4. The school shall be conducted in accordance with the conditions required to be fulfilled by an elementary school in order to obtain an annual parliamentary grant.

Parliamentary Grant.

Under the new Act, no parliamentary grant can be made to any elementary school, which is not a 'public elementary school' within the meaning of the Act.

Conditions of the Annual Parliamentary Grant.

The conditions required to be fulfilled by an elementary school, in order to obtain an annual parliamentary grant, are those contained in the minutes of the Education Department in force for the time being, and, among other matters, provide that after March 31, 1871—

(1.) Such grants shall not be made in respect of any instruction in religious subjects:

(2.) Such grant shall not for any year exceed the income of the school for that year which was derived from voluntary contributions, and from school fees, and from any sources other than the parliamentary grant;

but such conditions do not require that the school shall be in connection with a religious denomination, or that religious instruction shall be given in the school, and do not give any preference or advantage to any school on the ground that it is or is not provided by a school board.

The managers of every elementary school are empowed to fulfill the conditions required in pursuance of the Act to be fulfilled in order to obtain a parliamentary grant, notwithstanding any provision contained in any instrument regulating the trusts or management of their school, and to apply such grant accordingly.

The preliminary conditions of the annual grant, set forth in the New Code of Regulations of the Privy Council, under date Feb 7, 1871, are:Before any grant is made to a school the Education Department must be satisfied that

(a.) The school is conducted as a public elementary school; and no child is refused admission to the school on other than reasonable grounds. (b.) The school is not carried on with a view to private emolument. (c.) The school premises are healthy, well lighted, drained, and ventilated, properly furnished, supplied with suitable offices, and contain in the principal school-room at least 80 cubical feet of internal space, and in the school-room and class-room at least 8 square feet of area, for each child in average attendance.

(d.) The principal teacher is certificated.

Exception:-An evening school may be taught by an assistant teacher fulfilling the conditions of Article 79.

(e.) Notice is immediately given to the Department of the date at which the teacher enters on the charge of the school, from which date the grant is computed.

(f) The girls in the school are taught plain needlework and cutting-out as part of the ordinary course of instruction.

(9.) The infants, if any, attending the school are instructed suitably to their age, and in a manner not to interfere with the instruction of the older children.

(h.) Registers of admission and daily attendance, and accounts of income and expenditure, are accurately kept and duly audited: and all statistical returns and certificates of character (Articles 67, 77, and 80) may be accepted as trustworthy.

(2) Three persons have designated one of their number to sign the receipt for the grant on behalf of the school.

Exception:-The treasurer of a school board signs the receipt for grants to schools provided by the board

1

Up to the period of the new Act coming into operation, Government gave its annual aid to all elementary schools, in consideration of the religious, as well as secular, instruction imparted therein. Now, the Parliamentary grant is given solely in consideration of secular instruction, and no note whatever is taken, by the State, of religious instruction. Under the former system, Her Majesty's inspectors were bound to examine into not only the secular, but the religious, teaching of the great majority of the schools of the country-those of the Church of England-and to report to the Education Department on the quality as well as the quantity of said religious instruction; and as regards the British and other Protestant schools not in connection with the Church of England, the Church of Scotland and other Scottish schools, and Catholic schools, the State gave them credit for imparting religious instruction, but did not take any cognizance of the quantity or quality thereof. In fact, all schools got credit, in the amount of Parliamentary grant allocated to them severally, for religious instruction imparted. Now, under the new system, no cognizance whatever is taken of religious instruction by the Education Department; and it is expressly enacted, as we have just seen, that to public elementary schools 'the parliamentary grant shall not be made in respect of any instruction in religious subjects.'

Furthermore, religious instruction is prohibited, during the ordinary school hours, in all schools under the supervision of the Department; but in the first class of schools-voluntary and denominational-it is permitted (not enjoined) either before or after, or both before and after the ordinary school hours.

That religious instruction would thus be given in extra hours, in voluntary and denominational schools, appears to have been contemplated, as certain, by the framers of the Act, as is evidenced by the following provisions :

Where the managers of any public elementary school not provided by a school board desire to have their school inspected or the scholars therein examined, as well in respect of religious as of other subjects, by an inspector other than one of Her Majesty's inspectors, such managers may fix a day or days not exceeding two in any one year for such inspection or examination.

The managers shall, not less than fourteen days before any day so fixed, cause public notice of the day to be given in the school, and notice in writing of such day to be conspicuously affixed in the school.

On any such day any religious observance may be practiced, and any instruction in religious subjects given at any time during the meeting of the school, but any scholar who has been withdrawn by his parent from any religious observance or instruction in religious subjects shall not be required to attend the school on any such day.

Under the new Code of Minutes of the Education Department (1871), four hours a day are fixed as the minimum attendance for instruction in secular subjects; viz., two hours in the morning and two hours in the afternoon. Religious instruction must be outside of these. It, therefore, has become a much more difficult matter than formerly, when instruction in religious subjects might be given at any time. The

difficulty can be met only by great zeal and attention on the part of the managers and teachers. The school-room, no doubt, may be freely used for religious instruction and religious exercises in extra hours, notice thereof being given in the time-table affixed in the school-room. Moreover, in such matters of secular instruction as may occasionally border on religious controversy-history for instance the State observes complete neutrality, as regards the books to be used. Then, there is no prohibition of texts of Scripture being inscribed on the walls, or a Crucifix, or a statue of the Blessed Virgin being set up in the schoolroom, as formerly, if the managers please. But the law is imperative that there shall be no instruction whatever in religious subjects, during the ordinary school hours.

But while instruction in religious subjects is permitted, outside the ordinary school hours, in voluntary schools receiving the annual Parliamentary grant, it is altogether prohibited in school-board schools, which also receive the Parliamentary grant, and, furthermore, are built and maintained by public rates, and managed by boards elected by the rate-payers. For, with respect to these latter, it is enacted, that every school provided by a school board shall be conducted under the control and management of such board in accordance with the following regulations::

(1) The school shall be a public elementary school, within the meaning of this Act:

(2.) No religious catechism or religious formulary which is distinctive of any particular denomination shall be taught in the school.

Let us now glance at the provisions for the election of school boards, their constitution, management, source of income, and powers and functions, under the Act.

It is enacted that the school board shall be elected-in a borough by the persons whose names are on the burgess roll of such borough for the time being in force, and in a parish not situate in the metropolis by the rate-payers.

The school board for London is elected, in the city by the same persons and in like manner as common councilmen are elected, and in the other divisions of the metropolis by the same persons and in the same manner as vestrymen, under the Metropolis Management Act, 1855, and the Acts amending the same. The school board for Oxford, nine in number, is elected, six by the rate-payers, and three by the University.

At every election, every voter is entitled to a number of votes equal to the number of the members of the school board to be elected, and may give all such votes to one candidate, or may distribute them among the candidates as he thinks fit.

The Act provides that the number of members of a school board (except the school board of the Metropolis) shall be such number, not less than five nor more than fifteen, as may be determined in the first

instance by the Education Department, and afterwards, from time to time, by a resolution of the school board, approved by the Education Department.

The Education Department have, in accordance with the provisions of the Act, fixed the number of members of the school board for London at forty-nine, the numbers for the several divisions being respectivelyChelsea four, City four, Finsbury six, Greenwich four, Hackney five, Lambeth five, Marylebone seven, Soutwark four, Tower Hamlets five, and Westminster five. The Education Department have the power of altering any of these numbers, by way of increase or decrease, hereafter, as the population or rateable value of any of the divisions may vary.

The Recorder of London is named returning officer for the first election of the school board of London; and his ten deputy returning officers are severally named in the orders of the Education Department; viz., the Secondary of the City of London for the City, and vestry clerks of certain parishes for the other nine districts.

The returning officer for the first election of the school board of the district of the local board of Oxford is the chairman of the said local board, or a member thereof appointed by the said local board for the purpose.

The returning officer of a borough, under the Act, is the Mayor or a deputy appointed under his hand.

The returning officer of school boards in parishes not situate within municipal boroughs, or within the Metropolis, is the clerk of the union of which the parish forms part, or the person for the time being discharging the duties of such clerk.

Triennial Election and Retirement of Members.

The school boards are elected for three years. The day for the triennial retirement of members is the day prescribed by some minute or order of the Education Department. Members retiring are re-eligible. Members chosen to fill the office of retiring members come into office on the day for retirement, and hold office for three years only. Casual vacancies are filled up by an election directed by an order of the Education Department.

Disqualification of Members by Non-attendance.

If a member of the school board absents himself during six successive months from all meetings of the board, except from temporary illness, or other cause to be approved by the board, or is punished with imprisonment for any crime, or is adjudged bankrupt, or enters into a composition or arrangement with his creditors, it is enacted that such person shall cease to be a member of the school board, and his office shall thereupon be vacant.

The Act provides that no member of a school board or manager appointed by them shall have any place of profit vested in the school board or in any way share or be concerned in the profits of any bargain or contract with the school board, save any sale of land or loan of

money to a school board, or any bargain or contract made with or work done by a company in which such member holds shares, or the insertion of any advertisement relating to the affairs of any such school board in any newspaper in which such member has a share or interest, provided always that he does not vote with respect to such sale, loan, bargain, contract, work, or insertion.

Constitution of a School Board.

It is provided by the 30th section that the school board shall be a body corporate, by the name of the school board of the district to which they belong, having a perpetual succession and a common seal, with power to acquire and hold land for the purposes of the Act, without any license in mortmain.

Thus, the system is eminently popular in its basis. Every inhabitant of each district, who pays rates, has a vote in the election of the school board. Therefore the school board, generally speaking, must be a fair representation of the district for which it acts. It is to be hoped that the rate-payers are, as a body, anxious for, as, no doubt, their interests are deeply involved in, the education—that is, education in its strict sense of the masses around them. Consequently, it is but fit that they, through their elected representatives on the school board, should take part in carrying out the system of public elementary school instruction, contemplated by the Act. Besides, as the school fund will, to a considerable extent, be furnished out of the rates which they pay, and, as regards the Parliamentary grant, out of the taxes to which they contribute their proportion, it is considered only fair that they should have a voice in the matter.

The Cumulative Vote.

The clause enabling a voter to give all his votes to one candidate, or to distribute them among the candidates as he thinks fit, is of more consequence than at first sight may appear. For instance, it enables a minority to be at least represented, if they can not be in force, on the board; and this, in itself, is of much value. Let us suppose a district in England, in which the Wesleyans, or Presbyterians, or Catholics are a small minority. The rate-payers of any one of these denominations will naturally, under the circumstances, agree among themselves to give all their votes for one candidate, and thus they will have a representative to press their views and guard their interests; and it is to be hoped that the views of a particular creed, even though a small minority, will receive fair consideration from every board, when those views do not contravene any provision of the Act, or do not run counter to the interests of any other communion. Englishmen are proverbially lovers of fair play, and hence we may anticipate that it will very rarely occur that large majorities on school boards will abuse their power and unnecessarily hurt the conscientious feelings of small minorities of their fellow. subjects.

That this is no mere surmise, but is actually borne out, in point of