Education as connected with Agriculture. 
G7 
farmer to that of his landlord on the one hand, and his labourer 
on the other. It seems very desirable that, as he will (have so 
much to do with these in his business and after-life, so at some 
point or other of his education he should come into contact with 
both, and establish some links of fellowship and sympathy not 
inconsistent with his relative position towards either. These 
points of contact might be formed in the elementary day-school 
at the outset, and in the college at the completion of his course. 
If the elementary schools of England were under masters and 
mistresses who, in addition to sufficiency of knowledge and 
efficiency of teaching, enjoyed the advantage of respectable 
parentage, and the consciousness of honourable independence in 
their position, I see no reason why the children of all the middle 
classes, and the farmers especially, should not receive in these 
schools their first rudiments. 
The labourer's children, as a general rule, could not go 
beyond these schools, or stay in them after the age of twelve. 
In agriculture, as in manufactures, children's labour seems to 
become more valuable with every improvement in machinery ; 
and there is a constantly increasing need for the protection of 
childhood from the excessive use by parents and masters of this 
source of profit. Still, however this state of things may require 
to be regulated, it is in itself a happy circumstance that employ- 
ment offers a very early maintenance to the labourer's children ; 
for industrious earnings are of more value to society than un- 
earned education. The early age, therefore, at which the 
labourer's child should reasonably be expected, and indeed 
encouraged, to leave school for work will always determine the 
limits of the elementary or village school. These should be 
further defined by accurate certificates of competence in the 
rudimentary subjects of writing, reading, and ciphering. It 
would be well if employers made such certificates available, if 
not essential, as introductions to service ; at all events they would 
serve the employer's children as a mark of proficiency on entering 
the higher boarding or day school, the expense of which would 
be beyond the means of the labourer. 
I must repeat, though I fear the opinion will grate upon the 
feelings of some parents, that if the elementary schools were 
generally under the charge of respected and efficient teachers, 
no injury would be done to the child of the higher class by sitting 
for a while on the same bench, and learning the same lesson, with 
the child of his father's subordinate ; and it might be that many 
a kindly and pleasant association would spring up in after-life 
horn the recollection of this early intercourse. 
Again, if with the county colleges in which the farmers' sons 
would, after passing through school, end their education, there 
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