cere, his hearty hatred of a snob, and his cour¬ 
ageous contempt and loathing of oppression, 
“Looking back over the experience of a long 
and intimate acquaintanceship with the dead, I 
find that all has disappeared but the impression 
of one of the sweetest and kindliest hearts, one 
of the robustest, subtlest intellects, with which 
I have been permitted to communicate, f be¬ 
lieve this to be the impression of all who knew 
Thackeray well, and could judge him on fair 
data, and of none more than some he had been 
at feud with, on causes due often to their own 
inconsiderateness or want of feeling, not unfre- 
quently to his own touchiness in little matters, 
or his excessive susceptibility to opinion. 
Thinking of the inference which has often been 
drawn from THACKERAY’S writings, that he 
was a man who took a cynical pleasure in lay¬ 
ing bare baseness or littleness, in showing re¬ 
spectability how much it may have in common 
with the blackguardism it shrinks from—not 
because he loved respectability less, but because 
he loved blackguardism more—in revealing sel¬ 
fishness under all sorts of masks, I am aston¬ 
ished how the notion ever took root. Such 
inferences were contradicted by everything his 
friends saw in Thackeray's life and manners. 
No man delighted more to hear of good, gener¬ 
ous or unselfish actions, or was heartier or 
louder in his recognition of them. Belter still, 
no life was ever more made up of such actions. 
But his subtle ken pierced through the multi¬ 
form disguises of selfishness and meanness, and 
hia truthful nature compelled him to lay bare 
what he found underneath. His hatred of pre¬ 
tension ancl Pharisaism concurred with his large 
charity in leading him to point out how the web 
of all lives is shot with lights and darks. But 
theve was never any confounding of black and 
white, still less any -mister sympathy with evil 
thoughts, words or doings, or any preaching of 
the doctrine either of despair or devil-worship. 
Perhaps there never was a man who was more 
freely resorted to by the needy and the helpless 
of his literary confraternity; and certainly 
there was no man w ho ever recognized more 
fully the claims of such brotherhood. Ail who 
knew him must remember almost comical cases 
of the straits he was often put to to find work 
and pay for unfortunate titerateun who had 
sought his aid—how he groaned, anti sweated, 
and protested, but always paid, and comforted. 
I can hardly command myself yet to write of 
Thackeray's sweet and.amiable manners as a 
companion, guest, or host; of the playfulness of 
his wit, the charm of Inn manner, the gentle¬ 
ness of his voice, the sweetness of his smile. 
There was much of the child about him at such 
times, as there was always something childlike 
in his calm, candid face, and soft, bright eyes." 
regions; deserts; situation and the cause of salt 
lakes, etc. We now come to climate, and thence 
proceed to organic nature, to plants and animals, 
and finally to man. 
We are now prepared to make a careful study 
of that particular part of the earth which wc 
inhabit, the United States. Wc have traced an 
outline of North America, and have drawn the 
great rivers and mountain chains. We now 
direct attention to the political divisions of 
North America, and proceed directly to study 
the grout physical features of the United States: 
we note its peculiar fitness for the wants of man, 
its vegetable and mineral resources, its climate, 
soil, etc.. In our study we embrace the history 
of its discovery and its early settlement, and 
study till wc embrace all that pertains to the 
country in general, when we arrive at the more 
detailed study of the general political divisions, 
with their modes of life, their communications, 
their institutions, etc. 
We believe with this or a similar course, 
children in a comparatively short time would 
master the subject of Geography; which is what 
few at present, ever do. One lesson of a half 
hour is time enough to give an attenive child a 
good idea of all the great mountain systems of 
the earth. Wc protest earnestly and confidently 
against the process so laboriously ami so unsatis¬ 
factorily pursued of following a text-book from 
State to State, through the vast maze of town 
and country, lake and river, boundary and defi¬ 
nition, till at last the mind is overburdened with 
a mass of unclassified details, and the child feels 
as a caged animal does that attempts to liberate 
himself by gnawing his way out. When the 
poor prisoner is free, he looks with pity upon 
himself, and w ith contempt upon the mass of 
rubbish that entrapped him. 
For very shame, let us escape from such 
MY “ISTHMUS HOME, 
GEOGRAPHY-HOW SHOULD IT BE TAUGHT! 
WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY. 
actors which he laid bare, either belonged to 
another time, or to classes and castes unlike 
those with which we are familiar. But it is 
foreign to our purpose to attempt any analysis 
of his merits as a writer. The English, and 
many prominent Americans, belonging to our 
liUrati, pay tribute to his genius in words of 
glowdng eulogy. It is to be supposed that they 
know him better than the class who fail to 
appreciate his writings. 
Thackeray was bom in Calcutta, in 1811. 
His father belonged to an old Yorkshire family, 
and was engaged in the civil service of the East 
India Company. When seven years old, the 
son \Vus seut to Loudon to school—first to the 
Charter House school, and thence to the Uni¬ 
versity of Cambridge. But he did not take a 
degree. When of age, he Inherited a fortune, 
chose Art for a profession, traveled on the Con¬ 
tinent, and studied for several years in France, 
Italy aud Germany. When thirty years old, 
his fortune was greatly reduced by losses and 
unsuccessful speculation-, and he adopted litera¬ 
ture as a v .j , i > T i *■ • i. , IT. .contributed to the 
Times, and to Fr v.As Amy urine, early in his 
literary life. Among the earlier papers from 
his pen were “The Great Iloggarty Diamond,” 
“The Paris Sketch Book.” “The Second Fuiio- 
ral of Napoleon,” “The Chronicles of the 
Drum,” “The Irish Sketch Book,” and “ Barry 
Lyndon-” 
In 1841 he contributed to the great comic 
paper. Punch, over the signature of “ The Fat 
Contributor,” a series of papers, which were 
followed by “ Jeamea’ Diary,” and “The Snob 
Papers.” In 1816, “ Vanity Fair,” illustrated 
by himself, was published, following a Christ- 
book entitled “ Mrs. Perkins’ Ball,” It 
PRIMARY AND GRAMMAR TEACHERS. 
In some parts of the country—in the West 
particularly—an interesting discussion is in pro¬ 
gress relative to the place for the hett teachers. 
.Some insist it should be in the Primary Schools, 
and others in the Grammar Schools. A writer 
in the Illinois Teacher talks in this wise: 
“ In the Primary School children learn their 
letters; in the Grammar School they learn the 
first principles in grammar and arithmetic. 
Upon which foundation is there to be the most 
building? Will the manner in which those 
children learn the alphabet exert a greater 
Influence upon their future course of study than 
that in which they learn to study the sciences? 
Why are so many people unable to explain the 
inverting of the divisor in division of fractions? 
Is it because they are not taught the alphabet in 
the light way ? or is it because the foundation 
in arithmetic was not well laid? 
*• it u. Mid trial the best teacher should he In 
the Primary Department, and if mediocrity 
must preside at the teacher’s desk, let it be in 
the Grammar Department. By best teachers I 
understand teachers who possess the faculty of 
teaching in a pleasing way, of making crooked 
things in learning straight, and of imparting 
life and vivacity to scholars. Does it need any 
more tact to teach a child his letters than t» 
teach him to write numbers? Does it require 
FACTS ABOUT THE REBELLION. 
Not eighteen months ago, the rebel Secretary 
of War publicly predicted that on the 4th of 
July. 1863, the rebels would beat their drums 
on Boston Common, and that the rebel rag 
would float in triumph over Fanueil Hall. 
Wlgfall, about the same time, predicted that I 
on the next Christmas day, he and his staff 
would eat a holiday dinuer at Philadelphia. 
While at Gettysburg last summer, Gen. Ewell, 
the successor of Stonewall, was heard to declare 
that within a fortnight the rebel forces would 
occupy Philadelphia, Harrisburg and Lancaster. 
About the same time, the Richmond papers 
were felicitating themselves that their forces 
would succeed in setting on fire the vast coal 
fields of Pennsylvania, and thus reduce them to 
a mass of cinder. 
A year ago the rebel forces were acting in 
concert, moved by one head, united. For six 
months past, the forces have been cut in two, 
communication between its commanders East 
and West of the Mississippi has been infrequent, 
unreliable and dangerous. 
Two years ago, there were more rebels in fact 
in Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee and Maryland, 
than there were Union men. To-day, a popular 
vote in those states would be overwhelmingly 
for the Union. 
It was claimed by the rebels, at the outset of 
the rebellion, and for months afterwards, that 
their cause represented twelve millions of people 
in the slaveholdlug States. To-day the stars and 
stripes float over slaveholding territory having 
mas 
was followed by another Christmas book, called 
“Our Street,” then “Dr. Brick aud hia Young 
Friend,” “The Flistory of Pendennis,” “ Re¬ 
becca and Rowena,” “The Kiokleburys on the 
Rhine,” “The Neweoraes.” “The Virginians,” 
“Level the Widower,” “The Adventures of 
Philip on hia way through the World,” and 
later8tiU, “The Roundabout Paper*.” 
Such is the compeud of Iris literary work. 
By it lie hits attained the rank of the greatest 
satirist of his time, and ranks high with the 
best English novelists. Of his personal char¬ 
acter, wc must let another speak. Tom Tay¬ 
lor, his friend, thus writes of the burial of 
Thackeray, at the Kensal Green Cemetery, 
the 30th of December, 1863: 
“ The crowd which yesterday gathered within 
Kcusul Green Cemetery was almost made up of 
men in some sense representative; and nearly 
all of the classes whose manners Thackeray 
hail most studied, whose weaknesses he had 
most subtly detected, and whose shams and 
sore points he had most mercilessly laid bare. 
There were the literary men to whose little 
foibles and vanities, improvidence and generos¬ 
ity, lie hadilcalteven measure of justice—the class 
whose fopperies and faults of manner, or defects 
of education, he had us keen an eye as for their 
high aspirations aud exquisite enjoyments—the 
officials, lawyers, and men about town, and 
swells, and soldiers, whose orders had all in 
turn passed under liis scalpel, and on to the 
object-glass of his microscope. Yet there 
seemed but one feeling in that large crowd. 
Respect and love for the departed, and sympa¬ 
thy for his children, brooded like a presence, 
and gave an awful solemnity to the responses 
which rose from hundreds of reverent voices 
in the bright aud genial air that breathed rather 
of Spring than Christmas time. At that mo- 
meut it scorned as if every thought iu those 
hundred of hearts was attuned to one sentiment. 
All the little foibles and susceptibilities, to which 
no eminent man was ever more subject than 
Thackkray, were lost sight.of in the strong 
sense of his gentle, noble and generous nature, 
the geniality and playfulness of his humor, the 
warmth of his heart and the openness of his 
hand, the readiness of his recognition of excel¬ 
lence, his delight iu helping forward the strag¬ 
gler or the student, the genuineness of his aver¬ 
sion to all that was shifty, shuffling, or insin- 
TEXT-B00KS FOR TEACHERS IN THE CLASS. 
Is it any way proper that a teacher should 
have the aid of a text-book in the class more 
than his scholars! Do not many of our teachers 
sit, in undisturbed complacency, with the book 
open before them, asking questions which they 
could not themselves answer if they wore to be 
questioned in their turn, and leading both ques¬ 
tion aud answer? Do not pupils often suffer 
from this slavish confinement to the letter of a 
book, and lose confidence iu their teachers, aud 
interest in their studies? The vivacity and ani¬ 
mation of a lesson is necessarily gone when tho 
teacher is afraid to differ from his text-book, and 
discourages anything like a spirit of free inquiry 
Among his pupils, lest he lie led out of his depth, 
"Whatever is worth teaching, is worth teaching 
well; and if the teacher and scholar were 
obliged to meet on equal ground, if the one were 
required to be as certain of the lesson as the 
other, it would revolutionize the teaching in 
many schools. 
Let this be the rule in teaching, “Whenever 
the pupil needs a text-book iu reciting, the 
teacher needs erne in teaching, and only then.” 
In geography, history, grammar, and in all the 
definitions and rules of arithmetic, a teacher 
ought to he able to teach better without the 
hook than with it. It would require more 
thoroughness of preparation, of course, but that 
is, of all things, to he desired. When the public 
sentiment of New Horn philtre requires such 
teaching everywhere, most particularly in its 
Common Schools, the State will have to spend 
very little to educate its teachers; they will do 
it for themselves. N. II. Journal of Education. 
THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE. 
THE words of the English language are a 
compound of several foreign languages. The 
English language may be looked upon us a com¬ 
pilation, both m words and expressions, of 
various dialects. Their origin is from the Saxon 
language. Our laws were derived from the 
Norman, our military terms from the French, 
our scientific names from the Greek, and our 
stock of nouns from the Latiu, through the 
medium of the French. Almost all the verb- 
in the English language arc taken from the 
German, and nearly every other noun or adjec¬ 
tive i- taken from other dialects. 
The English language is composed of 15,734 
words—of which 6,73- arc from the Latin, 4,321 
from the French, 1 ,665 from the Saxon, 1,660 
from the Greek, 60t from the Dutch, 211 from 
the Italian, 106 from the German (not including 
verbs), 00 from tho Welsh, 75 from the Danish, 
53 from the Spanish, 50 from the Icelandic, Si 
from the Swedish, 41 from tho Gothic, Ul.from 
the Hebrew, 15 from the Teutonic, and the 
remainder from the Irish, Scotch, Arabic, Syriac, 
Turkish, Portugese, and other languages. 
Trying to be what we cannot, positively 
prevents us from being what we ought. 
