The education department at t. Petersburgh causes school books to be printed and distributed. The number officially distributed in 1846, is stated to have been one hundred and sixty-two thousand.

Private persons have occasionally made munificent gifts in support of education. Count Demidow founded three prizes in the academy of St. Petersburgh-one of five thousand roubles banco, to which two thousand roubles are added to defray the expense of printing. Eight other prizes of two thousand five hundred roubles each, are distributed from the same foundation.

Before turning my glance westward from Siberia, I may here mention that the Empire of China is a remarkable instance of the success of a national system of education; it is true that, ostensibly, the schools are not supported in the same manner as in America, in Prussia, &c. but from the palace of the Emperor to the hovel of the unworthiest field labourer, there is, throughout the Empire, a reverence for letters, and a conviction that on the parent devolves the weighty responsibility of shaping the moral aspect of his child; and we see that, though not to the Chinese was announced the commandment, (the only one to which a promise is attached) that parents shall be honoured, yet as in China, the substance of the commandment has been more rigidly kept than amongst any other known people, so in China has followed, to a greater extent than elsewhere, the realization of the promise. Venerable dynasties have in other climes been swept away, and the builders of the world's wonders have even been forgotten; but while Egyptian, Assyrian, Greek and Roman, have, in their turn, bent before the scythe of time, the filial respect which pervades the morality of China, has saved her, and her alone, from the rapid decay around. Her political system is doubtless rotten to the core, and it may be said that the vast empire which it misrules, coheres rather by want of energy for disturbance, than

by any vitality of its government. It is as if the original political element had proved so feeble that, while it perished from inanition, the transition from life to death was not attended by the sad but active process by which, generally, bodies that have had life are decomposed. But the reverence paid to the fathers of families, the veneration in which learning and the doctrines of Confucius are held, and the fact that it is from the Emperor that literary distinctions are derived, have bound the whole empire in one vast system of mental culture, of whose fruits all are ambitious, and in whose vices none can be made to believe.

I have heard it noticed with surprise in the Australian Colonies, that all, or nearly all, of the Chinese immigrants can read, and when we remember that their written characters present numerous difficulties to the learner, we might indeed be surprised at the amount of learning possessed by the Chinese peasantry, if we ignore the fact that, throughout the Empire, the acquisition of literary 'science is deemed the highest object of earthly ambition. The profession of letters is the most honourable; next to it may be ranked that of the followers of agriculture; and the & Toλo, merchants, shopkeepers, and soldiers bring up the undistinguished rear ranks of society. Teachers and tutors are looked upon with the utmost respect, and in each town and village, not only are there many families of the better class who employ and treat tutors with distinction; but there are also schools, in which the youth of the village of all classes may join together to obtain a knowledge of the "sublime implements" used in literary composition. The schoolrooms are public property, and fortunately the respect which is entertained for learning, renders it not a difficult task to keep such buildings in repair. There are many occasions on which, by examinations, and by encouragement familiar and official, parents and mandarins assist in the great work of education; but the great desideratum in spreading, literary knowledge, viz., a

willing people, already exists in China, and needs no fostering hand.

I need not enumerate many details concerning the Chinese system, but may conclude this chapter by mentioning, that though there are no universities in China, there are in every city halls appointed for the examination of students and graduates, and that after each examination, the names of those on whom distinction has been conferred, may be seen figuring in the "chop," or proclamation, which is posted up on the walls of several public places, as well as at the entrance of the Doctors' Hall. Keying, the late Governor of Canton, was looked upon with much respect by the Chinese savans, and I remember that on one occasion when I visited a country house of a rich mandarin (a son of one of the old Hong merchants of the city), after the various collections of art and curiosity which the premises contained had been shewn to us, the cicerone pointed out with unfeigned admiration, several long labels on the walls of a choice sitting-room, and reverentially told us that they had been written by Keying himself, and given to the owner of the house. These labels contained as usual some wise and moral sentences, extracted from the works of Confucius, which the Chinese thus place ever before them.

CHAPTER VIII.

IN SPAIN, those who grudge to the common people the faculty of intelligence, have a good test of the sonndness of their views; there are schools and universities of a certain kind in the country, but they are far from being institutions calculated to expand the domain of intellect.

The Cortes did indeed during their short rule, after the Revolution of 1820, ordain (IX Cap. Constitution,) that there should be a system of education open to all who wished to learn, but this ordinance was swept away in 1823, by the Restoration, and the effort to confer education was thus made a failure except as regarded some few institutions for the higher classes;the old cathedral and conventual schools. were restored to their pristine gloom, and the Spaniards remain benighted with ignorance in the midst of the light of the nineteenth century. It is but a short time ago that a decree was made, prohibitory of the teaching of philosophy in the universities, and thus the countrymen of Cervantes have been compelled to plod on with their eyes closed upon nature. In very many villages there is no semblance of a school.

In SARDINIA, also, Denominationalists might not long since have boasted that they possessed a field obstructive of success. After the resuscitation of the Jesuits, in 1814, the care of education was restored to them, and they had influ

ence enough to procure a royal decree, prohibiting the learning of reading and writing to all who did not possess capital of fifteen hundred lire, and sealing the sciences to all who had not an income of the same sum.

Those who lament the late continental disturbances are, perhaps, sometimes forgetful of the husbandry which provoked them.

Sardinia now boasts many schools, and seems determined to organize thoroughly a school system.

In the PAPAL STATES education is at a low ebb :the ignorance of the people will doubtless be admitted by those who reflect that the present Pope, so general a favorite as to have been at one time extolled by Protestants as a reformer, and to be now lauded by Cardinal Wiseman as the great Protestant bugbear, was ignominiously driven from his dominions in 1848. It seems almost a pity that on his return one of his first acts (according to the English press) was to neutralize the efforts which had been made by the shortlived Republic, in the matter of schools, one of his Holiness's Acts, being an ordinance to prevent girls from learning to write without special permission. I say that it seems a pity that the worthy Pope acted as he did, because if ignorance made his subjects err, the best preventive against future error would have been to enlarge the means of procuring knowledge.

The celebrated colleges of the Propaganda, La Sapienza, and the Gregorian College, may be mentioned here, but my limits do not allow me to dilate upon them; I may mention, however, that a few years ago one of a Society of Jesuits, published in Rome a work gravely impugning the received theories of the positions of the planetary worlds, and affirming that the sun was about the figure of a goodsized warming-pan. This work has been attributed to Dr. Cullen, but he only belonged to the society of which the author was a member.