from there, by railroad, to Alexandria. Spent |lished by New England Friends have radiated a portion of the next day in visiting the schools in that place, accompanied by Col. Lee, of the Freedmen's Bureau, in all of which we saw satisfactory evidence of the capability of the colored child to receive and appreciate the education appropriate to its age. Many astonished us with their recitations. to all surrounding localities. They have classified departments for education in one building, and a store in another, where goods of every description are sold at cost price. In reviewing the condition of our schools, and their influence upon the neighborhoods where they are located, we feel justified in urgSome of the school houses are in the shadowing the Association to continue its support, not of the old Slave-Pen, now a decaying monument of past iniquity; but we may rejoicingly believe that in these educational institutions memorials of present benevolence are forming, to carry cheering and imperishable records into the Future. In the afternoon, by the kindness of a Friend from Woodlawn, we were conveyed to that place, and, on the way, stopped to visit Deborah K. Smith's school, about five miles from Alexandria. The house is situated directly on the roadside, more than a mile from the teacher's lodgings, and the most uncomfortable that we had seen. The teacher and scholars had suffered with the cold, owing to the open condition of the house; yet neither murmured; they looked happy and much interested in their respective occupations. Heard all the classes, and were well satisfied with their progress. Seventh-day, visited some of the people in their homes at Woodlawn. The next morning returned to spend balf an hour in D. K Smith's First-day school. From there to Woodlawn meeting, and spent the afternoon with the colored people gathered in S. Lloyd's school-house, which is a comfortable building, about a mile from her boarding place. Heard the recitations of several classes in reading, spelling and arithmetic; but the afternoon was chiefly devoted to Scriptural reading and religious instruction given by several volunteer assistants. Addresses were delivered from strangers present, and cordial expressions of gratitude from the colored people for the advantages they were experiencing through our Association. We felt it to be an exceedingly interesting and impressive occasion, and a fitting close to our mis sion. We may, perhaps, be allowed to add that we were much gratified with the marked improvemeat in the condition of the freed-people in Washington, attributable not only to the efficiency of the Bureau, but also to the judgment and energy of benevol nt associations and individuals. Among the most important and effective aids in producing this encouraging change was acknowledged to be the labors of Eliza Heacock, in her departments of industrial and domestic instruction. We saw about fifty children employed in plaiting straw braid, which is made at the same place into hats. The beneficial effects of the mission estab. only by establishing schools, but by furnishing each teacher with a good supply of clothing, in order that the aged and sick may be cared for, and no child prevented from attending school on account of not having comfortable garments. Everywhere we saw evidences of the liberality of our friends, in the clothing worn by the people. We wondered what they would have done without it. We look upon those under our care as chil dren just beginning to walk, who need aid until they shall learn to step unassisted, and then the external means of support should be judiciously removed. And while we offer this view, we hope also that the Association will be furnished with pecuniary ability to extend its field of labor. Before closing this report, we desire to state that we were greatly aided in the performance of our work through the kindness and attention received from individuals whose unreserved hospitality will be gratefully remembered. Fifth month 1st, 1867. HENRY M. LAING, EDITH W. ATLEE. DESCRIPTION OF GOOD AND BAD MEATS. Every housekeeper or buyer should be familiar with Dr. Letheby's description of good and bad meats, as follows: Good meat is neither of a pale pinkish nor a deep purple tint. It has a marbled appearance, from a ramification of little veins of intercellular fat; and the fat of the internal organs especially is firm, hard and suety, and is never wet, whereas that of diseased meat is soft and watery. The feel of healthy meat is somewhat elastic, and hardly moistens the finger. Diseased meat is soft and wet. Good meat has but little odor, and this is not disagreeable; whereas diseased meat smells faint and cadaverous. Good meat bears cooking without much shrinking or losing much of its weight; but bad meat shrivels up and boils to pieces; this is due to the larger proportion of watery and gelatinous material, and the absence of fat and true muscular substance in the meat. Under the microscope the fibre should be clear and well defined, and free from infusorial animalculæ ; whilst that of diseased meat is sodden and tumid, as if it had been soaked in water; the transverse streaks are indistinct and wide apart, and animalculæ abound in it. Dr. Letheby's official station requires him to prevent the sale and consumption of unWere wholesome meat in the city of London. it not that facility is offered by the salesmen for the detection of fraud, his subordinates would be very much crippled in their operations, and it is gratifying to be able to acknowledge this fact. To supply more than three millions of people, about six hundred tons of meat are brought to market daily, and nearly six hundred tons of meat unfit for consumption have been condemned and destroyed during the past six years. Much of this would have certainly produced serious disease in the com munity. Allowing six ounces a day to each person, it represents nearly 600,000 meals, and at a reduced calculation, "we may fairly say," in the words of the London Lancet, "that nearly half a million persons would be prevented eating diseased meat once by the labors of Dr. Letheby and his inspectors in one year." -Phila. Ledger. "And he buried him in a valley, in the land of Moab, over against Bethpeor: but no man knoweth of his sepulchre unto this day."-DEUT. xxxiv. 6. By Nebo's lonely mountain, On this side Jordan's wave, In a vale of the land of Moab, But no man dug that sepulchre, For the angels of God upturned the sod, That was the grandest funeral But no man heard the trampling, Comes, when the night is done, Or the crimson streak on ocean's cheek Noiselessly as the spring time Her crest of verdure waves, And all the trees, on all the hills, So, without sound of music, Or voice of them that wept, Silently down from the mountain's crown Looked on the wondrous sight; Still shuns the hallowed spot; His comrades in the war, And after him lead his matchless steed, Amidst the noblest of the band, They lay the sage to rest, And give the bard an honored place, With costly marble drest, In the great minster's transept high, This was the bravest warrior That ever buckled sword; And never earth philosopher, Traced with his golden pen, On the deathless page, words half so sage, And had he not high honor?- To lie in state while angels wait, The dark rock pines, like tossing plumes, And God's own hand, in that lovely land, O silent tomb in Moab's land, Speak to these curious hearts of ours, Ways that we cannot tell; He hides them deep, like the sacred sleep The "Inaugural address of John Stuart Mill," delivered to the University of St. Andrews, Glasgow, Scotland, in the second month of this year, is full of interest and instruction. Some selections from it have been made and will from time to time appear in our columns; but we would advise all interested in the subject of education to procure the entire address. It can be obtained at the office of the "Living Age," Boston, or at Challen's Book Store, 1308 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia. EXTRACTS FROM JOHN STUART MILL'S INAUGURAL ADDRESS. Let me first say a few words on the great controversy of the present day with regard to the higher education, the difference which most broadly divides educational reformers and conservatives; the vexed question between the ancient languages and the modern sciences and arts; whether general education should be classical-let me use a wider expression, and say literary or scientific. A dispute as endlessly, and often as fruitlessly agitated as that old controversy which it resembles, made memorable by the names of Swift and Sir William Temple in England and Fontenelle in France-the contest for superiority between the ancients and the moderns. This question, whether we should be taught the classics or the sciences, seems to me, I confess, very like a dispute whether painters should cultivate drawing or coloring, or, to use a more homely illustration, whether a tail any other acquirements. If a boy learnt Greek and Latin on the same principle on which a mere child learns with such ease and rapidity any modern language, namely, by acquiring some familiarity with the vocabulary by pracgrammatical rules-those rules being acquired with ten-fold greater facility when the cases to which they apply are already familiar to the mind; an average schoolboy, long before the age at which schooling terminates, would be able to read fluently and with intelligent interest any ordinary Latin or Greek author in prose or verse, would have a competent knowledge of the grammatical structure of both languages, and have had time besides for an ample amount of scientific instruction. I might speak out all that I think practicable in this matter, as George Stevenson was about railways, when he calculated the average speed of a train at ten miles an hour, because if he had estimated it higher, the practical men would have turned a deaf ear to him, as that most unsafe character in their estimation, an enthusiast and a visionary. The results have shown, in that case, who was the real practical man. What the results would show in the other case, I will not attempt to anticipate. But I will say confidently, that if the two classical languages were properly taught, there would be no need whatever for ejecting them from the school course, in order to have sufficient time for everything else that need be included therein. or should make coats or trowsers. I can only reply by the question, Why not both? Can anything deserve the name of a good education which does not include literature and science too? If there were no more to be said than that. scientific education teaches us to think, and lit-tice and repetition, before being troubled with erary education to express our thoughts, do we not require both? and is not any one a poor, maimed, lopsided fragment of humanity who is deficient in either? We are not obliged to ask ourselves whether it is more important to know the languages or the sciences. Short as life is, and shorter still as we make it by the time we waste on things which are neither business, nor meditation, nor pleasure, we are not so badly off that our scholars need be ignorant of the laws and properties of the world they live in, or our scientific men destitute of poetic feel-go much farther; but I am as unwilling to ing and artistic cultivation. I am amazed at the limited conception which many educational reformers have formed to themselves of a human being's power of acquisition. The study of science, they truly say, is indispensable: our • present education neglects it: there is truth in this too, though it is not all truth and they think it impossible to find room for the studies which they desire to encourage, but by turning out, at least from general education, those which are now chiefly cultivated. How absurd, they say, that the whole of boyhood should be taken up in acquiring an imperfect knowledge of two dead languages. Absurd indeed: but is the human mind's capacity to learn measured by that of Eton and Westminster to teach? I should prefer to see these reformers pointing Let me say a few words more on this strangetheir attacks against the shameful inefficiency ly limited estimate of what it is possible for huof the schools, public and private, which pretend man beings to learn, resting on a tacit assumpto teach these two languages and do not. I tion that they are already as efficiently taught should like to hear them denounce the wretched as they ever can be. So narrow a conception methods of teaching, and the criminal idleness not only vitiates our idea of education, but acand supineness, which waste the entire boyhoodtually, if we receive it, darkens our anticipa of the pupils without really giving to most of tions as to the future progress of mankind. them more than a smattering, if even that, of For if the inexorable conditions of human life the only kind of knowledge which is even pre-make it useless for one man to attempt to know tended to be cared for. Let us try what con- more than one thing, what is to become of the scientious and intelligent teaching can do, be-human intellect as facts accumulate? In every fore we presume to decide what cannot be generation, and now more rapidly than ever, done. the things which it is necessary that somebody A few practical reformers of school tuition, should know are more and more muliplied. of whom Arnold was the most eminent, have Every department of knowledge becomes so made a beginning of amendment in many loaded with details, that one who endeavors to things: but reforms, worthy of the name, are know it with minute accuracy, must confine himalways slow, and reform even of governments self to a smaller and smaller portion of the and churches is not so slow as that of schools, whole extent: every science and art must be for there is the great preliminary difficulty of cut up into subdivisions, until each man's porfashioning the instruments: of teaching the tion, the district which he thoroughly knows, teachers. If all the improvements in the mode bears about the same ratio to the whole range of teaching languages which are already sanc- of useful knowledge that the art of putting on a tioned by experience, were adopted into our pin's head does to the field of human industry. classical schools, we should soon cease to hear Now, if in order to know that little completely, of Latin and Greek as studies which must en-it is necessary to remain wholly ignorant of all gross the school years, and render impossible the rest, what will soon be the worth of a man, for any human purpose except his own infi- | ledge, affords. Let us understand, then, that nitesimal fraction of human wants and require it should be our aim in learning, not merely to ments? His state will be even worse than that of know the one thing which is to be our princisimple ignorance. Experience proves that pal occupation, as well as it can be known, but there is no one stuly or pursuit, which, prac- to do this, and also to know something of all tised to the exclusion of all others, does not nar- the great subjects of human interest; taking row and pervert the mind; breeding in it a care to know that something accurately; markclass of prejudices special to that pursuit, be- ing well the dividing line between what we sides a general prejudice, common to all narrow know accurately and what we do not and respecialities, against large views, from an incapa-membering that our object should be to obtain city to take in and appreciate the grounds of a true view of nature and life in their broad outthem. We should have to expect that human line, and that it is idle to throw away time upon nature would be more and more dwarfed, and un- the details of anything which is to form no part fitted for great things, by its very proficiency in of the occupation of our practical energies. small ones. But matters are not so bad with us: there is no ground for so dreary an anticipation. It is not the utmost limit of human acquirement to know only one thing, but to combine a minute knowledge of one or a few things with a general knowledge of many things. By a general knowledge I do not mean a few vague impressions. An eminent man, one of whose writings is part of the course of this University, Archbishop Whately, has well discriminated between a general knowledge and a superficial knowledge. To have a general knowledge of a subject is to know only its leading truths, but to know these not superficially but thoroughly, so as to have a true conception of the subject in its great features; leaving the minor details to those who require them for the purposes of their special pursuit. There is no incompatibility between knowing a wide range of subjects up to this point, and some one subject with the completeness required by those who make it their principal occupation. It is this combination which gives an enlightened public: a body of cultivated intellects, each taught by its attainments in its own province what real knowledge is, and knowing enough of other subjects to be able to discern who are those that know them better. The amount of knowledge is not to be lightly estimated, which qualifies us for judging to whom we may have recourse for more. The elements of the more important studies being widely diffused, those who have reached the higher summits find a public capable of appreciating their superiority, and prepared to follow their lead. It is thus too that minds are formed capable of guiding and improving public opinion on the greater concerns of practical life. Government and civil society, are the most complicated of all subjects accessible to the human mind: and he who would deal competently with them as a thinker, and not as a blind follower of a party, requires not only a general knowledge of the leading facts of life, both moral and material, but an understanding exercised and diciplined in the principles and rules of sound thinking, up to a point which neither the experience of life, nor any one science or branch of know It by no means follows, however, that every useful branch of general, as distinct from professional, knowledge, should be included in the curriculum of school or University studies. There are things which are better learnt out of school, or when the school years, and even those usually passed in a Scottish university, are over. I do not agree with those reformers who would give a regular and prominent place in the school or university course to modern languages. This is not because I attach small importance to the knowledge of them. No one can in our age be esteemed a well-instructed person who is not familiar with at least the French language, so as to read French books with ease; and there is great use in cultivating a familiarity with German. But living languages are so much more easily acquired by intercourse with those who use them in daily life; a few months in the country itself, if properly employed, go so much farther than as many years of school lessons; that it is really waste of time for those to whom that easier mode is attainable, to labor at them with no help but that of books and masters; and it will in time be made attainable, through international schools and colleges, to many more than at present. Universities do enough to facilitate the study of modern languages, if they give a mastery over that ancient language which is the foundation of most of them, and the possession of which makes it easier to learn four or five of the continental languages than it is to learn one of them without it. Again, it has always seemed to me a great absurdity that history and geography should be taught in schools; except in elementary schools for the children of the laboring classes, whose subsequent access to books is limited. Who ever really learnt history and geography except by private reading? and what an utter failure a system of education must be, if it has not given the pupil a sufficient taste for reading to seek for himself those most attractive and easily intelligible of all kinds of knowledge? Besides, such history and geography as can be taught in schools exercise none of the faculties of the intelligence except the memory. An University is indeed the place where the student should be introduced to the Philosophy of History; where professors who (To be continued.) THE IRON BAR.-Here is a good lesson from an iron bar. Read it, boys. A bar of iron worth five dollars, worked into horseshoes, is worth $10.50; made into needles, it is worth $355; made into penknife blades, it is worth $3285; made into balance springs of watches, it is worth $250,000. What a drilling the poor bar must undergo to reach all that; but hammered and beaten and pounded and rolled and polished, how was its value increased! It might well have quivered and complained under the hard knocks it got; but were they not all necessary to draw out its fine qualities, and fit it for higher offices? And so, my children, all the drilling and training which you are subject to in youth, and which often seem so hard to you, serve to bring out your nobler and finer qualities, and fit you for more responsible posts and greater usefulness in the world. ITEMS. On the evening of the 14th inst., while Judge Kelly, of Philadelphia, was addressing a large audience in Mobile, an assault was made upon the speaker, and firearms were freely used. One white man and two negroes are known to have been killed, and many wounded. The exact cause of the murderous attack is contradictorily stated, but there can be no doubt that it had its origin in the rebel determination to put down free speech in Mobile. The bankrupt act which will go into operation on the first of Sixth month, sweeps off imprisonment for debt throughout this country. It sets aside all stay laws, and all preferences, voluntary agreements, and secret attachments. The Female Medical College, of Philadelphia, is hereafter to be known by the name of the Women's Medical College. Since the organization, young ladies or females, before they reached the era of tution, but as nobody but women are hereafter to be womanhood, were admitted as pupils of the instiadmitted, the change of the name is necessary, as it indicates the future of the organization. London despatches say the recent great Reform demonstration numbered 100,000. Fifteen separate meetings were organized, and at one of them a woman spoke in favor of female suffrage. There and vicinity were under arms, and a large force of was no disturbance, but all the troops in London police was concealed in a secluded part of the Park. The Prince de Ligne will contribute a great curiosity to the Paris exhibition. It is a book which is neither manuscript nor printed; it is made of characters cut with scissors in the most delicate and adroit manner, and placed in lines of mathematical exactness. In 1640, Rodolf II., Emperor of Germany, offered 11,000 ducats for it. Nothing is known of its history. Late paper. The Emperor of France and the King of Prussia have both formally signed the Luxemburg treaty, and the war clouds have rolled away from the skies of Europe. Brevet Major General N. A. Miles, assistant com. missioner of the Freedmen's Bureau for North Caro lina, in his report for the month of April, represents a satisfactory condition of affairs in that State. The majority of all classes appear to be moving in their respective spheres with a determination of purpose calculated to produce good results. Notwithstanding much destitution prevails, there are encouraging prospects of the same being materially decreased. The crops are bidding fair for a large yield, and the early fruits and vegetables will soon be available. The advancing spring offers many op. portunities to labor, and there are but few localities where all so disposed cannot obtain at least a partial support. The very liberal donations from Northern philanthropists, in conjunction with the facilities afforded by the recent resolutions of Congress, have enabled the bureau to reach cases of destitution unknown before or unable to be reached by the Gov. ernment. The farmers are working to the fullest possible extent of their resources, and large tracts of land which have until now remained forests, or which have for years remained idle, have been taken MARYLAND REPUBLICAN CONVENTION.-There assem- up by energetic freedmen, who are busy with their bled recently at Bilimore the most remarkable operations, showing conclusively by the results alpolitical body that ever held its sessions in that city. ready obtained that the great experiment of free It was the Republican Convention of the State of labor is a success. As a general rule contracts are Maryland, composed of delegates chosen without re- strictly observed by both parties interested, and gard to color, admitted without regard to color, complaints of wrongs or injuries inflicted are seldom sitting in the Convention without regard to color, heard. The educational work continues with unavoting and speaking in the process of its delibera-bated ardor, notwithstanding the season has arrived tions without regard to color. It is a very safe when many are called to the field of manual labor. statement to say that no such body ever before sat The monthly returns show a much more gratifying within the borders of Maryland since the founda- result than for any corresponding period of the year tion of the Republic.- Wilmington Commercial. previous. General Miles also says: "The initiatory steps taken toward giving the colored people their rights of representation already give evidence of their influence in the development of their manho: d, they in a quiet manner indicating an appreciation of their position, unattended by any evidences of elatedness, but with an earnestness of purpose characterized by moderation and proper reasoning."-Press. EDUCATION OF COLORED CHILDREN IN NEW ORLEANS.— A bill is now before the Common Council of New Orleans, which provides that $60,000 be appropriated for the education of colored children in separate schools. It is estimated that there are 22,000 colored children in that city of a proper age to attend school. |