of Edinburgh, Session 1870 - 71 . 
315 
schools may be said, in a word, to be supported wholly by contri- 
butions from the annual income of the community, in the shape of 
— 1st, school fees ; 2d, local rate ; 3d, general taxation. The first 
step towards providing for the maintenance of a Volksschule is, 
that the proper authorities of the gemeinde, or commune, register 
each family as assessed at a certain rate of school fees for any 
children that may be of school-going age. In this country there 
appears to he a sort of repugnance to the idea of a graded scale of 
fees in proportion to the income of parents. But in Prussia 
this is the first principle of public instruction. Fees are assessed 
upon families not in relation to the cost of the school, but solely in 
relation to the circumstances of those who are to pay the fees. 
G-overnment, however, fixes a maximum and a minimum rate. 
No child is to pay more than fifteen thalers, or about forty-four 
shillings per annum ; and the lowest rate (from which there would 
only he exemption in the case of extreme poverty) is one groschen, 
that is about three halfpence, per week. Between these extremes 
the assessment takes place. 
The next source of revenue for the school consists in the collec- 
tions made in the parish church during one Sunday in each year. 
Then there is a small capitation tax on poor and rich alike, and, 
finally, a rating on property, estimated by a loose valuation. 
Grants from the general taxation of the country for elementary 
schools are only made in cases where the commune can show real 
inability, on account of the poverty of its inhabitants, to meet the 
necessary cost. The Go vernm ent, however, has occasionally allowed 
grants for increasing schoolmasters’ salaries. It is clear, then, that 
as the fees are almost always extremely low, the burden of main- 
taining the primary schools falls mainly upon the rate-payers. 
This principle was introduced by the Allgemeines Landrecht , or 
general code of Prussia of the year 1794, which lays down 
that u where there are no endowments for the support of the 
common schools, then the maintenance of the teacher falls upon 
the collective householders, without distinction of religion. The 
contributions requisite for this purpose, whether they he paid in 
money or kind, must he equitably divided among the householders, 
in the proportion of their property and holdings.” 
To show the working of this system in a large city, it may be 
