THE RECOLLECTIONS OF AN INSPECTOR OF SCHOOLS.* TREES can be
no doubt about the place which H.M.I. should take in the great multitude of autobiographies and recol- lections. Soldiers, sailors, statesmen, divines,. soholars, jesters, have written such books, and we may doubt which of them is the most complete. This is the classical story of an inspector of schools. The office is, as things go in England, a new one. A man whose years were some way short of the century might well recollect the beginning of it. This, if we remember right, was somewhere about 1839, when the new Committee of Council took over the administration of the Education grant from the Treasury. Mr. Sneyd-Kynnersley, who is still in his sixties, cannot, of course, go back so far, but he saw the beginning and the end of the School Boards. "I watched by their cradle and followed their hearse," he says in Grattan's phrase, and he pronounces over their resting-place a judgment that is not excessive in its praise. The system "provided a body of men who had an opportunity of being acquainted with the wants of the place," who lived near enough to attend the meetings, and who could impose a rate. Of course, it was the case of inefficiency that imprinted itself on the memory of the inspector, and furnishes appro. priate " passages " for the entertainment of his readers. Work well done does not lend itself to picturesque narra- tive. It is folly that makes good stories. We can all enjoy the story of our author's experiences when he was sent down to report on a matter of a disputed site. He found the Chairman at home; the other members were not so easily got at, The rector was very ill. Mr. A did not care to show himself because there was an affiliation summons out against him, and he, being a chapel elder, preferred obscurity. Mr. B and the Chairman were not on good terms,—the Chairman had issued a writ for slander. B came, however, and explained that he was "no scholar " ; be farmed some thousands of acres, but he could not read or write. Mr. 0 remained. He was of the peasant class, and was busy with his hay : "Yu see, Sir, I've a dale of hay out, and I'm a bit hard of hearin', and they du all talk at once." But he quite agreed to what the gentleman thought right. All this is possible enough ; the misfortune was that the small School Boards came into existence where the natural leaders of the people were indifferent, or inefficient, or unpopular. The Board for the island in The Tempest as sketched by one of Mr. Kynnersley's colleagues is an admirable creation. " Prospero —Tory Landlord : Miranda—qualified by entire ignorance to superintend the girls' sewing : Antonio—Liberal, Leader of the Opposition : Stephan° —a drunken butler, repre- senting the Trade : Caliban—Agricultural Labourers' Union." And the Clerk ? Ariel, "who will bamboozle the lot, and My Lords too."
About managers, who were before the Boards were created, and have survived them, though with greatly diminished vitality, H.M.I. has a great deal to say, though much of it, it is true, has nothing to do with the management of schools. Such is the story of Parson "Hugh," who subscribed to no missions except that to the Patagonians, and to this because he under- stood that the savages ate the missionaries. Such, too, is the tale of how Parson Morgan was asked to "cry the nuts" after the Second Lesson. A good lady of the parish had an orchard of nut-trees, and the people were to be warned not to take them under pain of prosecution. The parson said that the nuts ought to be " cried " to the people who were not in church,—a suggestion that takes the edge off not a few sermons. Then there are the stories, Oxford and other, told in the study of Parson Miller,—his Christian name was Joseph, but he is not to be identified with any one in the Clergy List. There is what "Topers "—whom Oxford veterans will easily recognise —said to a Mr. Littler in Collections. "Mr. Littler, your Greek prose is disgusting, your Latin prose is disgusting, your translation is disgusting, and your name is un- grammatical." One of Mr. Miller's guests produces a "chestnut," how a sponsor gives the name of Beelzebub and H.AIL : Some Passages in the Life of One of H.M. Inspectors of Schools. By E. M. Saeyd-Kynseraley. Leaden ; maelawan sad. co, Da fd, mid the. clergyman., Christenathe..child "John." "You call-that a new story I" said the host, and he , took up a folio: and impre, vieed a storyin Latin of .how Augustine:(°f :Canterbury) did the same thing. A. mother asks the saint to baptise her frtiola. He consents, and they go ad font m. Here a kindly listener intervenes. "Font would not be the .font, of course, but a spring. Augustine was preaching on the hillside" Miller resumes. • The mother, stammering over the. name, says : " Lu-lu-lucia." The saint,-a little deaf, cries : "Do you dare to give the name of Lucifer to an infant about to. become a Christian P Tob.annem appellari mallent." The "managers' stories" proper come a little later on. Generally H.M.I. found the clergy better men: of business than the laymen. "They used to fill up Form H "—this is the crucial document—" with an ease to which the unhallowed lawyer or land-agent never attained." "It was a solicitor," he goes on, "who in two successive years presented me with a balance-sheet showing a surplus on both sides of the account." Nor did the pro- fessional accountant (who became a necessity in the -"late nineties ") approve himself more to our author's mind. "After same experience I concluded -that compound addition and subtraction are no part of an- auditor's education." Here, again, it is the mean or shifty or arbitrary manager that necessarily :figures in these pages. It was usual, of course, to- entertain the inspector at lunch. This was a trial to some frugal souls: One would try to charge it as expenses ; another included it under " repairs "; some tried more subtle conceal- ments. Here we have a story &propos. A sea-captain:charged his Liverpool employers with "horse-hire." Where did he hire ? He failed to satisfy, and the item was- struck out. Next year there was no horse," and the senior-partner con- gratulated him on its disappearance. "He's there all right," said . the captain frankly ; "you don't see him, but he's there."
After managers we may put inspectors. Estimates of these gentlemen varied largely. At one• hotel H.M.I. was taken for-Royalty—thanks to the official envelope—and, charged accordingly. On the other hand, he tells us how he read in a novel that the fool of the story got "one of those appointments which 'equine° special capacity, such as an Inspectorship of Schools" ; and the Times plaintively -recalled, a time" when Inspectors of- Schools were really men of mark." Of one of these "men a mark," Matthew Arnold, we have some charm- ing stories.. Edmonton was in his district, and he lived at Esher. Now it was a rule of the Department that if an inspector had two days? workin a place he was to stop the night there instead of returning home and charging fares. Matthew Arnold did return and did charge. "Why not stay at Edmonton?" asked the clerk at Whitehall, "the Knight of the Blue -Pencil," as the poet called him. "How can you expect mato stay et -Edmonton when John Gilpin couldn't P" was the answer.. He was leniency itself, and not only when there were special circumstances, as when he gave every girl at Whitelands Training College the highest marks for recitation. "They are suck charming girls," was his reply to a questioning colleague. "Mr Bluffer," on the other hand, was not a man of mark, end he was something 'of a savage, but he was•human. • A .curate-in-charge asked him to lunch. He accepted in doubt,—could a curate entertain properly P But the prudent. man-had found out at Bluffer's London club his special weakness. "When- be came to my lodgings and saw the oysters laid out on the table, and the brown bread and butter, his-face lit up with' a heavenly smile, and the report was excellent." Such was the curate's account. Anyhow, be was better than "-Snarler," who was reported to have said : "I never-feel that I have done my duty in school unless I have left the mistress in tears."
Now for the children. "What does your father do ? " asks the inspector of a big lad.—" Cotohes savrmon th' river."— " Capital : you will be able to do this -sum : 20 lbs. of salmon at 3d. a lb. : what-is that worth? "—" Yah : tha' would not be worth a dom." Here is another: "Is a girl an animal ? "— " Neo."—" Is a girl a vegetable ? Do you grow them in a garden, like cabbages ? "—" Noo."—"-Is a girl a mineral P Do you dig them out of a mine, like coals ? "—" Noo."—" What ar she, then P" Classes I. and II. felt the horns- of the dilemma; and were silent. Not so a boy of four in :Class III. "ROO'S A WENCH." Here is a fatally true reply. In a certain village there was a parson who had not made himself aeoeptable4o his people. .. The inspector wanted to get at the meaning of" deserted" in oonnexion with desert," *idol -the ohms had defined- as "a sandy plain where nothing grew."! He had seen an empty house, • and put., his question': "As I was coming here, I saw an empty building, all shut. up; where nobody lives, and nobody goes-; what shOuld you say that house was ? " And "a fatal boy" replied : "The House of God."
Last of all in the procession, -as befits their dignity, come "My Lords." (Our author objects to the "pontifical pro- noun " with its capital "M") They are all gone 'now; but what they were is sufficiently set forth in Francis Palgrare's answer. A manager wanted to know his rank ; was his opinion final ? "Not at all: I am what they call a Senior Examiner; above me are three Assistant-Secretariell above them is the Secretary, Sir Francis Sandford-; above:him, the Vice-President, Mr. Forster; above him, the Lord President, Lord Ripon; and above him, I believe, the Almighty." H.M.I. makes various criticisms on these officials,'espeoially the Vice-President.' One of these we give, suppressing the name.' The Secretary (he really "ran the show "—is it so in other Departments ?) said one day in subdued tones to the .Lord President: "Look what Mr. M— has said to me." The noble Earl read it, and said soothingly: "I assure you that is nothing to what he says to me." All through this chapter we are treading on ignes suppositi eineri doloso. With the latest educational authority, the County Council, H.21.1. had little Or nothing to do. The writer of this review may be permitted to supply 'an anecdote out of his own experience. The County Council took over the school property from the School Board on July 1st. On June 29th it demanded of. the. writer, who was acting as correspondent, an inventory in triplicate of all school property (including books used by two hundred children), to be furnished in two- days. He remonstrated,-aa volunteer could not be expected to put aside all his own -occupations ; "besides," he added, "you seem to forget that these are the days of the Oxford and Cambridge cricket :match." We venture to correct an anecdote told of Dr.. Johnson. It was not the Doctor who threw the snails over the garden-wall; it was a friend, and the Doctor remonstrated with him on his unneighbourliness, but said "Throw away" when told that he was a Dissenter.
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