We give in another column an amusing letter, describing the
wrath of a vestry when asked to provide a rate for the purposes of education. The real danger, both in London and the country, is the danger that the Education Boards will fall into just such hands as the vestry there described,—the hands of men who think no rate, vulgarity, and ignorance, infinitely better than twopence in the pound, refinement, and knowledge. Mr. Forster himself fears the Education boards getting into the hands of cliques, and -warned a London deputation on Thursday of the special danger of this in London,—where local interests are so weak, and where it is so difficult to find a society which even knows its own best men. The only hope is, as we said last week, for the clergy, both of the National Church and of Dissenting bodies, to put forward their -own best men who have shown the greatest interest in the cause of -education,—a step which would at once render a place on the School Board a respectable position ; and then for the working-men to take >real pains with their own candidates, and to see that they have more than one representative for each district. A vast deal depends on the precedent set by the first elections.
Previous page
