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APPENDIX.

No. I. NOTE A. See p. 4.

THE importance of the national establishment of parish schools in Scotland will justify a short account of the legislative provisions respecting it, especially as the subject has escaped the notice of all the historians.

By an act of the king (James VIth) and privy council, of the 10th of December, 1616, it was recommended to the bishops to deale and travel with the heritors, (landed proprietors) and inhabitants of the respective parishes in their respective dioceses, towards the fixing upon

some certain, solid, and sure course" for settling and entertaining a school in each parish. This was ratified by a statute of Char. I. (the act, 1633, chap. 5.) which empowered the bishop, with the consent of the heritors of a

parish,

parish, or of a majority of the inhabitants, if the heritors refused to attend the meeting, to assess every plough of land (that is, every farm in proportion to the number of ploughs upon it) with a certain sum for establishing a school. This was an ineffectual provision, as depending on the consent and pleasure of the heritors and inhabitants. Therefore a new order of things was introduced by Stat, 1646, chap. 17, which obliges the heritors and minister of each parish to meet and assess the several heritors with the requisite sum for building a school-house, and to elect a schoolmaster, and modify a salary for him in all time to come. The salary is ordered not to be under one hundred, nor above two hundred merks, that is, in our present sterling money, not under 51. 11s. 14d. nor above 111. 2s. 3d. and the assessment is to be laid on the land in the same proportion as it is rated for the support of the clergy, and as it regulates the payment of the land-tax. But in case the heritors of any parish, or the majority of them, should fail to discharge this duty, then the persons forming what is called the Committee of Supply of the county, (consisting of the principal landholders) or any five of them, are authorized by the statute to impose the assessment instead of them, on the representation of the presbytery in which the parish is situated, To secure the choice of a proper teacher, the

right of election by the heritors, by a statute passed in 1693, chap 22, is made subject to the review and control of the presbytery of the district, who have the examination of the person proposed committed to them, both as to his qualifications as a teacher, and as to his proper deportment in the office when settled in it. The election of the heritors is therefore only a presentment of a person for the approbation of the presbytery, who, if they find him unfit, may declare his incapacity, and thus oblige them to elect anew. So far is stated on unquestionable authority,*

The legal salary of the schoolmaster was not inconsiderable at the time it was fixed; but by the decrease in the value of money, it is now certainly inadequate to its object; and it is painful to observe, that the landholders of Scotland resisted the humble application of the schoolmasters to the legislature for its increase, a few years ago. The number of parishes in Scotland is 877; and if we allow the salary of a schoolmaster in each to be, on an average, seven pounds sterling, the amount of the legal provision will be 61391. sterling. If we suppose the wages paid by the scholars to

amount

* The authority of A. Frazer Tytler, and David Hume, Esqrs.

amount to twice this sum, which is probably beyond the truth, the total of the expenses among 1,526,492 persons, (the whole population of Scotland) of this most important establishment, will be 18,4171. But on this, as well as on other subjects respecting Scotland, accurate information may soon be expected from Sir John Sinclair's Analysis of his Statistics, which will complete the immortal monument he has reared to his patriotism.

The benefit arising in Scotland from the instruction of the poor, was soon felt; and by an act of the British Parliament, 4 Geo. I. chap. 6, it is enacted, "that of the monies arising from the sale of the Scottish estates forfeited in the rebellion of 1715, 20001. sterling shall be converted into a capital stock, the interest of which shall be laid out in erecting and maintaining schools in the Highlands. The Society for propagating Christian Knowledge, incorporated in 1709, have applied a large part of their fund for the same purpose. By their report, 1st May, 1795, the annual sum employed by them, in supporting their schools in the Highlands and Islands, was 39131. 19s. 10d. in which are taught the English language, reading and writing, and the principles of religion. The schools of the society are additional to the legal schools, which from the great extent of

many

many of the Highland parishes, were found insufficient. Besides these established schools, the lower classes of people in Scotland, where the parishes are large, often combine together, and establish private schools of their own, at one of which it was that Burns received the principal part of his education. So convinced, indeed are the poor people of Scotland, by experience, of the benefit of instruction to their children, that, though they may often find it difficult to feed and clothe them, some kind of school instruction they almost always procure

them.

The influence of the school-establishment of Scotland on the peasantry of that country, seems to have decided by experience a question of legislation of the utmost importance-whether á system of national instruction for the poor be favourable to morals and good government. In the year 1698, Fletcher of Saltoun declared as follows: " There are at this day, in Scotland, two hundred thousand people begging from door to door. And though the number of them be perhaps double to what it was formerly, by reason of this present great distress, (a famine then prevailed) yet in all times there have been about one hundred thousand of those vagabonds, who have lived without any regard or subjection either to the laws of the land, or

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