add to them two smaller hives, about 8 inches in diameter and 7 deep, (with a bit of glass let in, as in the large hive); 1 or 2 pieces of wood, 12 inches square, a quarter of an inch thick, with holes in them to correspond with the holes at the top of the large hive, and 1 or 2 bellglasses. These last should be about 5 inches in diameter at the bottom, and 6 inches deep. The small hives should have holes in the top.

In May the large hive, after having been weighed, and the weight noted, must be sent to the person from whom the swarm is to be purchased. This is much better than buying an old stock. Particular care must be taken to place the hive on its stand on the very day the bees are hived into it. The window, which must be in the back of the hive, will show how the bees are getting on. If the season is good it will be pretty well filled with comb and honey in about three weeks. A bell-glass should then be placed over the hole at the top, (the bung, or stopper having been withdrawn,) and may be taken away when full, and if the season is very good, another put in its place. These glasses sho'uld always have one of the small hives over them or something to darken them, for bees will not work in the light. This is as much as can be expected from the swarm during its first year, and not even this unless it is an early swarm, and the season pretty good, much better than that of 1848, which, in my district, has been nearly the worst ever known. When the last glass has been taken away the holes in the hive must again be stopped, and all made snug for the winter. The hives must be weighed, and, after deducting the original weight of hive and board, and allowing 3 or 4 pounds for the bees, there ought to be 15 pounds for honey and comb, which is as little as ought to be left for the winter.

The next spring, in April or May, according to the season, the holes must again be opened, and one of the square pieces of wood before-mentioned placed on the top of the hive, and one of the small hives, with the hole in its top stopped for the present, put on this. When this is nearly filled with honey, and the combs sealed, open the hole at the top, place over it another of the square pieces of wood, and a second small hive again at the top of this. If this is not done in good time there is risk of a swarm leaving the hive. A bell-glass of larger size than those recommended before may be substituted for the uppermost hive, but it must be covered to exclude light, and the milk-pan must always cover the whole. Or, which is perhaps the best plan, the first small hive may be lifted up, and the second placed between it and the stock-hive. This additional room must be given if the bees cluster at the mouth of the hive.

When the upper hive is quite filled it may be taken off, and moved gently to a short distance, and placed so that the bees may leave it, which they will not do if it is moved roughly. If they will not leave it, and the bees in the stock-hive are in commotion, it must be replaced and taken off another day, as probably the queen is in it. In detaching a glass, or small hive from the board on which it stands, it found necessary to pass a knife under it, should the bees have united the comb of the upper with that in the under hive.

may

be

By this means the best honey is obtained, instead of the mass of different substances which is the result of the old burning system.

The combs, when taken, should not be pressed, but when as much

honey has run out as will do so without pressure, they may be given to any bees which are short of food for the winter.

Too much must not be expected. Twenty pounds every year from each stock, not including swarms, is a very fair average, and more than is made on the burning plan. Mr. Cotton's little book raises great expectations of profit which are not likely to be realized, and he is wrong in asserting that, on the collateral system, swarming can be entirely prevented. In very bad years, like the last, it cannot be prevented with any certainty, on any plan-at least, not without much more attention on the part of the proprietor than a schoolmaster can possibly give, nor without much experience and knowledge. Should a swarm issue, if not wanted to increase the number of stocks, it must be returned to the parent hive; the method of doing which, and some other matters, I must reserve for another letter, unless you have already had too much of the subject.

Your obedient servant,

ARISTÆUS.

LETTERS TO A SCHOOLMASTER FROM A NORMALSCHOOL TEACHER.

No. II.

MY CHRISTIAN FRIEND,-I closed my last communication just as I imagined that I saw you admitting the children of your school into the room which you had prepared for their reception. Before I consider the BOYS themselves, permit me once more to call your attention to the building, as a subordinate means of education. The windows, the floor, and the ceiling ought obviously to be kept as clean as possible. Plenty of water should be laid on the back premises. There ought to be no lack of brown soap and coarse towels. If the room is not fully and freely ventilated, I recommend you to open, at certain intervals, every door and window, and to set the children in motion for five or six minutes. Your own health, as well as their comfort, will be greatly promoted by this simple process. Examine the little offices attached to the school, and see that no words whatever are written in or about them. Forbid absolutely all scribbling on the walls. The children who have never been checked in writing on the walls of the school-room will not often refrain from leaving their name and age inscribed on the public monuments of the country.

See to it that there are no corners in which cobwebs, candles, dirt, &c. are allowed to accumulate. The presence of these things in an elementary school is generally significant of a dirty and ill-mannered master. Spiders may be accounted among the great satirists and telltales of the age. Hogarth employed their webs, covering the poor's box, to illustrate the absence of charity. And we may generally discover that their long threads, stretching across a room, and glittering in the sunlight, imply a torn coat, an unshaven face, and dirty hands on the part of the master.

The boys having been admitted into the room, it will be necessary for you to observe that each makes a low bow, and practises those courtesies which are, in the case of children, necessary to all right

ideas on the nature of law, superiority, and obedience. A due attention to these minor morals will prepare their minds, we may trust, for those which are more grave and imperative. Good manners are not merely the sign of good dispositions, but the means of keeping them alive; and they are as properly a subject of care to the schoolmaster as any other part of his duty. In fact he ought to attend to them the more, if he teaches the children of poor and illiterate people, as these are not likely to inculcate them on their offspring. He thereby insensibly inculcates respect for constituted authority, for sacred persons and sacred things, and begets a delicacy of feeling in his children which is surely allied to virtue.

Prayers, of course, will next be read. In the order and selection of these you will be guided by the clergyman of the parish. If from any circumstances constituting an exception to this rule you are obliged to select them yourself, you cannot do wrong in taking them from the liturgy. By all means let your religious services be liturgical. Let the children have their full share in them. Mr. Masters has just published an excellent manual on this principle. To the Lord Bishop of London, Mr. Abraham of Eton, and to many others, we are indebted for services taken, more or less, from the Prayer Book. Mr. Canon Hamilton's Family Prayers may be easily adapted to the purposes of a school. By teaching your children to chant the hymns of the Church, you will prepare them to take an intelligent part in public worship. If you wish for metrical psalms and hymns, you cannot do better than use the cheap collection made by Mr. Harvey, the Rector of Hornsey, a judicious and moderate compiler.

It will next be your duty to see that all your scholars are placed in the right class. There are two modes of classification, each of which appears to possess peculiar advantages. The one is that which fixes a boy's position in the school according to his skill in reading, which is presumed to be a true index of the general powers and cultivation of his mind. The other is to inquire what is the standing of each boy in each subject, and to give him a relative position accordingly. The latter may be beneficially adopted in small schools; but would, as it appears to me, introduce too cumbrous a machinery into large schools: the former is obviously simple and easy in both.

The READING of the school ought to be a business of the first importance. It is too generally treated with indifference. The mass of boys in course of instruction at the elementary schools of the country are not proficients in this great art; and it is to be feared that the masters, in too many instances, are scarcely in advance of their pupils.

An excellent essay on pronunciation, rhythm, modulation, and on the principles of remedy for the defects of utterance, is prefixed to the new edition of "Walker's Dictionary," just published by Messrs. Longman, and edited by a veteran elocutionist, Mr. B. H. Smart. This treatise may be advantageously studied by the master.

Many works have been recently published to supply a course of well-selected reading for the children of elementary schools. That by Mr. Boyes, entitled "English Repetitions," deserves your attention, as designed to cultivate the taste of the young through the medium of our own writers." I incline, however, to recommend that you

should adopt, for your first class, the "Fifth Book" of the Irish Commissioners.

Your own private copy of this judicious compilation ought to be interleaved; and you ought to write upon those leaves suggestive remarks, likely to assist you in questioning your boys during the course or at the close of the reading lesson. Rare etymologies, geographical and scientific hints, might be recorded with advantage; and occasionally those blunders which appear to be stereotyped in the minds of children. But, above all, let me recommend you personally to study the reading lesson before you are called to superintend it. Make yourself master of the grammatical difficulties of every sentence; and so imbue your mind with the scope and bearing of the whole, as to let no point escape you which ought to be remembered by the scholars.

The proper analysis of the subject-matter of a reading lesson, the criticism on the tone and manner of it, are inconsistent with the solemnity and reverence with which we should ever approach the perusal of the Holy Bible. As well may you expect children to love the Word of God, whose only recollection of its contents is associated with those of parsing and pronunciation, as those to love the house of God who have never entered it except to be cooped up with a restless host of their fellows, in some far and fearful gallery, where they hear nothing of the service but the deep and unrelieved diapasons of the I am, your sincere friend, &c.

organ.

TRUST DEEDS OF SCHOOLS.

REV. SIR,-While so much is said about trust-deeds of schools, and the interference of the state in their "clauses," I wish to warn the clergy against an evil which I believe to be almost as prejudicial as the most fearful despotism of the government. I mean that which leaves the trust-deed of a school to be managed by parties who are interested in the neighbouring freeholds. It is said that some schools in the hands of certain great London educationists are at any time liable, by the terms of the deeds, to be invaded by the original holders of the soil on which they are built. The case I am about to relate involves a yet more flagrant breach of trust. A school was erected a few years ago in a parish of the diocese of York. Rich and poor alike subscribed in the parish, as well as of the neighbouring gentry "not a few." The name of the late Archbishop of York was foremost on the list of contributors, and next came that of the late Earl of Harewood. Those who had no money gave their labour gratuitously. The building was erected entirely by voluntary subscription and unpaid labour. managing attorney conveyed the premises to an acting trustee, contrary to the wishes of the freeholder of the soil, who was an aged and unbusiness-like person, and now that trustee and his heirs claim the whole as their own, and I am advised that a suit in Chancery would leave us without remedy. I am inclined to think that this is a frequent case, and that if we grumble on the one hand at the Government, for assuming too much power, we ought, on the other, to applaud them

A

for protecting us, by the care which the Committee of Council bestows on trust-deeds, from such gross perversion as that to which I have called your attention. I am, &c. &c.

A COUNTRY VICAR IN THE WEST RIDIng.

COMMON SCHOOLS IN NEW YORK.

SIR,-I think that your readers will not be displeased to receive some account of the common-school system in the state of New York, which is viewed with much anxiety and suspicion by the authorities of the Protestant Episcopal Church, although they have not hitherto attempted to counteract it by any organized opposition. This system supplies every ward of the city population, and every district of that which occupies the country, with an elementary school. This institution is, in many respects, admirably organized. The master is carefully selected; the scheme of instruction comprises every subject required by the workman or shop-keeper. In short, a good English and scientific education, to use our own popular language, is supplied, free of expense, in this common school. The buildings in which it is held, the classrooms, books, maps, apparatus, &c., are all excellent, so that the mass of the poor in the cities, and the mass of the whole population in country places, attend it. The state supports none other. Classical instruction, and whatever belongs specifically to a grammar-school, are only given in private academies.

The common-school system of public instruction was organized some ten years ago. Its grave defects did not excite much opposition among the various Protestant denominations. Born in New England, of an ambitious and philosophical Presbyterianism, which had itself been dry-nursed in German Neology, it was commended by many plausible arguments to the community. Only one public functionary opposed it; namely, Dr. Hughes, the Romish prelate of New York. "If," said he, in effect, as the representative of a party, which, at that time, held the balance of political power, "if we pay taxes, we ought to have our share of them to defray the expense of educating our children in what we believe to be the eternal truths of revealed religion. We will not consent to give the fathers of our future church over to the tender mercies of a profound indifferentism. We respect the age to come. We acknowledge our obligations to posterity." The result of his ardent, and perhaps, in the eyes of many, unscrupulous efforts, was, that separate schools were organized for the Roman Catholic population, in which the full religious teaching of that church was supplied under state recognition and patronage; while the whole body of the Protestants were left to the common schools. In these it is to be feared that, from the nature of the case, the religious instruction is indefinite, meagre, and unsatisfactory. It is not earnest and warm-hearted Methodism. It is not Presbyterianism, with its vigorous system of objective doctrine. It has not the assumed spirituality of Quakerism, much less the calm, dignified Catholicity of the Episcopal Church. The master may be a Millerite or Muggletonian, Baptist or Bryamite, Arian or Sabbatarian, so that he is only a man of good character, and a clever