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 THE 
 
 ORIGIN AND PROGRESS 
 
 Rational aulr f nDustrial ^ci)ools. 
 
 IN CONNECTION WITH THE 
 
 CHURCH OF THE HOLY TRINITY, 
 
 AT riNCHLET, 
 
 SHOWING THEIR EFFECT IN 
 
 PREVENTING JUVENILE DELINQUENCY. 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 JOSEPH MASTERS, ALDERSGATE STREET, 
 
 AND NEW BOND STREET. 
 
 MDCCCLV. 
 
 6d. 
 
 i
 
 LONDON : 
 
 PRINTED BY JOSEPH MASTERS AND CO., 
 
 ALDERSOATE STREET.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 To a philanthropist and a Christian there cannot be a more 
 painful sight than is presented to him as he passes through the 
 land, by the appearance of om* prisons. That such buildings 
 should be required for the punishment of crimCj — that sums 
 almost fabulous in amount should be expended in the erection 
 of these massive edifices, in their maintenance, and in the 
 administration of criminal justice, — is a disgrace to us as a 
 Christian nation ; a stigma upon our national character, which 
 every Englishman should labour with heart and hand to efface. 
 That a large number of the leading men of the country arc 
 desirous of seeing a reform in this terrible feature of our social 
 system, and are endeavouring with all their energy to effect it, 
 is a consoling reflection ; and as we have essayed in a former 
 publication^ to direct attention to what we believe is the best 
 means of preventing crime, we purpose in this to show, that in 
 one of the earliest, if not the earliest, of those establishments 
 which we are anxious to see general in the country, the use of 
 the means recommended has been attended with the best effect. 
 In noticing the past and present state of Tinchley, and in 
 detailing the causes which have produced what all who are 
 acquainted with the parish as it was and as it is, admit to have 
 been a most beneficial change, we have been desirous of guarding 
 
 ' " Industrial Scliools the best means of decreasing Juvenile Crime." — 
 Masters. 1853.
 
 habitants was 4,120. There was, till lately, only one church 
 in the parish, that of S. Mary, which stands upon an eminence 
 about a quarter of a mile from the great north road; and 
 national schools for boys, girls, and infants, situated near that 
 church. 
 
 Finchley Common was memorable in the days of Dick Turpin, 
 and both before and after his period, for being the scene where 
 highwaymen carried on their daring and lawless pursuits ; the 
 tree is still standing that formed their rendezvous, and the black- 
 smith's forge is on the same site where the old farrier shod the 
 horse of one of these " minions of the moon" the wrong way, in 
 order to enable him to evade pursuit by leaving a reversed track 
 behind him. This Common is now suri'ounded by the villas of 
 our London merchants. 
 
 One part of the parish of Finchley consists of East End, a 
 large village including what are known as " Brown's Well," and 
 the " Hog Market." This district is situated nearly one mile 
 and a half from the parish church and schools ; and in the former 
 there were only about 70 free sittings, whilst the population of 
 East End was between 1,500 and 1,600. There was no resident 
 clergyman : and though it is due to the Dissenters (Wesleyans and 
 Independents) to say, that they first turned their attention to this 
 neglected spot, by establishing an Infant School, it is also the truth 
 to add, that they were able to do little to relieve the spiritual 
 and moral destitution of the inhabitants, which was at as low 
 an ebb as in any part of England. Owing to the distance from 
 church, and the want of accommodation there, the poor generally 
 spent their Sundays at the ale-houses ; their children were con- 
 stantly abroad in the woods and hedgerows, and acquiring 
 habits which utterly unfitted them for the pursuits of industry; 
 On jMondays, the magistrates were occupied for hours in adjust- 
 ing the quarrels which arose on the previous day, a day that 
 ought to have been kept holy and devoted to religious obser- 
 vances and healthful and innocent recreation. Many violations 
 of property were also committed, and the cases of juvenile delin- 
 quency were painfully numerous. 
 
 The first step that was taken for the reformation and perma- 
 nent improvement of this district was the erection of a Church. 
 A worthy clergyman, now deceased, the Rev. Charles Worsley,
 
 and an active and zealous magistrate^ T. B. Herring, Esq., were 
 the first movers in this good work. They commenced a sub- 
 scription in 1844, to which the Bishop of London, and George 
 Byng, Esq., at that time one of the representatives of the county, 
 each contributed .€100 j and the more wealthy and many of the 
 middle-class inhabitants cordially and effectively supported the 
 benevolent work. A design in the Early English style was fur- 
 nished by A. Salvin, Esq. ; and on the 10th of October the first 
 stone of the new building, which is dedicated to the Holy Trinity, 
 was laid by Mr. Byng. This church contained 437 sittings, of 
 which 300 were free ; and these not inconveniently situated, but 
 occupying the best position in the sacred edifice. The con- 
 secration took place in August, 1846; a minister, the Bev. F. 
 S. Green, was appointed, and found his flock, as might have 
 been expected, lamentably indifferent to all religious duties. 
 Many children, and not a few adults, were unbaptized ; com- 
 municants amongst the poor were very rare ; and, indeed, the 
 blessed Sacraments were altogether undervalued and disregarded 
 as channels of Divine grace. The clergyman, by a careful and 
 earnest performance of his duties, soon effected a change. He 
 adopted the system of ministerial visits from house to house, 
 and attention in carrying out the services of the Church soon 
 began to tell upon the people; — the increased congregations 
 which, after a short time, attended Divine worship, and the 
 greater number of communicants, visibly proving that the 
 Church was regaining her lost influence. 
 
 But the juvenile depravity required the application of the 
 reforming hand, as well as the irreligion of the adult and elder 
 branches of the community. There was, in this part of the 
 parish, no place of education for the children of the poor, except 
 an infant school in connexion with the British and Foreign 
 School Society; no provision whatever had been made for train- 
 ing the young in the doctrines and the discipline of the Church, 
 nor for affording them the spiritual superintendence and teach- 
 ing of a clergyman. The distance of the schools at Church 
 End was a suflicieut excuse for many parents not sending their 
 children there at all ; whilst in those few who did attend, the 
 effect of good example and good instruction at school was, in too 
 many instances, counteracted by bad examples at home. To
 
 8 
 
 remedy this evil, as soon as Holy Trinity Church was opened, — a 
 school was commenced in a cottage, and a committee was formed 
 for the purpose of obtaining funds and superintending the erection 
 of school-buildings. The following clergyman and gentlemen 
 formed the Committee: the Rev. F. S. Green, Chairman; T. B. 
 Herring, Esq., Treasurer; John White, Esq., Honorary Se- 
 cretary; with James Lermitte, Anthony Salvin, and Isaac S. 
 Cooper, Esqrs., acting members, under the patronage of the 
 Earl of Mansfield, K.T., the Bishop of Loudon, and Lord 
 Robert Grosvenor ; witb a number of clergymen and gentlemen 
 of the district as vice-patrons. The principle adopted and car- 
 ried out by these gentlemen was, to connect religious, moral, and 
 intellectual, with Industrial Instruction ; as they believe that 
 the great defect in the present National Schools arises from the 
 want of attention to this latter branch of the essential education 
 of the children of the poor; and to the influence of industry 
 as a preventive of crime, not being sufficiently insisted upon, 
 and made an indispensable element in the system of instruction. 
 As poor children have generally little or no home-industrial 
 instruction, they felt it was their duty to have them instructed 
 at school, not only in the truths of religion, in the duties which 
 moral and social obligations impose upon them, and in the 
 arts of reading, writing, arithmetic, vocal music,^ &c., but also 
 in such manual crafts or occupations as are fitted to develope 
 health and strength, and to impart habits of order, neatness, 
 dexterity, punctuality, and industry. Systematic instruction 
 and training, at an early age, in manual employments will, in 
 their opinion, (as stated in one of their early appeals to the 
 inhabitants for aid,) " tend to make the scholars handy and 
 useful ; valuable as servants, mechanics, agricultural and gene- 
 ral labourers, or farmers ; and by thus endowing them with a 
 knowledge of common things, (the philosophy of every-day life,) 
 and thoroughly instructing them and exercising them in such 
 employments as in their several stations may fall to their lot in 
 after-life, both the disposition and the ability to perform their 
 duties well will be instilled." Their system, therefore, com- 
 prises, that in addition to the ordinary elementary instruction 
 
 ^ Froiu this class tbe Churcli choir is formed, the parents and others 
 joining.
 
 imparted in National Schools, the boys shall be taught garden- 
 ing and husbandry, the composition and properties of soils and 
 manures, the rotation of crops, the use of ordinary tools, and 
 the elements of mechanics ; whilst the girls shall be in- 
 structed in cooking, making bread and baking, washing, and 
 getting-up of linen, cutting out and making clothes, knitting, 
 and general household work. They appealed to the public to 
 enable them to carry out their plans, and their school buildings 
 were adapted to meet all the additional requirements which 
 these plans involved. 
 
 The child should be educated, in all schools, on a principle 
 which would teach him to resist temptation, otherwise instruction 
 in the arts of reading and writing is as likely to be converted to 
 his own and society's injury, as it is to contribute to their 
 benefit. The Church must be united with the School. The 
 spirit and the body must both be educated ; and whilst the 
 latter is trained to subjection, the former must be elevated and 
 refined, by the inculcation of those pure doctrines which are 
 found in the Gospel, and which are nowhere so eloquently — yet 
 so simply — enforced as in the " Sermon on the Mount." Nor 
 should the mind, or intellect, be disregarded; for it is quite 
 true, as a Rev. divine remarks — that 
 
 " We have fallen on times when men have discovered that mind sub- 
 dues matter and is power. Stop the intellectual developement of this 
 nation, and you stop the progress of her civilization, the progress of 
 science and art, on which, as a commercial country, her subsistence de- 
 pends, and her power will fall. Other nations will pass us by, leaving us 
 to mourn over our short-sightedness and folly, when it is too late to 
 repair."' 
 
 The subscriptions were opened in 1846 ; the Finchley 
 National and Industrial Schools of the Holy Trinity com- 
 menced building in 1847, and they came into active operation 
 in 1848. The establishment includes a boys^ school for one 
 hundred ; girls' and infants' schools for eighty-four each, 
 with class-rooms, lavatories, cap and cloak rooms, and fur- 
 
 ' " Sermon preached on the opening of the Highgate National Industrial 
 School," by the Rev. II. W. Bellairs, A.M.
 
 10 
 
 nished houses for the master and mistresses (there are two 
 of the latter required, one for the girls', and one for the 
 infants' school), kitchen, fitted up for the proper instruction 
 of the girls in effective but economical cooking ; a wash- 
 house, furnished with cisterns, coppers, and washing- troughs, 
 with pipes for hot and cold water; a laundry, with ironing- 
 stove, mangle, and other necessaries; a drying-room, with 
 hot-air apparatus; store-room; scullery and bake-house; gar- 
 dens, shrubberies, and play-grounds;^ for the committee have 
 not lost sight of the fact, that the child as well as the adult 
 must have amusement, and that it is only by the encou- 
 ragement and proper regulation of innocent and healthful 
 recreations that the tendency to join in vicious pursuits, inju- 
 rious to the body and destructive to the soul, can be coun- 
 teracted. The gardens and land used for agricultural purposes 
 are contiguous to the schools ; and each boy in the indus- 
 trial class cultivates, under the direction of the master, but 
 for his own or his parents' use and profit, a plot of ground, of 
 the expense, the produce, and the value of which he is required 
 to keep an account. In the offices enumerated, the girls are 
 taught washing, ironing, cooking, and all household duties that 
 are required in a female servant, or in an industrious wife and 
 mother in a cottage. The education imparted, in other re- 
 spects, is fitted for the children of the middle-class ; and there 
 can be no doubt but that it is desirable " for moral reasons" 
 (observe the committee) " that the children of these classes 
 should be educated together in the National School. Such 
 a union of the middle and labouring classes is recommended 
 by the Committee of Council on Education, and has pro- 
 duced admirable results at King's Somborne, and in other 
 places." 
 
 At the commencement of the undertaking the Committee 
 found great difficulty in obtaining a master and mistress pro- 
 perly qualified to carry out the industrial part of the training ; 
 and this will, temporarily, be a bar to the successful operation 
 
 ^ The play-gvounil being attached to the sehool, is found very efficient 
 in keeping the pupils out of the sphere of mischief. It becomes the centre 
 of attraction, and they have no wish to wander beyond its boundaries.
 
 11 
 
 of such establishments ; but it is one that is now being removed 
 as the National Society a rcpreparing teachers for this work. 
 To this cause chiefly it is to be ascribed, that mistakes were 
 made and expenses incurred in the outset, which the experience 
 of Finchley will teach future school committees to avoid ; but 
 with the exception of these disadvantages, which there is no 
 wish to conceal or extenuate, the experiment has been en- 
 tirely successful ; and the objection which has been frequently 
 made by parents in the country, when urged to send their 
 children to school, viz., that " the book-learning they got 
 seemed no how to teach them to work for their bread," that it 
 did not make them " more handy or clever for service,^^ and that 
 " farmers said, ' an old school boy was no use to a farmer,^ 
 whilst tradesmen's wives would not take an old school girl into 
 service on any terms," are completely removed. 
 
 The following is the detailed system that is pursued with the 
 industrial pupils. 
 
 The elder boys, from eleven years of age, and upwards, 
 cultivate plots of ground of about four poles each, they hold 
 these plots rent free, and take the crops home for the use of 
 their families. The elder boys are allowed to retain their gar- 
 dens, when they are able to get work in the village, an arrange- 
 ment being made that they shall go to work in the morning, 
 and attend school in the afternoon, or vice versa. 
 
 The industrial girls are employed in their department, during 
 the whole of Tuesday morning from six till half-past twelve, 
 and during an hour or two of each week day, in the intervals 
 of school time. They arc trained in plain cooking, washing, 
 house-work and needle-work ; under the superintendence and 
 with the assistance of the mistress. Two girls and tv/o 
 boys are regularly brought forward as pupil teachers on the 
 Industrial system, thus laying the foundation for future masters 
 and mistresses accustomed to that part of their duty, and 
 assisting in the removal of the difficulty under which the 
 Finchley Schools have laboured. The boys are also instructed 
 in the elements of botany, mechanics, and agricultural chemistry ; 
 and every inducement is held out to them to strive for further 
 improvement in these branches of industrial science. For the 
 assistance of both boys and girls, " Manuals" have been pro-
 
 12 
 
 vidcd, which are found very useful in their training and instruc- 
 tion. These "Manuals" are: 
 
 No. 1. — Cooking : comprising instructions for the practical and 
 economical management of the Kitchen, Plain Cooking, Bread- 
 making, Baking, Brewing, Pickling, &e.' Price \0d. 
 
 No. 2. — Gaudkning : or practical and economical Training for the 
 Management of a School or Cottage Garden; imparting a know- 
 ledge of soils and their manures, of the arts of draining, spade 
 husbandry, the cultivation of esculent plants, the treatment of 
 the grape-vine, gooseberry, and currant-bushes, the raspberry- 
 cane, the strawberry-bed, the cottager's flower-garden, &c. lOrf. 
 
 No. 3. — Household Work : in which the duties of Female Ser- 
 vants are practically and economically illustrated, through the 
 respective grades of Maid-of-AU-Work, House and Parlour-Maid, 
 and Laundry-Maid ; embracing not only general domestic occu- 
 pation, but the management of the Laundry, in washing, ironing, 
 &c ; with many valuable recipes for facilitating labour in every 
 department. Price \0d. 
 
 No. 4.— Plain Needlework, in all its branches ; with full direc- 
 tions for shirt, shift, frock, and boys' dressmaking ; cutting-out, 
 and repairing ; marking, knitting, and fine-drawing, netting, and 
 various other sorts of fancy-work, in thread, worsted, &c. ; illus- 
 trated by tables and diagrams. Price lOd. 
 
 No. 5. — Domestic Fowls and Animals: their Natural History ; 
 rules for their breeding and rearing, with the Management of the 
 Dairy, Directions for keeping Bees, &c. Price 8d. 
 
 Notwithstanding the addition of industrial to intellectual in- 
 struction, no time is lost with respect to the latter, as compared 
 with other National Schools : on the contrary, the Committee 
 state that they may go further and say : 
 
 " That, in two ways, much more is gained. The first is, by the greater 
 number of years the children remain at school, owing to the inducement 
 
 ^ This " Manual " was found of service in a quarter where it certainly 
 could have been little expected. In the " Report" of the Rev. M. Mitchell, 
 M.A., one of Her Majesty's Inspectors of Schools for 1854, we find the 
 following statement : " A letter from an Etonian, an officer in a Light 
 Dragoon Regiment out at Varna, says, 'Tell him that his Finchley 
 Manual caused me to be promoted to the office of troop cook, till our 
 duties became so heavy, that I was obliged to resign in favour of a woman, 
 and that I am still looked up to as an authority iu all culinary matters, 
 thanks to him." — See " Minutes of the Committee of Council on Educa- 
 tion, 1854—65," p. 481.
 
 13 
 
 held out from the present pro<Uice of their labour, and the very evident 
 future benefit to the children, by the valuable practice they are taught, 
 
 and the equally valuable maxims instilled into them The next 
 
 way in which the instruction is increased, is by the adoption of Saturday, 
 as in part a school day. That this is a most important feature in country 
 schools, none who have watched the use of this one idle day can for a 
 moment doubt ; that on it usually all the good instruction of the week has 
 been destroyed, and, in a great measure made of none effect, the children 
 being at liberty to join the number of vicious and lazy wandering vaga- 
 bonds of their own age, and sometimes older, who so abound in country 
 districts. Instead of its being a holiday and rest, as originally intended, 
 it is a day spent in vice and irregularity. The Sunday would be much 
 more appreciated, were half the Saturday devoted to education." 
 
 By the addition of Saturday, it is found that the boys gain 
 about five hours a week, and the girls eight, more than the 
 usual time of attendance in the National Schools ; and this is 
 in itself a great advantage : the retention of the children at 
 the schools till they are thirteen or fourteen years of age, in- 
 stead of their leaving at ten or eleven, is a still greater benefit, 
 as it 
 
 " obtains for them the benefits of School and Church Instruction, at 
 the very age when, by their withdrawal from school, they soon withdraw 
 themselves from Church, and the downward course is begun, which tends 
 to fill our jails and prisons with juvenile criminals. At this age, too, they 
 are more likely to get fixed habits of order, neatness, punctuality, and 
 industry, and distaste for idleness and dissipation, by the constant employ- 
 ment of their bodily powers. Thus, instead of the complaints we so often 
 hear, that not one in forty of our National School children ever become 
 candidates for Confirmation and Communicants, they are under training 
 u)) to that period, and started in the world with these additional safeguards 
 and assistance." 
 
 It is found that industrial occupation has a tendency to 
 correct that irregularity in attendance, which is found in all 
 schools attended by the children of the poor. Thus, in the 
 four classes at Finchley, the average attendance, per cent., for 
 the year ending June 1, 1855, was as follows : 
 
 Class 1, industrial 80-5 I Class 3 65-6 
 
 „ 2, do 83 I „ 4 65-9
 
 u 
 
 In the same year, the cultivation of about forty-seven poles 
 of land, by fourteen boys, produced the following result : 
 
 Expenses. 
 
 
 
 
 Produce. 
 
 
 £ 
 
 s. 
 
 d. 
 
 £ s. d. 
 
 Digging, at 6d. per pole 
 
 1 
 
 3 
 
 6 
 
 The account was kept by 
 
 Planting, at 3c?. „ 
 
 
 
 11 
 
 9 
 
 the boys, and checked by 
 
 Weeding, at 6cL „ 
 
 I 
 
 3 
 
 6 
 
 the master, the value of 
 
 Rent, at 6dJ 
 
 1 
 
 3 
 
 6 
 
 each article reckoned ra- 
 
 Cost of Seed for 4 7 poles 
 
 2 
 
 10 
 
 7} 
 
 ther below market price 8 15 8 
 
 6 12 7i 
 
 8 15 8 
 
 Leaving a profit of £2. 3s. Of </., or about £7. 6s. Sd. per acre. ; 
 besides the value of the standing crops on the ground, esti- 
 mated at about 10s. or 15s. It must be remarked, however, 
 that the expenses do not include the cost of superintendence, 
 nor any thing for manure, as there is a liquid manure tank on 
 the premises, from which the boys can obtain any quantity they 
 want. But adding a reasonable charge for those two items, there 
 would still be a profit, and a respectable one too. 
 
 The expenses and value of the washing of fourteen girls for 
 the same year is as follows : 
 
 £ s. 
 
 Cost of Soap, &c 3 17 
 
 Balance— Profit 8 14 
 
 £ s. d. 
 
 12 11 8 
 
 Total value of girls' wash- 
 ing for the establish- 
 ment and their own 
 clothes 12 11 
 
 From the opening of the schools in the cottage, early in 
 1847, to the 1st of June, 1855, the number of children ad- 
 mitted had been 242 boys, 209 girls, and 258 infants, — total, 
 709. Since the industrial schools have been in operation, 27 
 girls and 43 boys have left school for service. They have been 
 at once engaged from the schools; and the Committee have 
 received the most gratifying accounts of their conduct. These 
 
 * Returned by the Treasurer. 
 
 - Her Majesty's School Inspector considers the prices fixed much below 
 the value.
 
 15 
 
 boys and girls have, it should be remembered, been enabled at 
 once to step from the school into profitable and respectable 
 occupations, and have not had to waste their time, as is so fre- 
 quently the case with young persons, in running about seeking 
 employment. They thus became useful members of society at 
 an earlier period than usual ; and it is a most gratifying fact, 
 that juvenile delinquency, as the magistrates will cheerfully 
 testify, now scarcely exists in East End, Finchley. 
 
 The general results of the regular pursuit of the Committee's 
 plans may be thus briefly enumerated : 
 
 1. It gives the parents a pecuniary interest in the schools, as they receive 
 the proceeds of their chihh-en's labour. 
 
 2. They are induced to keep their children at school from three to four 
 years longer than we usually find is the case at schools where the industrial 
 system is not adopted. 
 
 3. The regularity of attendance on the part of the children is con- 
 siderably increased. 
 
 4. The farmers, and tradesmen and their wives, are eager to engage the 
 children as labourers and servants immediately upon their leaving school; 
 and the frequent applications for servants trained at the schools, shows how 
 the system is appreciated from its effects on the conduct of those who are 
 under its influence. 
 
 6. The system is not Reformatory, but Preventive; it, therefore, 
 strikes at the root of that evil which has so long and so banefully aftected 
 society, notwithstanding all that has been done by the Christian and the 
 moralist to prevent it. 
 
 The united operations of the Church and the School have 
 completely changed the social aspect of East End ; which, from 
 being perhaps as immoral and vicious a place as any in the 
 kingdom, has now a population as well conducted as can be 
 reasonably expected. The attendance of the poor at Church is 
 most satisfactory to those who recollect what it was previously 
 to the consecration of Holy Trinity Church, which has recently 
 been enlarged to meet the wants of the middle and poorer 
 classes of society, and has now 600 sittings.^ This spot, only 
 
 ^ The children arc required to attend Church regularly — an exception is 
 made where the parents are Dissenters, but they are expected to take 
 their children to their own place of worship.
 
 16 
 
 a very few years back so spiritually dark and desolate, has 
 now all the appliances for administering to its inhabitants the 
 life and light-giving system of the Church, whose minis- 
 ters are daily seen among all classes of society, and in her 
 schools. Her holy ordinances are held in respect ; Baptism is 
 looked upon "as generally necessary to salvation ;" Confirmation, 
 as a sacred, profitable, and strengthening ordinance ; and the 
 Holy Communion is more and more frequented by all classes, 
 we having been assured that there are at least 200 commu- 
 nicants in the district, the average attendance at the table of 
 our Lord being about sixty. The magistrates testify as well 
 to the improved state of the parish generally, as to the decrease 
 of juvenile delinquency. The diminution in the number of 
 committals is as marked as the increase in that of commu- 
 nicants; and there has been, up to the present moment, the 
 most gratifying proof of the efficiency of that united system 
 of religious, moral, intellectual, and industrial training which 
 has been introduced at Finchley, and which would be well ex- 
 tended to every parish in England. 
 
 Since 1846, several benevolent institutions have been set on 
 foot in connection with the Church. The Ladies' Visiting 
 Society, which in the course of the last year relieved 239 
 persons, 2,386 visits having been made to the families of the 
 poor. The Coal and Clothing Club, which receives deposits of 
 small sums weekly, returning the amount at stated intervals 
 with additions, in coals and clothes ; the Clothing Club for the 
 School Children ; the Parochial Lending Library ; and the 
 Lying-in Charity; are all emanations of that spirit which 
 prompts men to do unto others as they would have others do 
 unto them. The principle of industry taught to the young in 
 the schools has also been stimulated in the elders by the es- 
 tablishment of allotments (ten acres having been rented for that 
 purpose,) which have afibrded the labourer employment for his 
 leisure hours, and, in a great measure, weaned him from the 
 ale-house. And here the advantages of the school have been 
 again experienced, for it has been found the nursery, not only 
 of labour, but of agricultural knowledge; and the child has 
 been of great assistance to the parent in cultivating the ground.
 
 17 
 
 In the midst of what has been done for the poor, a parsonage- 
 house has been built, and it is to be hoped that, both in this 
 world and the next, the labours of the reverend gentleman and 
 his coadjutors, who have striven so zealously for the eternal and 
 temporal welfare of others, will meet their reward. 
 
 And why should not that system which has been adopted at 
 Finchley, be extended to every parish in the land ? Why should 
 not as much zeal be shown to prevent as there is to punish crime, 
 and to reform criminals ? In various parts of the United King- 
 dom reformatory schools for juvenile offenders are established, 
 and by an Act passed in 1854, (the 17th and 18th Victoria, 
 cap. 86,) magistrates are empowered to send offenders, under 
 sixteen years of age, to these schools at the expiration of their 
 sentence, (provided they have not been sentenced to less than 
 fourteen days' imprisonment,) for not less than two nor more 
 than five years ; and the expense of their maintenance is to be 
 defrayed by the Lords of the Treasury, in all cases (which will 
 be the great majority) where it cannot be levied on their parents. 
 The example of Finchley proves, that if Industrial Schools were 
 generally established, Reformatory Schools, if not entirely need- 
 less, would certainly not be required more than in the propor- 
 tion of one, where otherwise there must be at least four or five ; 
 and would it not be much better to have a population growing 
 up around us who never knew crime, than to be successful to 
 the utmost extent which the most enthusiastic eulogist of prison 
 discipline and reformatory measures can imagine, in reforming 
 criminals ? It is quite true that, profitable and attractive as 
 Industrial Schools may be rendered to the pupils and their 
 parents, they must entail somewhat more expense upon the 
 parishes in which they are established than ordinary National 
 Schools ; an expense which in many districts could not be met 
 by the inhabitants. And we cannot expect to see the system 
 generally adopted in parishes unless Her Majesty's Government 
 will afford extraordinary aid to such schools, and will increase 
 the augmentation grants of their masters and mistresses, who 
 must possess additional qualifications to those required in the 
 masters and mistresses of the existing places of instruction, 
 and must devote more time and labour to the performance of
 
 18 
 
 their duties. And this Her Majesty's Government ought to 
 do; for as large sums are paid for the maintenance and in- 
 struction of those who have broken the law, why should not 
 more be devoted, than has hitherto been the case, to "train up 
 children in the way they should go,'' in the confident hope that 
 they would become observers and not violaters of ordinances, 
 whether human or Divine ? It is only by such means as have 
 been adopted at Finchley that the education of the poor can be 
 rendered really effectual. Children will never be restrained 
 from idleness and vice by being taught merely to read and 
 write. With this instruction for the intellect, (and we care not 
 how far that instruction is extended, if united with other 
 branches,) the doctrines and truths of religion, the moral obli- 
 gations of truthfulness, punctuality, courtesy, and the habits 
 of industry, cleanliness, and order, must be united, — the indus- 
 trial training, next to religious instruction, being the most 
 important. The effect of that training we have seen to be most 
 .beneficial in the Finchley Schools, and the importance of the 
 two taken in connection cannot be over estimated. Surely it 
 must be beneficial for children to be taught to look upon all 
 they do, in connection with their Christian privileges. It must 
 be good for them to be reminded, that as they are made God's 
 children by adoption and grace, so the law of their Heavenly 
 Father is, that " man should earn his bread by the sweat of 
 his brow;" and to be practically inured to "labour, working 
 with their hands the thing that is good." It is thus that they 
 will be led to see that what was pronounced as a curse upon 
 mankind, has by the good Providence of God been converted 
 into a blessing; that though a Christian man is compelled to 
 work, the apostolic rule being "if a man will not work neither 
 should he eat ;" still that in work is to be found his truest and 
 highest enjoyment, — his greatest restraint from indulging in 
 the vicious propensities of his fallen nature, — his merciful safe- 
 guard against the vanities and temptations of a wicked world. 
 Were such a system of instruction general we believe we should 
 have infinitely less crime; and as the vast sums that have been 
 and are expended in education do not sensibly reduce the rate 
 of criminals, surely we may be pardoned for pressing upon the
 
 19 
 
 country and on the legislature, the absolute necessity of uni- 
 versally adopting a system, which, so far as it has been partially 
 carried out, has been found productive of the desired effect. ^ 
 
 In Ireland, the system of Industrial Education is much more 
 fully carried out. There the Commissioners of National Educa- 
 tion maintain a class of Agricultural pupils on the school farms, 
 and also pay the elder boys for work done on the establishment. 
 
 On the 31st of December, 1854, the total number of Agri- 
 cultural Schools in Ireland was 155, and of these, nineteen 
 were Blodel Schools, tinder the exclusive management of the Com- 
 missioners. Fourteen, in full operation, were supported at a 
 charge of .£6,035, 18s. Sc?.^ and the receipts from the same 
 were £1,793. 175. 2d.^ leaving a deficit of £4,242. Is. 6^. ex- 
 pended, in these fourteen Schools alone, for the furtherance of 
 industrial knowledge, which the Commissioners justly consider 
 quite as valuable as literary education. Now it is certain that 
 the younger part of the rural population of this country stands 
 in as much need of instruction in agriculture as that of Ireland, 
 yet we have not a single establishment in England, supported 
 by Government, which might serve as a model for combined 
 literary and industrial instruction. The following statistics are 
 
 ' The principle of giving aid to industrial schools has been recognized 
 by the Committee of Council. We find in the " Minutes" of that body 
 for the last year, a '* Statement of Grants to Schools of Industry, for in- 
 dustrial i)urj)oses (towards payment of rent, purchase of tools, remunera- 
 tion of superintendents, &c), up to 31st December, 185-1." The grants 
 are \M in number ; 120 to schools in England, and 14 to schools in Scot- 
 land. Fifty-nine reformatory and industrial establishments were assisted 
 in the former, and 6 in tlie latter. The sums granted vary from 9s. to 
 .£'159, the majority of grants was under ^'10, twenty-two being under ^'2, 
 and sixty-seven under .£"5. The following sums were granted to Finchley : 
 in 185 1, ^^13. 15s. ; 1852, £U\ 10s. ; 1853, £8. 5s. ; 1854, £7. 2s. 
 
 2 Salaries of teachers, maintenance of agricultural pupils, expenses of 
 working farms, live stock, &c. 
 
 * Sales of farm produce, &c.
 
 20 
 
 from the twenty-first Report of the Commissioners of National 
 Education in Ireland. 
 
 " The following Table shows the number of National Schools, together 
 with the number of cliiidren in attendance therein, as specified in our 
 several Reports, to the 31st of December, 1854. From this return it will 
 be seen that there has been a steady increase in the attendance at the 
 National Schools every year, except in 1847 and 1849, in which the de- 
 crease is attributable to the causes adverted to in our Reports for those 
 years : — 
 
 
 
 
 No. of Children on 
 
 
 No. and Date of Report. 
 
 No. of Schools in 
 operation. 
 
 the Rolls, for half- 
 years ending 
 
 
 
 
 30th September. 
 
 No. 1, 
 
 31st December, 1833, 
 
 789 
 
 107,042 
 
 No. 2, 
 
 31st March, 1835, . 
 
 1,106 
 
 145,521 
 
 No. 3, 
 
 do. 1836, 
 
 
 1,181 
 
 153,707 
 
 No. 4, 
 
 do. 1837, 
 
 
 1,300 
 
 166,929 
 
 No. 5, 
 
 do. 1838, 
 
 
 1,384 
 
 169,548 
 
 No. 6, 
 
 31st December, 1839 
 
 
 1,581 
 
 192,971 
 
 No. 7, 
 
 do. 1840, . 
 
 
 1,978 
 
 232,560 
 
 No. 8, 
 
 do. 1841, 
 
 
 2,337 
 
 281,849 
 
 No. 9, 
 
 do. 1842, 
 
 
 2,721 
 
 319.792 
 
 No. 10, 
 
 do. 1843, 
 
 
 j 2,912 
 
 355,320 
 
 No. 11, 
 
 do. 1844, 
 
 
 1 3,153 
 
 395,550 
 
 No. 12, 
 
 do. 1845, 
 
 
 3,426 
 
 432,844 
 
 No. 13, 
 
 do. 1846, 
 
 
 3,637 
 
 456,410 
 
 No. 14, 
 
 do. 1847, 
 
 
 3,825 
 
 402,632 
 
 No. 15, 
 
 do. 1848, 
 
 
 4,109 
 
 507,469 
 
 No. 16, 
 
 do. 1849, 
 
 
 4,321 
 
 480,623 
 
 No. 17, 
 
 do. 1850, 
 
 
 4,547 
 
 511,239 
 
 No. 18. 
 
 do. 1851, 
 
 
 4.704 
 
 520,401 
 
 No. 1.9, 
 
 do. 1852, 
 
 
 4,875 
 
 544,604 
 
 No. 20, 
 
 do. 1853, 
 
 
 5,023 
 
 550,631 
 
 No. 21, 
 
 do. 1854, 
 
 
 5,178 
 
 651,110» 
 
 ' There was, in addition to these numbers, an attendance of 5,441 chil- 
 dren, with a daily average of 2,557, in schools to which salaries were 
 granted during the three months from the 30th September to the 31st 
 December, 1854, making the total attendance on the rolls 556,551. The 
 portion of expense of the education of this large number of children borne 
 by government is ^'228,649. \0s. Id. being rather less than 8s. per head." 
 
 J MASTERS AND CO., PRINTERS, ALDERSOATE STREET, LONDON.
 
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