Page:Pleasant Memories of Pleasant Lands.djvu/387

 362 BOKOUGH-ROAD SCHOOL.

strength. Subordination, the privilege of childhood, is better secured to them. Their little minds are not fevered with doubt whether they are to rule or be ruled. The sentiment of respect, constantly cherished within them, is a sedative principle, and contributes to serenity.

The parents, on the other side of the water, seem less exhausted than we ; better able to meet the trials involved in their position, and not too busy to enjoy that domestic happiness which is their natural solace.

The industrial schools of England are on a rational plan, very thoroughly carried out. The useful and nice performances of the nSedle, to which those girls are gradually inured, who at first knew not on which finger to place the thimble, are truly surprising. At the Borough-Road School, four hundred female pupils exhibited specimens of needlework, of different grades of excellence, some of which, arranged in cases, we purchased, to amaze the little ones at home. They also read with propriety, and sustained several recita tions.

In another portion of the building, six hundred boys, from five to thirteen, were examined in arithmetic, and some of the more distinguished, solved mathematical problems. They all executed calisthenic evolutions in a very rapid and systematic manner ; sang in unison scientifically, and exhibited drawings of architectural designs, done with great accuracy. Precision and obe dience strongly characterized their movements, as if all those one thousand minds were formed on the same model.

�� �