EDUCATION. 145 



Except by the allusion which I made to Lord Clarendon's Practical In- 

 structors of 1848, and to your own [i.e., Earl Spencer's] prize scheme of 1872, 

 I have confined my remarks in this letter to the fitful fortunes of agricultural 

 education as administered by the Commissioners of National Education. 

 But the story of Irish agricultural education would be incomplete if no- 

 reference were made to the operations of the industrial and reformatory 

 schools, which not only in boys', but in girls' schools, have embraced agri- 

 cultural and dairy instruction in their industrial curriculum, and, I believe, 

 with very marked success— a significant reproach to the panic-born policy 

 which forced the National Board to withdraw their grants, in 1862, for 

 agricultural education from the workhouse schools. 



