424 
Agricultural Education in Ireland. 
time under its auspices, appeared an able paper on Industrial 
Education, from which I take the following passages : — " Every 
national school in Ireland should be an agricultural school, if 
situated in a rural district ; every schoolmaster in Ireland, every 
functionary of education, should be impressed with, and inculcate 
the one idea, that the gangrene of Irish society is absence of 
practical principles It is our belief in the honest anxiety 
of the Board of Education to increase the efficiency as well as 
the number of their schools, that emboldens us to call upon them 
to establish the industrial character of the instruction they give." 
The original idea of the Education Commissioners, when they 
embarked in agricultural education, was to blend agricultural 
with literary instruction, in as many of the rural national 
schools as possible. But, urged on by the gentry, they were in- 
duced to enlarge their plans. Applications were made to them 
from all parts of the country for aid towards establishing agricul- 
tural schools of a more comprehensive class, than they at first 
contemplated. In their report for 1849, they say : — " We have, 
during the past year, received a considerable number of new ap- 
plications for grants towards the establishment of model agricul- 
tural schools. We have found it necessary to postpone our 
decision upon twenty of these applications." Ultimately, the 
Commissioners yielded to the appeals made to them, and estab- 
lished, solely at the public expense, in various parts of the 
country, a number of model agricultural schools. 
There are now in operation throughout Ireland, seventeen of 
these model schools, exclusive of the Albert Institution, at Glas- 
nevin. From a variety of causes, it happened that for several 
years the farms attached to these schools did not pay ; and this 
circumstance nearly brought the whole proceedings of the Board 
into disrepute. This state of matters, however, has latterly been 
altered for the better. 
The landed gentry of Ireland became so satisfied with the 
model agricultural school, and model farm system, that for a time 
the original notion of blending agricultural with literary in- 
struction in ordinary rural national schools was neglected. It 
was not, however, abandoned by the Board ; they encouraged it, 
although with varying success. The number of this class of 
schools went down to thirty-nine, in 1861. It then began to re- 
vive ; and the number now in operation is one hundred and fif- 
teen ; the total cost to the State for the agricultural instruction 
afforded in these schools, is 5/. per school. The total number 
of boys who receive this agricultural education is about 4200, 
which makes the cost about 3s. per head. In addition, there are 
sixteen national schools, which rank as model agricultural schools, 
under local management. In fifteen of these the teachers receive 
