the school-house, but bequeathing property to support them, are called Endowed Schools. Such is the wealth of the Harpur estate, that the funds are applied to other benevolent purposes besides the education of youth; for the extraordinary increase of the revenue occasioned the trustees to apply to parliament to regulate its disposal, and extend the objects of the charity. Eight hundred pounds are annually given as marriage portions to forty young women, (daughters of ten years householders of Bedford,) in sums of twenty pounds each, or ten in every quarter. Fifteen hundred pounds are annually reserved for apprenticing boys and girls; and premiums are given for length and fidelity of service; two pounds for every year, and five pounds for every fifth year; and good apprentices, at the expiration of their indentures, are entitled to rewards of ten pounds or twenty pounds. The effects of such liberality are visible in the manners and morals of the people throughout the neighbourhood. Servants entitled to these advantages are anxiously sought for, and there are in the gaols comparatively few prisoners.

The suppression of the monasteries, as we have just explained, led to the increase of schools in England; while the clergy were enjoined by proclamation" to exhort the people to teach their children the Lord's Prayer, the Creed, and the Ten Commandments in English," the service of the church having been previously performed

in Latin. In this reign also the first edition of the whole bible, in English, was published, with a dedication to Henry; and about the year 1536, bibles were ordered to be set up in some convenient place within the churches, that the parishioners might read them; and by a proclamation in the year 1539, it was ordained that every parish should buy a Bible, under the penalty of forty shillings; the price of which, bound, with clasps, was forty shillings.

In the reign of Henry's successor, Edward VI. the public libraries were plundered by the Reformers. In that at Oxford, books and manuscripts were destroyed without distinction: thousands of volumes were condemned as useless, and those of geometry and astronomy were supposed to contain nothing but necromancy or magic.

Edward VI. was a diligent, docile, gentle, sprightly boy, whose proficiency in every branch of study was remarkable. One of his tutors was Sir Anthony Cook, a man eminent for his literary acquirements. This king died in his sixteenth year; but the diary of his life, written with neatness and correctness, proves that he merits much of the praise bestowed on him by historians of the time.

Among the distinguished characters of this period must be named, Roger Ascham, who was Latin secretary to Edward VI., to Mary, and to Elizabeth. Ascham contrived to introduce an easy and natural style in English writing,

instead of the taste of his day, by which books were filled with words and phrases intelligible only to a few readers: he adopted, he tells us, the counsel of an ancient writer, "to speak as the common people do, to think as wise men do." The study of the Greek language was the fashion of this day, and Ascham informs us that the princess Elizabeth understood Greek better than the clergy of Windsor. One of Ascham's works was on shooting; for, at this time fire-arms were so little known, that the term shooting was confined to the bow, then this weapon of our hardy countrymen, and its use was part of an English education. In this work Ascham says: I have written this English matter in the English language for Englishmen." Another of his works is entitled The Schoolmaster, to teach children to understand, write, and speak the Latin tongue," and this little book he bequeathed to his family as "the right way to good learning." Ascham died suddenly, and Elizabeth is said to have declared that she would rather have forfeited ten thousand pounds than have lost her tutor.

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Of the education and early days of Lady Jane Grey, we have many interesting particulars. This beauteous lady was born at Bradgate, near Leicester, in 1587. Part of her father's mansion yet remains, including a tower, which tradition assigns as that occupied by the Lady Jane. She received her early education from Aylmer, domestic chaplain to her father, and

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afterwards made bishop of London by Queen Elizabeth. At the age of seventeen, Jane was well skilled in the Hebrew, Greek, and Latin languages, and in the study of divinity, as appears by her writings. Ascham, of whom we have just spoken, visited the Lady Jane at Bradgate, where he found her reading in Greek, Plato's Dialogue on the Immortality of the Soul, while the rest of the family were hunting in the park. Ascham asked her why she did not join the chase: smiling she answered," All their sport in the park is but a shadow to the pleasure that I find in Plato: alas! good folk, they never felt what true pleasure meant.' Ascham asked her what chiefly allured her to this deep knowledge, "seeing that not many women, but very few men have attained thereunto:" she replied: "One of the greatest benefits that ever God gave me, is, that he sent me so sharp and severe parents, and so gentle a schoolmaster. For when I am in presence either of father or mother, whether I speak, keep silence, sit, stand, or go, eat, drink, be merry, or sad, be sewing, playing, dancing, or anything else, I must do it so perfectly as God made the world, or else I am so sharply taunted, so cruelly threatened, with pinches, nips, and bobs;" suffering till time come that I must go to Mr. Aylmer, who teacheth me so gently, so pleasantly, with such fair allurements to learning, that I think all the time nothing while I am with him. And when I am called from him, I

fall on weeping, because, whatever I do else but learning, is full of grief, trouble, fear, and whole misliking unto me: and thus my book hath been so much my pleasure and more, that in respect of it all other pleasure, indeed, be but trifles and troubles unto me." Her love of learning and private life even induced her to refuse the crown; but, overcome by the ambitious entreaties of her husband, she became queen but for nine days, when Mary being acknowledged sovereign, the unfortunate Jane was executed for treason on Tower Hill, Feb. 12, 1554. In the morning she wrote a Greek letter to her sister on the blank leaf of a Testament in the same language, and in her note-book three sentences in Greek, Latin, and English, of which the last is as follows:"If my faults deserved punishment, my youth, at least, and my imprudence, were worthy of excuse. God and posterity will show me favour."

Mary was brought up under her mother Catherine of Arragon: little is recorded of her education, though she is said to have possessed a share of the distinguishing vigour and ability of her family. Of the education of Elizabeth, we have more gratifying report. Ascham, her master, was proud of being preceptor to the greatest pupil in England. Through his instruction she became familiar, in her sixteenth year, with Greek and Latin. She, like her royal predecessor, King Alfred, completed an English translation from the Greek of Boethius's