contribution (from the State, the Department and the Communes) amounts to 4,150,000 fr. Making allowance for bursaries the public funds in France accordingly pay somewhat less than half the cost of secondary education in the Lycées. The expenses of the Colleges Communaux are defrayed on nearly the same principles.

A similar state of things is found in Austria, Switzerland, Holland, and in fact in all countries where there is a sufficient supply of secondary education with proper guarantees for its efficiency. The universal experience of these countries is that the natural demand for higher schools cannot be satisfied without invoking to a considerable extent the aid of State funds, and none of their governments, whether aristocratic or democratic, hesitate to sanction the necessary demands.

We have thus far considered the claim of the middle classes to a fair share of public support for their schools as a plea for justice. We have insisted that the State which maintains various grades of schools up to, but stopping short at the Secondary Schools of the middle classes, should take the further step, required alike by logic and justice, of giving these schools a reasonable measure of support. We would now point out some of the advantages which would be secured to secondary education and to the middle classes by such a support and control of their schools.

It is in the first place the only sure means of providing the necessary supply of higher schools for the country at large. We have seen how incomplete the supply of Secondary Schools at present is, with the result that some large towns have no Secondary Schools, while small towns have, and that a small Secondary School may have double the endowment of a large one. This is not picturesque variety—it is utter confusion. A proper contribution to secondary education in proportion to the population of the larger towns would secure a uniform supply of secondary, as of elementary schools. The public grants should no doubt in part be derived from local rates: but the area of rating for Secondary Schools should be extended from the burgh or parish to the county or division of a county, so

The scholars' fees supplied £10,630 of this sum, and the town funds gave a supplement of £7960, or about two-fifths of the total cost. Thus the municipality gives a reasonable return to the middle classes for the educational taxes which they pay. But in doing so, it does not neglect the more urgent claims of the elementary schools. On the contrary, it pays as much as four-fifths of their cost, which is very much the same proportion as the elementary schools of Glasgow receive from the rates and the government grant. Again, in the German city, the total grant by the municipality to the elementary schools amounts to £39,650, and that made to the higher schools to £7690 or about a fifth of the grant to the elementary. The middle classes thus receive less than they contribute, and the working classes much more: but by this just and rational scheme the wealthier tax-payer is reasonably satisfied, while the duty of the rich to the poor is amply discharged. Best of all, the educational wants of both classes are fully supplied.

In France secondary education is maintained on exactly the same principles. We quote the following figures from the magnificent report which M. Bardoux prepared for the French government in 1878. It is not at once obvious how much the public funds in France contribute for purely educational purposes in connection with Secondary Schools. All the French public Secondary Schools, (i.e., the Lycées and Colleges Communaux) are boarding establishments, as well as day schools. Now in 1876 the total receipts of the Lycées amounted to 24,028,867 fr., and the net contribution from the public funds (exclusive of bursaries) was only 4,150,000 fr., or apparently about a sixth of the whole. But it must be remembered that the expense of boarding, except in the case of bursars, is not one to which the State can be expected to contribute: on the contrary it makes a profit, though a slight one, from the boarding charges. We must compare the fees and the public grants and calculate thus: In the Lycées there are 18,956 day scholars, who pay 2,655,578 fr. in school fees: there are 18,026 boarders, whose fees (not stated separately from the boarding charges) would amount on the same scale to 2,500,000 fr. We

contribution (from the State, the Department and the Communes) amounts to 4,150,000 fr. Making allowance for bursaries the public funds in France accordingly pay somewhat less than half the cost of secondary education in the Lycées. The expenses of the Colleges Communaux are defrayed on nearly the same principles.

A similar state of things is found in Austria, Switzerland, Holland, and in fact in all countries where there is a sufficient supply of secondary education with proper guarantees for its efficiency. The universal experience of these countries is that the natural demand for higher schools cannot be satisfied without invoking to a considerable extent the aid of State funds, and none of their governments, whether aristocratic or democratic, hesitate to sanction the necessary demands.

We have thus far considered the claim of the middle classes to a fair share of public support for their schools as a plea for justice. We have insisted that the State which maintains various grades of schools up to, but stopping short at the Secondary Schools of the middle classes, should take the further step, required alike by logic and justice, of giving these schools a reasonable measure of support. We would now point out some of the advantages which would be secured to secondary education and to the middle classes by such a support and control of their schools.

It is in the first place the only sure means of providing the necessary supply of higher schools for the country at large. We have seen how incomplete the supply of Secondary Schools at present is, with the result that some large towns have no Secondary Schools, while small towns have, and that a small Secondary School may have double the endowment of a large one. This is not picturesque variety-it is utter confusion. A proper contribution to secondary education in proportion to the population of the larger towns would secure a uniform supply of secondary, as of elementary schools. The public grants should no doubt in part be derived from local rates: but the area of rating for Secondary Schools should be extended from the burgh or parish to the county or division of a county, so

providing such education for the surrounding district. This difficulty might also be solved, as it is in Germany, by charging somewhat higher fees for children whose parents are not taxpayers within the area of rating.

With a change in the system of rating schools also come a change of management. The present School Boards are not fit managers of Secondary Schools. Many of their members have had no secondary education themselves, and few of them have any idea of the complicated organization and working of a Secondary School. They are chosen for the comparatively easy task of supervising elementary education; and in a good many cases they simply represent the cause of economy. But the scheme of elementary education is so fully laid down in the code, and the government inspector is so uncompromising an advocate of efficiency, that the School Boards are not likely to go far wrong. In the sphere of secondary education the case is altogether different. The Boards have no programme of studies to guide them, no public authority to control or advise them, and no competent acquaintance with the work which they supervise. Their management of Secondary Schools is therefore unskilled, and, as a rule, unsympathetic. They are elected mainly by the working classes, who think only of their own education, and regard expenditure on secondary education as a luxury to be cut down to the lowest limit. The Boards, in short, don't know what is wanted; if they did, they don't know how to provide it; and even if they knew, they have not the necessary freedom or authority. It would be a very simple thing to devise a much fitter governing body, consisting say of two or three representatives from Town Councils, one from the Commissioners of Supply, the sheriff resident in the division of the county, a professional and eminent educationist, and a government assessor.

Some public inspection of higher schools would probably accompany these changes, as a much needed guarantee of efficiency. There is at present in most cases an annual inspection of higher schools under School Board management. But it is conducted by inspectors appointed from year to year

public authority, no common standard of examination, and, in many cases, little previous experience in such work. Their reports, therefore, cannot have much value for purposes of comparison. Moreover, being appointed and paid by the particular School Board, and perhaps desiring to be reappointed, they have not the independence necessary for giving a perfectly candid and discriminating report. Finally, as their reports are not usually made public, the individual parent has no means of judging of the school; and if, in the case of an unfavourable report, the School Board acquiesce in the inefficiency of the school, there is no remedy at hand. A judicious system of public inspection would remove these drawbacks. It would require, of course, to be much more elastic and much less minute than that applied to elementary schools, but it could easily be devised so as to help and stimulate secondary education.

The proper organisation and support of our higher schools would also make education cheaper. The fees at present charged in High Schools in the provinces in Scotland are not very heavy, rarely exceeding £10 per annum; but in many of these cases this apparent cheapness is purchased by an undue curtailment of the staff, and an insufficient subdivision of the work. In larger towns the fees are greater: in the schools recently established by the Girls' Public School Company' in England, they rise as high as £25 per annum. These fees may be moderate compared with the exorbitant charges of many boarding schools; but they are much higher than the corresponding fees in France and Germany. The maximum fees in the Lycées and Colleges Communaux of France vary in different parts of the country from £5 to £10 per annum. In the German Gymnasien they are from £3 to £6, while the highest fee in the 'Girls' High School' in Dresden is £6 per annum. It must also be remembered that in France and Germany these fees procure an education not of doubtful, but of guaranteed efficiency.

Much might be said of the great loss which the middle classes sustain by the very inadequate provision of education