Page:Reports on the State of Education in Bengal (1835 & 1838).djvu/371

Rh The average age of all the scholars at the time the school was visited was 16·6 years. The school is made in part to pay its own expenses by means of the fees received from some of the scholars. The ten Christian scholars and thirty-four of the Hindu scholars pay nothing and of the remaining thirteen Hindu scholars three pay four annas each per month, eight pay eight annas each, and two pay one rupee each, making the monthly receipts from the scholars amount to Rs. 6-12. This sum is employed in keeping the school-house in repair and in furnishing books to those who are unable to purchase them. The other scholars have books from Mr. Williamson at the Calcutta cost-price with the addition of one anna per rupee for carriage. The school is also aided by local subscriptions which amounted in 1835 to 160 rupees, being 50 rupees less than the previous year.

The monitorial system of teaching is employed under Mr. Williamson’s superintendence. The subjects taught are spelling, reading, writing, grammar, geography, morals, and religion. It was intended to introduce the study of general history and natural history.

Mr. Williamson joined his scholars in earnestly soliciting that a Government institution should be established at Siuri to supersede the English school under his management.

The second English school is at Raipur, a village situated in the Kasba thana. The patron is Jagamohan Singh who built the school-house at a cost of 250 Rupees and pay the teacher Rasik Lal Chose a salary of 40 Rupees per month. The scholars are 16 in number of whom twelve are Kayasthas and four Brahmans. Of the Kayasthas four are sons of the patron and all the other scholars receive instruction gratuitously. The scholars are divided into three classes. The youngest boys were reading Murray’s spelling-book; the more advanced, Woollaston’s grammar in addition to the spelling-book; and the first class boys, Clift’s Geography, the History of Greece, the Poetical Reader, and Murray’s large grammar. This school has existed for three or four years, and its establishment is solely attributable to the patron’s desire to give an English education to his children. The teacher was formerly a pupil in the English school established by the late in Calcutta.

There was formerly a girls’ school under Mrs. Williamson’s care at Siuri, but in October 1834 one of the scholars abandoned