Mr. Hughes moved, late on Monday night, an Address to
the 'Queen praying her to order that in the five statutes establishing 'the Constitution of the new governing bodies of Shrewsbury, Winchester, Harrow, Charterhouae, and Rugby, the words re- quiring membership of the Church of England as a qualification in the case of persons elected or nominated members of the _governing bodies, should be omitted. -As it was after 1 o'clock -when the motion came on, the discussion was almost immediately adjourned, and was, we believe, to be continued last night, too late, however, for us to know its course or result. We may just say, however, that the impression of the Public School Com- missioners seems to have been that all schools, both under the Public Schools Act, and the Endowed Schools Act of last year, where the services of the Church of England are used (i.e., nine- 'tenths of all the grammar schools) are denominational schools, with a right to their strictly denominational character, whether -the religious teaching be one of the main objects of the founder -or not. If that were so, the Universities would clearly have an equal right to maintain their denominational character. We are -quite sure this was not the meaning of the Government in drawing the Endowed Schools' Act, and we are quite sure no such interpretation can hold with relation to the great public schools. The University of London has of course declined to investigate the faith of the governors she is asked to appoint, and unless this provision be cancelled, at least in her case, she -cannot appoint any governors under the new order of things at all.
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