small gift at his master's hand, as a new penknife or a paper book, or the like signal testimony of the master's approbation of what he hath done. Those parents which are of more ability may do well to allow the master a small sum of money to reward their sons' diligence now and then, and to excite them to the better performance of their tasks and exercises, which will invite them to go faster on in learning than a rod can drive them.

As for inflicting punishments even upon the meanest and worst of children, it should ever be the most unwilling piece of work that a master can take in hand; and therefore he should not be hasty to punish any fault whereof the scholar hath not been premonished, except it be such a notorious crime as a boy can not but know beforehand that he ought not to have done it. As for the ferula, I wish (and as I have already done) for many reasons, which it is needless to commit to paper, that it might be utterly banished out of all schools. A good sharp birchen rod, and free from knots, (for willow wands are insufferable, and fitter for a bedlam than a school) as it will break no bones nor endanger any limbs, so it will be sufficient wherewith to correct those that shall deserve it in the lower forms, and for the higher scholars that will not behave as they ought to do without blows, a good switch about their shoulders would (in Quintilian's judgment) seem fitter than a rod elsewhere; and his reason is so modestly agreeable to nature, that as I am loth to mention it, so I wonder that it hath not more prevailed with many discreet schoolmasters, who (I persuade myself) have often read it, and can not but approve of it as most Christian, however it dropped from a heathen's pen. But Nobilis equus umbra virgæ regitur. Ingenuous and towardly scholars will not need so much as the shadow of a rod. And towards others that seem to extort a rod from the master whether he will or not, and (as I may say) will enforce him to fight, he should generally use such clemency in his hand as not to exceed three lashes, in the laying on of which he may contribute more or less weight, with respect to the demerits of the fault. But of this he should always make sure, that he never let the offender go from him with a stubborn look or a stomachful gesture, much less with a squealing outcry or muttering to himself; all which may be easily taken off with another smart jerk or two; but you should rather let him stand aside a little, and see how his stomach will settle.

That a boy may at once know you dare adventure to whip him, and withal how little you delight in his skin, you may at some time when he hath cause to think that he hath well deserved a whipping, and when you have him ready for the rod, pass him over with an admonition to beware another time; and if he again be peccant in the same kind, you may give him more cause at present to remember both his faults together, and for the future to avoid them.

This even and indifferent carriage in rewards and punishments will make those scholars that have any ingenuity in them, less willing to offend, and incline the rest to behave more dutifully, because they see their master bear such a loving mind towards them all, and to be sharp in punishing none but those that know they well deserved what blows they had.

As for those boys that do slight good order, and are apt to stir up others to reject them (which are usually those of bigger stature) that perhaps have not been acquainted with your teaching or government, or know they shall shortly remove from under your command, or those that without any cause love to truant it abroad, or by other licentious demeanor bring disgrace to your school

or offer any affront to yourself, I conceive your best way is (at a fitting opportunity) to send for their parents or friends, with one or two judicious neighbors to be by (where there are no governors of the school) and let them justly know the fault, and adjudge what punishment such a boy deserveth; but if the parents be unwilling to have him corrected for his peremptory disorders, choose rather to send him home with them than retain him any longer, to the disturbance of the school or your own unquiet. This you shall find as an especial remedy to prevent such clamorous outcries of supposed tyranny, when every jerk that is given to a notorious unhappy boy for his insolent misbehavior shall chance to be multiplied in the relating, (like Scoggins' crows,) from three to thirty; which base obloquy and misreport, what hindrance it bringeth to the flourishing of a school, and what unseemly disgrace to a worthy master, I need not mention.

But because such boys as these sometimes are apt to take it as an argument of the master's pusillanimity thus to send for their parents, who generally do not love to hear of their children's faults, the master may take an occasion, where he sees admonitions will not prevail, to watch them more strictly at every turn, and having found them to have committed some gross enormity, to chastise them more smartly than ordinarily, yet so as to show no rigor. And if after that he perceive them willfully to rush into the same acts of lewdness, let him fairly turn them out of his school, and signify the cause to their friends; at whose entreaties he should never take them again, except they will engage to forfeit a sum of money to be bestowed in public books, in case they offend in that nature again.

As for the lesser sort of children, that are apt to reiterate the same fault too often, for which they have sometimes been already corrected, your surest way to reclaim them is, after you have once given them warning, to whip them for a fault, and if that will do no good, to double your strokes the second time; but if a third time they come under the rod and beg heartily for pardon, (as commonly then they will do, fearing lest their punishment should be tripled,) you should not let them pass, except they can procure two of your more orderly boys, or one that is in your favor for his constant well-doing, to give their words for them, and to engage to be whipped for them if ever they do the like. If you see they get sureties to your liking, you may let them escape so; but if they can not, you may adventure to take their own single words; and the care of their sureties, and fear to displease you again, will so work upon them that they will seldom or never do the like afterwards.

Such faults as are viciously enormous are to be duly punished with a rod, according as the obliquity of the will appeareth in them more or less; as for such as are committed for want of understanding, they are to be remedied by due instruction, but those that seem to offend through laziness and careless neglect should be abridged of desired liberty when others have leave to play. The shutting of children up for a while in a dark room, and depriving them of a meal's meat, or the like, (which are used in some tabling schools) as they are not of good report, so they can not be commendably or conveniently used in our greater schools.

But these things I leave to the discretion of every prudent master, who is able to judge of every particular action by its several circumstances, and to take such course as he sees best available for the orderly management of his own school, especially where he is not tied to any rules of government.

IX.-Of Scholars writing their Exercises fair, and of keeping their books handsome. And of erecting a School Library for the master's recreation therein, at vacant hours.

Though the teaching of children to write a fair hand doth properly belong to writing-masters, as professors of that art, yet the care of seeing that all they write in paper books and loose papers by way of exercises be neatly done, doth pertain to every schoolmaster; and therefore we shall here touch a little concerning that, and also show what heed is to be taken about keeping their books. The usual way for scholars learning to write at the country grammar-schools, is to entertain an honest and skillful penman, that he may constantly come and continue with them about a month or six weeks together every year, in which time commonly every one may learn to write legibly. The best season for such a man's coming is about May-day, partly because the days are then pretty long, and partly because it will be requisite for such as are then getting their grammar rudiments, to learn to write before they come to translations. The parents of all other children should be advised to let them take that opportunity to improve their hands, forasmuch as the benefit thereof will far exceed the charge, and it will be a means of better order to have all employed together about a thing so necessary. The master of the school should often have an eye upon them, to see what they do and how they profit, and that they may not slack in their other learning, he may hear them a part at morn, and a lesson at noon before their copies be set or their books can be provided for them, and proportion their weekly exercises accordingly. And that the stock which they then get may be better increased against the next year, the penman should cause them to write a piece, a day or two before he leave them, as fair as they can, with the date above it, and their names subscribed underneath, which the schoolmaster may safely keep by him as a testimony of what they can perform, and take care to see that their writing for the future be not much worse. This pattern or copy I formerly received from that industrious penman, Mr. Roger Evans, who had sometimes taught me to write, being a scholar at Wakefield, and afterwards yearly taught my scholars whilst I was schoolmaster at Roth. erham.

June 1, 1635.

A man can not any way enter into the canonized rule to come to God's holy will and kingdom, except he reform, and become acquainted with virtuous manners, in most prudent sort that may be, &c. ROGER EVANS.

But in London, (which of all places I know in England is best for the full improvement of children in their education, because of the variety of objects which daily present themselves to them, or may easily be seen once a year by walking to Mr. John Tradescant's, or the like houses or gardens where rarities are kept, a book of all which might deserve to be printed, as that ingenuous gentleman hath lately done his by the name of Museum Tradescantianum, a Collection of Rarities; could parents at home but half so well look to their behaviour as the masters do to their learning at school,) it is ordinary for scholars at eleven and five o'clock to go to the writing schools, and there to benefit themselves in writing. In that city, therefore, having the opportunity of the neighborhood of my singular loving friend, Mr. James Hodder, (whose copy

books of late printed do sufficiently testify his ability for the profession he hath undertaken, and of whose care and pains I have had abundant trial by his profiting of my scholars for (at least) twelve years together, who had most of them learned of him to write a very fair hand, not to speak of arithmetic or merchants' accounts, which they gained also by his teaching at spare times,) in the Token-house garden in Lothbury, somewhat near the Old Exchange, I so ordered the business with him that all my lower scholars had their little paper books ruled, wherein they wrote their lessons fairly, and then their translations and other exercises in loose papers in his sight, until they were able of themselves to do every thing in a handsome manner. And afterwards it is not to be expressed what pleasure they took in writing and flourishing their exercises all the while they continued with me at the school. This or a better course (perhaps) may be taken at other schools where they have a writing-master constant and ready to attend them every day throughout the year, as I have heard Mr. Farnaby made use of Mr. Taylor, a famous penman, for the teaching of his scholars to write. If at any time a scholar doth not write his exercises in the fairest manner that he is able, his punishment may be to write them over again whilst others play. I have been told of a porter that could neither write nor read, who, if at any time he had seen his son write his exercises at home in a worse hand than he thought he was able to do, would tear them to pieces, and thus at last enforced the scholar upon a very good hand of writing; which rude kind of dealing with a child I would have no parents to imitate, yet I would advise them sometimes to look upon their children's writing at home, and to encourage them to do it in the neatest fashion. For as it will be an ornament to them in their learning and an especial furtherance of their studies or future employments elsewhere, so it will be a great ease to the master in the perusal of what they have written, I, with some others, have been sorry to see some of that reverend and learned Mr. Hooker's sermons come in manuscript to the press, and not to have been possible to be printed, because they were so scribblingly written that nobody could read three words together in them. It is commonly objected to the best scholars in any of the three professions, that they write the worst hands, and therefore I wish that care may be taken to prevent that objection at the school to a future generation.

Now to train up scholars as well in calligraphy as orthography, whilst they write their translations in a paper book, they should often be admonished,

1. To keep a large margin on both sides, and to leave the space of a long letter's length betwixt every line, and of a small letter's breadth betwixt every word, and to regard the proportion of every particular letter, and the difference betwixt j and i, and v and u, and above all to beware of blotting or soiling their books.

2. To make every comma, colon, semicolon, period, note of interrogation, parenthesis, and note of admiration, &c., in their due places.

3. To write all their words in an even line with the tops, bellies and bottoms of the letters of an even size, and when they have an occasion to divide any word, to part it by its just syllables, making this mark hyphen (-) at the end of the line. And

4. In Latin to give an adverb or other word its note of difference, and the like, as the grammar will further direct them But for directions in fair writing, I refer him to that sheet which Mr. Hodder hath caused to be printed before his Copybook, which will sufficiently commend its author.

After they have once got a habit of these things, they will more easily observe them in future exercises, the neglect whereof will be harder to remedy afterwards, which I have seen too gross in some men's letters that have come from the universities.

As for books, a care should be first had to procure those of a fair print in good paper, and strongly bound; then the master may more easily see that his scholars keep them all safe and cleanly and free from scribbling or rending, by causing them at a time unexpected to bring all their books before him, and to show their names, together with a note of the price, fairly written in the middle of every one of them, as well as at the beginning or end. And that none may squander his own or pilfer away another's book, or have it carelessly thrown about, or to seek when he should use it, the master may do well to make every scholar once a quarter to deliver him a catalogue of his books, with the day of the month and his name subscribed, which he may lay by him, so as at any time to call him whom he suspecteth to be negligent of his books to a private and particular account of them. That the school may be furnished with all kinds of subsidiary books for the general use of all the scholars, (to be laid up in repositories or presses, as so many little libraries belonging to every form, and to be safely kept under lock and key,) whereof the head boy in each form should take the charge to deliver them out, and see that they be brought in every night without being abused; it would not be amiss that every scholar which is admitted into the school should give 12d. (besides what is accustomed to be paid to the master,) and every one at his removal into a new form should give 12d. likewise, towards the procuring of common books. The master also may do well to stir up his friends that come to visit the school, or especially such as prevail with him for a playday, to contribute somewhat towards the furtherance of children's learning, as well as to be earnestly importunate for that which may hinder it. But where a school is liberally endowed, it would be good that a considerable stock of money were appointed to be laid out yearly in all kinds of school books, whereby the poorer sort of children may have whereon to learn, and they and all other scholars wherewith to help themselves in their lessons and exercises.

And might I become a petitioner to the forementioned trustees for the maintenance of students, or any that are both willing and able to promote the growth of good learning, I should desire that towards the better completing of a grammar-school, there might be a little library well furnished with all sorts of grammars, phrase-books, lexicons, dictionaries, orators, poets, histories, herbals, commentators, scholiasts, antiquaries, critics, and some of the succinctest and choicest authors for matters of humanity, divinity, medicine and law; besides those which treat of every art and science, whether liberal or mechanical, that he that is employed as a professed schoolmaster may thoroughly stock himself with all kinds of learning, and be able to inform his scholars in anything that shall be necessary for them to know. For every new master can not at the first be provided with a good study of books for his own private use and his scholars' benefit, neither indeed at any time can he procure them without great trouble and charge, especially if he live at a place far distant from London. I have observed it therefore as a great point of discretion, as well as a matter of charity, in Mr. Calfe, that in founding his grammar-school at Lewinham. he provided a library for the master's use, as well as a house for him to dwell in.