Professor Jack (of Owens College, Manchester) illustrates again, in a
letter to Tuesday's Times, what he insisted on with great effect earlier in the year,—the importance and the feasibility of treating the compulsory principle, when adopted by our School Boards, rather as a reserve force, not intended for ordi- nary use, than as an every-day instrument. In Paisley, out of 2,661 children between five and thirteen years of age who were not at school at all in 1875, no leas than 2,280 have been got to school in 1876, without a single prosecution; while besides this, the attendance of those who are on the books has become much more regular, the average number of absentees having fallen from about 13 per cent, to about 10 per cent. All this has been done by great activity in using all sorts of gentle means, and letting the poor know universally what they lose, and what they risk in the way of prosecution, by -keeping their children away from school.
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