expence, and the benefit must be very great: sensible images impress the mind so much more strongly than any ideas conveyed by words. The Annual Expence of the School. Salary to six teachers, at Is. 1d. per Sunday, Books, about £ 16 18 0 5 13 9 £ 22 11 9 The above sum is raised by yearly subscription. Mrs. Stewart and Mrs. Oliver being the principal subscribers, have the entire management of the school. Premiums of clothing to the most deserving children are given once a year: there is no regular fund to provide for this expence, which is defrayed by the profits of balls, and amounts to about 30l, yearly. The premiums are of three degrees. Coats and gowns are given to the best boys and girls, and articles of inferior value to others, in proportion to their merits. There is no public examination of the children as to their learning; but at the distribution of the premiums, the visitors give publicly an account of the progress, behaviour, and attendance of those they superintend, and recommend each for the particular reward of which they think them deserving. In forming. their judgment, the chief thing that influences them is regular attendance; the reason of which is, that as the children, from the difference of their situation, have very unequal means and leisure for improvement during the week, some being at service and others having the advantage of a weekly school, their progress in learn-ing would be a very unfair criterion of their real. merit; whereas those who constantly and regu larly attend the Sunday-school, shew a desire for improvement that certainly deserves encourage ment. Children of all religious persuasions are indiscriminately admitted, have all the same books given to them, and receive exactly the same religious instruction; but no attempt is made at conversion, and they are left at liberty to attend whatever place of worship their parents go to, provided they return to school in the afternoon. The success of the Derryloran Sunday-school may principally be ascribed to three things, viz. to the constant personal attendance of the ladies who superintend it, to the annual distribution of premiums, and to the particular care uniformly taken to avoid all religious distinctions. Many excellent effects have resulted from this establishment. The children, who at first were disgusting, from dirt and rags, in a short time became decent in their appearance, and orderly in their behaviour. The constant attendance of the ladies who superintend the school, is beneficial in so many respects, that it is hardly possible to enumerate them. They are more capable of instructing the children, by conversing with and asking them questions, than the common masters and mistresses; and advice, praise, or censure, comes with more weight from them, and has a better effect: this familiar intercourse creates a reciprocal attachment between them and the children, which even extends to the parents, who, as far as we can judge, have been in every instance fully sensible of and grateful for the benefits their children have derived; and so far from encouraging levelling principles, it encreases respect, founded on gratitude and esteem. In some instances, persons who, before the establishment of the Sunday-school, had scarcely ever been seen at church, became afterwards regular in at tendance at church and at the sacrament; which we cannot help attributing to the instruction and books their children received at the school. Others, who could not read themselves, have expressed with the utmost thankfulness, the delight they experienced from their children being able to read the Bible to them on a Sunday, or during sickness. As far as our knowledge extends, we have great reason to be satisfied with the subsequent conduct of the children educated at this school; in some instances particularly so. There is no school of industry in the parish; but the visitors to the Sunday-school, as an encouragement to little girls who are particularly diligent, often send them to a working-school during the week. Some of them have lately experienced great satisfaction from the benefits resulting from the giving spinning-wheels to children of seven or eight years old, who before were idle for want of one; though perhaps able to spin only one dozen in a week, yet by a steady perseverance in spinning that quantity regularly, they have in the course of a few months clothed themselves from head to foot. A pound or two of flax given as a reward for industry, has been found an excellent spur. OBSERVATIONS. The account of this school presents a striking example of the efficacy of personal superintend ence, confirmed by the experience of ten years. In some instances, the difference of religious sects. in this kingdom, the indifference of parents to the instruction of their children, and a variety of other circumstances, have been represented as unsurmountable impediments to the success of such an establishment. Before the steady zeal and unabating perseverance of the ladies who have superintended Derryloran Sunday-school, all these difficulties have been found to melt away; and though there are several instances in which institutions of the same kind have been attended with success in this kingdom, we have met with none more calculated to animate and encourage similar undertakings than the present. The superintendence of the rich is the grand principle of success in every undertaking for the relief or instruction of the poor: it convinces them that their interests are an object of affectionate concern with their wealthier neighbours, and excites them to co-operate in every scheme instituted for their advantage; it cannot fail to have a beneficial effect upon their manners, and to promote civilization amongst them; and by making them feel inequality of rank and wealth as the immediate source of blessings and comforts, must furnish the best practical answer to all factious declamation on the equality of mankind. No. VI. An Account of Cookstown Charitable Communicated by the same. THE necessity of some effectual provision for the poor, had long been felt by the inhabitants of Cookstown; they were not only infested by swarms of beggars from all parts of the country, but it was known that much misery existed throughout the parish, beyond what it was in the of individuals to relieve; and while many power an old inhabitant, reduced by sickness or age, or burthened with a large family, suffered extreme distress, the charitable were often imposed upon by the fictitious tale of an artful stranger. From an inquiry by the churchwardens, it appeared that between fifty and sixty families were in great poverty and distress, though very few of that number were of the description of common beggars, and not half of them were on the churchlist; consequently they had no resource but in the casual bounty of individuals. To remedy these inconveniences, to provide relief for the really-deserving poor, to exclude the idle and worthless, to relieve sickness, to prevent beggary, and encourage industry, a plan was proposed and has been adopted, the idea of which was suggested by the perusal of a pamphlet, entitled, "An Account of the Management of the Poor at Hamburgh *." In May 1799, the first quarter of an annual subscription of 105/. was collected, and a meeting called of the subscribers, out of whom were chosen three directors, nine overseers, a physician, treasurer, and manager of flax. The poor of the parish was afterwards divided amongst the overseers, allotting to each three a particular district. They were instructed to visit and make strict inquiry into the circumstances and character of every person applying for relief; to report their situation to the directors, together with their own opinion of the relief required. To assist them in these inquiries, they were provided with a printed list of questions, the answers to which they were to write upon the blank column of the page. * Printed at Dugdale's, and in 7th No. of the Reports of the Society for bettering the Condition of the Poor in England. |