these outcomes of a past sordid 
 abuse are now defended as wise and beneficent institutions. ” 
 
 In the “Commissioners’ Report on Endowed Schools (Ireland), 
 1881,” p. 261, Mr. Mahaffy directs attention to what might be thought 
 somewhat undue economy in the Winchester School arrangements : — 
 “ The appointments of the dormitories,” he tells us, “ seemed not to have 
 been changed for centuries, and were of the coarsest description. As 
 housemaids are not permitted within the college, their duties are per- 
 formed by men, indeed often by the younger boys as fags for the elder. 
 It can easily be imagined what kind of order and neatness is produced 
 by this class of attendance ” (sic). “ At their meals the scholars are 
 attended by the choristers, dressed in gray liveries.” 
 
232 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 object of searching these receptacles at nights or on 
 holidays, should he have any reason at any time to 
 suspect that there may be in them whisky, tobacco, &c., 
 This gentleman boasts that he leaves his pupils, for 
 several hours every day, to their “ honour ” — so he calls 
 it ; to their dishonour, others might be inclined to say. 
 And, though himself employing false keys to assist him 
 in maintaining discipline, he affects to look down on 
 the Irish system of supervising boys during their recrea- 
 tion hours by good masters — well-educated young men 
 who act as mentors to their pupils, keeping them from 
 mischief and sin, and from the pain and trouble and 
 harm to others consequent thereon — as espionage. The 
 Irish system is no doubt an expensive one : but then in 
 Ireland, let us thankfully remember, schoolmasters do 
 not meanly employ, or act themselves as, “ spies.” The 
 head-masters of both the schools referred to were 
 educated at English schools, and subsequently at one of 
 the great English universities. 
 
 Were these head-masters to keep upon their staff 
 plenty of good masters — and they have incomes suffi- 
 ciently large to enable them so to do — then they would 
 not feel themselves obliged to demean themselves by 
 hiring spies, and using false keys, to assist them in the 
 management of their boys. To leave boys to their dis- 
 honour for so many hours every day, and then to employ 
 spies and false keys to detect them in wrong-doing, is, 
 in the first place, to subject them wrongfully to many 
 temptations, and, in the next, to try and keep them from 
 yielding to these by the most ignoble and least efficacious 
 of motives — fear of detection. 
 
 Malo coactus qui suum officium facit 
 Bum id rescitum iri credit tantisper caret : 
 
 Si sperat fore clam rursum ad ingenium redit. 
 
“ SCHOOLBOY HONOUR .” 
 
 233 
 
 llle quem beneficio adjungas ex animo facit ; 
 
 Studet par referre : prcesens absensque idem erit . 
 
 Hoc patrium est,potius consuefacere filium 
 Sua sponte rede facere quam alieno metu. 
 
 Hoc pater ac dominus interest : hoc qui nequit 
 Fateatur nescire imperare liberis .* 
 
 It is not by fear — certainly not by fear alone — that 
 boys over whom there are worthy masters in charge, are 
 kept from wrong-doing. They are specially urged to 
 eschew evil and do good from the highest motives that 
 there are — love of God, one’s neighbour, and one’s self. 
 
 The following passage is from Colonel Chichester’s 
 " Schools :”— 
 
 “ How,” he asks, “ do we act in other matters which 
 ought to weigh less with us than our care of our young ? 
 In matters of business, in our social relations, in our care 
 of the animals that we train for our use and pleasure, in 
 the army, nearly everything that is or is not done is made 
 matter for written reports ; in the navy, in every phase of 
 life, we leave nothing to chance that we can help, except 
 where we sacrifice knowingly to sloth. We trust nothing 
 to honour, absolutely nothing , as a general rule, except 
 where we cannot help ourselves, or we do so as a matter 
 of convenience. Why is this, unless because our experi- 
 ence of the world tells us that the honour of man is not a 
 staff on which we can securely rest our weight ? 
 
 “ If this be so, is not the casting of a boy loose upon his 
 honour, when the strength of his character and the good- 
 ness of his principles are as yet unknown either to himself 
 or to those set over him, the mere casting him recklessly 
 into a sea of temptation, to sink or swim as may hap ? Is 
 it not the very worst conceivable way of producing that 
 * Ter. Adel. i. 1. 
 
234 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 spirit of honour and truth which it is desired should be 
 developed ? Is it not, at its very best , a physiological experi- 
 ment of a remarkably cruel and reckless character 1 
 
 “ Let us distinctly understand what it is we are asked 
 to do. We are asked to lay down, as a principle, that 
 during playtime, when boys have no obligatory task im- 
 posed upon them, and temptations to evil are, in conse- 
 quence, most rife and dangerous, it is absolutely better to 
 leave boys of all ages and characters entirely to them- 
 selves ; that it is a mistake to try and separate the weak 
 and yielding from the strong and overbearing; that the 
 boy of good principles should not be protected from the 
 one of indifferent principles ; that the delicate-minded 
 should be left to the torture of the foul-mouthed ! 
 
 “ When a young lad is exposed to the contagion of vice, 
 what immediately happens is the breaking down of the 
 first outwork of virtue, which consists in unconsciousness 
 of evil. . . . Can we honestly say that a young lad so 
 exposed is getting a fair chance ] Putting the question of 
 schools aside, is there a single English father, of ordinary 
 prudence and love for his child, to say nothing of his 
 feelings of responsibility, who would deliberately thrust 
 his boys out, to play and consort with boys of whose 
 reputation he knew nothing, and without looking after them 
 in any shape or form , under the idea that that was the way 
 to strengthen them against vice, and to nourish a nice sense 
 of honour 1 But if the system of leaving boys entirely to 
 themselves is good in itself, this is precisely the course 
 which all loving parents ought to follow. Yet who would 
 not recoil at the very thought ? 
 
 “ We are dazzled by the glamour of the large English 
 public schools, so that we, many of us, cannot see the 
 truth till we spell and reason it out, word by word and 
 thought by though t.” 
 
 And what of the results of the two systems — for the 
 
SCHOOLBOY HONOUR. 
 
 235 
 
 question is manifestly an eminently practical one ? Has 
 the Irish supervision system or the no-supervision 
 system prevalent in England the better results to point 
 to in evidence of its success ? Eor their number, the 
 Irish schools have, beyond a doubt, far better results to 
 point to in evidence, as any unbiassed reader of these 
 pages will perceive for himself. Do not most boys 
 leave our schools fairly well-educated, industrious, good, 
 and manly ? A vast amount of evil we have all 
 heard of, resulting from the absence of supervision. 
 But who ever heard of any evil resulting from the 
 shielding of one’s sons from evil influences, as far as pos- 
 sible, during the tender, impressionable years of their 
 boyhood ? The following excerpt is from Colonel 
 Chichester’s “ Schools.” I quote it in order to strengthen 
 my views as to the permanent harm that may result 
 from the English no-supervision system : — 
 
 “In an article which appeared in the Dublin Review for 
 April 1878, the late lamented Dr. Ward thus wrote: 
 4 The present Dublin Reviewer does not shrink from saying 
 that his whole existence has been blighted by the reckless- 
 ness in this matter’ (he was writing of the absence of 
 supervision) ‘ of his former Protestant masters. Some 
 fifty years ago he was educated, to his irreparable mis- 
 fortune, at one of the most distinguished among Protestant 
 public schools ’ [the name of the school, which I suppress, 
 can be ascertained by the curious reader on reference to 
 the article from which this is an extract] ; c and to this day 
 he cannot remember without a shudder — nay, without 
 being tempted to a transport of indignation — the experi- 
 ences which befell him .’ 99 
 
 The following story will show to what an extent the 
 Prefect system is carried on in England. An Irish 
 
236 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 schoolmaster of my acquaintance was dining a short 
 time ago with a head-master of an English preparatory 
 school. There were several other guests present, among 
 them an assistant-master from a large proprietary school 
 about three miles distant. This assistant-master had 
 a separate boarding-house of his own, the property of 
 the school. In this house he had thirty-two boarders, 
 from thirteen to sixteen years of age. This master, an 
 4 excellent classical scholar, was one of the principal 
 teachers in the proprietary school to which I refer. He 
 was purposely invited to dinner on this occasion to 
 meet my Irish friend. As they sat next each other at 
 dinner they discussed with each other many interesting 
 features of school life. They asked each other many 
 questions, and answered them. One question which 
 was put by the Irish schoolmaster received a reply that 
 struck him as being a most remarkable one. He asked 
 his fellow-guest, Who looked after his thirty-two boys 
 when he was dining away from home, as on the present 
 occasion — and was calmly answered, “ They take care 
 of themselves. And then, of course/’ the Englishman 
 went on to explain, “ there is the Prefect in charge over 
 all, and responsible to me for the conduct of the rest.” 
 This gentlemans wife, who acted as his housekeeper, 
 was also one of the guests. A boy of sixteen was, there- 
 fore, literally master of the house if the servant element 
 — one not always suggestive of good where boys are con- 
 cerned — be not taken into account, from about half-past 
 five to eleven o’clock on the evening in question.* Some 
 of the thirty-two boys were Irish boys. Happy state 
 of things, thought the Irish schoolmaster to himself, for 
 
 * The St. Winifred boys “bribed the servants to secrecy." — St. 
 Winifred's, p. 400. 
 
“ SCHOOLBOY HONOUR. 
 
 237 
 
 the English schoolmaster. In Ireland, he wonderingly 
 asked himself, what would be thought of the school- 
 master who would coolly go out at half-past five in the 
 evening, and leave his boys without any supervision 
 save that of one of themselves — a youth of sixteen— 
 for five or six hours at a stretch ? And yet the very 
 same parents who would not tolerate such gross neglect 
 — for so they would justly term it — in an Irish school, 
 are smilingly satisfied with it in an English one; in 
 fact, speak loudly in praise of it. Truly, indeed, 
 
 “ Tis distance lends enchantment to the view.” * 
 
 The Englishman did not think it necessary in the least 
 to defend his position. He considered, my informant 
 told me, that an assistant-master’s life would be quite 
 intolerable if he could never go out to dine during term 
 with his friends ; and that he could not possibly, being 
 only an assistant-master himself, be expected to keep 
 an assistant-master under him ; that the state of things, 
 therefore, which the Irish schoolmaster appeared to 
 regard as indefensible, was simply necessary. 
 
 Is it any wonder that, under the circumstances, the 
 boys in Irish schools should be better in regard to their 
 moral characters than those in English schools, and 
 should grow up into more virtuous men ? “Not in the 
 least,” can be the only answer to the question. 
 
 “ But surely,” some one may say, “ such a state of 
 things as that here described is abnormal and extra- 
 ordinary ; there cannot be many schools in England 
 managed so negligently.” Let him who is inclined to 
 say so investigate the matter for himself, and he will 
 
 Campbell’s “ Pleasures of Hope. 
 
238 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 find that there is nothing whatever unusual in the 
 occurrence I have related. 
 
 A young friend of mine is at present at an English 
 school — one of the great public schools of that country. 
 In his “ House ” there are forty boys, ranging in respect 
 of age from thirteen to eighteen. The House-master 
 (he has no assistant) and his wife frequently spend 
 their evenings out. The boys on these occasions take 
 their tea, as they also do ofttimes their dinner, alone ; 
 study alone ; go to their beds alone ; and so forth. 
 When I say “ alone,” I mean without the superintend- 
 ence of any master. Five of the forty boys are Prefects : 
 these officiate at dinner, preside at tea, supervise the 
 preparation-hours, &c., during the master’s absence. The 
 master’s wife is his house-keeper — when at home. 
 
 What would Irish parents think of the Irish school- 
 master who would leave his boarders, whether forty in 
 number or only five, to their own devices and Prefects — 
 these being boys of from thirteen to eighteen years of age 
 — from six o’clock in the evening till midnight, again and 
 again, during term-time ? With such a schoolmaster, 
 if an Irishman, his boys’ parents and guardians could 
 find no words too severe to express their indignation. 
 Their sons and wards they would one by one remove 
 from him ; and his carelessness and neglect they would 
 mercilessly decry and publish abroad in all directions. 
 Yes, this is the way Irish parents and guardians would 
 treat an Irish schoolmaster who would act so ; while 
 they, these very same persons, will tolerate — nay, even 
 admire and belaud — the very same method of carrying 
 on a school in England, which they denounce so angrily, 
 so indignantly in Ireland. 
 
 Irish schoolmasters have, however, nothing to com- 
 
PREFECTORIAL SYSTEM. 
 
 239 
 
 plain of. It is far better for the morals of boys at Irish 
 schools that neglect on the part of their schoolmasters 
 will not be tolerated. Why should any parents be 
 satisfied that their sons should be left to themselves in 
 their school without any master to look after them, 
 again and again, for hours and hours together, while 
 their schoolmasters are out at dinners and dances 
 amusing themselves ? 
 
 When using the word Prefects in this chapter, I do 
 not, I should explain, mean by Prefects pupil-teachers 
 or monitors — boys who take, for example, junior 
 classes for masters, turn off the gas in the dormitories 
 at night, perform outdoor supervision duty for them, 
 and so forth. The boys who perform such duties as 
 these are really junior masters rather than Prefects, 
 and they ought to be paid openly for the duties they 
 perform. Then they will feel a sense of responsi- 
 bility that they cannot feel otherwise. Boys should be, 
 above all things, taught the right use of language, and 
 to look at things from their true point of view. If a 
 boy has to perform such duties as those referred to, he 
 should be taught to regard himself as, what in truth he 
 is, a deputy assistant-master. As such his fellow- 
 pupils would soon come to regard him, and to respect 
 him accordingly. 
 
 Wages and rewards are by no means the same thing. 
 Wages are the payment for which any one formally 
 engages or gages in advance to perform certain work — 
 work which he only undertakes to do because he is 
 paid for it. From this undertaking neither party to the 
 engagement can legally or equitably withdraw at will 
 without expressed or implied mutual consent. This, I 
 think, at least may be fairly regarded as a generally true 
 
240 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 explanation of the word. From the working for a reward 
 one may, without the infringement of any obligation of 
 any kind, withdraw at any moment ; for to work for a 
 reward one is not bound, nor does he bind himself, by 
 any engagement. Whether he does work for a reward 
 or not, is entirely his own affair. Generally speaking, 
 before one discontinues to work for another person for 
 wages — it is always for one’s self that one works for a 
 reward — notice, more or less formally, must be given by 
 him to this other person, the precise formality of the 
 notice depending on the nature of the engagement. The 
 Victoria Cross is a reward for personal valour displayed 
 by a British subject on behalf of his Queen and country. 
 If earned it must be given ; but no one ever engages, 
 or enters into any formal contract, to earn it. The 
 soldier’s daily pay is wages — a very different thing. 
 For his wages he is obliged to work so long as he con- 
 tinues a member of the service. From the working for 
 his wages the soldier cannot withdraw for so many 
 years of his life without an understanding with the 
 military authorities ; nor can these withhold from him 
 his wages, so long as he performs for them his under- 
 taken services, without his consent. Were his wages a 
 reward it would be different : either party, before the 
 reward has been earned, is free, the one to withdraw 
 the offer of the reward, the other to give up the working 
 for it — there being no engagement of any kind to bind 
 the one party to the other in the matter. 
 
 If a senior boy undertakes to act the part of a deputy- 
 master (c.g., teaching a class, performing dormitory 
 duties, &c.), then let him be properly paid for his services, 
 and he will properly perform what he undertakes to 
 do, if he can. If he cannot, then let him be released from 
 
PREFECTORIAL SYSTEM. 
 
 241 
 
 his undertaking. No boy should be asked to act the 
 part of a deputy-master without being properly requited 
 for his assistance ; and the requital should be plainly 
 regarded as wages, not as a reward — first, for the sake 
 of truth ; and, secondly, because the boy or man who 
 regularly engages to perform any services for fair wages, 
 will be far more likely to perform them effectually 
 than he who has entered into no such formal contract. 
 
 But then there are services which should be required 
 of all senior boys, whether Prefects or not, and which 
 should be even insisted on by the schoolmaster. For 
 the performance of these services senior boys should be 
 neither rewarded nor paid. And why ? Simply because 
 they are manifest duties, which the senior boys, as being 
 senior boys, should be obliged to perform without fee, 
 favour, or reward. Senior boys must be taught to know 
 that there are certain services which they must render 
 gratuitously, because it is their duty so to render 
 them. A boy must be taught that he must not pass 
 through school-life a useless log, a mere a^o? apovprj 9, 
 simply because his schoolmaster refuses to reward 
 him or pay him for the performance of duties which 
 he has a perfect right to require of him, being as he is 
 an important member of a Christian community. 
 
 There are numberless things a senior boy can do 
 that an assistant-master cannot do, in the cause of 
 right — and for this reason. An assistant-master can- 
 not be present everywhere and at all times. Villanies 
 of all sorts can be going on in a school even where 
 the supervision is of the most careful kind — villanies 
 of which the masters in charge, how vigilant soever, 
 may be, one and all of them, in total ignorance. 
 
 There are things which boys will not do openly, for 
 
 Q 
 
242 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 they know how abominable and wrong they are. To 
 do these they will, with wondrous cunning, watch their 
 time and opportunities; and during the twenty-four 
 hours it is absolutely impossible to debar ’cute boys, 
 who are bent upon sin, from having some time, some 
 opportunity, for some iniquity or another. Herein 
 lies the opportunity for the senior boys. 
 
 Very few things of a forbidden and unlawful nature 
 can go on in a school for any considerable length of 
 time without the knowledge of the senior boys, if they 
 only choose to keep their ears and their eyes moderately 
 open ; and this they should certainly be expected to do. 
 Masters or no masters, supervision or no supervision, 
 the senior boys should be required to exert themselves 
 to keep, so far as in them lies, the boys among whom 
 they live and have influence from wrong-doing and 
 evil-speaking of every kind. They should be taught 
 that it is simply their duty so to do ; that God gave 
 them talents of a certain kind, ten or five or two, as 
 the case may be; and that of these talents they are 
 expected by Him who gave them to make ample and 
 proper use ; and that if this proper and ample use of 
 them they do not make, they will (for so God Himself 
 has plainly warned us) be punished hereafter. They 
 should be taught, too, that for any good of this nature 
 which they may do they have no right whatever to 
 claim any fee or favour as a debt ; for that, fee or no fee, 
 favour or no favour, their duty as Christians they are 
 bound to do. They should have it impressed upon them, 
 that Virtue will in due course bring its own rewards — 
 a rich supply of them ; it being at the same time fully 
 explained to them what these “own rewards ” of Virtue 
 are. This surely is a theme on which every school- 
 
PREFECTORIAL SYSTEM . 
 
 243 
 
 master who has his heart in his work, and is otherwise 
 fitted for his profession, ought to be able to enlarge, 
 and should delight to enlarge, to an almost illimitable 
 extent. 
 
 There is no end to the number of little ways in 
 which senior boys can be of help in their school. I am 
 waiving now great occasions which it requires a certain 
 amount of possibly even heroic virtue to meet. 
 
 Vile expressions can be discountenanced by them ; 
 filthy conversation in the dormitory at night can be 
 objected to; ungodly exclamations can be protested 
 against ; inveterate idleness can be held in contempt 
 — held at least as nothing whatever to boast of; 
 bullying can be stopped ; the constant infringement of 
 rules can be declaimed against — all, all this, and far 
 more of the same kind, can be done by a senior boy. 
 And in doing all this he should be taught that he is 
 doing only his duty, that he is doing nothing whatever 
 to be rewarded for ; that in doing all this he is sacri- 
 ficing nothing; while he is gaining much, for he is 
 building up and strengthening his own character, im- 
 proving the morale of his school-fellows, and earning 
 universal gratitude and respect. 
 
 To reward a boy for assisting in the cause of virtue 
 in all these little ways, is bad in principle — is, as 
 experience proves, bad in its results. To reward a boy 
 for doing his plain, manifest duty is to demoralise him, 
 and to demoralise, of course, as well all who look on 
 and see, and are likely to be affected by, the prevalence 
 of such a corrupting practice. 
 
 It is satisfactory to think that the custom of reward- 
 ing boys for doing what it is simply their duty to 
 do, by means of extra school privileges and sundry 
 
244 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 immunities, obtains in hardly any Irish schools. Would 
 that I could say in none ! In Ireland, however, as 
 in all other countries, there are persons weak and 
 vulgar enough to “go in” for what is at once cheap 
 and fashionable, how nasty and foolish soever. 
 
 All boys should have these principles of duty that 
 I have laid down instilled into them, of course, from 
 their earliest days at school. The little boy must 
 be trained in the way that he should go ; and then 
 when he is a senior boy he will find the difficulty of 
 not departing from it comparatively slight. 
 
 “But what if a boy should refuse to assist the cause 
 of right gratuitously ? ” What, I ask in return, if a boy 
 should refuse to do any other duties — to learn his lessons, 
 or keep within the bounds of the school, we shall say 
 — gratuitously ? Why, he must then be dealt with 
 according to his deserts. A boy, however, who would 
 in cold blood tell his schoolmaster, who had been im- 
 pressing upon him the importance of using his talents 
 and opportunities aright, that these talents and oppor- 
 tunities he would not use without some tangible 
 recompense, is not one to be met with, I should think, 
 in a lifetime. With a boy who would suggest such a 
 thing, much less say it, I have certainly never yet, 
 myself, personally, either as boy or man, come into 
 contact. 
 
 “ But is it not expecting too much from boys to ex- 
 pect them to help in this way ? ” Too much in the way 
 of honour and goodness cannot be expected from boys 
 such as those with whom the head-master of an ordinary 
 grammar-school comes daily into contact. The more 
 one expects from them, the more he will get. Bequire 
 but little of them, and you will get but little. Let your 
 

 PREFECTORIAL SYSTEM . 245 
 
 standard of boy morality be low, but two feet high 
 say, and their morality will certainly reach no higher. 
 Make your standard six feet high, and there is a possi- 
 bility that your boys’ standard may reach to five feet 
 high at all events, if not to the entire six. To expect 
 less goodness and honour from boys than they are 
 able to give, is to keep them in a far lower moral con- 
 dition than they ought to be in. To raise their tone of 
 morality to the highest possible pitch, and to expect 
 them then to act up to their lights, and to keep con- 
 stantly urging them thereto, can do nought but good : 
 good it must do. To do less than this for boys is to 
 do them positive harm — it is simply to demoralise 
 them. To do less than this is unworthy of one who 
 professes to be an educator. All schoolmasters, how- 
 ever, do less than this who, as so many schoolmasters 
 do in England, appoint such and such boys Prefects, 
 Praepostors, or Monitors; reward them for performing 
 duties that they should perform without any reward ; 
 and leave all the other boys, those not thus singled out 
 and honoured, under the impression that they are a 
 mere vulgus profanum from whom nothing particularly 
 good can be reasonably expected. 
 
 If a boy only use his talents and opportunities aright 
 because he is rewarded for so doing, he must be but a 
 poor creature as a mere ordinary companion for his 
 school-fellows, not to say as a Prefect over them. 
 
 “ But,” I can imagine some one exclaiming, “ surely 
 you would not do away with the whole system of 
 rewards?” No; not the whole system of rewards. 
 And yet I think the system of rewards and prizes, at 
 athletic, intellectual, and all other contests, is in these 
 countries carried much too far. We certainly ought 
 
 I 
 
246 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 not to abuse the system of rewards, as I believe is too 
 often done by English schoolmasters. I would not, 
 for instance, give a reward where a reward has not been 
 fairly earned, and is not fairly due ; and I do not think 
 that any reward in the shape of extra school privileges 
 has been fairly earned by, or is fairly due to the school- 
 boy who simply acts in accordance with the dictates 
 of an enlightened conscience — a conscience that ought 
 to be enlightened at all events.* 
 
 The boy who performs the duties of a Prefect, though 
 without the name or privileges of one, cannot, however, 
 be truthfully said to be without rewards. The rewards 
 that such a boy obtains — and these rewards a school- 
 master should educate him more and more to long for 
 and appreciate — are the consciousness that he is trying 
 to do his heavenly Father’s will, with the consequent 
 delightful feeling of self-approbation ; the conviction 
 that he is piously acting as his earthly parents would 
 above all things like him to act — and this, no matter 
 whether these be alive or not : if “ gone before,” he will 
 be, he certainly should be, gratified by thinking that he 
 is acting loyally towards them, and as a true and affec- 
 tionate son ought to act ; the knowledge of the fact 
 that he is doing what is most calculated to promote 
 his own interests ; the approbation of his masters ; the 
 esteem of his school-fellows ; the sense of success — for 
 
 * The German educationists object in toto to the system of reward- 
 ing in our schools and Universities. They consider that it is demoral- 
 ising to a student to give him a prize for doing that which it is his 
 plain and manifest duty to do ; and, therefore, in German schools and 
 Universities there are scarcely any prizes given. Those that are given 
 are chiefly reserved for poorer students, to enable them to pay the cost 
 of their school and college education ; and they usually take the form 
 of exhibitions and scholarships, without which it would be impossible 
 for many a poor German student to meet the expenses of his education. 
 
PREFECTORIAL SYSTEM. 
 
 247 
 
 to a boy of this kind success is sure to come. Are not 
 these things, each of them, even alone by itself, a bright 
 reward ? Are not all of them together the best, the 
 brightest reward that any one on this earth can possibly 
 obtain ? Do not all of them together, indeed, constitute 
 what we call happiness ? These are the rewards that 
 Irish schoolmasters who do not approve of the Pre- 
 fectorial system, are — such is their method — always 
 keeping before the minds of their pupils. From their 
 pupils they expect a good deal, and they usually get it. 
 If less they were to expect, less they would get. 
 
 The injury to a school — and it is endless — which is 
 inseparable from the misplacing of confidence in un- 
 worthy Prefects, the Irish schoolmaster, who objects in 
 toto to the Prefectorial system, naturally escapes.* 
 
 There is one objection to the Prefect system on 
 which I have not yet touched — namely, the injury 
 possibly done to the gentleness of the nature of the 
 Prefect himself. A Prefect may err from undue severity 
 
 * Archdeacon Farrar thus writes of a Prefect at “St. Winifred’s” : — 
 “ Kenrick’s example told with extraordinary power through the whole 
 house, and especially upon the highest boys, who naturally imitated 
 him” (p. 371). “He never interfered, although things were going to 
 rack and ruin” (394); and “ended by joining in it all” (372) — i.e. 
 (273), “ bad language, dodges for breaking rules and escaping punish- 
 ments, agreed-on lies to avoid detection, suppers, brandy, smoking- 
 parties, false keys,” &c. 
 
 “ O Kenrick, when human beings meet face to face before a certain 
 judgment-seat, there are some young souls who will have a bill of 
 indictment against you” (374). Another monitor “rather followed 
 Kenrick’s lead,” and another, “ though well-intentioned, was a boy of 
 no authority ” (394) — and all this for several Terms together without 
 a pause. The moral is obvious. — These things must, of necessity, 
 be continually happening in Prefect-governed schools. Archdeacon 
 Farrar appears to regard “ St. Winifred’s ” as an excellent school of its 
 kind. 
 
248 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 as well as from over-laxity. “ I have no doubt/’ 
 declares a witness whose evidence before the Endowed 
 Schools Commissioners (1864) is quoted by Colonel 
 Chichester, “ that . . . even a high-minded boy is 
 tempted to be a tyrant. . . . He is made harsh by 
 'freshness of dominion/ and leaves the school before 
 he has acquired enough experience. ... A man of 
 twenty-four, being invested with the powers of a 
 master, has less power of doing mischief than a Prefect 
 of seventeen, because he is much more directly sub- 
 ordinate to superior authority . . . and experience. . . . 
 I have often heard of vexatious abuses of the kind 
 committed by persons who have left the school.” 
 [Evid. of W. Johnson, Esq., vol. ii. p. 128.] 
 
 "But would not a schoolboy,” it may be asked, 
 “ feel more inclined to do his numerous social duties 
 energetically and heartily, if for doing them some sub- 
 stantial, tangible rewards were offered to him ? ” 
 
 No ; I do not think so. The boy who would 
 coolly tell you, or deliberately determine, that he 
 would do his duties heartily and energetically only on 
 condition that he would receive a tangible reward for 
 so doing, is not one that could be depended upon for 
 doing them properly under any circumstances. How 
 could you trust a boy who would make barter and sale 
 of his duties in this manner ? Some boys will by their 
 very natures cordially accord with their masters in their 
 views upon a schoolboy’s duties. Boys of this kind 
 will not stop to ask, every time an opportunity for doing 
 some good in the school presents itself to them, “ What 
 will be my tangible reward if I now do the right thing ? ” 
 Kewarded or unrewarded, Prefects or not, boys of this 
 stamp will always try to do what is right, so long as 
 
PREFECTORIAL SYSTEM. 
 
 249 
 
 they remain at school. No offer of rewards could make 
 them do more than their best ; and their best they are 
 already doing. The promise of a reward on condition 
 that they should do so could not but have an injurious 
 effect on their sense of duty and proper appreciation of 
 right and wrong. The offer of a reward would, in short, 
 tend to demoralise such boys. The lazy, careless boys, 
 on the other hand, could not be bribed, so far as my 
 experience enables me to form an opinion, into being 
 anything but lazy and careless. Who is not acquainted 
 with many men who could soon raise themselves into 
 far better social positions, and whose incomes would be 
 much increased, if only they could or would exert them- 
 selves a little more than they have been doing, and 
 could only be induced to make a better use of their 
 talents and opportunities ? But they do not seem 
 capable of more exertion, of a truer sense of duty, or 
 more wisdom in the using of their opportunities and 
 talents. Their laziness seems ineradicable, their care- 
 lessness an essential part of their natures ; they are 
 wholly unambitious. What good could the offer of 
 rewards do these ? They would undertake, no doubt, 
 readily enough to do ever so much if only properly 
 compensated for the doing of it. But they would not 
 do anything the more for all their promises. They 
 know already of themselves that if they will only work 
 harder, and give their minds more to their work, it 
 will serve their interests effectually. But yet this they 
 cannot — or will not — do. The offer of rewards for 
 harder work to such as these must be ever in vain. 
 
 “ Rewards,' ” I may be told, “sweeten labour. 5 ' No 
 doubt they do ; but, as has been pointed out, rewards 
 should not be confused with wages. Neither should 
 
250 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 they be offered to boys for the performance of duties 
 which they should not be allowed with impunity to 
 neglect. 
 
 Besides, as we have seen, the exemplary schoolboy 
 is never unrewarded : 
 
 “ What nothing earthly gives, or can destroy, 
 
 The soul’s calm sunshine and the heart-felt joy, 
 
 Is Virtue’s prize : a better would you fix ? ” * 
 
 Furthermore, masters have it in their power to show 
 kindnesses of many kinds to well-deserving boys, and 
 their opportunities in this respect they will not, it may 
 be believed, be so foolish, so ungrateful, as to overlook. 
 
 ’AvfipL toi xP e &v 
 
 fJLvrjfArjV Tpoaeivai , repirvov et tl ttov irdOrj. 
 
 XdpLS X ( *P LP 7 dp €(Ttlv 7) tlktovv' del’ 
 
 6tov d’dirofipei fivrjGTis e& TreirovOoTOS, 
 ovk av y kvoiT £Q' ofiros euyevfy avrjp. + 
 
 But gratitude, and the kindness which a grateful 
 heart is sure to show, is one thing : wages, or rewards 
 offered in advance, and claimed as a right, quite another. 
 I should be the last to object to gratitude in any shape.J 
 
 In conclusion : have I, I ask the candid reader, made 
 out my case against the managing of boys by means of 
 prefects — this grand essential of the “Public School 
 System ” ? If it be granted me that I have, how impor- 
 tant, from my point of view, the admission ! 
 
 * Pope, “Essay on Man,” iv. + Soph. Aj., 520, &c. 
 
 X I would not like it to be inferred from anything I have said in 
 this chapter that I object to good-conduct prizes. Of bond fide good- 
 conduct prizes, given generously but discreetly, I thoroughly approve. 
 Daily permission to go “ down town,” authority to “ tund ” a com- 
 panion, and such-like privileges, granted to a boy because he is a 
 prefect, are not, however, good-conduct prizes. It is to the abuse, not 
 to the use, of the prize-giving system that I object. 
 
( 251 ) 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 “ THE FRIENDSHIPS FORMED BY AN IRISH BOY AT 
 AN ENGLISH SCHOOL SURE TO BE USEFUL TO 
 HIM AFTERWARDS.” 
 
 “ But is not one’s son likely to form many friendships 
 in an English school that will be sure to be beneficial 
 to him in after life ? ” 
 
 One’s son will be sure to form many friendships in 
 any school in any country that will probably be, if not 
 actually useful to him afterwards, the source, at least, 
 of a great deal of pure pleasure to him. 
 
 There are few friends like the friends of one’s boy- 
 hood. How at one of our “ Old Boys’ ” dinners the heart 
 of the old man of seventy overflows with happiness as 
 he shakes, and shakes, and shakes again the hand of 
 another “ Old Boy ” whom he may not have seen — and 
 whose appearance he can scarcely now recognise — since 
 they parted company at the school-gate, after years of 
 tried friendship, over fifty years ago ! 
 
 The home-educated Irishman who resides in Ireland, 
 has generally, however, so far as the happinesses of 
 friendship are concerned, a great advantage over him 
 who was educated in England, for he is constantly meet- 
 ing with old school-fellows, especially if he graduated, 
 and resided while an undergraduate, in T.C.D. 
 
 There being but the one college connected with the 
 
252 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 Dublin University, there are constant reunions always 
 going on there of old school-fellows, who have thus an 
 opportunity given them of renewing and strengthening 
 their early friendships year after year. It is very 
 different in England, where the two great Universities 
 are divided each into many colleges. 
 
 There is not the same opportunity, therefore, of con- 
 tinuing the friendship of one’s schooldays in England 
 as there is in Ireland, even in the case of students at 
 the same University — unless these belong also at the 
 same time to the same college. Seeing, then, that 
 “ friendship is,” as Cicero tells us, “ the only thing in 
 the world concerning the usefulness of which all man- 
 kind are agreed ” * — and who can doubt the truthfulness 
 of the observation ? — the schools of that country, in 
 which Irishmen have most opportunities of perfecting 
 their friendships — and, that, without effort or design — 
 have evidently an advantage for them in this respect 
 over those in the country wherein the opportunities for 
 so doing are comparatively few and far between. 
 
 In regard to the students of the Dublin University, 
 considerably over 95 per cent, of them were, I 
 have no doubt, educated in Ireland. The Trinity 
 College student, therefore, who was educated at an 
 English school has seldom or never an old school-fellow 
 of his own to whom to unburden his mind as to a 
 friend. His friends must all be made, if he is to have 
 any friends : he has no old friendships to keep up ; and 
 the making of friends in a University in which you 
 probably will find yourself a blank stranger is by no 
 means the easy and simple thing that an inexperienced 
 person might, without reflection, suppose it to be. 
 
 * Dc Am. xxiii. 
 
SCHOOL FRIENDSHIPS . 
 
 253 
 
 “ Friendship is no plant of hasty growth. 
 
 Though planted in Esteem’s deep fixed soil, 
 
 The gradual culture of kind Intercourse 
 Must bring it to perfection.” * 
 
 In regard to the English friendships which the Irish 
 University student may have formed during his school- 
 days in England, how is it possible for him to “ bring ” 
 these “ to perfection ” by “ the gradual culture of kind 
 intercourse ” ? How is it possible for him even “ to 
 keep” them “up,” as the expression is — to waive the 
 bringing of them “ to perfection ” ? The Irish lad of 
 seventeen or eighteen years of age, who enters, direct 
 from an English school, an Irish University, and after- 
 wards goes to a profession in Ireland, has, indeed, little 
 opportunity of so doing. And then, what becomes of 
 his intimacies with his young English friends ? “A 
 man,” wisely said Dr. Johnson, “ should keep his friend- 
 ship in constant repair.” But without plenty of fitting 
 opportunities this he cannot do. 
 
 “But surely, as friendship is admittedly a useful 
 thing, the friendships formed by the young Irish boy 
 in an English school must prove useful to him, should 
 he happen to live in England after leaving school ? ” 
 
 In the first place, there is no certainty that they will. 
 A great deal will depend upon circumstances — the 
 occupation of the young Irishman, the part of England 
 he lives in, his private means, and so forth. And, 
 secondly, the very suggestion of such a thing to a boy 
 is to my mind hateful in the extreme. The bare idea 
 of sending a boy to school with the deliberate design 
 that he is there and then deliberately to make friends 
 
 * Joanna Baillie. 
 
254 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 who may serve him afterwards, is such a perversion of 
 the term friendship that one can hardly consider it with 
 patience. The idea is, however, an old one, and one 
 which is, alas ! only too frequently acted upon. Cowper 
 satirised, a hundred years ago, the then prevailing 
 custom of sending boys to school in order that they 
 might therein form acquaintance with boys who, on 
 growing up to man’s estate, would have rich Livings 
 in their gift to dispose of among their acquaintances, 
 in his “ Tirocinium,” in these scathing words : — 
 
 “ ‘ Ah, blind to bright futurity, untaught 
 
 The knowledge of the world, and dull of thought ! 
 Church-ladders are not always mounted best 
 By learned clerks and Latinists profess’d. 
 
 Th’ exalted prize demands an upward look, 
 
 Not to be found by poring o’er a book. 
 
 Small skill in Latin, and still less in Greek, 
 
 Is more than adequate to all I seek. 
 
 Let erudition grace him, or not grace, 
 
 I give the bauble but the second place ; 
 
 His wealth, fame, honours, all that I intend, 
 
 Subsist and centre in one point — a friend. 
 
 A friend, whate’er he studies or neglects, 
 
 Shall give him consequence, heal all defects. 
 
 His intercourse with peers, and sons of peers — 
 
 There dawns the splendour of his future years ; 
 
 In that bright quarter his propitious skies 
 Shall blush betimes, and there his glory rise. 
 
 Your Lordship and your Grace , what school can teach 
 A rhet’ric equal to those parts of speech ] 
 
 What need of Homer’s verse, or Tully’s prose, 
 
 Sweet interjections ! if he learn but those ? 
 
 Let rev’rend churls his ignorance rebuke, 
 
 Who starve upon a dog’s- ear’d Pentateuch ; 
 
 The parson knows enough w T ho knows a duke.’ 
 Egregious purpose ! worthily begun 
 In barb’rous prostitution of your son, 
 
SCHOOL FRIENDSHIPS . 
 
 255 
 
 Press’d on his part by means that would disgrace 
 A scriv’ner’s clerk, or footman out of place, 
 
 And ending, if at last its end be gain’d, 
 
 In sacrilege, in God’s own house profaned.” 
 
 “ Egregious purpose, 1 ” indeed ! “ Barb’rous prostitu- 
 
 tion of your son,” in real truth ! One’s sons ought 
 surely to be taught — and the teaching cannot begin too 
 early — to depend for their success in life on their in- 
 dustry, their abilities, their uprightness, their resolve 
 to do whatever they undertake to do with all their 
 might — in short, upon God and themselves : not upon 
 “ tuft-hunting ” — the meanly, with cool deliberation, 
 seeking to secure the friendship of boys richer and more 
 influential than themselves. 
 
 I can imagine no sort of moral education more de- 
 grading to one’s sons than the training of them from 
 their childhood upwards to cringe before, and fawn on, 
 and flatter, for the sake of certain ulterior advantages, 
 boys more influential than themselves. Success in life 
 is a great thing, no doubt, to achieve ; but, great as it 
 is, it can be purchased too dearly. 
 
 Self-respect we should zealously, constantly inculcate 
 upon our children. This virtue, of all virtues, we should 
 teach them never to lose sight of. We should, in 
 short, impress upon them never — to use the words of 
 Juvenal — 
 
 propter vitam vivendi perdere causas. * 
 
 The question, How far the friendships formed at 
 English schools between English and Irish boys is 
 likely to benefit the latter is, after all, a mere practi- 
 cal, matter-of-fact one : there might be statistical tables 
 
 * Sat. viii. 84. 
 
256 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 drawn up on the subject. Perhaps there are. Per- 
 sonally, I have never heard any one admitting that he 
 had ever derived any assistance, when of assistance he 
 stood in need, from any one whose friendship he had 
 formed at an English school — and I reckon, I may add, 
 among my acquaintances, many Irishmen who were 
 educated in England, and have spoken to several of 
 them upon this very subject. What is the reader’s 
 own experience in the matter ? 
 
( 257 ) 
 
 CHAPTEE XX. 
 
 ADVANTAGE TO AN IRISH BOY EDUCATED AT AN 
 ENGLISH SCHOOL RESULTING FROM THE TRUER 
 VIEW OF ENGLAND AND THE ENGLISH, AND THE 
 BROADER SYMPATHIES, WHICH AN EDUCATION 
 AT AN ENGLISH SCHOOL IS SUPPOSED BY SOME 
 TO BE SURE TO ENGENDER. 
 
 “ But does not the educating of one’s son in England 
 tend to enlarge his mind and produce in him more 
 sympathy for, and a truer knowledge of, Englishmen 
 and English affairs than if he were educated as a boy 
 wholly in Ireland ? ” 
 
 Let us assume for a moment that this he really so — 
 that an Irish boy’s mind is enlarged, and that his sym- 
 pathies become broader in consequence of his being 
 educated in England. What is the price, let us ask our- 
 selves, that one has to pay for this advantage ? Let us 
 take care that we do not sacrifice too much for it, that 
 this advantage, great as it is, is not outweighed by 
 counterbalancing disadvantages. One disadvantage 
 which is tolerably sure to result from the effort made 
 to gain this advantage, is, to judge from results, an 
 inferior moral and intellectual education. Another is, 
 the diminished chances of making warm and lasting 
 friendships. And a third is, the danger that, while the 
 mind and sympathies of one’s son are being enlarged 
 
 R 
 
258 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 at an English school so far as England and the English 
 are concerned, in all that pertains to Ireland and the 
 Irish they may become narrowed to the last degree. 
 
 “ But you have been to Palestine — alas ! 
 
 Some minds improve by travel, others, rather, 
 Resemble copper-wire or brass, 
 
 Which gets the narrower by going farther ! * 
 
 There is a danger of a boy's becoming anti-Irish in his 
 social and political views, while he is growing pro- 
 English. There is a danger of his losing all his natural 
 affection for his native country while he is acquiring 
 admiration for England and the English. There is, in 
 short, a danger of an Irish boy’s becoming narrowed and 
 cramped and prejudiced in his opinions, in place of 
 becoming broader and fairer and more enlarged in his 
 sympathies, by a sojourn of five or six years, at the 
 most impressionable time of his life, in an English 
 school. 
 
 And it must be clear that the Irish lad who is actually 
 prejudiced against Ireland, who dislikes her people, and 
 despises and misunderstands them, is not favourably 
 circumstanced, should it be his lot to come back and 
 spend his life in Ireland after his school education is 
 over, or to enter the House of Commons as a re- 
 presentative of an Irish constituency, or to become a 
 member of the House of Lords. 
 
 The following extract is from a letter which I lately 
 received from a leading Professor of the late Queen’s 
 University (in Ireland), bearing upon this point. The 
 writer must be regarded as somewhat of an authority 
 in the matter, for he was himself educated at an English 
 school : — 
 
 * Hood : “ Ode to Rae Wilson, Esquire.’' 
 
ADVANTAGES OF ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 “ Irish boys who are sent to English public schools 
 seem to me,” writes the Professor, “ to lose a great deal. 
 They do not come to understand the English people, as 
 they only see one class of them, and look on the rest as 
 cads; and they don’t understand the Irish people, as 
 they are disconnected from them from their very boy- 
 hood. Thus they lose in knowledge of human nature — a 
 knowledge which is very valuable. Moreover,” he con- 
 tinues, “ they are commonly sent to shake off a local 
 accent. The presence or absence of an accent does not 
 affect the genuine qualities of a man ; and the boy runs 
 a risk while imitating the English accent of becoming 
 a masher or a toady.” 
 
 Furthermore, if there be any objection to home edu- 
 cation on the ground suggested by the heading of the 
 chapter, the objection holds good, in a greater or less 
 degree, in the case of English boys educated in England 
 as well as in that of Irish boys educated in Ireland. 
 The question may be fairly retorted thus : “ But may 
 not an English boy’s mind also be enlarged and his 
 sympathies broadened by being educated at an Irish 
 school ? ” Admitting that the question of enlarged 
 sympathies and a large mind be worth considering — and 
 this it obviously is — it must be considered in an all-round 
 manner. What is good for the education of Irish boys, 
 must be good also, to a certain measure, for the educa- 
 tion of English boys — not to speak of those in Scotland. 
 There should be an interchange of pupils. Why let the 
 denationalising — I know of no less strong suitable word 
 — and mind-enlarging process be all on the one side ? 
 
 I have no doubt, indeed, that the Irish question 
 would not be the perplexingly unhappy one that it is 
 at the present day, if our English legislators had all 
 
26 o 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 been educated, as boys, for at least a year or two of 
 their lives in Ireland. 
 
 The English boy who would be sent to an Irish 
 school for his education, would certainly gain more 
 than he would lose by the experiment ; and his gain, 
 too, would be very substantial. He would not have 
 to sacrifice for it money, for a good education admit- 
 tedly costs less in this country than in England. Nor 
 a healthy religious and moral education, for the religious 
 and moral education of Irish schoolboys is notably 
 well attended to — and, that, with results so satisfactory 
 that even our worst enemies do not pretend to ques- 
 tion it. Nor a first-rate intellectual education, for 
 — as results prove to demonstration — the intellectual 
 faculties of the Irish schoolboy are generally well 
 awakened and developed. Why, then, it may be 
 wonderingly asked, are there not more English boys 
 educated in Ireland ? 
 
 If there is anything worth considering in the objec- 
 tion implied in the heading prefixed to this chapter, 
 assuredly an English boy's mind would be enlarged 
 and his sympathies broadened, and he would get a 
 truer view of the real and relative position of Ireland 
 in the system of these countries, and he would become 
 possessed of a far better knowledge of it, of its wrongs 
 and rights, its aspirations and requirements — and what 
 a gain to him would be this knowledge ! — if he were 
 educated in it, as a boy, for a year or two at least. 
 
 So far as the removal of prejudice is concerned, an 
 English boy would, as it seems to me, gain a great deal 
 more from being educated in Ireland than would an 
 Irish boy from being educated in England : for the Eng- 
 lish boy usually knows less of Ireland and the Irish than 
 
ADVANTAGES OF ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 261 
 
 does the Irish boy of England and the English, and he 
 is a good deal the more prejudiced of the two. 
 
 The gain to the Irish boy does not certainly appear 
 to me to be very much. In these days of daily or 
 twice-daily newspapers, steam, telegraphs, and tele- 
 phones, migrations for holidays, and so forth, I cannot 
 hold it to be necessary for an Irish parent to send his 
 sons to an English school in order specially to enlarge 
 their minds, and give them a truer insight into the 
 real English character, and secure for them broader 
 sympathies in all matters pertaining to the people of 
 England and Ireland respectively. If any one may feel 
 disposed to disagree with me in this, I would request 
 him to glance over the list of names recorded in Chapter 
 VI., and to read with attention Chapter III. He will 
 find on perusing these chapters, that the fact that a man 
 was educated as a boy in Ireland evidently does not 
 prevent his attaining, in due course of time, to the very 
 highest rank in any calling in life to which he chooses 
 to devote his abilities and energies, whether in England, 
 the Colonies, or at home. 
 
( 262 ) 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 ON THE FEES FOR BOYS IN ENGLISH AND IRISH 
 SCHOOLS , RESPECTIVELY . 
 
 The terms for board and tuition in English grammar- 
 schools range from about £ 2 5 to ^300 a year; in 
 Irish schools, from about £ 4.0 to £ 60 . The Irish 
 schoolmasters whose terms are ^50 a year — the 
 ordinary boarding-school terms in Ireland — may there- 
 fore, as will be perceived, be considerably undersold by 
 some English schoolmasters. 
 
 It is to the cheap English schools that most middle- 
 class Irish schoolboys are sent. It is against these 
 cheap English schools that this Essay is principally 
 directed. 
 
 Not but that small fortunes are not oftentimes spent 
 by middle-class Irish parents, who can but ill afford 
 the expense, on fees for their sons at costly preparatory 
 schools in England * 
 
 * The following is an extract from a letter which I recently received 
 from a brother Irish schoolmaster : — “ I was speaking to a gentleman last 
 week who told me that he had his son, aged eleven, at an English 
 school (preparatory) near London — the terms of which were 150 
 guineas a year. He mentioned the names of two other gentlemen in 
 Dublin who had their sons at the same school, and of a third who had 
 recently sent his son from it to Eton. Thus these four Dublin gentle* 
 
SCHOOL'FEES IN ENGLAND AND IRELAND. 263 
 
 “But could not these Irish schoolmasters who are 
 undersold by schoolmasters in England, reduce their 
 terms ? ” it may be asked. 
 
 No ; certainly not — at least without rendering their 
 schools quite as worthless as places of education as are 
 most of the English schools to which Irish boys are 
 sent — sent to their permanent detriment — year after 
 year. “ Dead bargains ” are seldom satisfactory. To 
 this general rule dead bargains in the matter of educa- 
 tion form no exception. 
 
 To have a really efficient school there must be really 
 good masters in it. To secure these, high salaries 
 must be paid. A good school there cannot be without 
 good masters ; good masters cannot be procured with- 
 out high salaries. The salaries paid for the ordinary 
 class-master in Irish schools are, though it may surprise 
 people to say so, higher than those paid to similar 
 masters in corresponding schools in England. This 
 becomes evident whenever Irish schoolmasters require 
 assistants in their schools. If one advertise through an 
 English newspaper or scholastic agency for a master, 
 offering a salary of, say, £ 100 a year with board and 
 residence, scores of applications from Oxford and Cam- 
 bridge graduates, many of them holding masterships in 
 English schools, will come to him within a week. If 
 ^250 a year be offered, the applications will be quite 
 as numerous, even though the qualifications in regard 
 
 men between them paid that school 600 guineas annually. How 
 happy the half of that sum for four boys would make one of us ! 
 How hard we find it to get anything but the merest pittance for our 
 pupils ! Yet we are taunted with the poorness of our appliances and 
 surroundings when compared with English schools ! ” For the ineffi- 
 ciency of some of these London preparatory schools, see footnote, p. 175, 
 and Chapter X., passim. 
 
264 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 to experience in teaching and scholarship required in a 
 master to whom the higher salary is offered are really, 
 from a University standpoint, high. 
 
 When one reflects on all that the head-master of a 
 boarding-school undertakes to do for each and every 
 pupil — teach him, feed him, pay his laundry expenses, 
 see that his clothes, boots. &c., are kept in proper repair, 
 taking care of him alike in sickness and in health, 
 for at least nine months in the year, it will not be 
 thought that the terms charged in even the most 
 expensive of Irish grammar-schools could be wisely 
 reduced. They certainly could not be reduced unless 
 there were to be, simultaneously with the reduction of 
 fees, a lowering of the whole tone of the school. Eeduce 
 the fees, and the masters’ salaries, for example, must 
 also be reduced ; and the masters at the lower salaries 
 will be, to say the least of it, no improvement on their 
 predecessors ; the class of boys, from a social point of 
 view, will begin to deteriorate, and so forth. 
 
 While it is, no doubt, true, as a general statement, 
 that the smaller an assistant-master’s salary is, the less 
 capable he is likely to be, it does not follow from this 
 that it is, conversely, true, that the larger the salary, 
 the more capable the master. For £200 a year, for 
 example, as good a master (classical or mathematical) 
 may be procured as for £1000. For £ 600 as good a 
 master as for ^2000. That is to say, for the smaller 
 salary, if enough to provide a young unmarried man 
 with all the conveniences, and some of the luxuries of 
 life, a master may be procured who, for all practical 
 purposes, may be as sound a scholar, as capable a 
 teacher, as congenial and sympathetic a companion for 
 the boys, and as courteous a gentleman, as for the 
 
SCHOOL-FEES IN ENGLAND AND IRELAND. 265 
 
 larger one. Nay, the less well paid master may some- 
 times actually have the advantage over the better paid 
 one in all these respects. 
 
 But all this, and more to the same effect, may be 
 left to the common sense of the reader. 
 
( 266 ) 
 
 CHAPTEE XXII. 
 
 HIGH FEES SPENT ON IRISH BOYS AT ENGLISH 
 SCHOOLS NOT ALWAYS A JUDICIOUS EXPENDL 
 TURE OF MONEY . 
 
 " But may not the money spent by a parent on his sons’ 
 education at a first-rate English school be regarded 
 generally as money well invested on their behalf ? ” 
 
 Whether the money thus expended be well invested 
 or not will altogether depend upon (a) the means of the 
 parents; and (/ 3 ) the country in which the boys are 
 intended to reside after leaving school. 
 
 I know of no reason why a rich Irish boy, destined 
 to live in England as a man, should not be sent to a 
 good English school. 
 
 The financial view of the question may be considered 
 from two aspects, (i.) the special and individual, and 
 (ii.) the general. 
 
 (i.) If the Irish parent, whose circumstances are some- 
 what straitened from want of money, can secure an 
 excellent education for his son at an Irish school for, 
 let us say, £y 5 a year, extras included, it certainly is 
 not conducive to his sons interests that he should pay 
 for him .£150 at an English school, unless it can be 
 shown that the education given at the latter school is 
 really superior to that at the former, especially if the 
 boy be destined to reside afterwards in Ireland. 
 
HIGH SCHOOL-FEES OFTEN WASTED . 2 67 
 
 Let us conceive now the existence of two Irish parents, 
 A. and B., whose means, by no means large, depend, in 
 each case, upon the health and strength of the possessor, 
 and each with two sons to be educated. Let us further 
 suppose that A., by making a great and sustained 
 effort, manages to keep his sons at one of the great 
 English public schools, paying for the two of them 
 together in fees ^300 a year — a by no means extravagant 
 figure — inclusive of extras, travelling expenses, pocket- 
 money, &c. Let us suppose that B., with the same means 
 as A., sends his sons to an Irish school, the fees 
 of which amount to no more than, say, ^150 a year 
 for the two — extras and all included. Let us further 
 suppose that, in each case, the parents keep their sons 
 at school for altogether six years. Under the supposed 
 circumstances — and in no instance is the case, as stated, 
 an extreme one — A. by the end of his sons’ school 
 career will have paid for their education ^1800; B. 
 £goo. In other words, when the boys’ school-days are 
 over B. will be by £900 a richer man than A. ; or, in 
 other words still, he will have £gco more than A. to give 
 his two sons, to enable them to make a better start in 
 life — a most important consideration — or to spend upon 
 the education of any other children he may have. 
 
 Which of these two parents now, it may be asked, 
 has acted most conducively to his sons’ welfare ? A., 
 
 some may say ; B., others will maintain. It is a ques- 
 tion, at all events, it will be admitted, which is fairly 
 open to discussion. For my own part, I should say B. 
 without the slightest hesitation — always provided, as I 
 have assumed all along, that, so far as the actual educa- 
 tion of the boys is concerned, the school to which A. 
 sends his sons is not in the least degree superior to that 
 
268 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 to which B. sends his. What a man spends on his sons 
 when they are boys he cannot, of course, give to them 
 when they are men. And it is assuredly better, other 
 things being the same, for the ordinary middle-class 
 Irish parent to give to his sons, each, four or five hun- 
 dred pounds extra when starting in life than to pay 
 away this money in school-fees for them when they are 
 boys. I have known men who have been struggling 
 successlessly against poverty all their lives just for want 
 of some such sum at the beginning of their careers. 
 
 (ii.) Nor is this the only point of view from which 
 this financial element in the question of school selec- 
 tion may be regarded. If, as I contend, the large 
 majority of Irish boys who go to school in England 
 come back uneducated, or, worse still, ill-educated, 
 and thus grow up into drones rather than workers 
 — grow up, at all events, if this language be considered 
 too strong, less self-helpful and useful than they would 
 be if soundly educated — this clearly is a loss, from a 
 monetary point of view, to both the boys themselves 
 and all connected with them, and, of course, ultimately 
 to the country. 
 
 Whatever sort of education turns out young men most 
 helpful to themselves and their country is the best. 
 The more helpful to themselves, and the more likely to 
 be useful as citizens, boys become at school, the better 
 is the education they are receiving, and the better, 
 from a financial and every other point of view, it is for 
 their country. And, of course, conversely, the worse 
 the education, the worse for the country, from a mone- 
 tary and every other point of view, it is. 
 
 Furthermore, if I am right in my assumption that 
 some 1500 or 1600 Irish boys are sent yearly to school 
 
HIGH SCHOOL-FEES OFTEN WASTED. 269 
 
 in England, the pecuniary loss which this exodus causes 
 yearly to the country, i.e ., to its inhabitants, is immense. 
 Let us now for a moment consider what this pecuniary 
 loss amounts to. Well, supposing that 1500 Irish boys 
 go yearly to England to school — and I suspect that in 
 putting the total number at 1500 I am, if anything, 
 underrating it ; and supposing that the fees for each of 
 these 1 500 boys, inclusive of travelling expenses and 
 extras of all kinds, amount to, on the average, £100 
 a year (and this, I am inclined to think, is certainly not 
 overrating the average cost of each boy), then the bulk 
 sum spent yearly by Irish parents on their sons’ educa- 
 tion in England amounts to exactly £1 50,000. A large 
 sum this to be spent out of the country every year, even 
 if well spent ! But what shall we say of it if it be ill- 
 spent, unprofitably spent ? It cannot be retorted by the 
 Irish parent, “ Oh, but with this general financial view 
 of the question I am not personally concerned;” for 
 this would not be true. With this financial view of 
 the question every one living in Ireland is concerned, 
 whether he likes to think so or not. The draining of 
 £ 1 50,000 yearly from the pockets of Irish parents to 
 be spent in England is obviously a tremendous loss to 
 Ireland. And what is bad for the country is certainly 
 bad for every one of its inhabitants. What is bad for 
 the hive, that also is bad for the bee. 
 
 Again, let us look at the matter in this light. If 
 the cost of education of each of these 1 500 Irish boys 
 would at our Irish schools amount to, say, £jo per 
 annum on the average, then the gross amount spent by 
 their parents on their education would come to only 
 £105,000, in place of £150,000, and herein there would 
 be a saving in actual cash to the parents of £45,000 
 
2/0 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 — not to say anything of the fact that the ;£ 105,000 
 would be spent in their own country, while the £ 1 50,000 
 would be spent in England ; and in this way also they 
 would be substantial gainers by educating their sons 
 in Ireland — where, if facts prove anything, they can be 
 educated, to say the least of it, extremely well. 
 
 In putting the number of Irish boys who go year 
 after year to school in England at 1500, I may, as I 
 have suggested, be understating the number, or I may 
 be overstating it ; it is impossible to say, for there are 
 no statistics resting on evidence to refer to for informa- 
 tion. But in neither case is the general scope of my 
 argument interfered with. The exact number of 
 migrating boys is immaterial to my argument. The 
 larger it is, the worse it is for the country and for the 
 people in it; the smaller it is, then the less injurious, 
 from a pecuniary point of view, is the exodus — 
 that is all. The argument that the exodus is, from a 
 pecuniary point of view, a loss to the country and to 
 the people in it holds good in any case if the education 
 secured by the greater outlay be no better than that 
 secured by the less. It is a question merely of degree, 
 whether the loss in pounds sterling is as great to the 
 country as I have computed, or greater, or smaller. In 
 any case the loss is immense. Eor my reasons for 
 estimating the number of Irish boys who go yearly to 
 school in England at 1500 or 1600, see pp. 4-5.* 
 
 * The exact number of Irish boys receiving in England their educa- 
 tion it is practically impossible to calculate. Eor (i) of the English 
 clergymen who “ receive a few pupils,” struggling grinders, and private 
 schoolmasters, unknown to fame, there is no register kept, and so no 
 one can apply to these, not knowing who they are, as to the number of 
 Irish boys being taught by them ; and (ii) English teachers regard as 
 Irish boys those only whose parents actually reside in Ireland. They 
 
HIGH SCHOOL-FEES OFTEN WASTED. 271 
 
 The Irish Universities would be especial gainers if 
 the Irish schoolboy exodus were stayed. Many of the 
 Irish boys who go to English schools, go subsequently 
 to the English Universities — wherein, as a rule, they 
 do not distinguish themselves. Now, if the Irish school- 
 boy exodus were stayed, fewer Irish boys would enter 
 the Universities in England ; while more would enter 
 those in Ireland, and ultimately settle down as resident 
 gentlemen in their own country. The percentage of 
 Irishmen resident in Ireland who are graduates of an 
 English University, having been in the first instance 
 educated at English schools, is a mere nothing when 
 compared with that of the Irishmen who, having been 
 educated as boys in Ireland, subsequently graduated in 
 an Irish University. The greater the number of stu- 
 dents who enter the Irish Universities, the better, for 
 obvious reasons, for these institutions ; and the better, 
 also for obvious reasons, for the country generally. For 
 there can be no doubt, I suppose, that the greater the 
 number of young Irishmen, resident in Ireland, who 
 receive a University education, the better for Ireland it 
 must be. 
 
 do not, for example, reckon as “ Irish,” though the sons of Irish parents, 
 boys who come to them from India and the other colonies, or those taught 
 by them as day-boys — their parents living in England. Yet both these 
 sets of boys are, of course, quite as much Irish as those who go to them 
 every year “ in the cross-Channel steamers ” direct from Ireland. 
 
( 272 ) 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 EFFICIENCY OF IRISH SCHOOLS IN REGARD TO 
 TEACHING ACCOUNTED FOR. 
 
 (i.) Irish boys and masters comparatively poorer : poverty a great 
 stimulus to exertion ; (ii.) fewer holidays ; (iii.) teachers in 
 Ireland better qualified ; (iv.) more masters in proportion to 
 number of boys : therefore smaller classes ; (v.) boys’ moral 
 conduct more faithfully attended to in Irish schools : less 
 bullying ; (vi.) the Intermediate examinations ; (vii.) effect 
 of the greater popularity of English schools conducive to the 
 educational well-being of schools in Ireland ; (viii.) nature 
 of Irish boys better understood by teachers in their own 
 country. 
 
 (i.) In the first place, there is a greater necessity in 
 Ireland than there is in prosperous, wealthy England, 
 for teachers to teach and for boys to learn with dili- 
 gence. There are extremely few boys at Irish schools 
 to whom a sound education is not a matter of even 
 vital importance. Of this the teachers in our Irish 
 schools are well aware ; and of this, if Irish teachers 
 were disposed to be careless, the parents and guardians 
 of their pupils would take very good care soon to 
 remind them. It is to the parents’ and guardians’ 
 natural anxiety on this head that the anxiety of many 
 an Irish teacher to teach his pupils efficiently may be, 
 perhaps, to some degree ascribed. Irish parents — and 
 so best for the cause of education— really cannot afford 
 to allow their sons’ teachers to be lazy or indifferent. 
 They thus act as a constant stimulus to them. Ho boy 
 
EFFICIENCY OF IRISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 2 73 
 
 who was not taught with the utmost care in an Irish 
 school would be allowed by his parents to remain at 
 it. Easy-goingness on the part of a teacher would 
 be very soon detected and found fault with by them ; 
 and therefore, for this reason among others, there is 
 but very little easy-goingness on the part of Irish 
 teachers in Irish schools to find fault with. 
 
 Irish boys, too, are for the most part aware of and 
 fully appreciate the impecunious condition of their 
 parents. They know perfectly well — and, for fear 
 that they should forget it, they are frequently re- 
 minded of it — that they must either work hard at 
 their lessons while at school, or give up the hope of 
 passing any severe examinations for any good appoint- 
 ments after they leave school. And they also know — 
 and what a stimulus to poor boys is this ! — that, if 
 they will only work hard at school, there is no position 
 in after life too high for them to look forward to. 
 
 In English schools, at least in the great public 
 schools of England, it is different. In these there 
 are always numbers of boys whose parents are com- 
 paratively rich, or who, if not rich, have at least 
 opulent friends and relatives in the commercial world, 
 and reasonable expectations accordingly of good busi- 
 ness openings for their sons as soon as they leave 
 school. Many of the boys so circumstanced are ex- 
 exceedingly idle, and by their idleness injurious to 
 their school ; being not only idle themselves, but the 
 cause of idleness in others. From rich idle boys of 
 this kind our Irish schools — and well it is for them 
 that it is so — are almost perfectly free. In whatever 
 school there are many boys who have a fair prospect 
 of becoming rich without learning, these, it may be 
 
 s 
 
274 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 looked on as a certainty, will make their mark on the 
 tone of the entire school, lowering it appreciably so 
 far as studiousness is concerned, for such boys are, for 
 the most part, idlers. In whatever school, on the other 
 hand, the large majority of the boys are poor — as in 
 Ireland — boys who know that they must either work 
 or possibly starve, in these there will be always more 
 work done by masters and boys alike. 
 
 Of this great difference between English and Irish 
 schools Irish parents, especially those of small means, 
 should never for a moment lose sight. It, no doubt, 
 in . some measure accounts for the miserable condition, 
 intellectually, in which we find many a once hopeful 
 Irish boy of seventeen or eighteen, whose boyhood has 
 been spent at an English school. 
 
 Cowper, in his Tirocinium , is strong in his condem- 
 nation of the English public schools of his time, 
 especially as places of education for the sons of middle- 
 class parents : 
 
 “ The great, indeed, by titles, riches, birth, 
 
 Excused th 5 incumbrance of more solid worth, 
 
 Are best disposed of, where with most success 
 They may acquire that confident address, 
 
 Those habits of profuse and lewd expense, 
 
 That scorn of all delights but those of sense, 
 
 Which though in plain plebeians we condemn, 
 
 With so much reason all expect from them. 
 
 But families of less illustrious fame, 
 
 Whose chief distinction is their spotless name, 
 
 Whose heirs, their honours none, their income small, 
 
 Must shine by true desert, or not at all, 
 
 What dream they of, that with so little care 
 They risk their hopes, their dearest treasure there ? ” 
 
 It may fairly be asked, Would Cowper, were be 
 
EFFICIENCY OF IRISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 275 
 
 alive now, have the same low opinion of English 
 public schools as he had when he wrote the Tirocinium 
 in 1784? And I think it may be fairly answered, 
 Yes, he would. So far, at least, as pertains to the 
 habits and tastes contracted by boys at English schools, 
 and of the prevalence of which Cowper was himself 
 for many years a distressful witness — “ Those habits 
 of profuse and lewd expense, That scorn of all delights 
 but those of sense ” — there is, it is to be feared, little 
 or no change in them for the better. Many of the 
 most indefensible customs in vogue at English schools 
 a hundred years ago, when Cowper published his poem, 
 are in vogue even now. Schoolmasters are on the 
 whole wonderfully conservative — 
 
 “ The slaves of custom and establish’d mode, 
 
 With pack-horse constancy we keep the road, 
 
 Crooked or straight.” * 
 
 (ii.) Secondly — and, perhaps, as the natural con- 
 sequence of the foregoing fact — there are far fewer 
 half and whole holidays in Irish schools than there 
 are in English ; far shorter vacations also. In many 
 English schools there are from fifteen to sixteen and 
 even seventeen weeks’ vacation in the year ; in some 
 there are even longer vacations still ; and this quite 
 
 * Tirocinium. Compare with the passage from Tirocinium , quoted 
 on the preceding page, the following from the Daily News of June 6th 
 1882. I find it quoted in Colonel Chichester’s Schools : — “Many are 
 sent there” (to Eton) “for fashion sake, and perhaps fall under the 
 influences of the evil, not of the noble, traditions of the school. They 
 become prematurely knowing men of the world ; luxurious, idle, snob- 
 bish, fond of money, of display, of eating and drinking The 
 
 wrong sort of boy sent to Eton may be perhaps more exhaustively and 
 completely depraved there than anywhere else, if he hardens his heart 
 to eschew good and seek evil.” See quotation from Cowper, p. 103. 
 
276 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 apart from the innumerable whole and half holidays — 
 Wednesdays, Saturdays, Saints' days, and the rest. 
 The longer the vacations, the less, of course, the study 
 — and the larger the profits of the Head-masters. In 
 Ireland thirteen weeks' vacation, in all, in the year is 
 looked on as on the long side. Then, again, in England 
 there are generally now three vacations, instead of two, 
 in the year. It seems now to be an understood 
 thing among English schoolmasters — I am not aware 
 that their views are endorsed by the medical faculty — 
 that no schoolboy or teacher could be expected to have 
 “ a sound mind in a sound body " unless allowed to 
 have three vacations in the year. In a few years hence 
 these same schoolmasters will possibly think that their 
 pupils and they themselves require four vacations — or 
 more. How different was it during the boyhood of 
 the parents of the present generation of schoolboys ! 
 Teachers and pupils could then manage to prosper 
 remarkably well in both mind and body without any 
 known disadvantage to either — as they do in most 
 schools in Ireland even now — with but two vacations 
 in the year, and these comparatively short ones. The 
 extra break-up, with the journey to and from home, 
 is necessarily productive of a certain unsettledness in 
 a boy's mind which cannot but be injurious to his 
 progress ; and this, without any equivalent benefit, so 
 far as I have ever been able to ascertain by inquiry, 
 to his mind, body, or estate. 
 
 (iii.) Then there are no teachers at the head of any 
 Irish schools who are not properly qualified for the 
 responsible posts they hold, so far as bond fide 
 University honours and distinctions are concerned. 
 The same thing certainly cannot be said with truth 
 
EFFICIENCY OF IRISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 277 
 
 of the Headmasters of some of the private and small 
 proprietary schools of England. [For further details 
 upon this subject see Chapter XIII.] 
 
 (iv.) Fourthly, the classes in Irish schools are usually 
 much smaller, and consequently more easily taught well, 
 than classes in corresponding schools in England.* 
 
 (v.) In the fifth place, the boys in Irish schools are 
 kept better in hand during their after-school hours 
 than they are in England. Few, if any, Irish school- 
 masters believe in the laissez-faire method of managing 
 a school. Most of them consider that, to use the 
 words of the Guardian , “ the ‘ spirited and manly 
 education ’ so prevalent in English schools is but too 
 often a synonym for neglect of proper influence over un- 
 formed characters.” t Irish school-boys are thoroughly 
 well looked after during their play-hours, and that 
 not by drill sergeants or beadles (as in some English 
 schools), but by young University men who act the 
 part of guardian friends and elder brothers to them 
 — who, in short, are all that Prefects ought to be. 
 They consequently seldom fall into trouble and mis- 
 chief and sin. They are consequently less likely to 
 render themselves by their immoralities unfit for as 
 well as averse to study. And I know of nothing so 
 destructive of all studious habits as the longing for, 
 and familiarity with, and vivid recollection of, vicious 
 self-indulgence. And, then, as to that curse of school- 
 boy existence, bullying, bullying in Irish schools, 
 thanks to the all but omnipresence of masters, there 
 cannot be — certainly not to any extent worth speaking 
 
 * For further elucidation of this statement see Chapter XII. 
 
 + Extract from a review of “ Intermediate Schools in Ireland.” 
 (Simpkin, Marshall, & Co., London ; Sullivan Brothers, Dublin) 
 March 17, 1880. 
 
278 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 of. How grave are the evils arising from systematic 
 bullying, alike to the bullies and their victims, the 
 reader 011 the least reflection will perceive for himself. 
 
 (vi.) Sixthly, there are, and have been since 1878, 
 operating for the benefit of Irish education, the Inter- 
 mediate examinations, which are semi-competitive, 
 semi-qualifying, ably conducted, open, and annual.* 
 (vii.) Seventhly, there is the indirect effect of 
 fashion to make Irish schoolmasters work. It is so 
 much the fashion now-a-days with Irish parents to 
 prefer schools in England to schools in Ireland (see 
 Chapter XVI.), that it is only the teaching in the 
 latter, which is generally believed to be sound, that 
 induces them to send boys to them at all. This they 
 frequently do unwillingly. “ But, good teaching,” they 
 feel, and will candidly tell you, “is a great attraction, 
 and will outweigh ” — and this it surely will — “ many 
 drawbacks.” But, only for this indubitable advantage, 
 to the prevailing fashion in regard to schools they 
 would never, they assure you, run counter. School- 
 masters in Ireland are well aware of all this, and they 
 are, no doubt, how unconsciously soever, stimulated to 
 extra exertion accordingly. Their efforts, they feel, 
 they dare not for a moment relax unless they mean 
 to see their pupils all soon taking flight for schools 
 in England — schools it is the fashion with Irish parents 
 to prefer so much. This is another cause (and there 
 is no corresponding one operating so potently in the 
 case of English schools) of the efficiency of schools in 
 Ireland in regard to teaching. Necessity is, indeed, a 
 most effectual task-master. 
 
 * For some remarks upon the advantages to Irish schools of the 
 Intermediate examinations, see Chapter XXIV., and footnote, p. 282. 
 
EFFICIENCY OF IRISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 279 
 
 (viii.) And eighthly and lastly, there is the fact that 
 Irish teachers understand and appreciate the natures 
 of Irish boys better than English schoolmasters could 
 possibly do ; and it should, therefore, not in the least 
 surprise us that Irish schoolmasters should be able to 
 teach Irish boys with more satisfactory results than 
 their brother schoolmasters across the Channel. They 
 understand their natures and their characters better. 
 An English assistant-master in an Irish grammar- 
 school takes a long time to understand the characters 
 of the boys he has to deal with. Similarly, these 
 boys take usually a long time to understand their 
 English teacher's character; and there is, accordingly, 
 generally a great deal of valuable time lost until the 
 two parties begin to mutually understand each other.* 
 In an Irish school, however, an English assistant- 
 master is more or less obliged to become acquainted 
 with the characters of his pupils ; he is obliged to study 
 them if he desire to succeed even moderately well in 
 his duties. He cannot, indeed, easily avoid doing so, 
 being in such close contact with them, morning, noon, 
 and evening. In the English school, on the contrary, 
 the English assistant-master is not under at all the 
 
 * The question may naturally here arise, Why then should an 
 Irish schoolmaster ever engage an Englishman as an assistant-master ? 
 He engages Englishmen as assistant-masters simply because he cannot 
 procure Irishmen : this, I mean, would be the answer to the question 
 in the large majority of cases. Eor one Irishman who applies for a 
 vacant assistant-mastership in an Irish grammar-school when a vacancy 
 in one is advertised, at least a dozen Englishmen apply. Sometimes, 
 indeed, it is almost impossible to secure the assistance of a well quali- 
 fied Irishman at any price. When this difficulty occurs, an English- 
 man simply must be engaged ; there is no other course open. Young 
 Irishmen of ability, and well educated, in general much prefer the 
 Civil Service, or one of the learned 'professions, to that of teaching — ■ 
 which, strange to say, is not in these countries a “ learned ” one. 
 
28 o 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 same necessity. There he may or may not, according 
 to his pleasure or sense of duty, make a study of the 
 temperaments and characters of his Irish pupils ; 
 while his opportunities for so doing are much smaller. 
 This study, as we may naturally suppose, he will 
 sometimes shirk. And consequently the English 
 teacher of Irish hoys is seldom as successful a teacher 
 in an English school as he, this same teacher, would 
 be in an Irish one. In other words, Irish boys, so 
 far as teaching is concerned, are at a disadvantage 
 when taught in English schools by English teachers ; 
 their characters and temperaments and idiosyncrasies 
 of all kinds being frequently not understood, mis- 
 understood, or even wholly ignored. 
 
 The following passage from Father Hayden’s remark- 
 able letter to the Freeman's Journal (referred to already 
 — see p. xi.) is to the point. I quote the passage 
 because I think it is well that it should be clearly 
 understood that the view I am endeavouring now to 
 impress on the reader is in no way singular. The 
 same view is held, I have no doubt, by every educa- 
 tionist in both this country and England who has 
 given his mind to the consideration of this particular 
 feature of the vast, even illimitable, subject, education. 
 
 “ The mental aptitudes of nations,” observes Father 
 Hayden, “ are admittedly different. The Italians 
 excel in art, the Germans in laborious research, the 
 French in physical science ; and instances of this kind 
 warrant the presumption that the Irish, too, have 
 their special aptitudes. But special aptitudes suppose 
 special development, and this development may be 
 conducted by the judicious selection of subject-matter 
 and of methods of education. The subject-matter 
 
EFFICIENCY OF IRISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 281 
 
 will be determined to a great extent by standards of 
 examination ; but, at the same time, as is well known, 
 successful competitors at examinations pursue their 
 studies into regions outside of the educational pro- 
 gramme. The methods of education admit of endless 
 variety, and if they are to be successful, they must 
 be chosen in harmony with the natural aptitudes of 
 the learners. It is from the managers of Irish schools 
 that we may justly exact a selection of subject-matter 
 and of methods that shall suit the aptitudes and exi- 
 gencies of Irish youth.” 
 
 Father Hayden considers that even in the physical 
 faculties of the Irish and English boys there is some- 
 what of a difference, and that this difference cannot 
 without certain injury to the Irish boy, be overlooked 
 by the teacher. “ The exigencies and aptitudes of the 
 frame,” he writes in the letter already quoted, “ differ in 
 persons of different nationalities. How, in youth a 
 due attention to physical development is an essential 
 part of education. Modern science has brought out 
 into bold relief the dependence of the mind upon the 
 body, and the influence which the latter exerts on the 
 fate and fortunes of individuals. Hence in all well- 
 conducted educational establishments arrangements are 
 carefully made for the physical wants of the majority. 
 The more special these arrangements are, the more do 
 they promote the end in view. ... It is only at Irish 
 schools that parents may reasonably demand a careful 
 and detailed study of the physical requirements of 
 Irish youth.” 
 
 Father Hayden thinks that in the matter of religious 
 and moral training also the Irish teacher is more suited 
 
282 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 than the English for Irish boys. The following pas- 
 sage is part of what he writes upon this point : 
 
 “ Moral training is a branch of education which, to 
 persons of all religious persuasions in Ireland, has 
 been one of great concern. This, too, is more likely 
 to be well conducted in schools where the majority 
 are Irish. Moral education consists in the develop- 
 ment of the good and the repression of the perverse 
 propensities of the mind and will. It supposes, on 
 the part of the educator, a thorough knowledge of the 
 persons to be educated — a condition which for Irish 
 boys it will be difficult to realise outside of Ireland.” 
 Let it be accounted for as it may, it certainly is a 
 fact that the percentage of Irish boys who learn 
 little or nothing at English schools, is very much 
 larger than is that of these same boys who learn little 
 or nothing at Irish schools. 
 
 Boyswdll naturally learn best in whatever schools their 
 moral, intellectual, and physical natures are best under- 
 stood by their instructors. They will obviously, there- 
 fore, learn best when their teachers are, other things 
 being the same, their own fellow-countrymen.* 
 
 * The following passage from the Intermediate Examiners’ Report 
 for 1886, just published (Jan. 1887) strongly corroborates Section vi., 
 above. Mr. Bailey, one of the Examiners in English, observes : — “ The 
 general conclusions indicated by the answering to my mind reflect much 
 credit on the system of Intermediate education which has led to such 
 satisfactory and substantial results. Teachers seem to have thoroughly 
 learned how to prepare candidates for these examinations, and, in doing 
 so, have distinctly raised the standard of knowledge and the effici- 
 ency of education in the country in a manner which cannot but result 
 in far - reaching and permanent benefit to the future of the entire 
 community.” Mr. Bailey is a B.A. and 1 st Sen. Mod. T.C.D. 
 
( 283 ) 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 ADVANTAGES TO IRELAND , FROM AN EDUCATIONAL 
 POINT OF VIEW , OF THE INTERMEDIATE 
 EX AMIN A TIONS. 
 
 (i.) They encourage sound teaching to the exclusion of cramming ; 
 (ii.) they encourage the pushing on of the many boys who 
 are not clever rather than of the few who are ; (iiL) the 
 curriculum falls fairly in with the regular university exami- 
 nation courses of every school ; (iv.) only idle boys do 
 not wish to go in for the Intermediates ; (v.) number of 
 grammar schools thereby increased ; (vi.) English composi- 
 tion and literature, physical geography, book-keeping, 
 French, and drawing better and more generally taught than 
 formerly ; (vii.) a great boon to assistant-masters; (viii.) the 
 Board of Examiners a thoroughly trustworthy one; (ix.) 
 educational value of the Intermediates tested by subsequent 
 examinations ; (x.) they encourage the learning of a few 
 subjects well rather than of many indifferently. Arithmetic, 
 a most useful branch of knowledge, necessary for a “pass” 
 in Mathematics; (xi.) no means of testing a boy’s educa- 
 tional progress in England so efficacious as the Intermediates 
 in Ireland. 
 
 (i.) THEY ENCOURAGE SOUND TEACHING TO THE EXCLU- 
 SION OF CRAMMING. 
 
 Some persons there are who allege, but without giving 
 any evidence or reasons for their allegation, that the 
 Intermediate examinations encourage cramming. As 
 a rule, those who say so know nothing about the 
 subject. Besides, there are many clever persons in 
 existence who think it clever to find fault with every- 
 
284 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 thing. There are others who, if they feel piqued or 
 offended by any committee of management for any 
 reason whatsoever — through their advice not having 
 been asked, let us say, or not taken when given 
 unasked — show their indignation with that committee 
 and everything connected therewith by abusing it, 
 reasonably or unreasonably, for the rest of their lives. 
 And many men of this kind have weight in Ireland 
 — so small, comparatively, is its middle-class popula- 
 tion — who in England would be absolutely unin- 
 fluential. 
 
 The Intermediates certainly do not encourage cram- 
 ming. Experience assures us that sound teaching 
 secures far higher marks and more valuable prizes at 
 these examinations than cramming does. 
 
 To get a pass with honors, the student, to speak 
 generally, must gain at least 50 per cent, of the gross 
 total of marks assigned to the questions in that 
 subject or section : it is only honor marks that are 
 taken into account in the awarding of Exhibitions.* 
 
 Very few schoolmasters, as it happens, are able to cram. 
 It is not their forte or business to cram. The business 
 of the schoolmasters and their forte is to educate their 
 pupils, and that in the broadest sense of the word, 
 without any regard whatever to the questions likely 
 to be set by the examiners at this or that approach- 
 ing examination. The crammer’s profession is osten- 
 sibly to prepare for certain examinations — this, and 
 
 * E.g ., a student who takes up Greek — the maximum marks for 
 which are 1200 — must gain, at least, 600 to have his marks taken into 
 account for an Exhibition. Thus if he only obtains 599, these 599 
 marks, being under the specified 50 per cent, will not count as any- 
 thing. This shows how little chance a mere smatterer in the various 
 subjects that there are, has of gaining an Exhibition. 
 
ADVANTAGES OF THE “INTERMEDIATES.” 285 
 
 nothing more. It is a distinct and separate calling in 
 itself. 
 
 To be able to cram well, one must possess special 
 skill and energy — skill and energy certainly not always 
 possessed by the average assistant-master. It is much 
 easier, i.e ., lighter work, to teach than to “cram.” 
 
 Let us explain the difference between teaching and 
 cramming by means of an example. A. and B. are 
 two teachers. A. is a crammer, B. a schoolmaster. 
 They are, each, teaching their class a Greek play. Ob- 
 serve how differently they proceed each with his work. 
 The schoolmaster puts his boys — the eldest of them 
 sixteen, say — deliberately through the entire play, line 
 by line, omitting nothing, leaving nothing unexplained, 
 commenting on everything, the plot, the characters, 
 the scenes, and so forth ; he scrupulously directs their 
 attention to the various readings, asks the meaning of 
 the historical allusions, inquires into the derivations 
 of words, looks out frequently on the atlas for places 
 referred to in the text, and so on. The process is, no 
 doubt, a long and slow one, but it is sound and sure 
 and thorough. Now, let us see how the crammer, on 
 the other hand, teaches his class this same play. The 
 crammer has but a comparatively short time in which 
 to prepare his pupils, some of whom are not particu- 
 larly well-read young men, and many of whom will 
 soon be past the extreme limit of age allowed for 
 competition for the appointments they aspire to. To 
 go through the play with them, therefore, in the 
 regular, methodical, thoroughgoing manner that the 
 schoolmaster adopted when teaching it to his class 
 would not be practicable. The crammer is obliged to 
 pursue some far shorter and more cursory method of 
 
286 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 teaching. What he does is this : he procures classical 
 examination papers, of all kinds and descriptions, 
 relating to the play in question. These papers he 
 studies with laudable industry and energy, making up 
 the answers to the several questions with as much 
 zeal as if he were himself going in for the examina- 
 tion. He next marks with a pencil in the margin of 
 his edition of the play all the passages for translation 
 that have been set at any important examination in this 
 play for years and years past, as well as all the other 
 passages which he himself thinks this or that particular 
 examiner, or any ordinary examiner, would be likely 
 to set. If he is a skilful crammer, his judgment in 
 these matters is, if not absolutely unerring, seldom 
 much at fault. Having done these things — and they 
 require a good deal of energy, expertness, and penetra- 
 tion to do them w T ell — he proceeds to “ cram ” his pupils 
 in the answers to the previously given examination 
 questions and in the passages marked for translation. 
 All parts of the play except these he omits ; the 
 choruses he touches not at all ; for he is aware that 
 the choruses, or passages therefrom, are seldom or 
 never set at the particular examinations his pupils are 
 being prepared for. The crammer’s sole and whole 
 object is to “ make ” his pupils “ up ” in their prescribed 
 course, or at least in the most important parts of it 
 ( i.e ., most important from the examination point of 
 view), and in those portions of the unprescribed course 
 on which he thinks they are most likely to be asked 
 questions at the approaching examination. If he 
 succeed in the very limited space of time at his 
 disposal in effecting this object satisfactorily, he will 
 
ADVANTAGES OF THE “INTERMEDIATES” 287 
 
 very probably gain bis reward — the only reward he 
 seeks for : his pupils will pass their examinations. 
 
 Now, to inquire which method of teaching, that of 
 B., the schoolmaster, or of A., the crammer, is the better 
 would seem to me to be but a useless expenditure of 
 time. Each method is admirable in its own way. The 
 schoolmaster’s is best adapted for his purpose, which is 
 to train aright and strengthen the mental faculties 
 of his pupils, to arouse in them an interest in know- 
 ledge generally, not merely in this or that particular 
 book or subject, and to make them more capable of 
 learning, and more desirous of learning, just for learn- 
 ing’s own sake. The crammer’s method is best adapted 
 for his (the crammer’s) purpose, which is in a very 
 limited time to get into his pupils’ heads a certain 
 number of facts, most or all of which they will be 
 required to reproduce at the coming examination — 
 this and nothing more. # Each in his own way does 
 his duty. If the crammer were to teach after the 
 fashion of the schoolmaster, his pupils would un- 
 doubtedly be “ plucked ” at their examination, and he 
 might be fairly accused of at once neglecting and being 
 unfit for his own special business. 
 
 If B the schoolmaster were to teach like A the 
 crammer, his pupils’ prospects of becoming sound 
 classical scholars would be much marred, and, that, 
 for ever ; for boys so taught — even if ripe, and this 
 they would not be, for such method of instruction — 
 
 * Under this system” (i.e., the competitive examination system), 
 “ teaching becomes cramming, and an enormous accumulation of pro- 
 positions of all sorts and kinds is thrust down the students’ throats, to 
 be poured out again, I might say vomited out, into examiners’ laps.” 
 So Mr. Froude spoke of the competitive examination system to the 
 students at St. Andrew’s, March 19, 1869. 
 
288 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 would learn from the beginning to falsely regard 
 the passing of an examination as the sole end of 
 all study : soundness of scholarship they would not 
 aspire to ; thoroughness they would scorn. And 
 with what disastrous results to themselves, intel- 
 lectually, and even morally, would they do and feel 
 all this ? They would become inaccurate and unsound 
 in place of accurate and sound : to the bottom of the 
 subject of their study they would never seek to go : 
 mere smatterers would they become : in their composi- 
 tions from English into Greek, Latin, &c., they would in- 
 variably break down [cf. sect. ix. p. 298] : they would 
 have formed no classical tastes : their power of doing 
 honest work they would have materially weakened. 
 
 This, and still worse that this, must be the result 
 of cramming instead of educating the schoolboy. All 
 this every schoolmaster knows ; and therefore it 
 happens that even if the schoolmaster were able, he 
 would not be willing to cram for the Intermediate exa- 
 minations. It is on the good results of sound, careful 
 teaching that the schoolmaster builds all his hopes of 
 his pupils’ successes — present or future. Sound, care- 
 ful teaching is the only sort of teaching he has ever 
 been accustomed to, or believes in ; and no other kind 
 can he, or, even if he can, will he — Intermediates or 
 no Intermediates — adopt. 
 
 In the foregoing observations I am speaking only of 
 the ordinary boy of from eleven or twelve up to seven- 
 teen years of age. A month’s, or even two months’, care- 
 ful cramming before an examination can do the well- 
 read boy of seventeen or upwards little or no harm — 
 for such a boy, not like his unprepared junior, can bear 
 being crammed ; while it may possibly do him much 
 
ADVANTAGES OF THE “ INTERMEDIATES .” 289 
 
 good. But this is not the case that is being con- 
 templated when one alleges as a charge against the 
 Intermediate examinations that they encourage cram- 
 ming. It is not the exceptionally studious boy of 
 seventeen or eighteen that is being considered, but 
 the ordinary school-boy of the average school-boy age. 
 This the average school-boy is certainly, I maintain, 
 not “ crammed ” for the Intermediate examinations. 
 My reasons for holding this opinion I beg to repeat. 
 In the first place, very few Intermediate school- 
 teachers are able to cram ; and, secondly, even if they 
 were able, they would seldom be willing. For they 
 know as a matter of fact, that in the case of the 
 average schoolboy cramming would not “ pay ” even 
 so far as the Intermediates themselves are concerned, 
 and still less so if regard be had to subsequent Uni- 
 versity examinations, and the stern work of life. 
 
 (ii.) THE INTERMEDIATE EXAMINATIONS ENCOURAGE THE 
 PUSHING ON OF THE MANY BOYS WHO ARE 
 NOT CLEVER, RATHER THAN OF THE FEW WHO 
 ARE. 
 
 The larger the number of the boys who pass the 
 Intermediates each year, the better, pecuniarily, it is 
 for their schoolmaster ; and the higher in the eyes of 
 the public stands their school. 
 
 In the days prior to the Intermediate examinations 
 it was different. Then the University examinations 
 were the only test worth mentioning of a boys know- 
 ledge and progress at school. And then consequently 
 the many dull or lazy boys who had no chance of 
 gaining high University honours, were, no doubt, 
 
 T 
 
290 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 frequently neglected for the sake of the few bright 
 ones from whom much in this way was expected. 
 But, thanks to the Intermediates, this is so no longer. 
 
 (iii.) THE INTERMEDIATE CURRICULUM FALLS FAIRLY IN 
 WITH THE REGULAR UNIVERSITY EXAMINATION 
 COURSES OF EVERY SCHOOL. 
 
 “ But does it not generally interfere with a boy’s 
 regular course of school-studies, his being obliged to 
 go in for the Intermediate examinations ? ” 
 
 No ; certainly not — always provided that the boy 
 be not himself a silly fellow, and that the schoolmaster 
 be worthy of his important responsible position as 
 head of an Intermediate school. If the boy choose 
 to take up too many subjects for his Intermediate 
 examination, or to continue in a lower grade, or to go 
 into a higher grade than he is fit for ; and if his 
 schoolmaster trouble not himself at all about these 
 things, then no doubt the Intermediates can become a 
 source of much evil. But what may not become a 
 source of evil if no regard be had to time, place, 
 moderation, and proper uses ? Moreover, a foolish 
 schoolboy and a worse than foolish schoolmaster 
 cannot reasonably be expected — Intermediates or no 
 Intermediates — to bring much credit on themselves or 
 on their school. If they do not, it is absurd to blame 
 the Intermediates for the unfortunate results. It is 
 not the fault of the Intermediates if they are abused, 
 instead of being used with discretion and with care. 
 
 Greek, and Latin, and Mathematics, and English, 
 and French form a great part of these examinations, 
 even as they do of every ordinary grammar-school 
 
ADVANTAGES OF THE “ INTERMEDIATES .” 291 
 
 curriculum. The special authors or particular parts 
 of some subjects prescribed by the Intermediate 
 Commissioners for this year or for that may, no 
 doubt, not always be exactly the same as the authors, 
 or particular parts of subjects, prescribed for the same 
 years by the Examining Boards of the Dublin or 
 Boyal University. But what of this ? No matter 
 what the special Latin, Greek, or French author, for 
 example, may be that is prescribed in this or any other 
 years Intermediate course, Greek is Greek, Latin Latin, 
 and French French. And it, surely, can make but 
 little difference what special author is being prepared 
 by the boy at school, provided that he is being well- 
 grounded in Greek, Latin, and French. By the well- 
 grounded scholar special books are easily mastered. 
 And then, in regard to the grammars of the Greek, 
 and Latin, and French languages, these grammars are 
 common to all Greek and Latin and French examina- 
 tion courses ; and the boy who tries to master the 
 grammars of these languages while at school, whether 
 for the Intermediates or not, is beyond the shadow of 
 a doubt mastering grammars that will, alike from an 
 educational and an examination point of view, be of 
 the utmost value to him afterwards. The same may, 
 of course, be said of Mathematics. Whether a boy is 
 being prepared for the Intermediates or not, Arithmetic, 
 Algebra, and Euclid are Arithmetic, Algebra, and Euclid ; 
 and the only question that can arise in regard to the 
 study of these subjects is this : Are they being taught 
 wisely and well ? And so of English. English history 
 is English history, and English literature English 
 literature, no matter what the special course being 
 prepared for may be. No doubt, the prescribed por- 
 
292 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 tions of these subjects in the Intermediate curriculum 
 may occasionally differ somewhat from the portions 
 prescribed, if any, by the Eoyal, Dublin, or any other 
 University; but what matters it? The portions 
 selected by the Intermediate Commissioners year after 
 year are, in general, judiciously selected ; and no boy 
 who is studying English subjects at all could employ 
 himself much better than in learning thoroughly the 
 set portions of this part of the course. Whoever 
 masters these, will master all the more readily other 
 prescribed courses in English. And what has been 
 said of English history and literature may also be said, 
 only still more strongly, of English Composition. Eng- 
 lish Composition is, Intermediates or no Intermediates, 
 English Composition. In English Composition, at all 
 events, there are no special “ Authors ” to be “ made 
 up.” And so on of the other subjects in the course. 
 In fine, to end as I began, the Intermediate curriculum 
 falls fairly in with the regular University examination 
 courses of every school. 
 
 (iv.) IT IS ONLY IDLE BOYS WHO DO NOT WISH TO GO IN 
 FOR THE INTERMEDIATES. 
 
 I have never heard of a boy wishing to shirk the 
 Intermediate examination from any good motive. The 
 only boys who, so far as my own personal experience 
 goes, have wished to avoid going in for them since 
 they came into operation seven years ago, w^ere down- 
 right idlers — boys, who felt that if they went in for 
 them they would be obliged either to shake off their 
 sloth — a thing they by no means wished to do if 
 they could possibly avoid so doing — or disgrace them- 
 
ADVANTAGES OF THE “ INTERMEDIATES .” 293 
 
 selves. To idlers of this kind the necessity of going 
 in for the Intermediate examinations — for such boys 
 never should be let off going in for them — is evidently 
 especially beneficial. I have never known a case of 
 a boy who did well at the Intermediates failing after- 
 wards, because he did so, at other examinations. 
 
 (v.) NUMBER OF GRAMMAR SCHOOLS THEREBY INCREASED. 
 
 Scores of excellent day-schools have been opened 
 in places where there were none before, instituted 
 specially to prepare pupils for the Intermediates. 
 These schools, how detrimental so ever to the pros- 
 perity of the old endowed schools, are an immense 
 boon to those whose means do not permit of their send- 
 ing their sons as boarders to the latter Institutions.* 
 
 * Some large well-endowed, well-equipped Boarding Schools — eleven 
 or twelve such schools at the least — there should, however, always 
 be in Ireland ; first, for the sake of those parents who desire to send 
 their sons to Boarding Schools in their own country ; and, secondly, 
 as prizes in the profession. Take away all the large Boarding Schools 
 that there are, curtail their emoluments considerably, reducing all the 
 schools in Ireland to a dead flat level, and you will take away what 
 stimulates many and many an able promising young man to go to the 
 pedagogic profession. Were such a change in our school system to 
 take place, the head-masterships would gradually fall into the hands of 
 inferior men — inferior intellectually and socially at all events ; and 
 higher-class education would suffer accordingly. The more capable 
 in all respects the head-masters of our Grammar Schools are, the better 
 for the education of the country, the better for the country itself. 
 The best form of higher education cannot reasonably be expected in 
 schools presided over by inferior men. True, it may be urged by some 
 one, there have been prizes in the profession for many years past, and 
 how poor the outcome notwithstanding ! It is not the prizes in the 
 profession, I reply, which must be held responsible for the outcome 
 whatever it be. Chief among the preventable causes of the failure of 
 some of the principal schools in Ireland are the facts, that so many of 
 the head-masterships are appointments for life ; that there are no 
 
294 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 (vi.) ENGLISH COMPOSITION AND LITERATURE, PHYSICAL 
 GEOGRAPHY, BOOK-KEEPING, FRENCH, AND DRAW- 
 ING BETTER AND MORE GENERALLY TAUGHT IN 
 IRISH SCHOOLS THAN FORMERLY. 
 
 These are now regular school subjects. In old 
 times they were taught — if taught at all — most 
 inadequately and fitfully. 
 
 (vii.) THE INTERMEDIATES A GREAT BOON TO ASSISTANT- 
 MASTERS. 
 
 Skilful and clever assistant-masters like the Inter- 
 mediates vary much, so far as I have been able to 
 learn by inquiry; and no wonder. For they possess 
 by their means an opportunity, never possessed by 
 them before, of having their teaching powers fairly 
 tested year after year. They must also feel an in- 
 citement to work which must be agreeably and 
 healthfully stimulating to them, as the portentous 
 examination draws nearer and nearer each year. It 
 is a great thing for a young man to be able to say with 
 truth — ay, and to be able to prove it, too, for he has 
 the Intermediate Result Books to point to in evidence 
 — “ Such and such a number of my pupils ” (mention- 
 ing the number) “ have passed the last Intermediate 
 examinations, gaining amongst them many valuable 
 distinctions ; ” — distinctions which he can, if called 
 
 retiring pensions ; and that there is no proper supervision. Schools so 
 managed, or rather not managed, could not be expected to prosper. 
 But the fact that endowed schools have been mismanaged in the past, 
 is no reason why they should be mismanaged in the future. It is not 
 large, w T ell-endowed, ill-managed, but large, well-endowed, well-managed 
 Boarding Schools of which, I have said, there should be always, at the 
 least, eleven or twelve in Ireland. 
 
ADVANTAGES OF THE “INTERMEDIATES.” 295 
 
 upon, refer to in detail. Yes, it is, indeed, a great 
 thing for any young master to be able to feel that he 
 can point to the results of previous Intermediate exam- 
 inations with honest pride, should his teaching powers 
 ever be called in question — as, of course, every time 
 he applies for a mastership they are pretty sure to be. 
 To the lazy assistant-masters the Intermediates are of 
 critical importance. The fruits of laziness are never 
 good. Obviously the head-master’s opinion of the 
 assistant-master whose pupils fail, not from want of 
 ability, but because they have been badly taught, 
 cannot be expected to be particularly high. Of this, 
 the assistant-master is anxiously aware ; and the 
 knowledge cannot but have at once a sobering and a 
 stimulating effect on him, and so cannot but be helpful 
 to him as a teacher. 
 
 (viii.) THE INTERMEDIATE BOARD OF EXAMINERS A 
 THOROUGHLY TRUSTWORTHY ONE. 
 
 There could scarcely be devised a Board more trust- 
 worthy and more capable in every respect. On it are 
 scholars of eminence and practical experience from 
 every part of the United Kingdom, and also from the 
 Continent. The following, for example, was the 
 
 LIST OF EXAMINERS, 
 
 Selected, with the Approval of the Lord Lieutenant, 
 to Conduct the Examinations in 1885: 
 
 Greek and Latin. 
 
 Butler, Rev. M. J., B.A., D.D. 
 
 Davies, John F., M.A. (Dub.), F.R.U.I., Prof, of Latin, Queen’s 
 College, Galway. 
 
296 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 Dougan, T. W. (Cantab.), M. A., Fellow, St. John’s College, Cam- 
 bridge, Prof. Latin, Queen’s College, Belfast. 
 
 ITayes, Rev. Laurence J., I).D., Professor, The College, Thurlcs. 
 
 O’Farrell, Edward, B.A. (Dub.), Mod. T.C.D. 
 
 Tyrrell, Robert Y., M.A. (Dub.), F.T.C.D., Prof, of Greek, Univ. 
 of Dublin. 
 
 English. 
 
 Browne, Rev. Robert, St. Patrick’s College, Maynooth. 
 
 Carmichael, Rev. Frederick F., LL.D. (Dub.) 
 
 Croly, D., M.A. (R.U.I.), Prof. English Literature, Catholic Train- 
 ing College, Drum con dra. 
 
 Dougherty, Rev. J. B., M.A. (R.U.I.), Prof, of Logic, Magee 
 College, Londonderry. 
 
 Evans, Rev. Henry, D.D. 
 
 Lyster, Thomas W., B.A. (Dub.), ist Senior Moderator, T.C.D. , 
 Assistant Librarian, National Library of Ireland. 
 
 M ‘Donald, Rev. Walter, St. Patrick’s College, Maynooth. 
 
 Nicolls, Archibald J., LL.B. (Dub.) 
 
 Owens, Rev. R., St. Patrick’s College, Maynooth. 
 
 Park, John, M.A. (R.U.I.), F.R.U.I., Prof, of Logic and Meta- 
 physics, Queen’s College, Belfast. 
 
 Flench. 
 
 Barbier, Paul E. E., Lecturer, French Language and Literature, 
 Univ. Coll., South Wales, Cardiff. 
 
 Cogery, A., B. es L. (Paris), Examiner in French, Trinity College, 
 London. 
 
 Polin, Rev. G., B. es L., F.R.U.I. 
 
 German. 
 
 Oswald, E., M.A., Pli.D. (Gottingen), Instructor in German to 
 Royal Naval Coll., Greenwich. 
 
 Italian. 
 
 Ricci, Luigi, Prof., City of London Coll., and Examiner to H.M. 
 Civil Service Commission. 
 
ADVANTAGES OF THE “ INTERMEDIATES 297 
 
 Celtic. 
 
 Joyce, Patrick W., LL.D. (Dub.), Professor, National Board of 
 Education. 
 
 Mathematics. 
 
 Bernard, J. H., M.A. (Dub.), F.T.C.D. 
 
 Crofton, Morgan W., D.Sc. (R.U.I.), F.R.S., F.R.U.T. 
 
 Kavanagh, James W., late Prof, of Elementary Mathematics, 
 Catholic University, Dublin. 
 
 Leebody, John R., M.A. (R.U.I.), Prof. Mathematics and Natural 
 Philosophy, Magee College, Londonderry. 
 
 Lennon, Rev. Francis, Professor of Mathematics and Natural 
 Philosophy, St. Patrick’s College, Maynooth. 
 
 M'Grath, Joseph, B.A. (Lond.), Professor of Mathematics, Catholic 
 Training College, Drumcondra. 
 
 Shaw, George F., LL.D. (Dub.), F.T.C.D. 
 
 Tarleton, Francis A., LL.D. (Dub.), F.T.C.D. 
 
 Arithmetic and Book-keeping. 
 
 O’Brien, Edward T., Accountant, Mining Company of Ireland. 
 
 O’Dea, Rev. Thomas, Professor, St. Patrick’s College, Maynooth. 
 
 Rambaut, Arthur A., B.A. (Dub.), Senior Mod., T.C.D., Assistant 
 Astronomer, Dunsink Observatory. 
 
 Whitton, Frederick A., Accountant, Representative Church Body. 
 
 Natural Philosophy. 
 
 Coffey, George, B.A. (Dub.), Senior Moderator, T.C.D. 
 
 Doherty, J. J., LL.D. (Dub.), Senior Moderator, T.C.D. 
 
 Scott, A. W., M.A. (Dub.), Prof. Physical Science, St. David’s 
 College, Lampeter, Cardiganshire. 
 
 Chemistry. 
 Davy, Edmund W., M.A., M.D. (Dub.) 
 
 Botany. 
 
 Sigerson, George, M.D., M.Ch. (R.U.I.) 
 
298 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 Drawing. 
 
 Carroll, John, Art Master, Hammersmith Training College. 
 Townsend, Edward, M.A. (Dub.), D.Sc. (R.U.I.), Prof, of Engineer- 
 ing, Queen’s College, Galway. 
 
 Vinter, J. A. 
 
 Theory of Music. 
 
 Gick, Thomas, Mus.D. (Dub.) 
 
 Hoffmann, Francis. 
 
 "VVhat a great thing it is for the Irish parent to be 
 enabled to have his son’s school progress publicly tested 
 every year, and that at a merely nominal cost, by 
 such a highly qualified Board of Examiners ! 
 
 (ix) THE EDUCATIONAL VALUE OF THE INTERMEDIATES 
 TESTED BY SUBSEQUENT EXAMINATIONS. 
 
 “ Do the boys who distinguish themselves at the 
 Intermediates, and subsequently go to an University, 
 generally fare well also at the University ? ” 
 
 Yes, remarkably well — and, that, no matter whether 
 they go to Oxford, Cambridge, Trinity, or the Boyal 
 University — a fact which alone proves that the “ Inter- 
 mediate ” system is a thoroughly sound one. If it 
 were not so, such excellent results it could not produce. 
 
 (x.) THE INTERMEDIATES ENCOURAGE THE LEARNING OF 
 A FEW SUBJECTS WELL RATHER THAN OF MANY 
 INDIFFERENTLY. ARITHMETIC NECESSARY FOR 
 A “ PASS ” IN MATHEMATICS. 
 
 Some subjects in the Intermediate education pro- 
 gramme are properly regarded as large subjects, others 
 as minor ones. No candidate obtains credit for the 
 examination generally, nor is his name published in 
 
ADVANTAGES OF THE “INTERMEDIATES.” 299 
 
 the Schedule of Results, nor are Result Fees paid on 
 his account, unless he pass in at least two of the 
 former and one other subject. The large subjects are 
 these : — Greek, Latin, English, Mathematics, and the 
 Modern Languages : the others are all regarded as minor 
 ones. To prevent too many subjects being taken up, 
 the candidate must so select his subjects that the total 
 marks assigned to them shall not exceed 7000. There 
 are more marks assigned to the larger subjects than to 
 the minor ones ; and it is according to the number of 
 marks assigned to each subject or section that the 
 Result Fees are regulated. ^*10 prizes are awarded 
 to students who have exhibited great proficiency in 
 (a) Classics (Greek and Latin together) ; (j$) Mathe- 
 matics ; (7) English, together with one Modern Lan- 
 guage. To gain an exhibition without a good knowledge 
 of most of the large subjects in the programme, would 
 be quite impossible. Gold medals are awarded only 
 to the best answerers in one or more of the large 
 subjects. In all these ways the study of the large 
 subjects is greatly encouraged by the Intermediate 
 Education Commissioners. Their determination to dis- 
 courage the learning indifferently of too many subjects 
 will be best shown, perhaps, by means of an example. 
 A and B, two Junior Grade boys, are candidates. A 
 takes up only three subjects — the fewest he can 
 take, to pass, namely, Italian , Music , and Mathematics 
 (Euclid and Arithmetic).* The total number of marks 
 
 * To pass in Mathematics, it is necessary and sufficient for boys in 
 the Junior Grade (there is some difference in the Middle and Senior 
 Grades) to pass in Arithmetic together with either Euclid or Algebra. 
 Book-keeping, which has 200 marks assigned to it, is a “ Section ” of 
 Mathematics, but does not count towards a pass iu that “ subject.” 
 Any student shall be eligible for examination in the “ Junior Grade ” 
 
3 °° 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 assigned to these three subjects is in the aggregate 
 1800, viz., 500 + 300+ 1000, respectively. A passes 
 in his three subjects, scoring just exactly the mini- 
 mum 2 5 per cent, in each — 4 5 o marks in all. And 
 so he “ passes the Intermediates ” and has Result 
 Fees paid for him, to the extent of 10/ + 6/ + 
 20/, £1, 16/ in all.* B takes up, on the other 
 hand, ten subjects, the total marks assigned to which 
 are in the aggregate 7000 — the largest number of 
 marks he can compete for. I11 five of his ten sub- 
 jects — viz., English, Book-keeping, Euclid, Algebra, 
 and Music — he passes, obtaining for each full marks : 
 in the other five — viz., Greek, Latin , French, German, 
 and Arithmetic — he fails, being just one mark below 
 the minimum pass marks (25 per cent.) in each. He 
 scores on the whole, however, 3770 marks against 
 A’s 450: in other words, he scores just 3320 marks 
 more than A. He, nevertheless,' does not “ pass the 
 Intermediates,” not having passed in two of the large 
 subjects. The marks of the two boys, with subjects 
 &c. in full, are subjoined in tabular form, so that the 
 reader may the more easily understand what I have 
 been trying to explain to him, seeing thus with his 
 own eyes the marks and subjects plainly set forth. 
 
 
 
 Total obtained. 
 
 
 Gross total. 
 
 A B 
 
 Greek . . 
 
 . , 1200 
 
 — . fF 299 
 
 Latin . 
 
 . . 1200 
 
 — . F 299 
 
 who on the first day of June, in the year in which he shall present 
 himself, shall either attain, or be under, the age of sixteen years. 
 
 * In the Junior Grade Result Fees are paid at the rate of 2/ per 100 
 marks assigned to the subject or section in which the student passes. 
 Thus 20/ are the Result Fees for a pass in Mathematics, 1000 marks 
 being assigned to this section. 
 
 t F placed thus over a mark means ‘‘failed” in this subject — the 
 quarter of the obtainable marks not having been obtained in it. 
 
ADVANTAGES OF THE “ INTERMEDIATES ” 301 
 
 English 
 
 1200 
 
 . — 
 
 . 1200 
 
 French .... 
 
 700 
 
 . — 
 
 F 174 
 
 German 
 
 700 
 
 . — 
 
 F 174 
 
 Italian .... 
 
 5 °° 
 
 125 
 
 . — 
 
 Celtic .... 
 
 600 
 
 
 . — 
 
 Arithmetic . 
 
 5°° 
 
 N 
 
 H 
 
 . F 124 
 
 Book-keeping 
 
 200 
 
 . 
 
 . 200 
 
 Euclid .... 
 
 500 
 
 125 
 
 500 
 
 Algebra 
 
 5°° 
 
 . 
 
 500 
 
 Natural Philosophy 
 
 5°° 
 
 . 
 
 . — 
 
 Chemistry . 
 
 5°o 
 
 . 
 
 . — 
 
 Drawing 
 
 5°° 
 
 . 
 
 . — 
 
 Theory of Music . 
 
 3°° 
 
 75 
 
 . 300 
 
 Maximum . 
 Total obtained . 
 
 9600 
 
 by A 450 
 
 . by B 3770 
 
 Total obtainable 
 
 . 
 
 by A 1800 
 
 . by B 7000 
 
 To A’s schoolmaster there are, as we have seen, 36/ 
 paid in Eesult Fees : to B’s Schoolmaster nothing. 
 
 From all which it must be clear that the Inter- 
 mediate education system — no matter what its oppo- 
 nents may say to the contrary, or what its other 
 faults may be — encourages the learning of a few sub- 
 jects well rather than of many indifferently. 
 
 (xi.) NO MEANS OF TESTING A BOY’S EDUCATIONAL PRO- 
 GRESS IN ENGLAND SO THOROUGHLY EFFICACIOUS 
 AS THE INTERMEDIATES IN IRELAND. 
 
 There are no examinations for schoolboys in Eng- 
 land comparable to the Intermediates in Ireland, 
 when the publicity, popularity, comprehensiveness, and 
 generally excellent management of these examinations 
 are all at once taken into account ; none which give 
 at one and the same time such a stimulus to teachers 
 to teach and to pupils to learn with diligence. In 
 Ireland there are the Intermediate Result-Fees to 
 stimulate the teachers ; the exhibitions, book-prizes, 
 money-prizes, and medals to stimulate both the pupils 
 
302 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 and the teachers. In England there are no Inter- 
 • mediate Result-Fees to stimulate the teachers; no 
 State-offered exhibitions, book-prizes, money-prizes and 
 medals to stimulate the pupils. Then there are, as 
 soon as the Intermediate examinations are over and 
 the results made known, the Examiners’ published 
 reports; and then, following close upon these, the 
 many able, searching newspaper articles and letters to 
 comment on these reports ; to review the general 
 results ; to criticise the questions ; to compare school 
 with school, contrasting the honors, &c., won by one 
 school with those won by another, and so forth. What 
 incitements to work hard at school are there in Eng- 
 land, at once so thorough, so encouraging, so stimu- 
 lating, so above-board, to compare with these ? Simply 
 none. The Intermediates are, in good truth, more 
 precious than gold to Irish parents who have their 
 children at Irish grammar schools. 
 
 In order to corroborate my often expressed opinion 
 that the Intermediate examinations have been, and 
 are, of the greatest service, from an educational point 
 of view, to Ireland, I beg to quote the following pas- 
 sages from the published “ Extracts from the Eeports 
 of the Examiners (Intermediate), 1885.” The Exa- 
 miners’ Reports for 1886 have not yet (Sept. 18th, 
 1886) been published.* How the opponents of the 
 system can continue to oppose it in the face of such 
 strong testimony in its favour I cannot conceive. The 
 College degrees, and high characters generally of the 
 
 * The footnote on p. 282 was inserted after the proof-sheets of the 
 entire book had been revised. 
 
ADVANTAGES OF THE “INTERMEDIATES” 303 
 
 Examiners, from whose reports these extracts are 
 quoted, are assuredly sufficient guarantee of their trust- 
 worthiness and ability as judges in the case. 
 
 Greek. 
 
 From the Eeport of E. Y. Tyrrell, Esq., M.A., F.T.C.D. 
 
 All Grades — First Paper — (Boys and Girls). 
 
 “ As a rule there were signs of careful teaching. ” 
 
 Latin. 
 
 Senior Grades — Second Paper — (Boys and Girls). 
 
 “ The answering in general I thought good.” 
 
 From the Eeport of John F. Davies, Esq., M.A. 
 
 Middle Grade — First Paper — (Boys and Girls). 
 
 “ This seems to show that very earnest endeavours are 
 made from year to year to attain the utmost amount of 
 improvement, according to the Examiners’ Eeports and 
 suggestions. 
 
 “The attempts at Latin Yerse Composition were good 
 and interesting. A few were as good as it was possible for 
 any one to accomplish in the time allowed. 
 
 “ I am of opinion that this is a very valuable and essen- 
 tial part of the Classical course. A knowledge of the 
 exact meaning of words,” Mr. Davies adds, “ cannot be 
 acquired without the practice of Yerse Composition.” 
 
 From the Eeport of M. J. Butler, Esq., B.A., D.D. 
 
 Middle Grade — Second Paper — (Boys and Girls). 
 
 “ Showed a very fair, and, in some instances, a very high, 
 standard of education and training, as not a few students 
 scored ninety per cent, and upwards in the more important 
 and more difficult questions.” 
 
IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 304 
 
 From the J oint Report of John F. Davies, Esq., M. A., and 
 Edward 0 ’Far re 11, Esq., 13. A. 
 
 Junior Grade — First Paper — (Boys and Girls). 
 
 “One of the most noteworthy features of this examina- 
 tion was the almost entire absence of blanks and insignifi- 
 cant totals as compared with former years.” 
 
 From the Joint Report of Rev. M. J. Butler, B.A., D.D. 
 and Rev. L. J. Hayes, D.D. 
 
 Junior Grade — Second Paper — (Boys and Girls). 
 
 “ A decided improvement on that of last year.” 
 
 English. 
 
 From the Report of Rev. J. B. Dougherty, M. A. 
 
 Senior Grade — First Paper — (Boys). 
 
 Middle Grade — Second Paper — (Boys and Girls). 
 
 “There was but a small percentage of total failures, and 
 the answering, on the whole, was satisfactory. That of the 
 boys in History is worthy of special commendation for ful- 
 ness, accuracy, and intelligence ; it was superior to anything 
 I have met with in my previous experience of these exami- 
 nations. 
 
 “ In the History of Literature the answering was also 
 excellent, a result, no doubt, to be attributed in part to the 
 admirable text-book recommended in this subject. The 
 Geography, too, though not equal to the History, was well 
 done. 
 
 “The map-making compared most favourably with that 
 which I examined some years ago in the Junior Grade.” 
 
ADVANTAGES OF THE “ INTERMEDIATES .” 305 
 
 From the Report of John Park, Esq., M.A. 
 
 Senior Grade — Second Paper — (Boys). 
 
 Middle Grade — First Paper — (Boys and Girls). 
 
 “ The handwriting was in most cases good, often excellent, 
 and sometimes really elegant ; the answers were as a rule, 
 correct in spelling, and even in punctuation. The questions 
 were almost always understood, and errors were due not to 
 confusion, but to ignorance, or to mere inadvertence. .... 
 Most essays displayed considerable fluency, average intelli- 
 gence, and power of expression, and many gave evidence of 
 facility and felicity of diction. In grammar and analysis 
 I was able to perceive a decided improvement, especially 
 in the case of the boys. Their answering was often clear, 
 correct, and intelligent, and bad answers and stupid inepti- 
 tudes were exceedingly rare.” 
 
 From the Joint Report of Daniel Croly, Esq., M.A. ; 
 
 Thomas W. Lyster, B.A. ; and Arch. J. Nicolls, LL.B. 
 
 Junior Grade — First Paper — (Boys). 
 
 “We are glad to be able to state that the English Com- 
 positions, more especially those of the advanced boys, 
 showed a very decided improvement on the Compositions 
 of previous years. 
 
 “ The handwriting and spelling were, with a few except 
 tions, good. 
 
 “ In conclusion, we have much pleasure in testifying to 
 the general style and form in which the answers were 
 turned out.” 
 
 U 
 
306 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 From the Joint Report of Rev. Robert Browne, D.D; 
 Rev. F. F. Carmichael, LL.D., and Rev. Richard 
 Owens. 
 
 Junior Grade — Second Paper — (Boys). 
 
 “We have much pleasure in reporting that the answer- 
 ing in the subject of which we had charge was, on the 
 whole, satisfactory, and afforded unmistakable evidence of 
 a progressive improvement in the training and preparation 
 of the students. 
 
 “In Geography, Physical Geography especially, the 
 answering was better than that of last year. 
 
 “ We have special pleasure in reporting that, even since 
 last year, a most marked improvement has taken place in 
 the orthography and penmanship of the students. The 
 failures, consequently, under the head of English Grammar 
 were very few.” 
 
 French. 
 
 From the Joint Report of Paul E. E. Barbiere, Esq., and 
 Rev. G. Polin, 
 
 Junior and Senior Grade (Boys). 
 
 “ We can report favourably on . . . the translations 
 of the idiomatic sentences, and the extracts, of the Junior 
 Grade. There is an improvement in the answers in French 
 Accidence this year compared with last year.” 
 
 From the Report of A. Cogery, Esq., B.-es-L. 
 
 Middle Grade (Boys). 
 
 “ I think I can say the results obtained in the Middle 
 Grade present a noticeable improvement which leads to 
 hope for a very successful examination in the Senior Grade 
 next year.’' 
 
ADVANTAGES OF THE “INTERMEDIATES” 307 
 Arithmetic. 
 
 From the Joint Report of E. T. O’Brien, Esq. and the Rev. 
 Thos. O’Dea. 
 
 Junior Grade (Boys). 
 
 “We have much pleasure in reporting that the Junior 
 Grade (Boys) have shown this year a good knowledge of 
 Arithmetic. The results show a decided improvement on 
 those of last year. The style of answering was in many 
 cases faultless, and as a rule fairly satisfactory.” 
 
 From the Report of Arthur A. Rambaut, Esq., B.A. 
 
 Middle Grade (Boys and Girls). 
 
 “ The answering of the boys in this grade was extremely 
 good, especially in those questions which came directly 
 under some rule. On the whole, the fact that 46 per cent, 
 of the candidates obtained honor marks, and that no less 
 than 83 per cent, passed, must, I think, be considered highly 
 satisfactory.” 
 
 Euclid. 
 
 From the Report of George F. Shaw, Esq., LL.D., F.T.C.D. 
 Senior Grade (Boys). 
 
 “ A comparison of the Senior Grade Papers with those 
 of the Junior Grade left me impressed with the great im- 
 provement the boys are making. The spelling and grammar 
 were remarkably good.” 
 
 Algebra. 
 
 From the Joint Report of James W. Kavanagh, Esq., 
 Joseph Magrath, Esq., and Geo. F. Shaw, Esq., LL.D. 
 
 Junior Grade (Boys). 
 
 “ Several achieved the difficult feat of obtaining full 
 marks — 500. In neat and clean penmanship, distinctness 
 
3°8 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 in the use of algebraic symbols and elementary processes, 
 the papers of the majority of the boys who passed, or passed 
 with honors, were eminently satisfactory, testifying to 
 efficient teaching in these respects.” 
 
 Chemistry. 
 
 From the Report of Edmond W. Davy, Esq., M. A., M.D. 
 
 All Grades (Boys and Girls). 
 
 “ It affords me much pleasure in being able to furnish 
 you with a favourable report on the general answering in 
 Chemistry of the three different grades, at the examination 
 held last June, which, I consider, showed a marked im- 
 provement on that of the year 1880. ... In conclusion, I 
 beg to say that I consider the results of this last examina- 
 tion in Chemistry to be, on the whole, very satisfactory.” 
 
 Drawing. 
 
 Geometrical and Perspective Drawing. 
 
 From the Report of Edward Townsend, D.Sc. 
 
 Middle and Senior Grades (Boys and Girls), 
 and Junior Grade (Girls). 
 
 “I beg to report that the answering in Geometrical 
 Drawing has been exceedingly good. The candidates have 
 exhibited great neatness and accuracy in the drawing of 
 figures, and a good knowledge of the geometrical principles 
 necessary for their construction.” 
 
 From the Joint Reports of John Carroll, Esq. and J. A. 
 
 Yinter, Esq. 
 
 Junior Grade (Boys). 
 
 “In Geometrical Drawing, the result is on the whole 
 satisfactory, a large number of answers having obtained 
 full marks.” 
 
( 309 ) 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 ESPECIAL DISADVANTAGES IN CASES OF ILLNESS 
 INSEPARABLE FROM THE ABSENCE OF IRISH BOYS 
 AT ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 The accommodation for and care of invalids is no 
 better in the ordinary middle-class schools of England 
 than it is in the corresponding schools of our own 
 country. Good school infirmaries, skilful doctors, and 
 kindly attention are to be had in Ireland as well as 
 in England. This, then, being admitted, it must 
 assuredly be granted me that it is desirable that, if 
 boys whose parents reside in Ireland must be sick at 
 school, they should be sick in Ireland rather than in 
 England. 
 
 To speak generally, it involves less anxiety and 
 expense on the part of the Irish parent resident in 
 Ireland to visit his son, if stricken down with illness, 
 at an Irish school than it would to visit him if he 
 were similarly afflicted in an English one. 
 
 The railway journey in Ireland would be usually 
 shorter and more convenient. The Irish doctor would 
 probably have a clearer insight into the Irish boy’s 
 case, understanding his nature better ; # while it is not 
 inconceivable that he might also, at the same time, 
 be actually a better qualified physician and surgeon. 
 
 * See the quotation, bearing upon this point, given on p. 280. 
 
3io 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 The Irish parent, too, would be more likely to have 
 some old acquaintance or friend in, or in the neigh- 
 bourhood of, the school in Ireland, who would sym- 
 pathise with him in his distress, and help him in 
 many little ways should he go to visit his invalided 
 son. Letters, moreover, might be more frequently 
 received and answered. I have known instances of 
 Irish parents whose sons were sick at an English 
 school — sick unto death. Nothing could exceed the 
 misery of these parents, intensified as it was by the 
 consciousness of long distances intervening between 
 themselves and their sons. There was nothing to 
 alleviate it. I have also known instances of boys being 
 sick at Irish schools. Sickness in such cases can 
 never but be accompanied with sad suspense. But 
 there are many comforting little circumstances, many 
 little alleviations of grief, many little consolations, many 
 little helpful accessaries, for the Irish parent whose son 
 is sick in Ireland, in which the Irish parent whose son 
 is sick in England has no share. The sea alone by 
 itself, especially in the case of parents who are them- 
 selves aged or weakly, is a barrier which is by no 
 means to be left out of account. I have known cases 
 where the strip of sea, narrow though it is, that 
 separates England from Ireland formed an actually 
 insurmountable obstacle to Irish parents visiting their 
 invalided children in England. No equally serious 
 obstacle, in case of illness, can there exist for the Irish 
 parent, residing in Ireland, who has his sons at an 
 Irish school. 
 
 What has been said in regard to the inconveniences 
 and discomforts to Irish parents, arising from distances, 
 which attend, as necessary accompaniments, the illnesses 
 
SICKNESSES. 
 
 3ii 
 
 of their sons in England, applies also to cases where it 
 is the parents themselves who fall ill, not the sons. 
 There are instances on record when tidings that his 
 father or mother were dying reached the son, at his 
 distant English school, too late to bring him home in 
 time to gladden the weary heart, and receive the final 
 blessing, the last farewell of the departing parent.* 
 
 * In connection with this subject, it may interest the reader to 
 know that in the Commissioners' Endowed School Report (Ireland), 
 already referred to, Mr. Mahaffy assures us, “ When I visited Win- 
 chester, it was easy to distinguish in a large class the boys who had 
 won their way into the foundation by competition ; they were remark- 
 able for their worn and unhealthy looks ” (p. 255). 
 
 And again in this same Report, p. 261, he writes : “I cannot think 
 that the curious traditional rudeness of the scholar’s life at Winchester 
 is likely to suit boys rendered delicate by their training.” For 
 instances of this “ rudeness” see footnote, p. 231. “ Professor Creasy 
 
 bears witness that in his time, about fifty-five years since, the life of 
 an Eton Colleger, in the Long Chamber, was about as hard as that of 
 a cabin-boy on board a ship.” So records Mr. Pycroft in his Oxford 
 Memories , vol. i. p. 2. Is the said Colleger’s life very much less “ hard ” 
 now, it may be asked, or the better suited for delicate boys ? Mr. 
 Pycroft (same vol. p. 6) ascribes the prevalence of the fagging system 
 of those days to the fact that “ the system of our public schools was 
 such as to necessitate much menial work under the name of Fagging 
 from economy of servants, and to necessitate frequent punishment for 
 want of masters as a sufficient police of prevention.” What now 
 necessitates “fagging,” and the “hard life” — hard especially to deli- 
 cate boys — thereby entailed ? 
 
( 312 ) 
 
 CHAPTEE XXYI. 
 
 CONCLUDING REMARKS. QUESTIONS ON THE ESSAY. 
 
 I have shown that the majority (over 90 per cent.) 
 of our distinguished living Irishmen were educated, as 
 boys, exclusively in Ireland. This proves that a very 
 satisfactory education can be secured for ones sons in 
 Ireland. I have at the same time shown that only 
 about 5 per cent, of our distinguished living Irishmen 
 were educated, as hoys, altogether in England. These 
 facts certainly tend to show that a satisfactory educa- 
 tion cannot, if one may judge from results, be secured 
 for Irish boys at English schools. 
 
 Let all Irish parents take courage, and act indepen- 
 dently in this gravely important matter of school 
 selection. Let them, when making their choice, not 
 lose sight of the fact — how significant it is ! — that of 
 the thousands of Irishmen, now in their prime so far as 
 age is concerned, who were educated, as boys, exclu- 
 sively at English schools, only thirty can be reckoned 
 as “ distinguished.” If in regard to manners or accent 
 they begin to feel any qualms, let them bethink them- 
 selves of such men as Lord Monck, the Earl of Eosse, 
 Lord Fitzgerald, the Hon. David Plunket, M.P., Lord 
 Ashbourne, Lord Justice Fitzgibbon, the Provost and 
 the Yice-Provost, T.C.D., Lord Chief Baron Palles, Sir 
 J. C. Mathew, the Bishop of Peterborough, the Lord 
 
CONCLUSION. 
 
 3 T 3 
 
 Primate, the Bishops of Down, Cork, Kilmore, Clogher, 
 Lord Wolseley, Dr. Quain, and the many other dis- 
 tinguished living Irishmen who w T ere educated, as boys, 
 exclusively in Ireland. Let them bethink themselves of 
 these, and cheer up. The manners and accent of these 
 may, no doubt, be “ Irish ; ” nay, very probably are, 
 seeing that they received their early education exclu- 
 sively in Ireland ; and this, undoubtedly, is a great pity, 
 a great drawback and disadvantage to them. This, for 
 argument’s sake, one may readily admit. But all the 
 same, the disadvantages and drawbacks in regard to 
 accent and manners under which these gentlemen 
 labour notwithstanding, they somehow managed to suc- 
 ceed splendidly : this at least is a comfort. 
 
 Irish manners and an Irish accent in their sons may 
 assuredly, therefore, be cheerfully borne with by Irish 
 parents, seeing that distinguished success in life is, as 
 is clear, by no means incompatible with such manners, 
 such accent. 
 
 And, after all, let them bear in mind that an Irish 
 education possesses many decided advantages as some 
 set-off against its disadvantages, allowing — and this I 
 would not allow except for the sake of argument — that 
 an Irish education really does entail certain disadvan- 
 tages arising from inferior manners and accent. May 
 not this supposed inferiority in point of manners and 
 accent be endured with something more than mere 
 resignation for the sake of those counterbalancing 
 advantages with which we can justly credit it ? 
 
 The advantages and disadvantages of English schools 
 
 o o o 
 
 for Irish boys I have set forth, so as to bring them the 
 more clearly before the eyes of the reader, in the fol- 
 lowing tabular form : — 
 
314 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 ANTITIIETA ON ENGLISH SCHOOLS AS PLACES 
 OF EDUCATION FOR IRISH BOYS. 
 
 PRO. 
 
 (i.) The fact that (as 
 is alleged by some, 
 though stoutly denied 
 by others) an English 
 school education pro- 
 duces more gentle- 
 manly men, and teaches 
 nicer habits and a 
 better accent. 
 
 (ii.) The spending of 
 all one’s early life in 
 
 CONTRA. 
 
 (i.) The greater chances that a boy 
 runs of being roasted almost to death, 
 like Tom Brown at Rugby, and of being 
 otherwise bullied most miserably. The 
 obvious objections to one’s sons being 
 made “ fags ” of. 
 
 N.B. Fagging is not countenanced at 
 Irish schools.* 
 
 (ii.) The danger of a boy’s contracting 
 most dangerous and abominable vices 
 
 * The following passage describes the roasting scene : — 
 
 “‘Very well then, let’s roast him,’ cried Flashman, and catches 
 hold of Tom by the collar : one or two boys hesitate, but the rest join 
 in. Tom is dragged along struggling. His shoulders are pushed 
 against the mantelpiece, and he is held by main force before the fire, 
 Flashman drawing his trowsers tight by way of extra torture. 
 
 “ ‘ Will you sell now for ten shillings ? ’ says one boy who is relenting. 
 [i.e. sell a ticket which Tom had just drawn in a swindling transaction 
 which these sporting young gentlemen called a “ Derby lottery.”] 
 
 “ Tom only answers by groans and struggles. 
 
 “ ‘ I say, Flashey, he has had enough,’ says the same boy, dropping 
 the arm he holds. 
 
 “ ‘ No, no ; another turn’ll do it, answers Flashman. 
 
 “ But poor Tom is done already, turns deadly pale, and his head falls 
 forward on his breast. 
 
 “Flashman and one or two others slink away ; the rest, ashamed 
 and sorry, bend over Tom or run for water, while East darts off for the 
 housekeeper. Water comes, and they throw it on his hands and face, 
 and he begins to come to. ‘ Mother ! ’ — the words came feebly and 
 slowly — * it’s very cold to-night.’ ‘ Where am I ? ’ goes on Tom, open- 
 ing his eyes. ‘ Ah ! I remember now ; ’ and he shut his eyes again 
 and groaned.” — Tom Brown's Schooldays , Part I. Chapter VIII. 
 
 Any boy may, any day or night, be subject to the same treatment as 
 Tom Brown in any school in which there is little or no supervision, and 
 boys are constantly left to themselves and their honour during after- 
 school hours. We have no reason to regard this case of bullying as 
 exceptional. 
 
CONCLUSION . 
 
 3^5 
 
 Ireland said to give a 
 false notion of the im- 
 portance of Ireland in 
 the system of these 
 countries, and to breed 
 a narrow and unintel- 
 ligent sort of national 
 feeling, and to be warp- 
 ing and narrowing to 
 the mind generally. 
 Therefore, an educa- 
 tion in England prefer- 
 able. 
 
 [see quotations from Eric and other 
 publications in Chapter IX. Compare 
 also Chapter XIV.] 
 
 (iii.) The greater chances of a boy’s 
 learning little or nothing [see Chapters 
 I., IX., X., XL, XII., XIII., XXIII.] 
 (iv. ) The greater cost of education — 
 if the school be a bond fide respectable 
 place of education [see Chapters XXI., 
 XXII.] 
 
 (v.) The increased discomforts, diffi- 
 culties, and inconveniences in cases of 
 sickness [see Chapter XXV.] 
 
 (vi.) The certainty that an Irish 
 boy’s moral, intellectual, and physical 
 faculties will be less well understood 
 and appreciated by English teachers 
 in English schools than by his own 
 countrymen in his own country [see 
 Chapter XXIII. (viii.)] 
 
 (vii. ) The absence of proper super- 
 vision during after-school hours [see 
 Chapter XVIII., passim , and Chapter 
 XXI II. (v.)]. 
 
 (viii.) The excessive size, for the most 
 part, of the classes in English schools 
 [see Chapter XII.] 
 
 (ix.) The possibility that an Irish boy 
 may contract a hybrid accent most un- 
 pleasant to listen to [see Chapter XVII.] 
 (x.) The danger that an Irish boy, 
 who is educated in England, may con- 
 tract a thorough dislike for Ireland and 
 everything connected therewith; and 
 
IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 the certainty that he will know less of 
 the Irish character than if he had been 
 educated in Ireland — all which will be 
 a serious loss to him if he should be 
 obliged to spend his life in Ireland ; also 
 a loss to Ireland should he ever become 
 a member of the House of Lords or 
 Commons [see Chapter XX.] 
 
 (xi. ) The certainty that he will make 
 fewer friends than if he had spent his 
 boyhood in Ireland — which will be a 
 great loss to him if he should have to 
 live in Ireland afterwards [see Chapter 
 XIX.] 
 
 (xii.) The absence from English schools 
 — at least from the larger English schools 
 — as compared with schools in Ireland, 
 of the home element.* 
 
 “ This is, doubtless, a very one-sided account. It is 
 the man painting the lion with a vengeance/’ some one 
 may say. Let him who feels inclined to say so deny 
 the account, point by point, if he can, in place of bring- 
 ing vague general charges against it and throwing out 
 disparaging innuendos. If this he will not do, if this 
 he cannot do, then, in common honesty, let him re- 
 frain from depreciating generalities : they are quite out 
 of place in a serious discussion of this kind — indeed, 
 in a serious discussion of any kind. 
 
 What a great deal of hope and courage may Irish 
 
 * This absence arises partly from there being too few masters for the 
 number of boys, partly from the withdrawal of the masters from the 
 society of the boys during their recreation hours, &c. “ That education,” 
 writes Sydney Smith in his essay, already several times referred to — 
 and with his opinion in this matter I cordially agree — (( seems to us to 
 be the best which mingles a domestic with a school life, and which 
 gives to a youth the advantage which is to be derived from the learning 
 of a master, and the emulation which results from the society of other 
 boys, together with the affectionate vigilance which he must experience 
 in the house of his parents.” 
 
CONCLUSION . 
 
 3 l 7 
 
 parents who have their sons at Irish schools derive 
 from the calm consideration of the foregoing Antitheta ! 
 There is one great fact, at all events, that cannot be 
 denied — one circumstance on which assuredly all Irish- 
 men may fairly congratulate themselves ; and this is, 
 that nearly all our leading Irishmen were educated as 
 boys in Ireland. Be their accents Irish or not ; be 
 their manners good, bad, or indifferent, we find on our 
 lists of distinguished Irishmen who were educated as 
 boys entirely in their own country — and this privilege 
 no casuistry or special pleading can take away from us 
 — eminent lawyers, famous soldiers, distinguished states- 
 men, learned theologians, eloquent, impressive preachers, 
 authors of standard works, classical scholars, physio- 
 logists and mathematicians known throughout the 
 civilised world, physicians and surgeons of high repute, 
 poets, painters, musicians, who are respected and 
 admired wherever poetry, painting, and music find 
 votaries, noble philanthropists, public-spirited mer- 
 chants. Yes, many such we find among those who 
 were educated, as boys, exclusively in Ireland. 
 
 What though the manners and accent of these Irish 
 bishops, judges, generals, and the rest of them, be in- 
 ferior to what they might have been, if only they had 
 been educated as boys in England instead of Ireland ? 
 and this I am perfectly sure they are not. But what 
 if even they should be ? The fact assuredly will cause 
 but little pain either to themselves or their parents. 
 
 If one’s son become as successful a politician as 
 Lord Ashbourne or Sir Charles Bussell, Q.C., M.P. ; 
 as able a lawyer as the Bight Hon. John Gibson, Q.C., 
 M.P. ; Hugh Holmes, Q.C., M.P., or Mr. Digby Sey- 
 mour, Q.C. ; as brave and accomplished a soldier as 
 
318 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 Lord Wolseley; as deeply-read a theologian as Dr. 
 Gwynn or Dr. Salmon ; as lucid and eloquent a 
 preacher as the Bishop of Peterborough, or Dr. 
 Forrest, or Dr. Littledale; as wise and astute a 
 judge as the Master of the Rolls, Chief Baron 
 Palles, Sir J. C. Mathew, or Lord J ustice FitzGibbon ; 
 as profound a mathematician as Sir Andrew Hart, 
 Professor Burnside, Professor Casey, Dr. Salmon, Mr. 
 Williamson, or the Provost ; as sound and tasteful 
 a classic as Professor Tyrrell, Professor Crossley, or 
 Mr. Bury; as respected a philologist and politico- 
 economist as Dr. Ingram ; as thoughtful and 
 learned a metaphysician as Professor Maguire or 
 Mr. Abbott ; as subtle a logician as Mr. Monck ; 
 as much imbued with the true spirit of poetry as 
 Professor Armstrong ; as versed in English literature 
 as Professor Dowden ; as charming a musician as Dr. 
 Yilliers Stanford or Sir Robert Stewart ; as admirable 
 a painter as Sir Frederick Burton or Sir Thomas 
 Jones; as estimable a statesman as Lord Monck ; as 
 judicious a law Lord as Lord Fitzgerald ; as brilliant a 
 physicist as Professor Tyndall ; as eminent an analyst 
 as Sir Charles Cameron ; as great a physician as 
 Dr. Quain; as skilful a surgeon as Sir William Mac- 
 Cormac or Sir George Porter or Sir William Stokes ; 
 as prosperous and benevolent a merchant as Sir 
 Edward Cecil Guinness ; as gifted and spirited a War 
 Correspondent as Dr. W. H. Russell ; as versatile a 
 dramatist as Mr. W. G. Wills ; as famous a financier 
 as Sir Robert Hart ; as expert and original a geologist 
 as Professor Hull; as world-renowned a telescope 
 optician as the talented and ingenious Mr. Grubb ; as 
 experienced and authoritative an engineer as Professor 
 
CONCLUSION. 
 
 319 
 
 Crawford, Mr. Manning, Mr. Barton, or Mr. James 
 Price ; as capable and enlightened an architect as Mr. 
 Drew ; as courageous and useful a Civil Servant as 
 Sir Eobert Montgomery — if one’s son become as distin- 
 guished as any of these — and they were all educated 
 exclusively in Ireland, then assuredly his parents 
 may well, and they probably will, regard with perfect 
 equanimity whatever manners or accent, be they ever 
 so “ Irish,” he may happen to have. 
 
 Despised, neglected schools of Ireland ! What good 
 reason you have to be proud of the educational work 
 that you have done, and are doing ! Yes, are doing 
 in spite of the chilling, ungenerous neglect, the insolent 
 disdain with which you — those of you, at least, which 
 are under Protestant management — have been for so 
 many years treated by the vast majority of those dis- 
 tinguished pupils of yours who owe so much, so very 
 much, of the success they have achieved in life to the 
 sound, thorough training and teaching which they 
 received, as boys, within your unornamented, unpre- 
 tending walls ! 
 
 Nor is it only in literature and science and art and 
 statesmanship and the various professions that there 
 are, civil and military, that Irishmen, educated exclu- 
 sively in Ireland, come to the very front. In cricket, 
 football,* and lawn-tennis ; as marksmen, oarsmen, in 
 the hunting-field ; at racquets, and at all other manly 
 pastimes, home-educated Irishmen may also — as facts 
 incontestably prove — come to the foremost rank. 
 
 In short, there is nothing — no art, no science, no 
 
 * Thirteen of the XV. who beat the All England Team in February 
 (1887) were educated as boys in Ireland. 
 
320 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 literature, no pastime, no profession — in which home- 
 educated Irishmen may not become proficients. 
 
 Goodness and bravery, and artistic skill, and physical 
 strength, and athletic agility, the clear head, the re- 
 fined and cultivated mind, a right understanding, the 
 strong arm, fleetness of foot, these may be all acquired 
 in Ireland. This facts make clear. What more can 
 an Irish parent reasonably ask for ? And at how 
 small a cost, too, may these qualities and accomplish- 
 ments be acquired ! With goodness, and bravery, and 
 learning, and aesthetic culture, and health, and strength, 
 and energy, and activity, as characteristics of his sons, 
 any parent, at all reasonable, ought surely to be 
 content. And that one’s sons may grow up in Ireland 
 to be brave, good, energetic, learned, highly-cultured, 
 healthy, robust, athletic, is surely self-evident. 
 
 It is very difficult, I am well aware, to prove any- 
 thing by means of statistics in such a manner that 
 the argument may not in some way be contravened. All 
 I ask is, that the reader do not judge of my Essay by a 
 part only, but by the whole. In short, I only ask that 
 it may be read fairly. I do not pretend that it is 
 gracefully written : I do not say that there may not be 
 flaws in some of the arguments. I do not flatter my- 
 self that I may not have laid too much stress upon 
 some points, too little upon others. That my Essay 
 may be defective and faulty in all these respects I am 
 prepared to frankly, unhesitatingly admit. But I do 
 say, that if I have made it clear, as I believe I have, 
 that it is Irish schools that have supplied the present- 
 day society of Ireland with nearly all its brightest, 
 ablest, and most useful members — over 90 per cent, 
 of them at least ; that of the Irishmen residing in 
 
CONCLUSION . 
 
 321 
 
 England, or the Colonies, or other countries who have 
 come to the front an immense majority were educated 
 as boys in Ireland ; that of the vast number of Irish boys 
 educated in England extremely few reflect any credit 
 either on themselves or their schools ; that, if I have 
 made all this clear, then in this case I hold that I 
 have proved my case, namely, that “ Irish schools for 
 Irish boys ” is the principle on which middle-class 
 Irish parents, where their sons’ education is concerned, 
 ought in justice to their sons and to themselves, 
 to act. 
 
 Nothing so conduces to a boy’s happiness as, at one 
 and the same time, a good religious and moral train- 
 ing, sound teaching, and freedom from bullying. Now, 
 if I have made it clear that there is — and, thanks to 
 our supervision system, there must be — less bullying 
 and less vice, and, to judge by results, sounder and 
 more effectual teaching, in an Irish than in an English 
 grammar-school, then it seems to me that the Irish 
 middle-class parent is bound by all the ties of parental 
 duty to send his sons to an Irish rather than to an Eng- 
 lish school. “ Honour your father and mother ”is a great 
 commandment, one which we are always anxious to 
 impress upon our children ; but “ Honour your chil- 
 dren ” is also a duty incumbent by the laws of both 
 revealed and natural religion upon every parent. 
 Maxima debetur puero reverential But how can “ re- 
 verence” be said to be shown towards their children 
 by their parents, if these parents send them, for the 
 sake of even an English accent, to schools in England, 
 wherein, as we learn from English masters, English 
 doctors, and English clergymen — for it is they, be it 
 
 Juv. xiv. 47. 
 
 X 
 
322 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 noted, who have “ painted ” these schools so “ black,” I 
 only having copied — vices of the worst kind prevail to 
 an alarming extent ; wherein, in many cases, fagging is 
 tolerated, if not eulogised, as part and parcel of the 
 regular school system ; and learning is thought less of 
 than amusement ? Is it ever right to sacrifice what 
 is lasting and substantial for what is ephemeral and 
 superficial ? Is it right to treat one’s sons with 
 irreverence in place of reverence ? What are manners, 
 what is accent, to compare with sound, careful teach- 
 ing, freedom from systematic bullying, and the better 
 prospect of avoiding contact with the worst forms of 
 vice, during the long, trying, impressionable years of 
 boyhood ! Without purity of thought and conduct, 
 and that peace of mind which a good conscience alone 
 affords, and that cheerfulness of spirit which teasing 
 and worry are so apt to destroy, no boy can be said 
 to be getting fair play. Ought these essentials to a 
 good education — to happiness, to be diminished by 
 one jot or tittle for the sake of a so-called English 
 accent ? for the sake, indeed, of anything that is evi- 
 dently in no way conducive to one’s permanent happi- 
 ness or success ? 
 
 We have seen that most of our best Irishmen both at 
 home and abroad, have received their education, as 
 boys, exclusively in Ireland. Can any one suppose 
 that any one of these — Dr. Salmon, let us say, the 
 Bishop of Peterborough, Lord Fitzgerald, or the Provost 
 — would have been better and happier as a boy, or 
 better and more learned as a man, had he been edu- 
 cated in England — any one, at least, who reflects on 
 the large number of Irish boys who have been, to 
 their lasting injury, educated in that country ? Is it 
 
CONCLUSION . 
 
 323 
 
 not possible that, had it been preordained that their 
 education as boys should have been carried on in Eng- 
 land, not Ireland, they might not, any of them, occupy 
 the high positions they at present hold, with such 
 advantage to themselves — and others ? 
 
 I cannot but believe that the many distinguished 
 Irishmen, whose names will be found recorded in 
 Chapter VI., have suffered no loss, while I believe 
 they have reaped much benefit, through their having 
 been educated when boys in their own country. Might 
 not the ordeal that boys have to pass through at most 
 English schools (once again I call to witness Archdeacon 
 Earrar, Mr, Hughes, Mr. Lyttelton, and the others 
 whose opinions I have quoted) have proved too fiery 
 for them ? Might it not, indeed, have been their ruin ? 
 
 I have known Irish boys come back from English 
 schools with a cordial dislike of Ireland and every- 
 thing Irish. The minds of such must assuredly have 
 been warped and narrowed, not enlarged and whole- 
 somely strengthened, by their sojourn in England. I 
 have known Irish boys go to English schools pure- 
 minded and well conducted, return from them licentious 
 young spendthrifts. I have known Irish boys who were 
 sent to school in England unaffected and gentle in 
 their manners, and with an accent natural, simple, and 
 pleasant to hear; and I have known these same boys 
 come back from their English schools — schools, too, 
 which stand high with many Irish parents, although 
 held in no esteem in their own country — with vile 
 swaggering manners and a complex, mongrel accent, 
 most disagreeable to listen to. I have known Irish 
 boys, of no mean ability and of fair average industry, 
 come back from English schools, at which they had 
 
324 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 been for two or three years, having forgotten the little 
 that they knew when they went to them, and having 
 learned nothing new — yes, come back even to the 
 very same schools in Ireland at which they had been 
 before being sent, to their misfortune, to school in 
 England, in order to learn at their old Irish school, 
 by dint of sound teaching, just enough Classics and 
 Mathematics to enable them to pass the Entrance 
 Examination into Trinity College. All this I have 
 known. But I have never known a case of any Irish 
 boy who was indolent and stupid in his own country, 
 becoming clever and energetic by going to an English 
 school. Brains and studious habits never come to 
 Irish boys who are by nature dull and idle from 
 sending them for change of air to school in England : 
 
 Patrice quis exsul 
 Se qaoque fugit ? * 
 
 Eor the bright and studious such change is needed not. 
 
 Charming, excellent lads I have met with — who has 
 not ? — from English schools, gracious and polished in 
 their manners, educated splendidly for their age, and 
 good as gold. But who has not met with lads at 
 Irish schools of whom quite as much might be said ? 
 And there was this great difference : whereas the 
 former cost their parents for their education, many of 
 them Aioo a year, others of them ^300 a year, and 
 even more, the latter cost theirs not more than £7 5 
 at the most. 
 
 Small private and proprietary schools in England 
 come and go with extraordinary rapidity — flourishing, 
 or appearing to flourish, to-day, gone to-morrow, or 
 * Hor. Od. II. xvi. 19, 20. 
 
CONCLUSION. 
 
 '325 
 
 else open under a new name ! As soon as they are 
 opened, boys are at once attracted to them ; but, their 
 defects as places of education soon becoming manifest, 
 the boys are gradually withdrawn, till at last the pro- 
 prietor or proprietors think it best to close the estab- 
 lishment. And thus what was yesterday a busy school 
 is to-day a mere “ House to Let.” This is the history 
 of scores of English schools in which some years of 
 the boyhood of many a clever Irish boy have been, to 
 his permanent injury, spent. 
 
 In regard to the great schools of England, these will 
 flourish so long as wealth and fashion will endure — 
 flourish and be, in the words of Canon Norris (v. p. 
 1 3 6), “extremely unsatisfactory — most unsatisfactory.”* 
 
 Unless one’s sons are destined to go to an English 
 University, and reside afterwards in England, I cannot 
 perceive the least special benefit to mind or body they 
 are likely to derive from spending their boyhood at 
 an English school of any kind, great or small — still 
 
 * “ If the head-master of a small school,” observes the writer of the 
 article on “ Public School Government ” in the St. James's Gazette of 
 J une 1 6th 1886, “ becomes careless or idle, or overbearing and rough, the 
 numbers fall off, and he is warned in the most practical manner to mend 
 his ways. But with one of the great public schools it is very differ- 
 ent. The prestige of old association, the wealth of the foundation, the 
 splendour and antiquity of the buildings, give the school such advan- 
 tages that the applicants for admission are always in excess of the 
 possible vacancies. How little the personal qualities of the head affect 
 the numbers of the school may be judged by the story told a few days 
 back by the head-master of Harrow. He had just (so he told his 
 audience) registered the name of a candidate for admission in 1900. 
 By that time Mr. Welldon may have quitted his present distinguished 
 position for one yet more eminent. But this was nothing to the parent. 
 What he cared for was Harrow. The richer, therefore, the country 
 grows, and the keener the competition to send boys to the great public 
 schools becomes, the more independent will the head-masters of the 
 great schools find themselves. ” 
 
326 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 assuming that, to speak generally, the education given 
 in English schools be not really superior to that 
 which can be obtained in Ireland. On the contrary : 
 if they are destined to go to an Irish University, and 
 to reside afterwards in Ireland, it will surely be 
 for many reasons much wiser to send them to an 
 Irish than to an English school — the education in 
 the former being quite as good as that which 
 can be obtained in the latter. But under no con- 
 ceivable circumstances can it be wise for an Irish 
 parent residing in Ireland to send his sons, as is now 
 the fashion for so many of them to do, to a third, 
 fourth, fifth, sixth, or seventh rate English school, no 
 matter what its terms may be, or where his sons may 
 be destined afterwards to live. If not thoroughly 
 sound in principle and in every other way, education 
 must be always dear, no matter how low the fees 
 charged for it may be. God grant that we may all act 
 wisely in the matter of our sons’ education ! May we, 
 unmoved by what is regarded as “ fashionable,” un- 
 shaken by the promise of a better accent and address, 
 have the strength of mind to send our sons to schools 
 in our own country, if, after mature and dispassionate 
 consideration of the question, we conclude that the 
 substantial parts of their education — namely, their 
 religious and moral training and sound grounding in 
 Classics and Mathematics — will be better attended to 
 in Ireland than in England ; that their physical 
 faculties will be attended to at least as well ; and that, 
 in addition to these things, they will be in Ireland less 
 subjected to the cruelties practised by boys upon one 
 another at English schools, in which — and, that, 
 according to one well acquainted with the English 
 
CONCLUSION. 
 
 32 7 
 
 school system — boys are all divided into “ despots and 
 slaves ” * 
 
 With the view of at once bringing before the reader’s 
 mind the principal points of the Essay and epitomising 
 it for him, I subjoin some questions. 
 
 The number prefixed to each question, or group of 
 questions, corresponds with the number of the chapter 
 in which the answer or answers will be found. In 
 the “ Table of Contents ” at the beginning of the book 
 the page of each chapter is indicated. 
 
 I regard, as I have already pointed out, the question 
 discussed in this Essay as of not only grave practical 
 importance to every middle-class parent in Ireland, 
 but as even of national importance. This is my reason 
 for treating it so seriously. 
 
 The reader will find that the pondering the follow- 
 ing questions, and frankly answering them for himself, 
 will greatly conduce to clear his understanding, and 
 help him to arrive at a proper conclusion in regard 
 to the entire subject — “ Irish versus English grammar 
 schools for Irish boys.” Nor to ponder and frankly 
 answer for himself these questions will he think of 
 refusing, if really interested in the various educational 
 topics discussed throughout the Essay, and anxious to 
 form about them, one and all, a correct judgment. 
 That any one who has read the book so far is really 
 
 * See footnote, p. 225. The entire sentence in which the words 
 occur in this: — “Whatever evils might arise from supervision, they 
 could hardly be greater than those produced by a system which divides 
 boys into despots and slaves.” Compare with this Sydney Smith’s 
 observation, quoted on p. 215 : “At a public school every boy is alter- 
 nately tyrant and slave” 
 
328 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS . 
 
 interested in these educational topics, and is anxious to 
 form about them, one and all, a correct judgment, I 
 am surely justified in assuming. 
 
 Questions. 
 
 1., II. (a) Approximate number of Irish boys educated 
 
 in England ? (/3) Meagre outcome of English schools so far 
 
 as pertains to the success in life of their Irish pupils 1 
 
 111., VI. (a) Nearly all our distinguished living Irishmen 
 were educated in Ireland : corroborate by examples this 
 statement. (/3) Name (i.) the present Fellows, T.C.D., and 
 (ii.), the present Irish judges who were not educated as 
 boys in Ireland. 
 
 IV., VII. (a) The success of old Irish schoolboys in 
 England a particularly strong testimony in favour of the 
 Irish school system ? (13) Probable number of boarders in 
 
 the twenty best Irish and twenty best English grammar 
 schools, respectively 
 
 VIII. Many of our most distinguished Irishmen were 
 educated at obscure schools in obscure little Irish towns ; 
 others of them were educated at home. Moral to be drawn 
 from these facts 'l 
 
 IX. Write a short theme on the morality of English, 
 schools, basing your arguments on (i.) indirect evidence — 
 e.g., the present moral tone of society in England ; (ii.) on 
 direct evidence — e.g., the testimony of others on the subject. 
 
 X. Mr. Payne’s testimony, and that of some other 
 English educationists, as to the teaching in English schools ] 
 
 XI. The opinion of some Irish schoolmasters upon the 
 attainments, classical and mathematical, of the Irish boys 
 who go to them from English schools 1 
 
QUESTIONS . 
 
 329 
 
 XII. Number of boys usually in a class in an Irish 
 grammar-school ? In an English one ? Inference to be 
 drawn therefrom ? 
 
 XIII. Some remarks upon the existence of worthless 
 private and small proprietary schools in England and 
 Ireland, respectively ? 
 
 XIV. (a) “ Entrance examinations ” at English schools, 
 
 why undesirable ? (/3) Preparatory schools, why objection- 
 
 able ? 
 
 XV. Superannuation examinations, why objectionable ? 
 
 XVI. How account for the great preference shown by 
 Irish parents for English schools ? 
 
 XVII. (a) Define the expression, “English accent.” (0) 
 
 Is an English accent worth acquiring ? (y) Derivation of 
 
 the word “brogue”? (d) Misapplication of the word? 
 (g) Dr. Johnson’s observations about accent ? about pronun- 
 ciation ? 
 
 XVIII. Objections to the prefectorial system? Write a 
 brief dissertation upon the expression, “ school-boy honour.” 
 
 XIX. “ The friendships formed by an Irish boy at an 
 English school sure to be useful to him afterwards.” What 
 is your opinion upon this subject ? 
 
 XX. The education received by an Irish boy at an 
 English school supposed by some to impart to him a truer 
 view of England and the English, and to broaden his mind 
 and to enlarge his sympathies : write a note upon this point. 
 
 XXI. General range of fees in Irish and English schools 
 respectively ? Could Irish schoolmasters reduce their 
 school fees, so as to prevent themselves from being under- 
 sold by English schoolmasters, without injury to their 
 schools ? 
 
33 ° 
 
 IRISH VERSUS ENGLISH SCHOOLS. 
 
 XXII. (i.) High fees spent on Irish boys at English 
 schools not always a judicious expenditure of money ? 
 (ii.) Amount of money probably lost to Ireland every year 
 by the partiality shown by Irish parents for English 
 schools ? 
 
 XXI II. How account for the superior efficiency of Irish 
 schools in regard to teaching ? 
 
 XXIV. (a) Advantages to Ireland, from an educational 
 point of view, of the Intermediate examinations? ($) In- 
 feriority, from an educational point of view, of the Oxford 
 and Cambridge local examinations to the Intermediates in 
 Ireland ? 
 
 XXV. Special inconveniences in cases of illness in- 
 separable from the absence of Irish boys at English schools. 
 
 TIIE END. 
 
 PRINTED BY BALLANTYNE, HANSON AND CO. 
 EDINBURGH AND LONDON. 
 
©tfjer $itfcltcattons tig tlje same Slutfjor 
 
 AN INTRODUCTION TO THE LATIN LANGUAGE. 
 
 Crown 8vo. Price 35. 6c?. 
 
 London : HAMILTON, ADAMS, & Co. 
 
 Dublin : SULLIVAN BROTHERS, Marlborough Street. 
 1879. 
 
 . . . “It will, we think, be found that his proposal (in his decidedly 
 original ‘ Introduction to the Latin Language,’) to abridge the tedium of 
 the steps from Accidence to Syntax, and thence to Delectus and exercise 
 books, by arranging a graduated process whereby the pupil may be intro- 
 duced at a much earlier stage to familiarity with a classical author, is 
 worthy of trial, as indeed, more or less, it has been tried in the experi- 
 ence of not a few practised teachers. A sine qua non , as he remarks, and 
 corroborates by an appendix from Roger Ascham’s ‘ Scholemaster,’ is the 
 daily practice of double translation. We must also commend his recourse 
 to Virgil and the First Book of the iEneid for examples to his graduated 
 Syntax. He has Dr. Arnold on his side in deeming that a language, cer- 
 tainly a classical language, is better acquired from a poetic than from a 
 prose writer. We have no space to go further into the details of Mr. 
 Hime’s tentative ‘ Introduction ’ than to state two of its recommendations 
 — first, that his system assumes nothing on the learner’s part, therein 
 differing from Ollendorff’s, which assumes too much ; and secondly, that 
 on the vexed question of pronunciation he adopts a via media between 
 the Continental approximation to the modern Italian pronunciation and 
 the old-fashioned use of English scholars. In p. 134 the pupil is put 
 through his paces and tested as to his acquaintance with the chief syntax 
 rules over a retranslation of the ‘Episode of Nisus and Euryalus’ — a 
 happy and attractive experiment.” — Saturday Review. 
 
 “This is an admirable manual, compiled by a thorough scholar. The 
 chapter on Roman Money, Figures, &c., alone would prove it. . . . The 
 system of graduated exercises here is well managed ; and, if followed 
 carefully, it cannot fail to make the student a master of Latin prose com- 
 position. ” — Tablet. 
 
 “ The work is the most complete compendium of Latin Grammar which 
 can be had for the price.” — Irish Educational Journal. 
 
 . . . “Examination of Mr. Hime's ‘Introduction’ to Latin leaves a 
 very favourable impression of its merits. In the object he has had before 
 
( 2 ) 
 
 him in adding one more to the many Introductions to Latin, he is sure 
 to have the concurrence of everybody. He aims at saving both time and 
 money to the learners and their friends. His remarks on the old system, 
 under which the classics received almost exclusive attention in many 
 high-class schools, will find a ready echo in many memories.” — North, 
 British Daily Mail. 
 
 “We do not think that the author of the work now under notice need 
 fear even the most microscopic inspection. Dr. Hime has, we think, 
 produced the very best Latin Grammar of its size and class yet published. 
 An intimate acquaintance with the latest results of philological science, 
 and a lengthened experience as a schoolmaster, have combined to enable 
 him to have regard at once to the requirements of a scientific method, 
 and to the inability of boys to master the difficulties of a language except 
 by degrees. The rules are clearly expressed, and, what is of much import- 
 ance, are as few as may be, and the exercises and examples are chosen 
 with nice discrimination. With reference to this last point, it is right to 
 remark that this work, unlike most grammars, is an exercise-book and 
 dictionary as well as grammar ; and another feature which we think is 
 peculiar to it is the excellent series of rules for translation given at the 
 end of the syntax. . . . We hope that Dr. Himk’s Grammar will, in all 
 Irish schools at least, supersede every other now in use.” — Nation . 
 
 “‘An Introduction to the Latin Language’ contains a grammar and 
 exercises. There is a certain convenience in this. A boy should certainly 
 be ‘ exercised ’ in what he learns as soon as possible ; and it saves time 
 to have the materials at hand. Mr. Hime adds some useful and interest- 
 ing appendices.”— Spectator. 
 
 “Its method and arrangement are clear and excellent. The syntax is 
 admirably well done, and is replete with good examples drawn from the 
 best authorities. It is just the grammar to help boys, not quick at 
 apprehension, at the very point they stand most in need of help.” — 
 Examiner . 
 
( 3 ) 
 
 PARTING WORDS TO BOYS LEAVING SCHOOL. 
 
 New Edition. Crown 8vo. Price 3s. 6i. 
 
 London : SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, & Co. 
 
 Dublin: SULLIVAN BROTHERS, Marlborough Street. 
 
 1879. 
 
 “These Essays constitute an excellent gift book for all those who are 
 about to enter upon the duties of life.’' — Broad Arrow. 
 
 “There is much in the volume which is valuable and true.” — Spectator. 
 
 “Dr. Hime, the editor of this admirable volume, has already been 
 mentioned by us as an author of a most useful and scholarly Introduction 
 to the Latin Language. The present work is directed to the improvement 
 of morals among schoolboys, and contains twenty-five essays. Besides 
 being excellent in their intention and tendency, they have the advantage 
 of being free from controversial matter. So little, indeed, does Dr. Himk 
 engage in polemics, that we have recently seen a book of his on Morality , 
 which is an expansion of the last article in this volume, approved in a 
 published letter to the author by the Rev. the President of Stoneyhurst 
 College, accompanied by a desire that the blessing of God may rest upon 
 it.” — The Tablet. 
 
 “ ‘ Parting Words ’ embodies a useful notion ; it is a number of Essays 
 by various Contributors on the dangers and opportunities of opening life. 
 We may note a capital one on 4 College Life,’ and a very useful one by 
 Dr. Traill on ‘Sensuality.’” — Guardian. 
 
 “ The volume deserves the cordial approval and support of all inte- 
 rested in the guidance of the young generation.” — Nation. 
 
 “ It is impossible not to respect the purpose of this volume, or to 
 deny that it contains much seasonable counsel.” — Pall Mall Gazette. 
 
 “ A more wholesome leaving book cannot well be imagined.” — Graphic . 
 
 “A schoolmaster, earnestly devoted to the moral well-being of his 
 pupils on their entrance upon the world, could not set before them a 
 more trustworthy guide — the Bible alone excepted.” — Church Opinion. 
 
 “The volume contains lectures on such subjects as, in the opinion of 
 experienced men, are most desirable for the purpose ; and not a few of 
 them are written with a grasp of thought and force of language quite 
 worthy of a much more pretentious work.” — Army and Navy Gazette. 
 
 “So lofty and pure in tone, so excellent in matter and in manner, and 
 so suggestive of all that is good and lovely, is this volume of advice to 
 young men, that we feel it nothing less than our duty, in their interest, 
 to recommend it to their earnest study.” — School Board Chronicle. 
 
 “Of the Essays we cannot speak too highly ; most of them are charac- 
 terised by that terseness of style and directness of appeal, which are 
 
( 4 ) 
 
 peculiarly fitted in addressing young men to arouse the attention, con- 
 vince the judgment, and sway the mind for good. The seed-thoughts 
 contained in them are of the most healthy and vigorous kind, and such 
 as will tend to produce fruit in the form of a pure, noble, and Christian 
 life.” — North British Daily Mail. 
 
 “Such a work as the above was much needed, and Mr. Himk has set 
 himself to do it, and has done it well. It is very much more than its 
 modest name indicates. Its object is to prepare boys for the struggle of 
 life, by pointing out the dangers to be shunned, by inculcating a spirit of 
 true manliness, by making them fed the nobility of their nature, and by 
 teaching them to love the good because it is good, and to hate evil be- 
 cause it is evil. Its purity of sentiment, earnestness of purpose, and 
 impressiveness of style, make it eminently fitted to accomplish the noble 
 aim of its authors— that of moulding the characters of boys, and making 
 them nobler, purer, better.” — Irish Educational Journal. 
 
 It is with much pleasure that we place our deliberate imprimatur on 
 this volume. We know of no other exactly like it, or that fills the same 
 important place in the literature of school and college life. Dr. Himk 
 deserves the best thanks of all parents and guardians for giving them the 
 opportunity of putting these admirable essays into the hands of their 
 sons. We can say with truth that we have ourselves derived the greatest 
 profit from the perusal of several of them, and have met with no senti- 
 ment that we cannot cordially approve of.” — Irish Ecclesiastical Gazette. 
 
 “Among the papers we may note an eloquent sermon by Bishop Alex- 
 ander, and a paper ‘ On Sensuality,’ by Dr. Traill, which might have 
 been more effective if it had gone a little farther. On reading, on un- 
 belief* on purity, on work, there are many most thoughtful and instruc- 
 tive passages ; and the work, from its desultory character, may find itself 
 more readers than a mere formal treatise would obtain. Certainly its 
 views and admonitions are such as all lovers of youth must approve and 
 long to see put in practice.” — Literary Churchman. 
 
 “The present lectures are sensible enough, and their good intention is 
 beyond dispute. In some of them there is shrewd good sense ; others are 
 pitched in a higher key, and are proportionately less effective as practical 
 lessons of conduct ; but in all may be commended the spirit of sincere 
 and serious sympathy with those to whom they are addressed.” — Daily 
 News. 
 
 “The Essays are by various hands, and in various styles; some are 
 very good indeed. Amongst these we may specify the two last, which 
 are by the editor, on the ‘Prevalence of Unbelief’ and on ‘Hindrances 
 to leading a Religious and Moral Life.’ ” — Church Times. 
 
 “ ‘ Parting Words to Boys Leaving School ’ is a work which may be read 
 with profit by lads emerging from boyhood, and left for the first time 
 largely to their own guidance. This small volume embodies the results 
 of large and ripe experience, and displays on the part of the various 
 writers a heartfelt interest in the welfare of those to whom it is addressed, 
 as well as a genial sympathy with the feelings and aspirations of youth. 
 It points out the peculiar temptations to which lads are exposed on their 
 first entrance into life — more especially into college life— and it indicates 
 the spirit in which these temptations ought to be met, and the weapons 
 with which they are to be resisted. It contains, besides, much snge and 
 wholesome advice, and has the great merit of being thoroughly unsec- 
 tarian. —Scotsman. 
 
( 5 ) 
 
 INTERMEDIATE SCHOOLS IN IRELAND. 
 
 Crown 8vo. Price 3s. 6 d. 
 
 London: SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, & Co. 
 
 Dublin: SULLIVAN BROTHERS, Marlborough Street. 
 
 1879. 
 
 “These Essays will be read with pleasure and profit by all who are 
 interested in the education of boys. They recommend themselves by 
 their style, and they are full of practical suggestions.”— Examiner. 
 
 “ To those who are interested in the education question generally, 
 but especially to those who are watching the progress of the changes 
 in the Sister Isle, we commend Dr. Hime’s volume with the utmost 
 pleasure.” — The Schoolmaster. 
 
 “Full of interest to all who concern themselves with the training of 
 the young.” — Tablet. 
 
 “ As a picture of the grievances of Irish secondary schoolmasters in the 
 past, the book has some interest.” — Scotsman. 
 
 “ There is much in the volume that will repay perusal by any one inte- 
 rested in education. Two letters on classical studies, headed, ‘Forced to 
 Learn Latin and Greek,’ and ‘ The Use of Greek,’ are an excellent resume 
 of the arguments for classical education ; and there are many sensible 
 reflections upon such matters as corporal punishment, the monitorial 
 system, supervision out of school hours, &c. . . . When we find so able 
 and practised an educationist as Dr. Hime laying down as a necessity 
 for the good government of boys the constant supervision by masters out 
 of school hours, we feel that he is moving in a different range of ideas 
 from that familiar to us. Not that we altogether disagree with his stric- 
 tures on those deeply -rooted idola of our public school system— the 
 monitorial system, corporal punishment, and the notion that boys are 
 best left entirely to themselves and to the influence (so often mistaken) 
 of boyish notions of honour and boyish ideas of right and wrong ; for our 
 ‘ spirited and manly education’ is but too often a synonym for neglect of 
 proper influence over unformed characters.” — Guardian. 
 
 “Dr. Hime is evidently a scholar and a man of ability, and one who 
 has well thought over educational questions. He has acquired a reputa- 
 tion as a writer, and his present work will not diminish it. . . . The 
 book is never dry or feeble. As a thoughtful contribution to a con- 
 troversy of no small importance ... we gladly recommend it.” — 
 Churchman. 
 
( 6 ) 
 
 Price : One Shilling. 
 
 SELF- EDUCATION: 
 
 AN ESSAY ON THE RELATION BETWEEN THE TEACHER 
 AND THE TAUGHT. 
 
 Second Edition. 
 
 London : W. SKEFFINGTON & SON, 163, Piccadilly, W. 
 
 Dublin : J. CHARLES & SON, 61, Middle Abbey Street. 
 
 1881. 
 
 “A somewhat exhaustive treaty on the relations between the teacher 
 and the taught, more especially with respect to senior pupils. To those 
 interested in education — and who is not? — this essay will prove most 
 interesting.” — Oxford University Herald. 
 
 “ The relation between the teacher and the taught in this little book 
 is ably described, and much instruction will be found throughout, which 
 will be very useful to either. The essay is well written and discussed, 
 and is admirably adapted for students and teachers.” — Cambridge Ex- 
 press. 
 
 “An essay which must be read with advantage by everybody who 
 has at heart the higher development, moral, intellectual, and social, of 
 the public schoolboy.” — Irish Ecclesiastical Gazette. 
 
 “This present essay, in our opinion, lets in a flood of light on the 
 subject (Self-Education), and should, we think, create and foster sounder 
 views on this most interesting field of thought.” — Irish Teachers' 
 Journal . 
 
 “ We heartily commend this essay to the attention of our readers.” — 
 The Schoolmaster. 
 
 “ There are many to whom this thoughtful and well-written essay 
 will suggest useful lessons.” — The Christian. 
 
 “ We commend this essay to the notice not only of schoolboys and 
 schoolgirls, but of their parents.” — Dublin Evening Mail. 
 
 “We have much pleasure in recommending Dr. Hime’s pamphlet both 
 to the teacher and the taught.” — Daily Express. 
 
 “The essay abounds with the true philosophy of teaching.” — The 
 Irish Educational Journal. 
 
( 7 ) 
 
 “ Dr. IliME, in the little work before us, demonstrates the absolute 
 necessity of a reform — a revolution, in fact — in the method of gaining 
 instruction on the part of the pupil, and of imparting it on the part of 
 the teacher, of immense consequence in promoting the highest interests 
 and lasting benefit of the rising generation. We heartily and entirely 
 concur with the views set forth in these pages, and commend them to 
 the earnest attention of all parents, guardians, and instructors of youth, 
 who desire that boys at school shall be thoroughly educated and not 
 hastily and injudiciously ‘ crammed .’ ” — The Church Advocate. 
 
 “ An able, interesting, and concise treatise on the true theory of edu- 
 cation, viz., the training of the student to educate himself. It is full of 
 useful hints, well put, which will be welcomed by the teacher and taught 
 alike.” — The Methodist. 
 
 “The book should be widely read.” — The Practical Teacher. 
 
 “ Dr. Hime, inasmuch as he attacks the cramming system, and 
 the modern fashions of conveying instruction, which go in the same 
 direction, has all our sympathy. For young men entering upon the 
 solemn and important office of instructors of youth this monograph will 
 be found highly valuable ; and for boys advanced enough to appreciate 
 as it deserves the timely and benevolent counsel it contains it will form 
 a most useful guide.” — Irish Times (extract from Sub-leader, March 23, 
 1881). 
 
 “ There is no one part of the book that can be overlooked without 
 loss ; no one part that does not carry conviction with it. On taking a 
 reluctant leave, we recommend a careful reading of the book to teachers, 
 who will see pointed out to them what their duties are, and the results 
 which the performance of such duties would unfailingly bring forth ; 
 and to pupils, so that they may fully understand, and by practice after- 
 wards appreciate, the value of Self-Education.” — The Scholastic Gazette. 
 
 Y 
 
( 3 ) 
 
 ON THE 
 
 PREPARATION OF LESSONS FOR SCHOOL: 
 
 WITH 
 
 SOME REMARKS ON THE PUSHING ON OF CLEVER BOYS ; AND 
 THE TREATMENT OF SCHOOLMASTERS BY THEIR 
 PUPILS’ PARENTS GENERALLY. 
 
 [Being the copy of a printed Letter addressed by the Headmaster of 
 Foyle College to the father of one of his day-boys. ] 
 
 Dublin : J. Charles & Son, 61, Middle Abbey Street. 
 
 Second Edition. Price Threepence. 
 
 1882. 
 
 “ Should be in the hands of every pupil at our public schools and 
 colleges.” — Kilkenny Moderator . 
 
 “We heartily recommend it to our readers.” — Waterford Citizen. 
 
 “A well written and sensibly written pamphlet. Cashel Gazette and 
 Tipperary Reporter , 
 
 “Replete with valuable hints to parents and guardians.” — Wexford 
 Independent. 
 
 “ Ought to be in the hands of every parent who has a son at school.” — 
 Waterford Standard. 
 
 “ Very reasonable, and very practical, and very practicable.” — Evening 
 Telegraph . 
 
 “ If widely read, calculated to do much good. We therefore warmly 
 recommend it, not only to parents, but also to teachers and pupils.” — 
 Derry J ournal. 
 
 “An excellent letter. The arguments throughout are sound; and 
 they deserve the close attention of all parents anxious regarding the 
 education of their children, both male and female.” — Newry Telegraph. 
 
 “Essential and important.” — Tuam Herald. 
 
 “We question if the Headmaster of now, we are glad to say, one of 
 the most flourishing schools in Ireland, has ever given to the public a 
 more thoroughly useful threepence worth than this little book before 
 us, which imparts as many useful hints to parents in regard to the part 
 which they are not unreasonably asked to take in the supervision of 
 
( 9 ) 
 
 their boys’ lessons, as it would be possible to crow'd into eighteen pages.” 
 — Dublin Evening Mail . 
 
 “Dr. Hime has already, as we had occasion before to remark, done 
 valuable service as an author, and in other respects, in the cause of 
 education. We recommend this late emanation of his able and well- 
 trained mind to those for whose benefit it may be intended with all our 
 heart.” — Armagh Guardian. 
 
 “ Mr. Hime has spoken out boldly and well, on the non-performance 
 of a duty which all parents, who can claim to have any regard for their 
 children’s welfare in after life, are bound to see carried out strictly. We 
 earnestly advise all parents to secure a copy of this pamphlet.” — Irish 
 Farmer. 
 
 “ In this Letter parents and guardians and teachers of youth will find 
 much valuable advice on a subject that is of paramount importance to 
 the rising generation. We recommend the epistle to every one inte- 
 rested in the mental culture of the young, and again avail ourselves 
 of the opportunity to congratulate the Principal of Foyle College upon 
 his meritorious efforts to promote the cause of education.” — Derry 
 Sentinel. 
 
 “A vigorous and convincing appeal to parents, given with impressive 
 earnestness, and well deserving of their best attention.” — Daily Express. 
 
 “Every one who has the interests of education at heart will welcome 
 the appearance of this essay, which is, in form, a letter to parents on the 
 supervision of day-boy’s home studies. Dr. Hime’s advice, if followed, 
 will go far to balance the advantages enjoyed by the boarders and day- 
 boys in our intermediate schools respectively. ... In pointing out what 
 kind of assistance a master may most judiciously give while ‘hearing 
 lessons,’ and what should be left to the industry of the boys, Dr. Hime 
 has conferred a great benefit upon teacher and pupil alike. Attention to 
 his suggestions is quite sufficient, and yet absolutely necessary, to turn 
 the abilities of a master to the utmost advantage.” — Irish Ecclesiastical 
 Gazette . 
 
 “ Anything coming from the pen of Dr. Hime is sure to command 
 attention. His publications have been received with favour by the Press 
 and the public, and contain the soundest advice from one who has had 
 long experience in the business of education. We think the pamphlet 
 may be read with profit by all engaged in the education of youth, as well 
 as those most immediately concerned for their welfare.” — The Irish 
 Manufacturers ’ Journal. 
 
 “We should be glad if, by any words we can say in praise of this 
 pamphlet, it could be brought under the notice of school teachers and 
 parents throughout the land. It is written by one who plainly knows 
 liis duty as a teacher, and has a conscience in its exercise ; he also re- 
 gards, too, his profession with something of a Miltonic enthusiasm.” — 
 The Ecclesiastical Gazette (England). 
 
( IO ) 
 
 Price Sixpence ; post free, Sevenpence. 
 
 IIAND30MELY BOUND IN BED LlMP CLOTH AND SILVER. 
 
 READY MONEY: 
 CHEQUES: 
 RECEIPTS: 
 
 %\x (Sssag. 
 
 Third Edition, 
 
 London : W. H. Guest, 29, Paternoster Low. 
 Dublin: J. Charles & Son, 61, Middle Abbey Street. 
 
 1884* 
 
 “Whoever takes Dr. Hime’s advice will never be likely to want ‘ready 
 money.’ We hope the essay may find its way into the hands of thousands 
 of young men.” — The Church Standard. 
 
 “ The advantages of cash payments in all conditions of life are forcibly 
 presented in this thoughtful essay, which is well adapted for presentatiou 
 to young men just going out into the world.” — Daily Chronicle. 
 
 “An instructive essay. . . . Young men generally will find in it much 
 that will repay careful perusal.” — Derry Sentinel. 
 
 “ A short and interesting essay.” — The Globe. 
 
 “We commend the little work as a guide to young men.” — Cashel 
 Gazette. 
 
 “ If followed out, sure to engender virtuous habits.” — Clare Advertiser. 
 
 “A useful little book, written with the purpose to which Dr. Hime 
 has laudably devoted much thought and labour — the moral and social 
 welfare of youth.” — Derry Journal. 
 
 “Very few little books would be of greater service to boys when 
 starting in life than ‘Beady Money.’ ” — Portadown and Lurgan News. 
 
 “ If Dr. Hime’s advice were more generally acted on, much trouble 
 and worry would be avoided.” — Clare Journal. 
 
 “We recommend this small volume to the careful perusal of all our 
 readers.” — Mercantile Journal (Belfast). 
 
 “We heartily commend this book to the notice of all.” — Newry 
 Telegraph. 
 
( II ) 
 
 “ We trust Dr. HiME’sbook will be widely read and acted on.” — Ulster 
 Gazette. 
 
 “ We strongly recommend the work to the perusal of all, and particu- 
 larly to the young man beginning the world.” — Drogheda Conservative . 
 
 “ The author has done good service by placing his views 4 upon the 
 importance of the economic system, that of ready-money payments,’ 
 before the general public.” — Carlow Sentinel . 
 
 “ To young men starting in life a careful study of Dr. Hime’s ideas 
 cannot fail to be exceedingly useful.” — Lurgan Times. 
 
 “If the advice given by Dr. Hime were generally acted on, much 
 worry would be averted, and the transaction of business would be a 
 much simpler matter than it is at present.” — The Cork Constitution. 
 
 “We strongly commend the book to the notice of our readers, and, 
 as it may be obtained for sixpence, it comes within the reach of the 
 humblest home.” — Kilkenny Moderator. 
 
 “ To every one the present tract is useful. To none more than to 
 those for whose benefit it is especially written.” — The Limerick Reporter. 
 
 “Dr. Hime, of Foyle College, Londonderry, who has already published 
 so many valuable books of instruction for youth and adolescence, has 
 in this little treatise offered advice which is well worthy the attention 
 not only of the young but of people of all ages — and we may add of both 
 sexes. ” — Cork Examiner. 
 
 “We recommend this handsome little work with all our heart.” — 
 Armagh Guardian. 
 
 “ In ‘ Keady Money ’ are set forth with clearness, and the common-sense 
 outspokenness with which the public have become familiarised by the 
 author’s work on Morality , the advantages of the ready-money system. 
 The book is worth every one’s while to read ; its arguments are cogent ; 
 its style unaffected, and its main contentions such as must command the 
 assent to them of every reader.” — Evening Telegraph. 
 
 “Dr. Hime has spared no pains to make his advice generally accept- 
 able ; and, as is quite clear, no one could have written the book who had 
 not, not only wide experience in matters of the kind, but had thought 
 over the matter, and acted himself systematically on the principle re- 
 commended by him.” — Longford Independent. 
 
 “Likely to encourage habits of industry, sobriety, and economy.” — 
 Clare Examiner. 
 
 “ A little book like this in the hands of young men who are restricted 
 in their means ought to prove of inestimable advantage to any one 
 who has the virtue to be guided by its sound wisdom and practical good 
 sense.” — Waterford Standard. 
 
 “Will be read with profit by all engaged in mercantile or commercial 
 transactions. ” — Dundalk Examiner. 
 
 “ So attractively written a book should be in the hands of every young 
 man.” — The Baltina Herald. 
 
 “An admirable essay. We recommend its careful perusal to our 
 readers.” — Bassett’s Chronicle (Limerick). 
 
 “ A bright, racy little book,”— The Family Echo. 
 
( 12 ) 
 
 + 
 
 “ Dr. Hime shows so lucidly and so convincingly the benefits accruing 
 from a state of freedom from debt, and puts the subject in so many 
 interesting points of view, that the reader will not lay down the 
 pamphlet till he reaches the last line, and will then lay it down with 
 the resolution to pay off his old debts with all possible despatch, and be 
 exceedingly slow to contract new ones. Dr. Hime has published many 
 books of great service to the young. This one is of the highest service 
 to both young aud old.’ , — Dublin Evening Mail . 
 
 “ The title of this little book suggests the idea of political economy, 
 but those who are acquainted with the writings of Dr. Hime will know 
 that he loves to deal with the practical rather than the theoretic ; and of 
 all the sound advice which the author has in his publications given to 
 young men, there is none more practical, and, we may add, none more 
 important, than this capital little treatise on the right use of money. It 
 is just such a book as we should be glad to put into the hands of a young 
 man who finds himself for the first time in the possession of an income.” 
 — Daily Express. 
 
 “Marvellously cheap.” — Kilrush Herald . 
 
 “An excellent address on the advantages of ready-money transactions. 
 Dr. Hime deals with the subject in a clear and common-sense fashion, 
 and it is to be hoped his remarks will receive the attention they deserve.” 
 — City Press . 
 
 “A very useful little book on the advantage of paying ready money 
 and not running into debt. It might, with advantage, be placed in the 
 hands of all young people, and it would be well for many older folk, too, 
 if they would act upon Dr. Hime’s advice.” — Ecclesiastical Gazette 
 (England). 
 
 “ Dr. Hime has done a good service to society by endeavouring to instil 
 into the mind of his College a sense of the evil of debt — the injustice it 
 inflicts, and the misery it entails. Though many commercial transac- 
 tions could not” be carried on without it, it is, in far the greater number 
 of instances, a decided hindrance to welfare both on the debtor and cre- 
 ditor side. We do not think Dr. Hime has laid by any means too much 
 stress on the importance of ready-money payments. It would, as he says, 
 be hardly possible to do so. To adhere to the economic system which he 
 recommends would preserve multitudes from ruin, and render calm and 
 contented many periods of life which are now made wretched through 
 mismanagement and indifference to the convenience of creditors. . . . 
 It is based on mutual interest — those of the buyer and seller, debtor 
 and creditor, wholesale and retail dealer. Every one would be the better 
 for it ; no one the worse. It would tend to correct a multitude of social 
 evils ; and a general improvement of all branches of trades and commerce, 
 and a strengthening of securities in all directions, would be its inevitable 
 result if it were steadily persevered in. Households conducted on the 
 principle would be graced by members, young and old, possessed of strong 
 principles and straightforward honesty in word and deed. 
 
 “It is to be hoped that a very wide circulation will be obtained by 
 this most useful and truth-telling essay.” — The Tablet. 
 
 “This is a very valuable little work, and should be in the hands of 
 every young man. It is written in a crisp and vigorous style, and cannot 
 fail to effect much of the good which its author aims at.” — The Financial 
 Reformer. 
 
 “ This is one of Dr. Hime’s best essays.” — Irish Ecclesiastical Gazette. 
 
( l 3 ) 
 
 “ Every young man should read it.” — The Christian World . 
 
 “ An able little book . . . worth putting into the hands of every young 
 man who is likely to succumb to the soft temptations of a sound credit. ”• 
 --Church Review, 
 
 “ Obvious as its lessons are, they are yet much needed ; and we gladly 
 welcome anything that will help to enforce them.” — School Guardian . 
 
 “An admirable essay.” — Investor's Guardian . 
 
 “ The author has done well in giving his thoughts to business-men, as 
 there is now such competition in the mercantile world, that too much 
 cannot be known of the 4 Science of Business ’ by those who wish to steer 
 clear of the dangerous rocks upon which so many have been shix> wrecked.” 
 — The Christian Union . 
 
 “The advice it contains will, if practised, tend to promote the per- 
 manent peace and happiness of many a young man starting in life.” — 
 The Christian Life . 
 
 “We can heartily recommend this little book to all our readers.” — 
 Irish Churchman. 
 
 “ A good book for all teachers and heads of families to have at hand 
 for the purpose of presenting to senior boys who are going to make their 
 way in the world.” — The Sligo Independent. 
 
 “Many head-masters might find it useful to adopt Dr. Hime’s practice 
 of presenting each of his senior boys with a copy of this little treatise on 
 his leaving to start in life. ” — Railway News. 
 
 “The author is an enthusiast on the subject of ready-money payments, 
 and places before his readers in the strongest light the very obvious 
 advantages attending the system.” — Money. 
 
 “We think ‘ Ready Money ’ deserves to become a text-book not only 
 in schools, but in every household where punctuality, good order, promp- 
 titude, and prudent economy are desiderata.” — Fermanagh Mail. 
 
 “Should be placed in the hands of all our senior scholars.” — The School 
 Newspaper. 
 
 “A useful little treatise. . . . The advantages of ready-money pay- 
 ment are pointed out with an eloquent simplicity which can scarcely fail 
 to create a highly favourable impression.” — The Army and Navy. Gazette. 
 
 “An excellent practical essay on a very important subject.” — The 
 National Church. 
 
 “ This wonderfully wise and practical little volume should be read 
 by all young men starting in life, and all young women setting up 
 housekeeping.” — The Wesley an- Methodist Magazine. 
 
 “In a pleasant, but thoroughly practical and impressive strain, Dr. 
 Hime discourses with point on the evils the practice of buying on tick 
 leads to ; and the benefits — in peace of mind, economy, general content- 
 ment, judicious conduct and wise regulation of life — of paying ready 
 money. His remarks may be recommended to young men in particular. 
 Without the ready-money system frugality and prudence can scarcely 
 flourish, or even exist.” — The Bullionist . 
 
 “ We would be exceedingly glad to know that the essay was read by 
 every young man who is desirous of acquiring correct business notions and 
 
( H ) 
 
 habits ; and even [fathers of families may read it with advantage.” — 
 The Irish Teacher's Journal. 
 
 “All young men should read this book.”— Irish Temperance League 
 Journal. 
 
 “ Dr. Hime treats fully of his subject in all its aspects, and his obser- 
 vations may be studied with benefit by all.” — Irish Times. 
 
 “Seems likely, if one may judge from its intrinsic worth, to run 
 through a third edition. AVe hope that many have benefited by its teach- 
 ing.” — The Shareholder. 
 
 “Dr. Hime’s essays have already obtained a considerable measure of 
 success, and this sensible little book will help to support his reputation. 
 ‘ Heady Money ’ is full of useful advice on money matters, and its sound 
 common sense will recommend the volume to its readers.” — The Literary 
 Churchman. 
 
 “The importance and duty of prompt cash payments cannot be too 
 strongly impressed upon our elder scholars in all classes and schools. For 
 a few pence any lad may be supplied with Dr. Dime’s sensible remarks 
 upon the loss, anxiety, dishonour, and shame brought about by running 
 into debt.” — The Schoolmaster. 
 
 “A most attractive little volume, which no young man who wishes to 
 understand the benefits of the ready-money system and of thrifty living 
 should be without.” — The Belfast Morning Neics. 
 
 “ Dr. Hime, who is well known by his Essay upon Morality, as w r ell as 
 by other educational books and essays, here gives us some practical advice 
 upon the responsibilities and the proper use of money. The booklet 
 (only 6d.) would be a good gift for many a young man just entering upon 
 business life ; indeed for all who are about to have money of their own 
 to receive and spend. We warmly recommend it.” — Scottish Guardian. 
 
( i5 ) 
 
 Price Fourpence, 
 
 MASONIC HINTS: 
 
 IN THREE PARTS. 
 
 Part I. 
 
 CONTAINING SOME NEWSPAPER EXTRACTS RELATING TO THE CONCERT 
 RECENTLY GIVEN IN DERRY IN AID OF THE 
 
 MASONIC ORPHAN BOYS’ SCHOOL. 
 
 Part n. 
 
 REFLECTIONS CONCERNING 
 
 A “MASONIC MONDAY.” 
 
 Part iii. 
 
 AMATEUR ENTERTAINMENTS : 
 
 HOW TO ORGANISE AND RENDER THEM SUCCESSFUL. 
 
 Dublin: Brothers J. Charles, 6i Middle Abbey Street. 
 
 1884. 
 
 “The practical purpose of this handbook should commend it to Free- 
 masons all over the world. Impressed by the success which attended a 
 concert given under his guidance at Derry, on behalf of the Masonic Boys’ 
 Orphan School, Dr. Hime suggests the organisation of a ‘ Masonic Mon- 
 day.' This means the setting apart of one day in the year for a musical 
 and literary entertainment to be given in every town in Ireland, in aid 
 of the Masonic schools .” — Daily Chronicle. 
 
 “Dr. Maurice Hime, Headmaster of Foyle College, Londonderry, has 
 issued an interesting little pamphlet which seems to be enjoying a huge 
 circulation among the brethren of the Mystic Tie. It has been written 
 with a view to the establishment of a Masonic Monday, somewhat on the 
 principle of Hospital Sunday — the desire being that on a certain Monday 
 of every year the Masonic brethren of every town in Ireland should give 
 an entertainment, of greater or less pretensions, in aid of the schools in 
 which the orphans of deceased Freemasons are carefully reared and edu- 
 cated. Dr. Hime argues that if this scheme of his were properly carried 
 out, the benefit to these deserving institutions must necessarily be very 
 great, and cites, as an example of it, the fact that a concert organised by 
 him in Londonderry in March or April last, resulted in the handsome 
 some of £100, which he handed over to the Boys’ School. The pamphlet, 
 which is printed and published by J. Charles & Son, of Middle Abbey 
 Street, Dublin, is an extremely readable one, and Dr. Hime has been for- 
 tunate in securing the services of Mrs. Power O’Donoghue to write his 
 concluding pages, some excellent hints on the proper method of organising 
 and conducting amateur entertainments being given in that lady’s bright- 
 est and most attractive style. The little book contains so much that is 
 
( 16 ) 
 
 good and well written, that, even apart from the excellence of its subject 
 matter, it will prove most pleasant reading, and be sure to enjoy a very 
 wide sale. ” — Lady's Pictorial. 
 
 “We remember once having heard a Homan Catholic clergyman say 
 that if Freemasons had behaved in other countries as they do in the 
 United Kingdom the heads of his Church would never have condemned 
 them. Of course he was giving only his own personal opinion, but as he 
 was a good theologian, and greatly respected by his ecclesiastical supe- 
 riors, it may not unfairly be inferred that he did not speak without some 
 warrant for his statement. We are not, however, about to endeavour to 
 proselytise in favour of Masonry ; in fact, we have no right to do so, inas- 
 much as neither editorially nor otherwise are we free of the craft. But 
 we can use our eyes as well as most of our neighbours, and we know that 
 in Great Britain and Ireland the heir-apparent and other princes of the 
 Royal House, a large number of the nobility, many members of the learned 
 professions and of the wealthy grades of the mercantile classes, and others 
 least likely to engage in rebellious conspiracies or to be affected with Com- 
 munistic or anti-religious views, are associated with the Masonic craft. 
 That Freemasons as a body are known for their zeal and generosity in 
 behalf of charitable and educational foundations connected with their 
 body can be denied by none. Only the other day purposes of recreation 
 led us to stroll round in the Ball’s-bridge direction, when we gazed with 
 much pleasure on the beautiful buildings and grounds and the neatly- 
 dressed pupils of the Dublin Masonic Female Orphan College. There is 
 also a Boys’ Masonic Orphanage, and in support of its funds Dr. Hime, 
 the learned President of Foyle College, got up, one evening in April last, 
 with the aid of his assistant-masters, some of his pupils, the Rev. Chan- 
 cellor Tisdall, of Christ’s Church, Dr. and Mrs. Power O’Donoghue, and 
 others, a musical, &c., entertainment in the city of Londonderry. It was, 
 we believe, most successful in every respect. The pamphlet under our 
 notice contains numerous newspaper extracts regarding this concert, and 
 also a really admirable essay by Mrs. Power O’Donoghue, entitled 
 ‘Amateur entertainments : how to organise them.’ We have read every 
 word of this essay, written in that terse, lucid style for which Mrs. 
 O’Donoghue is remarkable, and we must say that there are no persons of 
 any creed or party in the country engaged in the arduous work of organis- 
 ing amateur, musical, or dramatic entertainments who will not derive 
 an abundance of most useful information from the perusal of this brochure. 
 We are happy to announce that Mrs. O'Donoghue is about bringing it out 
 in a separate form, which will thus render it accessible to the public at 
 large .” — Irish Sporstman. 
 
 “ This pamphlet will be read with all the greater interest from the fact 
 of its being so rarely our privilege to draw attention to the sayings and 
 doings of our Irish brethren. Part II. contains a very useful suggestion, 
 namely, that, after the manner of our Hospital Sunday, there shall be in 
 Ireland a Masonic Monday or other day specially set apart for the pur- 
 pose of assisting the funds of the Irish Masonic Orphan Schools ; while 
 Part. III. contains some valuable hints and suggestions by Mrs. Power 
 O’Donoghue, the wife of a most worthy Irish Mason, for those who may 
 attempt to get up concerts and similar entertainments in aid of Charit- 
 able Institutions whether Masonic or non-Masonic. We may congratulate 
 Bro. Hime on his excellent little publication, which we commend to the 
 notice of our brother Masons all the world over .” — The Freemason's 
 Chronicle . 
 
( l 7 ) 
 
 Price, Is. 6 d . ; Post Free, Is. 9c?. 
 
 Ninth Edition. Crown 8vo. Creen Cloth and Gold. 
 
 MORALITY: 
 
 AN ESSAY ON SOME POINTS THEREOF. 
 
 London : J. & A. CHURCHILL, 11 New Burlington Street; and 
 all Booksellers. 
 
 1884. 
 
 N.B. — This Book is now on the Catalogues of books recommended 
 by the “Moral Reform Union;” the “Social Purity Alliance;” the 
 “Church of England Purity Society;” and the “Church of England 
 Book Society.” It is also recommended by many Bishops — among them 
 the Bishop of Durham, Founder and President of the “White Cross 
 Army” — Deans, Archdeacons, Schoolmasters, and others. 
 
 “Any one who carefully studies this work, and who makes use of the 
 ‘ Four Safeguards ’ mentioned by the author, will be well protected against 
 what is the besetting sin of many.” — Lancet . 
 
 “Dr. Hime discusses with much lucidity the question ‘Whether con- 
 tinence endangers health,’ summing up entirely in favour of an opinion 
 quoted from Sir James Paget ; and he finishes a well-written and care- 
 fully-argued treatise by the enumeration of ‘Four Safeguards against 
 Immorality.’” — British Medical Journal. 
 
 “Thousands will be the better for reading it.” — Christian . 
 
 “We most heartily recommend it.” — Christian Herald. 
 
 “We recommend this book as one that may be safely used.” — Guardian . 
 
 “ The author has written for a good cause, and not for gain. His essay 
 should be pushed among the young men of the city, to whom it is calcu- 
 lated to be of great service.” — City Press. 
 
 “Clergymen will find many suggestive hints in Dr. Hime’s essay, and 
 schoolmasters will do well to lend it whenever necessary. Above all, it 
 is a book for parents. ” — Church Times. 
 
 “Full of deepest Christian feelings, and evidently the result of careful 
 reading and knowledge of the world. It meets the sophistries of the sen- 
 sualist with calm and sober judgment.” — Scottish Guardian. 
 
 “ After the Bible, we know of no better manual to place in the hands 
 of every young man.”— Church of England Pulpit. 
 
 “It is a book for parents to put into the hands of their sons.” — Church 
 Review. 
 
( 18 ) 
 
 “ Every person in a position of charge and responsibility for youths and 
 young men should regard it as a duty to bring a warning so religious and 
 affectionate, yet so plain-spoken and practical in tone, under the notice 
 of the young men in whom he is bound to be interested.” — Literary 
 Churchman . 
 
 “The writer has treated the subject with equal truthfulness and deli- 
 cacy.” — Church Bells . 
 
 “Dr. Htme writes with much zeal and evident honesty of purpose. 
 We hope this book may be read by the class of men for whom it is de- 
 signed. ” — Westminster Review. 
 
 “This book is written with so holy a purpose, and is so calculated to 
 answer that end, that we give it an unqualified recommendation. It is 
 pervaded with a power well suited to work out its righteous design.” — 
 j Ecclesiastical Gazette (England). 
 
 “Hundreds of parents and teachers will be indebted to the author.” — 
 Christian Globe . 
 
 “Ought to be extensively read by parents and schoolmasters.” — Cam- 
 bridge Express . 
 
 “ As we read on, this feeling (of diffidence, almost approaching dis- 
 trust) entirely disappeared, and left only admiration for the exceptional 
 tact and wise discretion with which the author has handled a profoundly 
 difficult subject.” — Daily Chronicle. 
 
 “ Deserving of the utmost consideration.” — Broad Arrow . 
 
 “ The most agnostic and most animalistic of natures could not cast away 
 Dr. Hime’s work as cant, or deny its sound conclusions.” — Life . 
 
 “Dr. Hime writes with wisdom : his pleadings are affectionate and yet 
 manly.” — Baptist. 
 
 “ The subject is dealt with in an exhaustive manner.” — Oxford Univer- 
 sity Herald. 
 
 “ A powerfully written book.” — Christian Life. 
 
 “ Were Q. E. D. to be printed on the last page, no one could deny that 
 it had been fairly earned.” — Examiner. 
 
 “To the erring and the tempted, to the ignorant and deluded, every 
 line may do good which the limitations of this life may not confine.” — 
 Catholic Standard. 
 
 “The only practical book on the subject we have ever seen. The 
 author has ransacked the courts and roamed the field of letters in order 
 to illustrate a theme too frequently shunned, and show that it may be 
 made attractive and charming.” — Tablet. 
 
 “Dr. Hime deserves our most grateful thanks.” — New and Old. 
 
 “This is a work the fame of which deserves to be made known in all 
 d irections. ” — Freemasons' Chronicle. 
 
 “ This valuable little book should certainly be in the hands of every 
 schoolmaster and clergyman, and might well be studied by all fathers.” — 
 Seeking and Saving. 
 
 “We have nothing but words of admiration for the delicacy and tact 
 with which the subject is handled.” — Methodist. 
 
( 1 9 ) 
 
 “ We commend it to every young student in a big town.” — Freemans ' 
 Journal . 
 
 “A most excellent and manly book. We wish Dr. H1M12 ever} 7 success 
 in his noble work.” — Durham University Journal. 
 
 “ This is an outspoken, manly, but quite discreet discussion of the 
 subject of purity. We can heartily recommend it to our readers.” — The 
 Spectator. 
 
 Extract from a review of Morality in the Vanguard, the monthly 
 paper of “The Church of England Purity Society,” February 1885.— 
 “We may safely add that we consider the book one which many fathers 
 may be thankful to place in their sons’ hands, and which should benefit 
 and help many a well-disposed lad. The difficult subject is treated 
 throughout, not only with great delicacy and tact, but with the plainness 
 of true modesty, and in the most practical and useful manner ; while the 
 style is as graceful as it is concise, and is lightened by many appropriate 
 and poetical quotations. The arrangement of the chapters and para- 
 graphs is particularly clear, and the book is got up in a very attractive 
 form. Space will not allow us to go. into details, but our conclusion is 
 that any discreet father, who is anxious that his son should be put on his 
 guard against the moral dangers he is certain to meet, cannot do better 
 than study Dr. Hime’s excellent little book, and give it to his boy if he 
 find it suitable.” 
 
 “It is seldom that a book on morals is written which papers of such 
 different shades of opinion combine in speaking favourably of. The book 
 should be in the library of every teacher of youth. It is well worth the 
 attention of the clergy.” — Irish Ecclesiastical Gazette . 
 
( 20 ) 
 
 Crown 8vo t Cloth. Price is. 6c l. 
 
 A SCHOOLMASTER’S RETROSPECT 
 
 OF EIGHTEEN AND A HALF YEARS IN 
 
 AN IRISH SCHOOL. 
 
 Second Edition. 
 
 London : SIMPKIN, MARSHALL & Co. 
 
 Dublin : SULLIVAN BROS. 
 
 1885. 
 
 “ Mr. Maurice Hime writes of his profession with rare and becoming 
 enthusiasm in ‘A Schoolmaster’s Retrospect.’ Eighteen years’ ex- 
 perience as head of an Irish grammar-school might well be expected 
 to suggest much that is thoughtful and valuable, and Mr. Hime’s 
 survey more than fulfils the expectation. Educational topics and 
 questions of discipline and training are treated in a broad and en- 
 lightened spirit, full of interest to parents and tutors alike. Especially 
 admirable is the section of Mr. Hime’s essay on the insufficiency of 
 mere Biblical instruction and the distinctions between Biblical and 
 religious education.” — Saturday Review. 
 
 “ This little book should be in the hands of every schoolmaster and 
 parent who sends boys to school, and there is matter in one or two 
 chapters that may well be considered by the administrators of the 
 Education Department.” — St. James's Gazette . 
 
 “Dr. Hime has that refined enthusiasm for his subject which is 
 without superlatives ; every point is clear, concise, defined.” — Cam- 
 bridge Review . 
 
 “ There is no preceptor, no matter how great his fame or high his 
 standing, who will not only obtain benefit by a perusal of this little 
 book, but also confer permanent good on future generations, if only 
 he rules his conduct on the lines laid down by the author.” — Armagh 
 Guardian. 
 
 “ The ‘ Schoolmaster’s Retrospect ’ is a publication of the highest 
 value, and will, we predict, maintain a permanent niche in the temple 
 of scholastic literature.” — Belfast Standard. 
 
 “ Mr. Hime, in reviewing a period of somewhat more than eighteen 
 years of a schoolmaster’s life, takes the opportunity of stating some 
 experiences and conclusions. Some of these are of general interest ; 
 some refer to Irish or local matters. We do not find ourselves always 
 in agreement with Mr. Hime, but we can testify that he is always 
 worth listening to. He is absolutely opposed to corporal punishment, 
 
( 21 ) 
 
 an opinion wherein he certainly differs from great authorities. Indeed , 
 he has given up all punishment whatever . This is very curious, and we 
 should like to hear more about it. As to the subject of education, he 
 prefers to walk in the old paths. He pleads for the more frequent 
 admission of laymen to the headmasterships of schools. Indeed, be 
 puts his argument in such a way that one would infer that no clergy- 
 man ought to be a schoolmaster. ‘ Schoolmasters should be physi- 
 cians,’ not in esse , but in posse. Many other matters are dealt with, 
 and always in a sensible, reasonable way. About the prospects of Irish 
 schools and schoolmasters Mr. Hime has some interesting things to 
 say. The disestablishment of the Irish Church has injured them, as 
 might be expected. Landowners, land-agents, and lawyers, especially 
 conveyancers, have suffered from the land agitation, and cannot afford 
 their former outlay on education. On the other hand, school-keeping 
 is more costly than it was. Meat, that cost 4fd. per pound in 1866, 
 now costs 8d. or 8Jd. Servants’ and labourers’ wages are much higher. 
 (How do these facts fit in, by the way, with the tale of the tenant- 
 farmers’ distress ? Men who get nearly twice the old price for their 
 meat — and Ireland is mainly a grazing country — and pay reduced rents, 
 or no rent at all, ought to be well off.) This is a useful and interesting 
 book.” — Spectator . 
 
 “ Dr. Hime has been for over eighteen years the headmaster of an 
 Irish grammar-school, and it is this period of school life which he retro- 
 spectively surveys. In the clear and simple manner which charac- 
 terises the author’s writings, he discusses his subject from the master’s 
 as well as the pupil’s and the parent’s points of view, and for each he 
 has a store of wise and practical suggestion.” — Pall Mall Gazette. 
 
 “Deserves the cordial approval and support of all concerned and 
 interested in the guidance of the rising generation.” — Cork Consti- 
 tution. 
 
 “We doubt if, in the compass of 134 pages, any book of like interest 
 is to be found in recent times.” — City Press. 
 
 “Full of valuable suggestions.” — Evening Mail . 
 
 “Entertaining, and, withal, instructive.”— Christian Commonwealth. 
 
 “ The thoroughly practical remarks here set forth, and the sound 
 common-sense they contain, claim for this excellent little volume an 
 important place in the mind of every parent and schoolmaster in the 
 land, ay, and of every schoolboy too, for he would here see that his 
 ‘ master ’ is not his enemy, but a true friend to those who would make 
 him so.” — Christian. 
 
 “ A more valuable book, dealing with educational questions, than 
 Dr. Hime’s ‘ Ketrospect ’ has not been published during recent years. 
 The sober, rational, and eminently practical ideas of an accomplished 
 and a highly successful schoolmaster on almost every subject inci- 
 dental to the education of the young, cannot be too attentively 
 studied by parents and guardians, by those who are connected with 
 the various educational systems of this country, and by those who are 
 
( 22 ) 
 
 anxious to become teachers themselves. Dr. Ilime’s latest work will 
 commend itself to every class in the community. We cannot doubt 
 that the conclusions arrived at on all the points considered by the 
 author will meet with the approval of the great body of teachers in 
 this country .” — Belfast News-Letter . 
 
 “Dealing with a subject that might possibly be thought dry and 
 uninteresting, the able author has succeeded in investing his treatise 
 with much that is attractive and generally instructive. We cannot 
 recall a single topic that should come under his purview that is not 
 here treated with a consummate care and judgment. Some of the 
 chapters in particular are full of evidence how deeply Dr. Hime has 
 weighed his subject, and brought a long and practical experience to 
 bear upon it. We approve especially of those chapters devoted to the 
 religious education of our boys in public schools .” — The Schoolmaster. 
 
 “ In a small volume of 134 pages, Dr. Hime discusses almost every 
 conceivable educational topic, propounding his views, perhaps, some- 
 what dogmatically, and expresses his wonder that any one could differ 
 from the opinions which he enunciates. The work is largely auto- 
 biographical, and the author does not conceal his satisfaction with 
 regard to the results of his eighteen years of labour as a schoolmaster. 
 — British Medical Journal .” 
 
 “ In this very excellent work the reader, whether teacher or other- 
 wise, will find several valuable suggestions, and enlarge in a most 
 agreeable manner his knowledge on the subject of education . — Irish 
 Times. 
 
 “A lofty ideal of education is set up ; and we owe Dr. Hime a debt 
 of gratitude for the enthusiasm with which, laying aside reserve, he 
 propounds the attractions of his profession .” — Edinburgh Courant. 
 
 “ Some of its points are very noteworthy .” — School Board Chronicle. 
 
 “ It should be read by all who are interested in teaching, and school- 
 masters especially should feel pleased to see their profession so well 
 vindicated as it is by the author. Education is a great science ; if 
 once this idea is grasped, the schoolmaster’s occupation will be raised. 
 It only depends upon its members to obtain for their calling the 
 recognition it deserves .” — The Provincial Medical Journal . 
 
 “We have read with interest ‘ A Schoolmaster’s Ketrospect. 5 All 
 that pertains to education is of the first importance to medical men. 
 The best minds in the profession are engaged in imparting knowledge 
 to others. Any hints given by a practical schoolmaster of large 
 experience cannot fail to interest. Dr. Hime’s book is evidently the 
 outcome of a great deal of thought, and of very considerable experience 
 during eighteen and a half years. He discusses a great many topics.” 
 — Lancet. 
 
 “This ?s a lively and interesting account of the reflections, and 
 feelings, and settled opinions, which come naturally, and not altogether 
 unpleasantly, into the mind of an enthusiastic and energetic teacher, 
 when he passes in review all that the experience of eighteen years’ hard 
 
( 23 ) 
 
 work has taught him. We can speak of the book as suggestive, help- 
 ful, and, in many ways, refreshing and stimulative. Few schoolmasters 
 or schoolmistresses will read it without pleasure and profit.” — Educa- 
 tional Times. 
 
 “We cordially commend it to the perusal of parents and guardians, 
 and all others who are interested in the educational, moral, and religious 
 training of the rising generation.” — Freemason’s Chronicle . 
 
 “ Dr. Hime’s remarks on educational matters, especially his practical 
 suggestions, founded as they are on an experience of nineteen years as 
 headmaster of a large grammar-school, are extremely valuable, as 
 they are the fruits of long experience, and, we are convinced, of care- 
 ful and protracted study.” — Nation. 
 
 “ To inspire boys with a love of right and a hatred of wrong, Dr. 
 Hime has not found a particularly difficult or arduous task ; but 
 ‘ corporal punishment will never, can never, convince a boy of these 
 things.’ It is a convenient outlet for the master’s ill-humour ; and ‘ the 
 man who indulges in it,’ either with his hands or a stick, is both treat- 
 ing the boys like a brute and acting himself like one. These are 
 golden words.” — Bradford Observer . 
 
 “ It is not surprising that Dr. Hime should take a cheerful view of 
 a schoolmaster’s life and duties. But if encouragements have come to 
 him, it is because he has thrown all his energies into his work — a fact 
 to which the many books he has written, all bearing on some aspect of 
 schoolboy life, bear testimony.” — Daily Express. 
 
 “ Dr. Hime writes from experience and practical knowledge, and his 
 advice to teachers is clear and useful.” — Literary Churchman. 
 
 “ Dr. Hime, by his successful course as a teacher, has earned a right 
 to speak on the art and science of education, and his book may tend to 
 brighten the pathway both of scholars and teachers, provided the latter 
 are not above reconsidering their methods and learning better ones. . . 
 His Retrospect put into the hands and head of young teachers will be 
 the means of saving many of them from making shipwreck of their own 
 and their pupils’ lives.” — Church Times. 
 
 “ In our days when strenuous efforts are being made to raise the 
 standard and social position of high class teachers; when, in spite of 
 all, the voices of complaint still by far exceed those of satisfaction, it 
 is indeed refreshing to meet, in a book by so hearty and genuine a 
 schoolmaster, the experiences, observations, and opinions of a man 
 animated by warm enthusiasm for instruction and education. Study- 
 ing Dr. Hime’s book more closely, the only thing that steals upon us 
 like a feeling of regret, is the fact that its author is not a German but 
 an Irish schoolmaster. And yet the interest which he forces from us 
 by his clear exposition and competent criticism of Irish scholastic 
 affairs does not allow this regret to linger. The result of the perusal 
 is admiration, admiration for a man who is so enthusiastic for the 
 honour and character of a profession, which on the other side of the 
 channel takes a lower place in social rank than in Germany.” — 
 Englische Studien. 
 
 Z 
 
( 24 ) 
 
 Crown 8vo. Cloth. Price is. 6 d. 
 
 UNBELIEF: 
 
 AN ESSAY ADDRESSED TO YOUNG MEN OF EVERY 
 CHRISTIAN DENOMINATION. 
 
 Second Edition. 
 
 London: SIMPKIN, MARSHALL k Co., Stationers' Hall Court. 
 
 Dublin : SULLIVAN BROTHERS, Marlsboro’ Street. 
 
 1885. 
 
 “We have in this work a thoroughly digested and compact manual, 
 whereby with the least possible exertion any person of average intelli- 
 gence may acquire a really good knowledge of the evidences of 
 Christianity and their bearings upon modern thought.” — Yorkshire 
 Post. 
 
 “Dr. Maurice Hime’s plea for Christianity will be none the les3 
 useful to young men, to whom he addresses it, because he is a layman 
 and a lawyer. Whatever may be thought of his proofs, which will 
 remind the reader of Whately’s Christian Evidences , his practical 
 advice is pointed and sagacious, and would go far to render evidence 
 unnecessary if it were acted upon. Premising that Christianity is not 
 capable of demonstrative proof, he asks them to consider the presump- 
 tions in its favour. Recognising in the ignorance of many doubters 
 the weakness of the defence, he shows them the logical inconclusive- 
 ness of the attack, to which they yield without a blow. He tells his 
 hearers and readers what to read and, most emphatically, what not to 
 read ; how to answer and when to be silent ; not to dally with doubt 
 or with the moral incentives to unbelief ; that either way it is a serious 
 matter, and those who mistrust a Christian apologist may be sobered 
 by M. Renan’s conclusion that ‘in reality few persons have the right 
 to disbelieve Christianity.’ ” — Saturday Review. 
 
 “ Logical, persuasive, convincing.” — City Press. 
 
 “Young men, read it ! ” — Christian. 
 
 “ This remarkably able, candid, and lucid essay will well repay care- 
 ful perusal.” — Sheffield Independent. 
 
 “An admirable little volume.” — Irish Times. 
 
 “Answers its purpose admirably.” — Church Times. 
 
( 25 ) 
 
 “ We regard it as one of the best books of the kind we have seen.” — 
 Christian Commonwealth. 
 
 6 * Contains many pregnant paragraphs suitable for young men.” — 
 Ecclesiastical Gazette (England). 
 
 “ Written with clearness and point.” — Church Bells. 
 
 “ A thoughtful and earnest address to young men, in which the whole 
 subject is very ably dealt with, and some excellent advice is given.” — 
 Rock. 
 
 “ Dr. Hime’s simple logic and practical advice, entirely without cant 
 or any virulence, is admirable.” — Cambridge Review. 
 
 “ The neat appearance of the book, and its clear, straightforward style 
 and unsectarian spirit, but chiefly, perhaps, the fact that its author is 
 a layman, and therefore not professionally committed to the public 
 defence of Christianity, will do much to secure it the attention it 
 deserves. 
 
 “ The book abounds with warnings, illustrations, and unanswerable 
 arguments, and cannot fail to be useful in counteracting the evils 
 it deplores as well as proving a valuable safeguard to the young, who 
 may be hereafter exposed to these dangers, which seem to be ever 
 gaming in force and influence, and are consequently more to be feared 
 now than in days that are past.” — Church Advocate . 
 
 “ This excellent essay is a quiver full of able and powerful arguments 
 against doubt and atheism. ” — Banbridge Chronicle. 
 
 “ It can be put into the hands of average young men that are to be 
 met with by thousands in our towns and cities. The arguments are 
 solid, sensible, weighty, and strike home.” — Limerick Chronicle. 
 
 “ The charm and value of Dr. Hime’s books consist in their healthy 
 religiousness, their frank, full-hearted faith in Holy Scripture, and 
 their strong, practical sense.” — Wesleyan Methodist Magazine. 
 
 “Worthy of the perusal of all Christians.” — ChHstian Globe. 
 
 “ This is a useful volume to put into the hands of young men who 
 are exposed to the insinuations and temptations of scepticism. It is 
 a good popular essay.” — Christian World. 
 
 “This is a scholarly, skilful, suggestive eighteenpenny work on the 
 difficulties of modern unbelief, and the strength, fulness, and sufficiency 
 of the Christian evidences. The work is bright, candid, concise, and 
 convincing. Young men especially will find it invaluable. Its argu- 
 ments are as powerful as they are luminously and gracefully stated. 
 The work cannot fail to do good.” — Oldham Chronicle. 
 
 “ Not the least of its merits is a well-arranged list of works on the 
 defence of Christianity, and it will be found to be well fitted for the 
 library of reading-rooms and working-men’s institutes.” — Literary 
 Churchman. 
 
( 26 ) 
 
 “The value of this work has been widely recognised by represen- 
 tatives of all denominations, and it cannot be doubted that it has been 
 the means of doing a vast amount of good, especially among young 
 men, who have nowadays so much to contend against if they desire not 
 only to remain in the “good old way ” themselves, but also to induce 
 others to be their companions on the same route. The great value of 
 Dr. Hime’s essay seems to us to consist in the breadth of its applica- 
 tion. It will be recognised as the work of a friend, the sincerity of 
 whoso sympathy is apparent in every page. We cannot too earnestly 
 recommend it to the study of all young men.” — Belfast Newsletter . 
 
 “ He exhibits, unbelief in such a clear light as to guard intelligent 
 readers from its baleful influence. There is a delightful absence of all 
 cant and narrowness in it, and no better book could be placed in the 
 hands of the young. With his main positions in the book we cordially 
 agree. ” — Presbyterian Churchman . 
 
 “ The writer has a sound, simple method of reasoning, and cannot 
 be well misunderstood. We advise young men to read it and make its 
 plan their own, and it will materially help to establish them in the 
 faith, and furnish them with forcible replies to attacks from infidels.” 
 — Baptist Messenger . 
 
 “ This is not by any means the first book by Dr. Hime of which we 
 have written in favourable review, but the author has never directed 
 his energies to better purpose or with happier results than in the work 
 now before us. In both what it says and what it does not say, in its 
 general tone and temper, in the knowledge it displays of logical forms 
 and methods, and in its well-chosen quotations, this little book is 
 deserving of praise.” — Daily Express. 
 
 “Dr. Hime’s essays, especially Morality and Self-Education , have 
 been favourably received in England. The latest essay — containing in 
 eleven sections an apology of the Christian doctrines, and offering an 
 admonition to lead a practical Christian life — may be strongly 
 recommended to those of our clergymen readers who understand 
 English.”— Thcologisclies Liter aturblatt (Leipzig). 
 
 “ Dear Sir, — I have read your Essay on Unbelief with much plea- 
 sure, and I hope it may be found fully to answer the excellent pur- 
 pose with which it has been written.— I remain your most faithful 
 servant, “ W. E. Gladstone. 
 
 “15 th November 1886.” 
 
 “ That Mr. Gladstone, at his advanced age, and with his many 
 avocations, should markedly notice Unbelief, is certainly a compli- 
 ment to the author, and a strong testimony in favour of the power 
 of the book.” — Londonderry Sentinel. 
 
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