Page:Macaula yʼs minutes on education in India, written in the years 1835, 1836 and 1837 (IA dli.csl.7615).pdf/16

Rh For Head Master I would propose Mr. Woollaston. He is desirous to quit his present situation. He is quite useless there. He has qualifications which would make him very useful elsewhere. Agra is the very place for him. I have already expressed my decided opinion that the English class in the Sanscrit College ought to be abolished. We can never have a better opportunity than this. It is only by taking this course that it will be in our power to assist the Agra College. We have not the means, I fear, of allowing 400 Rs. a month to that institution without making a reduction in some other quarter. By abolishing the English class in the Sanscrit College, we gain a good master; we gain money to pay him with; we give an excellent system of education to Agra; we deprive Calcutta of an institution, which appears, from all the evidence before us, to be not only useless, but mischievous.

I do not think it necessary to go, on every occasion, into the question whether we ought, besides furnishing the students with instruction, to pay them for receiving that instruction. If the sense of the Committee is, that the orders of Government on that point ought to be reconsidered, let us address Government on the subject.

If such a proposition should be made, I will state at length the reasons which lead me decidedly to approve of the Government orders. Until such a proposition is made, I think it sufficient to say that, if the general rule be bad, it ought to be altered, and that, if it be good, no reason is assigned for thinking that Agra ought to be made an exception more than Patna, Dacca, Allahabad, Meerut or Benares.—[Book E. page 157.] 7th November, 1835.

Agra College.—Mr. Sutherland's draft is altogether at variance with the determination to which I understand the Committee to have come. He says that we cannot appropriate any portion of our general fund in support of the Agra College. What I proposed, and what I understand the Committee to have resolved, is that the services of Mr. Woollaston shall be transferred to Agra, that the English class in the Sanscrit College shall be done away, and that the sum which we save by getting rid of an useless institution here, shall be employed to assist the Agra College. If this be done, there will be not the smallest difficulty in carrying the whole of my plan into immediate effect. A reference to Government will, I suppose, be necessary. I would suggest that it should be instantly made; and that, till an answer is received, we should make no communication to the Agra Committee.—[Book E. page 171.]

Since the above was written I have learned that Mr. Suther-