Colonial Chapter in the History of American Education.

It is, therefore, interesting in taking note of our educational progress to give a brief glance at what was done by our fellow colonists at a corresponding early period in the history of the "old thirteen colonies," which formed the nucleus of the present American Confederation.

It has been the custom, probably unwittingly, but chiefly on the part of certain American writers, to exalt every good in their political and social condition, as of revolutionary origin, and reluctantly to admit that anything which was really excellent in both, in the early colonial times, was of British origin. One unacquainted with the processes and progress of civilization in America would, on consulting such writers, suppose that, Minerva-like, the young Republic had sprung from the head of Revolutionary Jove, fully equipped, if not fully armed for the battle of life, into the arena of the new world, and that this phenomenon happened just at the extinction of British power in the old colonies, and as the result of it. The policy of these writers has been either to ignore the facts of history, or to keep entirely out of view the forces which had been operating in the British colonial mind, before and at the time of the Revolution. They have never stopped to enquire as to the source whence they derived their idea of political freedom, but have attributed it to their own sagacity, or regard it as the outgrowth of their own enlightened speculations and thinkings when emancipated from British control. There never was a greater mistake as to fact, or a greater wrong done to the memory and example of such noble English patriots as Hampden and his compeers, who laid down their lives for political principles which, considering the times in which they lived, were even more exalted and ennobling than those which were professed by the American revolutionists of 1776. In fact, no proper parallel can be instituted between them. John Hampden, in our humble judgment, was as far superior to John Hancock, "President of the Continental Congress," in the purity of his political motives and aspirations, as Cromwell was above Jack Cade.[14] However, it is not our purpose to discuss this question, but rather to vindicate the sagacity of the old colonists, who (at a time when loyalty was the rule, and not the exception), laid the foundation of those educational institutions, which to this day are the glory of the American Republic.

Nor were the British colonists into those early times peculiar in their zeal for the promotion of Education. The Dutch, Swedish, and Irish colonists who settled in Pennsylvania, New York, and Maryland did their part in his great work, and on the whole did it well, according to the spirit of the times.

In 1633, the first schoolmaster opened his school in the Dutch Colony of New Amsterdam; and in 1638, the "articles for the colonization and trade of New Netherlands," provided that, "each householder and inhabitant shall bear such tax and public charge as shall hereafter be considered proper for the maintenance of schoolmasters." General Eaton, the United States Commissioner of Education, in his valuable report for 1875, says:

"We find, in numerous instances, the civil authorities of these Dutch colonies acknowledging, (1) The duty of educating the young, (2) The care of the qualification of the teacher, (3) Provision for the payment of his services, and (4) The provision of the school-house. When, in 1653, municipal privileges were granted to the New Amsterdam [New York], the support of schools was included."

In 1642, the instruction sent to the Governor of New Sweden [Pennsylvania], was "to urge instruction and virtuous education of youth and children." In 1693-6, large numbers of primers, tracts and cathechisms were received from Sweden, for these schools on the Delaware. This was the educational state of the Swedish settlement in what was afterwards known as Pennsylvania, on the arrival of its noble English founder, William Penn. His views on education were well expressed in the following declaration:

"That which makes a good Constitution must keep it, viz.: men of wisdom and virtue; qualities which, because they descend not with worldly inheritance must be carefully propagated by virtuous education of youth, for which spare no cost; for by such parsimony, all that is loved is lost."

The first real systematic efforts to promote popular education began in New England, from thence it has spread in all directions. In 1635 the first school was opened at Boston, Massachusetts, and brother Philemon Purmount was appointed schoolmaster by the Town Committee. Thirty acres of land were given for his support. In 1642 the General Court, (or Legislature) passed a resolution enjoining on the local authorities:

"To keep a watchful eye on their brothers and neighbors, and above all things to see that there be no family in so barbarous a state, that the head thereof do not himself, or by the help of others, impart instruction to his children and servants, to enable them to read fluently the English language, and to acquire a knowledge of the penal laws, under a penalty of twenty shillings for such neglect."

Speaking on this subject, in his inaugural address in 1853, President Walker of Harvard University said:

What most distinguishes the early settlers of Massachusetts, is the interest and care they took in education, and especially in the institution of a system of common schools, to be sustained at the public charge.

Here they were first. In other things they thought wisely and acted nobly; but in this, and perhaps in this alone, they were original. Honor, immortal honor to the men, who, while still struggling for a scanty and bare subsistence, could yet find the means and the heart to do what had never been done or attempted before: placing the advantages of a competent instruction within the reach of all. By taking this course, what a noble confidence they manifested in the truth of their principles and in the justice of their measures.... But the founders and early settlers of Massachusetts did not limit their views of education to common schools. Many of their leading men had studied at the English Universities and were imbued with, or at least, could appreciate the highest scholarship of that day. They also knew, on general grounds and as practical men, that the public good requires the advancement, as well as the diffusion, of knowledge; in short, that both must go together; that the streams will soon cease, if the fountains fail.—Pages 33, 34.

To be brief on this point I may state that in 1847, the first legislative enactment in favor of schools was made in Massachusetts; and in 1670, the Governor of Connecticut declared that "one-fourth of her revenue was devoted to schools."

General Eaton in his comprehensive report of 1875 says:

"History, with hardly a dissenting voice, accords to the English Colonists of New England, the credit of having developed those forms of action, in reference to the education of children, which contained more than any other the distinct features of the systems adopted in this cuntry."

In the early colonial times, before the revolution, there were nine colleges established in seven out of the thirteen colonies.

These colleges, with the date of their foundation, are as follow:—

1. Harvard—Massachusetts, in1638

2. William and Mary—Virginia, in1693

3. Yale—Connecticut, in1700

4. Nassau Hall (now Princeton)—New Jersey, in1748

5. Kings (now Columbia)—New York, in1754

6. Brown—Rhode Island, in1765

7. Dartmouth—New Hampshire, in1770

8. Queen's (now Rutgers)—New Jersey, in1771

9. Hampden—Sydney, Virginia, in1775

The Legislature of Massachusetts, aided by the Rev. John Harvard, founded Harvard Congregational College, in 1638, and the colonists of Connecticut, established the Yale Congregation College in 1700.[15]

The New Hampshire colonists endowed the Congregational College at Dartmouth with 44,000 acres of land in 1770. The Episcopalians of the English colony of New York, aided by the Legislature, founded King's now Columbia College, in 1753. Indeed, so true were the English colonists to the educational instincts of the mother land, that when the Dutch Province of New Netherlands fell into their hands in 1644, the King's Commissioners were instructed "to make due enquiry as to what progress hath been made towards ye foundaçon and maintenance of any College Schools for the educaçon of youth."—(Colonial History of N. Y., Vol. III. p. 53.)

The English Province, par excellence, of Virginia made various praiseworthy efforts to promote education. In 1619, soon after the settlement of Jamestown, Sir Edwin Sandys, President of the Virginia Company, had 10,000 acres of land set apart for the establishment of a University at Henrico for the colonists and Indians. The churches in England gave £1,500 sterling in the same year to aid in the education of the Indians. In 1621, 1,000 acres of land as an endowment, and £150 were granted to establish a school at Charles city. Other efforts were made in the same direction in 1660 and 1688. The colony also nobly determined to establish a University; and in 1692-3, the project was practically realized by the founding by the King and Queen, under royal charter, of the Church of England College at Williamsburgh, of William and Mary. To this College the King gave nearly £2,000, besides 20,000 acres of land, and one penny per pound on all the tobacco exported from Maryland. The Legislature also gave it in 1693, the duty on skins and furs exported, and on liquors imported.[16] The plans of the College were prepared by Sir Christopher Wren. Among the first donors to the College was the celebrated Robert Boyle.[17] Of all the colonial Colleges few exercised a greater educational influence among the leading men than did this royal college. Jefferson, Munroe, Marshall (afterwards Chief Justice of the United States), the two Randolphs, and Governor Tyler, of Virginia, received their education here.

The Irish Roman Catholic Province of Maryland was not, at least in purpose, much behind her English sister. In 1671 an Act was passed by one of the Houses of the Legislature for the establishment of a School or College, but owing to religious differences the other House did not concur. In 1692, the Legislature passed an Act for the encouragement of learning; and in 1696, King William's Free School, Annapolis (afterwards St. John's College), was established.

New Jersey was one of the colonies which early promoted higher education by founding the Presbyterian College at Princeton, under the name of Nassau Hall, in 1746, and the Dutch Reformed College at New Brunswick (N.J.), under the name of Queen's, now Rutger's College, in 1770.

The little colony of Rhode Island did not fail in its duty to higher education, for in 1764 it founded the Rhode Island College, now Brown University.

The Quaker colony of William Penn, following the example of the Anglicized Dutch colony of New York, established the University of Pennsylvania at Philadelphia—the metropolis of the colonies in 1755.

Of these nine ante-revolution Colleges, Harvard, Yale, Columbia and Princeton maintain an equally high reputation, while Brown University, the University of Pennsylvania, Rutgers, William and Mary and Dartmouth Colleges are more or less about the average standard of American Colleges.

Governor Oglethorpe, the founder of Georgia, was a graduate of Oxford. He, with other English University colonists, conceived the idea of a College for this, the then youngest of the English colonies. The project of his friend, the Irish Bishop Berkeley, of Cloyne, of founding a College in the Bermudas having failed, he secured £10,000 of the Bishop's funds to aid him in his settlement of the colony. The seed sown by Oglethorpe bore fruit; and while Georgia was still a colony, provision was made for a generous system of education.

D. C. Gilman, Esq. (President of the John Hopkins' University, Baltimore), in his admirable sketch of the growth of education in the United States during the last century, pays a high tribute to the nine Colonial Colleges to which we have referred. He says:—

"These nine Colleges were nurseries of virtue, intelligence, liberality and patriotism, as well as learning; so that when the revolution began, scores of the most enlightened leaders, both in council and upon the field (on both sides) were found among their graduates. The influence of academic culture may be distinctly traced in the formation of the Constitution of the United States, and in the political writings of Adams, Hamilton, Jefferson, Madison, Munroe and many other leading statesmen of the period. A careful student of American politics has remarked that nothing more strikingly indicates the education given at Cambridge than the masterly manner in which different problems of law and government were handled by those who had received their instruction only from that source."[18]

Prof. Charles Sprague Smith, A.M., (of Columbia College) in his essay on The American University, read June, 1887, thus refers to the character of these colonial colleges:—

"In New England the higher system at general education, brought over from Old England, was divided here, as there, into the two studies of the College and the Grammar School; the latter being superceded in quite recent times by the so-called Academy. The curriculum of the American (or Colonial) College was, in the main, modelled upon that of the parent country, special consideration being given to theological science, etc."—Page 13.

A recent American publication on revolutionary topics, thus deals with the question of the superior education of the British colonists who formed the first American Congress:—

"An examination of the Continental Congress, composed as it was of leading men of all the colonies, affords some light upon the topic of popular education at that period. The Congress, whose sessions extended through some ten years, comprised in all some three hundred and fifty members, of whom one-third were graduates of colleges. A recent writer in one of the most intelligent and accurate of American journals has[19] taken pains to collect and array a paragraph of important statistics upon this subject, which we have taken leave to insert here, though without verification, that, however, being hardly necessary for our present purpose.

"There were in the Continental Congress during its existence, 350 members, of these 118, or about one-third of the whole, were graduates from Colleges. Of these, 28 were graduates from the College of New Jersey in Princeton, 23 from Harvard, 23 from Yale, 11 from William and Mary, 8 from the University of Pennsylvania, 4 from Columbia College, 1 from Brown University and 1 from Rutger's College, and 21 were educated in foreign Universities. These 118 graduates were distributed in the Colonies as follows:—New Hampshire had 4 College graduates among her delegates; Massachusetts had 17; Rhode Island had 4 graduates; Connecticut had 18 graduates; New York out of her large delegation had but 8 graduates; New Jersey had 11 graduates; Pennsylvania had 13 graduates; Delaware had 2 graduates; Maryland had 7 graduates; Virginia had 19 graduates; North Carolina had 4 graduates; South Carolina had 7 graduates; Georgia had 5 graduates. We find that Princeton had representatives from 10 of the colonies; Yale from 6; Harvard from 5; the University of Pennsylvania from 3; William and Mary from 2; and Columbia, Brown and Rutger's from 1 each. Fifty-six delegates signed the Declaration of Independence. Of these, 28, or just one-half, were College graduates."

Incidentally, and as illustrative of the influence of college-bred men in the Legislature, Mr. Adams, speaking of the great liberality of South Carolina in founding a college in that State, says:—

"But no State ever made a better investment. During the first part of this century the general accomplishments and political ability of the statesmen of South Carolina were the just pride of the State, and would have been the pride of any State. In forming this high standard of intellectual and political power the influence of the College was immeasurable."—North American Review, January, 1876, pages 215, 216.

It is gratifying to us, British Colonists, and to the descendants of the U. E. Loyalists, thus to have from so important a source, an acknowledgment so candid and so honorable to men, many of whom were the founders of Ontario and the Maritime Provinces of the Dominion. It is an historical fact of equal significance, and an element of social and political strength to us in these British provinces, to know that it was to the thoroughness and breadth of culture which the American "Revolutionary heroes" received in early days in British colonial institutions which fitted them afterwards to take so prominent and effective an intellectual part in the great struggle which took place when they were in the prime of manhood. Another gratifying reflection arises out of the fact that the high place which the United States has taken in later years as a great educating nation is due to her following out the traditional policy of the Colonists of ante-revolution times.

This fact is clearly brought out by Mr. Gilman in the North American Review for January, 1876. We only quote the following remarks on this point, he says:—

"When the new constitution of Massachusetts was adopted in 1780 public education received full recognition. An article (the spirit of which was fully in accordance with the legislation of 1647 [more than 200 years before]) was adopted, and still remains the fundamental law of the State.... The constitution of New Hampshire, as amended in 1784, transcribes very nearly the same words of that section of the constitution of Massachusetts already quoted," etc.—Pages 198, 199.

Thus Andrew Ten-Brook, Esq., in his American State Universities, says:—

"The introduction of an educational system into the New England Colonies may be deemed substantially contemporaneous with their settlement. It was of such a character, too, and so energetically prosecuted, that education suffered little if any deterioration in passing from Old to New England. It was even more on this side than the other side of the ocean.... Thus Common School instruction at least was provided for all. Higher schools, too, had an early beginning. What afterwards was Harvard College was established but six years after the settlement of Boston.... Every town [township] of fifty families was obliged to support a school, and the same general state of facts existed throughout New England. Classical schools followed in regular succession. These were modelled after the Grammar Schools of England, in which the founders of the Colleges had themselves received their first classical training.... As early as 1701, the law of Connecticut required every parent to see that he had no child or apprentice in his household who could not read the Word of God, and 'the good laws of the colony.' The system embraced a High School in every town [township] of seventy families, a Grammar School in the four chief county towns to fit pupils for college, and a College to which the general court [Legislature] made an annual appropriation of £120."—Pages 1-3.

Mr. Ten-Brook, speaking of these New England schools, which were afterwards transplanted to each of Western States, says:—

"They were the elements of that noble system out of which has grown the present one, by the natural laws of development," etc.—Page 18.

Mr. C. K. Adams, in his interesting paper on State Universities in the North American Review for October, 1875, in speaking of the educational policy of the colonies, "pursued up to the time of the Revolution, says:—

"In general terms it may be stated that, through all the dark periods of our Colonial history, the encouragement of higher education was regarded as one of the great interests of the State. It was no doctrine of the Fathers that higher education was less entitled to the fostering care of the commonwealth than was the education offered by the Common Schools."—Page 374.

The "Free School" idea, of which we hear so much as the outgrowth of "modern American civilization and enlightenment," was due to Colonial thought and foresight. It was first broached by Jefferson, three or four years before the treaty with Great Britain was signed by which the United States became a nation. His plan was so comprehensive that we reproduce it here. In a letter to the veteran philosopher, Dr. Priestley, he thus unfolds it:—

"I drew a bill for our [Virginia] Legislature, which proposed to lay off every county into hundreds, or townships, of five or six miles square. In the centre of each of them was to be a free English School [to be supported, as his bill provided, "by taxation according to property."]

The whole Commonwealth was further laid off into ten districts, in each of which was to be a college for teaching the languages, geography, surveying, and other useful things of that grade, and then a single University for the sciences. It was received with enthusiasm (he goes on to say), but as he had proposed to make the Episcopal College of William and Mary the University, "the dissenters after a while began to apprehend some secret design," etc.—Ten-Brook's American State Universities, pages 9, 10.

A writer in the North American Review for October, 1875, in referring to Jefferson's scheme, says:—

"The view entertained by Jefferson was by no means exceptional. Indeed, a similar spirit had pervaded the whole history of our Colonial life."—Page 379.

Thus this comprehensive scheme of public instruction for Virginia unfortunately failed; and that noble "Old Dominion" is in consequence to-day immeasurably behind even the youngest of her then New England contemporaries in the matter of public education.

As to the abiding influence of the old Colonial ideas in regard to higher education, we quote the following additional remarks from Mr. Gilman, in the North American Review, he says:—

"In reviewing the history of the century, it is easy to see how the colonial notions of college organization have affected ... the higher education of the country, even down to our own times. The graduates of the older colleges have migrated to the Western States, and have transplanted with them the college germs ... and every Western State can bear witness to the zeal for learning which has been manifested within its borders by enthusiastic teachers from the East."—Page 217.

Mr. Ten-Brook, in his American State Universities, also says:—

"The New England colonists left the mother country in quest of greater religious freedom. Their religious system was put first, and carried with it a school system as perfect in organization, and administered with equal vigor. This formed an active leaven, which, at a later day, was to spread to other parts.... Everywhere there was a considerable infusion of men who had received in the European universities a liberal culture, which they desired to reproduce on those shores. Early action was full of promise. Probably, at a period from just before the Revolution to the end of it, the average position of the colonies in regard to lighter education relatively as to age, and to the population and wealth, was quite as good as it is at the present time."—Pages 16, 17.

This opinion of the writer is a virtual admission that in reality higher education in the United States has not advanced in quality, though it has in quantity. To be in 1876 merely where education was "relatively" in 1776, is no advance at all, but rather retrogression. The cause of this declension, the writer thus incidentally admits:—

"Most of the colonies established, or aided, the (ante-revolution colleges named). The principle of the State support to higher learning was not merely accepted, but was the prevalent one."—Page 17.

Mr. Gilman, President of the Johns Hopkins' University, touching on the same point, says:—

"There was a civil as well as an ecclesiastical element in most of these foundations. Harvard and Yale were chartered, and, to some extent, controlled by colonial government of Massachusetts and Connecticut, and were for a long time nurtured by appropriations from the public chest....—Page 215.

"These institutions were colleges of an English parentage and model, not Scotch nor continental universities.... They were disciplinary in their aim, and had more regard for the general culture of large numbers, than for the advanced and special instruction of the chosen few. They were also, to a considerable extent, ecclesiastical foundations—finding the churches and ministers their constant, and sometimes their only efficient supporters. Harvard, Yale and Dartmouth were controlled by the Congregationalists; Princeton was founded by the Presbyterians; and New Brunswick, N.J. (Queen's, now Rutgers) by the Dutch Reformed; William and Mary was emphatically a child of the Church of England; and King's College (now Brown University) was under the patronage of the Baptists....

"The declaration of the original supporters of these colleges indicate a desire to train up young men for service of the State, not less distinctly and emphatically than to desire to provide an educated ministry. Individual aid was also expected and invited, and the names of Harvard and Yale perpetuate the remembrance of such generous gifts."

Then follows a eulogy upon these colonial colleges, and a tribute to the intellectual vitality of their teaching, as shown in the mental equipment and breadth of culture exhibited by men who took part in the perilous and stormy times of the American revolution. To this we have already referred. Mr. Gilman, in following up his remarks in the extract which we have just given, says:—

"Hence these nine colleges were nurseries of virtue, intelligence, liberality and patriotism, as well as of learning; so that when the revolution began, scores of enlightened leaders, both in council and in the field (and on both sides), were found among their graduates. The influence of academic culture may be distinctly traced in the formation of the Constitution of the United States, and in the political writings of Adams, Jefferson, Madison, Munroe, and many other leading statesman of the period. A careful student of American politics has remarked that nothing more strikingly indicates the influence of the education given at Harvard, 'than the masterly manner in which difficult problems of law and government were handled by those who had received their instruction only from that source.'"—Pages 215, 216.

The United Empire Loyalist Period in Upper Canada.

We might pursue this branch of our subject further, were it desirable. But that is not necessary. Our object was to show that to British Colonial foresight, zeal, and self-sacrifice, was due, not only the foundation of the best colleges and universities on the continent, but the introduction and diffusion of the principle of "free and universal education for the masses of the people." This we have done on the authority of American writers themselves. We might multiply examples on the subject; but the fact is already sufficiently established. We should rather seek to draw lessons of instruction from the noble example of the devotion to education on the part of our British colonial progenitors, whose descendants have shed such a lustre of heroic self-sacrifice and patriotism on the history and exploits of the United Empire Loyalists of the thirteen colonies. To the Americans they have left a rich legacy from the colonial times in such universities as Harvard, Yale, Columbia and Princeton—of which the descendants of the expatriated Loyalists, no less than those of the victorious revolutionists, are so justly proud. Let us, as worthy representatives of these clear-headed and far-seeing Loyalists, bequeath to our children as noble a heritage as the fathers of the founders of this Province did to New England, and indeed to the whole Republic.

Trained in such an educational school, and animated with the educational zeal of these old colonial times, the "United Empire Loyalists" brought with them into Canada their love for education and their devotion to the sovereign.

In order to keep up the historical sequence of this Retrospect, I shall now refer to the early beginning of Educational life in Upper Canada, and then take up the thread of the narrative at the point where the educational forces—afterwards directed by the Rev. Dr. Strachan and the Rev. Dr. Ryerson—took practical form and shape. (See page 59.)

Governor Simcoe's Educational Views in 1795.

Lieutenant-General J. Graves Simcoe, the first Governor of Upper Canada, arrived here in 1792. He was a man of comprehensive views and noble impulses in regard to university education. He was educated at Eton College and partly at Merton College, Oxford, but entered the army before taking his degree. He served with distinction under Wolfe at Quebec, and during the American revolutionary war.

In April, 1795, Governor Simcoe addressed a letter to the Protestant Episcopal Bishop of Quebec.[20] In that letter Governor Simcoe uses the following striking language in describing the social condition of the people in the rural parts of Upper Canada, and the utter absence of schools and churches, as contrasted with their existence on the United States side of the lines. He said:—

"There was nothing, in my late progress, that has given my equal uneasiness with the general application of all ranks of the most loyal inhabitants of the Province, that I would obtain for them churches and ministers. They say that the rising generation (of the U. E. Loyalist settlers) is rapidly returning into barbarism. They state that the Sabbath, so wisely set apart for devotion, is literally unknown to their children, who are busily employed in searching for amusements in which they may consume the day. And it is of serious consideration that on the approach of the settlements of the United States, particularly on the St. Lawrence frontier, these people, who, by experience, have found that schools and churches are essential to their rapid establishment (as a nation), may probably allure many of our most respectable settlers to emigrate to them, while in this respect we suffer a disgraceful deficiency."

The remedy which Governor Simcoe suggested for the state of things which he so graphically described is thus set forth in the same letter to the Bishop of Quebec. It was, as will be seen, entirely general in its character:—

"Nothing has happened since I left England, in the least, to invalidate, to my own conception, the policy of the measure I then proposed. And as far as may be now in the power of His Majesty's ministers, I most earnestly hope that what remains to be effected—that is by giving the means of proper education in this Province, both in its rudiments and in its completion, that from ourselves we may raise up a loyal, and, in due progress, a learned clergy."

Early Beginnings of Education in Upper Canada, 1785-1805.

A few particulars as to the kind of schools which existed in Upper Canada before and after the date of this letter may be interesting. For instance, the first school opened (so far as I have been able to learn) was by the Rev. Dr. John Stuart, a Protestant Episcopal clergyman, and a United Empire Loyalist, who had been chaplain to the provincial volunteers, and came into Upper Canada with them as a refugee.[21]

In the year 1785 Dr. Stuart opened a select classical school at Cataraqui, (Kingston); and a Mr. Donovan taught the Garrison school there. In 1786, Mr. J. Clarke taught a school in Frederickburg, and Mr. Smith one in Ernestown. In 1789, Mr Lyons kept school in Adolphustown. In the same year, Deacon Trayes, a Baptist, opened one at Port Rowan. In 1792, Rev. Mr. Addison, an Episcopalian, opened a school at Newark (Niagara), then the seat of government. In 1794, the Rev. Mr. Burns, a Presbyterian, (father of the late Judge Burns) opened a school at the same place; and in 1796, Mr. Richard Cockrel opened an evening school in Newark; Mr. Cockrel shortly afterwards transferred his school to the Rev. Mr. Arthur and removed to Ancaster, where he opened another school. A notice in the York Gazette in 1796 stated that "as schools were now opened, ignorance would be no longer tolerated." In 1797, Mr. James Blayney opened a school at Niagara. In 1798, Mr. Wm. Cooper opened a school in George St., little York, (Toronto). In 1800, the late Bishop Strachan opened a private school at Kingston, and in 1804, one at Cornwall. In 1802, Mr. and Mrs. Tyler opened a school near Niagara; and in the same year, Dr. Baldwin, (father of the late Hon. Robert Baldwin) opened a classical school at York, and in 1803, the first school in Prince Edward district was opened at "High Shore," Sophiasburgh; another at "Grassy Point," was taught by John James. Rev. Wm. Wright, (Presbyterian) kept the first school at Meyer's Creek, (Belleville) in 1805. He was followed by Mr. Leslie. In that year, Rev. Mr. Strachan held the first public examination of his school at Cornwall.

State of Education in Upper Canada, 1795-1799.

As to the actual state of education in Upper Canada at this time, we get a brief glimpse from the travels of the Duc de la Rochefoucauld, who visited Kingston in July, 1795. He says:—

"In this district there are some schools, but they are few in number. The children are instructed in reading and writing, and pay each a dollar a month. One of the masters taught Latin, but he has left, without being succeeded by another instructor in the same language."

As to the character of the private schools thus established, and the facilities of education which they afforded, we learn incidentally from letters and early books of travel, what they were. In a "Tour through Upper Canada, by a Citizen of the United States," published in 1799, we learn that the policy of the government of that day, was to exclude "schoolmasters from the States, lest they should instil Republicanism into the tender minds of the youth of the province."

First Official Educational Movements in Upper Canada, 1797, 1798.

As the result of the correspondence between the Governor and Bishop Mountain, the question of a University and free grammar schools was discussed. The Governor referred the matter to the Upper Canada Legislature, which, in 1797 memorialized King George III, soliciting a grant of land for the endowment of a grammar school in each district, and a University for the whole Province. To this request the King gave his assent, and, in 1798, the "chief civil officers" in Upper Canada recommended that "500,000 acres of land be set apart for the establishment of a grammar school in each district and a central University for the whole Province." They also recommended a grant for the erection of a "plain but solid and substantial building for a grammar school in each district, containing a school room capable of holding 100 boys without danger to their health from too many being crowded together, and also a set of apartments for the master, large enough for his family and from ten to twenty boarders."

The salaries proposed to be given were: £100 for the head master, £50 for the assistant master; and £30 for repairs, etc., Kingston and Newark (Niagara) were recommended as eligible sites for schools; after which, when the funds were sufficient, schools were to be established at Cornwall and Sandwich. York (Toronto) was recommended as entitled to the University, and for the establishment and support of which a sum at least equal to that granted to the four schools was named.

In 1799, an act was passed by the Upper Canada Legislature "to provide for the education and support of orphan children." It authorized the township wardens, with the consent of two magistrates, to bind and apprentice, until they became of age, children deserted by their parents. In the same year an orphan school was opened near St. Catherines.

Educational Pioneers in Upper Canada.

Governor Simcoe authorized the Hon. Messrs. Cartwright and Hamilton, to select a person to take charge of the proposed college. The celebrated Rev. Dr. Chalmers having declined the appointment, it was accepted by Mr. (late the Right Reverend Doctor) Strachan (Bishop of Toronto) then a schoolmaster at Kettle, Scotland; but his arrival at Kingston, on the 31st of December, 1799, he found that the project of a college had been abandoned, Governor Simcoe, in the meantime, having left for England.

It was soon discovered that half a million of acres of land would endow but few grammar schools, land being then only worth a shilling per acre: the schema had, therefore, to be abandoned. Meanwhile the Hon. Mr. Cartwright made an arrangement with Mr. Strachan to instruct his sons, and a select number of pupils for three years. In 1804, Mr. Strachan, having been ordained, removed to the mission of Cornwall, where, at the request of the parents of his former pupils, he opened a private school.

For several years this school was the only one of any note in Upper Canada; and in it and in Mr. Strachan's school at York, were educated many of those gentlemen who have filled some of the most important positions in the province. Subsequently Mr. Strachan's school was constituted the grammar school of the Eastern district. In 1806, a temporary act was passed by the Legislature and made permanent in 1808, establishing a classical and mathematical school in each of the eight districts into which Upper Canada was then divided. In the same year(1806) at the suggestion of Dr. Strachan an Act was passed, granting £400 for the purchase of apparatus for illustrating the principles of Natural Philosophy, which were to be deposited in the hands of a person employed in the instruction of youth. In 1807 an appropriation of £800 a year for four years was made to provide for the salaries of masters in the Grammar Schools to be maintained in each of the districts into which Upper Canada was divided. These masters were to be engaged by trustees appointed by the governor, and the governor's sanction was also necessary for the teacher's appointment. There is still in existence the letter, dated, April 16th, 1807, signed by Governor Gore, appointing the Rev. George Okill Stewart, D.D., Archdeacon of Kingston, first Head Master of the Home District Grammar School at York (Toronto).

North of what is now Adelaide Street (formerly Newgate Street), bounded westward by Church Street, and eastward by Jarvis Street, was a large field, almost square, containing about six acres—for many years the playground of the District Grammar School.

In the south-west corner of it, some hundred feet or more from the street boundaries, was elected the plain wooden building, about fifty-five feet long by forty wide in which, on the first Monday of June, 1807, when the population of the town was only about five hundred, the Grammar School was opened. It was attended by the sons and daughters of the well-to-do citizens of York, and on the few existing records may be found many a well known name.

In 1812, the Rev. John Strachan. D.D., was appointed Rector of York, and succeeded the Rev. Mr. Stewart as Head Master of this school.[22] Mr. Barnabas Bidwell (father of the late Hon. M. S. Bidwell) kept a good Latin School at Bath, on the Bay of Quinté, in 1811. In 1813, he removed to Kingston, where he taught for twenty years until he died in 1833.

In 1820, the "Central School at York" was opened under the mastership of Mr. Joseph Spragge, father of the late Chief Justice Spragge. Lieutenant-Governor and Lady Sarah Maitland took a special interest in the success of this school.

In a View of Upper Canada, published at Baltimore in 1814, by Mr. M. Smith, (who resided in the Province from 1808 until the breaking out of the War in 1812) he said:—

"The greater part of the inhabitants are not well educated, for, as they were poor when they came to the Province and the country being but thinly settled for a number of years, they had but little chance for the benefit of schools. But since the country has become settled, or the inhabitants rich, or in a good way of living, which is almost universally the case, they pay considerable attention to learning. Ten dollars a year is the common price given for the tuition of each scholar by good teachers."—Page 52.

In 1813, Rev. John Langhorn (a Church of England missionary at Earnestown and Bath from 1787 to 1812, and teacher of a school) made a present of his library to the inhabitants of the Bay of Quinte district. In 1814 Rev. Robert Baldwin was appointed Grammar schoolmaster at Cornwall, vice Rev. John (afterwards Dean) Bethune resigned. In 1815 the Midland District School, so-called, was incorporated.

Dr. Strachan resigned the head mastership of the District School on July 1st, 1823. He was succeeded by Mr. Samuel Armour, M.A., a graduate of Glasgow University, who afterwards became a clergyman of the English Church, and officiated many years in the township of Cavan.

The Rev. Thomas Phillips, D.D., an accomplished scholar, came out from England in 1825 to take charge of the school, and remained in the position of headmaster, much honored and beloved by his pupils, until, in 1830, chiefly by the exertions of the Governor, Sir John Colborne, Upper Canada College was established and the work of the college began in the old District Grammar School building. Classes were opened in the new buildings erected in another part of the city for the college in 1831, and the Grammar School was closed, the building being removed from its original site to the line of Nelson street (now Jarvis street), and fenced into a plot about 70 × 120 feet. The remaining portion of the six acres was handed over to Upper Canada College.

On the active remonstrance of the citizens living in the eastern part of Toronto, the school was re-opened and secured to the city, Mr. Charles N. B. Cosens being appointed headmaster in 1836, and succeeded by Mr. Marcus C. Crombie in 1838.[23]

Early Efforts to Establish Common Schools 1816-1820.

In 1816, seven years after the establishment of District Grammar Schools, a praiseworthy effort was made to provide for the establishment and maintenance of common schools."[24] A liberal grant of $24,000 a year, for four years, was made as an experiment. Whether the experiment was a success, or not, does not appear, but in 1820, the grant was reduced to $10,000 a year.

State of Education in Upper Canada, 1784-1819.

In regard to the state of education of Upper Canada in 1817, and the fluctuating character of its progress since the settlement of the Province, in 1784, up to that time, Mr. Gourlay, a well-known Canadian politician and author, writes as follows:—

"There is no college in Upper Canada, but there are said to be several townships of land set apart for the purpose of endowing such institution, when the population and circumstances of the Province shall require it.

"No provision is made by law for free schools. The inhabitants of the severe! townships are left to a voluntary support of schools, according to their own discretion.

"An Act of the Provincial Legislature, in 1807, granted a hundred pounds a year to the teacher of one school, in each of the eight districts under the direction of trustees. In some districts the school thus provided for is made a free school; but in other districts the salary is considered as a public encouragement to a teacher of literary eminence, in addition to the compensation received for the tuition of each scholar."—Statistical Account of Upper Canada, etc., by Robert Gourlay, 2 vols., London, 1822.

The Rev. Dr. Strachan became a master of one of these schools, and Rev. George Ryerson and his brother, Egerton, master and usher of another.

As to the state of feeling in the rural parts of the oldest settled portions of Upper Canada, we make the following extracts from a letter written to Mr. Gourlay from the township of Grimsby, in 1818, by a highly respected resident there, William Crooks, Esq. Mr. Crooks remarks:—

"The state of education is at a very low ebb, not only in the township, but generally throughout the [Niagara] district; although the liberality of the legislature has been great in support of the district (Grammar) schools, (giving to the teachers of each £100 per annum), yet they have been productive of little or no good hitherto, for this obvious cause, they are looked upon as seminaries exclusively instituted for the education of the children of the more wealthy classes of society, and to which the poor man's child is considered as unfit to be admitted. From such causes, instead of their being a benefit to the Province, they are sunk into obscurity, and the heads of most of them are at this moment enjoying their situations as comfortable sinecures. Another class of schools has, within a short time, been likewise founded upon the liberality of the legislative purse, denominated common, or parish, schools, but like the preceding, the anxiety of the teacher employed, seems more alive to his stipend than the advancement of the education of those placed under his care: from the pecuniary advantages thus held out, we have been inundated with the worthless scum, under the character of school masters, not only of this, but of every other country where the knowledge has been promulgated, of the easy means our laws afford of getting a living here, by obtaining a parish school, which is done upon the recommendation of some few freeholders, getting his salary from the public, and making his employers contribute handsomely beside.

"It is true, rules are laid down for their government, and the proper books prescribed for their use; but scarcely in one case in ten are they adhered to, for in the same class you will frequently see one child with Noah Webster's spelling book in this hand, and the next with Lindley Murray's. However prone the teachers are to variety in their schools, much blame is to be attributed to the trustees, who are in many instances too careless and I might almost add too ignorant to discriminate right from wrong, in the trust they have undertaken for the public benefit. It is, therefore, not to be wondered at why the parish school system should meet with almost universal reprobation from most discerning men.

"Of these parish schools, we are burdened with a liberal share, having no less than three of them. If the establishment of this system was meant by the legislature to abbreviate the present enormous price of education, they have been miserably deceived; for I can see no alteration or reduction from the charge made before the passing of the act. The price then was 12s. 6d. [i.e. $2.50,] and is now the same, per quarter."

In July, 1819, provisions was made for an additional district grammar school; for holding annual public examinations; for reporting the condition of the schools to the governor, and for educating ten common school pupils, free of charge, at each of the nine public grammar schools already established; but the provincial allowance to teachers of grammar schools was reduced to £50 in all cases where the numbers of pupils did not exceed ten.

Fitful Educational Progress from 1822 to 1829.

In 1822, Sir Peregrine Maitland, the Lieutenant-Governor, submitted to the Imperial Government a plan for organizing a general system of education, including elementary schools; and, in 1823, he obtained permission from England to establish a Board of Education for the general superintendence of this system of education, and for the management of the university and school lands throughout the Province. The members of this Board, with Rev. Dr. Strachan at its head, as chairman, were: Hon. Joseph Wells, Hon. G. H. Markland, Rev. Robert Addison, Hon. J. B. Robinson, and Thomas Ridout, Esq. This Board prepared some general regulations in regard to the schools and proposed a plan by which to exchange 225,944 acres of the less valuable of the school lands for the more productive Clergy Reserve lands. The plan having been approved by the Home Government, was carried into effect by the Governor soon after. In 1824, the first attempts towards providing the public with general reading books, in connection with the Common and Sunday schools, were made. The sum of £150 was annually appropriated for this object, and authorized to be expended by the Provincial Board of Education in the purchase of "books and tracts designed to afford moral and religions instruction," and distributed equally among all the districts of Upper Canada.

Thus were presented the dim outlines of a system of public instruction which it was clear the necessities of the country required, but which for want of a vigorous and systematic supervision was gradually permitted to languish, and the legislative enactments themselves were suffered to become almost obsolete on the statute book.

In January, 1824, the Common School Act was made to apply "to all schools that are now or may hereafter be established and kept among the Indians who shall be resident within the limits of any organized county or township within this Province, excepting such schools as shall or may be otherwise provided for."[25] Provision was also made for the examination of Common School teachers by County Boards of Education.

State of Education in Upper Canada, 1827-1829, from the Official Reports, Etc.

The number and condition of the Common and other schools in Upper Canada in 1827 may be gathered from "An appeal to the Friends of Religion, and Literature, in behalf of the University of Upper Canada," published in London in 1827 (of which I have an original MS. copy). Dr. Strachan says:—

School in Upper Canada, 1827.—"In about 340 Common Schools in Upper Canada from 12,000 to 14,000 children are taught reading and writing, the elements of arithmetic, and the first principles of religion. The people, scattered as they are over a vast wilderness, are thus becoming alive to the great advantage of educating their children ... insomuch so, that schools supported by subscriptions are more in number than those established by law. Provision is made by statute for the translation of some of the more promising scholars from the Common to the District Schools, where the classics and practical mathematics are taught. In these schools (eleven in number) there are at present 300 young men acquiring an education to qualify them for the different professions....

Niagara District Board of Education, 1828.—"It must be admitted generally that after the approval and appointment of teachers by the Trustees the Board have not rejected teachers however incompetent, from a regards to the wishes of their employers, the terms for tuition being so very low as not to induce men of sufficient qualifications generally to engage in the humble and ill-requited duties.

Reading, writing and arithmetic have been uniformly taught in all schools. Grammar and geography in a few. Religious instruction has not been overlooked. Upon the whole, the system of education in this district may be considered as efficient as can be expected upon the footing on which it is placed."—Rev. Thomas Creen.

Provincial Board of Education, 1828.—The number of District Grammar Schools in operation in the Province is 11; pupils in attendance, 372. Number of Common Schools, 401; number of pupils in attendance, 10,712—increase over 1827 of nearly 2,000 pupils.

The President of the Board (Rev. Dr. Strachan) last summer visited in person all the districts of the Province, and not only inspected the grammar schools, but examined minutely the systems of management adopted by their respective teachers.

In order to produce a greater uniformity of the system to supply, in some measure, the want of experience to younger teachers, the President has submitted an outline of study for the grammar schools, the adoption of which, the board cannot but think would be highly beneficial, and produce a higher standard of education throughout the Province.[26]

In some places girls are admitted to the district schools, for want of good female schools, but the admission of female children interferes with the government which is required in classical seminaries.

In a population of nearly 200,000, at least one-fifth, or 40,000, is composed of children between the ages of 5 and 15 who should be going to school. Taking the number of those who are benefited in the Common and Sunday schools at 15,000, then the expense to the Province is about 3s. 9d. each. In some districts the salaries allowed to the schoolmasters of the Common Schools are exceedingly small. They range from £12 10s. downwards. In some little more than £5, and in one less than that trifling sum. Many schools continue only six months; others eight months in the year. The natural consequence of this state of things is that superior teachers desert the Common Schools as soon as they can procure any other employment, and many persons resort to the occupation of teachers merely as a temporary expedient. These latter are without experience, which is all-important to an instructor of youth and can have little desire to establish a reputation in an employment to which they have only recourse for present convenience.

In the sister Colony of Nova Scotia, the sum of £1,000 is annually appropriated to the Common Schools and divided among 12 counties, not equally, but in proportion to population. One law, by giving the same sum to each district, whether populous or not, in that particular requires alteration.

The Board would submit that in addition to the public allowance, a power should be given to the townships to assess themselves for the schools. In Nova Scotia it is provided in the statute that two-thirds of the freeholders may, under certain conditions, tax themselves according to their ability for the support of education, and that no school of 30 scholars shall be entitled to the stipulated aid of £20, unless the teacher receives bona fide from his employers £10, together with this sum, exclusive of and in addition to board, etc.; and that no school of 15 scholars shall be entitled to the stipulated sum of £15 unless the teacher receives from his employers £25 per annum as aforesaid. The Board had distributed to the Common Schools a large quantity of useful school books including Mavor's Spelling Book. They have also contracted for 2,000 copies of this excellent work to be executed on cards for the township schools. There appears to be a great scarcity of arithmetic books in the Province, and those in use are in general too difficult or deficient in matter, etc. The President has, therefore, undertaken to draw up a short manual on the subject, suitable to the state and business of the country.

Neither the sick nor the destitute have higher claims upon the public than the ignorant. The want of knowledge brings all other wants in its train; and if education be regarded as a charity, it is a charity of which the blessings are without alloy. It demands no jealous scrutiny of the claims of its applicants, nor does it require to be so stinted as not to multiply their number.—Rev. John Strachan, President, York, 5th February, 1829.

Midland District Grammar School, 1829.—It is to be lamented that so few of the wealthy farmers of the Midland District avail themselves of the means of giving their sons that degree of education which the public school can readily afford, which would qualify young persons to discharge the duties of the magistracy and other public situations with credit to themselves.

The trustees regret that no poor children are educated gratis under the patriotic and very benevolent provision of the statute, in consequence of no returns being made to them of the most promising scholars from the Common School. The trustees, therefore, submit, whether in order to encourage native genius in humble circumstances, some means might not be devised of maintaining all the 10 children whom the statute authorizes the trustee to select for gratuitous instruction.—Rev. George O'Kill Stuart, Thomas Markland and John Macaulay, Kingston, December 30th, 1829.

Note.—The local reports for the succeeding year are chiefly statistical and explanatory and contain no general remarks. From a report signed by the Rev. Dr. Strachan and Hon. Wm. Allan in 1839, it would appear that things had for years remained in statu quo. They say:—

"For many years elaborate reports were sent from this (Home District) Board of Education detailing what were believed to be the alterations necessary to render the present Common School Act efficient. In consequence of these, and like reports from other districts, a measure for the establishment of such schools has been for more than six years before the Legislature, which purposes to provide remedies for the defects which are met with in the working of the present system."

Course of Study Suggested by Rev. Dr. Strachan as suitable for the District Grammar Schools throughout the Province, 1829.

In a "letter from the Rev. Dr. Strachan to Rev. A. N. Bethune, Rector of Cobourg," dated October 6th, 1829, he thus sketched a course of study for Grammar Schools:

First Year—Boys from 7 to 9.

1st. Latin.—Eton Grammar; Vocabulary; Corderius; Selectæ e Profanis.

2nd. English.—Mavor's Spelling Book; Enfield's Lessons; Walker's Lessons; Murray's Lessons; Blair's Class Book; English Grammar; Writing; Arithmetic, chiefly mental.

Second Year—Boys from 9 to 11.

1st. Latin.—Grammar; Valpy's Delectas; New Testament; Daley's Exercises; Exampla Minora; Entropius; Phædrus; Cornelius Nepos.

2nd. English.—Grammar and Reading, as before; Writing and Arithmetic (mental and mixed); Geography; Civil and Natural History and Elocution.

3rd.—To commence French.

Third Year—Boys from 11 to 13.

1st. Latin—Grammar; Bailey's Exercises; Cornelius Nepos; Cæsar; Ovid's Metamorphoses; Nonsense Verses; Psalms into Latin Verse; Exampla Moralis; Versions or rendering English into Latin.

2nd. Greek—To commence about the middle of the third year: Eton Grammar, or Nelson's edition of Moore's Grammar; Greek Vocabulary; New Testament; Greek Exercises.

3rd. English.—Grammar; Writing; Elocution; Civil and Natural History; Geography, Ancient and Modern; English Composition.

4th. Arithmetic.—And to commence Algebra.

5th. French.

Fourth Year—Boys from 12 to 14.

1st. Latin.—Grammar; Terence Virgil; Horace; Sallust; Cicero; Livy; Latin composition, verse and prose; Grotius de Veritate Exampla Moralia.

2nd. Greek.—Eton Grammar; Græca Minora; Greek and Latin Testament; Xenophon; Homer.

3rd. English.—Grammar and Composition; Civil and Natural History; Geography, Ancient and Modern, use of the globes; construction of maps.

4th. Mathematics.—Arithmetic; Book-keeping; Algebra; Euclid.

5th. French.

Fifth Year—Boys from 14 to 16.

1st. Latin.—Virgil; Horace; Livy, Juvenal; Tacitus; Composition, in prose and verse.

2nd. Greek.—Græca Majora; Homer; Thucidides; Composition, in prose and verse.

3rd. English.—Grammar and Composition; Elocution; Civil and Natural History; Geography, Ancient and Modern; use of the globes; construction of maps.

4th. Mathematics.—Algebra; Euclid; Trigonometry, Application to heights and distances; Surveying; Navigation; Dialling; Elements of Astronomy, etc.

5th. French.

Rev. Dr. Strachan's System of School Management.

Rev. Dr. Scadding, in his sketch of Dr. Strachan, "The first Bishop of Toronto—a Review and a Study," says:

"The system pursued in Dr. Stachan's school at Cornwall and afterwards at York, exhibited features that would have gratified the advanced educationists of the present age. In that system the practical and the useful were by no means sacrificed to the ornamental and theoretical, or the merely conventional. Things were regarded as well as words.... In regard to things—the science of common objects—we doubt if in the most complete of our modern schools there was ever awakened a greater interest or intelligence in relation to such matters. Who, that had once participated in the excitement of its natural history class, ever forgot it? Or in that of the historical or geographical exercises? We venture to think that, in many an instance, the fullest experience of after life, in travel or otherwise, had often their associations with ideas awakened then; and often compared satisfactorily and pleasurably with the pictures of places, ani given, rudely it may be, in text books, ransacked and conned in a fervour of emulation then. The manner of study in these subjects was this: each lad was required to prepare a set of questions, to be put by himself to his fellows in the class. If a reply was not forthcoming, and the information furnished by the questioner was judged correct the latter 'went up' and took the place of the other. This process, besides being instructive and stimulating to the pupils, possessed the advantage of being, as it often proved, highly diverting to the teacher."

On this system Dr. Strachan himself remarks:

"The method of instruction by question and answer possesses many advantages over any other, and is not only the very best and shortest, but the most satisfactory. In this system the deficiencies of each scholar becomes manifest, and the teacher knows to what particular points he must direct his explanations. There is no time for inattention or wandering; the question and necessity for reply compel attention and recollection. The children, if the teacher proceed with conciliatory firmness, acquire lively interest in the lesson, for each is particularly addressed and brought forward with action."[27]

The late Bishop Fuller, who was also one of Dr. Strachan's pupils, also states that:—

"He had a remarkable talent for interesting boys in their work; and, by taking a deep interest in it himself, he led them to do the same. He was very original in many of his plans for promoting the good of his school. Amongst others, which I never met with elsewhere, was one of making the boys question one another on certain of the lessons. This made the boys quick at seizing on the leading points in the lessons, ready at shaping questions, and deeply interested in the questions and answers. The Bishop took as deep an interest in the questioning and answering of the boys as they did themselves; and thus this plan, whilst it was of great service to the boys in various ways, tended strongly to bind master and scholars together."[28]

As to his method of teaching arithmetic, he explains it in the following words:

"In a new country like this, a variety of branches must be taught in every respectable school. Young men ... are anxious to get forward as fast as possible, and even those destined for the learned professions are seldom allowed the time requisite for acquiring the knowledge previously necessary. These considerations induced me to turn my thoughts to the discovery of some sure, and at the same time, expeditious method of teaching arithmetic. This object I have accomplished with a much greater degree of success than I dared to promise myself.

"I divide my pupils into separate classes according to their progress. Each class has one or more sums to produce every day, neatly wrought upon their slates. The work is carefully examined, after which I command every figure to be blotted out, and the sums to be wrought under my eye. The one whom I happen to pitch upon first gives, with an audible voice, the rules and reasons for every step, and as he proceeds the rest silently work along with him figure for figure, but ready to correct him if he blunder that they may get his place. As soon as this one is finished, the work is again blotted out and another called upon to work the question aloud as before, while the rest proceed along with him in silence, and so on round the whole class.... This method of teaching arithmetic possesses this important advantage, that it may be pursued without interrupting the pupils' progress in any other useful study. The same method of teaching Algebra has been used with equal success. Such a plan is certainly very laborious, but it will be found successful, and he that is anxious to spare labor ought not to be a public teacher."[29]

Desiring to give a local interest to the exercises in his book, Dr. Strachan gave several examples from Canadian subjects. Thus a question is addition reads:—

"From Quebec to Montreal is 180 miles—from thence to Kingston 200—from thence to York 149—from thence to Niagara 78 miles—from thence to Detroit, 210. Required the distance from Quebec to Detroit. Answer—317 miles."

Again a question in multiplication reads:—

"The distance from Quebec to Montreal is 180 miles, supposing the road 17 yards broad, how many square yards does it contain? Answer—5,385,600 yards."

As to his diligence as a student, while yet a teacher. Dr. Fuller remarks:—

"The late Bishop said to me on one occasion: 'I had to study every night quite as hard as the boys; for I was not much in advance of the highest class in school. These and parochial duties demanded sixteen hours every day,—and yet these nine years were the happiest years of my life."

Rev. Dr. Strachan's Career as a Teacher.

Having been appointed Minister at Cornwall in 1803, Dr. Fuller states that there he was:—

"Induced to resume his school, at the solicitation of the parents of those boys who had been in his school at Kingston, and of others, both in Lower and Upper Canada, who were desirous of placing their sons under a master so practical, wise and successful, as he had proved himself to be. Thus he commenced the school at Cornwall, which afterwards became so celebrated, and at which were educated the first men that Canada has produced, and of whom she may well be proud—such men as the late Sir J. B. Robinson, Judge Maclean, Sir J. B. Macaulay, Sir Allan MacNab, Judge Jones, Mr. Stanton, the Bethunes (Alexander, John and Donald), Sir James Stuart, and his brother Andrew Stuart, besides many others who have reflected credit on our country.

"The Bishop had a great faculty for not only attaching his scholars to him, but also for inducing them to apply themselves most assiduously to their studies. He told me he made it a rule, during the time he kept school, to watch closely every new boy, and at the end of a fortnight, to note down in a book his estimate of the boys who had passed through his hands.

"He was never afraid of having his dignity lowered by liberties taken with him, and he always felt every confidence in his position and entered warmly and personally into many of the boys' amusements, and thus gained an immense influence over them. The influence over his pupils has been shown in the fact, that almost all of them embraced his principles; and the love and affection for him of his celebrated Cornwall school was shown many years ago, when the surviving members thereof presented him with an address[30] and a most beautiful and costly candelabra. Nor did his more recent scholars entertain less affection for him, though they never proved it so substantially as did those of his Cornwall School.... He was an excellent teacher. His scholars were well grounded in their work. The grammar was well mastered, and every rule thereof deeply impressed on the memory. Every lesson was thoroughly dissected, and everything connected with it thoroughly understood, before we passed on to another lesson."[31]

Mr. Joseph Hume's Essay on Education Edited as a Catechism by Mr. Wm. Lyon Mackenzie in 1830.

In 1830 Mr. Mackenzie republished at York (Toronto), in pamphlet form, the first part of a Catechism of Education, prepared by Mr. Joseph Hume, M.P., in England. The pamphlet in my possession is worn and weather-stained. It is inscribed to David Thorburn, of Queenston, and extends to 46 pages. In his preface Mr. Mackenzie says:

"To Mr. Joseph Hume.—The compiler is indebted for an Essay on Education, which lays down and explains principles of vital importance to the best interest of the Canadians, the perusal of which first suggested the design of this catechism.

"In the first parts, under the heads Domestic, Technical, Social and Political Instruction, it has been attempted to shew chiefly what the means are by which the human mind may be endowed with those qualities on which the generation of happiness depends."

Vicissitudes of Education in Upper Canada, 1830-1839.

For many years subsequently spasmodic efforts were made from time to time by progressive and earnest men in the Legislature to establish a system of schools. Enquiries were instituted and reports made, chiefly but not wholly, by the House of Assembly. A vigorous contest was maintained between that body and the Legislative Council on the subject. Bills were passed by the Assembly and rejected by the Council. The contest continued until the Rebellion occurred, and this event turned all men's thoughts into another channel for the time.

Of the able and zealous men who, almost single handed, fought the battle of elementary education in the Legislature, prior to the rebellion of 1837, I may refer to the efforts in this direction of Dr. Charles Duncombe and Mr. Malhon Burwell, who did good service in the cause, as also did Archdeacon Strachan, Hon. William Morris and others for higher education.

In the light of the growth and educational progress of to-day, the miserable condition of public education in the days of the educational pioneers to whom I have referred, can hardly be credited. And were it not on record in the proceedings of the Legislature, the statements there made would appear to apply to some other country rather than to ours.

There were in the House of Assembly in those days (as I have intimated) men of rare power and ability, who did noble service in the popular cause, and in behalf of general education. They passed school bills, founded on elaborate reports, year after year, only to see them defeated by a majority in the Legislative Council. This state of things continued for some years, and with disastrous effects on the intellectual life of the country. This fact is illustrated in the proceedings of the House of Assembly. For example: In a petition of the United Presbytery of Upper Canada, presented to the House in 1830, the signers say:—

"It is with deep regret that your petitioners (in their ministerial capacity, connected with a very large portion of His Majesty's subjects in this Province) are compelled to say that the state of education is, in general, in a deplorable condition."

The reason for this state of things is thus clearly set forth by the House of Assembly in an address to the Lieutenant-Governor, adopted in the same year:—

"We the Commons of Upper Canada, in Parliament assembled, most respectfully represent that there is in this Province a very general want of education; that the insufficiency of the school fund to support competent, respectable and well-educated teachers, has degraded common school teaching from a regular business to a mere matter of convenience to transient persons, or common idlers, who often teach school one season and leave it vacant until it accommodates some other like person, whereby the minds of our youth are left without cultivation, or, what is still worse, frequently with vulgar, low-bred, vicious or intemperate examples before them, in the capacity of monitors."

Educational Efforts of Mr. Mahlon Burwell in the House of Assembly, 1831-1836.

Few men exerted themselves more or to better purpose in the cause of education than did Mr. Burwell during the time he was a member of the old Upper Canada Legislature, in 1831-1838.[32]

Amongst the many motions relating to education which were moved by Mr. Burwell in the House of Assembly from time to time, was the following important one, which was concurred in by the House in February, 1831:—

"That a standing committee be appointed on the subject of education generally in this Province....

"That it be a principal duty and business of the committee to enquire whether an appropriation of 500,000 acres of land was not made, in virtue of a joint address of both houses of the Provincial Parliament, adopted at their session of 1797, or 1798, and whether the same is not subject to the control of the Legislature of this Province; to enquire if anything, and what, has been done with the lands or any part of them, and what is their present situation.

"That the said committee do enquire in what way the several district schools of the Province can best be endowed with portions of the said lands, so as to render them more efficient and fitting for the improvement of the rising generation than they are at present."...

Such were the comprehensive terms of a motion which gave to the subject of education a status in the House of Assembly at the time by making a committee on the subject a Standing Committee of the House, and clothing it with important powers. Mr. Burwell also, of the same month, moved for the production of all the despatches, reports, and other documents relating to the royal grant of lands by George III. for grammar schools and colleges in Upper Canada. In response to this latter motion, the Lieut.-Governor, Sir John Colborne (Lord Seaton), sent down to the House a mass of papers of great value, showing what steps had been taken by the Imperial and Provincial Governments during the intervening years for the promotion of public education. These papers were printed at the time, but little is now known of their contents.

In April, 1831, Mr. Burwell, as chairman of the Quarter Sessions of the London District, presented to the Lieut-Governor a memorial setting forth the advantages to that locality of endowing a college at London. Amongst the reasons given are the following:—

"Your memorialists are aware that education of a superior kind cannot be brought to every man's door, and that under any arrangements, the inhabitants of the Province generally must send their children a short distance from home; but such is the extent of the several districts, that the school can seldom be a day's journey from any part of them; and the scholars can return to their homes without expense during the holidays; and, if sick, they can be visited by their parents in a few hours, and removed to their habitations without difficulty. Added to all this the cheapness at which board can be obtained in country places, and the easiness with which, in most cases, it can be paid for by produce from their farms."

These reasons are somewhat primitive in their character; but they throw light on the social condition of the people in these days, and illustrate the common practice then of paying even for education "in kind," or by "produce from the farms." The object of the memorialists was to obtain such an endowment for the London District Grammar School—

"As shall render it efficient as a classical seminary, and a nursery (as such schools are intended to be) for the University of King's College....

"The endowment should be such a one as would furnish a good school-house, a commodious residence for the head master—to enable him to keep boarders and produce an income of four or five hundred pounds."

In the following June a similar, but a much longer and more strongly worded, memorial was presented to the Governor from the trustees of the Kingston "Royal Grammar School," protesting against the withdrawal from that school of an extra grant of £200 a year and giving it to Upper Canada College, thus reducing the rank of the Kingston "Royal Grammar School" to that of a district grammar school.

Efforts at Educational Legislation by Dr. Charles Duncombe, 1831-1836.

As one of those who took a prominent part in the troublesome events of 1837-38, in Upper Canada, Dr. Duncombe acquired considerable notoriety. He was, nevertheless, a man of broad views, of comprehensive aims and large sympathies.[33]

From his first entry into the House of Assembly, Dr. Charles Duncombe, M.P.P. for the county of Norfolk, took up warmly the cause of popular education. In this he was actively supported by two other medical gentlemen—Dr. Thomas D. Morrison and Dr. Thomas Bruce—who were also members of the House of Assembly at that time.

Dr. Charles Duncombe's first motion in the House of Assembly (on the 13th December, 1831) was for an address to the Lieut.-Governor urging the setting apart of a sufficient quantity of the public lands of the Province to form a permanent fund for the support and maintenance of common schools. His motion was, however, defeated.

As Dr. Duncombe's motion is of historical interest, so far as the facts which it alleges are concerned, I give some extracts from it. The motion stated:—

"That there is in this Province a very general want of education; that the insufficiency of the Common School Fund to support competent, respectable and well-educated teachers, has degraded common school teaching from a regular business to a mere matter of convenience to transient persons, or common idlers, who often stay but for one season, and leave the schools vacant until they accommodate some other like person, whereby the minds of the youth of this Province are left without due cultivation, or, what is worse, frequently with vulgar, low-bred, vicious and intemperate examples before them in the persons of their monitors," (i.e., teachers).

The motion goes on to say that:—

"If provision were made for the liberal and punctual payment of common school teachers ... the teaching of common schools would soon become a regular and respectable calling, gentlemanly, well-educated persons would not be ashamed to take charge of youth, the schools would be no longer vacant, nor the scholars ignorant. Upper Canada would then form a national character that would command respect abroad and ensure peace, prosperity and happiness at home, perpetuate attachment to British principles and British institutions, and enable posterity to value, as they ought, the inestimable blessings of our glorious constitution."

The motion went on to urge the Lieut.-Governor to represent to the Colonial Secretary the important necessity—in view of the facts cited—of entreating

"That His Majesty, William IV., be graciously pleased to place at the disposal of the Provincial Legislature a portion of the waste lands of the Crown as a permanent fund for the support of common schools within the same."

Dr. Charles Duncombe, with a prescience of the future, and of the necessities of the case, (which were not then recognized, nor for many years afterwards,) strongly urged, as did other members of the Assembly, that at least one million acres of the "waste lands" of the Province should be set apart for the support of common schools.[34]

The motion was negatived. Dr. Duncombe was, however, determined not to be beaten. Mr. David Burn and other friends of his in the county of Oxford—no doubt on his suggestion—got up a petition to the Legislature on the subject, and on the 21st December—a week after his motion was defeated—Dr. Duncombe read this petition and had it referred to a select committee for report thereon.

On the 26th December an elaborate report on the petition was brought in by Dr. Duncombe himself, as chairman of the committee. In that report the whole subject was gone into fully, and a scheme elaborated by which the 1,000,000 acres of land were proposed to be hypothecated in advance, so that by the issue of debentures for $500,000, redeemable in ten, fifteen and twenty years, a sufficient sum would be at once realized on the prospective value of these lands to form a permanent fund for the support of common schools.

This report (as did the rejected motion) placed on record a few facts and principles which are interesting in the light of to-day. The report stated that—

"The common schools of this Province are generally in so deplorable a state that they scarcely deserve the name of schools."

It recommended that the common school law of the Province be so amended that hereafter the school grant be paid only to—

"Organized schools, taught by a person who had a certificate from the District Board of Education, or school inspector, of his or her ability to teach a common school."

It also urged that the Common School Fund should be large enough, with the local contributions, to provide an ample stipend for good teachers, instead of "transient persons" and "common idlers" then so often employed as teachers—

"So that common school teaching, instead of being a mere matter of convenience to transient persons, or common idlers, would become a regular, respectable business in the hands of gentlemanly, well-educated persons. For surely the foundation of the minds of our children (on which must depend the happiness or misery we are to enjoy with them) and their own success in life, is a business worthy to be respectable, worthy of the patronage of men in the highest walks of life."

The report then laid down an important principle in regard to the necessity for a certain and permanent endowment for public education. It said:—

"Funds and appropriation for the support of education should be permanent. They should not depend upon the annual vote of the Legislature, nor on any other casualty that might, by possibility fail, and thereby check the regular progress of education."

Dr. Duncombe, in stating this principle, had no doubt in view the example (then well known) of the fickleness of the Legislature in the matter of school grants. In 1816 the vote for the support of common schools was $24,000. In three subsequent years the same vote was repeated; but, in 1820, it was reduced to $10,000—closing schools here and there all over the Province, and inflicting grievous hardship on many worthy (and, in the language of the day and of the report, unworthy) teachers. This miserable state of things continued for many years, and, as I stated on this subject in 1863—

"Thus ebbed and flowed, without a master hand to stay the current, that tide which, in other lands, is regarded as the nation's life's blood; and thus was permitted to ensue that state of living death by which Upper Canada, in the significant and popular metaphor of the day was likened to a 'girdled tree,' destitute alike of life, of beauty, or of stately growth."[35]

No wonder that in these degenerate days the young men, with stirrings within them of noble impulses and patriotic devotion to their country, should have been compelled to depend upon themselves for intellectual enlightenment and advancement. The flippant sneer of many persons of to-day at such "self-made" men is unworthy of those who enjoy the advantages which these self-made men laboured to secure. They belonged to that noble band of pioneers, who achieved for us the civil and religious freedom which we now so richly enjoy. All honour to them, therefore!

Continued Educational Efforts by Mr. Burwell in the House of Assembly.

In January, 1832, Mr. Burwell made a motion similar to the defeated one of Dr. C. Duncombe, which led to considerable discussion. It was as follows:—

"That this House do address His Majesty, humbly beseeching that His Majesty will be graciously pleased to grant an appropriation of one million of acres of waste lands of the Crown in this Province for the maintenance and support of common schools within the same."...[36]

In the same month Mr. Burwell introduced a bill "for the establishment and support of common schools throughout the Province." It was printed but was not proceeded with that session. Mr. Burwell's object clearly was to keep the subject before the House and to promote discussion on it. In this he succeeded. The House of Assembly was alive to the importance of the question, but the Legislative Council was obstructive in regard to the same subject.

In November, 1832, Mr. Burwell again had a committee of the House of Assembly appointed to enquire into the manner in which the King's wishes had been carried out in regard to the royal grant of lands for educational purposes in 1798. To expedite this enquiry the important despatches and reports formerly asked for by him and sent down to the House by the Governor, with others, were printed and distributed.

Mr. Burwell also introduced a bill "for the establishment, maintenance and regulation of common schools," in the Province. He made several motions, too, on the subject of the King's College charter and school lands. On the 21st November he submitted the first report of his "Select Committee on the Subject of Education." The historical part of this report being somewhat interesting in its statements, I quote it as follows:—

"The committee have been forcibly struck with the uniform anxiety which has been manifested at all times by the Legislature and Provincial authorities for the establishment of a university.

"It formed part of the prayer of both Houses in their address to the King in 1797.

"It was strongly recommended by the Executive Government, the judges, and law officers of the Crown, in 1798.

"In 1806 the Legislature, to show that something more was even then required than grammar schools, did all their limited means permitted, in providing a small apparatus for the instruction of youth in physical science, that they might enter the world with something more than a common district school education; such an institution was again noticed in 1820, and an earnest desire expressed by the Legislature, which knew best the wants of the Province, for its speedy establishment.

"In 1825 so many young men were found turning their attention to the learned professions that the Executive Government thought that the establishment of a university could be no longer delayed without the greatest detriment to the Province, and, therefore, applied to His Majesty for a Royal Charter, which was granted in 1827, in terms as liberal, it is said, as the then Government would allow; but such has proved by no means satisfactory to your Honorable House."[36]

About the middle of December, 1832, Mr. Burwell brought in the second and very elaborate report of the Select Committee on Education. This report was chiefly based upon the opinions of several witnesses examined by the committee on the subject of school lands, King's College charter, U. C. College, and education generally. The witnesses examined were Chief Justice Robinson, Archdeacon Strachan, Chairman, and the Hon. G. H. Markland, Secretary to the Provincial Board of Education; Hon. Joseph Wells, a member of the Board, and Treasurer of U. C. College; Rev. Dr. Joseph H. Harris, Principal of U. C. College; Rev. Dr. Thomas Phillips, Vice-Principal, and Mr. S. P. Hurd, Surveyor-General of the Province.

The general views of these noted men on the subject of education are both interesting and instructive in the light of to-day. The report itself deals with the then pressing question of the extension of educational facilities to the entire Province. It points out in strong language the undesirability of continuing a system of district, or grammar, schools which were quite adequate to the wants of the Province when the population was only 50,000, but which was not at all equal to the requirements of Upper Canada when that population had increased to nearly 300,000. These references show how wonderfully the Province has progressed in population and in its educational advantages since that time.

Early Opinions on the Necessity for Manual, or Industrial, Education.

The following passage from the report of 1832 is prophetical in its anticipation of the future. By way of illustration I may mention the fact that a somewhat similar utterance was made by Sir Lyon Playfair in his address as president of the British Association, at Aberdeen, in 1887. The passage in the report of 1832 is as follows:—

"That the situation of the Province in wealth and commerce, and in its demand for superior attainments in the various professions is very different from what it formerly was; and that unless opportunities are immediately furnished by the establishment of superior schools for the instruction of our youth in the higher branches of science, we must fall behind the age in which we live."

What was thus put forth as a local thought, but yet as an educational axiom, by these educational pioneers of Upper Canada, upwards of fifty years ago, is thus forcibly and beautifully amplified by the president of the British Association in 1887. Speaking generally, and contrasting the educational policy of the colonies and that of the mother country, he said:—

"The colonies, being young countries, value their raw materials as their chief source of wealth. When they become older they will discover it is not in these, but in the culture of scientific intellect, that their future prosperity depends.... Jules Simon tersely puts it:—'The nation which most educates her people will become the greatest nation, if not to-day, certainly to-morrow.' Higher education is the condition of higher prosperity, and the nation which neglects to develop the intellectual factor of production must degenerate, for it cannot stand still.... The illustrious consort of our Queen was not the first prince who saw how closely science is bound up with the welfare of states.... How unwise it is for England to lag in the onward march of science, when most other European powers are using the resources of their states to promote higher education and to advance the boundaries of knowledge. [She] alone fails to grasp the fact that the competition of the world has become a competition of intellect.... A nation in its industrial progress, when the competition of the world is keen, cannot stand still.... I contend that in public education there should be a free play to the scientific faculty, so that the youths who possess it should learn the richness of their possession during the educative process.... Science has impressed itself upon the age in which we live; and as science is not stationary, but progressive, men are required to advance its boundaries, acting as pioneers in the onward march of states. Human progress is so identified with scientific thought, both in its conception and realization, that it seems as if they were alternative terms in the history of civilization."

In giving these extracts so fully I have done so for two reasons: First, I desire to do honour to the zeal and to acknowledge the forethought and prescience of those members of the House of Assembly who, in 1832, placed so strong an emphasis upon the value of "the instruction of our youth in the higher branches of science;" and secondly, to point out, in the weighty words of Sir Lyon Playfair, the immense importance (in the light of past experience) which he and other leaders of thought in regard to England's industrial life and practical progress, attach to the teaching of elementary science in the schools. He touches upon this point in another part of his address, in pointing out the absurdity of requiring all pupils to study the same subjects. He says:—

"In a school a boy should be aided to discover the class of knowledge that is best suited to his mental capacities, so that in the upper forms of the school, and in the university, knowledge may be specialized in order to cultivate the powers of the man to the fullest extent.... The adaptation of public schools to a scientific age does not involve a contest as to whether science or classics shall prevail, for both are indispensable to true education. The real question is, whether schools will undertake the duty of moulding the minds of boys according to their mental varieties."

Later Opinions on the Necessity for Manual Training in Our Schools.

So deeply impressed was I of the immense importance of this subject, and of the necessity of providing in our school system for a practical solution of the question which was then, and is now, of pressing importance—viz., manual training in our schools—that in 1876 I prepared and delivered a lecture on the subject, in various parts of the Province. The lecture was founded on the industrial lessons taught to us so impressively at the Centennial Exhibition, Philadelphia, in 1876. These lessons, in their educational aspects, were even more forcibly impressed upon me at the great Industrial Exhibition held in New Orleans, in 1885. Having been there six weeks, as an Educational Juror, on behalf of the United States Bureau of Education, I had abundant and admirable facilities for studying the whole question, and for seeing how it was being worked out (more or less effectually) in the various national school systems which came under review during that enquiry—especially in France. Thus the French school law of 1882 provides that "primary education includes [among other things] the elements of the natural, physical and mathematical sciences, and their application to agriculture, to hygiene, and to the industrial art; manual work, and the use of tools of the principal trades, the elements of drawing, modelling, etc." Apprenticeship schools have also been established, the object of which is to form workmen, as distinguished from foremen, and in which various trades are taught. An official report, published by the United States Bureau of Education in 1882, states that the apprentices of these schools "find employment readily after they have left the workshops, at wages, it is said, varying from five to even as much as eight francs per day."

In discussing this question in the lecture to which I have referred, these passages occur:—

"It is not assumed that every pupil in our schools is qualified, or that he should be compelled, as a matter of course, to engage in the study of elementary science or practical drawing. Far from it. But what I do say is, that those pupils who exhibit a taste for any of the various subjects of natural history, elementary science or practical mechanics, should have an opportunity in the Public and High Schools (of cities and large towns) of learning something about them. In an address by Mr. Gladstone on this subject, he stated that the boys of the English schools, and it is so in our schools, had not yet had fair play in the study of elementary science and natural history....

"There are few schools in which there are not boys possessing talent scientific, inventive, or industrial talent, or constructive genius, which are never evoked, much less aroused or stimulated. As to the question whether for the few the country should be put to the expense of their special training, I answer it in the words of Professor Huxley, who says:—

"To the lad of genius, even to the one in a million, I would make accessible the highest and most complete training the country could afford. Whatever it might cost, depend upon it the investment would be invaluable. I weigh my words when I say: that if the nation could purchase a potential Watt, or Davy, or Faraday, at the cost of a hundred thousand pounds down, he would be dirt cheap at the money.... It is a mere commonplace and an every-day piece of knowledge to say that, what these three men did, (in their special departments of practical science), has produced untold millions of wealth for England and the world, speaking in its narrowest economical sense of the word."

The educational mind of the United States, as well as Europe, is being constantly directed to the consideration of this interesting practical subject. Magazines and reviews, as well as educational journals, freely discuss it. One of the most useful articles on "Manual Training in the Public schools," will be found in the Andover Review for October, 1888. The United States Bureau of Education has also published various reports and papers on the subject. One of the most valuable is an elaborate report on Industrial Education in the United States, published in 1883. Some of the more important railways in that country have also established training schools for their employés.

Further Educational Efforts in the House of Assembly, 1835, 1836.

For the four years during which Dr. Duncombe was a member the Legislature of Upper Canada, his efforts to promote the cause of education were unceasing. With the exception of Mr. Burwell, who devoted himself almost entirely to the interests of education in the House, none excelled Dr. Duncombe in his zeal for the cause of public education. His efforts were chiefly directed to awaken an interest amongst his fellow members in the subject generally, and especially on behalf of the education of the deaf and dumb, in asylums for the insane, in prison discipline and similar matters. At length his efforts in the session of 1835 culminated in the appointment, by resolution of the House of Assembly, of Doctors Charles Duncombe, Thomas D. Morrison and William Bruce, Commissioners, to enquire, amongst other things, into "the system and management of schools and colleges" in the United States and elsewhere. Two of these commissioners deputed their colleague, Dr. Duncombe, to "go on a journey to the United States, or elsewhere, to obtain such information as is desired by a resolution" of the House of Assembly in that behalf. Six hundred dollars were granted by the House to defray the expenses of this enquiry.