left when a most distressing scene occurred. Two girls of twelve or thirteen years of age quarrelled, as it would appear, about a remark which one of the clergymen had made concerning a new frock which one of them wore. The first notice I had of this was to see the pair boxing most viciously; before I could get at them, they had hold of each other's hair, and were yelling most fearfully; they fought like furies. took hold of one, and myself the other; but before we could separate them, one had received a severe, and I fear a lasting injury in the eye, and her nose bled profusely. I sent her home, and went again to work; but I had not been quiet for ten minutes, when a fearful outbreak took place. Seven women rushed into the school; the stairs were full besides; and outside, at least fifty women had collected. These were the mothers and friends of the girls who had fought. Having abused me in no measured terms-and if I mistake not, they collared me-they proceeded to fight. remonstrated with one woman, and I with the other; so we stopped their battle. Our boys cheered most tremendously. The women swore and shrieked. Those outside (several men amongst them) responded. Never, surely, was such a noise heard before. I did not believe that human beings resident in this most Christian metropolis, could so behave. pos held up his hands, and if he said anything I did not hear. We got our visitors out at last, and we could see they held an important meeting on the subject of their visit in the court below. But not being interested, we shut the windows to exclude the noise, and proceeded with our work. To compose the children, if sible, I proposed that we should have a little music, and sang very sweetly the first verse of the Evening Hymn. We then invited the children to follow us, and we got through the first line or two very well-but a blackguard youth thought proper to set up on his own account, and he led off a song in this strain :- I need scarcely add that every boy followed this leader, ay, girls and all, and I could not check them. After some time I spoke to them very gently and sadly, and having gained attention to some degree, I ventured to close the school with a very short prayer. I did so. Fearful to relate, in the midst of the Lord's Prayer, several shrill cries of "Cat's meat!" and "Mew, mew," added another fact to the history of this school. So by the help of God we must both work harder. It is a post of honour. It is a forlorn hope. 30th Oct. 1849.-If possible the scholars were more unruly to-day than they were yesterday, but no serious outbreak took place. Before I got out of the locality I managed to empty my pockets, "Give, give," is the cry-I gave a lesson to-day on the duty of labour, and I pointed out the colonies as a good market. This was the first lesson which arrested their attention. * * * * I had occasion to remark to a poor old woman who looks after the sewing, that I thought the girls were employed more at sampler work than was necessary. She tells me that they will not work cheerfully at anything else. They have no notions of thrift or of useful work. It is difficult to get them to make a shirt. I gave notice that in future I should expect to see more of them making and mending stockings and shirts, and none of them who could not do such work well were to be allowed to waste their time in samplers. I mean to speak on this subject to some lady visitor should one appear, as I am not wellinformed, perhaps, in the importance of samplers. I think markingink would do the work better, and save time. At least, a shirt ought to be made before it is marked. May God help us! What a solemn charge is this! All our copy-books have been stolen, and proofs exist that the school is used at night as a sleeping-room. We must get a stronger door to it. I must also get a tub to stand by the pump in the court, and a piece of coarse towelling and soap. My duties must resolve themselves into Daily First. To see the boys and girls well washed and scrubbed. Secondly. To try to get prayers said decently. Fifthly. Reading. Sixthly. Writing. 31st Oct. 1849.-Great noise, turbulence, and confusion, but no serious outbreak. The rev. the rector called and left without saying anything. A lady visited us this afternoon and waited for some time. I am at a loss to ascertain the motives which induce ladies to visit such a place, unless one is uncharitable enough to attribute them to mere curiosity, or to that morbid feeling, which makes such places as the Old Bailey, or the Chamber of Horrors, in Baker Street, attractive. We should get on much better without visitors. The children are so accustomed to be shown off, that they bristle up for the occasion, and fire their witticisms with more impudence than when no strangers are present. These boys and girls require to be sobered; all exciting influences should be avoided, and therefore I mean, if possible, to discountenance visitors. I gave a lesson this afternoon in geography in presence of some clergymen; I was attempting to get out the fact that we lived on an island called Great Britain. We spoke of England and Scotland and Wales as being countries close to each other. I got out that an island was a portion of land surrounded by water. Then I asked, "What do we live on ?"-" On food, when we gets it," was the ready answer. I bought some calico and asked the girls to make boys' shirts, which may be given away if they are ever finished. The material for three cost 2s. 6d., just tenpence a piece! The fact is being con stantly forced on my notice, that these children are not so deficient in mere religious wordiness, if that is the word, as might be supposed. They have had a great deal of good schooling in a certain sense, or rather much labour has been expended in teaching them to read, write, and cipher well. But I cannot believe that any attention has been bestowed in making this knowledge useful. They are utterly destitute of feeling or propriety; and their technical education, such as it has been, has not made them more civilized or better children. After all, the school must be looked upon as secondary to home teaching. It is apparently worse than useless to expect a man to be made better by merely learning to read and write. Those of our scholars who can do so best are decidedly the most depraved. One boy, who is quite as well schooled as the average number of boys at his age are schooled-(say twelve years of age)-said to me to-day, "Please sir, I'll go down on my knees and say The Lord Jesus Christ and the Fellowship of the Holy Ghost, for a halfpenny." Another, as we went along the lanes from school, called after us, 66 Glory be to the Father," &c. All this is very monstrous, and I am puzzled to find the cause for such impiety -there must be a cause-and until I can come to some conclusion on the subject I am at a loss to apply a remedy. I have prohibited the use of the words, "Praise the Lord, Hallelujah!" which they were very fond of shouting, and I have resolved to make their religi ous lessons as impressive as I can. I use the Lord's Prayer only in opening or closing school; and in the lessons generally I have attempted to introduce a sober solemn tone for that flippant, irreverent, thoughtless, gabbling manner to which they are very prone. We almost shed tears to-day when we pondered over our work.Sursum corda! 1st Nov. 1849.-Wrote to the curate, asking him to get us a tub to be placed near the pump and about the door of the school, &c. Being All Saints Day, we were bothered by many boys from the Romish school in the neighbourhood, as they had a holiday. 2nd Nov. 1849.-More confusion and excitement. Two lady visitors, who sat nearly the whole afternoon, without helping in the least but apparently enjoying the sad spectacle which our debased scholars presented. I am sorry for these ladies, as I cannot allow ourselves to be sport for them at such a sacrifice to the children under our charge. This making of our school a kind of public exhibition is most detrimental to its discipline and progress. It must be stopped. Are these ladies writing a novel? Surely they are not preparing themselves to be present at a public execution! A boy, D- called another boy a thief, on which the latter replied by a few cuffs; I separated them, and let the business of the school proceed. The mother of D- came into the school to retaliate on the boy who had punished her son. I objected to this, and insisted that I would not have interference from without. The woman raged very much, and called me a blackguard. She declared that my bread was at an end; the authorities would turn me out, &c. N.B.-Avoid violent scenes in the school. 5th Nov. 1849.-Scarcely a boy to be found in the lanes, or near 2 the school. They are off picking up pence by the exhibition of effigies, or Guys. Many of these have had a Roman Catholic training. Their fear of the priest seems very trifling. Kept the school open all the morning, and mustered about twenty; might have doubled that number had we admitted all that came, but I declined the honour of the National schoolboys' visits, and politely requested them to enjoy their holiday. Called on Mrs. P. . as the name Don't the is pronounced-to ask kindly after her girl, who received the box in the eye last week. Mrs. P is a highly respectable, judicious, and God-fearing woman-at least, she says so herself. She says that she is well known to the aristocracy, and despises the acquaintance of any one who is not a lady. She gave the names of several persons of distinction with whom she is intimate. Mrs. P-- is determined to keep her position, and preserve the fine feelings of her daughter, which have been carefully developed by a course of maternal training. Certainly, her daughter can box very well indeed; and the manner in which she tore her antagonist's hair the other day gives proof that she will keep her place amongst her compeers. Mrs. P is not only disposed to be reserved towards her neighbours, and to move in a select circle; she is also very much inclined to be exacting. Kitty B is no companion for her daughter, nor is widow 's family fit to associate, or even to sit in the same school, with her child. Oh no! Before Miss P―― can return to my seminary, all the children of the families who are obnoxious to Mrs. P- must be expelled. "Don't the rector know Miss P? in course he does; didn't he examine her eye? clargy respect Mrs. P- — and her family; and Mr. P who never drinks his beer at the public-house, but has it brought home in his own jug, and drinks of a Sunday like a jintilman? Mrs. Pis not bigoted, nor is Mr. P——. God forbid. Don't he read the Bible, ay, does he; not like the tight-laced people upstairs, who hate the Bible as the Devil does holy wather." Here Mrs. P produced a pocket Bible out of a drawer, in proof of her assertion. According to Mrs. P———, the widow Dwho gave me the scolding on Friday, is a very bad character, and it also appears that the widow was very drunk on Saturday, and got put IN for six hours. What this means I cannot say, unless it be that she was taken to the police station for being disorderly. From another authority-our female assistant-I learn that gave Mrs. Dfive shillings on Friday. The rector and his curates are sadly deceived by these people. I have no pretensions on the score of reading character, but I defy any one who takes the least trouble to observe and compare what he hears from Mrs. P▬▬▬'s own mouth to remain ignorant of the fact that her family make a very good business out of their respectability. The fight before alluded to was occasioned by some remarks respecting a frock which Miss PI was not quite unprepared for this development of Mrs. P- --.'s character; for, the last time my predecessor visited the school, he said to me when leaving, "I am going to visit Mrs. P———,' Then," answered loudly one of my hopeful children, "he is going to visit a sneak." wore. We could not make a school this afternoon; at three o'clock four boys and six girls of the first division alone were present. The attractions outside were overpowering. In addition to the lucrative employment afforded by the carrying about of effigies, or Guys, there were three funerals from the court, which were accompanied by the inhabitants. The deaths were occasioned by black fever, scarlatina, and measles. From what I hear, the locality is very sickly at present-no drainage-no water. Perhaps I should have given a holiday to-day, but I wished to respect the feelings of the Romish population-a wish which they evidently did not understand. In short, they seem to have no feelings; they have fallen so low, that they derive a kind of happiness and independence from their very degradation. "Fears and sorrows," says Campbell," fan the fire of joy," and this is true in a sense of which he did not dream. It seems as if the excitement caused by an excess of fear and sorrow produced happiness! More of this when I have time. I shall think over the assertion, and I cannot see why it should not be so. "An excess of modesty," said the elder D'Israeli, "is an excess of pride." That paradox will do for a text. Any careful observer would come to another conclusion; and that is, that these people do not require the schoolmaster so much as they need some municipal act for the regulation of lodginghouses and dwelling-houses generally. The Society for Improving the Dwellings of the Lower Classes is one which, if properly supported and carried out, would work wonders. Preaching and teaching can never fructify in the heart or mind of a man who is never alone. It is almost cruelty to talk of virtue or decency to a being who is doomed to sleep and do everything else in a crowd. Let any one visit a lodging-house in this neighbourhood and he will never forget it. The woman who live in the room under our school (which has no strong door), tells me that she hears people moving about at night-houseless wanderers, who come there to sleep. They have not as yet stolen anything! It is thus they pay for their lodgings. We did lose some copy-books a short time ago; but I have a notion that they were not stolen, they were taken. I have a notion why. * * * * * Got on very well to-day, but I cannot say that the school improves. The scholars are always out of their element when no strangers are present; and I am glad we had none to-day. Had a conversation with Mr. the district visitor, and having explained, or rather described to him the difficulty we encountered every morning and afternoon in getting the scholars together, and the very great trouble we had to get them out again, we determined to keep the school open all day, (that is, without having any recess at dinnertime). These people have no regular hours for meals, and our school resembles a club for poor children more than anything else. To-morrow, then, we shall assemble at ten, and keep school till three. The Romish school adopts this plan, and I have no doubt it will be found better than our present mode of breaking up the school from twelve till two. * |