232 EDUCATION. 



the colony could not well be asked for Government grants 

 to two sets of schools at once. In face of these circum- 

 stances, the late Governor thought fit to take action on 

 the very able and interesting report of Mr. J. P. Keenan, 

 one of the chiefs of inspection of the Irish Xational 

 Board of Education, Avho had been sent out as special 

 commissioner to inquire into the state of education in the 

 island ; to modif}^ Lord Harris's plan, however excellent in 

 itself; and to pass an Ordinance by wdiich Government aid 

 was extended to private elementary schools, of whatever 

 denomination, provided they had duly certificated teachers ; 

 were accessible to all children of the neighbourhood without 

 distinction of religion or race ; and " offered solid guarantees 

 for abstinence from proselytism and intolerance, by subjecting 

 their rules and course of teaching to the Board of Education, 

 and empowering that Board at any moment to cancel the 

 certificate of the teacher." In the wards in which such 

 schools were founded, and proved to be working satisfactorily, 

 the secular ward schools were to be discontinued. But the 

 Government reserved to itself the power of re-opening a 

 secular school in the ward, in case the private school turned 

 out a failure. 



Such is a short sketch of an Ordinance which seems, to 

 me et least, a rational and fair compromise, identical, mutatis 

 mutandis, with that embodied in Mr. Eorster's new Education 



