THE STORY OF ENGLISH EDUCATION. 345 



in 1870 it was only beginning (despite the great advance on 1851) to 

 be of real value. In 1870, out of every 1,000 children qualified by 

 age and attendance for the examination in the two higher standards, 

 319 ought to have been prepared to pass. In fact only 98 were pre- 

 sented for the examination. Slow as was the progress between 1833 and 

 1870, ceaseless efforts had been made to hasten that progress. Popula- 

 tion and the congestion of soul-ruining unsanitary areas, however, pro- 

 gressed more rapidly than the education movement and 1870 found a 

 million and a half of little children without the means of education. 

 Yet philanthropists and statesmen had striven manfully enough to 

 solve the awful problem, A select committee of the House of Commons 

 in 1838 reported on the deplorable conditions of education in the great 

 towns. This led to the institution of the education committee of 

 the Privy Council. The inquiry made by the National Society in 

 1846-7 showed that the established church was striving with might 

 and main to do its duty, for it was actually educating one million 

 children in its day schools. A select committee of the House of 

 Commons in 1853 reported on the Manchester district of England 

 and showed a school attendance improvement of no less than 300 per 

 cent. The Duke of Newcastle's commission appointed in 1858 recom- 

 mended, after a lengthy examination of the education problem, grants 

 out of rates as well as out of the imperial exchequer, advised the 

 creation of local boards of education in every county area, advocated 

 a more efficient system for the training of teachers, and an extension 

 of evening schools. The grants out of the rates were to be paid in 

 respect of individual scholars upon examination by examiners appointed 

 by the local boards of education. The revised code introduced by 

 Mr. Lowe — the code governing the conditions under which the educa- 

 tion committee of the Privy Council made the grants to the schools — 

 adopted the principle of individual examination and the payment of all 

 grants direct to the managers of the schools that earned the grant. Mr. 

 Lowe in a famous phrase promised that the system should be either 

 cheap or efficient. When he made this promise it was dear and ineffi- 

 cient. Under the revised code the parliamentary annual grant fell 

 from £813,441 in 1861 to £636,810 in 1865. The system, however, 

 was not efficient and it was found necessary once more to strive after 

 educational legislation. In 1843 an effort had been made to pass a 

 factory act that would secure some measure of religious and useful 

 education to all children in the factories. The bill, however, in con- 

 sequence of nonconformist opposition, was withdrawn. In 1853 a 

 bill was introduced enabling those borough councils that chose to 

 adopt the act to appoint a school committee for the purpose of con- 

 trolling the elementary education of the district. It was proposed in 

 this measure that any elementary school should be admitted to this 

 control and reap its manifold benefits on the application of the school 



