130 TiMEHRI. 



caprice of managers ; and that it was desirable to 

 secure a superannuation allowance and hold out the 

 hope of promotion to the energetic and faithful who 

 displayed ability in the discharge of their duties. In 

 conformity with these recommendations, the Court of 

 Policy passed the Compulsory Education Ordinance of 

 1876 (nominally still in force), and the Board of Educa- 

 tion, under its provisions, framed a Code of Regulations 

 which embraced nearly all the changes recommended 

 by the Commission except the last-mentioned. These 

 regulations, with very few alterations, remained in force 

 until 1882, raising the standard of education and morality 

 among the people, attra6ling ability and intelligence to 

 the teaching profession, and spreading light and know- 

 ledge. But Sir Henry Turner Irving came, and with 

 him the good prospects of Education were blighted. 

 Being alarmed at the amount of the Education Vote 

 at a time when the Colony was threatened with bank- 

 ruptcy. Sir Henry precipitately passed through the Court 

 a new Code of Regulations, sweeping away at once the 

 Training College for Teachers, certificate qualifications, 

 individual passes of children, and special grants in aid of 

 rents, repairs and the building of new schools, thus put- 

 ting the Colony more than twenty years backwards in its 

 slow and laborious educational progress. The 1882 

 Regulations failed most lamentably. They failed in the 

 principal obje6l of their creation,— -that of keeping down 

 the education vote. As the grant was paid on the aver- 

 age attendance solely, teachers found it to their interest 

 to have as many children as would give the largest 

 averages possible ; hence some poor country pedagogue 

 was often driven to the necessity of using extraneous 



