Statements of Dr Perry.

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no one of these points is fully secured; and in many, all are neglected.'

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This Report was not very well received at first, and some were quite offended with its honest plainness. It did great good, however, as we have reason to believe; and as is confidently stated by a writer in a late number of the Mercantile Journal. This writer speaks of the results, as he calls them, of the investigation so perseveringly made by Messrs Woodbridge and Fisher. School rooms,' he says, of improved construction, have been erected in various parts of the city. Two just completed in Moon street, reflect great credit upon their architect. They appear to be of the best materials and workmanship. Attention has been paid to light and ventilation. They ought to have been, perhaps, of larger dimensions; they certainly ought to have had much larger yards attached to them. With these exceptions, they are worthy of being adopted for every school.'

The same writer, however, subsequently complains of an 'universal difficulty,'-the want of sufficient room for exercise during recess. 'The rooms,' he says, are not clean enough; the walks are not kept well stained or colored; the wood work is either not painted or of a very doubtful hue; there are no pictures, prints, illustrations, models, or apparatus provided; there are too many pupils in almost every school;' no one teacher being able, as he adds, to take care of 75, 80, or 85 children.

We are happy in being able to confirm the statements of this writer, in relation to improved school rooms. There is certainly a great deal doing, in the way of improvement, for which credit is due somewhere. Still, however, much remains to be done. There are yet many miserable school houses, with their miserable or sickly occupants. Of this we have the most abundant and unequivocal evidence.

During the last autumn, Dr M. H. Perry of this city, in the prosecution of his duty as an officer of the primary schools, was led to note several remarkable evils in connection with these institutions; to which, in a lecture on Consumption, delivered before the Physiological Society in Boston, Dec. 19, he freely but kindly adverted. He mentioned, in particular, the unhealthy location of three or four of the schools. One of these in Boylston square, was very badly situated. He found the teacher, and many of the pupils, more or less sickly; and, on inquiry, was not surprised to learn that the very pupils on whom his mind. has been fixed as tending to consumption, were among those who had been longest in the school. His statements drew forth critical remarks in the Mercantile Journal, already spoken

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School in Boylston Square.

of, which were replied to by a writer over the signature of X., in the following manner :

Dr Perry's remarks upon Primary School Rooms, sprang from none but the highest and best motives. His attention was directed to a school room in Boylston square. He visited it. He found sixty children, in a close, dark, hot room, 25 feet 3 inches long, 13 feet 5 inches wide, 6 feet 10 inches high; with no means of ventilation except the windows; with half a dozen privies either underneath or adjoining it; and deprived of sunlight and air by the high buildings around it. The children were pale and sickly.

The teacher complained of being often affected by a nausea and headache. He asked how long the committee had been contented with such accommodations, and he was told thirteen years! He learned all this-it was his opinion that no child could be exposed to the air of this room, six hours in a day, for two years, without the formation of tubercles in the lungs. Was he not bound to speak of the evil? He was lecturing upon Consumption, was it not his duty to point to this room, where the seeds of that disease are inhaled, with every breath the children draw?

If any one supposes we have used too strong language, let him visit the room in question, or that in Theatre alley, the room at the corner of Salem and Prince streets, or that in Carver street. Let him go one or two hours after school has commenced, and judge for himself. I venture to say, he will be satisfied that he never met with a more offensive or corrupt air. These poor children have been obliged to breathe it for years; and they will have to do so for a long time to come, if the committee can quiet their consciences with such tame strictures as our correspondent quoted in his reply to Dr Perry.'

Excited by the foregoing statements, we visited the school in Boylston square, a few days afterward; and were sorry to find things in a worse state, if possible, than represented by Dr Perry. The air was even more impure than we had supposed. The clothes, hats, caps, bonnets, &c., were hung up on every side of the room, so as to line nearly one half of the walls; for there was no other place where they could be deposited. The children looked pale and sickly, and we verily believe that the seeds of disease are already sown in more than two thirds of them.-The teacher, who has been employed now nearly thirteen years in the school, assured Dr Perry that she often felt, in the forenoon, as if she should be unable to continue her school through the afternoon; but that the walk at noon, to her lodgings, and the intermission of two hours, partly restored her.

Another Bad School Room.

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We have also visited the school alluded to by Dr Perry, at the corner of Salem and Prince streets. Its location is much more healthy than that in Boyslton square, being surrounded by fewer receptacles of filth, and having a commodious entrance for depositing clothes, fuel, &c. It is very far, however, from being what it should be. It is in the third story of an old and decayed building, is at the junction of two noisy streets, from one of which it is entered; and it can be reached only by a narrow and somewhat dark flight of crooked stairs. The windows and ceiling are low and dirty; the benches are narrow and without backs; the room itself is small; and its general shape, quite inconvenient. There was nothing in it cheerful and comfortable, like an agreeable parlor or joyous fireside; and nothing calculated to form pleasant associations, except the teacher's kind voice and smiling countenance. These, though she had been 'mistress' of the school eighteen years, had not become staid and monotonous, as we have often found them in similar instances. The number of pupils was little more than forty; but even this number was too many for the accommodations which existed, as well as for only one teacher. Nor is there, even here, any provision for ventilation except by means of the windows; and these, in consequence of the inconvenience, are seldom opened, at least in winter. The air was exceedingly impure when we entered the room, which was between the hours of eleven and twelve; and most of the pupils bore the marks of habitually inhaling it, as well as of neglect of healthy and agreeable exercise.

*

It is a matter of astonishment-utterly so-that individuals worthy of being chosen as School Committee men, should slide over these matters from year to year; and only promise, from time to time, to procure better school rooms. How they can even endure certain exhalations long enough to make a visit to such a school room as that in Boylston square, especially in warm weather, is more than we can divine. But we trust the statements which have recently been so publicly made, and which cannot be successfully controverted, will have the effect, at length, to awaken public attention, and to produce some good degree of reformation.

*Since writing the above, we have seen an unpublished Report of the Standing Committee of the Boston Primary Schools, which appears to confirm, most fully, the statements we have expressed, especially in relation to the bad location and condition of the school rooms; twenty or more out of seventyeight, the whole number, being loudly complained of. We ought, however, to say here, that this Report shows the Committee to be awake at length to the ubject of improvement; and we trust they will not slumber any more till the work of reforination is accomplished.

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A City School Missionary.

We have heard of late that is in contemplation by some, to secure the appointment of a sort of city missionary of instruction, whose office it shall be to inspect, minutely, all schools in all their circumstances, and report respecting the same to the proper authority. Messrs Woodbridge and Fisher had in view chiefly the physiological condition of the primary schools; and indeed hardly that, to any considerable extent. They ran through the city, and examined and measured the school houses, rather than visited the schools. They performed a noble service, it is true, great as was the sacrifice, and many as were the enemies they procured by it. But we want, now, a more diligent and extensive investigation. We want an officer who will examine the whole condition of all the schools-we mean of all which are public. In regard to those which are private or select, he could not of course be admitted to these, any farther than their teache s, in courtesy, should think proper and convenient.

Such an officer, to perform, faithfully, an annual examination of this sort, would do immense good, and be a greater honor to our metropolis than a thousand things, however valuable, for which we cheerfully pay our thousands and tens of thousands of dollars. Yet there are among us men of knowledge and philanthropy, who would accomplish the work with little or no expense but a moderate salary; and thus confer on the city and the world an immense benefit.

How much need there is of improvement in the schools of this city, especially the primary schools, can hardly be conceived by by those who have not made a thorough investigation of the matter. There is a very general impression that the system is already quite perfect. True something has been done, as we have already said, and many things have been done well; but nothing which is worthy of Boston, in the middle, or almost the middle of the nineteenth century. For it is not-we repeat it— the physical condition of the pupils alone, that demands attention, and creates the necessity of such a public functionary as we have alluded to. There is great and lamentable neglect, in regard to school books and studies. And as for the moral education of the pupils, any farther than can be secured by having teachers whose general character is unimpeachable, it is scarcely thought of. The following are the views of a very accurate observer of the condition of these schools, as published recently in one of our daily papers.

There are two radical defects of the whole system, compared with which all others are of little moment.

The intellectual education of the pupils is hardly provided

Defects of the System of Instruction.

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for in the least. They do not learn to know, to observe, reflect, compare and decide. Without this, all other learning is the veriest chopped straw and east wind.

'The art of reading, the use of our mother tongue, writing, speaking, eloquence in its lowest movements and its dizziest heights, all depend upon the strength, the clearness, the native energy and the acquired compass of the intellect. Quicken then the mind-address its comprehension-reveal its own powers to itself, and the work of education is completed.

Who of

'In what one of our Primary Schools is this done? the Teachers-who of the Committee, fulfils this more than royal office; unfolding the intellect, unlocking the secret and mysterious springs of all knowledge in the children committed to his charge? We must begin at the beginning-we must first bear to be told that we have not done so yet, and then we must lend all exertions to make amends for the past.

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The moral education of the children is equally neglected. To judge from the Rules and Regulations' of the Board, one would suppose the four thousand pupils were destitute of moral natures or exempt from moral exposure. Every thing else should be abandoned till this want is remedied. We do not want sectarianism, or party-ethics. But we do want to have the foundations laid, and the structure itself, as far as possible raised, of common honesty and morality.

'Before all their lessons, let the children learn the precepts of truth and right. Let their feelings be only cherished and strengthened, let them be fitted for life's momentous duties in these their first schools. Let the principle be recognized and honored, that all the hopes of human society hang upon the cultivation and direction of our moral nature. Let not the heart be for a moment overlooked; with it should all education begin.

'By kindness, gentleness, patience and watchfulness-through sympathy and interest, with pleasant tones addressed always to the heart and the intellect-with simple, natural, and usually conversational modes of instruction, with frequent questions and full explanations, let the teachers aim to discharge their mission, and honor and success will crown their exertions. Nothing less will suffice, no substitute for this can be devised by the art or ingenuity of men.'

But we have probably said enough on this subject for once; it may be resumed on some future occasion. We are unwilling, wholly so, that a school system which has so good a name, by remaining stationary year after year, while money is poured out like water, for everything else-unless, indeed, for water itself