just with regard to morals, as to mere words; here, the examples are those of every hour in every day; and the mind must be indeed dull that does not by degrees "classify them," and ultimately deduce from them rules and general principles."

The most prominent of these is the thoroughly pervading spirit of TRUTH, which exists within the walls of Hazelwood. It is quite manifest, that the very shadow of falsity,-nay, I might almost say, the idea of its existence, scarcely ever crosses the mind of a single boy in the school. I hope none of your readers will consider me imbued with the spirit of Munchausen, because I express surprise at this. Some of your fair readers, whose education has been in the midst of their own families, may probably exclaim, "What, is this man surprised that gentlemen's sons speak truth?" Let them turn to their brothers, and, if they have been at any public school, nay, at any school of the old stamp, ask them the following question: What would have been thought, by his school-fellows, of a boy who, on a fault being publicly announced by the master, with the query of "Who did it?" answered at once, "It was I?" The brother will certainly answer, "Pooh! no master would have been so absurd as to set about an enquiry in that fashion; for he would be right well aware that no boy in the school would be idiot enough to betray himself." Nay, allow me to beg the ladies above-mentioned to ask their brothers whether they can deny the following allegation;—if they can, they have not been at any of our great schools, or of those conducted on similar principles: I make it without any qualification, and I am certain that any one who has been at those schools will say it is true to the letter, unless the very habits on which I am commenting still stick about him. If a boy be accused of a fault that he has committed, he will be thought the more of by his school-fellows, considered the "finer fellow," in exact proportion with the degree of ingenious falsehoods which he invents to accomplish his escape! Can any of you deny this?—None.

Having had the happiness of being myself bred under an improving system like this, I think, my dear I may be pardoned if I tell you that when, as I was walking with a young relation of mine who has just gone to Hazelwood, he chanced to mention an instance of self-accusation, as a matter of course, I exclaimed, "What?" in a most sonorous tone, as I stopped short in surprise. Some persons may think this a most trifling thing. Let him compare a system in which truth is so thoroughly imbued in the every-day practice as not to be considered a merit at all with one where falsehood, if ingenious, is considered a merit. It may be said, that this is the direct opposite to the recognised doctrines of the school;-that the masters disapprove of it-It exists, though. How are they to stop it? I don't know; but it does not exist at Hazelwood.

I am quite aware that even some of the teachers at Hazelwood will think I am making a great rout about nothing. Indeed, one of those gentlemen who had been bred there seemed scarcely able to understand what I meant when I said something to the effect of what you have just read. He appeared at a loss to conceive that at any of our great schools a system of feeling among the boys could exist which casts no

shame upon the use of this craft, concealment, and falsehood, for selfscreening in wrong. Yet such the practice at our great schools is.

It so happened that I saw the very instance of truth, which gave rise to my surprise at its being a matter of course, put into practice. At the general muster after breakfast I was present; the muster was gone through in that manner which has attracted so much attention, and which, from the necessary length of detail in the description, has had intricacy imputed to it; I can only say, that the comparison which arose in my mind was, that a person never having seen a watch would scarcely be able to form an idea, from a description of its mechanical construction, of the beautiful simplicity of the manner in which the hands point the time. And thus it may be, with this mode of ascertaining the presence of all the boys. I dare not, after what I have said, go into a detailed description of it; but the following I believe to be its main points. It is preceded by the bell ringing for two minutes, to collect the boys from every quarter of the premises. As they assemble, they form their ranks; but this part of the process I did not witness, as they were in order when I entered. The band was then ready to play, which it almost immediately did. It is during this period that those whose duty it is, look over the ranks, so as to be able to make the rapid returns of which I shall presently speak. The performance of the band was, I must say, excellent, the time was admirably perfect, and the taste and execution were both exceedingly good. When the band ceased, a boy, who had been watching the clock, called out four minutes and some seconds. A boy who was on the raised platform on which I was standing with some of the masters, repeated this aloud; it meant, as I gathered, that it was the time that had elapsed from the period at which the bell began to ring. A boy in the second rank from the platform called out "One wanting in (I think) the eighth rank," and declared his name; and a similar declaration was made in two other instances, one of them announcing the absence of two. The same boys then called out the numbers that were present in their ranks, each adding his number to that announced by the one preceding. A voice, I could not exactly distinguish whose, but I believe it was a teacher's, added the number of the complete ranks; and the registrar, also adding that of the absentees, said, "which completes the list." The boy watching the clock again exclaimed the time, which was, as far as my memory serves me, something more than five minutes since the bell began. I regret much I did not note down at the moment what was the exact time of the calling the numbers, &c., which was also announced; but I really scarcely could follow the whole-and I had so much to remember afterwards, that the precise number of seconds escaped me, but they were considerably under a minute. The word "Form!" was then given; the boys formed into the respective classes which were about to be heard, and they marched away to their different rooms. During, or rather at the beginning of, this time, the registrar ran over the names of absentees to a teacher, who had a list of those who had recognised causes of absence; and there were no others.

It was immediately before the boys formed to march off, when it was ascertained that the whole school was assembled, except those APRIL, 1829.

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whose absence was unavoidable, that the announcements were made to which I have alluded. They were preceded by some of a scholastic nature, given out by one of the sons of the principal, who is himself a teacher; upon his concluding, one of the older boys, who held some office of responsibility, the exact name of which I did not catch, called out" there have been some windows broken at," describing some particular locality;—" let any boys who have thrown stones near there for the last six weeks, hold up their hands:"--and four boys immediately did. Some small irregularity of the day before was detected in a similar manner; and a loss was announced, with a direction for the finder to bring the thing found to a given individual. These matters are not, and should not be, considered trifling; they give habits of regularity, of steadiness, and, above all, of honourable frankness and truth, which tend in the very strongest degree to the formation of a valuable and virtuous character. I shall notice a few more of these general principles, to which I am inclined to attach so much importance, before I follow the boys into their various class

rooms.

I have during to-day-my visit to Hazelwood is of three days ago— recurred to the article in the Edinburgh Review,' on the first small edition of the account of the system adopted there. (January 1825,-published in March.) My impression was that I admired and agreed with all that was there said. But I find I must have been impelled by my eagerness about the plan itself, of which I then heard for the first time, to run on at once to the immediate details about the school:for of the previous observations of the reviewer touching general principles, I find I cannot agree with ten syllables together in any one place throughout. It is not often, dear , as you know, that I quarrel with the Edinburgh Review;' but really, if its more powerful writers were to meet with the introductory remarks in this article in any Tory journal, the writer thereof would be infinitely to be pitied. The whole spirit of them is so utterly unphilosophical, that I am by no means sure that they are by the same hand as the latter part, though even that betrays the cloven foot of a sneer far too often. But I am a quiet, steady gentleman, who care not a jot for the writer, who know not who he is, and shall not attack him at all. But I shall attack a few of his positions, thinking them in the highest degree unsound and hurtful.

He sets out by denying the possibility of any improvement of mankind by education:-an opinion, I hope, which even in this spring time of education, fact has already blown into the air. That the "good old times" have become the better new ones, I believe no one out of Bedlam now denies, unless he be in St. Luke's. HISTORY has set this matter quite at rest, where I shall leave it :-as, to do the reviewer justice, so does he. I shall only ask, "What is there to stop us exactly where we stand?"

Next, the reviewer doubts, in the fashion which makes doubt a denial, that "any thing material can be done towards the formation of moral character or habits, by any course of early or elementary instruction." Here again the reviewer and I agree,-in so far as to think this question worthy of examination; and he brings forward arguments

accordingly, in support of his position, the value of which I wish fairly to discuss; for, I confess, there are few propositions which I would not more readily admit.

The key to the reviewer's arguments appears to me to be, that he lays down facts, and lo! believes them forthwith to be principles. Suppose a man, when steam-navigation was first proposed, had said "Pooh! what has hot water to do at sea?-no way is there made by wheels, and levers, and boilers; but by masts, sails, and rigging." True, no way was then made at sea by steam mechanically applied, it was all done by sails and so forth. But is it impossible so to apply steam? Experience has shewn. Now, might not the following axiom be most fairly tried by the same test:

"Moral character, principles, or character in general, are not formed by precepts inculcated at school, or by observations made, or experience collected, in that narrow and artificial society,―but by the unconscious adoption of the maxims and practices that prevail among the freeagents around us, and the spontaneous assimilation of manners and sentiments which result from this contagion."

I readily admit that morals are not, even now, at nearly all schools, inculcated in any manner at all; for the "spontaneous assimilation" from this, as the reviewer very justly phrases it, contagion, is generally of bad "manners," and odious "sentiments." But that is no reason why good ones should not be taught even in "the narrow society" of a school. They are taught at Hazelwood; as I shall presently shew more than I have already shewn :-The steam does go where sails cannot:-and the fact that the sails go somehow or somewhere, is no proof that the steam does not carry the vessel more steadily, truly, and safely on her course.

Again:

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All children, at every school,-and we may almost say in every home, are taught the same precepts of morality,-warned against lying, and thieving, and gluttony, and quarrelling, and exhorted to be industrious, obedient, and obliging. Nay, they are not only taught these doctrines, but they are all aware, generally, of their truth."

Indeed!-Let us look a little into fact, as to the practice by these young gentlemen of the doctrines of which they are so well aware. Whether or not such may be the practice of schools in Scotland, I really acknowledge I am totally ignorant; but, from the items which the reviewer here gives, he either labours under an equal ignorance as regards the old-established English schools, or he is playing booty, and purposely holding forth a helping hand to the promoters of an improved system of education. As for "lying," I have already said my say of that;-of thieving and gluttony, let the hen-roosts and farmyards of the neighbouring farmers, and the game-preserves and fishponds of the surrounding grandees, give evidence;-and for quarrelling-pitched battles are no rare things,-the science of Mendoza and of Belcher still is studied. But these, though bad as all quarrelling is, are far the best modes of giving vent to hot blood practised at our schools-it does not then become bad blood, which the system of domestic tyranny, of which occasionally such awful instances peep forth, brings into existence. These words, in their darkest sense, are

not too strong. I could give a crowd of instances, within my present knowledge, were it not for fear of wounding individual feelings. The sufferers I know had rather I should not, and the inflictors of the suffering may have reformed. I would not for the world exaggerate; --neither am I impelled, in the very least, by animosity against these establishments, as establishments. Many a dear friend of mine, to say nothing of my simple self, have been brought up at them, and all manner of lang-syne feelings have I that are connected with them: -but I cannot allow these to put a bandage over my eyes, and blind me to faults equally glaring and dangerous. What I wish is, that the old names should remain worthy of their old fame-that they should not bring the accumulated evils of years to worse than nullify— to poison-their present efforts, but that they should move at an equal pace with the advancing morals and intellect of the nation, by at once annihilating those sources of evil to which, they must be aware, the eyes of that nation are now very strongly drawn-and by generally adapting their systems more to the wants which, in this age, make themselves heard so loudly. At all events the more prominent faults must be crushed-the country now sees them—the country calls for their destruction, as yet calmly-it will soon do so loudly-and it always, in the end, is obeyed. Let us hope its voice need be raised very little above its present pitch.

To revert, however, to my argument, I would ask whether such habits do not teach "principles and character in general"-and whether they are not likely to render a man's outset vicious;-happily gifted is he, if his reflections on his early experience be sufficient to stop him before they become confirmed!

If then bad habits-and habits are the source as well as the product of principle--especially in early life-if bad habits can be fostered by" early and elementary instruction" in great schools, why cannot good? Common sense says they can, and so does Fact; for we find them at Hazelwood. Few things can be more beautiful than the general spirit of kindliness and good-fellowship which pervades among the boys, and which spreads even to the feelings which exists between them and the masters. I am not blinded by the representations of the latter; I have, as you know, a very near and very young relation who has lately gone thither-he left a most happy home-he came from the midst of a large family, which, of course, he had never before quitted for a day: I know that he dreaded the transition exceedingly. Three months are not yet passed; and his description to me of the general kindliness (I must repeat the word) of conduct which prevails throughout the whole community, is such as must deeply touch those who know, as I do, what a young boy, leaving home under such circumstances, endures under a system of fagging! Here there is none-the name and the thing are alike unknown. Fighting also is nearly, if not quite, unknown. Yes-Fighting, in pugilistic England, scarcely exists!and the mode by which it was put down is, I think, one of the most ingenious and rational pieces of legislation I ever heard of. You will see I have marked two passages, referring to each other, to be printed in Italics-for they shew so strikingly that direct reference to a real principle, and those sound and immediate means