Part 13

We think it needless to enter upon this topic, for if the reason here alleged be valid as against the parish schools, it is also valid as against the parish churches--against, in a word, the whole system of the national religious Establishment; and we trust that the time is not yet come when the propriety of overthrowing that institution, and--for all must stand or fall together--those of the sister kingdoms, admits of serious discussion. It is worthy of notice, however, in passing, not only that such is at bottom the true state of the question, but that, with almost the whole of the advocates of a change, it is acknowledged to be so; and that that change, like the similar proposed innovations in the universities, and like the Lord Advocate's Marriage and Registration Bills, is mainly desired, when desired at all, as an important step towards the gradual accomplishment of an ulterior object, which it is not yet expedient to seek by open and straightforward means.

Before concluding this protest against the sweeping measures proposed by Lord Melgund and the party which he represents, it is right to take some notice of another question. Is the school system of Scotland incapable of any alteration whatever for the better? Granting that its fundamental principles ought to remain intact, may it not, and should it not, be rendered more efficient in the details of its administration, by the aid of the legislature?

One matter of detail which has been often pointed out as calling for legislative interference, is the difficulty, under the present law, of relieving parishes from the burden of incompetent schoolmasters, and particularly of schoolmasters who have become unfit for their duties by age or infirmity. Unhappily there are no retiring allowances provided in the parochial school system of Scotland. The consequence is, that it depends upon the mere liberality of the heritors--who however, to their honour, are seldom found wanting in such cases--whether a man who has outlived his usefulness shall continue to exercise his functions. For this evil it is very desirable that the obvious remedy should be furnished; and we think that there are no insurmountable practical difficulties to arrangements on the subject being carried into effect. It might also be proper to give greater facilities to presbyteries in dismissing teachers for wilful neglect of duty--a contingency which it is right to mention is both of very rare occurrence, and is best provided against by care in the selection, on the part of the heritors, and in the rigorous exercise by presbyteries of their large powers of examination and rejection, when the appointments are originally made.

With regard to the existing salaries, their inadequacy has been already insisted upon. Nor, for many reasons, can we accept the recently propounded--if it can be said to be propounded, for its terms are not a little ambiguous--plan of the Privy Council's Committee for their augmentation as any remedy whatever. That plan--not to speak of more serious objections to it--includes certain conditions which are so framed, as practically to exclude from participation in the grant all parishes except the wealthiest and most liberal, which, of course, least need it. It is enough to mention here, that one of the conditions on which this grant, in every case, depends, is the _voluntary_ concurrence of the heritors themselves in the payment of a considerable proportion of any addition to the present salary. We, of course, wish, that eventually some truly practicable means may be adopted to secure for the parish schoolmasters, throughout the country, allowances more in proportion than their present pittances to the importance--which can hardly be overrated--of their duties, and, we may add, to their merits.

These matters of detail admit, we repeat, of improvement. It is desirable that something should be done in the case of both. Better, however, a hundredfold, that things should remain altogether as they are, than that the principles lying at the foundation of the system should be shaken. It is to be hoped that the Church will be true to herself in regard to the question of pecuniary aid either from government, or by government legislation; refusing for its sake to compromise in the least degree her sacred rights--or let us rather call them her sacred duties--of superintendence; Better to be poor than not pure.

One word more. Alarming as is the proposal of the member for Greenock, we have to state, with great regret, that it does no more than confirm apprehensions for the safety of a system hitherto found to work well, which have been awakened by actual proceedings already adopted. It is impossible that any one can have watched the gradual development of the plan, in regard particularly, though not exclusively, to Scotland, of that anomalous board, the Privy Council's Committee on Education, without being persuaded that they are, we do not say intended, but, at least, most nicely adapted to the eventual attainment of the very same object which Lord Melgund would accomplish _per saltum_. The every-day increasing claims of the Board to a right of interference with the internal management of all schools, its assumption of apparently unlimited legislative powers, and its continual indications of special hostility to the parochial school system, constitute an ominous combination of unfavourable circumstances. Even in the act of ostensibly aiding, it is secretly undermining that system. It is not only weakening its efficiency by the encouragement of rival schools--_rival_ in the strictest sense of the term--but, by its grants to the parish schools themselves, on the conditions now exacted, it is purchasing the power, and preparing the way, for an eventual absorption of these schools in a comprehensive system to be under its own exclusive control, and to be regulated by principles at direct variance with those under the influence of which, in the schools of Scotland, have been for nearly two centuries brought up a people--we may say it with some pride--not behind any other in intelligence, or in moral and religious worth.

FOOTNOTES:

[11] _Remarks on the Government Scheme of National Education in Scotland_, 1848.

[12] We observe, however, that by the Parliamentary Returns of 1834, the school accommodation was even then considerably greater than is here stated. The greatest number attending the parish school was 246, and non-parochial schools 443; which, to the population there given of 3210, was nearly a proportion of 1 in 5 of the inhabitants--a larger proportion than in Prussia!

[13] They have taken care to sound the committee on the subject, and have received an answer encouraging enough. The following extract is from their report of a deputation to the Lord President:--"2. In regard to applications for annual grants under the minutes, it was asked--What evidence will ordinarily be required to satisfy the Committee of the Privy Council that any particular school is needed in the district in which it stands, and that it ought to be recognised as entitled to its fair share of the grant equally with others similarly situated? Supposing, in any given school, all the other conditions, as to pecuniary resources, the qualifications of teachers, &c., satisfactorily complied with, will it be held enough to have the report of the Government inspector or inspectors that a sufficient number of children (say 50 or 60 in the country, and 90 or 100 in towns) either are actually in attendance upon the school, or engaged to attend, _without the question being raised as to the contiguity of other schools_ of a different denomination, or the amount of vacant accommodation in such schools? In reply, it was stated that the Committee of Privy Council could not limit their discretion in judging of the comparative urgency of applications; their lordships were disposed to receive representations, and to inquire as to the sufficiency of the existing school accommodation; and they would also consider any other ground which might be urged for the erection of a new school where a school or schools had been previously established."--_Minutes for 1847-8_, vol. l, p. lxiv.

[14] _Schoolmasters' Memorial_, p. 3.

[15] In many parishes side schools are built and endowed, in addition to the parish school, from the same funds: the salary in these cases being fixed by the Act at about £17.

[16] _Parliamentary Inquiry_, 1837, _Appendix_.

[17] That the presbytery has the power of insisting upon qualifications supplementary to those prescribed by the heritors, was decided, we think about a dozen years ago, in the case of Sprouston.

[18] The Church herself, to a considerable extent, supplements deficiencies in the legal school provision by means of her "Education Scheme," whose object and efficiency may be partly gathered from the two first sentences of the last report of the managing committee:--

"The schools under the charge of your committee (as has often been stated) are intended to form auxiliaries to the parish schools, not to compete or interfere with these admirable institutions; and, accordingly, are never planted except where, owing to local peculiarities, it is impossible that all the youth of the district requiring instruction can be gathered into one place. While much needed, your schools continue to be most useful; and, indeed, by the divine blessing, they appear to have been rendered eminently beneficial.

"The number of schools under the care of your committee may be reported of thus:--Those situated in the Highlands and Islands, 125; those in the Lowlands, 64; and those planted at the expense of the Church of Scotland's Ladies' Gaelic School Society, and placed under your committee's charge, 20; in all, 209."

ARARAT AND THE ARMENIAN HIGHLANDS.[19]

It were a worthy and novel undertaking for a man of science, enterprise, and letters, to explore and describe in succession the most celebrated of the earth's mountains. And we know of no person better fitted for such a task, and likely to accomplish it with more honour to himself and advantage to the world, than the persevering traveller and able writer, the title of whose latest work heads this page. Has he allotted himself that task? We cannot say; but what he has already done looks like its commencement, and he has time before him to follow the path upon which he has so successfully and creditably entered. In Dr Moritz Wagner we have an instance of a strong natural bent forcing its way in defiance of obstacles. Compelled by the pressure of peculiar circumstances to abandon his academical studies at Augsburg before they were completed, and to devote himself to commercial pursuits, he entered a merchant's house at Marseilles. Business took him to Algiers, and his visit to that country, then in the early years of French occupation, roused beyond the possibility of restraint the ardent thirst for travel and knowledge which had always been one of his characteristics. Abandoning trade, he returned to Germany and devoted himself to the study of natural history, and especially to that of zoology, which he had cultivated in his youth. In 1836, being then in his twenty-ninth year, he started from Paris for Algeria, where he travelled for two years, sharing, in the capacity of member of a scientific commission, in the second and successful expedition to Constantina. It is a peculiarity, and we esteem it laudable, of many German travellers of the more reflective and scientific class, that they do not rush into type before the dust of the journey is shaken from their feet, but take time to digest and elaborate the history of their researches. Thus it was not until three years after his return to Europe, that Dr Wagner sent forth from his studious retirement at Augsburg an account of his African experiences, in a book which still keeps the place it at once took as the best upon that subject in the German language.[20] The work had not long been issued to the public, when its author again girded himself for the road. This time his footsteps were turned eastwards; Asia was his goal: he passed three busy and active years in Turkey and Russia, Circassia and Armenia. The strictly scientific results of this long period of observant travel and diligent research are reserved for a great work, now upon the anvil. To the general reader Dr Wagner addressed, a few months ago, two volumes of remarkable spirit and interest, which we recently noticed; and he now comes forward with a third, in its way equally able and attractive. The apparent analogy between the subjects of the two books, as treating of contiguous countries and nations, but slightly cloaks their real contrast. The two mountain ranges, whose world-renowned names figure on their title-pages, are, although geographically adjacent to each other, as far apart as the antipodes in their history and associations, and in the character of their inhabitants. Of the one the traditions are biblical, of the other pagan and mythological. Upon a crag of Caucasus Prometheus howls, and Medea culls poison at its base; upon Ararat's summit the ark reposes, and Noah, stepping forth upon the soaked and steaming earth, founds the village of Arguri, and plants the first vine in its valley. In modern days the contrast is not less striking. Amongst the Caucasian cliffs the rattle of musketry, the howl of warlike fanatics, the glitter of Mahomedan mail, the charging hoofs of chivalrous squadrons, the wave of rich robes and the gleam of costly weapons purchased with the flesh and blood of Circassia's comely daughters. "Curse upon the Muscovite! Freedom or death!" is here the cry. Upon Ararat's skirts how different the scene and sounds! Cloisters and churches, monks and bishops, precious relics and sainted sites, the monotonous chant of priests and the prayer-bell's musical clang, the holy well of Jacob and the vestiges of Noah's floating caravan.[21] Dr Wagner esteems his journey to Armenia one of the most interesting episodes of his three years' Asiatic wanderings. In the preface to its record, he pays a handsome and well-deserved tribute to the enterprise of English travellers--to the names of Ker Porter, Wilbraham, Fraser, Hamilton, Ainsworth, and many others--who have contributed more, he says, to our geographical knowledge of Asia, than the learned travellers of all the other nations of Europe. He himself, he modestly and truly intimates, has added in the present volume to the store of information.

"When I undertook, in the year 1843, a journey to Russian Armenia, Mount Ararat was the object I had particularly in view. Various circumstances then compelled me to content myself with a visit to the north side of that mountain. But in the following year, during my journey to Turkish Armenia and Persia, it was vouchsafed me to explore the previously entirely unknown south side of the Ararat group, and to abide upon Turkish and Persian territory, in the vicinity of the mighty boundary-stone of three great empires. The striking position of Ararat, almost equidistant from China and from the Iberian peninsula, from the ice-bound Lena in the high northern latitudes of Siberia, and from the slimy current of the Ganges in Southern Hindostan, has at all periods attracted the attention of geographers. For years I had harboured the ardent wish to visit the mysterious mountain. Towering in the centre of the Old Continent, an image of the fire whose mighty remains extend to the regions of eternal ice, Ararat is indicated by Jewish and Armenian tradition as the peak of refuge, round which the deluge roared, unable to overflow it. From the summit of the gigantic cone descended the pairs of all creatures, whose descendants people the earth."

On Ararat, as in many other places, tradition and science disagree. Diluvial traces are sought there in vain. On the other hand, evidences of volcanic devastation on every side abound; and a wish to investigate this, and to ascertain the details of the subterranean commotion that had destroyed Arguri three years previously, was one of the principal motives of Dr Wagner's visit to Armenia. Towards the middle of May he started from Tefflis, the most important town of the Russian trans-Caucasian provinces, accompanied by Abowian, a well-educated Armenian and accomplished linguist, and attended by Ivan, the doctor's Cossack, a sharp fellow, and a faithful servant after his kind, but, like all his countrymen, an inveterate thief. Their vehicle was a Russian _telega_, or posting carriage, springless, and a perfect bone-setter on the indifferent roads of Armenia. They travelled in company with that well-known original and indefatigable traveller, General Baron Von Hallberg,[22] of whose appearance, and of the sensation it excited in the streets of Erivan, Dr Wagner gives an amusing account:--

"Amongst the travellers was a strange figure, around which the inquisitive mob assembled, with expressions of the utmost wonderment. It was that of an old man, hard upon eighty, but who, nevertheless, sprang into the carriage, and took his seat beside a young Russian lady, with an air of juvenile vigour. From his chin and furrowed cheeks fell a venerable gray beard, half concealing the diamond-studded order of St Anna, which hung round his neck, whilst upon his left breast four or five other stars and crosses glittered from under the black Russian caftan, and his bald head was covered by a red Turkish fez, to the front of which a leathern peak was sewn. 'Who can he be?' murmured the curious Armenians and Tartars, who could not reconcile the old gentleman's brilliant decorations with his coachman's caftan and Turkish cap. 'Certainly a general, or perhaps a great lord from the emperor's court--a man of the first _tschin_!'--'Or mayhap a foreign ambassador!' quoth others. 'Since he wears the fez, he must come from Stamboul.' A Munich _gamin_ would have enlightened the good folks of Erivan. The interesting stranger, as some of my readers may already have conjectured, was no other than Baron Von Hallberg of Munich, (known also as the Hermit of Gauting,) my much-respected countryman. I made the acquaintance of this remarkable man, and great traveller, in 1836, at Algiers, where we passed many a cheerful day together, in the society of some jovial fellow-countrymen. After a lapse of seven years, I again met him at Tefflis, and we travelled together to Armenia. Since our parting at the foot of Atlas, he had visited the pyramids of Egypt, and the ruined temples of Heliopolis, and now the unwearied traveller thirsted after a sight of the capital of Persia's kings. He had come down the Wolga, and over the Caucasus, and was about to cross the Persian frontier."