AGRICULTUSE OX THE RHIJfE. 97 



employed in manual labour to keep a spacious house 

 clean. Dirt accumulates in its passages, in its neglected 

 or too much thronged rooms. The extensive front 

 outside precludes all hope of constant neatness, and the 

 expensive luxury is ultimately abandoned in despair. 

 The distance at \vhich these village houses lie from the 

 land their owners have to till, absorbs the spare moments 

 that might be employed with the broom, and the want 

 of plan in laying out building-plots, where every man 

 applies his own land to the purpose, constantly allows a 

 neighbour to foil the best-directed efforts. 



These drawbacks to cleanliness and external neat- 

 ness are in part an effect of the German village system. 

 In Holland the small farm-houses, with the road neatly 

 clinkered in front, and unincumbered with useless build- 

 ings, offer a pleasanter picture to the English eye. But 

 in Holland, as in England, trade has promoted that 

 division of labour which is favourable to individual 

 comfort, and in Germany this powerful lever has hitherto 

 had little influence. What is most pleasing in the 

 German village is that the school is an indispensable 

 requisite, and often a conspicuous ornament of the place. 

 The village school is not intrusted to any bed-ridden 

 dame or superannuated person of the male sex who 

 volunteers his services. The schoolmaster has been 

 regularly educated to fill his post at seminaries destined 

 to train teachers. He must have obtained his 

 certificates of qualification and good conduct before any 

 patronage can help him to his post ; and usually he spends 

 some years as assistant or usher in some school of larger 

 resort before he is intrusted with the management of even 

 the smallest village institution. 



