EDUCATION OF THE RURAL POPULATION.
We have said that we will look at what education and other causes are
doing, and what they are leaving undone in the change of character which
they are effecting in the rural population. It appears by the Reports of
the Poor-Law and Charity Commissioners that education progresses more in
the northern and manufacturing districts than in the southern and
agricultural ones. This is, no doubt, very much the case; and what
education is leaving undone in these districts is, that it acts too
timidly, too much in the spirit of worldly wisdom. It is afraid of
making the people too intellectual; of raising their tastes, lest it
should spoil them as Gibeonites, hewers of wood and drawers of water. My
own experience is, that this is a grand mistake; that you cannot give
them too pure and lofty a standard of taste; and that especially, our
best and noblest poets, as Milton, Shakspeare, Wordsworth, Cowper,
Southey, Campbell, Burns, Bloomfield, etc. should be put into their
hands, and particularly into those of the agricultural population. What
can be so rational as to imbue the minds of those who are to spend their
lives in the fields with all those associations which render the country
doubly delightful? It is amazing what avidity they evince for such
writers when they are once made familiar with them; and whoever has his
mind well stored with the pure and noble sentiments of such writers will
never condescend to debase his nature by theft, idleness, and low
habits. The great alarm has always been that of lifting the poor by such
knowledge above their occupations, and filling their heads with airy
notions. I can only point again to the agricultural population of
Scotland, where such knowledge abounds. If the labourers have not the
genius of Burns, many of them have a great portion of the manly and
happy feeling with which
He walked in glory and in joy,
Following his plough along the mountain side.
There is every reason, so far as experiment goes, to suppose that the
same effect would follow in England. Where are there men so sober and
industrious as those artisans who are now the steadiest frequenters of
Mechanics’ Libraries? I have given, in the first chapter of the Nooks of
the World, a striking instance of the effects of such reading on an
agricultural labourer. Through my instigation several intelligent
families have made themselves acquainted with this meritorious man, and
speak with admiration of his manly and superior character. Let the
experiment be repeated far and wide!
But education itself yet wants introducing to a vast extent into the
agricultural districts. The commissioners give a deplorable picture of
the neglect of the agricultural population in the counties bordering on
the metropolis. In some parts of Essex, Sussex, Kent, Buckinghamshire,
Berks, etc., schools of any description are unknown; in others not more
than one in fifteen of the labourers are represented as able to read. In
this county, Surrey, much the same state of things exists. I have been
astounded at the very few labourers that you meet with that can read;
and I think I see some striking causes for this neglect of the labouring
class in the peculiar state of society here--it has no middle link. A
vast number of the aristocracy reside in the county from its proximity
to town; and besides these, there are only the farmers and their
labourers; the servants of the aristocratic establishments--a numerous
and very peculiar class; and the few tradesmen who supply the great
houses. The many gradations of rank and property which are found in more
trading, manufacturing, and mixed districts do not here exist. It seems
as if the Normans and the Saxons had here descended from age to age; two
races, distinct in their habits as their condition, and with no one
principle of amalgamation. The aristocracy shut themselves up in their
houses and parks, and are rarely seen beyond them except in their
carriages, driving rapidly to town, or to each other’s isolated abodes.
They know nothing, and therefore can feel nothing for the toiling class.
The effect is visible enough. The working classes grow up with the sense
that they are regarded only as necessary implements of agriculture by
the aristocracy--and they are churlish and uncouth. They have not the
kindliness, and openness of countenance and manner that the peasantry of
more socially favourable districts have. The farmers too seem little to
employ them as house-servants, fed at their own table. You do not hear
of those jolly harvest-suppers, which you may still find in many
old-fashioned places, where master and man feast and rejoice together
over the in-gathered plenty. So far as downright rusticity goes, there
is as much of that within a dozen miles of London as in the farthest
county of England; but the peasants seem to have lost much of the
sentiment which those of more distant counties possess. They have their
wakes and fairs on their extensive commons and greens, and leap in bags,
and have wheelbarrow races, and races of women for certain articles of
female apparel, gipsies with their lucky-bags and will-pegs; but as to
anything of a poetical cast, I do not see it. What a fall from the
funeral train going chanting a psalm on its way to the churchyard, to
one which I saw the other day in this neighbourhood. The coffin was laid
on a cart, and secured with ropes; one shaggy horse went jostling it
along; another cart followed, occupied by the chief mourners, half a
dozen of them huddled together, and the rest succeeded on foot, in a
rude and straggling company.
In many villages I see no church at all; and where they are seen, how
different to the fine old churches of most parts of England. As you cast
your eyes over a wide landscape, you look in vain for those tall taper
spires and massy towers which rise here and there in most English
scenery; and find perhaps somewhere a solitary little erection
resembling a little wooden dovecote. The piety of these parts never
expended itself much in church-building. The villages themselves are
often very picturesque. They are frequently scattered along extensive
commons, amidst abundant woods and grey heaths; generally buried in
their old orchards, and built with many pictorial angles and
projections; often thatched, and consisting of old framed timber-work,
or wood altogether, with gardens full of flowers, and goodly rows of
beehives. Vines run luxuriantly over their very roofs, and in autumn
hang with a prodigality of grapes; and as to the country itself, nothing
can be more pastorally and sylvanly sweet than this county. Its grey
heaths and pine woods, in one part, remind you of Scotland--its commons,
in others, covered with the greenest turf and scattered with oaks, have
the appearance of old forests; and wherever you go, you get glimpses
into fine woodland valleys, and of old solitary halls standing far off
in the midst of them; grey farm houses; old water mills; the most rustic
huts; some pastoral stream like the Mole, which goes wandering about
through this scenery, fringed with its flags and meadow-sweet, and with
its bullrushes bending in its copious stream, as if it were loath to
leave it; in short it is a region full of the spirit of the poetry of
Keats,--a region lying as it might lie
-------------- Before the faëry broods
Drove Nymph and Satyr from the prosperous woods;
Before King Oberon’s bright diadem,
Sceptre and mantle, clasped with dewy gem,
Frighted away the Driads and the Fauns
From rushes green, and brakes, and cowslipped lawns,--
From beechen groves, and shadows numberless.
But the people themselves seem lost in their umbrageous hamlets, and on
their commons, unthought of. There is the village of Oxshott, some three
miles hence.--Go through it on a Sunday, when the agricultural people
are all at leisure, and there they are as thick as motes in the sun, in
the middle of the village street. There appears to be no church, nor any
inhabitants but farmers and labourers. Boys, girls, men and women, all
seem to be out of doors, and all in their every-day garbs. The colour of
tawny soiled slops and straw-hats gives, as a painter would say, the
prevailing tint to the scene. The boys are busy enough playing at ball,
or cricket. The men seem to pass their time sitting on banks and stiles,
or gossiping and smoking in groups. Scarcely a soul will move out of the
way to let you pass on. The intellectual condition of this obscure
hamlet is strikingly indicated to every passer through, by a large
school-house bearing on its front, cut in stone, this proud title--“THE
ROYAL KENT SCHOOL, founded in 1820;”--but which has been since so far
_con_founded, that its windows are broken to atoms, and it is at once
recent and in ruins! This state of things should not be suffered to
continue. The vast wealth of the aristocracy living hereabout, and the
ignorance around them, very ill accord. Amongst the affluent families in
the county, there are, no doubt, many who would be anxious to secure an
education to the rural children, _if they actually knew that it was
needed_! In the village of Esher this has recently been done: let us
hope that other places will “go and do likewise.”[35]
[35] I am told by intelligent people, who have spent the greater part
of their lives here, that the farmers are particularly jealous of the
peasantry receiving any education,--they conceive it would spoil them
as beasts of burden. This shews what is the deplorable ignorance of
_this_ class, too, of the rural population.
Since writing the above, I have met with the following statements, in
Mr. Frederick Hill’s excellent work on National Education. They are in
his account of Mr. William Allen’s School of Industry at Lindfield, in
Sussex; and are, at once, most confirmatory of the view I have taken of
the state of things in this county, and of the remedy to be applied. To
benevolent and wealthy landed proprietors they are full of
encouragement.
“We visited the school at Lindfield, in July 1831, and it had then been
established several years. Before fixing on the spot where to build his
school, Mr. Allen sent an intelligent young man on a tour through the
county, to find out where a school was most wanted. After a diligent
search, Lindfield was pitched upon as the centre of a district in which
the peasantry were in a very low state of ignorance. Lindfield is on the
road from London to Brighton; distant from London about thirty-seven
miles, from Brighton fifteen.
“Not only did Mr. Allen receive no assistance in building his school,
but most of the wealthy inhabitants endeavoured to thwart him; while
among the peasantry themselves, the most preposterous stories were
afloat respecting his designs. These poor people had been so little
accustomed to see persons act from other than selfish motives, that
they could not believe it possible that any one would come and erect a
large building, at great cost and trouble to himself, merely from a
desire of promoting their good. They felt sure that all this outlay was
not without some secret object; and at last they explained all, much to
their own satisfaction, by referring it to the following notable
project.--The building was to be applied to the diabolical purpose of
kidnapping children; a high palisade was to be thrown up all round it,
and other measures taken to prevent entrance or escape. Then the school
was to be opened, and every thing carried on smoothly, and with great
appearance of kind and gentle treatment, until such a number of children
had been collected as would satisfy the rapacious desires of the
wretches who had hatched the wicked scheme; when all at once the gates
were to be closed upon them, and the poor innocents shipped off to some
distant land!
“Greatly indeed must a school have been wanted where such unheard-of
absurdity could circulate and obtain credence. At length the building, a
most substantial and commodious one, was completed, though few indeed
were those who at once ventured within the dreaded bounds. However, by
dint of perseverance, this number was gradually increased. The few
children who did come, began in a short time to take home with them
sundry pence, which they had earned in plaiting straw, making baskets,
etc.; arts they were learning at school. The boys began to patch their
clothes and mend their shoes, without their parents having a penny to
pay for the work. Meanwhile there came no authentic accounts of ships
lying in wait on the neighbouring coast, nor had even the dreaded iron
palisades raised their pointed heads. Little by little, the poor
ignorant creatures became assured that there was nothing to fear, but,
on the contrary, much practical good to be derived from sending their
children to the school; and that strange and incredible as it might
seem, the London ‘gemman’ was really come among them as a friend and
benefactor. A breach being thus fairly made in the mud-bank of
prejudice, it was not long before the whole mass gave way. In short, the
scheme proved so completely successful, that at the time we visited the
school, almost every child whose parents lived within a distance of
three miles, was entered as a pupil, the total number on the list being
no less than 300. The children are at school eight hours each day;
three being employed in manual labour, and five in the ordinary school
exercises. There is a provision for a diversity of tastes in the classes
of industry; indeed the most unbounded liberality is manifest in all the
arrangements. Some are employed as shoemakers, others as tailors, and
others again, at platting, basket-making, weaving, printing, gardening,
or farming. The children work very cheerfully, and are found to like the
classes of industry better than the school.
“The first employment to which the little workers are put, is platting
straw. When they are _au fait_ at this, which is generally at the end of
a few months, they are promoted to some other craft; the one of highest
dignity being that of printer. Before leaving school the child will
become tolerably expert at three or four trades. Those who work on the
farm have each the sole care of a plot of ground, measuring one-eighth
part of an acre, and each is required to do his own digging, sowing,
manuring, and reaping. An intelligent husbandman, however, is always on
the ground, to teach those who are at fault. The plots of land were all
clean and in nice order; and from the variety of produce, oats, turnips,
mangel-wurzel, potatoes, and cabbages, the whole had a curious and
amusing appearance, reminding one of the quilted counterpanes of former
years. We found the system of _matayer_ rent in use; each boy being
allowed one half of the produce for himself, the other half being paid
for the use of the land, the wear and tear of tools, etc. One lad,
twelve years old, had in this way received no less a sum than
twenty-three shillings and sixpence, as his share of the crop of the
preceding year; and we were told that such earnings were by no means
uncommon.”
Lady Noel Byron established a school on a similar plan at Ealing, which
has been eminently successful. She there educates a number of boys in a
manner which must render them far better qualified to fulfil those
duties to which they will be called as they grow up, than has yet been
done by the old defective modes of England, and especially of English
villages. Besides being taught the most useful branches of English
education, they work three hours each day, partly for the institution,
partly for themselves, in their own gardens. Gardens of a sixteenth of
an acre are let to the elder boys at threepence a month; seeds they
either buy of their masters, or procure from their friends. Racks for
the tools are put up and numbered, so that each boy has a place for his
own, and in that he is required to keep them. The objects of this school
are to educate children destined for country pursuits, in a manner to
make them better workmen, and more intelligent and happy men than is at
present the case. For this purpose it was conceived necessary that they
should early acquire the habits of patient industry; that they should be
acquainted with the value of labour, and know the connexion between it
and property; that they should have intelligence, skill, and an
acquaintance with the objects with which they are surrounded; that the
higher sentiments, the social and moral part of their being, should
obtain a full development.
So industriously have the boys laboured, and so well have they
succeeded, that their gardens, with few exceptions, present before the
crops are harvested, an appearance of neatness and good husbandry. They
have all since, either disposed of their vegetables or taken them home
to their families. But vegetables are not the only crop; around the
borders of each, flowers are cultivated. It is a great matter to induce
a taste for, and give a knowledge of, the manner of cultivating flowers.
They are luxuries within the power of every person to command.
There is a considerable gaiety and alacrity in all this; the boys learn
to sing many cheerful and merry songs. They strike up a tune as they go
out in bands to works, and as they return, they do the same.
It is with the greatest satisfaction that I add, similar schools have
been established by Mrs. Tuckfield in Devonshire, Mr. James Cropper in
Lancashire, and that the Earl of Lovelace has now built a school on the
same plan at Ockham in Surrey, where the same course of education will
be given to the peasant children of the neighbourhood. The institution
in fact, contains three schools, a boy’s, a girl’s, and an infant
school. Suitable buildings are in progress for teaching the boys the
rudiments of the most common handicraft trades, as shoemaking,
tailoring, carpentry, basket-making, etc. The girls are employed at
certain hours, in the dairy, the laundry, and in all kinds of household
work. For this purpose able masters and mistresses are engaged, who
have been prepared by an especial education and long practice for their
arduous office. On our first visit to this interesting establishment,
though it was far from being completed, we found about 130 children
educating in it. It was delightful to see the young chopsticks of this
county, where, from generation to generation, the intellect of the
working class has long been suffered to lie as dead and as barren as one
of their own sand-hills, clustered about the master in the school,
answering questions in geography and natural history with as much
quickness and obvious delight, as any children of city or of hall could
possibly do; their little ruddy faces, no longer indicative only of
health and stupidity, but fairly a-blaze with the workings of their
minds, the pleasant thirst of knowledge, and the generous emulation of
honest distinction. We walked through the house, and found the neat
little girls sewing and ironing, cleaning and scouring, engaged in those
very avocations which must some day give comfort to their homes. We saw
the boys turn out with their spades, and soon found some of them
planting forest trees in a nursery-ground, others planting their own
gardens; and what delighted us, was to find on the bordering of their
garden ground, a string of little flower-beds, belonging to the girls,
which carried me at once away to my own school-days and school-garden at
Ackworth.
I have not room here to do more than indicate the existence of this most
invaluable school, in a part of the country where rural education is so
much wanted. And, indeed, where throughout England are not such
invaluable schools wanted? The attention of land owners everywhere ought
to be called to this patriotic experiment. Let but such schools as those
of the late Captain Brenton, William Allen, Lady Byron, and Lord
Lovelace, be once diffused throughout the towns and villages of England,
and a revolution will be effected, such as never yet was achieved in any
country. An educated population; men no longer apt to grow up in the
mere consciousness of their animal nature, but made acquainted with
their intellectual powers, their moral qualities and social affections;
women having the energies of their true character called forth, and
taught to give comfort, and the attraction of intelligence to their
homes,--then will England truly have “a bold peasantry, their country’s
pride.” Brutishness and low debauchery must disappear. All will feel the
claims which society has upon them; and all will see that, to attain a
common share of the good things of life, they must possess activity,
prudence, good management, and perseverance. Who can, indeed, imagine to
himself what this country must become, with a population thus
judiciously educated, filling its towns, its villages, its fields, and
overflowing into our colonies, with the certain and splendid dower of
industry and intellectual strength?