CHAMBERS'S INFORMATION FOR THE PEOPLE. 



in England and Ireland. The Church of Scot- 

 land in England has 4 presbyteries, 20 churches, 

 20 ministers, and 10 military chaplains. The 

 Presbyterian Church of England (comprising a 

 former branch of the Scottish United Presby- 

 terian Church) has 10 presbyteries, 275 churches, 

 130 ministers, 56,000 members, and 22,000 scholars. 

 In Scotland, the Episcopal Church is in the posi- 

 tion of a dissenting body ; it has 255 clergymen, 

 and about 75,000 members. 



In Ireland, the Established Protestant Church 

 in union with the Church of England, was dis- 

 established and disendowed by act of parlia- 

 ment, 32 and 33 Viet. cap. 42, on January I, 

 1871. The Irish Roman Catholic Church numbers 

 3,95 r,888 members and adherents; the Protestant 

 Episcopal Church of Ireland, 635,670 adherents ; 

 the Irish Presbyterians are in number 485,503 ; 

 Methodists, 47,669 ; Independents, 6014; Baptists, 

 4894 ; Quakers, 3696 ; Jews, 453 ; other persua- 

 sions, 19,035. The Roman Catholic Church is 

 under 4 archbishops Armagh, Cashel, Dublin, 

 and Tuam and 23 bishops. On the death of the 

 bishop, the clergy of the diocese elect a vicar 

 capitular, who acts as interim bishop ; they 

 nominate a person for the office, and postulate or 

 petition the pope to ratify their choice. The 

 bishops of the province also nominate eligible 

 persons to the pope, but the candidate is chosen 

 virtually by the cardinals constituting the Congre- 

 gation De Propaganda Fide at Rome, whose nom- 

 ination is always ratified by the pope. The emolu- 

 ments of a bishop come from his own parish, 

 usually the best in the diocese, from marriage 

 licenses, and from the cathedraticum, an annual 

 sum of from 2 to ^10 paid by the parish priests, 

 according to the value of their parishes, to keep up 

 episcopal dignity. Parish priests are nominated 

 by the bishops, and are paid by voluntary offer- 

 ings, mass, baptismal and marriage fees, and 

 Easter and Christmas dues. 



EDUCATION. 



In spite of the progress made in education 

 since the passing of the Reform Bill of 1832, the 

 ignorance of the masses in England is still deplor- 

 able. From a return issued, we find nearly 20 per 

 cent, of the males, and more than 27 per cent of the 

 females who were married in England and Wales 

 in the year ending September 1872, unable to 

 write their names in the register. This shews 

 improvement, however, since 1841, when the pro- 

 portions of persons in that ignorant condition 

 were males, 33 per cent. ; females, 49 per cent. 

 The figures also shew the percentage of ignor- 

 ance greatest in the mining, manufacturing, 

 and agricultural districts, and less in the latter 

 than in the former. In Ireland, the Registrar- 

 general reports in 1872 that 36 per cent of the 

 men, and 46 per cent, of the women married in 

 1869, were unable to write their names. In fact, 

 England had, and hardly has still, any definite 

 national system of primary education. The various 

 religious bodies, and private munificence and 

 enterprise, were relied on to supply the country 

 with primary schools. Since 1833, but chiefly 

 since 1846, the government stepped in, but only as 

 an auxiliary or a stimulant to the working of the 

 various agencies carrying on the elementary in- 



struction of the people, and parliament voted an 

 annual grant for educational purposes, the dis- 



?osal of which was vested in the Committee of the 

 rivy-council for Education. The Committee 

 never took the initiative in promoting education. 

 It only gave grants to those that did, no matter who 

 they were, or what sect they belonged to, provided 

 always that they could shew they were working out 

 satisfactory results, as tested by government in- 

 spectors. These grants in aid were (i) for building ; 

 (2) for maintaining schools ; (3) capitation grants 

 to the teachers of so much per head for each 

 scholar whose proficiency satisfied the school 

 inspectors. In 1870, a step was made towards 

 establishing a national system of primary educa- 

 tion, by the passing of Mr Forster's Act (33 

 Viet. c. 75), which enacted that there should be 

 provided for each school-district a sufficient 

 number of public elementary schools, available 

 for all children residing in that district, for 

 whose elementary education suitable provision 

 is not otherwise (that is, by denominational or 

 adventure schools) made. If new schools are 

 erected to meet the requirements of the district, 

 a thing to be determined by the ratepayers (who 

 signify their desire for increased school accom- 

 modation by electing a school-board, under whose 

 management these new public primary schools are 

 placed), the Act provides that all children attend- 

 ing these new public schools, whose parents are 

 unable from poverty to pay for the instruction 

 given, shall be admitted free, and their school-fees 

 paid from local rates. The general expenses con- 

 nected with managing these schools also must 

 come off local rates. The school-boards have the 

 option of enacting the compulsory education of 

 children between the ages of 5 and 13, of either 

 remitting the fees of indigent children attending 

 the board schools, or, if the parents desire the 

 children to attend denominational schools, of pay- 

 ing their fees for their attendance there a pro- 

 vision which is made by the 25th clause, and has 

 raised a storm of discontent on the part of the advo- 

 cates of unsectarian education or of erecting and 

 opening free schools for the special benefit of 

 indigent children, and supporting them out of the 

 rates. The ratepayers may or may not elect a 

 school-board ; that is, they may, if they please, 

 render the Act a dead-letter, and stick to the old 

 haphazard voluntary system ; indeed, as a matter of 

 fact, though school-boards have been formed in 

 all the large towns, where they were least needed, 

 comparatively few have been established in the 

 small towns and rural districts, where the in- 

 fluence of the landlords and Established Church 

 is most powerful, and where primary schools 

 were most urgently wanted. The Act is a com- 

 promise, in fact, the central ideas of which are 

 two permissive compulsion and permissive secta- 

 rianism. Where its machinery is not adopted, 

 the old system of voluntary schools, with govern- 

 ment grants in aid, still prevails. 



Scotland has had since 1696 a legalised system 

 of national elementary education. By law, each 

 parish was provided with a primary school at the 

 expense of the landowners or heritors, who had 

 to maintain it, and provide the teacher with cer- 

 tain emoluments, though he was also allowed to 

 charge a small fee for each pupil These schools 

 were under the management practically of the min- 

 isters and presbyteries of the Established Church* 



