A dinner was given yesterday week to Lord Lawrence, on
hilt retirement from the Chairmanship of the Metropolitan School Board, by his former colleagues, at which Mr. Forster was pre- sent, and remarked how few countries could boast of such riches as we have in men like Lord Lawrence, who, after governing a great empire and retrieving it from disaster, instead of reposing in triumphant quiet, comes back to work his hardest for the London poor. Mr. Forster went on to say that when Lord Lawrence's life came to be written, the history of the last three years would not be the' least interesting part even of a life so re- markable. Further, he declared that the moderate policy of the London School Board in relation to compulsion and in relation to religious teaching had been the secret of the Board's success, and he dwelt on the trifling rate which would cover the whole of the expenditure contemplated, something like 2d. in the pound,—a 2d. which will save ls. in the cost of pauper- ism and crime. If London can but elect such Parliaments as this educational one has been, repeatedly, and do as good work with them, the impulse given to municipal life will be most salu- tary, and the danger of over-centralisation greatly diminished. The London School Board, a very critical experiment, has been 80 far a brilliant success.
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