MUTUAL INSTRUCTION MYCONI. 



119 



scholars in every class assist and superintend their 

 fellow pupils. This name, which originated in 

 France, is not appropriate, as mutual instruction 

 does not, in fact, take place, but some of the most 

 distinguished scholars occupy the place of the master, 

 while the less able do not in turn instruct them. 

 The origin of this system may be traced to India, 

 where the traveller Delia Valle found it established 

 as early as the sixteenth century. The object of this 

 system is to carry on schools chiefly by means of the 

 scholars themselves, and to instruct an uncommon 

 number of pupils at once (Lancaster had 880 together, 

 and says that he could teach 1000), with compara- 

 tively few masters and little expense. The pupils 

 are divided into small classes, each instructed by 

 one of the more advanced scholars, in reading, 

 writing, arithmetic, &c., as far as the little teacher 

 has been taught previously by the master. Such 

 little teachers are called monitors, and have a class 

 of about ten on a bench, or, as Bell prefers, standing 

 in a semicircle. The oldest and most trustworthy 

 pupils have the superintendence as general monitors. 

 Other assistants take care of the lower departments 

 of service, or the police of the school ; one notes 

 down the absent, one rules the writing-books, at- 

 tends to the distribution of slates, &c. The strictest 

 discipline and order being observed, the whole 

 appears like a great piece of clock-work, which 

 moves without the interference of one part with 

 another. The school resembles an army, which a 

 single man is enabled to command by means of order 

 and discipline, and because every one knows precisely 

 his duty. All are instructed, and teachers are formed 

 at the same time. Cheapness is always kept in 

 view. The pupils commence learning writing by 

 making figures on tables covered with sand; then 

 old paper, written or printed on one side, is taken. 

 In England, where this system was first introduced 

 from India, 500,000 (in London alone, 8000, in forty- 

 three schools), in Ireland, 30,000 children, are edu- 

 cated according to this method, which has been 

 greatly improved of late years. Lancaster was 

 engaged, in 1824, in establishing similar schools 

 under the protection of Bolivar, in the South 

 American republic Colombia. In the British East 

 Indies, a society at Calcutta has established eighty- 

 eight schools on his plan, which has been also 

 adopted at Malta, the cape of Good Hope, on the 

 Senegal, in Sierra Leone, and other English colonies. 

 The Greeks also have made use of this means for the 

 establishment of elementary schools (in which they 

 were entirely deficient), on a cheap plan, at Athens, 

 Argos, and on the islands. From France, an interest 

 for them was excited in Italy, where Tuscany and 

 Parma (the latter since 1822) have permitted their 

 establishment. In Naples and in Spain, where 

 similar schools were established under the cortes of 

 1821 and 1822, in the principal towns, they were 

 prohibited in 1823. France had, in 1821, as many 

 as 1197 schools for children, and 166 regimental 

 schools, according to this system. The latter were 

 compelled, under the Bourbons, to renounce this 

 method entirely, and the constant opposition of the 

 ecclesiastics and the ministry lessened the number of 

 the former, it being considered dangerous, and 

 ^avowing of liberalism, to keep on foot such an insti- 

 tution for the improvement of the nation, in a coun- 

 try, where, amongst 24,000,000 of adults, only 

 9,000,000 could write and read, and of 6,000,000 of 

 children, only 1,600,000 enjoyed the benefit of school 

 education. From a similar cause, this system was 

 prohibited in the Austrian army and throughout 

 Austria ; and, in Russia, the zeal with which it was 

 at first received soon abated, so that only attempts 

 on a very small scale were allowed. The Danish 



government, on the contrary, began, in 1819, with 

 great zeal and success, to introduce these schools in 

 Denmark, Holstein, and Sleswick. The plan, though 

 not the same in all particulars, resembles, in its 

 chief traits, tliat of Bell and Lancaster. The num- 

 ber of schools in that country has rapidly increased, 

 and, according to a late report, amounted, in 1829, 

 to 2646. Professor Schuhmacher, rector of the 

 cathedral school at Sleswick, in a report on the sys- 

 tem of mutual instruction, observes, that it is excel- 

 lent, so long as it limits itself to matters of mechanical 

 skill or of mere memory. It saves time for the 

 teacher and pupil ; it saves expense in the business 

 of education, and is highly beneficial for all- elemen- 

 tary schools containing a large number of pupils, 

 differing so much in knowledge and intelligence, 

 that one teacher cannot instruct them all at the same 

 time, but is obliged to divide them into many classes. 

 This method, however, is superfluous in schools in 

 which the number of pupils is so small that the 

 teacher can superintend and instruct them conveni- 

 ently, particularly where all the members of one class 

 have made nearly equal progress. And even in 

 common schools, it would be injurious to strive to 

 bring every thing into this form, as it would put a 

 stop to the highest kind of instruction ; and in the 

 institutions for a more advanced stage of education, 

 where a scientific spirit, independent thought, the 

 formation of the judgment and taste, are the objects, 

 it is more peculiarly inapplicable. Much information 

 respecting this method in Denmark is contained in 

 the Progres de V Enseignement Mutuel en Dane- 

 mark, extrait d'un Rapport au Roi, par M. d' Abr aim- 

 son, Major, &c. (Copenhagen, 1825). The proper 

 field of this system is, undoubtedly, elementary 

 instruction. It will hardly be denied that it is of 

 great assistance in teaching the rudiments of know- 

 ledge, reading, writing, and ciphering, besides accus:- 

 toming the pupils to habits of order. It will also be 

 admitted, at least by all who live in popular govern- 

 ments, that every individual ought to be taught read- 

 ing and writing, without which, in the present state 

 of the world, he is excluded from half the benefits of 

 existence. Where, therefore, a large population is 

 imperfectly supplied with the means of instruction, 

 schools of this character will be of great benefit. 

 Besides, all primary instruction must be addressed 

 chiefly to the memory, notwithstanding learning by 

 rote is so much decried in our day ; and teachers, we 

 imagine, might often accelerate the progress of their 

 pupils in the branches taught in early childhood, 

 by a more extensive application of the system of 

 mutual instruction. The late king of Portugal 

 established, in 1824, a central school on these prin- 

 ciples, at Lisbon, through the instrumentality of pro- 

 fessor Lecocq ; but it has probably long since been 

 destroyed by the violent convulsions of that unliappy 

 country. 



MYCENAE ; an ancient city of Argolis, Pelopon- 

 nesus, eighty stadia from Argos, built by Perseus. It 

 was the residence of Agamemnon, and its ruins are 

 still seen in the state in which they were described 

 by Pausanias. The Lions' gate, the vaulted build- 

 ing of enormous stones, called the treasury of Atreus, 

 &c., are minutely described by Leake (Travels in the 

 Morea, 1830). 



MYCONI (anciently Myconus}; an island in the 

 department of the Northern Cyclades, in the Grecian 

 Archipelago, about twenty-one miles in circuit ; Ion. 

 25 23' E. ; lat. 37 27' N. ; the population, at pre- 

 sent, is about 4500, according to Anderson (Observa- 

 tions, &c., 1830). They are Greek Christians, and 

 distinguished navigators. The chief town, Myconi, 

 a seaport, contains about 4000 inhabitants. The soil 

 is dry and mountainous, but the mountains are not 



