II. 



THE SCHOOL BOARDS : WHAT THEY CAN DO, 

 AND WHAT THEY MAY DO. 



AN electioneering manifesto would be out of place in the 

 pages of this Review ; but any suspicion that may arise 

 in the mind of the reader that the following pages 

 partake of that nature, will be dispelled, if he reflect 

 that they cannot be published l until after the day on 

 which the ratepayers of the metropolis will have decided 

 which candidates for seats upon the Metropolitan School 

 Board they will take, and which they will leave. 



As one of those candidates, I may be permitted to 

 say, that I feel much in the frame of mind of the Irish 

 bricklayer's labourer, who bet another that he could not 

 carry him to the top of the ladder in his hod. The 

 challenged hodman won his wager, but as the stakes 

 were handed over, the challenger wistfully remarked, 

 " I'd great hopes of falling at the third round from the 

 top." And, in view of the work and the worry which 

 awaits the members of the School Boards, I must confess 

 to an occasional ungrateful hope that the friends who are 



1 Notwithstanding Mr. Huxley's intentions, the Editor took upon himself, in 

 wliat seemed to him to be the public interest, to send an extract from this 

 article to the newspapers before the day of the election of the School Board. 

 EDITOR of the Contemporary Review. 



