December 1852, amounts to 4,000,000 of tonnage, and is annually growing at the rate of 300,000 tons.*

Banking houses and insurance companies are established throughout the Union. Steamers throng the coast and rivers to the amount of 400,000 tons, and are claimed as an American invention. In other respects, the advance of this nation is interesting to England. The United States, not content with the vast emigration they annually absorb, have borrowed at least one third of the sailors of the British nation, and placing them before the mast, officer their ships with young Americans. They then navigate them with half the crews employed by other nations, viz., with two or three men only to the 100 tons, command high freights, and perform their voyages with certainty and despatch.

They have copied, too, the railway, almost as soon as England had invented it; and have not only given it a wide diffusion, but import from England a large part of their rails, and then manage their iron ways with less expense, with more profit, and with lower charges than are customary in England. By what appliances has this nation, in a little more than half a century, thus emerged from poverty and weakness, absorbed and civilised the outcasts of Europe, and been able to achieve such remarkable changes?

The inquiry is one of no common interest to the world. Should the population of the United States progress for one century more as it has done for the past sixty years, and the Union continue, the number of its inhabitants would exceed 300,000,000. Such a people, fronting on two oceans with a temperate climate and vast expanse of country, must exert, under any circumstances, an increasing influence over the globe. What agencies are at work to shape and temper that influence? The progress of the United States of America is often ascribed to their form of government; this combines many features of the English, and is borrowed in part from the institutions of England. It has doubtless aided their growth, although it does not uniformly draw into the public service the highest order of

Registered, enrolled, and licensed tonnage of

United States, June 30th, 1850

ditto June 30th, 1851

Vessels built in United States, year ending June 30th,

1850, 1360

ditto

ditto

tonnage

June 30th, 1851, 1367: tonnage

ditto 1852, 1448: tonnage

3,535,454,28 - 3,772,439, +3

100

See U. S. documents, Commerce and Navigation, 1852 and 1853.'

character. But republics have neither stability nor safety, unless founded on virtue and intelligence. We have seen the republics of Mexico and La Plata alternating with despotism; and the republic of France revolutionised in a night. We must look behind the constitution of the United States at the knowledge and virtue which characterise their citizens, at the culture and training which foster those indispensable requisites.

Education is not indissolubly connected with any frame of government. It may be cherished and flourish under a limited monarchy or a republic. It is requisite for the full development of each. And while efforts are made to extend it in England, it may not be amiss to inquire how far it has been cultivated, and what shape it is assuming, on the other side of the Atlantic. If the plant shows a novel hue or more vigorous growth West of the Atlantic, the system of the Western gardener demands attention. And if we find there unprecedented results from the action of mind on matter, we may well ask what has roused that mind to action? what has given an impulse and direction to its movements? Let us take a brief view of Education in the United States.

Many of the early settlers of New England and the Middle States were men of letters: they carried with them a love for learning to the wilderness. They considered it essential to their progress, and founded schools and colleges as soon as they had gained a foot-hold in the country. Schools soon multiplied; colleges were established in Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New Jersey. The fame of Harvard, Yale, and Princeton reached the mother country before the Revolution, and found many benefactors in the British Isles. In these colleges were reared some of the prominent leaders in the Revolution, and many of the statesmen who framed the Constitution.

The State of Massachusetts, one of the oldest of the original thirteen, was particularly active in the cause of letters. As early as 1635 the public Latin school was founded in Boston, and soon after, every town containing 100 families was required to maintain a school, with a teacher competent to fit youth for the University. Three colleges were subsequently founded in Massachusetts.

The deep-seated respect for learning is evinced by the Constitution and laws adopted by this State. By its constitution (chap. v. sect. 2.) it is made the duty of the magistrates and legislatures, To cherish the interests of literature and science, ' and all seminaries of them, and to countenance and inculcate the ' principles of humanity and general benevolence, public and 'private charity, industry and frugality, honesty and punctuality

' in their dealings, sincerity and good humour, all social affections and generous sentiments among the people.'

In accordance with the Constitution, the revised statutes provide for a school, to be opened at least six months annually, in each town containing fifty householders; for similar schools, and instruction in book-keeping, surveying, geometry and algebra, in all towns containing 500 householders; and in towns containing 4000 inhabitants, for the continuance of such schools for at least ten months, with masters competent to teach rhetoric, logic, history, and the Greek and Latin languages.

By such statutes (chap. xxiii. sect. 7.) provision is expressly made for instruction in morals; and all teachers are required to impress on the minds of the children and youth committed to 'their care and instruction, the principles of piety, justice, and 'sacred regard to truth, love to their country, humanity and 'universal benevolence, sobriety, industry, frugality, chastity, 'moderation and benevolence, and those other virtues which are 'the ornament of human society.'

By sect. 8. of the same chapter it is provided that 'It 'shall be the duty of the resident ministers of the Gospel, the 'select men and school committee in the several towns, to exert 'their influence, and use their best endeavours that the youth ' of their town shall regularly attend the schools established for 'their instruction.'

To defray the expenses of education no specified tax is imposed, and it remains optional with each town to raise any amount found requisite. But a school fund has been formed, and no town can participate in the income of the fund unless it raises by tax at least one dollar and a half for every child within its limits, between the age of five and fifteen years; and the spirit of the citizens is evinced by the fact, that the average sum raised by voluntary tax for each child within the age for education, is nearly threefold the amount prescribed by statute.

Boston, the ancient capital of this State, has ever taken a distinguished part in the culture of learning. Its Latin school and other institutions stood high before the Revolution, but have made great progress since.

Before this period, females did not participate in the benefits of the public schools; but in 1789 they were permitted to attend. Down to 1817 pupils were not admitted to the public schools until they had learned to read; but in that year primary schools were opened for both sexes. In 1821 a public high school was established in Boston, which now contains nearly 200 pupils, under four highly educated teachers, and gives instruction in drawing, book-keeping, elocution, the higher mathematics,

The

logic, philosophy, the French and Spanish languages. public Latin school, with five able masters, and 195 pupils, prepares youth for the Universities.

A normal school accommodating 200 girls, who have completed with success the course of studies in the grammar schools, under the instruction of five accomplished teachers, qualifies every year nearly 100 graduates to perform the duties of teacher in the schools for the younger children.

Reading, spelling, arithmetic, and music are taught in all the primary schools, and to these branches are added in the grammar schools, writing, geography, English grammar, history, and exercises in writing the English language for all the pupils and declamation for the boys. In proportion to her population, Boston expends annually a larger amount of money for public schools than any city in the United States. Boston has now

more than 1,200,000 dollars invested in schoolhouses; and with a population of 138,000, has 22,000 in her public schools, employs 350 teachers, and expends annually more than 300,000 dollars for the education of the people. All these schools are free, and three officers are employed to look after truant and idle children, and to induce their parents to send them to school. And yet Boston is aiming at a still higher standard of popular education, and in order to attain it employs a superintendent who, in the language of the law defining his duties, shall ' devote himself to the study of the school system, and of the condition of the schools, and shall keep himself acquainted with 'the progress of instruction and discipline in other places, in order to suggest appropriate means for the advancement of the public 'schools in this city."

6

Under these heavy disbursements for education, the city has made rapid progress in wealth, commerce, and population,—has taken the lead in manufactures, railways, the India trade, and the improvement of naval architecture. Its progress will appear in the following table based upon official documents:

While the capital of the State has been active in the advance

*The Boston clipper, Sovereign of the Sea,' a ship of 2200 tons, with a crew of 35 men, is reported in the New York Journal of May last, to have made her passage from the Sandwich Islands, around Cape Horn, to New York, in 80 days; and in one day to have run

ment of letters, the State government has not been unmindful of its duties under the constitution and laws. Aid has been given by liberal grants to the university and colleges; three normal schools for the education of teachers have been established at the public expense. A Board of Education has been created, composed of the principal officers of State, with a working secretary and two agents who traverse the State, and draw attention by addresses and conference with teachers to school architecture, the best modes of teaching, and the importance of a higher standard of education.

Institutes, or meetings of teachers and friends of education, are held in various parts of the State, under the sanction of the Board of Education, and a corps of professors employed to address them on the best mode of imparting knowledge, and to lecture on grammar, elocution, arithmetic, music, and drawing. Professors Guyot and Agassiz are now engaged in that duty. Four or five days are devoted to each of these institutes, and so popular and useful are these meetings, that the cities and villages where they are held, provide lodgings for the teachers at their own expense, and are clamorous for their turns.

Under the stimulus thus given to education, we are not surprised to learn, from the report of the Board, that in this small State, with a harsh climate and sterile soil, with but 7,600 square miles of surface, and 1,000,000 of people, there were, in 1851, 3,987 schools, or one for 2 square miles of surface, and an annual expenditure on schools, including buildings, not far from 1,500,000 dollars, or to learn the facts condensed in the following table:

430 miles, or 18 miles per hour. Another clipper, of 4000 tons, to carry four masts, was in May last on the stocks at Boston.

VOL. XCVIII. NO. CXCIX.

N