26 SEPTEMBER 1874, Page 2

We are assured by a letter] in Monday's Times that

a large school of 150 boys has been officially inspected, under the Con- joint Universities' Scheme, for no larger a sum than £37,—i.e., at a cost of about 5s. a head,—and we are assured from a private quarter that if smaller schools do not insist on having the number of marks gained by each boy in each paper specified, and if the masters of such schools lend all the assistance in their power to the inspecting examiuers, this rate need

never be exceeded, even in the case of small schools. For instance, inspection cost a school of 45 boys only ten guineas, and another school of 70 boys only fourteen guineas. We certainly had not supposed it possible, looking to the scale of fees asked on account of each examiner, that the inspection of a small school could have been so cheaply managed. And if the inspection in these cases were thorough, the assurance that it can be procured for so reasonable a charge would be a sufficieat answer to our criticism. An addition of only five shillings a head -to the school charges would certainly not, in the view of most parents, be any material set-off against the advantage of knowing the character attached by the University Inspectors to the school methods and discipline ; and even if it were, it would amply repay any good schoolmaster to pay such a sum out of his own pocket, for the sake of obtaining the University imprimatur on the efficiency of his teaching.