About the Electronic Publication

Katherine MacNaughton’s thesis, The Development of the Theory and Practice of Education in New Brunswick 1784–1900, has been re-issued as an electronic book as part of the University of New Brunswick’s 225th anniversary celebrations in 2010. The project is a result of a partnership between the university’s Archives and Special Collections department, and the Electronic Text Centre at UNB.

Copyright 2010, University of New Brunswick. All rights reserved. The electronic version of this text is made freely available for non-commercial use.

FOREWORD

In publishing a series of historical studies such as this the University is undertaking a task entirely new in its history of something approaching a hundred and sixty-five years. Through this present pioneer effort, and later volumes to come, it is hoped to make a valuable contribution to the cultural life of the Province in general and to the cause of education in particular.

It may appear to some readers an ambitious project for a relatively small university to attempt to develop a school of graduate research. There are, however, many considerations to justify it. The standard of undergraduate study is raised and the whole intellectual life of the university quickened. Projects conducted with patience, ability and honesty of purpose, as this effort has been, will be of great value to the community at large. The post-graduate students engaged in the research derive special benefits from the undertaking. I believe that it is fitting and proper that the University should promote and encourage such work, even though its primary role must continue to be the education of our youth on the undergraduate level.

This book is the first concise survey of the background of education in this Province based upon a wide use of the data available. It should be an inspiration as well as a warning for the future. It makes clear that the ambitions and aspirations of the period were not always faithfully reproduced in the quality and character of the educational facilities that came into being.

While reading this book it is easy enough for us to pause and speculate upon what might have been. One can wonder what New Brunswick might be today if, in the early nineteenth century, a consistent and progressive policy of economic and educational development, no matter how modest, had been established and adapted to the changing scene down through the years. We can look back and say that the educational system should have been designed to prepare New Brunswick's young people to a greater degree for participation in the cultural and economic growth of the Province, thereby enriching it by the full expression of their spirit and enterprise. Instead the story tells of a constant need for greater financial support, of conflicting objectives, and of the frustration of many noble efforts. One result was the trend, often referred to as the “export of brains”, but which in reality was a continued drainage from the Province of its youth seeking opportunities for self-expression and livelihood elsewhere. All this we can think, and more, as we scan the pages that follow, but we must remember all the intricate difficulties which characterized the period covered and, so remembering, we should recognize and build upon the solid progress that was achieved. Speculation concerning what might have been is justified only if it causes us to work with vision, energy, and a buoyant faith for the future. I feel confident that Miss MacNaughton's excellent study of the past will be very helpful in this task.

I wish to acknowledge the devoted labour of Dr. A. G. Bailey, Head of the Department of History of the University, whose conception of the University's obligations to the community has included an untiring search for source material and the production of a series of monographs on provincial subjects of which this is the first, and without whose able supervision, this work would never have been begun and could not have been produced.

MILTON F. GREGG,

President, University of New Brunswick.

Fredericton, Canada.
26 January, 1946.

INTRODUCTION

The notable achievements of Canadian historians in the fields of political, and economic history have served to establish a framework within which the task of the social and cultural historian may be conceived and performed. Yet the writing of an adequate general monograph in this field is hardly yet possible, for the lack of numerous special studies of particular phases upon which the general historian must depend as groundwork for his task of synthesis and interpretation. In this respect, and for discernible reasons, Canadians have lagged behind their contemporaries in Great Britain and the United States where the minute investigations of countless scholars have prepared the way for the brilliantly integrated studies that have for some years issued from the presses of those countries.

Because of this dearth of special studies, and in view of the fact that for a long period the cultural life of each of the provinces was to some extent separate and peculiar, although they drew much from a common source, and interacted upon each other, the most reasonable approach to the problem would seem to be through the production of series of provincial histories of beliefs, attitudes, and institutions, in such fields as education, religion, science, and literature, each conceived in its just relation to the total configuration. This appears to be the next great task to which Canadian historians should devote themselves, and it has been with a view to making some contribution towards it that the studies, of which this is the first, have been undertaken. The task should be congenial in view of the increasing concern of Canadians to recognize the marks of their own national identity. Although some progress has been made towards the achievement of such recognition, it is not yet possible to delineate the Canadian character with any high degree of precision, partly because an examination of the popular attitudes and beliefs that inform Canadian institutions, and that find, or fail to find, expression in Canadian social and cultural life, has only begun to be made. It might well be that such studies in social and cultural history, as have here been suggested, would yield a knowledge of certain persistent traits In Canadian life which, when recognized, would provide answers to many of the questions that now baffle the student of Canadian society. In that sense these studies are adventures in national self-discovery.

While our primary interest may be in the solution of contemporary problems, it is assumed that these problems must necessarily be approached historically. This point of view may be justified on two grounds. First, whatever else history may be, it still seems reasonable to regard it, although not in the eighteenth-century sense, as “philosophy teaching by example”. In the second place, although past, present, and future are necessary concepts, they constitute a continuous process and, in a sense, do not exist as separate entities. It is therefore of value, if indeed it is not imperative, to regard the “past” as the “present” and “future” in a state of becoming. If history is a continuum it follows that the “present” conditions result, in a casual relationship, from “past” conditions, and if we are to understand things as they are, and anticipate what they are likely to be, we must appreciate the causes that have made them so. The greater our knowledge, the more effectively may we control the conditions that mould our lives. A study of the past fortifies us against the contingencies of the future. In planning this and other studies in the series these considerations have been borne in mind.

Although all knowledge is the province of a university, it has been assumed that the Provincial University should include among its concerns a study of the forces that have shaped the life of the community of New Brunswick which it was so largely established to serve. It would be recreant to its high calling as a disseminator of “useful knowledge” if it remained indifferent to the reactions of its people to the exigencies of the physical and social environments, which they must meet with a firm will and an enlightened understanding if they are to realize the ends of a rational society on their own terrain. It is not our purpose here to specify the problems which might best be solved through provincial, national, or international action, nor is it intended that these studies should foster a parochial outlook. The anthropologist who pursues his legitimate task of studying the culture of a primitive tribe or area preserves a spirit of detachment and does not become a party to the tribal mores which he is engaged in recording. The concept of culture as regional has been useful in the field of ethnology. Likewise the impact of historic forces has had a regional incidence in New Brunswick, the most conspicuous of which have been those industrial and political processes that have produced that state of “chronic depression” so ably analyzed and described by recent economists. Yet it would be a mistake to regard man as entirely a passive object of blind and capricious forces, and although Mr. Arnold Toynbee does not write hopefully of this eastern region, students of his great work will be familiar with the fact that time and again throughout history men have successfully responded to the challenges of hard ground and penalization by redirecting their creative energies into possible channels leading to fruitful ends. It would be tragic if an ever-deepening taedium vitae resulted from the revelation of the adverse forces that impinge upon and affect the course of life in this area. If the problem were construed too narrowly in terms of natural resources there might be danger of neglecting to husband the human resources that must be brought to bear upon the problem of rebuilding society on surer foundations. In supplementing the work of students in related fields, these historical studies are intended to contribute to the accomplishment of that purpose by providing a basis for discussion which it is hoped will create an intellectual ferment without which there can be little hope of progress towards the realization of a better life for all.

A. G. BAILEY.

PREFACE

While several studies have been made in the field of New Brunswick education, no comprehensive or detailed history of the educational development of the province, based upon extensive archival research, has been published, nor so far as I am aware, has such a history been written. Certainly no attempt has been made to set developments in New Brunswick education against the social political, and economic background of the province, or to relate them to the wider field of educational movements in Britain, Europe, the United States, and other parts of British North America. For this reason the present work, in which such an attempt has been made, may be of some interest to the student of the history of ideas and institutions. While possibly of primary concern to the people of New Brunswick, it will, I hope, make some contribution to the cultural history of Canada.

Research into the manuscript, newspaper, book, and pamphlet collections contained in many of the archives and libraries of eastern Canada has enabled me to give a more comprehensive account of the flow of educational ideas and intellectual changes than would have been possible if the material used had been confined to the obvious printed sources. The subject has not been conceived as a succession of anecdotes or biographies, but rather as an aspect of a developing society treated in its relation to a general social and cultural context. Consequently no attempt has been made to enlarge upon the lives and personalities of educational officials, except in the cases of Marshall d'Avray and Theodore Rand who were responsible for inaugurating changes and determining policy in the two most crucial periods in the history of the province. The influence of the New England States, and the general significance of regionalism have been suggested whenever possible. I am well aware of many defects and deficiencies, for some of which I plead exigencies of time and space. The lack of an index is a serious omission, but the detailed table of contents will, I trust provide a useful substitute.

I acknowledge gratefully the financial assistance of a fellowship at the University of New Brunswick which has made possible the writing of this master s essay, and I express my warmest appreciation to the Campbellton School board for their generosity in granting me two years leave of absence from my teaching position. I am grateful to the staff of the Public Archives of Canada, particularly to Miss Norah Storey; to Miss Estelle Vaughan and the other members of the staff of the Saint John Free Public Library; to Dr. J. Clarence Webster, C. M. G., and to Miss Margaret Evans of the New Brunswick Museum for the courtesy with which they facilitated my research work. To Mrs. M. J. Thompson, Librarian at the University of New Brunswick, and to the entire library staff of the University, I am deeply indebted for the more than ordinary facilities which they placed at my disposal. Miss Louise Manny of Newcastle not only gave me encouragement but she and Dr. Lilian Maxwell generously offered the use of valuable material in their possession. Dr. A. S. MacFarlane, until recently the Chief Superintendent of Education and Dr. Fletcher Peacock, Director of Educational Services and Chief Superintendent of Education of New Brunswick, co-operated in every way in my search for material at the Education Office. The Honorable J. B. McNair, Premier of the province, and Mr. Justice Bacon Dickson, until recently the Deputy Attorney General, readily placed at the disposal of the Department of History of the University archival material In the vault of the Executive Council. Messrs. Houghton, Mifflin Company of Boston, have kindly given me permission to quote from Professor D. G. Creighton's brilliant interpretation of Canadian history, “Dominion of the North”. To these, and to those others who assisted me in various ways, I express my sincere thanks.

My greatest debt is to Dr. A. G. Bailey, head of the Department of History of the University of New Brunswick. But for his faith this book would not have been begun, and without his encouragement and assistance it could never have been completed. In that sense it belongs to him as well as to me. I must, however, bear final responsibility for any faults which may be found in the work. I am grateful also to Miss Frances Firth, of the Department of History, for her assistance in reading the proofs.

KATHERINE F. C. MacNAUGHTON.

Campbellton, N. B.
1945.

CHAPTER 1
THE BRITISH BACKGROUND

Whether the founders of the province of New Brunswick left the American Colonies because of love for king and royal traditions, or whether loyalty was only the basis of the cause of their exodus, and not the cause itself,1 an examination of the institutions to which they adhered, the traditions which they cherished, and the political and cultural ideals of the country with which their connections were strengthened is an integral part of any study of the early history of the province.

By the Restoration of 1660 Puritanism and democracy in England gave place to Anglicanism and aristocracy.2 Twenty-five years later when royal absolutism led James II to attack parliamentary traditions and the vested interests of church and state, the aristocracy took the lead in the movement against an unpopular king, thus identifying vested interests with the cause of British freedom.3 Quite naturally, therefore, an oligarchy of aristocrats replaced the discredited divine-right monarchy.

In broad principles there was little difference between Whig and Tory at the beginning of the eighteenth century, for both were aristocratic and intent on the perpetuation of the existing social and economic order. However, since many Tories became suspect of Jacobitism, Whig ministers and a Whig majority in parliament seemed desirable and necessary to ardent Protestants, to supporters of the Hanoverian succession, and to the first Hanoverian Kings. The eighteenth century was, therefore, the period of a powerful Whig oligarchy, and even the efforts of the third Hanoverian King to revive personal rule made no essential difference. “It would be a conservative estimate to say that ten thousand landlords and merchants ruled the England of George 111.” 4 The interests and desires of this class shaped the policies of English government from 1689 until the Industrial Revolution bore fruit in the nineteenth century, in the form of middle-class aspirations that would not be denied.

The social aristocracy of the Hanoverian epoch included the titled nobles, the squires, higher clergy and the cultivated middle class, i.e., merchants and bankers, who shared business interests with the aristocracy or were related to them by blood or marriage alliance.5 Accepting Locke's political philosophy that governments are for the protection of life, liberty and property, and using it as justification of the Revolution of 1689, they believed that as property owners they were the indubitable custodians of a government designed to preserve the rights of property. The unprivileged might indeed be grateful to them for an England of tolerance toward Dissent, of comparative freedom of person, speech and press, an England whose parliamentary constitutionalism was the admiration of a continent still enslaved to priests and kings. The duty of the masses, aside from this gratitude and a due appreciation of the charitable deed, the kindly smile and condescending word of their betters—product of a mixture of benevolence, amusement and good-natured contempt—was to exhibit a proper contentment with the station in which God had placed them, and to refrain from meddling in what was none of their concern.

“Partly as a matter of deep unconscious habit, partly in reasoned self-interest, . . . the ruling class in every society dreads change and seeks to perpetuate the existing status in morals, politics and religion.” 6 To the “Whig Oligarchy” the English parliament of the eighteenth century was a ready instrument for this purpose.

When the settlement of 1689 ended the rivalry between Crown and Parliament, it made the latter the leading partner in a co-operation between the two powers.7 Increasingly, except during the interval of George III's personal rule, the Crown became a symbol and Parliament omnipotent. While supposed to represent the people of Great Britain, actually Parliament did so very imperfectly and unfairly. The Upper House, composed of titled landlords and Anglican ecclesiastics, was a purely aristocratic body. The House of Commons, as everyone knows, although more representative in appearance, was in reality scarcely less aristocratic. Neither Whigs nor Tories in the eighteenth century dreamed of reforming such a system. The enthusiasm for vested interests, engendered by the outrages which had provoked the Revolution of 1688, gave those interests a sacrosanct character and defied reform for one hundred and forty years. For this reason, and because Parliament had shrivelled up into the selfish organ of a small group, “the period of Walpole and the Pitts was the heyday of unchallenged abuses in all forms of corporate life. Holders of ecclesiastical, academic, charitable and scholastic endowments had no fear of enquiry or reform. Schoolmasters could draw their salaries without keeping school. Universities could sell degrees without holding examinations or giving instruction. Parliamentary boroughs and municipal oligarchies could be as corrupt and ridiculous as they liked; it was enough that they were old.” 8

With politics a “gentleman's game” and Parliament amenable to manipulation by gentlemen, it is not surprising to find that in domestic policies the Oligarchy favored agriculture and the great landlords. Happily, economic self-interest could be garbed in patriotic dress. Tudor and Stuart “enclosures” had been the means of improving agricultural production. With the growth of population the national food supply was becoming increasingly important. By capitalistic, large-scale scientific agriculture the yield (and profits) of English farming could be increased. Between 1700 and 1800 Parliament passed a series of Enclosure Acts giving noblemen and squires the privilege of depriving tenants of their former right to common holdings. Similarly, the continuation of the Corn Laws long after Britain had ceased to be able to produce enough grain for her mounting population is evidence not only of the benefits reaped by the landed classes, but also of their ability to make their own interests appear as national needs. Continued into the nineteenth century Enclosures and Corn Laws were among the factors which sent droves of impoverished people to the British North American colonies, including New Brunswick, where they created heavy relief problems, and swelled that section of the population whose educational needs were most acute, but which exhibited the greatest indifference towards the benefits of education.

If the Enclosure Acts and the Navigation Acts favored the landed class the latter were also especially in the interests of the mercantile and commercial groups. It is true that these restrictions which “canalized trade along certain narrow lines” 9 had, as their primary object, the maintenance of British naval supremacy and national security. The statement of Judge Croke that 'every deviation from this system, whether voluntary or from irresistible necessity, every licence to admit foreign vessels into British ports, is a nail driven into the Coffin of the British empire'10 expressed the national attitude towards any relaxation of British mercantile regulations. Even Adam Smith, whose Wealth of Nations in 1776 shook the theory of 'beggar my neighbor', realized that the problem of the navigation system was closely tied up with national existence. Although he opposed the Physiocratic idea that agriculture is the basis of wealth, and agreed that the natural laws by which a nation might increase its wealth were to be found in laissez-faire principles, he admitted that the defence of Great Britain depended much on the number of her sailors and her shipping, and that the Navigation Acts properly endeavored to give the seamen and ships of Great Britain the monopoly of the trade of their own country.11 Granted that trade was considered principally as a means of promoting the employment of ships and that an extensive mercantile marine might serve as a nursery of seamen for the navy, the fact remains that the prosperity of a large number of British merchants and industrialists depended on schemes of trade protection. “National security was a catch phrase which could easily be made to serve the ends of self-interest.” 12 Justified, then, on the grounds of national safety, the external policy of England in the eighteenth century fell more and more under the influence of mercantile considerations.l3

This policy inevitably involved the regulation of colonies. Hide-bound believers in the colonial system were thoroughly in agreement with William Knox, on whom the settlement of Anglo-American commerce largely devolved, when he enunciated the rule that 'It was better to have no colonies at all, than not to have them subservient to the maritime strength and commercial interest of Great Britain.'14

In spite of certain compensations, British trade regulations sacrificed the interests of the American colonies to the interests of England or the Sugar Islands. They were tolerated, however, for many years, partly because they were not rigidly enforced, and partly because the weak and disunited Thirteen Colonies were dependent on British aid for security against France. When the outcome of the Seven Years' War had ended that danger, a revival of the Navigation Acts and a determined effort to enforce them contributed to the causes creating irreconcilable differences between England and the American Colonies.

After the loss of these possessions the power of tradition and the propaganda of vested interests continued strong enough to maintain the mercantilist scheme, with some concessions and modifications, for several decades of the nineteenth century. It follows, therefore, that during New Brunswick's colonial tutelage, her trade relations with Great Britain, the United States, and the West Indies, hinged largely on the British trade and navigation system.

The relationships between church and state also furnish many interesting pages of history. When a church is established and supported by the state, treason and heresy may almost be regarded as interchangeable terms. Conversely, adherence to the established church may connote loyalty. In general, national churches tend to serve secular interests and to link patriotism with religion.

As the eighteenth century advanced, belief in “nature” and “reason” fostered, among other great ideals of the “Enlightenment”, that of toleration, and in greater or less degree principles of that saving doctrine were proclaimed by all the great thinkers of the century.l5 As a matter of statecraft, expediency made toleration in England a necessary provision of the settlement of 1689, and in actual practice the spirit of the age secured even to Roman Catholics and Unitarians a considerable degree of free religious worship. Of religious equality, however, there was none until the nineteenth century, for the Church of England, while no longer a persecuting body, continued to enjoy many exclusive privileges.16 Moreover, the ecclesiastical constitution of the country harmonized with the political.l7 Both were designed to perpetuate aristocratic leadership power, and prestige.

The established Church was not, however, free from criticism, sometimes subtle, sometimes direct, aimed against its secular spirit and its exclusiveness, or against orthodox theology in general. This came from various quarters— non-conformists, deists, sceptics, and emotional pietists, especially the Wesleyans. Although the spirit of the Age of Enlightenment was in favor of relaxation of the old religious intolerance in educational matters, “coincident with this growth of religious tolerance among the English we find the Church of England redoubling its efforts to hold the children of its adherents, by the organization of parish schools, and by the creation of a vast system of charitable religious schools.” 18

In this field of educational endeavor one finds the chief significance of eighteenth-century Anglicanism for British North America. Through various missionary agencies, by means of political machinery, by alliances with “Family Compacts”, the Anglican Church exercised a monopoly over the educational institutions of those North American colonies still in British hands after the American Revolution. Moreover, the Loyalists, Americans though they were, looked to Great Britain for intellectual, as well as political, sponsorship. Consequently, theories and practices prevalent in the English educational system were naturally features of colonial educational schemes, modified though they might be by pioneer conditions and American influences. An understanding of the English conception of education is therefore of importance.

“In the history of England, the dominant theme throughout has been the response of a conservative society in terms of education to conditions brought about by revolution in industrial life.” 19 Although the Industrial Revolution began in the eighteenth century, response to the new forces of machinery and capitalized industry did not come until later. Throughout the long reign of George III the new forces “worked their blind will upon a loosely organized aristocratic society that did not even perceive that its fate had come upon it.” 20 Progress in terms of education was made only after pressure and as a reluctant concession.21 The history of education in England exhibits the characteristics of the national genius. The English temper is reverent of the past. In an aristocratic social organization, such as existed in England, this reverence for tradition practically amounted to an attitude that 'whatever is is right—if it can show a charter.'22 Moreover, the English national genius23 turns from the theorist and system-maker and approaches social and political problems without comprehensive views or fundamental principles. It meets the needs of the hour with the suggestions of the hour. It prefers patching up a system or institution to making a clean sweep, and tends to compromise.24

When one thinks of education in terms of the relation of the individual to the organized social and economic structure, its purpose is seen to fall into one of three categories: “education to perpetuate the existing pattern of economic and social arrangements”, to modify or reform the established system, or to reorganize it completely.25 “The needs of an aristocratic society, regarding the liberal education of the gentleman as alone necessary, are very different from the needs of a democratic society, asserting the rights of all men to an equal share in the dividend of culture.” 26 To the controlling upper classes, a system which prepared leaders for Church and State seemed highly satisfactory. Few felt under obligation to provide education for children not their own. As yet there was no general realization of any connection between the spread of education and the welfare of the state, and no perception that mass ignorance might be a public danger. During the whole of the eighteenth century the British Parliament did not pass a single law relating to the education of the people, aside from enactments concerning workhouse schools.27 In point of fact, English education was the result of no government plan or statute. The schools were not controlled by the government with respect either to curriculum or discipline. The only government regulation was to see that grammar school teachers were orthodox Anglicans and under oath of loyalty to the reigning sovereign.28

This view that education was no business of the state, but was a private voluntary affair, to be had by those who desired it and could afford to pay for it, meant, if maintained, that education, like wealth and breeding, would remain an attribute of aristocracy, a badge of superiority, a qualification for leadership. That the dominant classes were conscious of this implication is indicated by the half-indignant query 'Why should we let down a ladder that the people may climb up and dispossess both us and our children?'29

Even more deeply rooted in tradition than the exclusive spirit was the conception of the religious purpose of education. After the Reformation, the Anglican Church took the place in England of the Roman Catholic Church in the control of education. All school instruction was narrowly religious. “Christianity came to be identified with a strict conformity to the teachings and practices of the Established Church, and to teach that particular faith became one of the particular missions of all types of schools.” 30 At the middle of the eighteenth century, while in the German states and in the American colonies there was a shifting of emphasis from the old exclusively religious purpose toward a new view of education as preparation for life in the world, in Church of England schools the end and design continued to be instruction in the knowledge and practice of the Christian religion as taught in the Church of England.31 Secular instruction for the masses was considered unnecessary, even unwise. There was a suspicion that it would teach labourers to despise their lot, read bad books, and imbibe bad doctrine. Consequently, the Church stoutly maintained the attitude that “education must be the handmaid of religion”, and through charity and parochial schools, Sunday Schools, schools of the “Society for the Promotion of Christian Knowledge”, and later, the “National Schools for the Promotion of Education of the Poor”, exercised almost exclusive control of education for the lower classes. In all these schools Bible-reading and the Catechism formed the major part of the meagre curriculum.

It was the special function of the eighteenth century to civilize manners and to humanize conduct.32 Besides finding in science a new standard of truth and in reason a new authority, the Enlightenment gave an impulse to an interest in humanity, and, along with the Wesleyan Revival, helped to strengthen a conviction that the lot of mankind could, and should, be improved. Humanitarian movements, warmed by the blaze of romanticism and stirred to pity by the desperate plight of victims of waxing industrialization, multiplied in numbers and influence in the nineteenth century, and in the educational field compensated in some measure for the inertia of the public authorities. For the most part, however, the purpose of charity schools was to teach morals and religion. Illiteracy to the philanthropists was only one aspect of general moral delinquency, “and education was attached to the program of social reform only as a means to the larger end of removing profligacy, drunkenness and crime . . . The educational motive was not to provide opportunity for the lower classes to raise themselves to superior social stations, but to make them less of an eyesore in the face of respectability”, and, particularly after the French Revolution, to render them less susceptible to the blandishments of political and social radicals. The real purpose of philanthropic educational agencies was to Christianize: it was but incidental that they also helped to educate.33 But whatever the motive, schools founded and maintained through the benevolence and initiative of individuals and societies did extend a knowledge of the elements of learning to the poorer classes of society throughout the eighteenth century, and on into the next.

An understanding of the English conception of education as a private and voluntary affair, the concern of individuals, churches, and philanthropies, forces upon one the conclusion that the word “system” can scarcely be applied to educational operations in that country in the eighteenth century. Individualism expressed itself in a perfect welter of institutions. At the top were the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, wrapped in the traditions of the past, “intellectually torpid”, hostile to every new movement—whether Methodism or Jacobinism—and limited in clientele to the sons of the rich and the aristocratic.34 Below the Universities was a chaos of secondary schools, many of them heavily endowed. The most important were the great boarding-schools known as Public Schools, such as Eton, Winchester, Charterhouse, Rugby, and Harrow. These great secondary schools had been established to educate leaders and to give free education to a fixed number of poor boys. But very early the word “poor” in the title deeds was interpreted to mean the sons of poor gentlemen, and various expedients were employed to evade the founders, liberal intentions. In time, the sons of the local butcher and baker felt out of place among the gentlemen's sons, and ceased to enrol. In many of the Grammar Schools, and especially in the larger Public Schools, the fees were so high that only boys from fairly well-to-do families could attend. By the end of the eighteenth century the larger Public Schools were attended by the sons of the nobility, country gentry, merchant princes, and professional classes, and the smaller more local Grammar Schools had the patronage of members of the middle commercial class and the poorer members of the landowning and professional groups.35 As fiercely as the boys defended their schoolboy mores, just as fiercely did the administrators resent any interference in management. Misapplication of revenues, extravagances, favoritism, patronage, maladministration, had, indeed, little to fear so long as Parliament was an aristocratic oligarchy and tradition a fetish.

The instruction in these English secondary schools was in conformity with the traditional spirit of humanism. By the close of the seventeenth century the cultural and useful aim of the humanistic education which, as a result of the Revival of Learning, had been introduced into the secondary schools and universities of Europe, had shrunk into the lesser aim of imparting a mastery of the Ciceronian style in writing and speech.36 The periods of Cicero and the rules of Quintillian “doomed Europe to centuries of schooling in the polished but studied and meagre literature of Rome, to a formal and barren preoccupation with the bones of language, . . . to the sodden horrors of imitation Horace and veneer Virgil.” 37 This narrow linguistic attitude characterized classical education in German lands until the middle of the eighteenth century, and in other western European countries and in America until about the middle of the nineteenth century.38

So strong was the literary and classical bias in the curriculum of English secondary schools of the eighteenth century—and much of the nineteenth— that arithmetic represented mathematics, and there was practically no instruction in English language, literature, history, geography or civil government. The entire scholastic effort was expended on learning the Latin grammar, writing Latin prose or verse and translating Latin classics, or in similar exercises in Greek. Benthamites might protest against an education so lacking in “utilitarian” features, but in vain, for those who sent their sons to a public school scorned a scientific education as plebeian and materialistic. What the English valued in their public schools, and indeed regarded as a source of national greatness, was the aristocratic spirit with which they were imbued, and the manly training achieved through games and vigorous, if rough, self-government.39 Since in the great Public Schools boys learned to obey and to rule, to reach agreements, to effect compromises, since there they made friendships among the group destined to furnish the future rulers of England, such schools exerted a great influence in giving the sons of the ruling classes a sense of national unity, a national loyalty and a preparation for national service.40 If there was a “cultural lag due to the load of tradition and classical training,” 41 the supporters of these schools were unaware of it, or counted it a small debit against mighty credits in the form of services at Waterloo or in affairs of state. Not until the second half of the nineteenth century did the new democracy, pro- gressive, orderly, economical, the advocate of less expensive, more uniform, more modern and more advanced instruction for all,42 effect any marked change in either the administration or curriculum of English Public and Grammar Schools.

Besides these institutions of higher range there was a bewildering variety of elementary schools which, however, met the needs of only a fraction of the lower classes. Some of these schools were supported by endowments, others by church titles, charitable subscriptions or tuition fees. The workhouse schools or “schools of industry”, represented the only form of education supported in the eighteenth century by taxation in the form of parish rates. Of a humble type were the Dame Schools where old women, in their own kitchens, eked out a livelihood by imparting the rudiments of learning to small children. The private-adventure or “hedge” school was similar but was kept by a man. In all these schools the education given was of the most elementary kind, and in the church and charity schools it was largely religious.43

Toward the close of the century several interesting agencies developed which were of particular significance later for North America. One of these was the Sunday School. Partly inspired by religious and evangelical zeal, but owing something to the humanitarianism represented by Rousseau which was arousing the public conscience to a keener sense of duty toward children,44 these schools gave “the little heathen of the neighborhood” 45 a limited secular and religious instruction. Yet at first the movement met an opposition that reveals class prejudice and intolerance. Hannah More's Sunday Schools in Gloucestershire were violently attacked by the local gentry and farmers, and by the Tory press, as a public danger, as breeding-grounds of political and religious sedition, and as hotbeds of Methodism and Jacobinism.46

In the opening years of the nineteenth century a new school plan attracted attention in England, spread to the continent, and met with ready acceptance m the United States. This was based on the system of mutual or monitorial instruction, and seemed to be the answer to the demand for cheap education. Two organizations, the “National Society for the Promotion of Education of the Poor”, and the “British and Foreign School Society”, promoted this system in England, the former a Church of England creation, the latter favored by Dissenters and featuring non-sectarian religious education. As will be seen later monitorial schools promoted by the National Society played a prominent part for many years in New Brunswick education.

There is little to say about female education in the eighteenth century, for female intelligence at that time was not highly esteemed, and there was little provision for the formal education of girls. Reading, writing, a little arithmetic, religion, social accomplishments, and the art of housekeeping were thought sufficient to equip any woman for life.47 In church and charity schools girls seem to have been provided for as well as boys, and besides learning to read and to spell, were taught to 'knit their stockings and gloves, to mark, sew, and make and mend their clothes'.48 Unless there was a family governess, the road to higher education was closed to girls. Until the development of the democratic idea of education for all an educated woman was regarded with some suspicion, to the disgust of the few strong-minded female intellectuals who dared to be different, such as Lady Mary Montague, who complained 'that it is looked upon as in a degree criminal to improve our reason or fancy if we have any.'49

Aside from a few Teachers' Seminaries in Prussia, training schools for teachers were unknown in Europe in the eighteenth century. English pedagogues, as everywhere, were a motley lot, The masters of the Public and Grammar Schools were clergymen, were fairly well paid, and ranked well in social opinion, but elsewhere the abilities, virtues, and emoluments of the profession were small. Teachers in the elementary schools, especially in the private-adventure schools, were not infrequently sextons, choristers, bell-ringers, grave-diggers, shoemakers, pensioners, invalids, and failures rather than teachers.50 Pedagogical methods were simple. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries the social realists, Locke and Montaigne, had condemned the school training of their time and had urged that tutors should train the judgment and understanding rather than the memory, but the ideals of educational theorists were long neglected in actual practice. To teach was to tell: to learn was to memorize. The rod was a prominent feature of school discipline. Not much spared at home, “it was worn to shreds at school”. Pedagogues not infrequently boasted of the number of lashes, slaps, and blows which they had imparted during their teaching career. The natural interests, the capacities, and even the feelings of children were not studied or considered. Scarcely any books had yet been written especially for children, and very little had been written about them.51 Rousseau's protest, carried perhaps to absurd lengths in Emile , and at fault in wishing to deprive children of the heritage of human experience, was nevertheless an understandable reaction against some of the worst tendencies of the age.52 But authorities everywhere in church and state condemned Emile, and to the English tendency to ignore what other nations were doing in education there was added the prejudice against anything French during the Revolution and Napoleonic Wars. The existence of such attitudes delayed any application of even the most rational theories put forward by Rousseau, or the progressive plans of later French theorists such as La Chalotais, Diderot, and Condorcet.

Criticism of the English educational system of the eighteenth century must be tempered by the realization that it harmonized with prevailing attitudes and practices in Europe at the time, but the English reluctance to relinquish eighteenth century philosophies and to face the necessity of state action in edu-cation does lie open to modern criticism. When progressive ideas were being translated into action in France, America, and Prussia, England, as a nation hesitated to move forward from her traditional position. In France and America, however, revolution meant a clear break with the past, and in Prussia the humiliations suffered at the hands of Napoleon necessitated a national regeneration. In England, the slower process of evolution took the place of revolution. If, in retrospect, that evolution in the educational field seems unconscionably deliberate, one must remember that it was part of a complex process and was conditioned by many factors.

The significance of the connection between England's colonial possessions and the aristocratic tradition in English society, politics, business, and culture, only casually suggested in this chapter, will emerge more clearly later for in the development of New Brunswick this background often obtruded. But if ties of allegiance and dependence bound the province to Britain, other ties linked it with Britain's earlier colonies. The Loyalists were British, but they were also American. It is not enough to know something of conditions in the country to which they adhered politically and spiritually. The reasons for that adherence, the things they rejected as repugnant, and the cultural heritage which they brought with them to New Brunswick were to be found in America rather than in England. The American setting is therefore an integral part also of any study of New Brunswick history.

Notes

^1. MacFarlane, p. 107.

^2. Trevelyan, p. 307.

^3. Ibid., p. 360.

^4. Beard, Vol. 1, p. 192.

^5. Trevelyan, p. 398.

^6. Smith P., Vol. 1, p.315.

^7. Trevelyan, p. 332.

^8. Ibid., pp. 359, 360.

^9. Graham, p. 7.

^10. Ibid., p. 5.

^11. Ibid., p. 4.

^12. Ibid., p. 7.

^13. Trevelyan, p. 309.

^14. Graham, p. 26.

^15. Randall, pp.370-376.

^16. Trevelyan, p. 334.

^17. Halevy, p. 345.

^18. Cubberly, p. 233.

^19. Reisner, Preface, p.3.

^20. Trevelyan, p.361.

^21. Cubberley, p.335.

^22. Trevelyan, p. 360.

^23. The term “English national genius” is not here used in reference to biologically inherited traits. Our description is of cultural, rather than racial, attributes.

^24. Hughes & Klemm, pp. 22, 23.

^25. Curti, Preface, p. 16.

^26. Smith P., Vol. 1 p. 316.

^27. Cubberly, p. 247.

^28. Reisner, p. 226.

^29. Hughes & Klemm, p. 23.

^30. Cubberly, p. 172.

^31. Ibid., p. 233.

^32. Trevelyan, p. 366.

^33. Reisner, p. 240.

^34.Haievy, pp. 473-480.

^35. Reisner, p. 22.

^36. Cubberly, p. 213.

^37. Randall, p. 121.

^38. Cubberley, p. 150.

^39. Halevy, pp. 466, 467.

^40. Reisner, pp. 229, 230.

^41. Beard, Vol. 1, p. 803.

^42. Hughes & Klemm, p. 49.

^43. Cubberley, pp. 239-242.

^44. Halevy, p. 461.

^45. Cubberley, p. 337.

^46. Halevy, p. 461.

^47. Smith, P., Vol. 2, p. 466.

^48. Cubberly, p. 241.

^49. Smith P., Vol. 2, p. 466.

^50. Cubberly, p. 239.

^51. Smith P., Vol. 2, pp. 422-424.

^52. Ibid., p. 443.

CHAPTER 2
THE AMERICAN BACKGROUND

The pattern of eighteenth-century English education harmonized with the social, economic, and political fabric of the time and place. Both the warp and woof of American education in the same period exhibited many of the same aristocratic and exclusive fibres, but woven into the piece were other threads, strong, if sometimes coarse, manufactured of environment, and dyed with the vivid color of the American spirit. To change the metaphor, American education in the eighteenth century reflected the struggle in American life between aristocratic and democratic tendencies. We shall try to account for these tendencies and to note their influence in the various departments of American life, with particular reference to education; to take cognizance of the social aspects of the American Revolution; and to see where the Loyalists stood in relation to aristocracy and democracy.

Politically, all the American colonies in the seventeenth century, except during the upheaval of the English Civil War, centred in England and maintained with her close relations in every field of life.1 From her they inherited a strong sense of class distinctions. “Although the icing may be said to have been left off the American social cake owing to the fact that none of the titled members of the aristocracy came as permanent residents,” 2 the gentry and the merchants, those members of the middle orders next to the English aristocracy in the hierarchy of rank and wealth, became the colonial aristocracy and claimed deference and privilege. Even the founders of the Massachusetts Bay Colony had been “fashioned by a caste society” and brought over “an abundant heritage of class prejudice . . . They honored rank, were sticklers for precedent, respected class distinctions, demanded the hereditary rights of the gentry.” 3 “Habit is more potent than doctrine.” The early settlers preached the doctrine of equality, “but in their feelings and in their relations they recognized a caste as objectionable as that which they had been accustomed to in England.” 4

“Every colony had this class heritage developed into a well-articulated scheme of social subordination,” 5 with varying economic, political, religious, and social privileges forming the lines of demarcation. For example, in the seventeenth century in New England, even seating in church was regulated by an elaborate system based on social standing, and as late as the middle of the eighteenth century the names of students at Yale and Harvard were arranged according to the wealth and social prestige of their families. In the Middle Colonies, where agricultural possibilities were greater than in stony New Eng-land, the manorial lords of the Hudson valley created a landed aristocracy, and in the south, partiality to large estates worked by indentured servants and negro slaves stimulated the theory of social superiority and inferiority.

Class distinctions were inevitably accompanied, as in Europe, by the idea of minority rule. When John Winthrop accounted democracy to be the meanest and worst government, and John Cotton declared he could not imagine that God had ordained it as a 'fitt government eyther for church or commonwealth',6 they expressed the view of contemporary and subsequent leaders in church and state. By restricting the franchise, by denying equal representation to the back counties, by exerting influence and control through the colonial councils, the landed gentlemen and merchants of the tidewater area maintained minority rule against “a numerous democracy”.

One of the most interesting examples of oligarchic rule in America was the Massachusetts theocracy of the seventeenth century. Political and economic motives, as well as moral and religious, had prompted the emigration, but the leaders, John Winthrop, John Cotton and others, aimed at the creation of a self-governing Bible commonwealth, “a bulwark against the forces of Antichrist”.7 Civil and religious authorities cooperated in protecting the new state against error from without and schism from within, but the clergy were “the final depository of power in the colony”.8 For the sake of unity and strength the ideals of religious freedom and democracy were sacrificed.9 Gradually, however, the supremacy of the theocracy was undermined by a number of forces, and when the royal absolutism which Charles II and James II had attempted to substitute was itself demolished in 1689, theocratic rule was not fully restored in Massachusetts, and in the new charter of 1691 the basis of the franchise was no longer church membership, but property. However, taxpayers still had to contribute to the Established Congregational Church.

In education, colonial ideas and practices were very similar to those already described in connection with English education; Provincial culture is inevitably derivative in its origins. “The colonial conception of schools as instruments for the preservation of religious faith and existing economic and social arrangements was rooted in old-world tradition and practice.” 10 “From top to bottom the English educational system served as a guide to the immigrants who founded colonies in America.” 11 In New England, the religious purpose of education received particular emphasis. Only Rhode Island, organized as it was on a basis of religious freedom for all, lacked the sectarian stimulus to the founding of schools.l2 In the central colonies the heterogeneous population and the wide variety of religious groups made for that denominational control of schools which has always proved to be an obstacle in the way of state organization and control.13 In the south, as represented by Virginia, reliance on private agencies was natural because of the existence of pronounced class distinctions. The apprenticeship system and charity and pauper schools offered only a limited means of education for the poor. The children of the gentry were educated under private tutors or were sent to England. Thus those who proudly carried on the tradition of the Cavalier “staved off the growth of popular education in the South and the restive democracy connected with it.” 14

Although certain provisions for education in Massachusetts were unique, motives and purposes were in harmony with tradition. In the Calvinistic conception of a religious state the main function of education was to insure an educated ministry, and to enable serious folk to read the Bible “in order to learn the tests by which each might be certain of his own election and that of his neighbor”.15 English precedents were followed in the instruction given at Harvard and in the grammar schools. As for the primary schools of Massachusetts, and of New England generally, “one learned to read chiefly that one might be able to read the Catechism and the Bible, and to know the will of the Heavenly Father. There was scarcely any other purpose in the maintenance of elementary schools”.16 Massachusetts legislation of 1642 and 1647 has been identified as an assertion of the right of the state to require the establishment and maintenance of schools. “The laws of Massachusetts on this point,” says Beard, “have been so glossed over with uncritical comment that they have been hailed as marking the dawn of public education in the modern and secular form. In reality, seen in their historical setting, they do no such thing.” The fact that education was ordered by the state was not of special significance, “for the state and church were one in Massachusetts at the time”.17 To the clergy it seemed expedient to impose on all children the creed of the Puritan sect. Naturally, the gentlemen who shared authority with the clergy in theocratic government saw much in the argument that “to insure the obedience of good men, good wives, and servants, these must be able to read the capital laws on which rested the rule of clergy and gentlemen”.l8 By the Act of 1642, therefore, parents and masters had to see to it that their children could read and understand the Bible and the laws, and by the Act of 1647 towns of fifty families were to provide a teacher for elementary instruction. In order that a supply of educated ministers might be available towns of a hundred families were to set up grammar schools to train youths for the University. Towns neglecting for a year or more to comply with these regulations were penalized, but no specific way of supporting these schools was insisted on.19 In the fact that the plan of taxation was used by a number of towns there is considerable significance. but apparently until well into the eighteenth century people were, to quite an extent, opposed to spending public money for school purposes. “The old picture of every village with its free school and a population athirst for learning is a pure figment of the imagination. Such schools as were operated under the laws and were called free, required the payment of tuition from all but those pupils whose parents were too poor to afford it, and consequently were quite different from our modern public schools. There was nothing democratic about them and it was not intended that there should be.” 20 In fact, until Horace Mann's time, the term “common” as applied to schools often carried the connotation “inferior”, and well-to-do people tended to regard the public schools as places for the poor.21 Moreover, attendance at the town or village schools was not compulsory. The only theoretical requirement was that children should receive a certain amount of education from some source—the parents, the common schools, “dame” schools, or other schools of their parents' choice. The town schools and grammar schools were maintained merely to facilitate the process.22 Moreover, the regulations were not always complied with. In 1718 the general court of Massachusetts complained that many towns chose to pay the fine rather than maintain a school.23

In one feature of New England education, the “district” school, there may be seen some relationship to the parish schools established over a hundred years later in rural New Brunswick. After 1689, when the population began to expand toward the outer sections of the towns, children living on the outskirts found difficulty in attending the school at the village centre, especially in winter. If the school happened to be supported by taxation, families complained of paying taxes from which they received little or no benefit, and petitioned for a division of the town into districts. This was a democratic move, in a sense, but the small school unit often necessitated a very short school term, because of the inability of the small districts to raise adequate funds.24 In some cases difficulty in agreeing on the location of a school resulted in the “moving” school, held for part of the year in one section of the town and then moved to another part.25 A somewhat similar procedure was authorized in New Brunswick in 1805 in connection with grammar schools, only the moving was done from one parish to another, until all the parishes of a county had had the benefit of the county grammar school. It is not unlikely that this expedient in New Brunswick was derived from the New England experience.

The curriculum of colonial schools in the Pre-Revolutionary period was derivative in nature. In the colleges and secondary schools the narrow classical instruction of English educational institutions was carried out, and in the elementary schools the instruction was of the same limited nature as in England. The method of learning, as well as the curriculum, might be described as that of the three R's. “The pupils were expected to receive, retain, return what they were taught and that was all that was expected of them.” The memory was aided by rhyme and metre and also by “physical appliances cut from the branches of trees and applied vigorously and almost daily.” 26 The teachers, as in New Brunswick later, ranged from clergymen to itinerants who “boarded around,” for part of their salary, the rest being usually paid in subscription fees.

In the colonial scheme of education “girls met with the traditional discriminations”. They were, of course, shut out from colleges and grammar schools, but were generally admitted to the elementary schools. Under private patronage schools were opened in some regions where girls of the middle classes might learn reading, writing, arithmetic, sewing, music, and dancing, but in general women were expected to stick to household matters.27

While inheritance and tradition influenced colonial institutions and ideals, a variety of other influences weaned the American colonies from their Old World heritage and created an independence of spirit characteristically American and favorable to the growth of democracy.

Among these influences were geographical conditions. “The separateness of Britain and her colonies was based upon conditions beyond the power of man to change, upon the broad expanse of the Atlantic, upon soil, climate and geography.” Slowly, but inevitably, these conditions changed the Englishmen of the colonies into Americans.28 While settlers were transforming America, America was transforming the settlers.29

Secondly, in spirit many of the original settlers were sympathetic toward the principles underlying the Puritan Revolution. In the little colony at Plymouth there were the germs of American democracy. Before leaving the Mayflower the male adults compacted to enact and observe laws for the general good.30 That a group of people should take upon themselves the responsibility for self-government was unprecedented. Rhode Island, founded as a simple democracy by Roger Williams “tolerated from the first . . . a personal liberty that violated accepted traditions”.31 The original charter of Massachusetts, in granting freemen the right to decide taxation and to choose officials, contained the seeds of democracy. An oligarchy may have been set up and democratic tendencies discouraged, yet democratic possibilities were never entirely absent, especially in the minds of enlightened men like John Wise, who declared early in the eighteenth century that all power was originally in the people, that the only end of government was to promote the good of all, and that it was as plain as daylight there was no species of government like a democracy to attain that end.32

The New England democracy of labour, the township form of community, the town meeting, all fostered an independent spirit. So did the New England method of land holding. Land was granted in fee simple, that is, outright, without feudal dues or primogeniture and entail. In this independ ent ownership of land and in the development of many small farms can be seen a cause for the rise of a democratic society.33 Moreover, partly as a result of the Civil War in England, the New England colonies, especially Massachusetts, were able to act almost as independent states. During the period of the Whig oligarchy, interest and effort in England were concentrated on the furtherance of landed and commercial interests in the mother country, and for a time all the colonies were more or less neglected. Thus the colonists grew accustomed to managing their own affairs, and aversion to outside control took deep root.

Diversity of national origins was another factor in the development of an independent American spirit. Thousands of people entered the country without any previous allegiance to England, as in the case of French Huguenots and Germans, or with active hostility against her, as in the case of Irish and Scotch-Irish. These felt no love for the British government or for her colonial officials who might hamper them in their grim struggle to acquire property rights in the new land of promise.34 The jumble of religious faiths represented by these immigrants tended to break down belief in the necessity or desirability of a state church and to promote the cause of true religious liberty. In essence, a number of these sectaries were tolerant and democratic. “Quakerism tended to reduce all ranks of society to a spiritual level—a spiritual democracy.” 35 The Great Awakening, initiated by the tours which the Methodist evangelist, Whitefield, began in the colonies in 1739, gave an impetus to the principle of self-determination and democratic church government.36 There was a strong undercurrent of democracy in Whitefield's doctrine that those having the “new birth”, whether rich or poor, wise or ignorant, were equal before God. In stimulating the emotions of the people the Great Awakening “helped prepare the way for the emotional aspects of the American Revolution”. In contrast to the political conservatism of the Anglican Church, the “Popular Churches”, especially the Presbyterian, Baptist, and Methodist, tended to be liberal in politics. “This became important when the Revolution took on a religious aspect by attacks on the Anglican Church, particularly in opposition to the threatened appointment of an Anglican bishop.” 37

By the opening of the eighteenth century the pioneer phase of life was over in the coastal area, but beyond and behind, stretching from New England to the Carolinas, was the frontier, “at the hither edge of free land.” 38 This frontier bred democratic and leveling tendencies. Under the harsh solvent of frontier conditions, lines of social cleavage fade and are obliterated. “Even the power of money goes under a partial eclipse where money no longer can buy service and where everyone works for himself.”,39 Men who bear the brunt of frontier raids, fight hunger, cold and wild beasts, and hack out homes in the wilderness, develop hardihood, initiative and self-sufficiency, are impatient under restraint, and fearless in demanding their rights. “From the first the frontier districts have been prompt to raise a strident voice against privilege, injustice and the creation of artificial distinctions in government.” 40 To the frontier gravitated those who resented religious and political intolerance in the older more closely settled areas, especially those who objected to quit rents and feudal tenure, or had been cheated of their holdings by land speculations or colonial governments. The frontier, “inspired by a belief in political equality, free land, and religious liberty”, represented democratic tendencies, while the coastal area represented minority rule, religious intolerance, and monopolistic control of natural resources. In nearly every colony there was a struggle between these two forces.41

Intellectually, the new spirit of independence, initiative, and alertness expressed itself in the comparatively early achievement of a free press, in the growth of subscription libraries, and in an interest on the part of young intellectuals in the writings of the political theorists of the old world. By the time the Revolution broke out, American colonists were familiar with Locke's theory that the consent of the people is the only true foundation of government, and with the views of French radical thinkers. The American colonies began to feel the impact of those forces in Europe which attacked theological monopoly, exalted science, and gave increasing significance to secular affairs42. A new, more utilitarian, conception of schools began to grow up. “After 1750, it was increasingly evident that the old religious enthusiasm for schools had largely died out; that European traditions and ways and types of schools no longer completely satisfied; and that the period of the transplanting of European educational ideas and schools and types of instruction was coming to an end. Instead, the evolution of a public or state school out of the original religious school, and the beginnings of the evolution of distinctly American types of schools, better adapted to American needs, became increasingly evident in the Colonies as the eighteenth century progressed.” 43 The call of Bacon, Milton, and Locke for a less traditional and more useful type of education had gone almost unheeded in England, in practice at any rate. In Philadelphia, Benjamin Franklin, “a true child of the Enlightenment”, proposed a secular and practical programme for the Academy which he helped to found. Having little use for the frivolous arts and graces, the dead tongues, and all the other empty badges of the aristocratic past, his purpose was to train youth for successful careers in business and for useful service to the public.44 Franklin, like Milton and Locke, was thinking in terms of education for the rising middle class, but Jefferson, a firm believer in universal education as a necessary instrument of republicanism, advocated in 1770 a scheme which went farther than Franklin's toward breaking down class barriers in education. He intended “to rake from the rubbish such geniuses as would otherwise, for lack of nourishment, be unable to develop their capacities and serve society as trained leaders.” 45 His plan failed of immediate and complete realization for a number of reasons, but one must keep in mind the fact that such ideas were at least placed before the Republic in its troubled early years, while nothing so democratic was dreamed of in England at that time, or in New Brunswick, that colonial child whose paternity was reaffirmed by the Loyalists as forever British.

It becomes necessary at this point to reexamine the Massachusetts laws of 1642 and 1647. The spirit back of these laws may have been mediaeval but in effect this legislation fixed a new tradition. “Not only was a school system ordered established, . . . but, for the first time among English-speaking people, there was an assertion of the right of the State to require communities to establish and maintain schools, under penalty if they refused to do so.” 46 The lead which Massachusetts gave all North America in educational progress may be partly attributed to this tradition of public education. That the state ordered provision to be made for education but left the actual provision, whether by subscription or taxation, to the individual community, is a fact of some significance. Long afterwards, in New Brunswick, when public apathy was proving a great hindrance to educational advance, two governors of that province attributed progress in the neighboring American states to the fact that education was a local responsibility in those states. Sir William Colebrooke wrote in 1842: “The practice in the neighboring states of laying out the wilderness land in townships and of imposing on the purchaser a moderate rate to provide for schools and roads has induced a habit with the settlers of providing for these essential objects which the practice in this Province of contributing to them so largely from the Public Revenue has discouraged.” 47 Later, Sir Edmund Head, speaking of the township organization as one of the causes of prosperity m Maine, wrote: “They look after their own roads and their own schools and exercise those municipal rights which fit a man for sound and prudent action on a large scale by developing his political intelligence in matters which he readily understands and appreciates. The people of this province on the other hand are shrewd and sharp enough but they have habitually relied upon the government for the management of their roads and schools and have looked to the Executive Council or the Legislature for help in every emergency.” 48

The changing political, economic, and social conditions in the colonies during the eighteenth century were particularly reflected in secondary education. The grammar school of the traditional English type began to decline, and we note the evolution of the American Academy, possibly connected through the Non-Conformist schools established in England after the Act of Conformity in 1662 with the institution which Milton described in his Tract on Education. The idea of offering instruction in a wide variety of subjects proved more acceptable in America than in England, because of the growing demand in America for a type of education related to the economic life of the place and time. While the ancient languages continued to be taught in Academies as the mark of culture and social standing, a new emphasis was placed on native English and mathematical subjects, science, book-keeping, mensuration, surveying and navigation.49 (Incidentally, the inclusion of the last four subjects in the curriculum of New Brunswick schools in the nineteenth century may have been partly a legacy from American Academies and only partly a result of the importance in New Brunswick of shipping, lumbering, and mercantile operations.) Another significant feature of colonial academies besides their practical curriculum was the fact that they were usually open to girls as well as to boys—an innovation in secondary education almost unknown before.50

The struggle between the two forces in American life, one democratic, the other jealous of exclusive privilege, expressed itself politically in the royal colonies in conflict between the executive and legislative branches of the government, for “the royal governor represented a principle hostile to colonial interests and desires; the principle of external control.” 51 Not infrequently also, at one time or another, in all the colonies there was friction within the legislature, between the council and assembly, for the interests of the council, which was composed of the wealthy and aristocratic sections of the population, were often at variance with those of the common people. The assemblies, themselves, were not completely representative, for property requirements for the suffrage tended to disfranchise owners of small holdings or those with incomplete title to land. The legislatures were all too often on the side of the capitalists.52 To the frontier, therefore, the cries from 1763 onward of “no taxation without representation” and “all men are created free and equal” had a double meaning. They were battle slogans against England, and at the same time they often represented frontier grievances against colonial governments.53 The American Revolution, therefore, was a social struggle as well as a political conflict.

When one endeavors, however, to isolate the social aspects of the American bid for independence, one is confronted by contradictions in the alignments of various social classes. Democratic frontiersmen were allied with merchants and gentry who had no wish to share political rights with the “rag, tag and bobtail”; gentlemen divided on the question; for instance, one gentleman, Jonathan Odell, attacked another, George Washington, in vitriolic lines beginning “Thou hast supported an atrocious cause”; both the Sons of Liberty and the Loyalists included artisans, mechanics and small farmers. In other words, all the Revolutionaries were not land-hungry frontiersmen and unprivileged apprentices, and all the so-called Tories were not aristocrats and wealthy officials. But when we note the effect of the Revolution on those traditionary institutions and practices which, through the years, had helped to prop up aristocracy and minority rule, we perceive that the upheaval did indeed have some of the earmarks of a social revolution.

With the “dislocation of authority” which the Revolution started “shifts and cracks in the social structure” began to appear. That they did not at once cause the downfall of the superstructure is true. “Half a century passed before the levelling democracy proclaimed in Jefferson's Declaration of Independence came flooding into power”, but in many cases the qualifications for office holding and for voting were lowered at once, thus seriously undermining the old social system. The abolition of quit rents and the sweeping away of royal limitations on the acquisition and use of vacant lands transformed the land system. Tory estates, some of which embraced hundreds of square miles, were confiscated, broken into small lots, and distributed to farmers on easy terms. The system of entails and primogeniture was abolished in every state within fifteen years. This destruction of landed privilege was accompanied by an attack on ecclesiastical establishments. Within a few years the special privileges enjoyed by the established churches in the nine colonies which had featured tax-supported religion were relinquished. At the very time when the British government was increasing the severities of its penal code, in America a campaign was being waged, with eventual success, against barbarities in the criminal code. It is true that populism still had many a battle to fight against reaction, and that slavery, “a glaring contrast to the grand doctrines of the Revolution”, remained until the second cataclysm in American history, nevertheless the American Revolution appears to have been “an economic, social and intellectual transformation of prime significance.” 54

All this means, in effect, that the Revolutionaries welcomed “the process of change, for which Progress is but the optimistic name,” 55 while the Tories did not. In fact, Jefferson said afterwards to John Adams that he was convinced one of the matters on which the parties took opposite sides was the question of the improvability of the human mind. 'Those who advocated a reform of institutions . . . maintained that no definite limits could be assigned to progress. The enemies of reform on the other hand denied improvement and advocated steady adherence to the principles, practices and institutions of our fathers which they represented as the consummation of wisdom and the acme of excellence beyond which the human mind could never advance.'56

Naturally, those for whom a break in the British connection meant a loss of prestige, wealth, and power, supported the royal cause. “ 'The aristocracy of culture, of dignified professions and callings, of official rank and hereditary wealth' was, in large measure, found among the Tories.” 57 It has been said that, compressed into a sentence, the current Tory philosophy was “the expression of the will-to-power of the wealthy. Its motive was economic class interest, and its object the exploitation of society through the instrumentality of the state . . . Embroidered with patriotism, loyalty, law and order, it made a very respectable appearance; and when it put on the stately robe of the British Constitution, it was enormously impressive.” 58 Although it would be a mistake to think that all the Tories were aristocrats, they did represent those elements in the revolting states that feared innovation and were “tenacious of the customary”.59 Belonging to the more conservative and moderate classes, they might admit that grievances did exist, but they balked at rebellion, believing that difficulties could be adjusted without strife and disruption.60 Whether bloodshed could have been avoided or not is an interesting question, but violence was resorted to, and the Tories either had to flee “home”, to England, fit into the new scheme of things, if they could make their peace, or migrate to the remaining British colonies in America. Officials and many men of wealth did the first, some of those who had been least conspicuous in the war managed to effect a reconciliation, and those whom we call Loyalists followed the last course.

The view that the Loyalists in 1783 deliberately chose expatriation rather than renounce their allegiance to the King and to the British flag is popular, but not entirely in accordance with the facts. It would seem that in reality the choice was made much earlier, and before all that it involved was realized. “After July, 1776, each man who admitted a political opinion had to be either a 'Patriot' or a 'Loyalist'; he had to be for the new Republic or for the old Empire.” 61 As MacFarlane puts it, the Loyalists bet on the wrong horse and “it is well to remember that most of the bets were placed before the race began, and some of them even while the losing horse was enjoying a temporary lead.” 62 Doubtless the decision to support the royal cause originated in some cases in simple loyalty. In other cases, the excesses of Revolutionary mobs helped to drive undecided people to the British side. Other factors, such as traditional conservatism and dependence on the government for a livelihood, have been already mentioned. Whatever the motive, “the decision to support the Crown . . . invariably forced the Tory along a road on which there was no turning back, and which frequently terminated in exile.” 63 It could scarcely be expected that the Americans would forgive those whose British partisanship had contributed to the ferocity of the war and to its prolongation.64 When the British representatives at the peace negotiations failed to obtain terms safeguarding the Loyalists against the discriminations and persecutions to which many of them had been subjected there was no course for them but that of emigration.

To join social and economic forces with the political and sentimental in accounting for the exodus of the Loyalists may seem to cast doubt upon their loyalty. To suggest that they were reactionaries may seem to disparage that loyalty. However, if analysis reveals other motives besides simple loyalty on the part of the Loyalists, and other characteristics besides those admirable ones for which they have been honored, one cannot disregard the facts, even at the risk of offending traditional sensibilities. That many of the Loyalists were able and cultured is indicated by the fact that among those who came to Nova Scotia (including New Brunswick) were two hundred graduates of Harvard, and many from younger institutions.65 That they possessed courage, endurance, and energy is revealed by their achievements and by their correspondence. The point we must note, however, is this: under the circumstances the choice which the Loyalists made meant that they embraced “the ideal of a static society.” 66

It has been said that the Maritime Provinces reaped the benefits and paid the penalty of receiving the aristocracy of the Loyalists.67 The latter, having turned their backs on Republican principles, also repudiated democracy and committed themselves to aristocratic government. Did not Edward Winslow, in writing of the likelihood that New Brunswick would become a separate government, say “and if it does, it shall be the most gentlemanlike one on earth” ?68 In the newly established province the views of the leading Loyalists seem to have been in harmony with those of Governor Carleton who regarded with alarm the participation of the people in the administration of affairs, and attributed the troubles with the old colonies to the undue influence of the popular Assembly.69 “The Royal Prerogative was exalted at the expense of liberty, and any man who ventured to set limits to it was looked upon as a traitor.” 70 That is precisely the view which the Governor and Council entertained of James Glenie, New Brunswick's first radical, a native of Scotland and a resident of Sunbury County in the late eighteenth century. It has been said that if Glenie's ideas had been carried into effect, New Brunswick might have had responsible government more than half a century before it did, but to the Governor and Governor's coterie he was “that vagabond Glenie”. Captain Lyman's regret that there was not sufficient good sense and loyalty in the country to keep out such a “violent Democrat and Jacobin” was the official view of Glenie, the agitator for popular government.71

Of Jonathan Odell, the first secretary of the Province of New Brunswick, it has been said: “When we examine the work of Odell to discover the deeper springs of his thought, we come upon naked class prejudice, undiluted Toryism”.72 These are severe words, perhaps too severe, but one cannot deny that the leading Loyalists of New Brunswick brought with them notions of class distinctions and class privileges. That some of them contemplated the perpetuation of a privileged society based on huge estates is shown by the memorial signed by fifty-five prominent Loyalists in New York before the exodus, asking Sir Guy Carleton for grants along the Saint John River of five thousand acres each. Elias Hardy, who antedated Glenie as a champion of the people, was active against this application, which was not complied with, but Hardy's controversies, during the first year of settlement, with the Board of Directors in charge of the distribution of land would indicate that an effort was made by a number of Loyalists to obtain lots in excess of their deserts.73 That they resented Hardy's interference is clear from bitter remarks made about “the illiberal insinuations of that man Hardy”.74

Further evidences of class prejudice on the part of the leading Loyalists may be seen in the political manoeuvres which figured in the contest between the Upper Cove and the Lower Cove during Saint John's first election and in the derogatory nature of sundry remarks concerning the Acadians and pre-Loyalist settlers. Closely allied with these feelings of political and social superiority was the premium placed on connection with the Anglican communion. For many years the Church of England enjoyed pre-eminence and assumed special privileges,75 although only a minority of the people of the province belonged to that church.

The same narrow and exclusive spirit predominated in education. Men of education and culture, such as the leading Loyalists were, could not fail to recognize the importance of education, but their chief concern was for institutions in which gentlemen's sons should be educated. That they should think first of their own children was only natural; that progress in providing for educational facilities should be slow might be expected, considering the many pressing problems incidental to the founding of a province. The fact remains, however, that education in New Brunswick began with the old inherited ideas that education was a voluntary affair, that the first provision must be for secondary education along classical lines for the benefit of boys in the upper stratum of society, that the supervision of education was the prerogative of the clergy, and that the masses must go untutored or look to the efforts of religious, charitable and philanthropic agencies, such as “The Society for the Propagation of the Gospel”. We have seen that these views were current in England at the time and also in the American colonies to quite an extent. Lacking the impetus toward democratic education which the American Revolution furnished in the United States, founded by men one of whose reasons for being where they were was the perpetuation of their own society, hampered by the apathy of the bulk of the population, New Brunswick, as we shall see, moved forward but slowly from these eighteenth-century conceptions of education.

Considering the circumstances under which the Loyalists left the Thirteen Colonies it is not surprising that they-launched the new province on a note of conservatism, nor is it strange that they brought with them a decided aversion to anything American. “A proper hatred of the United States and an equally proper love of England became social decencies to be expressed in tra ditional terms.” 76 This is quite understandable but also regrettable, for the intensity of the feeling directed against the United States and the lack of discrimination which characterized it were hindrances to progress, especially when educational developments in the United States during the nineteenth century might have proved a source of inspiration to New Brunswick. As late as 1839 Governor Harvey reported that “the tide of prejudice . . . still runs very strong in this Province against anything American”.77

The development of any colony cannot be explained wholly in terms of the character of its principal contingent of settlers. The location of the country, its natural resources, its natives, its neighbours, and its past history are all factors of importance. In order to appreciate the development of New Brunswick it is necessary to know something of the state of the country when the Loyalists came, and why it was what it was. Were the Loyalists likely to have a clear field for their energies, ideas and institutions? With what difficulties would the new environment confront them? Particularly, what economic forces arising out of the physical environment were bound to be at work in Loyalist society, for “economic forces . . . condition what people can do and how they may develop more than do other forces”?78 In what may be termed the Nova Scotian background of New Brunswick we may find answers, or partial answers at any rate, to the questions we have just raised.

Notes

^1. Adams, pp. 23, 24.

^2. Ibid., p. 56.

^3. Parrington (1), p. 18.

^4. Messenger, p. 261.

^5. Beard, Vol 1, p. 126.

^6. Jernegan, p. 178.

^7. Wertenbaker, p. 87.

^8. Ibid., p. 93.

^9. Jernegan, p. 134.

^10. Curti. p. 4.

^11. Beard, Vol. 1, pp. 166, 167.

^12. Cubberley, p. 197.

^13. Ibid., pp. 197-200.

^14. Beard, Vol. 1, p. 127.

^15. Wertenbaker, p. 245.

^16. Cubberley, p. 202.

^17. Beard, Vol. 1, pp. 179-180.

^18. Curti. p. 6.

^19. Jernegan, pp. 190, 191.

^20. Adams, p. 132.

^21. Messenger, p. 304.

^22. Adams, p. 133.

^23. Jernegan, p. 417.

^24. Ibid., p. 417.

^25. Messenger, pp. 274, 275.

^26. Ibid., pp. 269, 270.

^27. Beard, Vol. 1, p. 181, 182.

^28. Wertenbaker, pp. 2, 3.

^29. Ibid., p. 304.

^30. Jernegan, pp. 120-122.

^31. Beard, Vol. 1, p. 140.

^32. Adams, p. 121.

^33. Jernegan, p. 169.

^34. Adams, pp. 170-178.

^35. Jernegan, p. 209.

^36. Ibid., p. 410.

^37. Ibid., p. 411.

^38. Turner, p. 3.

^39. Adams, p. 57.

^40. Wertenbaker, p. 307.

^41. Jernegan, p. 313.

^42. Beard, Vol. 1, pp. 155, 156.

^43. Cubberley, p. 286.

^44. Curti, pp. 35, 36.

^45. Ibid., pp. 40, 41.

^46. Cubberley, p. 196.

^47. P. A. of Canada, C0188, Colebrooke to Stanley, Vol. IX, Oct. 14, 1842, Dispatch 97.

^48. P. A. of Canada, C0188, Head to Grey, Vol. XI, June 27, 1849, Dispatch 61.

^49. Jernegan, p. 419.

^50. Cubberley, p. 248.

^51. Jernegan, pp. 275, 276.

^52. Adams, p. 249.

^53. Jernegan, p. 348.

^54. Beard, Vol. 1, pp. 291-296.

^55. Bury, p. 352.

^56. Beard, Vol. 1, p. 456.

^57. Baker, p. 18.

^58. Parrington (1), p. 197.

^59. Parrington (2), Introduction p. iv.

^60. Baker, p. 180.

^61. MacFarlane, p. 109.

^62. Ibid., p. 115.

^63. Ibid., p. 107.

^64. Morison & Commager, p. 149.

^65. Baker, p. 21.

^66. Parrington, (2), Introduction p. 5.

^67. McArthur (1), p. 193.

^68. Winslow Papers, p. 100.

^69. McArthur (2), p. 214.

^70. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, p. 162.

^71. Ibid., p. 213.

^72. Parrington (1) p. 257.

^73. Raymond (1), pp. 91-101.

^74. Winslow Papers, p. 186.

^75.For the first sixty years of New Brunswick history all the high government officials were members of the Anglican Church and every member of the Council until 1817; previous to the appointment of L. A. Wilmot in 1851 every Judge of the Supreme Court belonged to the favored church; missionaries of the Church of England were paid out of the civil list, and the College at Fredericton, although endowed with public money, was essentially an Anglican institution. (Hannay (1), Vol. 1, pp. 169, 170.)

^76. Baker, p. 32.

^77. P. A. of Canada, C0188, Harvey to Normanby, Vol. VII, May 15, 1839, Dispatch 40.

^78. Kilpatrick, p. 326 (Quoting Dewey & Childs, The Educational Frontier, p. 296).

CHAPTER 3
THE NOVA SCOTIAN BACKGROUND

Nearly two hundred years after De Monts and Champlain caught their initial glimpse of the splendid harbour at the mouth of the Saint John river, first comers among the Loyalists, scanning the same shores with interest and anxiety, beheld a scene almost as wild and uncultivated as that which had greeted the eyes of Champlain. Bushes and cedar trees still covered the rocks and swamps which surrounded the harbour of the Saint John,1 and the river valley, for which many of the Loyalists were bound, “seemed one dense and unending mass of green”.2 A recent writer, describing the area which is now New Brunswick as it was in 1760, has called it “a tangled, uninhabited forest massif”.3 So it had been for centuries, and so closely indeed did it still approximate that description at the time of the arrival of the Loyalists that one of the exiles in the van of the migration could say that nothing but wilderness met the eye.4

Strictly speaking, one can apply the word “uninhabited” to the New Brunswick of 1783 only in a figurative sense, for besides Acadians and Indians there were several settlements of English speaking people. Official and complete statistics for these pre-Loyalist settlements are not available for a later date than 1767,5 which may be evidence of the scant attention paid to the area by the government at Halifax. Estimates of the number of Acadians and English speaking settlers in New Brunswick in 1783 can be found in various studies on Acadian history but from our standpoint there is little gain in attempting to track down the number of pre-Loyalist settlers to the last man. The significant thing is that in an area of nearly 28,000 square miles there were no more than 5,000 inhabitants exclusive of the natives. Thus the Loyalists, being more than double the old inhabitants in number, might well feel possessive about Nova Scotia-north-of-the-bay, and when it became a separate province in 1784 might think of it, with reason, as “par excellence the province of the Loyalists,” 6

Only five thousand people! Yet New Brunswick, to use the present name, had been discovered nearly as early as any part of America, nor did it lack fish and furs, both great attractions in the early years of North American his tory. Geographically, too, it was nearer to Europe than Quebec or any of the thirteen colonies. Moreover, being separated from the St. Lawrence by the Appalachian Highland, as was New England, it formed an extension of the latter area and invited New England enterprise. But the energies of both French and English were directed to more strategic or more productive areas, and settlement in Acadia, both north and south of the Bay of Fundy, developed in a haphazard fashion without much assistance or attention from Europe. Then too, the fur trade, although inviting, was not of the grand proportions of the St. Lawrence trade. Acadia, unlike Canada, was sprawling and irregular, lacking the great centralizing system of the highway of Canada. Since the St. Lawrence, rather than the Saint John, led to the great fur-bearing area of the interior, and since monopoly could not be successfully enforced in “this maritime world of obstreperous individualism and keen competition”,7 organized trade in furs moved to the St. Lawrence, and the Acadian fur trade was left to a few adventurers whose individual operations were comparatively modest. Moreover, trade in furs did not necessarily imply colonization. In fact, the very nature of the business tended to discourage a settled existence, as Colbert discovered when pushing plans for the expansion of Louis XIV's empire on the St. Lawrence.8 The same was true of the fisheries. In the promotion of permanent settlement the fishing industry was little more effective than the fur trade, and New Brunswick, being less strategically situated than the peninsular part of Acadia in relation to the great bank fisheries, failed to acquire fishing stations comparable to Canso and Louisburg. Thus, for nearly two hundred years after its discovery, Acadia, particularly the mainland portion which is now New Brunswick, had few inhabitants save the native Indians. People did not come, or, when they did, seldom remained to establish permanent homes or to make a lasting impression on the country.

Generally speaking, to official France and England Acadia seemed unimportant in itself, but in time of war it assumed importance because of its relation to French and English interests elsewhere. For external reasons, therefore, the country frequently changed hands but in times of peace both France and England tended to neglect it. One significant feature of the transfer of Acadia to English hands in 1654 lies in the fact that the conquest was effected by Bostonians, who, having been balked in their designs on the Dutch at Manhattan by the termination of the Dutch War, had decided that to spend 'a lytle tyme upon ye coast in lookeinge after ye ffrench might torne to some accompt'.9 This decision was prophetic of a major interest which New England was to develop, an interest fraught with disastrous consequences for the Acadians.10 The other significant feature of this English interlude may be seen in the fact that it did not affect Nicholas Denys, French trader on the north shore of Acadia. In other words, French power continued in Acadia, and “this survival served as a reminder of the fact that Acadia was a divided country which it was difficult to rule, and also difficult to capture in its entirety.” 1l

After Acadia was restored to France in 1670 French efforts were concentrated on the building of a mighty empire at Quebec, and Acadia exper ienced forty years of neglect. Only a few settlers were sent to the area, and fewer still found their way north of the Bay of Fundy. The true agricultural centre of Acadia was south and east of the Bay, where a small number of new settlers, and the descendants of de Razilly's colonizing venture of 1632 spread remarkably along Minas Basin and Cobequid, and around Chignecto to Shepody. This was the Acadia of a peaceful peasantry. The other Acadia, between the Saint John and the frontier settlements of New England, was the scene of international conflict in which the Indians, incited by Quebec, played a terrible part.12 “It was the country's misfortune to be the eastern outpost and flank for both France and England in America.” It became a fixed pivot on which an international battlefront seesawed back and forth between the French and the English.13 Thus strong forces from without converged upon this sparsely peopled area, conflicted, and created a ferment which made life uneasy for those who were in the country, and discouraged others from coming. Raids, alarms and massacres were features of King William's War (1689-1697) and of Queen Anne's War (1701-1713). The capture of Port Royal in 1710 was motivated less by the fact that France and England were at war elsewhere than by the determination of Massachusetts to scotch the Indian snake in his lair west of the Saint John, to insure for New England freedom from raids, and to remove obstacles to the lucrative fisheries of Acadia and of Newfoundland beyond. The Treaty of Utrecht gave Acadia to England with all its ancient boundaries. “There were, however, elements of future trouble in the refusal of the Acadians to take the oath of allegiance to the English monarch, and in the claim which was first put forward by Vaudreuil, the Governor of Canada, in 1718 that Acadia only comprised the peninsula and did not include the territory now embraced in New Brunswick.” l4

The coming of peace lessened the strategic importance of Nova Scotia, as Acadia was now called, and for another period of forty years the country was more or less consigned to an “official limbo”.15 The English held it, “but it was odd how embarrassed they were by it, how little they could make of it, how apt they were to avoid it or neglect it altogether”.16 As long as the contest between France and England for North America remained an unfinished business, neither English nor New Englanders were tempted to choose as a home an area which, despite its British name, was inhabited by Frenchmen who managed to ignore suggestions, invitations, and orders to take an unqualified oath of allegiance17 and become British subjects.

When the great duel between France and England in North America came to a climax in the War of the Austrian Succession and the Seven Years, War the significance of Nova Scotia again emerged. Resisting the impulse to linger over romantic names and dramatic episodes, we shall merely note that the course of the war brought misery and hardship to hundreds of inoffensive French peasants who were pawns in the international game, and that the outcome of the conflict closed the French regime.

This period furnished but scanty materials for those interested in the history of Education. Primitive pioneer society, of necessity, can be concerned but little with things cultural. Habitant life, as A. R. M. Lower has pointed out, has never been characterized by desire for change, improvement, and progress.18 These factors, plus the disturbance bred by the pull of two rival imperial powers, explain why the efforts of Recollet and other missionaries to educate and christianize the Indians and to instruct the Acadians in the days of French occupancy bore meagre scholastic fruit, although they were instrumental in spreading the tenets of the Roman Catholic faith and in maintaining the French language. “The overburdened priests could probably do little more than teach the habitant children their catechism and alphabet . . . In the primitive pioneer settlements of Nova Scotia, Isle Royale and Isle St. Jean there was no provision for advanced work at all.” 19

During the period from 1760 to 1783 conditions were scarcely more conducive to the growth of learning and culture. In that short period of two decades the Seven Years' War was wound up, the first English settlements outside of Annapolis, Canso, Halifax and its vicinity were established, a constitutional struggle waxed and waned, and the American Revolution made Nova Scotia once again “a divided and disintegrated country, a borderland of uncertain loyalties, a battleground of rival imperial interests.” 20

There was little English settlement previous to 1760 although the founding of Halifax by Cornwallis in 1749 inaugurated a new British policy. His plans, and those of Governor Shirley of Massachusetts, called for the establishment of English settlements here and there in order to combat French pretensions, to drive wedges among the Acadians, and to make Nova Scotia really British.21 This, however, proved difficult to carry out, not only because of the stubborn stand of the Acadians, but also because English-speaking Americans found little attraction in a country which lacked representative institutions, a country whose ultimate fate awaited the outcome of the issue between France and England. Those who came were chiefly merchants interested in the possibilities of money-making at Halifax. For five years after the founding of that city Nova Scotia remained “a political tadpole, a head without much of a body”.22 But when events between 1755 and 1760 indicated the termination of French rule in North America, New Englanders began to find their way to Nova Scotia, seeking the lands which privileged proprietorship denied them in New England. This immigration was part of the northward expansion of New England, a movement encouraged by the imperial authorities. It was accelerated by the necessity of providing for disbanded soldiers at the close of the Seven Years, War, and by the Proclamation of 1763 prohibiting settlement beyond the Appalachian Highland.23

Among the townships which were established about this time the most remote from Halifax were three in the present New Brunswick, Sackville, Cumberland and Sunbury. Sackville was first settled in 1761 by families from Rhode Island and Massachusetts, and the Cumberland area east of Sackville received its first settlers about the same time. Sunbury was the huge district west of Sackville and Cumberland and east of the Saint John, extending from the Bay of Fundy to the southern boundary of Canada. Its principal settlements were at Maugerville and at the mouth of the Saint John river. In 1763 a group of settlers from Massachusetts, mostly ex-soldiers, under the leadership of Israel Perley had established themselves at Maugerville well up the river on its east bank.24 These several groups may have been only “a handful of adventurers to whom the prospects of a new field of endeavor appeared more attractive than the prosaic security of a small New England town”,25 but they were composed of men of courage and initiative who were well adapted to pioneer life. Like their contemporaries at Annapolis and Minas they had brought with them “the image of established New England communities.” 26 That they retained in large measure their New England interests and attachments were revealed fifteen years later during the American Revolution. It is possible that if that break had come later than it did the Maritime Provinces would today be part of the American Republic's “down east”.

For some years after 1764 a wave of land-grabbing and speculation flourished in Nova Scotia, often with government connivance. Favored individuals, select groups, and high-pressure promoters petitioned for, and often received, immense tracts of land.27 Turning our attention to land concentrations in New Brunswick, we note that 100,000 acres on the Miramichi were granted to two Scotchmen, Davidson and Cort, and other areas, equally large, were granted on the Saint John river and at Hopewell, Hillsboro, and Moncton on the Petitcodiac.28 In some cases a few tenants were settled, particularly in the townships on the Petitcodiac.29 Here and there a number of spirited business enterprises were undertaken. Such was the business in fish and furs carried on at the mouth of the Saint John river by Simonds, Hazen and White, also Davidson and Cort's salmon-curing on the Miramichi, and Beamsley Glasier's timber business on the Nashwaak. One point of significance may be noted in connection with land schemes along the Saint John river, namely, the careful and later exceedingly useful survey work which accompanied the laying out of the townships of Conway, Gage, Burton, Sunbury, and Newtown.30 Much of this land was eventually escheated for non-fulfilment of conditions of settlement and thus became available for Loyalist settlement.

After 1768 there was a lull in American immigration resulting from the opening up of the Ohio Valley, and also a slackening of British immigration due to the opposition of British landlords. The Passamaquoddy area, however, received about thirty families in 1770 and in 1772 a group of Yorkshiremen came to the Sackville township.31 These and the other establishments in New Brunswick, remote from the wrangling of Council, Assembly and Governor at Halifax, developed quietly in their own way without much interference or even attention from the capital. Records of these settlements are tantalizingly meagre. From the fact that the settled lands were good, especially those in the Saint John valley, we may suppose that farming operations were a success. “The stoneless alluvial lands, the rich natural pastures, and the parklike magnificent forests, free of underbrush, made the valley a prize for the pioneer farmer even when he had not the capital to trade largely in its furs or to build a sawmill”.32 That the natural resources of the region could yield a good profit for those who had capital is revealed by the flourishing business of Simonds and White, who exported $ 100,000 worth of furs, staves, fish, and lime in the period from 1764 to 1775.33

The Pre-Loyalist inhabitants of New Brunswick belonged for the most part to the Congregational Church, a circumstance which did not enhance their social and political importance in the eyes of leading Loyalists when the latter arrived. According to Hannay, the settlers on the Saint John river found in religion, and also in rum, solace and excitement for lives of isolation and hard work.34 Doubtless the town meeting, on occasion, furnished interesting episodes also. This New England institution had been promised by implication when Governor Lawrence, to attract settlers, had proclaimed the establishment of “a characteristically American rural township system”.35 Actually, however, Nova Scotia in local government as well as in central followed the practice of the royal colony of Virginia rather than that of Massachusetts, and county members never did get the New England form of local self-government on the statute books.36 But town meetings continued to be held; indeed the authorities attempted to place a check on them in 1770,37 thereby adding to the grievances of the outpost settlements, which not infrequently held illegal gatherings in the years immediately preceding the Revolution. It is hardly likely that the Maugerville meeting of May, 1776, which approved of union with the American cause,38 was the first town meeting held in the community.

As one would expect, public provision for education during this period was slight. The imperial authorities probably felt that they had done all that was necessary when they blessed the efforts of the S. P. G. and directed that four hundred acres of land in each township should be granted for the use of schools.39 In reality this generous-sounding provision could be only a gesture until the lands became productive of revenue. Legislation relating to schools before 1783 seems to have been confined to “An Act concerning Schools and Schoolmasters” in 1766. In harmony with the idea of the importance of clerical supervision the licensing of teachers was to be subject to the approval of the clergy. If there were no settled minister, the examination of the candidate was to be held by two Justices of the Peace for the county, provided that at least six inhabitants of the area could certify to the good character of the candidate.40 If there were teachers legally licensed at Maugerville previous to 1774, they must have been certified in this way, as the first settled minister in Maugerville, the Rev. Seth Noble, did not arrive until that year.41 In 1766, feeling was still strong against the Acadians, which probably explains why one section of the Act of 1766 stated that “no popish person shall be so presumptive as to set up any school in the province.” 42 Already the battle was on in peninsular Nova Scotia to promote exclusive Anglican schools under the S. P. G.,43 but the history of S. P. G. activities in New Brunswick does not properly begin until after the Loyalist arrival. Such schools as there were in this part of Nova Scotia before 1783 were conducted intermittently by teachers of the itinerant type, were generally held in private houses, and offered a very rudimentary education. Books were scarce, and the masters, paid by the subscription method and often in produce, received a mere pittance.44 Obviously, one of the great problems to confront the Loyalists on their arrival was the lack of opportunity for the education of their children, but the absence of any definite school system did leave them free within the framework of their economic circumstances to build on the old basis of class and church.

Except for a few observations we may dismiss the story of Nova Scotia during the Revolution as having but slight bearing on our theme. For a number of reasons the people of the province in general either adhered to the British cause or failed effectively to support the rebels, even the majority of New Englanders finding charms in the neutrality for which they had roundly abused the Acadians a few decades before. The present New Brunswick was the scene of the only real invasion directed against Nova Scotia during the conflict, minor enterprise though it was, and the country did not entirely escape those features of the struggle which made life miserable for the Fundy folk and the fishermen of the south coast. The people of Maugerville, whether because of their New England affiliations, grievances against the distant government at Halifax, or fear of attack by the Malicete Indians, sent to Massachusetts protestations of attachment, listened to Eddy when he sought aid for his Cumberland venture, and even endorsed the scheme by joining his expedition in small numbers. The settlements at Sackville and Cumberland had the choice between loyalty and rebellion closely presented to them when Jonathan Eddy arrived in their midst with his daring plan of attack on Fort Cumberland. But Eddy's attack turned into a fiasco and John Allan, Seth Noble, Phineas Nevers, and others who had been most “hearty” in the rebel cause fled to Maine. When a series of circumstances and events had relieved Nova Scotia from the fear of an American invasion, the Revolution, as far as the fourteenth colony was concerned, was over except for the aftermath of Loyalist immigration. The Loyalists, not unnaturally, considered the loyalty of the people of the province to be of a much paler shade than their own, a belief which tended to make them regard the “old inhabitants” as a poor lot.

From this brief review of the early history of Nova Scotia, one is impressed by the insularity of the colony and by its separateness from the rest of North America, a separateness which was intensified by the break with the Thirteen Colonies in the Revolution. This isolation should have given it a national unity, but geographical diversities, the scattered nature of the settlements, and differences in outlook between the government and the New Englanders who peopled the country worked against unity. Although the majority of the population were Americans, business and government tied the country to England, and the province, like Quebec, kept its independence of the United States and refused to become part of a great continental economy.

We have observed that that part of Nova Scotia which became New Brunswick was so negligibly settled previous to the coming of the Loyalists as to be almost empty. The Loyalists, therefore, could be sure of land enough for homes, and of a clear field for whatever institutions they might wish to establish. It is doubtful if they all realized before their arrival how difficult life in this wilderness was to be. From those who were cultured and town-bred pioneer life was to demand a heavy price, taking toll of their energies, cramping their ambitions, blighting their literature, and modifying their incipient institutions. Those early years were to constitute a testing time—and “testing times are distinguished by the surmounting of obstacles rather than the accomplishment of bold designs marked by outstanding initiative.” 45

This brief excursion into Nova Scotian history has shown us that economically and geographically Nova Scotia was part of New England, in spite of ties forged with London by Halifax bureaucrats and financiers. The Revolution meant that the best natural market of the Maritime Provinces would henceforth be, for political reasons, uncertain.46 These provinces had now moved “out of New England's orbit into Great Britain's”. Henceforth Nova Scotia must look eastward to London for direction and help rather than southwestward to Boston as in the past.47 But in a new province—and the Loyalists who came to the Saint John soon found many reasons why there should be a separate province north and west of the Bay of Fundy- there was bound to be such a lack of necessities that the inhabitants would have to turn to the nearest source of supply, the United States. In other words, the new province was likely to find itself pulled two ways, as had happened to Nova Scotia twice before, with adverse effects on its economy.

In 1783, however, the Loyalists turned away physically and emotionally from the old colonies. To their leading men the new land presented a challenge, despite personal deprivations, and with wonderful courage and optimism they accepted that challenge. “By Heaven we will be the envy of the American States”, wrote Edward Winslow to Ward Chipman in April, 1784,48 as he contemplated the formation of a truly Loyalist province.

In our next chapter we shall study those foundation years in which the New Brunswick school system had its slow beginnings.

Notes

^1. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, p. 134.

^2. Creighton, p. 171.

^3. Brebner (1), p. 9.

^4. Brown, p. 137.

^5. Hannay (1), Vol, 1, p. 77.

^6. Gilroy, p. 1 of Introduction.

^7. Creighton, p. 19.

^8. Ibid., p. 63.

^9. Brebner (2), p. 31.

^10. Ibid., p. 31.

^11. Creighton, p. 50.

^12. Brebner (2), p. 45.

^13. Ibid., pp. 15-17.

^14. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, p. 34.

^15. Brebner (2), p. 83.

^16. Creighton, p. 108.

^17. This whole question of the Acadian oath of allegiance is a controversial matter. It is dealt with at length in Brebner J. B., New England's Outpost, and it is also treated by A. G. Doughty in his book The Acadian Exiles.

^18. Lower (1), pp. 5-18.

^19. Creighton, pp. 127, 128.

^20. Ibid., p. 161.

^21. Brebner (2), pp. 166-180.

^22. Kerr, p. 6.

^23. Brebner (1), p. 93.

^24. Hanney (1), Vol. 1, pp. 65, 66.

^25. Gilroy, p. 1.

^26. Brebner (1), p. 57.

^27. Ibid., p. 35-37, 94-98.

^28. Hannay (1), pp. 67-70.

^29. Ibid., p. 69.

^30. Brebner (1), p. 116.

^31. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, pp. 76, 77.

^32. Brebner (1), p. 115.

^33. Ibid., p. 116.

^34. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, pp. 80, 81.

^35. Brebner (1), p. 27.

^36. Creighton, p. 151.

^37. Brebner (1), p. 297.

^38. Kerr, p. 75.

^39. Fitch, p. 2.

^40. MacKay, A. H., pp. 512, 513.

^41. Hannay (1), p. 81.

^42. MacKay, p. 513.

^43. Brebner (1), p. 197.

^44. Fitch, p. 2. Hay, pp. 545, 546. Raymond (2), Vol. VI, No. 7, pp. 131, 132.

^45. Gilroy, p. 82.

^46. Innis & Lower, p. 386.

^47. Brebner (1), p. 353.

^48. Winslow Papers, p. 353.

CHAPTER 4
THE LOYALIST PATTERN

It is customary to think of the first fifty years of New Brunswick history as a period of remarkable achievement in the face of terrific obstacles. No one can gainsay the difficulties or deny that much solid ground-work was laid, but in the realm of ideas the foundation years were marked in large degree by traditional thinking, conservatism, and even reaction. These traits, as we have already observed, were inherent in the colonial mentality of the American Tories, and they were strengthened during and after the Revolution by the proud association with loyalty. Those who have had to flee in order to save cherished traditions from the irreverent hands of iconoclasts are apt to think forever after in terms of those traditions— in fact tradition itself becomes a fetish, and desire for change is damned as blasphemy and treason.

In our treatment of the British background we noted that the Whigs of the eighteenth century were influenced by tradition in their thinking, and tended to follow comfortable routine in practice. These tendencies, however, were even more marked among the Tories, so that the term Toryism became identified with the maintenance of the old order, while the Whigs of the nineteenth century became the apostles of change. The excesses of the French Revolution tended to confirm Toryism everywhere and to discredit popular movements, even blighting the hopes of many English poets and idealists. Nothing good, it seemed, could come out of France. In education, for instance, even if England's leaders had been disposed to pay heed to the theories of liberal-minded men in other countries, the shadow of the Revolution was black enough to obscure Mirabeau's proposals for the establishment of primary schools throughout France, and a teachers' college as part of a National Lycée at Paris. Talleyrand's Report (1791) proposing the organization of a complete state system of public instruction for France, and Condorcet's bill (1792) embodying a democratic theory of education,1 being part of a French revolutionary programme, could not merit the enthusiasm of thorough Britishers. During the Napoleonic struggle, and the reactionary years heralded by the Congress of Vienna, the progress in educational organization and in the application to practice of new theories of education which was achieved by Prussia, England's ally against Napoleon, caused no flurry in English educational circles. Prussia, decades ahead of the rest of Europe in educational reform, achieved early in the nineteenth century a state-supported system of secondary schools, and of Volksschules or People's Schools, a central Department of Public Instruction, a university aiming to produce scholars capable of advancing knowledge by personal research, and the elevation of teaching to a profession through the establishment of sem- inaries where teachers were carefully trained, not only in knowledge, but also in the art of teaching. In these seminaries Pestalozzian principles2 were at work, for one of the first steps taken by the new department of education was to send seventeen Prussian teachers to Switzerland for three years at the government's expense, to study the ideas of Pestalozzi, and to warm themselves “at the sacred fire which burns in the heart of this man, so full of strength and love”. In 1809 Zeller, one of Pestalozzi's pupils, was called to set up a Seminary in Prussia to train teachers in Pestalozzi's methods, and the seventeen Prussian teachers, on their return from Switzerland, were also made directors of training establishments. The spirit of these men, thus warmed by the new conception of education, was expressed by Dinter, Superintendent of Education in East Prussia, when he said: “I promised God, that I would look upon every Prussian peasant child as a being who could complain of me before God, if I did not provide him with the best education, as a man and a Christian, which it was possible for me to provide”.3 Official purposes, however, back of these educational reforms were more nationalistic than democratic,4 but if England failed to be influenced by Prussia's example it was not because she was far-sighted enough to see that schools dominated by nationalistic motives might become mere nurseries of fanatical patriotism, but rather because what happened in Prussia seemed to have no significance for England. Obviously, after Jena and Tilsit, Prussia needed a thorough regeneration. The Prussian king had said that the state must regain in mental force what it had lost in territory and splendor.5 But just as obviously, to die-hard Tories, England needed no such regeneration, therefore no such drastic changes as Prussia was making were necessary. Besides, as we have noted earlier, the English, as a nation, tended to ignore or heed little what other nations were doing. Practically nothing, therefore, was done towards a solution of the problem of popular education—if indeed the question was recognized as a problem. In 1807 Whitbread, with his Parochial Schools' Act, raised for the first time in the British Parliament the question of the propriety of diffusing education among the poorer classes, pointing out that if the schools did not educate, the gutter would, but the bill was rejected by the Lords who feared that education would make the poor dissatisfied and indolent.6 The main champion of a national system of education after the death in 1815 of Whitbread was Henry Brougham, whose addresses, committees of enquiry, and bills did awaken interest.7 But Toryism was still in the saddle; and the English parliament was yet unreformed, in spite of the growing demands of the rising industrial capitalist class that they be added to the list of those who ruled England. Educational reforms, therefore, as well as political, social, and economic, had to wait for the first cautious steps of the Whigs after the Bill of 1832. Clearly, no progressive inspiration in educational matters could come from across the water to New Brunswick in the early years of that province.

In line with the mother country's traditional conservatism were her colonial policies of the period. In spite of the American Revolution these differed but little from those which had helped to alienate the thirteen colonies. Many of the officials who sought for some lesson to be learned from that tragedy concluded that too much, not too little, democracy had wrecked the first British Empire, and that it was therefore advisable to strengthen the principle of authority. Almost all the serious questions which faced Britain as she contemplated the remnants of her imperial dominions were answered in the traditional fashion.8 The very establishment of New Brunswick as a separate province was part of a British plan to divide and rule. There were, of course, local factors involved9—the distance of the region from the seat of government at Halifax; the homogeneity of the population; the dissatisfaction of the Saint John Loyalists with the administration, especially in the matter of land grants; their desire to assume the role of office-holders; and the wish of Governor Parr to be rid of responsibility for the settlers north of the Bay of Fundy, whom he termed “of a turbulent disposition” 10—but the division was too prompt and complete to be the result of these alone, as Lord Durham admitted long afterwards.11 At any rate, the imperial policy was opportune from the standpoint of prominent New Brunswick Loyalists who were now assured of a “genteel outlet for their talents.” 12 Blessing the ties that bound, they assumed the leadership of a province designed “as a citadel of conservatism and imperial loyalty.” 13

It is interesting to compare the spirit in which the province of New Brunswick was established with that which pulsed and throbbed at the inception of the American republic in spite of sectional contradictions. To the New Brunswick of 1784 one can apply almost the direct negative of a number of those statements14 which a vision of the young Republic has drawn from a noted historian. For the launching of the province produced no “ferment of ideas that touched all shores of thought and challenged all the creative energies” 15 of its founders, for the minds of the latter were not receptive to new thought. The country had no cultural life to begin with, and the economic and political arrangements of the new province were such as to maintain unchanged the social conceptions, concerns, interests, and educational views of its leaders.

Not only was the country insulated against change but it was isolated as well. Because of this isolation and because of provincial status, affiliations with centres other than London were not easily formed. Between the Loyalists and the independent Americans yawned a great gulf made by the Revolution. Soon the French Revolution would stamp as detestably Jacobin, French theories of equality and doctrines of perfectability and progress. Thus the gates were closed against the free inpouring of foreign science and opinion which invigorated every branch of American life.16 While “the new states born of the Revolution were swept into a national current, made a part of the world system of powers”,17 British North America had been broken up “into a number of small, immature, and feeble provinces”.18 These isolated appendages of Great Britain, with limited horizons, static leadership, and insistent practical problems, could neither know nor desire a dynamic progressive philosophy. The entire cast and tone of provincial life precluded it.

Governor Carleton's commission declared “We will and ordain that you the said Thomas Carleton shall have and enjoy a prerogative voice in making and passing all laws statutes and ordinances as aforesaid”.19 The Governor, who was the strongest link between the province and the Home Authorities, tended to guard jealously this and the other prerogatives which he exercised as the King's representative in the colony. The Council combined executive and legislative functions in one body until 1833, met behind closed doors until 1834, and, until 1817, was composed entirely of Anglicans. The first Council was drawn from the Loyalist elite, although the pre-Loyalist class was not without its representation.20 Because of the fact that the majority of the original members of the Council achieved a remarkable longevity of life, and because vacancies, when such did occur, were filled by their friends and relatives, the Council tended to perpetuate the dominance of a few ruling families and to deserve indeed the name of Family Compact. To such men the word “democratic” meant the same as “republican”. In an article in a New Brunswick newspaper of 1799, written on the occasion of a clash between Council and Assembly, the writer accused the Assembly of assuming a power that, if submitted to, must destroy the constitution “and introduce a pure democracy—a Government to avoid which, his Majesty's loyal subjects in this province left their native country”. The writer went on to say that “nothing has since happened in any part of the world to recommend a democratic form of Government to our approbation”.21 His Majesty's loyal subjects of the Council were at one with the Governor in attempting to preserve the sacrosanctity of government as conceived by the Colonial Office. This loyal purpose meant, in effect, that the Council should enjoy exclusively the dignities, emoluments, and prerogatives of office-holding. Such a group, composed as it was of lawyers, judges, and administrators, could know little of the problems of the commercial classes or of the rural inhabitants,22 nor did it wish to, if we may judge by the failure to give commercial interests a fair representation in the Council, a failure for which the Council, as His Excellency's advisers, shared responsibility with the Governor and Colonial Office.

Fifty years and more after the founding of the province, the wisdom of admitting the commercial classes to the Council was still a debatable question in certain quarters. In 1824, Sir Howard Douglas, a more liberal-minded governor than many of the incumbents of the office, wrote that he intended to look around for a gentleman actually in mercantile business in Saint John who might have the qualifications, influence, and information respecting the commercial affairs of the Province. By this appointment, wrote Douglas, “higher consideration might be shown to the commercial interests, which are not at present in a sufficient degree of influence in the Council Board”. On the margin of this letter we find written: “The answer states, no precedent for such a procedure.” 23 Later, toward the close of the period here being considered, the then governor, Sir Archibald Campbell, writing on the subject of appointments to the Executive Council, admitted uneasiness over the growing tendency in the House of Assembly to acquire such an ascendency in the Administration as would, if successful, destroy the proper balance between the Executive and Legislative branches. The composition, therefore, of His Majesty's Council was highly important. It must be so constituted as to interpose efficiently, but tactfully enough to avoid collision with the lower House, between the People's representatives and the Authorities of the Crown. Qualified men, in the opinion of the Governor, were scarce. Vacancies must necessarily be filled up from the lawyer and merchant classes. It was only fair that a proportion of the latter class should be selected, but one must, the Governor thought, “be very careful not to give them too much weight or influence at the Council Board.” 24 In view of this attitude it is not surprising to find that not a little opposition to the oligarchic Council came from the commercial interests of Saint John, a city resentful, to begin with, of the choice of Fredericton as capital, and incensed by the stubborn refusal of the Governor and Council to have certain sessions of the Supreme Court held in Saint John.25

To Carleton and the Home Authorities, an Assembly seemed of dubious value, but the Loyalists, as British, considered a representative body to be one of the inalienable rights of Englishmen, and, as American colonials, they were thoroughly familiar with its workings. An Assembly, therefore, was unavoidable, but Carleton postponed calling one as long as possible. The first Assembly, which met on January 3, 1786, was constituted on the basis of a liberal franchise, all males twenty-one years and over, resident in the province for three months, having the right to vote, except, of course, the Indians and French, the latter being disqualified because of their religion. This franchise, and even the more restricted one which soon superseded the first, were, by comparison with the regulations in England, exceedingly liberal, and indicate a con- cession “to the requirements and conditions of a pioneer community”.26 The Assembly, however, often had hard going to make its weight felt against a Governor responsible only to the Home Authorities, and a Council responsible only to the Governor. Moreover, in the early years of the province lack of effective communication often prevented members from attending the sessions27 and the opposition of the Council to the payment of members for their services precluded the attendance of those lacking personal means.28 The rank and file of the people, who seldom saw a newspaper and who were intensely occupied with the business of making a home, could not always understand the issues at stake, or find significance in them, and thus men were sometimes elected, as still not infrequently happens, who were more concerned with serving their own interests than with promoting the welfare of the province. Thus the Council, aided by the Governor, was often able to over-ride the Assembly. But there was a sturdy independence about many of the less prominent Loyalist pioneers, and a measure of infiltration of liberal principles had accompanied their coming,29 as is evidenced in the person of Elias Hardy. Even a stormy note of early radicalism was introduced by the Scotchman, James Glenie, who seems to have had an “opposition temperament”,30 and may have imbibed the current ideas of the French Revolution3l during his stay in England in 1793 and 1794. At any rate, his enemies labelled him a “violent democrat and Jacobin”.32 It is interesting to note that his chief support came from Sunbury County, site of the leading New England settlement in New Brunswick previous to the Revolution.

From the standpoint of educational developments, the chief significance of the many controversies between Assembly and Council during this period lies in the delaying effect such controversies had on school legislation, and in the partial evidence they present of the social distinctions which conditioned the early educational foundations of the province. “The social and intellectual differences between the councillors and the mass of the settlers deprived the Council of a representative character and tended to divide the people of the province into two factions.” 33 The first election in Saint John became a contest between aristocratic and democratic elements.34 One who lived at a number of places along the Saint John river has written of the aristocratic traditions maintained there in the early nineteenth century.35 According to Dr. D. C. Harvey, organized society in all the Maritime Provinces exhibited the class distinctions transmitted from the eighteenth century. These were most pronounced, of course, at the respective capitals, where there was an aristocratic coterie made up of government officials, military and naval officers, judges, leading lawyers, higher clergy, and prominent merchants. The rest of the inhabitants of the capital and practically all the rural communities were regarded with good-natured tolerance unless they tried to break into the charmed circle. “This coterie thought in terms . . . of perpetual class distinctions.” 36

It has been said that "when a set of people have made up their minds that they are superior by virtue of birth to all others, they are not usually in a condition to advance very far forward in any direction, or to add to the intel lectual or industrial development of the country in which they live."37 Our thesis is now clear. The school system of New Brunswick had a slow and cautious beginning along traditional lines, uninspired by the democracy to which the American experiment was dedicated. At the time (1795) When most of the contestants in the American Philosophical Society's essay competition were writing in favor of the full and free development of every individual, in order that a true democracy might be realized,38 New Brunswick leaders, delegating to the traditional agencies of Church and private initiative a large measure of responsibility for the education of plain folk, were thinking in terms of education for their own children, the leaders to be. They could not dream that the decorous decades would give way to boisterous years when a vigorous democracy would furnish the leaders of the province, leaders who would be none the better because of educational deficiencies for which the old order was responsible. It is, of course, only fair to note that traditionalism was not immediately routed in the United States; only fair, too, to remember that New Brunswick was a small province with as yet undeveloped resources, and that its leaders were harassed by manifold problems of a wide variety. Moreover, it is undeniable that efficient secondary and higher institutions of learning are of the utmost importance in any school system, as J. R. Inch, Superintendent of Education in New Brunswick from 1891 to 1909, has pointed out in the following words: “New Brunswick forms no exception to the general rule that in point of time the college and high school have been established in almost every country before the common school. Whatever may be the causes of this order of development, its beneficent effect cannot be doubted. Without effective higher institutions of learning a country cannot hope to maintain for any considerable time a system of common schools in the highest state of efficiency”.39 What we wish to point out here, however, is that class consciousness played a responsible part in the order of development referred to, and in the primary emphasis for many years on secondary and higher education.

New Brunswick schools during the first half-century fall into the old familiar pattern. There were schools, partially supported by the state, for the upper classes, i.e., the Academy and Grammar Schools; and for the poor, namely the parish schools, Indian Schools, and schools under the special aegis of the Church, working through the S. P. G. or the National Board. The remaining schools were of the private venture type. The total number of schools was inadequate, and the curriculum, for the most part, elementary. The spirit in which the leadership of the province conceded government aid to the parish schools was in such marked contrast with the spirit in which the Academy was supported that one might almost suspect that the parish schools were regarded as schools for paupers. Not until 1802, nineteen years after the coming of the Loyalists, was any provision made for such schools. When a measure to grant £ 10 to each parish of the province for educational purposes was passed as part of the appropriation bill by the Assembly in 1793, the Council rejected it, stating among other objections 'that the appropriating money for the education of children in the different parishes of this Province, was a new institution and necessarily required particular regulations'.40 Yet the year before, a grant had been made to the Academy, and in this particular year the Governor was demanding more money for that institution.41 Evidently schools for the “children in the different parishes of this Province” were in a different category entirely from a “Seminary of learning . . . where youth might be qualified for the learned professions”.42 They were, in effect, regarded as schools for the children of poor plebeians and the spirit in which they were established and supported was, for a considerable period, that of charitable benevolence.

To bracket the Grammar Schools with the Academy as institutions for the benefit of the upper classes may require some explanation. Undoubtedly they lacked the aristocratic character of the Academy, but the term “grammar school” indicates that they were designed, as in England and the Thirteen Colonies, for the education of children of the middle classes, i.e., children whose elementary education was gained at home or in private schools, and who were able to continue their schooling beyond the years and the curriculum of the parish schools. What Sir Robert Falconer has said of similar institutions in Nova Scotia lends support to the view that grammar schools may be described as schools for the upper classes. His words on the subject are as follows: “In pursuance of the policy of supplying opportunities first for that class of the population from which the higher ranks were recruited, the Government of Nova Scotia in 1811 passed a Grammar School Act to provide Grammar Schools in seven counties and in three districts.” 43 Actually many of the Grammar Schools of New Brunswick fell far short of the secondary curriculum they were supposed to follow, deteriorating to the point where they did little work beyond that of the parish schools. Yet year after year certain favored localities continued to draw the larger grant-in-aid and to enjoy the prestige of having a Grammar School.

While the schools of New Brunswick may be classified in the manner above suggested, their development, and the influences which affected that development, can be studied most readily from a chronological viewpoint, al- though at times a clearer understanding may be attained by departing from the strictly chronological method.

Private endeavor resulted in a number of schools antedating the first school legislation of 1792. Only a few parents could afford to send their children to England, as Edward Winslow did in the case of his eldest son in 1784.44 To send them to the United States incurred the risk of republican contamination. Some parents taught their children at home, partially at least, as Winslow seems to have been forced to do45 when his brood grew annually, but others lacked the time and the ability, yet desired education for their children. There was, therefore, an extensive field for private initiative. Many of the resulting schools were of the elementary and precarious type referred to in connection with the Pre-Revolutionary period. According to the Governor's Royal Instructions of 1784 no one was to keep school in New Brunswick without a license from the Governor,46 but it is likely that in rural areas this formality was often overlooked. Information about these schools is scanty. We know that Bealing Stephenson who came to Fredericton in 1790 taught school there for forty years, and was accounted an accomplished penman and an expert in mathematics.47 Mary Winslow attended a boarding school for young ladies in Saint John, kept by a Mrs. Cottnam.48 Judging by the advertisements in early Saint John papers the curriculum in some of these schools was quite elaborate, such as that offered by William Green whose flamboyant advertisement is here given in full:

Education for Young Gentlemen William Green

Proposes opening an English School, for the Education of Youth, on Monday, the 20th of April, at his house in Briton-Street, near Capt. Elmes'—where will be taught the following branches of Literature, in the most approved order from the best Authors used in the Principal Academies in Great Britain and Ireland—viz.

| Per Quarter> |
Reading | 0 | 7 | 6
Reading with English Grammar and the proper accent | 0 | 10 | 0
Writing | 0 | 10 | 0
Arithmetic | 0 | 12 | 6
Bookkeeping and Merchants' Accompts | 0 | 17 | 6

Geometry, Measuring, Surveying, Gauging, Navigation, Dialling, and other parts of the Mathematics according to agreement; also the use and projection of Maps and Charts after a natural, easy and concise method without burden to the memory. N. B. Those parents, that will give him a preference in the tutorage of their children, may depend on the strictest attention being paid to their natural genius, and their moral abilities. March, 27, 1789.49

Schools promoted by the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts were, like private schools, in existence previous to schools aided by the legislature, and continued to function for many years after the establishment of the parish schools. This missionary organization of the Church of England extended its activities from the Thirteen Colonies into Nova Scotia shortly after the founding of Halifax in 1749.50 The appointment in 1774 of James Porter as schoolmaster at Cumberland marked the inauguration of the Society's activities in the present New Brunswick. After the Revolution the Society adopted a definite policy of supporting primary schools in this province.51 According to a list,52 prepared by Raymond, of schools in New Brunswick before 1800 under the auspices of the S. P. G., there were such schools at Carleton, St. Andrews and Maugerville very shortly after the arrival of the Loyalists, and by 1800 there were fourteen in the province.

In the schools of the S. P. G. we have an example of the important place which religion and denominationalism occupied in the educational philosophy of the eighteenth century. The proselytizing and teaching functions of the society were closely related. According to the Royal Instructions, a license from the Lord Bishop of London, who supervised the work of the S. P. G., was obligatory for schoolmasters coming to New Brunswick from the Mother country.53 These were mostly Anglican missionaries and were not in sufficient numbers to meet the need. Consequently, masters from the best material available in the colony were placed on the S. P. G. list of teachers, sometimes on the recommendation of the Governor-in-Council, more frequently on the word of the clergyman in charge of the parish where a teacher was needed. Cases are on record in which teachers holding the Governor's license were placed on the S. P. G. list if they were Anglicans and were recommended by the missionary in charge of the parish where they taught. Thus Benjamin Snow, who had a school at Carleton in 1784, applied through the Rev. Samuel Cooke to be placed on the list of the S. P. G. schoolmasters, was accepted, and commended for sobriety, learning and morals.54 Not infrequently missionaries of the S. P. G. were themselves teachers. For example, Rev. Samuel Cooke, the first rector of Fredericton, and Rev. Walter Price both taught in the Fredericton Academy in 1791.55 The requirements of a prospective teacher wishing to be licensed by the S. P. G., and the instructions issued to schoolmasters employed by the society reveal unequivocally that the educational programme of the S. P. G. was a subsidiary of the denominational. A teacher wishing to be licensed by the S. P. G. must present certificates with respect to his zeal for the Christian religion, his affection to. the present Governor, and his conformity to the doctrine and discipline of the Church of England, also testimonials of his ability to teach the catechism of that church and such exposition thereof as the Society might order. In the Standing Orders of the Society instructions relating to the teaching of writing and elementary arithmetic were preceded by instructions emphasizing religious purposes. Children were to be taught reading in order that they might be able to read the Scriptures and other pious books. Masters were to teach their pupils to read the Church Catechism, to memorize it, and to understand it by the help of expositions sent over by the Society.56

The activity and influence of the Church of England in the educational field were not confined to the schools of the S. P. G. The teachers in the Academy, Grammar Schools, and later, in the College of New Brunswick, were Anglicans, and the Church of England catechism was taught in the Madras Schools. Moreover, the Anglican Church, as in the mother country, assumed that it was the special depositary of loyalty and superior breeding. Although an act passed in 1786 for preserving the Church of England referred to that church “as by law established”,57 it is doubtful if the Church of England was legally the Established Church of New Brunswick. Nevertheless, Anglicans acted on the assumption that it was. Bishop John Inglis in a written complaint to the Governor, Sir Howard Douglas, in 1826, fulminating against the action of certain Presbyterian trustees of a school at Chatham, pointed out that since the provincial law required the teaching of the Creed, Lord's Prayer and Ten Commandments, the use of the Anglican catechism was only logical, and added “indeed if a public school teaches the Established religion of the country, no more can be said”. The closing paragraph of the letter is of special interest. The Bishop asked Sir Howard if it might not be advisable to add so many members to the bench of magistrates at Chatham as would give a majority of Churchmen.58 This presumably would, in time, eliminate the offending Presbyterian trustees, since at that period the trustees were appointed by the magistrates.

Anglican control in secondary education has already been mentioned. The Academy and later the Collegiate School and College of New Brunswick were practically exclusive Anglican institutions, in spite of the fact that they received public money. So long as all the high government officials were Anglicans, as they were during the early years of the province, Dissenters, although they had the majority in numbers, could achieve little success in attempting to change this order of things. As a matter of fact, despite Glenie's championship, or perhaps because of it, Methodists and Baptists were even unable to secure for their clergy the right to solemnize marriages. 59 previous to the passing of the Dissenters' Marriage Bill in 1834, and until 1810 Roman Catholics were denied the right to vote. 60

Dissenters were unable to maintain schools as numerous and as influential as the Anglicans during this period, for they lacked the outside support which the Church of England received from the S. P. G., were cut off by the Revolution from their brethren in the Colonies, and could not count among their numbers as many persons of prestige and secure income as could the favored Anglican communion. They were not, however, inactive in education before the inauguration of parish schools, nor did they depend entirely on those schools when such were established. In 1788 a schoolmaster at Carleton reported to the S. P. G. that 'two wealthy Dissenters have started a rival school', and in 1829 Rev. Frederick Coster of Carleton wrote to the S. P. G. of a school under the management of a Presbyterian minister in an adjacent parish.61 In the course of time, immigration and “the intrusion of evangelical movements from outside” 62 added to the numbers, zeal and energy of Dissenters, facilitating the establishment of a number of important denominational schools, but their history belongs properly to the next period.

Shortly after the close of the period under consideration, the S. P. G. withdrew its aid.63 The pioneer phase of New Brunswick development was over; the Madras Schools were flourishing; parish and Grammar Schools were growing in numbers if not appreciably in character; continued aid from the Society seemed unnecessary. Perhaps, too, the Society was beginning to see the hopelessness of trying to make the Church of England the Established Church in New Brunswick, and to realize that the days of Anglican privilege and social prestige were beginning to wane.64

While the S. P. G. held a narrow view of education and an exalted view of denominationalism, and while it may have helped to create resentment among other denominations and to delay the establishment of free non-sectarian schools, we must not overlook the fact that the Society did render a service to elementary education at a time when schools of any kind were at a premium, and that those whom it commissioned to teach, working under difficulties, must have added appreciably to the sum total of knowledge. Those difficulties were far from slight. While the masters were sure of the £ 10 paid annually by the Society,65 the rest of their salary, subscribed by the people, was inadequate even when paid regularly and completely. The Society evidently expected long hours of service. A Mr. Lynch reported keeping school from six to one in the morning and from two to six in the afternoon, during the summer, and from eight to one, and two to five in the winter. George Barwick taught from eight to twelve in the morning and from two to five in the afternoon, and also conducted a night school from six to eight for the benefit of servants after the day's work.66 With conditions as they were in the country, one is not surprised to find that the S. P. G. employed only male teachers, although the Society does seem to have considered the plan of using women teachers for the younger children, but it was reported in 1796 that qualified females were unobtainable.67 Is this, we wonder, a reflection on the intellect and learning of the women of the province, or on their physiques, or does it merely mean that the tasks of the home in pioneer society demanded the whole of a woman's time?

It is a rather curious anomaly that while Loyalist parents were grieving, over the lack of educational facilities for their children, a definite and ambitious scheme was being launched in the interests of a group of people who were untroubled by their lack of schooling. A few months after Dr. William Paine, urged on by his wife, affixed his signature to a memorial praying that steps be taken toward the institution of a Provincial Academy of Arts and Sciences,68 the same gentleman became one of the commissioners, along with the Governor, Chief Justice, Provincial Secretary, and others, empowered by the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in New England and the Parts Adjacent to supervise the education of the Indians of New Brunswick.69

The Society referred to, like the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, was an outside agency. Its activities in New Brunswick represent an odd assortment of purposes and motives—Christian philanthropy, noblesse oblige, Protestant zeal, and opportunism. The Society, originally chartered by the Long Parliament in 1649 as the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in New England, was rechartered in the reign of Charles II, and the phrase “And Parts Adjacent” was added to the title. The aim of the Society was the propagation of the gospel among the Indians, principally in Massachusetts, but its funds, Hannay says, were largely appropriated by Harvard College for general education,70 an interesting point in comparison with a certain measure of diversion of effort later in New Brunswick. At the close of the Revolution the Society, commonly known as the New England Company, concentrated on the redemption of the Indians of New Brunswick from Roman Catholicism, migratory habits, and illiteracy. Certainly the plight of the Indians of the province might have been expected to arouse pity and a sense of responsibility on the part of any Loyalists having a lively memory of their own recent dispossession. Winslow admitted that their condition, because of the encroachments made on their hunting grounds by the new settlements, was one of abject poverty and distress.71 When to this consideration was added the willingness of the New England Company to spend money on Indian schools in New Brunswick, thereby affording a number of administrative jobs for several prominent members of the official class, a scheme for the improvement and education of the Indians appeared in the light of a duty and an opportunity. A commission was appointed empowered to engage and pay teachers for the purpose of civilizing and teaching the "heathen" natives and their children, with a view to placing them in some trade, “mastery” or lawful calling, or apprenticing them out to English families.72 Schools were established at Woodstock, Fredericton, Sheffield, Westfield, St. Andrews, Miramichi, and Sussex Vale. These were presided over by able men, a number of them being graduates of American colleges. In 1794 the commissioners, evidently realizing that these various schools, while they were of benefit to the Indians as relief centres, were failures as educational institutions, decided to close all but the one at Sussex Vale under Rev. Oliver Arnold. Winslow, commenting on this decision wrote: “The erecting of a convenient building at Sussex-Vale, as an academy exclusively for them, the employment of a preceptor to teach them the first rudiments of education, and the arrangements which were made for their accommodation and comfort, all contributed to soothe them in their state of distress .... They considered this place as an Asylum where the aged and infirm could rest from the fatigues which are incident to savage life, and where the young of both sexes were fed, clothed and instructed as far as they inclined to be.” 73 A degree of contrast to this picture of pleased and grateful natives occurs in Thomas Costin's letter to Winslow in 1804, a letter in which the writer spoke of the Saint John river Indians as distressed and discontented, and missing the relief afforded by the various schools which had been closed. Of the school at Sussex Vale, he said “What is that, as they observe, to their numerous tribe and the distribution of their nation?” 74

In Winsow's phrase “instructed as far as they inclined to be” lies one clue to the failure of the New England Company's venture in New Brunswick. For the Indians showed more interest in the supplies of provisions and clothing than in the benefits of education. A report of the school at Woodstock shows that during a six-month period only $ 3.30 was spent for books and writing paper while $ 529.12 was expended for food and clothing.75 Arnold reported that at Sussex Vale parents whose children were in the school frequently sold for a trifle the weekly allowance of supplies distributed to them, even good cloth, when they were almost destitute of warm clothing during a cold winter.76 Other traits of the Indian character besides improvidence proved an obstacle to the educational aims of the Company.77 Winslow admitted this when he said: “It is true literally that all the exertions which have been made have been hitherto ineffectual to conquer the prejudices of the savages against allowing their children to be bound out to trades, and they have another prejudice equally strong against the discipline of schools or chastisement for faults. To reconcile them to the latter it was proposed to introduce into the same school with them a certain number of the white children of the neighborhood, in order that the savages might mix with them and observe that they were treated with equal justice and attention.” 78 This device appears not unreasonable but one cannot help wondering if it was not resorted to in the interests of the white children rather than in the interests of the Indians. Not that one can strongly censure people who were deprived of schools for their own children for seeking to take advantage of excellent facilities provided for unappreciative Indians.

If officials of the Company outside of the provincial agents were not aware of this diversion of the Company's accommodations, a letter in 1824 from the Governor, Sir Howard Douglas, to Mr. Vaughan, the chairman of the New England Company, must have proved something of a shock. Sir Howard wrote that he found the school, not, as he expected, an Establishment specially devoted to the improvement and education of the Indians, but exhibiting them as last in the order in which were presented to him, to his surprise, a great concourse of other children of the first condition in the neighborhood. The plan, he thought, had failed and he was not afraid to breathe surprise that “expectations of improving the moral condition of people who stand in the very lowest stage of human existence, should be entertained, according to a Plan of which the foundation was laid in breaking all the tender ties of our nature, tempting the parent to sell the child, transplanting the Infant into a new condition, too forced and unnatural to be permanent, and subject consequently to let him relapse into savage life to Parents, with habits that do not suit that condition”. His Excellency suggested that the Indians must be brought gradually to such habits of agricultural industry as might induce them to establish their residences in tracts of reserved lands which had been appropriated to them and which might also admit of their young men following the desultory pursuits from which they could not seem to be detached. As the civilization of the country advanced they would be forced more and more to the cultivation of their fixed resources, and at proper periods in this gradual progress provincial leaders must watch out for the best opportunities and means, such as schools, of improving their moral and religious condition. Anything else would be “specious experiments deluding humanity and charity to grant their aids to ineffectual experiments which injure rather than improve”.79 Whether because of Sir Howard's condemnation or because the Company had already realized that only vain expenditure of money attended their efforts to induce the Indians to become Protestants, farmers, and scholars, the school was closed soon after this (1826),80 and the Company ceased its operations in the province. Altogether $ 140,000 had been spent, of which $ 40,000 had gone to officials whose jobs were practically sinecures. For instance, the Honorable John Coffin received £ 125 sterling per year as superintendent of the Sussex School, although he lived at the mouth of the Nerepis8l and probably did not see the school even annually. The whole enterprise, because of its failure to make any deep or lasting impression on the Indians of New Brunswick, scarcely deserves the attention here given it, but as an example of energetic but injudicious expenditure on the part of a wealthy outside agency, in comparison with the sluggish and inadequate provisions within the province for the bulk of the population of school age, it presents an interesting contrast.

In the same year in which the New England Company began its operations in the interests of the Indians of New Brunswick, definite steps were taken towards the establishment of the Fredericton Academy. We have noted that this Academy was the first institution of learning in New Brunswick to claim the attention of the legislature. The germ of the idea back of the school was in the minds of certain Loyalists before the migration. In New York, in 1783, a Plan of a Religious and Literary Institution for Nova Scotia was formulated and discussed by a committee including the Rev. Charles Inglis, afterwards the first Bishop of Nova Scotia, and Jonathan Odell, later the first provincial secretary of New Brunswick. A memorial to Sir Guy Carleton stressed the expediency of a Public Seminary, Academy or College at some “centrical” part of Nova Scotia, and a later letter from the originators of the plan declared that the founding on a liberal plan of such an institution where youth could receive a virtuous82 education and be qualified for the learned professions was of the utmost importance.83

The division of Nova Scotia in 1784 into two provinces brought about the first step in that decentralization of effort which has been a lamentable feature of educational endeavor in the Maritime Provinces. Largely through the efforts of Inglis, an Academy at Windsor was begun in 1787, and in 1789 was raised to the status of a college. In the case of the New Brunswick Academy emphasis on the function of such an institution as a training ground for clergymen was not quite so decided as in connection with Windsor Academy, but that may be due to the fact that lack of communication prevented Bishop Inglis from exercising much influence in this distant part of his diocese. The spirit, however, was appreciably the same as that revealed in a casual statement in the early records of Windsor 'that in exact proportion to the influence of the established religion will be the immovable loyalty of the inhabitants of the province'.84

The Fredericton Academy was founded at about the same time as the one at Windsor. In the records of the Council of New Brunswick there is a minute dated December 13, 1785, reporting consideration of a memorial of Dr. William Paine and others praying that a charter of incorporation be granted for the institution of a Provincial Academy of Arts and Sciences, also a memorial of the principal officers of the disbanded corps and other inhabitants of York County praying that part of the reserved lands around Fredericton be appro- priated to the use of the proposed Academy. Then follows the order of the Council “that the Attorney General and Solicitor General be directed with all convenient speed to prepare the draught of a charter for the establishment of the said institution”.85 The Minutes of the Council of a slightly later date, February 3, 1786, tell us that the trustees of certain reserved lands at Fredericton were instructed to lay out a glebe for a church, a common for the use of the inhabitants, and lots of specified sizes, the latter to be sold at auction and conveyed in fee simple on a ground rent reserved forever. Furthermore, the revenue so from time to time obtained was to be applied “to and for the use of an Academy or College to be erected and supported at Fredericton for the education of Youth in the various Branches of Literature and for the salaries or maintenance of the several preceptors and teachers appointed thereto in such proportions as the Governors or Directors of said Academy or College, authorized by Charter of Incorporation, shall direct and assign”.86 In anticipation of the granting of a royal charter, the Attorney General and Solicitor General prepared a draught of a charter based on that of King's College at New York, afterwards Columbia, but Carleton received a letter from Lord Sydney which restricted him from passing a charter of incorporation for the time being.87 Perhaps the royal bounty could not stretch to include both a King's at Windsor and a College of New Brunswick at Fredericton, or it may be that imperial interest was centred on a plan to establish foundations within Oxford and Cambridge, for the maintenance of young men from British North America who would take holy orders, and then return to British America to serve the Church of England.88 At any rate, the formal inception of the college was delayed until 1800. In the meantime the trustees promoted the Grammar School or Academy, using such masters as were available on the spot.89 Who the first teachers were is not known.90 A letter from Major Barclay to Edward Winslow, July 2, 1787, referred to some unnamed gentleman proposed as master, informing Winslow that the nominee, although a man of honor and integrity, was not of a shining genius, in fact, in the languages, unless he had improved himself since leaving college, he was hardly tolerable, and in mathematics, geography, etc., no more learned than Winslow and Barclay themselves.91 Evidently the difficulty of obtaining competent men at a low salary was one which continued into the college period, as Ward Chipman wrote Winslow from Salem in 1804 that he had made enquiries about an Instructor for the College but feared he would not succeed in obtaining one, as gentlemen qualified for the position could obtain in Massachusetts eleven or twelve hundred dollars a year.92

In 1792 the resources of the Academy were augmented by the legislative grant of £ 100 aforementioned. The next year, when the number of scholars exclusive of children under nine years of age was only seventeen,93 Governor Carleton emphasized the importance of making an annual allowance to the Academy, and it was resolved to grant an annual sum not exceeding £ 200 as soon as the amount of the anticipated bounty from Britain should be known, and a suitable plan and place agreed upon. This reference to a proper place angered the Governor's friends, for whom there was but one proper site, Fredericton.94 Their resentment was undoubtedly a factor behind the Council's refusal that year to pass a bill granting aid to parish schools, although the Council stated that their objection was due to the inclusion of the measure in the appropriation bill of the year.95 As only the year before the grant to the Academy had been included in the appropriation bill without any objection on the part of the Council, it is evident that the Academy and a parish school were horses of a different color. The effect of the deadlock between the two Houses was to delay any further legislative aid to the Academy, to postpone the charter,96 and to defer the passage of a parish school enactment.97

In 1800, the year after the deadlock between Council and Assembly ended, the Academy became incorporated as the College of New Brunswick. Its story from then on is a part of the history of higher education, but a preparatory school was maintained in connection with it,98 and when the college became King's College in 1829 this school became the Fredericton Collegiate School, supported partly by University funds and partly as a provincial grammar school.99 The greater part of the history of the Collegiate School belongs to a later period, but the inauguration of the school may legitimately be dealt with here. According to the regulations adopted by the College Council in 1829 for the government of the Collegiate School, the institution was to include a Grammar School, and an English School, under the superintendence of the Principal Preceptor of the Grammar School, the latter to hold no church preferment which might interfere with his scholastic duty of preparing candidates for matriculation. The English master was to teach the pupils under his charge Reading, Writing, the rudiments of English Grammar, Geography and History, Arithmetic, Practical Geometry, and Book-keeping, and was also to instruct the classical pupils in such of the foregoing branches as the Principal Preceptor might consider necessary. The tuition for classical pupils was to be £ 6 per annum, £ 1 of which was to be paid to the English master for every scholar from the classical department whom be instructed. Tuition for pupils of the English school was set at £ 4 per annum. Aside from the tuition fee, the only qualification for admittance was the ability of the candidate to read a chapter in the Bible. The daily exercises of the school were to commence and conclude with prayers according to the Anglican form. The Visiting Committee, which consisted of the College Professors, had the power to admit free scholars, provided that no more than six such scholars were in attendance at the school at any one time.100

The regulations relating to tuition, and the close connection between the school and King's College, which was an aristocratic sectarian institution, tended to limit the benefits of the school to a select few and bred a snobbish spirit. Lt.-Col. William Baird, referring to his attendance at this school in the 1830's, wrote: “Many of the boys were sons of the so-called aristocracy of that day, and Segee and myself were subjected to no small amount of taunts and sneers, at and after the competitive examinations which twice in each year were held on the hill at King's College . . . . The school was divided by the scions of aristocracy . . . into two classes; and the Plebei thus proscribed were made to suffer many indignities.” 101 The writer did not say whether he and Segee were numbered among the free scholars or not. If they were not, then the position of those who were must have been an unhappy one! Leaving the Collegiate School for the present, we turn back to the period of the first Pa rish School Act (1802). According to Professor S. D. Clark, who has studied social developments in Canada, “in New Brunswick the frontier phase of development had no more than set in by 1800”, using the word “frontier” to mean an area in which expansion of new forms of economic enterprise is taking place.102 It would seem, then, that the tardiness and tentative nature of educational developments were facets of a general slow development. Dugald Campbell's survey of New Brunswick for the year 1802 reveals the lack of bridges, and the fact that there were not ten miles of road fit for wheel carriage in the entire province, “with the exception of the left bank of the Saint John in Sunbury County, where nature had chiefly performed the task of roadmaking”.103 As for trade, it was becoming all too apparent that New Brunswick could not meet the commercial role assigned to it by sanguine imperialists at the time of the disruption of the Old Empire. Not only were the requirements of the West Indian trade beyond the resources and business arrangements of New Brunswick, but experience was also proving the dependence of the province on the United States for many staples.104 We can note only some of the factors in all the intricacies of the situation. On one hand was Britain's traditional colonial policy, and the desire of ardent imperialists to treat the United States as a foreign country and to make her pay the piper for the Revolution.105 Added to this was the eagerness of the remaining British colonies to monopolize imperial markets, and to reap the benefits of the exclusion of the United States from the West Indies. On the other hand, in the negotiations of 1783 the United States had obtained for her fishermen the valuable privilege of fishing in British-American waters,106 and was anxious to gain re-entrance to the West Indian trade.107 Moreover, Britain could not entirely ignore the United States because British North America was not an adequate substitute as a source of raw materials, and because the American market was too vital to Britain to be endangered by any policy favoring colonial interests at the expense of foreign trade. Britain's colonial policy toward her North American provinces was, therefore, affected by her policy toward the United States and was sometimes sacrificed to it.108 Before the Revolution, Nova Scotia had had only a minor trade with the West Indies in fish. After the war, the Maritime Provinces failed to meet the needs of the West Indies, especially after 1793, when Britain, at war with France, had to divert much of her shipping from the islands. As a result, the governors of the West Indies were allowed to open their ports to American vessels, if necessary, and thus the special privileges of the northern provinces were largely wiped out.109 While the Maritime Provinces strenuously advocated the exclusion of Americans from the West Indian markets, they themselves, needing American goods, often found a relaxation of the navigation laws desirable and necessary, and as long as British shipping bad the monopoly of the carriage, as it did until the American embargo of 1808, Whitehall was not unduly perturbed.110 A considerable volume of clandestine trade was carried on between New Brunswick and New England, facilitated by the indefiniteness of the boundary, the many islands in the Passamaquoddy Bay, the privileges of American fishermen in British coastal waters, the scarcity of patrol boats, the amenability of customs officials to bribery, and the connivance of the people on both sides. George Leonard, the Maritime Superintendent of Trade and Fisheries, his son, and his deputies fought a more or less losing battle against smuggling in the latter part of the eighteenth century and the early years of the nineteenth.111 The point is, that economic need, propinquity, past experience, and perhaps blood connections made trade between New Brunswick and New England a natural process, while the navigation laws imposed an artificial restriction.

The reasons why New Brunswick failed to realize the hopes entertained in relation to the West Indian trade throw a good deal of light on conditions in the province at the opening of the nineteenth century. Capital was scarce and skilled labourers few. In their struggle to capture the West Indian trade from the United States, the Maritime Provinces “were handicapped by distance, by high freight rates and insurance, and by lack of experience in the West Indies market”.112 Once the timber near the first sawmills had been cut, the labor and expense necessary to bring it from a distance, since the country lacked roads, made competition with American prices impossible,113 New England fishermen had more capital and experience than Maritime fishermen, could obtain apparatus and provisions 30% cheaper than colonials could, and after 1791 had the benefit of state bounties.114 As for shipbuilding, shipyards had been established early and a number of ships built, but “until the end of the Napoleonic Wars, shipbuilding remained an industry of spasmodic booms and prolonged slumps”.115 Agriculturally, the province was not even self-supporting. Many of the inhabitants were city-bred. Their professional or commercial training did not fit them for agriculture.116 Many were disbanded officers and soldiers, whose half-pay rendered unnecessary an all-out agricultural effort. Along the Passamaquoddy, New England provisions could be obtained in exchange for contraband gypsum, for which there was a great demand in the United States.117 Then too, as Professor Graham has observed, the fact that other occupations seemed more profitable explains in part the agricultural lethargy. The settler on new land could occupy himself in timber-cutting with a minimum of experience and expense. Why should he “sacrifice good wages, and, like the French coureur de bois, the freedom of a seasonal occupation for the sake of wresting a meagre living from the soil?” 118

Bearing all this in mind, one has some justification for believing that New Brunswick, at the turn of the century, was just barely getting along. Conditions proving too much for the baffled and the restless, there occurred the beginning of that movement out of the province which has since remained “a constant and embarrassing problem in Maritime life”.119 Some of the deserters, attracted by distant fields, left for Upper Canada;120 others sacrificed their loyal principles, swallowed their pride, and went back to the United States.121 In some cases the lack of educational opportunities probably was a factor in this emigration. Perhaps restrictions on land grants, in force after 1790, were partly to blame.122 Hannay has suggested also that the attitude of the Governor and favored ruling families bred resentment in the common people.123 At any rate, emigration did occur, and there was no highly compensating immigration. Information about New Brunswick for prospective British immigrants seems to have been wanting,124 and the provincial authorities, previous to 1802, took no steps to promote immigration. Not until after the close of the Napoleonic Wars did the province attract new settlers, and when they did come they created many problems.

The constitutional arrangements of New Brunswick, the temper of its politics, the quality of its leadership, the stringencies of its provincial economy, and the nature of its society, “not yet disciplined into culture by generations of leisure”,125 were not of the sort to inspire “adventures in intelligence” 126 at the opening of the nineteenth century. There was not yet abroad in the land a theory of popular education. Those best aware of the advantages of learning thought of it in terms of class distinction, denominationalism, and charity. Unable to conceive of the masses as potential rulers of the country, they could contemplate an uneducated people with regret, but without alarm. As a result, school legislation in this period was uninspired and inadequate, a haphazard fiddling with a problem which was viewed as a minor one.

As debates in the Assembly were not reported in the early years of the province, and the Minutes of the Executive Council do not include discussion, we cannot know what was said about the Parish School Act of 1802. Early newspapers also made no reference to it, nor is it mentioned in any of Winslow's letters. The Act was practically the same measure which had been rejected by the Council in 1793.127 But the quarrel between the Council and Assembly over the appropriation bill and the payment of members of the Assembly had ended.128 The departure of Glenie, inveterate enemy of the Council, had eased some of the tension. The Governor and Council had had their own way in the matter of the appointment of the Clerk of the Assembly in 1802.129 Besides, even the Council must have realized that something had to be done if succeeding generations of the original Loyalists were not to be vastly inferior to the first. In assenting to the bill the Council more or less acknowledged this, for the preamble of the Act reads: “Whereas, The education of children is of the utmost importance to their future usefulness in society: and whereas, The situation of many parents in the different parishes of the province renders them unable to procure for their children the benefits of instruction in reading and writing without the aid of the Legislature,” etc. The, main clause of the bill appropriated £ 420 for distribution among the parishes of the province for educational purposes, £ 10 to each parish.130 These sums were not large but neither were the provincial funds.

Those who framed the Act of 1802 took advantage of existing machinery for the licensing of teachers. According to the Royal Instructions issued to Carleton in 1784, a prospective teacher obtained a license to teach by applying to the Governor. It is probable that such requests were seldom refused at first in view of the scarcity of teachers. Because of this, and because there was no system of inspection, there could be little real guarantee of a teacher's abilities or morals. In a pioneer country one of the basic problems of education lies in the dearth of capable teachers. In failing to grapple seriously with this problem at an early date the legislators of New Brunswick assured the province of a travesty of education for decades, thereby depreciating the value of schooling in the eyes of the people and delaying the growth of a popular demand for it.

The Parish School Act of 1802 also proposed to make use of existing machinery in the matter of the distribution of the provincial grant. The township, generally the local unit in New England, had been the civil division in Nova Scotia, and the word township occurs in the Royal Instructions to Carle- ton in 1784, Sections 43 and 49 ordering that lands in or near each township be set apart for a school, and for the maintenance of a clergyman and a teacher.131 But the Royal Instructions also commanded that the Province be divided into such Parishes and Counties as might be thought expedient.132 Thus the parish became the civil division instead of the township, a small shift, but one in line with the renewed emphasis on the British connection. The chief parish officer was the Justice of the Peace, and the Justices of all the parishes of a county met as a Court of the General Sessions. It was to the Justices of the General Sessions in the different counties that the sum granted by the Legislature was to be paid in trust, to be allotted by them in their discretion at the rate of £ 10 per parish, so as to induce the establishment of schools where necessary, and to assist schools already in existence. The Justices were to report at the next session of the General Assembly how the money had been expended, and how far the expenditure had answered the purposes contemplated. As there were no school trustees, the ten pounds was to be paid directly to the teacher of a school as part of his salary, the rest to be subscribed by the parents whose children attended the school.133 It was suggested in an anonymous political tract, dealing with the refusal of the Council in 1793 to pass a bill similar to this act, that one of the Council's objections centred around this question of the control of school money by the Justices. As the members of the Assembly were almost without exception Justices, the Council feared that the Assembly would practically control the expenditure of school money, thereby rendering the grant “popularity money” to be expended by the members for their own advantage.134 It is quite likely that sometimes the various sections of a parish did contend for the grant of £ 10. In deciding which locality should be the privileged one, it may be that those Justices who happened to be members of the Assembly were influenced by political considerations. Certainly there is evidence that the question of school grants at a later date did become a political football.

The Act of 1802 made no provision for the building of school houses. According to the Royal Instructions lands were to be reserved for school purposes, and in the Minutes of the Council a number of applications for such lands are recorded. For instance, in 1787 the Justices of the Peace of Charlotte County were granted 1460 acres for a glebe and school.135 This was probably for an Anglican Church and school, as that favored church seems to have been in receipt, in the province at large, of extensive tracts of land.136 It would appear that comparatively few communities obtained land and built school houses, for when the Common School Act was passed in 1871 only a fraction of the then-existing trustee boards owned what school buildings there were. Since schools could not spring up out of the ground like mushrooms, and since few lands in this thinly populated province could bring in revenue in the form of rents, school lands were of little use to people too poor or too indifferent to spend money on school buildings. Sometimes the community used whatever was available; sometimes the teachers rented a vacant room or building, or used their own homes.

The Act of 1802, whatever its inadequacies, did create a precedent for state assistance to schools of the rural areas, where private schools and schools operated by the S. P. G. were much less common than in the more populated sections of the province. The Act has been described as marking “a change in the feelings of the people toward education”.137 Actually it seems truer to say that it marked the beginning of some slight responsibility on the part of the provincial leaders for the education of “the people”.

The College and the parish schools having been established, it was now the turn of the grammar schools. In 1803, a committee of the Assembly was ordered to prepare a bill for establishing “County” schools, but the bill failed to pass,138 for reasons not known. There was no session of the legislature in 1804, but in 1805 County Schools became the subject of legislation. At this time the province was administered by Gabriel G. Ludlow, the senior member of the Council, Governor Carleton being on leave in England. Ludlow, to the disgust of officials in Fredericton, persisted in residing at Saint John,139 a city which had resented the choice of Fredericton as capital and as the site of the Academy and College. Whether there was any connection between Ludlow and the Bill of 1805 is not clear. Ward Chipman, writing to Winslow in 1805 merely noted that “the school-bill is again revived, has passed the House, and will, I understand, be assented to by the Council”.140

The Act of 1805,141 curiously entitled “An Act for Encouraging and Extending Literature in This Province”, made provision first of all for a Grammar School at Saint John. The tendency in the province to regard the Church of England as the rightful supervisor of the upper levels of education was revealed by the clause which made the Rector of Trinity Church in the City the President, by law, of the Board of Directors. An annual grant of £ 100 was to be applied towards the salary of the master, and a like sum was to be used by the Board of Directors for erecting or buying a building. This Board was to account to the Legislature from time to time for the conduct and management of the property vested in them. The Act further provided that two County Schools be established in each of the Counties of Westmorland, Charlotte, Northumberland, Queens, York, and Sunbury, and one in the only other county of the province at the time, Saint John, the Saint John Grammar School to take the place of a second County School there. These schools were for the instruction of both sexes in the English language, writing and arithmetic. They were to be under the direction and control of the Justices of the Peace. These officials, sitting in General Sessions for their respective counties, were to appoint the masters and, when necessary, to dismiss them. To finance these schools the sum of £ 375 was to be granted annually for six years, £ 25 to the Justices of Saint John County, and £ 50 to the Justices of each of the remaining counties. Thus each master would receive £ 25 annually.

These schools were to be visited semi-annually by the rectors or missionaries of the parishes where they happened to be, together with committees appointed for that purpose by the Courts of the General Sessions, to whom the committees were to report. There could be as many as four free scholars in a school, and eight in the case of Saint John Grammar School. The most interesting provision of the Act stipulated that the County Schools were to be held in the various parishes of the counties in rotation, until each parish had received the benefit of the school. No County School could be held in Saint John City or parish, which were served by the Saint John Grammar School, or in Fredericton, which had the benefit of the Grammar School in connection with the College. As we have seen, the “moving” school had sometimes been a feature in New England. Those who framed the Act of 1805 may have remembered this colonial practice and have resorted to it in order to serve as many communities as possible. Whatever the benefits of the plan, it certainly could not foster continuity of schooling or promote the establishment of permanent school buildings.

Theoretically, New Brunswick now had two kinds of schools—the parish schools, to teach the rudiments, and the County schools, evidently intended to be of a superior type, since the masters received a larger grant, and there was more immediate supervision. It was a long time, however, before the County Schools had a distinct function in fact as well as in intention.142 More than that, for a decade after the passage of the Act, the Counties failed to take advantage of its provisions, only the Grammar School at Saint John coming into actual operation. It may be that the people were indifferent, and the justices, busy with other things, may have failed to show energy in promoting schools. Possibly the principle of moving the school proved unacceptable. At any rate, when a new Grammar School Act was passed in 1816 there was no mention of circulating schools, and Boards of Trustees replaced the Justices of the Peace as Directors of the Grammar Schools.

Throughout Governor Carleton's prolonged absence during the interval between the Act of 1805 and the three school acts of 1816, the government of the province was administered by a series of presidents and military officers. The arrangement by which the senior military officer of the province became the administrator, an arrangement probably due to the possibilities of war with the United States,143 was very unpopular in the province, especially with the Council, who resented the preference over their senior member in favor of a military man who might sometimes be their social inferior.144 Even Winslow, whose loyalty was unimpeachable, declared in 1811 that “the united abilities of all His Majesty's Ministers could not have contrived a measure better calculated to alienate the affections of the people and to check the progress of this flourishing Colony”.145 We may excuse Winslow's gloomy view of the situation, since the military arrangement had deprived him of the office of President which he had held for a few months in 1808.

During this period there was, as we might expect, considerable emphasis on things military. Militia bills, defence measures, recruiting, and drilling were subjects of discussion and legislation, and objects of expenditure. But the opposition of New England to the War of 1812 meant that the Maritimes were safe from attack by land,146 and New Brunswick's part in the war was the minor one of contributing troops, such as the 104th, a regiment memorable for the march on snowshoes from Fredericton to Quebec in 1813.147 However, although the Napoleonic Wars and the War of 1812 left New Brunswick untouched as a theatre of war, the effects of these conflicts on her trade, industry, and prosperity were momentous.

We have already noted that under pressure of war with France, Britain had practically suspended the Navigation Acts to allow American participation in the West Indian trade. Merchants of the Maritime Provinces were much displeased, and bombarded the Home Authorities with memorials.148 In 1804, when Britain tightened the regulations somewhat, colonial hopes soared. Ward Chipman, writing to Winslow from Saint John in February, 1805, declared: “I hope the exclusion of the Americans from our West India Islands will give a spring to our commerce and a new complexion to the interests of this Province. Unless this happens universal despondence will take place.” 149 But the “exclusion of the Americans” was more theoretical than real, for the phrase, “cases of real and great necessity,” gave the Governors of the West Indian Islands considerable latitude, and kept West Indian markets open to American trade.150 In 1807, Winslow, speaking of his son's training for a mercantile occupation, bemoaned the poor prospects for a merchant in New Brunswick. “Unless I send him to the United States (and I'd as soon send him to the Devil) there appears to be no field for speculation in his own profession. In the present situation of this province the whole trade of it would not give bread to five men of ambition.” 151 That was in 1807. By 1809 the picture had changed. The American government, irritated by Britain's insistence on the right of search as part of the counter-measures against Napoleon's blockade, in 1808 placed an embargo on American trade with British colonies. At once this accelerated the trade of the Maritimes with the West Indies. As these British colonies could not, however, supply West Indian requirements without the aid of the United States, Britain declared certain maritime ports, including Saint John, free ports, and virtually threw Nova Scotia and New Brunswick open to trade with neutrals-in other words, with New England.152 The effect on the trade and shipping of New Brunswick was marked. Soon New Brunswick ships were busy trading with New England, and transporting to the West Indies American goods and such Maritime products as were available for export, chiefly lumber. Because of the embargo, this New Brunswick-New England trade was illegal from the American standpoint, but New England was opposed to the embargo, and American officials could not halt a brisk contraband trade, especially in Passamaquoddy Bay. Even the hostilities of the War of 1812 affected commercial relations but little, for New England opposed the war almost to the point of secession. To New Brunswick, strategically placed beside a friendly enemy, the war brought prosperity. Britain, concerned for the welfare of the West Indies, and anxious to keep an American market open for British manufactures, purposely avoided blockading the coast of New England until the last year of the war, leaving the merchants of the Maritime Provinces a virtual monopoly of the existing American import trade in British manufactures.153 The general effect of the War of 1812 was to give the commerce of the Maritimes a great impetus. “Nova Scotia and New Brunswick not only became centres of a vast contraband trade, but they acquired connections with the British West Indies which could never have existed without the enforced withdrawal of the United States.” 154 “The beginnings of more than a few New Brunswick fortunes can be traced back to the Golden Era of trade and prosperity, inaugurated by the War of 1812.” 155 The close of the war caused much Maritime anxiety lest the Americans be allowed re-entry into the West Indies. Because Britain did exclude American trade, the United States instituted a number of counter-measures detrimental to British colonial trade and to British mercantile interests. For this reason, and because laissez-faire theory and practice were gaining ground as factory industry expanded, British rigidity had to give way, and in 1822 a compromise effected the resumption of legitimate trade between British North America and the United States.156

In the meantime, New Brunswick trade with the Old Country had grown enormously, an event also traceable to Napoleon's Continental System, which shut Britain off from a supply of Baltic timber, hitherto vital to the British navy and merchant fleet. Britain now turned to her American colonies, and between 1809 and 1812 increased the colonial preference on timber steeply enough to offset the high freights across the Atlantic. “With one great stroke of fortune British North America had found its justification and acquired its economic rights in the Empire. In their own weakness, the northern colonies had relied on Great Britain, and now, in its own temporary embarrassment, Great Britain had been obliged to fall back on them . . . . Timber, the inexhaustible material, became virtually the sole support of New Brunswick.” 157 British firms invested capital; American speculators, taking advantage of loose cutting regulations, poured across the boundary to share in the growing prosperity;158 great rafts of pine logs were floated down the Saint John and the Miramichi; Maritime ports swarmed with timber vessels; ship-building increased rapidly. As Hannay says, “it was a growing time in New Brunswick in those years of conflict”.159 That there were tares among the wheat was not yet distressingly apparent. Accelerated business and increased revenue seemed to herald a new era of prosperity.

The fact that the revenue in 1815 was four times as great as in 1811, and in 1816 was five times as large as the year before,160 must have had some bearing on the attention paid to education by the Legislature in 1816. The interest of the President, Major-General George Stracey Smythe, may have been a factor too. The personal support which he gave to the Madras Schools a little later shows that the concern which he voiced in his opening speech, in 1816, for the promotion of education in the province, was no mere formal expression. For ten years the educational system had rested. The only development in that time, that of the Sunday School,161 had been outside the system, and, in a sense, outside the educational field. Now, in 1816, three acts relating to education appeared upon the statute books.

One of these established a grammar school at St. Andrews, on terms very similar to those regulating the Saint John Grammar School. The fact that St. Andrews exhibited greater interest and energy than other county towns suggests the interesting speculation that its proximity to the American border may have been a factor, the more so as Winslow wrote in 1810: “The American settlements being directly opposite to ours causes a spirit of emulation which is highly beneficial to both.” 162 One of the members from Charlotte County, Robert Pagan, who had represented the County from the foundation of the province, and had proved to be an “honest and useful representative”, 163 presented a petition early in the session of 1816 from the inhabitants of St. Andrews, praying for assistance toward the erection of a Grammar School,164 and a little later he brought in a bill to establish such a school.165 The second bill before the House in 1816 came from a second attempt to found County schools, or Grammar schools, as they were called by the new measure, which was entitled “An Act to establish Grammar Schools in the several Counties of this Province”. This act provided for one Grammar School per county. A new feature was the power lodged in the Lieutenant-Governor-in-Council to appoint three Trustees or Directors for the purpose of establishing Grammar Schools in each of the counties except York, Saint John and Charlotte, those counties being already served by such schools. Various clauses defined the duties and respon- sibilities of the Trustees with reference to choosing a site for the school, receiving donations, hiring teachers, making bye-laws, holding public visitations, and admitting free scholars. There was no change in the regulations relating to the licensing of teachers. The grant-in-aid was raised from the twenty-five pounds provided in the Act of 1805 to £ 100. This sum was to be paid on the certification of the Trustees to the Lieutenant-Governor that a building and master had been provided, and that £ 100 had been subscribed by the inhabitants. A definite course of study was prescribed consisting of English Grammar, the Latin and Greek languages, Orthography and use of the globes, and the practical branches of Mathematics, or such other useful knowledge as might be judged necessary.166 This course, if it had been followed, would have raised these schools above the level of the parish schools, and would have fulfilled the intention of the act to provide each county with a secondary school. Repeated investigation, however, showed that these schools did not come up to standard for many years, for reasons which may be noted later.

There are several possible reasons why the oversight of the Grammar Schools was transferred from the Justices of the Peace to a Board of Trustees. In the first place, the Justices had failed to get action under the Act of 1805, probably because they were busy with other duties, including a number in connection with Parish Schools. Secondly, the Saint John Grammar School had been functioning for ten years under a Board of Trustees, although actually this was no certain guarantee of the efficiency of such a board in less urban districts. Lastly, in 1811 the neighboring province of Nova Scotia had placed its county grammar schools under trustee boards appointed by the Lt.-Governor-in-Council. This may have been the deciding factor. In fact, on comparing the two acts we find other points of identity. That clause of the New Brunswick Act of 1816 which dealt with the course of study is word for word the same as a similar clause in the Nova Scotia Act of 1811, and the clauses of the two acts relating to free scholars are very similar.167 We shall often find an element of imitativeness about New Brunswick school legislation. In general, legislators of the province do not seem to have been much concerned with educational philosophies or abstract theories, but they did tend to adopt procedures and devices which the experience of other countries had indicated might work in New Brunswick. This tendency naturally has meant a lag in progress, but perhaps it has saved the province from hasty experiments, fads, and extremes.

The third act which passed in 1816 dealt with Parish schools. These schools, too, were to be under Boards of Trustees whose duties were generally similar to those of the Grammar School Trustees, but who were to be appointed by the Justices and were to report to the Court of General Sessions. The amazing feature of the act was the introduction of the assessment principle. The Trustees were to summon a meeting of the inhabitants on fifteen days notice, for the purpose of subscribing money for the establishment of schools or of voting to raise it by assessment. Only freeholders, or people with an in- come of 40s., could vote. If the Trustees failed to call such a meeting, the Justices could do so at the request of five freeholders. Only the children of parents contributing to the support of the school could attend, unless the assessment principle were adopted. Upon certificate stating that a building was provided, a capable master appointed, and £ 30 raised by the inhabitants of the parish, £ 20 from the provincial treasury was to be granted, and a like proportion for any sum not exceeding £ 90, but no one school was to receive more than £ 20 in one year, and no larger sum than £ 60 would be paid to the schools of one parish. In other words, the number of assisted schools in a parish was limited to three.168 How the assessment principle came to be adopted so early in New Brunswick cannot be very satisfactorily explained. It is true that workhouse schools in England had been provided for by the general taxation of all property since the middle of the eighteenth century,169 and that thinking people in the United States were beginning to recognize that the only safe reliance of a system of state schools lay in the general and direct taxation of all property.170 It is also true that the use of license taxes, local taxes, and rate bills in New England recognized the principle of taxation in a sense,171 and that the Act of 1811 in Nova Scotia had recommended the principle of assessment, but these were feeble and isolated examples for a conservative and cautious state to follow, especially when there was no strong sense of educational consciousness among the people to act as a spur.

If the introduction of assessment as an option was a test case, the test revealed no inclination on the part of the people in favor of such a method of supporting schools. Not a parish tried it, and in 1818 permission to assess was removed, on the grounds that experience had proved that it was inexpedient to allow the towns and parishes to raise money in this way.172 Since the experience was negative, it is hard to see the proof of the inexpediency referred to. Possibly local controversies, centering around the question of whether to assess or not to assess, created discord which retarded the establishment of schools. At any rate, the assessment principle disappeared from New Brunswick school legislation for over thirty years, and assessment did not become compulsory for fifty-five years.

Another interesting feature of the Bill of 1816 was the authority it gave to the Trustees to remove or expel scholars of abandoned or wicked habits. The Trustees might also use 20s. for each school for prizes, for excellence in Orthography, Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic, provided that no reward were given any scholar unable to repeat by heart the Creed, the Lord's Prayer, and the Ten Commandments. 173 A clause charging the Trustees to use their best endeavors to cause the youth of the parish to attend school indicated an alarming indifference to the benefits of such education as was available, a recognition on the part of the legislature of that apathy, and a growing concern about it. Evidently there had happened in New Brunswick what “Investigator” feared would occur in Nova Scotia. This correspondent, writing to the Acadian Recorder in January, 1818, said: 'The infant state of this country, has hitherto rendered an extensive attention to the business of education impracticable: men struggling for food have little time to spend upon the pursuits of Literature. But there is a danger that the modes of thinking and habits, which arise out of such a state of society, may remain long after it is past: and imperceptibly enfeeble the community, amidst increasing means of energy.'174 Unfortunately, that is what had happened in New Brunswick. Interest in education had not kept pace with increasing means. On the contrary, a people deprived of education for a generation had come to regard it as unnecessary for “getting on”, an attitude concurred in by illiterate immigrants who began to arrive in large numbers after Waterloo. This popular indifference continued to curse New Brunswick almost down to recent times.

For a score of years after the Act of 1818 the most vigorous efforts to combat illiteracy in the province were linked with the promotion of the Madras Schools. We have noted the failure of the introduction of the assessment principle to effect an increase in the number of schools. Meanwhile, the number of uneducated people in the province was mounting, for reasons which may be now briefly noted. The failure of the crops in 1816, and the influence of the lumber industry in drawing vigorous young men from the farms had focused attention on the desirability of increasing the agricultural population. In 1816 the legislature voted £ 1000 to encourage immigration, and the autumn of that year saw the beginning of a process of immigration, of which the primary cause was the unfavorable economic conditions in Britain at the close of the Napoleonic Wars.175 At the same time the province received some five hundred slaves, who had fled from the southern states to British warships engaged in operations off the southern coast of the United States during the War of 1812.176 Coincident with all this was the rise to popularity in England of the monitorial system of instruction, a system already referred to. Of the two school societies employing the system, namely, the National Society for the Promotion of Education of the Poor, and the British and Foreign School Society, it was the former, imbued with the missionary zeal of the Anglican Church, which introduced and promoted the system in New Brunswick. Missionaries of the S. P. G., already in the field, had been for some time encouraging the Society's schoolmasters to conduct their schools along the lines advocated by the National Society. The initial steps in the introduction of the system into New Brunswick were taken in 1814, when 500 sets of books used in the National Schools of Britain were sent to Halifax for free distribution amongst the schools of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick.177 In 1817, Major-General George Stracey Smythe, who had been President of New Brunswick since 1812 except for a short interval, was called to Nova Scotia in his military capacity, and was in Halifax when he was ap- pointed Lt.-Governor of New Brunswick.178 It is not unlikely that his interest in the Madras system was kindled during his stay in Halifax. In 1816 the Society sent out Rev. James Milne and a Mr. West to promote the system in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, and in 1820 the latter gentleman opened a training school for teachers in Halifax. Governor Smythe was so impressed by the possibilities of the method for New Brunswick that he gave his patronage to the formation of a society for the promotion of this type of school in the province.179 In 1819 the committee in charge petitioned for a charter which was confirmed by the legislature in 1820.180 The Madras Board thus had the authority to establish schools wherever their funds permitted.

In the establishment of Madras Schools in New Brunswick several familiar threads in the Loyalist pattern of education can be discerned. First of all, we note again an outside agency working in the province in the interests of the Church of England. Secondly, these schools, although established in the nineteenth century, were of eighteenth-century origin, for they were primarily schools for the poor, established in the spirit of philanthropy and religion. But with these schools several new threads appeared in the educational pattern. Since a number of the Madras Schools were conducted by females, the idea of women in the role of teachers gained a wider acceptance than it had hitherto known. Eventually, of course, this would have happened anyway, but the Madras Schools do seem to have helped to popularize the idea. Then, too, Governor Smythe's connection with these schools marked the beginning of gubernatorial interest and influence in New Brunswick education. Lt.-Governor Carleton, it is true, had helped to promote the Fredericton Academy, but that was an exclusive school. To reconcile Governor Smythe's activity in education with the character assigned to him by Hannay is not easy. If he had no correct idea of the feelings of the people whom he governed, and lacked sympathy with their views, if the leading feature of his policy was “the maintenance of the old system by which the Province had been misgoverned for thirty-five years”,181 then it may be that he thought of schools for the common people in terms of benevolent condescension, noblesse oblige, and Church of England policy. Whatever his motives, his interest in the Madras Schools seems to have been genuine. A talented musician, he often instructed the boys in the Central School, in Saint John in singing, and when present at the opening of the school presided at the organ.182 Moreover, to encourage this school as much as possible, and to remove the stigma attached to the Madras Schools as designed primarily for children of the indigent, Governor Smythe sent his own son, Brunswick, to the Central School.183 To say that this 'stiff pedantic old thing',184 as Penelope Winslow called Smythe, established a precedent for interest in the educational system of New Brunswick on the part of the King's representative in the pro- vince is perhaps an exaggeration, but at any rate, dating from his tenure of office we find increasing references to education in the correspondence of New Brunswick's Lieutenant-Governors, references often characterized by shrewd observations, personal concern, and a sense of responsibility.

Finally, in the Madras System, definite and distinctive methods of instruction were employed. This implied the training of teachers in those methods,185 accustomed people to the idea of teacher-training, and helped to pave the way for a Normal School. To combine efficiency and economy, and to enable one teacher to instruct many children, the older and brighter pupils acted as monitors, conducting a group of children, generally ten in number, to an assigned station in the classroom, where they taught lessons previously taught to them by the master. Thus the advantages in time and discipline of the class-system of instruction, mechanical though it was in this case, were demonstrated over the individual method with its waste of time and disorder, and the school became in a measure what Dr. Andrew Bell, one of the originators of the monitorial system, believed it should be, an organized community of mutually helpful members.186 At best, this conception of the school was only imperfectly realized in the Madras Schools, and with the passing of the Madras System it received scant attention until the popularizing of the “project method” in the twentieth century.

The National Society, English sponsor of Madras Schools, was concerned principally with the education of the poor in the principles of the Established Church. In this country of few schools, people of all classes wished to patronize the schools, and so it became necessary, in the larger centres at any rate, to depart from the English precedent of confining instruction to the children of the indigent, as children “of the first respectability”, whose parents wished to avail themselves of these establishments, applied for admission.187 The advertisement of the National School Board of Saint John announcing the opening of the Central School in that city indicates the policy of the Board on this point: “It is expected that those persons who place children at this school, will pay to support the funds of the establishment, forty shillings per annum, thirty shillings, twenty shillings, or ten shillings, according to the ability of each individual to pay. The children of Paupers, or of those who cannot afford to make any pecuniary compensation, will be educated wholly at the expense of the institution.” 188 The Report for 1820 shows, that out of an enrollment of 224, 37 were rated free, and in 1822 the Board reported that the proportion of children admitted free was on the increase.189 Reference in the first report to deficiencies in the tuition money, and exertions made to collect the sums specified rather indicate that if larger numbers of people had been willing to stigmatize themselves as paupers, the resources of the Board, despite voluntary contributions, local grants, and aid from the National Society in England and from the S. P. G., would not have been equal to the strain. Related to the first departure from English precedent was another-the inclusion of teaching subjects beyond the elementary.190 There was still another. The Madras Schools were distinctly Church of England institutions, in fact, the aid such schools received from the National Society in England and from the S. P. G. practically necessitated their being so. But they provided such an inexpensive and superior type of education that Dissenters sent their children, who chorused with the class in Catechism the unhesitating, but in their case, the untrue statement that their godfathers and godmothers had given them their names at baptism.191 Evidently the attendance of children of all denominations was encouraged, for a modification was made in the rule of church attendance. In 1819 E. J. Jarvis, Secretary of the National Board in Saint John, publicly denied reports circulating in the city and province that only children who attended the Anglican Church could receive certain merits, and that an exclusive preference was shown by the conductors of the National School to the worship of that church. He explained that a senior boy of each denomination having a house of worship in the city was appointed the Sunday Teacher of the boys of his persuasion, who went from the schoolroom under his direction to their own place of worship, and upon his report the master distributed the merits to all who thus attended.192 As time went on, the difficulties of effecting the denominational purposes of the Madras Schools increased. The Thirtieth Report of the Madras Schools speaks of the difficulty of carrying out, in its integrity, the religious instruction contemplated, arising in some cases from want of proper books, in others from the objections of parents.193 In connection with the latter, we may note that the occasion of the previously mentioned letter from Bishop Inglis to Sir Howard Douglas was the refusal of the trustees of a school at Chatham to apply for the provincial grant for the teacher, because the Anglican Catechism was taught and the Presbyterian was not.

The Madras System multiplied the number of schools in New Brunswick and helped to create a sentiment in favor of education, supplying in a better manner than hitherto one of the crying needs of the country, namely, elementary education for children of all classes at small cost.194 At the time of the founding of the Central School at Saint John (1818), the Secretary of the Society expressed the hope that these schools would effect an improvement in the manners and language of boys who were roaming the streets of the city, ignorant and undisciplined.195 Thirty years later the Society was still emphasizing the philanthropic and charitable purposes of the system and declaring that it had admirably answered these ends.196 Incidentally, the opportunity presented in the Madras Schools for intercourse between children “of the first respectability” and children of the pauper class, limited although such inter- course probably was, may have helped in the breaking down of social barriers and in the democratizing of education.

The discipline maintained in these schools was one of the features which helped to build up their reputation for efficiency. This discipline was inherent in the organization of the schools, but the use of various merits and demerits was also a factor. Joseph Lancaster, who had worked out the idea of monitorial instruction in England at about the same time as Dr. Bell did, had had as a dictum “let every child have for every minute of his school time something to do and a motive for doing it.” 197 Unfortunately he largely relied on externals as motivating forces and elaborated a system of rewards and punishments.198 Since Pestalozzi's emphasis on child study and psychology was as yet little known outside of Switzerland and Germany, the possibility that such devices might occasionally operate harmfully on both the backward and the clever child was not recognized.

In the early enthusiasm for Madras Schools, the mechanical nature of the instruction, with its emphasis on stereotyped memorized answers, was overlooked. From the first, however, the difficulty of obtaining teachers trained in the methods of the system was an obvious drawback. A few were trained at Halifax. Others underwent a course of instruction at the central training school, i.e., the Central School at Saint John, but the majority had only a short course in one of the branch schools, thereby experiencing only a limited opportunity of obtaining a really adequate knowledge of the system. A correspondent, writing in the Saint John Gazette in 1822,199 said that visits he had made to the greater number of the so-called Madras Schools of the province had forced on him the conclusion that many were such in name only, and he singled out the school at Sussex Vale, conducted by Anthony Truro, as an exception.200 Time apparently did not lessen this difficulty, for the Thirtieth Report of the Society, already referred to, mentions as one of the peculiar difficulties in this country of carrying out the Madras plan that of obtaining masters versed in the system and friendly to its operation, and admits a further difficulty in retaining efficient monitors, because parents objected to their children's exercise of the office of teacher, and were often induced to withdraw them from school at an early age in order to place them at trades.

In spite of the defects and difficulties which have been cited, Madras Schools enjoyed great popularity for a long time. They were established in rural areas as well as in towns and cities; the Legislature gave annual grants;201 many of the parish schools were conducted in accordance with the plan.202 In 1870, the year before the passage of the Common School Act, there were still eleven Madras Schools in the province, and it was not until 1900 that the Madras charter was surrendered.203 From the time of the inauguration of Madras Schools until the close of the period under consideration there were several legislative acts dealing with education, but no significant developments. In 1823 an amendment to the Grammar School Act of 1816 increased the provincial grant to £ 175 per school, and repeated the provision which stipulated that the county must raise the sum of £ 100 before any sum could be obtained from the provincial treasury. This last was done on the grounds that the said requisition tended more to defeat the object of the Legislature than to encourage the establishment of schools as was intended.204 As a matter of fact, only two Grammar Schools, aside from those especially provided for at Saint John, Fredericton, and St. Andrews, had as yet been established, one in Westmorland County in 1820, and one in Northumberland in 1822.205 In the same year as this amendment an act relating to parish schools required the Justices of the Peace to use a prescribed form in making their returns,206 a measure in the interests of simplicity and uniformity, and one possibly necessitated by the illiteracy of the Justices themselves, for Peter Fisher, New Brunswick's first historian, commenting in 1825 on the lack of educational opportunities during the early years, admitted that “from this cause many persons who occasionally fill important stations in the several counties are found very deficient in learning”.207

The endowment of the college as King's College in 1829 focused attention on the Grammar Schools as the natural feeders of the college. A Committee of the Assembly, appointed to examine the state of education in the province, commended only the Parish Schools, reporting that the Madras Schools in rural areas were failures, and that the Grammar Schools were not doing the work expected. The Grammar School Act which followed had, however, no really remedial features. Arrangements relating to the licensing of teachers, the course of study, tuition fees, and the trustees and their duties, were practically identical with those provided for by the Act of 1816. In an effort to make the people themselves take greater responsibility for their schools the provincial grant was cut to £ 100, and no Grammar School could be in receipt of this sum unless the inhabitants of the county had raised the sum of £ 50 in support of the master. Lest a master, intent on obtaining the provincial grant, should consider it a good investment to pay part of this fifty pounds himself, the Act expressly prohibited him from doing so. The most interesting feature of the Act of 1829 was the clause which stated that after the first of June, 1830, no clergyman of any denomination, having the spiritual charge of any parish or congregation, could be appointed master or usher of a Grammar School.208 While all clergymen were thus prohibited from combining teaching and preaching, this restriction really struck at the Church of England, and was part of a growing assault on the privileges of that church.

We may note a few of the points of this assault. In line with the recent emancipation in Britain of Dissenters from certain political disabilities, the province passed a Catholic Emancipation Act in 1830, in spite of opposition in the Council on the part of a Tory of the old school, Chief Justice Saunders.209 The old privilege of benefit of clergy was abolished in the same year, following similar action in Britain in 1829.210 The Dissenters' Marriage Bill, which had been repeatedly blocked by the Council, was again to the fore, petitions coming in from every part of the province. When the measure finally passed in 1832 it was suspended in Britain on the grounds that it was not liberal enough, and had to be redrafted before going into operation in 1834.211 The new college charter of 1829 allowed Dissenters to attend the college and to take degrees, although the influence of the Church of England in the College Council was still impregnable. Thus, slowly, here and there, the Church of England, one of the pillars of society, if society were to be good according to Anglican-Tory standards, had to give ground before new forces, new ideas, and the growing numbers of other denominations. The Act of 1833 relating to Parish Schools was the last in a series which resulted in the development of a school system with a minimum of administrative machinery.212 The Act differed very little in essentials from that of 1816 except that it lacked the assessment clause. This time the number of Trustees was definitely set at three, but they still presided over the whole parish, which they were now required to divide into school districts.213 The schools were to be financed in much the same way as before. When a school had been kept to the satisfaction of the Trustees for not less than six months, the Trustees certified the facts to the Justices, these officers in turn made certificate to the Lt.-Gov ernor, and the legislative grant—at the rate of £ 20 per school for one year was issued, provided that no parish received more than £ 160 a year, and no county a larger sum than would amount to an average of £ 120 for each parish in the county.214 This last provision may have been designed to prevent the laying off of small and unnecessary school districts.

Perhaps the most interesting feature of this Act were the references to female teachers. Only two female teachers could receive a grant. in any one parish, and this grant was only one-half of that issued to males. Moreover, the inhabitants were not required to pay female teachers more than one-half of what they must pay masters. In other words, the total salary of a female teacher would not amount to more than £ 20 for the whole year. Fitch, in commenting on these restrictions, says that teachers taught the things they knew, and that the female teachers of the time did not know enough.215

Fifty years of provincial life had now passed for New Brunswick, and ten different measures dealing with education had been enacted, yet there was no central educational authority, no provision for the training of teachers, and no adequate system of inspection. The trustees, appointed by the Justices for one year, were, in the last analysis, the only officers with authority. Although unpaid, they were supposed to visit all the schools of their parish twice a year, a duty impossible of performance considering the nature of the roads. The teachers untrained, poorly paid, and subject to the vicissitudes of “boarding around”, seldom remained in a district more than six months.216 The time had evidently come for drastic changes in educational administration and policy. Change was in the air, was already altering society. Tory bureaucrats had used the Established Church, tradition, monopoly of education, of culture and of politics, to mark off neat and clear divisions in a simple social pattern. Now, with little regard for the old rules, new people, new forces, new interests, were at the loom and were casually making a tangled, inartistic, kaleidoscopic design.

It began with the rise to prominence of the lumber trade, and the influx of immigrants at the end of the Napoleonic Wars, developments so enthusiastically hailed as prophetic of a new era of prosperity that their disruptive potentialities were not recognized.

Disturbing repercussions from the lumber trade could be more marked in New Brunswick than elsewhere because there was no clear division between the natural forest and farm lands, as in Upper and Lower Canada. The fertile soil of the Saint John and the Miramichi river valleys sloped to rocky ledges of splendid stands of pine, “and thus, just as lumbering overshadowed agriculture throughout the province as a whole, so it crowded farming even on the lands of the individual settler”, dividing the population into two groups. One group, that of the camps and shipyards, was composed of the lumberers and labourers; the other comprised the farmer-lumbermen who tried to combine two occupations to the disadvantage of both.217 “The temptations of the timber industry, its illusory promises of an easy cash return for a winter's work in the woods, when the farm did not require much attention, proved too much for many of the settlers in the New Brunswick forests. Their neglect of their farms ended either in abandonment or in extremely slovenly farming”. Food for home consumption, such as flour and salt pork, had to be imported in great quantities. “The third member of the lumbermen's trinity, molasses, came up from the West Indies and was thus rather more respectable than the other two, since it formed a fair exchange for Provincial exports, while food from the United States had to be paid for mainly in cash. Many and bitter were the local indictments of an industry which sapped the energies of a bold 'peasantry' and kept the Province dependent for its very food on a foreign country.” 218 Peter Fisher, in 1825, regretted the absorption of so many in the business of getting out lumber for the merchants, and predicted that “instead of making a comfortable provision for their families (they) will wear out the prime of their days without making any permanent establishment; and keep their families shifting about the country like vagrants”, thus producing “a race of inhabitants who have no interest in the soil or welfare of the Province”.219 The same year, the Lt.-Governor, Sir Howard Douglas, in opening the Assembly expressed anxiety over the fact that the vast sums sent from the Province to purchase foreign agricultural produce raised the price of labour, and laid a heavy burden on the Province which “comes home to us, grievously, in various forms, in every operation of our domestic and political economy”.220 Agricultural societies, to which Sir Howard lent his patronage,221 endeavored to elevate the status of agriculture but met with little success for a long time. This meant that when Britain abandoned her policy of preferential protection, and the British market for colonial timber dwindled, New Brunswick lacked a diversified economy to meet the shock.

In the Tory conception of an ideal society, landed proprietors, officials, and professional men gave paternalistic leadership to respectful and pliant farmers, tradesmen, and laborers. With the growth of the lumber industry, lumbermen of all grades from the merchant-speculator down to the lumberjack of the camps became a new and disturbing element in society, one that failed to fit into the old picture. The merchants “steadily challenged the pretensions to social superiority of the old landowning and professional aristocracy established after the Loyalist migration”.222 At the other end of the scale, the lumberjacks, “with their dislike of the drab, continuous work of the farm, their impatience at the puritanical restraints of society, their love of rum, of gaudy finery, of uproarious companionship . . . were the coureurs-de-bois of the nineteenth century; and they swaggered about the streets of Saint John with the same jaunty and insolent assurance that the returned fur traders had once showed in Montreal . . . Like the coureurs-de-bois, whom they so clearly resembled, the lumbermen came to represent freedom, and quick wealth, and rich and varied experience for the entire community”.223 Intemperance, one of the problems which often arose in periods of rapid social development,224 came to be associated particularly with the timber industry. Excessive use of rum was not, of course, new. In 1786 the province had imported from the West Indies into Saint John rum to the value of £ 15,000.225 The consumption of spirits, for which settlers who were disbanded soldiers were partly blamed, declined somewhat after a time, but by the thirties, intemperance, under the impact of lumbering, had become an acknowledged evil in the province. Peter Fisher estimated that in 1824 ardent liquors were consumed at the rate of twenty gallons on an average for every male over sixteen.226 J. McGregor, in 1828, after describing the discomforts and hardships to which the lumberers were subject, and their addiction to liquor in order to stimulate the organs and to sustain the cold, said that “the epithet lumberer is considered synonymous with a character of spendthrift habits and villainous and vagabond principles”.227 Besides affecting the economic and social structure of the country, the lumber business caused international repercussions. “The influence of the expanding frontier of Maine was felt . . . in the form of the growth of a lusty and occasionally dangerous neighbor, who pressed on political boundaries, and sometimes sent his sons over, as individuals, on none too scrupulous errands.” 228 The presence of Maine lumbermen in the coveted forest areas of the upper valley of the Saint John led to irritations and disputes which sharpened the question of the unsettled boundary, flared up in the Aroostook or Lumbermen's War in 1839, and created for a time considerable international tension.229

Increasingly, after the 1820's, the immigrant also became an obtrusive figure. He did not come unsolicited, as we have seen. Unfortunately, the majority of those who came were famine-poor Irish, unfitted for pioneer farming and unskilled in the trades. There were some Scotch, mostly dispossessed crofters, but among them, apparently, no individual of the stature of Thomas McCulloch, whose passion for education made Pictou Academy in the neighboring province a powerful educational influence. One explanation of the fact that the most desirable immigrants did not come to New Brunswick, or coming, did not remain, lies in the more rapid expansion of the United States, which made that country the Mecca of the majority of those who crossed the Atlantic. But passage to New Brunswick was cheaper than to the United States because of the returning empty lumber-boats, and because there were no regulations to prevent captains from crowding their vessels with immigrants and dumping them at the ports of New Brunswick without any further responsibility. Once here, the ablest slipped over the border to the United States, leaving the indigent, the idle, and the helpless to burden this province.230 It may be, too, that a number who had intended to remain became discouraged. We note that the Lt.-Governor, Sir Archibald Campbell, wrote in 1831 that “the most valuable emigrants231 who come to this Province are disheartened at the prospect of untrailed wilderness before them, and too frequently pass on to some part of the States”.232 Writing a little later in the same year, Sir Archibald admitted the trouble and inconvenience caused by the indiscriminate shipments of “the useless and ignorant classes of society”, but thought it would be impolitic to impose restrictions on immigration, as the native labour of the province was totally inadequate to meet the requirements of the lumber mills and agricultural pursuits.233 “Trouble and inconvenience” there was a-plenty! Societies to help the destitute, and to place them on the land were formed, the first of which was the Fredericton Emigrant Society in 1819. In Saint John, where the problem was particularly acute, a number of meetings234 were held in 1819 to consider methods to prevent the immigrants from being “burthensome” to the community. A Registry Office was opened where all immigrants might make their circumstances known, and those who could not go upon their allotted lands that fall were to be “hutted” for the winter on some of the uncultivated lands near the city, the proprietors agreeing to let them get their fuel and to take a gratis crop the next season.235 Letters in the press, remarks made by the Colonial Governors, and petitions to the Home Authorities indicate that the problem grew in the ensuing years and was largely left to philanthropists and harassed communities to wrestle with as best they might, receiving no very adequate attention from either the British or Provincial authorities. In 1834 a Saint John resident, in an article entitled “Loungers”, wrote: “Our streets at this time are literally infested with this description of persons, chiefly Emigrants, hanging about in a listless and woebegone fashion. Employment for such persons in the City is out of the question, and it is with difficulty that they can be persuaded to go into the country, where they are much wanted and where they could obtain a fair compensation for their labours.” 236 Enough has been said to show that the first decades of European immigration created many problems in New Brunswick and did not materially better the agricultural situation. Many of the able-bodied among the newcomers did, of course, work in the lumber camps and in the shipyards of Saint John, but this work, being dependent on the fluctuations of lumber and ships in the British market, meant an uncertain living.

On the same “cultural fringe” with the immigrants were the Acadians,237 whose settlements in the northern part of the province were expanding in numbers and extent. Content with a minimum of material comforts, absorbed in family life, devoted to their Church, these people lived apart, and as yet exerted but little influence on the political life of the Province.

For the most part all these new groups in society were not characterized by literacy, and were not anxious for the benefits of education. They constituted, as it were, a second frontier society. Social considerations, as Professor Clark points out, have little weight in frontier society, and behaviour tends to be the expression of immediately felt wants.238 Because of the early emphasis on education for the ruling classes, and because of public indifference, partly engendered by lack of acquaintance with schooling, the educational facilities of the province were not adequate to take care of the growing population. To the majority of people in the groups we have been considering, the material struggle with environment left neither time nor money for community services. Those possessing capital were bent on economic exploitation, particularly those in the lumber business. This exploitive process was in full swing when Peter Fisher wrote his First History, and drew from him some trenchant remarks on the lack of public spirit. In speaking of the lack of ornamentation in the city of Saint John, he said that men of independent property, and those holding office in the different departments, were too few to do much, and many of the merchants in the shipping business were transients, who aimed to make as much as they could in as short a time as possible before returning to enjoy their gains in their native country. “Such persons, then, who are to be found in all the ports of the Province add nothing to the wealth of the country, but rather act as drains to it.” 239 Again, in reference to the lumber business of the Miramichi, he observed: “A stranger would naturally suppose that such a trade must produce great riches to the country; and that great and rapid improvements would be made . . . . But here he would not only be disappointed but astonished at the rugged and uncouth appearance of most part of this extensive country . . . . The persons principally engaged in shipping the timber have been strangers who have taken no interest in the welfare of the country; but have merely occupied a spot to make what they could in the shortest possible time . . . . The forests are stripped and nothing is left in prospect but the gloomy apprehension when the timber is gone of sinking into insignificance and poverty.” Continuing, he said that the woods used to swarm with American adventurers who cut as they pleased, felling only the prime trees, manufacturing only the best of what they had felled, and leaving the tops to rot. Now there was a system of licenses,240 but the matter was little mended as almost anyone could monopolize the woods, and so, “men who take no interest in the welfare of the province continue to sap and prey on its resources”.241 Professor Lower says there is little doubt that after 1809 American adventurers were “making timber” along with the natives of New Brunswick. In spite of regulations there were still Americans on the Miramichi in 1825, as a number were listed as sufferers in the famous Miramichi Fire.242 It has been said that “the extension of institutions is facilitated by the presence of a body of receptive attitudes and a favorable set of social customs”, and that where these are lacking coercion or propaganda has to be resorted to.243 Our glance at conditions in New Brunswick in the first half of the nineteenth century has shown that much in both the old and the new strata of society operated against the extension of education, and that it would take a long time to inculcate the bulk of the people with a regard for the value of schools, and a willingness to pay for them. On the other hand, in a conservative province where change came slowly, anything so drastic as compulsion was bound to be repellent. Moreover, in the decades which were coming up, there were political as well as economic questions to be resolved which would monopolize the stage at the expense of energetic educational policy.

As we have seen, there had been, from the first, intermittent clashes between the Council and Assembly, but now the question of executive responsibility to the people was about to become an issue, and even in this most loyal province there were signs of dissatisfaction with certain features of imperial policy. Already (1833), New Brunswick, the first province to make the change, had obtained a division of the executive and legislative functions of the Council, and was demanding control of the Crown lands and provincial revenue in return for a fixed Civil list.244

In Britain herself parliament had just been reformed, and middle class liberalism, with its emphasis on laissez-faire principles, its antagonism to governmental restrictions on trade, and its new attitudes towards colonies, was growing. In France, Louis Philippe's bourgeois government had just been established, and in the United States Jacksonian democracy had recently triumphed over the old political aristocracy. In Upper and Lower Canada, political grievances were mounting and would soon burst out in the Rebellion of 1837, and in Nova Scotia Joseph Howe was emerging as an able advocate of self-government. Echoes of all this from near and far reached New Brunswick, but perhaps served less to inflame sentiment than to emphasize the moderate language and respectful behaviour of those who here opposed the old order. Yet coincident with the social changes already described there was a new note of irreverence. When Sir Howard Douglas applied for the provision of a small vessel for the Governor's use he complained of the inconvenience and embarrassment to which he was exposed in travelling between Saint John and Fredericton, when shut up for a whole day “with the ranks in a country invaded as this is by the levelling principles of our neighbors, and in which freedom of manners, and question of public-affairs is most embarrassing and disagreeable”.245 Perhaps no more interesting illustration can be found of the new spirit which challenged the rule of the gentry and all they stood for than a letter to the Editor of the Royal Gazette in 1830, from a man who signed himself “Without one touch of My Hat, Neither Your's nor any man's servant, A Manchester Turn-out”. The writer said that he had thought, when he set out for North America, that he was bound for a land where the rights of a man were properly understood, but “there is more religion and loyalty . . . more absurd credulity and fanaticism; more base servility and crouching submission to power . . . than I ever saw in Old England”. He then referred to the schools, “supported too by grants of the public money where the children are taught the antiquated, obsolete, superstitious nonsense about fearing God and honoring the King, and submitting to governments, pastors and masters, and ordering oneself lowly and reverently to one's betters. (Betters forsooth; as if a man were better than his neighbors, because he is called Honorable or Esquire, has a little more land or money, or puts on a finer coat). A college also—an University King's College, a Royal Foundation, to perpetuate these abuses among generations yet unborn! ” Referring to the President's speech,246 his comment was: “I had hoped, Sir, when our military Governor left us, and one of ourselves took his place, that we should hear another strain. But here we have as much as ever of 'His Majesty's gracious and paternal solicitude for his faithful subjects in this loyal Province',—nay, and even a 'Divine blessing' invoked on that noble institution King's College. Oh, Sir, is it not enough to make one sick or mad?” He next attacked the newspapers. “Why, I declare they are everyone of them loyal and religious and so forth. Not one is there among them to give one the least idea that one is living in a land of liberty and an age of reason.” The writer concluded by saying that he was off to Upper Canada to live next to Mr. Dalton, who edited a paper worth reading. “He gives his readers the solid and consistent sense of that true and unchangeable Patriot, Mr. Cobbett.” 247 The Editor's note to this amazing epistle explained that he had published the letter to show his liberality towards all ranks. It was a comfort to know that such a Radical meditated a speedy departure. “We only regret that he should be going to Upper Canada, where we apprehend there are already too many who neither 'FEAR GOD' nor 'HONOR THE KING'.”

Dislike of Tory practices, principles, and institutions was perhaps not often expressed with the irreverence and the venom employed by A Manchester Turn-out, nevertheless with the growth of immigration and the development of the lumber business the fact was increasingly apparent that there were in the province large numbers of people who knew not the old concepts, or were, for social, mercantile, political or religious reasons, definitely hostile to them. These attitudes hampered the maintenance of a privileged church, a favored class, a political oligarchy, and an exclusive college. Professor Creighton has described the situation as one which presented increasing difficulties to those Loyalist leaders who wished to impose their ideal of a good society on New Brunswick, and in reference to the Church of England, the schools of the S. P. G., and King's College, he writes: “These treasured institutions, these unquestioned cultural standards, were threatened in the strange and rather precarious world that had come into being with the timber trade.” 248 With evangelicals, Irish Roman Catholics, lumber-jacks, shrewd woods operators, ambitious merchants, and self-made business men jostling the Tory squires, professional men, and bureaucrats, New Brunswick, at the close of the first half-century of its existence, was no longer “the pattern Loyalist province of British North America”.248

Notes

^1. Cubberley, pp. 279-282.

^2. The German-Swiss Pestalozzi 1746-(1827) who had been influenced by Rousseau's Emile, out of his own experiences in teaching abandoned children, had worked out a theory and method of instruction based on the natural development of the child. He thought of teaching as a drawing-out process, which made use of the child's sense impressions, his natural interests and his reasoning powers. Cubberley, 297-299, 413-415.

^3. Cubberley, pp. 316-320.

^4. Reisner, pp. 144-150.

^5. Cubberley, p. 315.

^6. Reisner, p. 239.

^7. Cubberley, p. 345.

^8. Creighton, pp. 173-176.

^9. Gilroy, p. 12.

^10. Clark, p. 152.

^11. Martin (1), p. 272.

^12. Gilroy, p. 12.

^13. Creighton, p. 177.

^14. Beard, Vol. 1. pp. 437, 438.

^15. Ibid., p. 437.

^16. Ibid., p. 437.

^17. Ibid., p. 437.

^18. Creighton, p. 176.

^19. Office of Executive Council of New Brunswick, Minutes of Executive Council, Vol. 1, p. 8.

^20. Gilroy, p. 62.

^21. St. John Gazette & Weekly Advertiser, Vol. XIII, No. 660, Jan. 18, 1799, p. 3.

^22. McArthur (2), p. 216.

^23. P. A. of Canada, C0188, Vol. II, Douglas to Bathurst, Nov. 10, 1824, p. 103.

^24. Ibid., Vol. IV, Campbell to Goderich, Confidential, Jan. 16, 1832, p. 427.

^25. Hannay (1), Vol 1, pp. 227, 228, 233, 249, et. al.

^26. Gilroy, p. 65.

^27. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, p. 210.

^28. Ibid., p. 189.

^29. McArthur (2), p. 214.

^30. Gilroy, p. 73.

^31. Ibid., p. 74.

^32. Winslow Papers, p. 420.

^33. McArthur (2), p. 214.

^34. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, p. 155.

^35. Stephenson, p. 23.

^36. Harvey (1), pp. 359, 357.

^37. Hannay (2), p. 30.

^38. Curti, p. 47.

^39. Inch. p. 226.

^40. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, pp. 234, 235.

^41. Ibid., p. 234.

^42. Raymond (2), Vol. V1, No. 8, Jan. 1893, p. 149.

^43. Falconer, p. 791.

^44. Winslow Papers, p. 237.

^45. Ibid., p. 579.

^46. Fitch, p. 4.

^47. Raymond (3). p. 131.

^48. Winslow Papers, pp. 336, 337.

^49. P. A. of Canada, Canada Misc., Misc. documents. Vol. 8, Lawrence Collection, Clipping from Saint John Gazette, March 27, 1789.

^50. Raymond (2), Vol V1, No. 9, Feb. 1893, p. 171.

^51. Anderson, p. 27.

^52. Raymond (2) Vol. V1, No. 9, Feb. 1893, p. 173.

^53. Fitch, p. 6.

^54. Raymond (2), Vol. V1, No. 9, Feb. 1893, p. 171.

^55. Maxwell (1), p. 64.

^56. Fitch, pp. 6, 7.

^57. New Brunswick: Journals of the House of Assembly, Vol. 1, p. 73.

^58. P. A. of Canada, Inglis Papers, p.p. 20, 21.

^59. Hanney (1), Vol. 1, pp. 214, 215.

^60. Ibid., p. 217.

^61. Maxwell, (1), p. 64.

^62. Clark, p. 118.

^63. Raymond (2), Vol. V1, No. 9, Feb. 1893, p. 173.

^64. Anderson, p. 32.

^65. Raymond (2) Vol. V1, No. 9, Feb. 1893, p. 171.

^66. Ibid., pp. 171, 172.

^67. Ibid., p. 172.

^68. Office of the Executive Council of New Brunswick, Minutes of Executive Council, Vol. 1, p. 95.

^69. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, p. 206.

^70. Ibid., p. 206.

^71. Winslow Papers, pp. 511-513.

^72. Raymond (2), Vol. VI, No. 10, March 1893, p. 193.

^73. Winslow papers, p. 511.

^74. Ibid., p. 514.

^75. Raymond (2), Vol. VIL No. 1, June 1893, p. 8.

^76. Ibid., Vol. VII, No. 2, August 1893, p. 24.

^77. The question of Indian reaction to the attempts of people of European stock to educate them is too extensive to be treated here. It may well be that the Indian saw no sense in the type of instruction afforded because it did not accord with anything in his experience. Cultural changes are difficult unless they can be fitted piecemeal into a pre-existing pattern. See: A. G. Bailey, Conflict of European and Eastern Algonkian Cultures, 1504-1700, A Study in Canadian Civilization, Monograph No. 2, N. B. Museum, Saint John, 1937. Also A. G. Bailey, The Indian Problem in Early Canada, America indigena II (3) julio, 1942, 35-39.

^78. Winslow Papers, p. 512.

^79. P. A. of Canada, C0188, Vol. 11, pp. 125-138.

^80. Raymond (2), Vol. 7, No. 2, August 1893, p. 24.

^81. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, p. 207.

^82. “Virtuous” probably meant not only moral but also free from republican taint.

^83. Raymond, (2) Vol. VI, No. 8, Jan. 1893, p. 149.

^84. Eaton, p. 205.

^85. Office of the Executive Council of New Brunswick, Minutes of Executive Council, Vol. I, p. 95.

^86. Ibid., pp. 102-104.

^87. Fitch, pp. 4, 5.

^88. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, pp. 228, 229.

^89. Fitch, p. 5.

^90. Raymond (2), Vol. VII, No. 3, Sept. 1893, p. 49.

^91. Winslow Papers, p. 343.

^92. Ibid., p. 517.

^93. Fitch, p.5.

^94. Hannay (1). Vol. 1, p. 234.

^95. Ibid., p. 235.

^96. Raymond (2), Vol. 7, No. 3, Sept. 1893, p. 48.

^97. Fitch, p. 8.

^98. Anderson, p. 24.

^99. Inch, p. 228.

^100. Regulations for the Government of the Collegiate Grammar School at Fredericton, pp. 3-8.

^101. Baird, pp. 33, 34.

^102. Clark, p. 119.

^103. Hannay (1), Vol. 1. pp. 287, 288.

^104. Graham, p. 48.

^105. Ibid., p. 21.

^106. Creighton, p. 167.

^107. Lower (2), p. 55.

^108. Graham, p. 32.

^109. Creighton, p. 190.

^110. Graham, pp. 34, 35.

^1ll. Ibid., pp. 154-162.

^112. Creighton, P. 190.

^113. Graham, p. 43.

^114. Ibid., p. 51.

^115. Ibid., p. 47.

^116. Ibid., p. 52.

^117. Ibid., p. 168.

^118. Ibid., pp. 49, 50.

^119. Innis & Lower, p. 387.

^120. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, p. 282.

^121. Winslow Papers, pp. 474-476.

^122. Gilroy, p. 29.

^123. Hannay (1). Vol. 1, p. 283.

^124. Winslow Papers, pp. 477-478.

^125. Beard, Vol. 2, p. 384.

^126. Ibid., Vol. 1, p. 809.

^127. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, p. 282.

^128. Ibid., p. 263.

^129. Ibid., pp. 277-280.

^130. Ibid., p. 282.

^131. Fitch, p. 6.

^132. Ibid., p. 14.

^133. Ibid., p. 13.

^134. Raymond (2), Vol. V11, No. 4, Oct. 1893, p. 70.

^135. Office of the Executive Council of New Brunswick, Minutes of Executive Council, Vol. I, p. 155.

^136. Hannay (1), Vol. 1. p. 170.

^137. Ibid., p. 282.

^138. Fitch, p. 15.

^139. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, p. 298.

^140. Winslow Papers, p. 532.

^141. For the clauses of the Act, I am indebted to Fitch, p. 15.

^142. Fitch, p. 15.

^143. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, p. 307.

^144. Ibid., p. 341.

^145. Winslow Papers, pp. 672, 673.

^146. Creighton, p. 197.

^147. Gilroy, p. 82.

^148. Graham, pp. 180-185.

^149. Winslow Papers, p. 532.

^150. Graham, P. 191.

^151. Winslow Papers, pp. 583-584.

^152. Graham, pp. 197-201.

^153. Ibid., p. 214.

^154. Ibid., p. 216.

^155. Gilroy, p. 82.

^156. Graham, pp. 222-230.

^157. Creighton, pp. 192, 193.

^158. Graham, p. 149.

^159. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, p. 313.

^160. Ibid., p. 333.

^161. Raymond (2), Vol. 9, No. 1, June 1895, p. 5.

^162. Winslow Papers, p. 654.

^163. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, P. 367.

^164. New Brunswick: Journals of the House of Assembly, Vol. 4, Jan. 17, 1816, p. 9.

^165. Ibid., Jan. 26, 1816, p. 17.

^166. Fitch, pp. 16, 17.

^167. For these Nova Scotia Acts see MacKay, p. 521.

^168. Fitch, pp. 17, 18.

^169. Cubberley, p. 246.

^170. Ibid., p. 371.

^171. Ibid., pp. 370, 371.

^172. Fitch, pp. 18, 19.

^173. Raymond (2), Vol. VII, No. 10, March 1894, p. 179.

^174. Clark, p. 182.

^175. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, pp. 343, 344.

^176. Ibid., p. 345.

^177. Raymond (2), Vol. VII, No. 12, May 1894, p. 221.

^178. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, p. 346.

^179. Raymond (2), Vol. VII, No. 12, May 1894, p. 220.

^180. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, p. 356.

^181. Ibid., pp. 346, 347.

^182. Hay, p. 550.

^183. Raymond (2), Vol. 8, No. 3, Aug. 1894, p. 53.

^184. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, p. 318.

^185. The Society gave a grant for this purpose. In the report of the Board in 1820 there is this item: “Paid J. Wilson's expenses to Halifax to qualify him, £ 20.”

^186. Raymond (2), Vol. 8, No. 4, p. 71.

^187. Ibid., p. 71.

^188. The City Gazette, Vol. 8, No. 366, July 15, 1818, p. 2.

^189. Fitch, p. 21.

^190. Ibid., p. 23.

^191. Raymond (2), Vol. 8, No. 3, Aug. 1894, p. 52.

^192. The City Gazette, Vol. 8, No. 403, March 31, 1819, p. 3.

^193. Madras Schools of New Brunswick, Thirtieth Report of, p. 2.

^194. Raymond (2), Vol. 8, No. 3, Aug. 1894, p. 51.

^195. Ibid., Vol. 8, No. 5, p. 89.

^196. Madras Schools of New Brunswick, Thirtieth Report of, p. 3.

^197. Raymond (2), Vol. 7, No. 12, May 1894, p. 221.

^198. Ibid., p. 220.

^199. Raymond (2), Vol. 8, No. 3, August 1994, p. 51.

^200. Anthony Truro later conducted the Central School at Saint John for thirteen years. (Ibid., p. 51.)

^201. Fitch, p. 22.

^202. Hopkins, p. 140.

^203. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, p. 357.

^204. Fitch, p. 26.

^205. Inch, p. 230.

^206. Fitch, p. 26.

^207. Fisher, p. 75.

^208. Fitch, p. 29.

^209. Hannay (1), Vol, 1, p. 439.

^210. Ibid., pp. 443, 444.

^211. Ibid., pp. 440-443.

^212. Fitch, p. 34.

^213. In 1826 the Counties of Nova Scotia had been divided into school districts by the Justices of the Peace (MacKay, p. 522.)

^214. Fitch, p. 34.

^215. Ibid., p. 34.

^216. Ibid., p. 34.

^217. Creighton, p. 210.

^218. Lower (2), p. 79.

^219. Fisher, p. 87.

^220. New Brunswick: Journals of the House of Assembly, Vol. 7, Feb. 1, 1825, p. 3.

^221. P. A. of Canada, C0188, Douglas to Bathurst, Sept. 30, 1824, p. 88.

^222. Clark, p. 117.

^223. Creighton, p. 211.

^224. Clark. p. 10.

^225. Graham, p. 119.

^226. Fisher, p. 89.

^227. Clark, p. 154.

^228. Lower (2), P. 74.

^229. Ibid., p. 84.

^230. P. A. of Canada, C0188, Vol. III, Douglas to Goderich on a petition from the Justices of the Peace of Saint John, Oct. 16, 1827, p. 216.

^231. The word “immigrant” did not come into use until later.

^232. P . A. of Canada, C0188, Vol. IV, Campbell to Secretary of State, Oct. 23, 1831, p. 22.

^233. P. A. of Canada, C0188, Vol. IV, Campbell to Goderich, Nov. 27, 1831, p. 418.

^234. The City Gazette, Vol.IX, No. 432. Oct. 20, 1819, p. 3.

^235. Clark, p. 137.

^236. Ibid., p. 134, Quoting from the British Colonist, Saint John, June 23, 1834.

^237. Ibid., p. 117.

^238. Ibid., p. 11.

^239. Fisher, p. 45.

^240. This system began in 1817, Lower (2), p. 76.

^241. Fisher, pp. 72, 73.

^242. Lower (2), p. 76.

^243. Clark, p. 7.

^244. Hannay (1), Vol. 1, pp. 448-455.

^245. P. A. of Canada C0188, Vol. II, Douglas to Bathurst, Oct. 20, 1824, pp. 96-99.

^246. In Sir Howard's absence the Honorable William Black was the administrator of the province.

^247. The Royal Gazette, Fton, Vol. 1, No. 3, Jan. 20, 1830, p. 3.

^248. Creighton, pp. 211, 212.

CHAPTER 5.
PROVINCIAL SOCIETY IN TRANSITION

The instinctive purpose of the leading Loyalists of New Brunswick to establish a society based on loyalty and permanency of British connection, and characterized by paternalistic government, class distinctions, and traditional lines of behaviour, formed an easily recognizable motif for the first fifty years of New Brunswick history, and the subordinating influences of that purpose stood out with a large degree of clarity. A central theme for the next two decades is less easy to perceive.

While the province had emerged as a whole from the frontier-stage, society continued to exhibit locally certain frontier characteristics, such as intemperance, rowdyism, and illiteracy. These manifestations of a lack of adjustment to new conditions were not abated by the increased tempo of immigration, particularly after the Irish famine of 1845, nor by the injudicious speculation, followed by periods of depression, which, as before, accompanied a persistent reliance on lumber as a staple industry.

During this period the province experienced a number of disasters, including a typhus epidemic in 1847 in which Saint John, as the port of entry for the majority of the immigrants, suffered particularly; an outbreak of Asiatic cholera in 1854; and severe fires in the city of Saint John in 1837, 1839, and 1841. Adverse weather conditions led to serious crop-failures in 1836 and 1845, and, in general, the status of agriculture continued to be rather depressed for the same reasons that had obtained earlier. There was, however, increased emphasis on the agricultural possibilities of the province by lecturers, editors, legislators, and governors. Lt.-Governor Sir John Harvey, in a letter to Lord John Russell in 1840, said that he had urged, and would continue to urge, on the people of New Brunswick a steady attention to agriculture in preference to lumbering pursuits, and expressed the opinion that the farmers of New Brunswick had only to adopt an improved system of agriculture in order to insure the fulfilment of every reasonable expectation.1 As an example of gubernatorial concern over the unfitness of the majority of the Irish immigrants for farming, we may note that Lt.-Governor Colebrooke wrote in 1842: “In regarding the colonies as a refuge for the indigent classes it is manifest that so arduous a mode of life”, (as farming), “requires that their previous habits and experience should in some degree have prepared them to encounter its trials, model colonies at home might thus be made a means of training for Emigration to the settlements abroad and if the habits of self dependence should thus be acquired and skill in the rude arts in which, the American settlers excel their difficulties would be abridged and their success more effectually assured.” 2 Incidentally, Cole- brooke's concern may have been sharpened by clashes between the Irish and Orangemen. In reporting such episodes at Fredericton, Saint John, and Woodstock in 1847, Colebrooke stressed the importance “of guarding against the adoption of any public measures which would have the effect at this time of promoting an extensive emigration from Ireland, without a corresponding increase of population from other parts of the United Kingdom”.3 Among the public speakers and newspaper men who were vocal on the subject of agriculture we note the Rev. W. T. Wishart, who gave a number of lectures before the Mechanics Institute of Saint John. Speaking in the hall of that body in 1845, Wishart, after showing how the agriculture of Scotland had been raised from a deplorable condition to a high state of efficiency by means of agricultural societies and meetings, the publication of useful practical works, the institution of a professorship of agriculture, the importation of seeds and plants, and the application of chemistry to an investigation of soils and manures, asked why might this not be done in New Brunswick. He declared that in a few years the province would be stripped of its timber, and that our legislators should be devising means by which new resources might be ready to supply the failure of lumber as a staple product.4 The same note was sounded by the editor of the New Brunswick Courier at a time when the end of the old navigation system had given rise to a feeling that Britain had deserted her colonies, and that the timber trade of the province would be ruined, The editorial in question commented favorably on the action just taken by the legislature in employing Professor Johnston to ascertain the agricultural capabilities of the province, but declared that something must be done to carry out Professor Johnston's views, and suggested that the science of agriculture might be introduced into our schools, especially in the country, and that Model Farms, which had proved of advantage in other parts of the world, might be established in New Brunswick.5 The scientist referred to, Professor J. F. W. Johnston, F.R.S., bore witness in his report that in New Brunswick a more general feeling appeared to prevail on the subject of agriculture among all educated persons than he had met anywhere else.6 Professor Johnston's report was a valuable document, although over-optimistic about the agricultural possibilities of the province. It is interesting to note that the year in which it was presented in the legislature the subject of converting King's College into an agricultural school, with a model farm attached, came up for discussion in the Assembly for the first time.

Carried over from an earlier day were other problems and concerns besides those to which brief reference has just been made. Among such was the question of the Maine boundary which vexed a good part of the governorship of Sir John Harvey, and was not settled until 1842 by the Ashburton Treaty. Another was a legacy of the imperial connection. We saw earlier that during the Napoleonic Wars the mercantile system of the Empire had become “heavily weighted in favour of the colonies” 7 through differential duties. Under the stimulus of the tariff favoring colonial wood, New Brunswick had built up a large trade with the United Kingdom in timber. The rise of a new manufacturing class in England and the trade depression which followed the Napoleonic Wars increased the numbers of those who championed freer trade. In 1821 there was a minor reduction of colonial protection. Others followed, and in 1849 preferential duties were abolished, and the ships of all nations might carry what they would from colonial ports. “All these drastic changes ended the old colonial system. It is hardly putting it too strongly to say that as they virtually all proceeded from English attention to English interests, . . . they constituted an attitude on the part of England to break away from her own empire.” 8 Naturally, the colonies bitterly opposed these changes, and in New Brunswick the lumber trade and the prosperity of the province seemed to face disaster, although possibly the correspondent, who signed the name Paul Jones to an article in the Courier in 1850, saw compensations in the abolition of the lumber preference. The article in question was in the form of a dialogue between Mr. Sharpe and Squire, in which the former set forth his opinion that the results of lumbering were disastrous to the welfare of New Brunswick. “It is a business, Squire, which is based on the most fictitious credit . . . Its foundation is cram and credit, the very worst two words in the English language for a new country.” The workmen were paid in goods and did not know until they settled what price was charged. Often when they settled they were in debt. It was bad, too, for agriculture. When the men should be on the land they were log-driving until the last of June. The crops, put in too late, were poor. Then the farmers cursed the country and said it would produce nothing.9 The Governor also wrote to Grey in 1850: “Your Lordship must not suppose that I myself or that the most intelligent men in New Brunswick look on the stimulus afforded to lumbering by the old protective duties as wholesome in itself, even if it were practicable to continue it. The habits of reckless speculation, and the preference of a wasteful and wandering mode of life to the quiet monotony of agriculture, are among the evils which the protective system has implanted in the province.” 10 When Lt.-Gov. Head opened the session of 1850 he expressed the belief that the effect on New Brunswick of the changes in the navigation laws would not be injurious,11 but the general view in the province was pessimistic, and it seemed to many people that there was now no advantage to the province in remaining a British colony.12 During that session, W. J. Ritchie, a member from Saint John, analyzing Lord John Russell's speech on the colonial policy of England, contended that if England would not depart from her free-trade policy, it was her duty to furnish the colonies with an outlet for their produce which might in some measure compensate them for that which they had lost; and even declared that if England did not so interfere the colonies would have to choose between annexation by the United States and starvation.13 Hannay has said: “There has been no period in the history of the British Colonies of North America when the tie between them and the Mother Country was so near being broken as during the years 1849 and 1850.” 14 The resentment lasted until it was found that the prosperity of the province had not been impaired by the offending British legislation. “The people of New Brunswick discovered that they could still go on building ships and sailing them, notwithstanding the competition of foreign nations, and that their market for the timber of the country bad not been seriously injured.” 15 In all the British North American colonies, however, one result of Britain's new trade policy was the emergence of the idea that closer commercial connections with the United States might prove advantageous,16 and in the early years of the fifties the question of Reciprocity became one of the controversial topics of the times.

No question, however, aroused more popular political discussion than that of Responsible Government, a question which agitated the whole of this period. This was the old controversy of Assembly versus Executive, but characterized by new vigor and more definite objectives and principles, and supplemented in its more critical stages by the “decentralizing, laissez-faire ideas of Lord Grey”.17 The struggle is seen to have not only extreme political significance but economic and social as well, when we consider that “awaiting the achievement of responsible government were many of the gravest economic problems of the century, accompanied, too, by the prosaic work of self-government - schools, and roads, fisheries and crown lands, 'rum and politics'.” 18 Thus the contest for popular control of government created much of the ferment of the forties and early fifties, and influenced, either positively or negatively, the other important issues of the period.

One aspect of the high degree of industrialization which had been taking place in England and in certain parts of the United States was progress in railroad construction. New Brunswick was not highly industrialized, although if we may believe an editorial in the Saint John Chronicle in 1837, there was considerable enterprise. This editorial declared “Proud are we to assert, that we know of no place of equal dimensions in His Majesty's widely extended territories, that can boast of so much enterprise and expediture of capital in praiseworthy and laudable pursuits, as are exhibited to the commercial world by our little Province of New Brunswick. Onward is the signal of our men of business . . . . No capital is here permitted to sleep, and the impetus that is given to all classes by its general circulation, is visible to every observing mind”.19 The year before this was written two new banks had been chartered, and the stock of two of the existing banks increased. The session of 1836 had also witnessed the first railway legislation of New Brunswick, in the incorporation of com- panies for the building of two railway lines.20 These circumstances may have helped to prompt the above expression of pride and confidence. We can make some allowance, too, for the note of complacency, by remembering that in 1837 New Brunswick, by contrast with Upper and Lower Canada, seemed a model province, “the brightest pearl in the chaplet of British American provinces”,21 and fulsome self-praise was therefore in order. Unfortunately, the capital referred to was limited, and the business enterprises were on a small scale. Several of Lt.-Gov. Colebrooke's dispatches refer to this lack of capital and to the hampering effects of such limitations. In 1841, after making a circuit through the remote counties of New Brunswick, Colebrooke wrote: “The extent to which progress of the Americans has been accelerated by means of British capital obtained through the public credit is contrasted with the little encouragement in this way which the British Provinces have derived since the revolution; and the obvious inadequacy of their own means to the object, and their relative weakness compared with the neighboring states, have led the colonists to feel that the time has arrived when the realization of the advantages from British connection ought not to be longer delayed.” 22 Five years later Colebrooke wrote: “It is thus that in New England every Township is the seat of some manufacture suited to the locality and which is the source of the prosperity of the people of every class by creating a demand for employment and a market for produce, while in New Brunswick it is remarkable that with the exceptions of the encouragement given for the erection of mills for sawed lumber and some grist mills there has been scarcely an attempt made to establish any kind of manufacture —the peasantry being dependent in many cases on their own rude contrivances for the most ordinary conveniences.” 23 It would seem, therefore, that the early interest in railways in New Brunswick was not a direct result of the Industrial Revolution, but was an indication that the isolation of the province was breaking down, the continental pull was making itself felt, and a belief was beginning to prevail, especially after 1850, that prosperity depended on having the province fit into a progressive North American scheme of things.

In contrast with the isolation and insulation of the foundation years there was indeed a widening range of interests, influences, and contacts. The struggle for Responsible Government helped to broaden horizons, for it directed attention to those British provinces which had experienced, or were experiencing, a similar struggle—the Canadas and Nova Scotia; and from the latter province came weekly copies of Howe's Nova Scotian.24 Instead of the early antagonism against the United States there was now often open admiration of American municipal and educational institutions, and a tendency to refer to them as examples. In 1852 a New Brunswick legislator could quote Horace Mann and was able to describe the schools, not only of Toronto, but also of Boston. In the technical, cultural, and educational extremity of the province, men of science and learning were brought in to make reports, or to lay new foundations. We have already mentioned Professor Johnston. From 1838 to 1842 Abraham Gesner was engaged in making a geological survey of the province. Engineers, engaged to make surveys for the proposed railways, contributed to the technical knowledge of the colony. From Scotland came James Robb, a man of science, culture, and experience in travel, to serve as professor at King's College from 1837 to 1861. When at last Governor Colebrooke's cherished scheme of a Training School for teachers came to tardy fruition, Marshall d'Avray, a polished and cosmopolitan gentleman, was imported from England to be the first master, and remained in the province in various educational capacities until the day of his death. In 1854, Upper Canada and Nova Scotia lent Egerton Ryerson and William Dawson respectively, to act as members of a commission investigating King's College and New Brunswick education. These men, as Superintendents of Education in their respective provinces, had studied the best educational systems of the United States, and Ryerson had also visited Germany. Dr. J. C. Webster has said “Those whose vision never pierces beyond the confines of their own land are utterly unable to form an estimate of their own development, because they are lacking in standards of comparison”.25 By the middle of the nineteenth century, however, there was no excuse for the leading men of New Brunswick to plead ignorance of what other countries were doing in education. Even second-hand glimpses of what lay beyond the province could not fail to stir a spirit of reform. We find, therefore, that at the close of this period the most intelligent men of New Brunswick were quick to extol science, to give lip service at least to the idea of education for all, and to rejoice that they lived in an age of progress. Over against this, however, was the great weight of indifference which characterized a large proportion of the population. To the definitely poor, and there were many such, education seemed too much of a luxury to be considered at all. Others, in better economic circumstances thought of progress in terms of material gain, were skeptical of the value of a better education than they themselves had had, as a means of “getting on”, and strongly opposed any change which would mean a greater expenditure for schools. The existence of such attitudes meant that the most active of educational reformers in New Brunswick could, like Lincoln, “advance only a little ahead of the slow-moving mass be sought to draw after him”.26

This survey of conditions in New Brunswick between the years 1833 and 1854 has showed a province harassed by many serious problems, and stirred by a number of exciting possibilities, a province subjected to a number of old, and many new, forces from within and from without, a province reluctant to leave the past but not entirely content to remain in it. All this meant at least ferment, if not ebullience, a ferment which may be considered the motif of the period.

The characteristic spirit in which the major problems of these decades were faced kept the ferment below the pitch of ebullience, yet, paradoxically, added to it. When the pudding does not boil furiously, it must simmer longer in the pot. Responsible Government, a Training School for teachers, the reform of King's College, the adoption of the assessment principle, were questions which for years agitated, but did not convulse, the province. A people to whom cataclysm is unnatural will hail compromises, half-measures, and petty improvements as lengthy strides in the march of progress, and thus will postpone the improvement of conditions which require remedy.

The temper of the province during these decades exhibited an empirical strain in that there seemed to be an absence of clear philosophy, an inconsistency in attitudes and alignments, a failure to understand the true meaning of abstract principles, and a tendency to interpret such principles in terms of some practical effect on individuals, institutions, and practices.

Several writers, thinking about New Brunswick trends, have commented on various aspects of this trait. Professor A. G. Bailey, referring to the rugged individualism of New Brunswick's political and industrial leaders during the pre-Confederation period, has noted that the effect of the small-scale enterprise of the province and its geographical segregation induced a “highly particularist attitude to the problems of life”.27 Hannay has remarked that New Brunswick has always been slow to make constitutional changes, even when such changes were based on sound principles, and adds: “There has often been a great disposition on the part of our people to judge the merits of a question rather by its effect upon individuals than by its relation to the public interests”.28 Professor Chester Martin, commenting on the illogicalities in the development of responsible government in New Brunswick, has observed succinctly that there was “more of Martha than of Mary in the phlegmatic political temper of New Brunswick”.29 Finally, to pile quotation upon quotation, William Smith has said: “One cannot but be struck with the difference in the aims which the people of New Brunswick set before themselves, as compared with those sought in other provinces. While they were struggling to widen the sphere of self-government, New Brunswick confined itself to strictly practical objectives. The people instinctively accepted Pope's dictum, 'for forms of government let fools contest', and were quite satisfied with a government which administered their affairs as they wished, let its form be what it might. If a constitutional principle was cited, it was simply to reinforce a plea advanced on other grounds for some object they desired to obtain”.30

While we need not concern ourselves here with the details of the development of responsible government, it is well to keep in mind that there was a definite connection between political and educational developments in New Brunswick. For one thing, political questions, appearing more alluring and exciting than other developments, tended to occupy the centre of the stage and to leave only a modicum of time, interest, energy, and thought for educational problems. The most intelligent and liberal-minded men of the province were absorbed in the political struggle. While L. A. Wilmot served on education committees time after time in the eighteen-forties, his position as one of the leaders for political reforms demanded his best talents and much of his time. The same might be said of Charles Fisher. Moreover, with so many important constitutional issues hanging in the balance, even the most personally unselfish legislators hesitated to push unpopular questions, such as assessment for schools, lest they jeopardize, not only their own political careers, but also the cause of political reform. This negative effect of politics on education was perhaps more marked in New Brunswick than in the other British North American provinces, because here the achievement of full responsible government was such a long drawn-out process of fits and starts, retrogressions, delays, and half-measures.

There was still another link between politics and schools. Either because members of the Assembly failed to understand the real meaning of responsible government, or understanding it, preferred a partial application of the system to losing certain personal advantages, the majority of the House opposed transferring from the Assembly to the Executive the right to initiate money votes, even though the Executive of this period differed a good deal from the old Executives with which early Assemblies had clashed so frequently. According to the time-worn procedure, any member of the Assembly could propose on the floors of the House a grant for a bye-road or a school in his constituency, and gain support for his resolution by promising his support for similar resolutions by other members.31 That this was an inefficient method of doing business was proved when the sizable fortune, which had accrued to the province on Britain's surrender in 1837 of the casual and territorial revenue, was squandered in five years. Yet in 1842, when the province was heavily in debt, a resolution passed in the Assembly that it was inexpedient to alter the existing mode of appropriation, which, tested as it was by fifty years of exper ience, gave satisfaction to the people of the province.32 Not only did this way of making appropriations waste money, but time was also lost in what Lt.-Gov. Head called the “intrinsic absurdity” of discussing in detail votes of £ 10 for the repair of a bye-road or the relief of an aged widow.33 In spite, however, of the obvious defects of the system, and in spite of plain-speaking on the matter on the part of Lt.-Governors Colebrooke and Head, the Assembly, as a whole, continued to resent any suggestions for change that were put forward by the more liberal members. Outside the Assembly in 1849, but soon to be an important political figure, S. L. Tilley denounced the extravagance and inefficiency of the old way in an indictment which made particular reference to the schools of the province. Tilley, the Chairman of a special committee of the New Brunswick Colonial Association, in presenting a report of the committee recommending economy in provincial expenditures and a reduction in the salaries of public functionaries, scored the existing system of initiating money grants as corrupt, and declared that the school system was not only inefficient but discreditable to the province. He suggested that the schools of the Eastern States should be studied, and a competent person engaged to organize a corresponding system in New Brunswick, and stated that “it would be impossible to find in the history of any country a precedent for such a system of jobbing, gross corruption, electioneering and bribery, as our Legislators have introduced into their mode of making School and Bye-road appropriations”.34 Tilley, it is true, was in opposition to the government of the day, but there is evidence arising from other sources that he did not greatly exaggerate.

If the peculiarities of the New Brunswick temperament had influenced only political developments during this period, there would be little reason to emphasize those peculiarities as we have done. It is illogical, however, to suppose that a people who approached serious political issues without a clear conception of the principles involved would think very deeply in educational matters, or would care to look very far ahead. That educational reforms proceeded in the same halting and rather desultory fashion as political reforms will emerge later from a detailed study of educational measures, but to suggest at this point that educational developments in this period had little enough of clear policy back of them, and were generally of a last-minute stopgap nature will help us to distinguish these characteristics later, in the midst of a vast assortment of heterogeneous facts.

Some of the hesitation in effecting political and educational changes came, of course, from that other prominent New Brunswick trait conservatism. This quality, a legacy of the circumstances under which the province had been founded in 1784, had become deeply rooted during the long period of rule by the Family Compact. Expressions of pride in the loyalty and good-behaviour of the province, such as would have disgusted “A Manchester Turnout” 35 were current coin in the language of the press, the lecture hall, the assembly room, and the official dispatch. As we have seen, the ultra-Tories had been careful to identify innovation with disloyalty, but even those who were aware that change might sometimes be the practical expression of a high type of patriotism repudiated any methods of effecting reforms which might be considered unconstitutional, and not infrequently, when suggesting that the province might profit from the study of American municipal or educational institutions, hastened to declare a prejudice against a Republican form of Government, lest their loyalty be doubted. When, in 1850, the editor of the New Brunswick Courier stated that “the people of New Brunswick have always chosen to do their political work in the legal and prescribed manner”, he implied that this was so because they were “quiet and conservative by nature and education”.36 Inevitably, anything coercive, such as compulsory school assessment or insistence on the attendance of all teachers at a training school, seemed drastic to people of this temperament. The whole course of the struggle for responsible government reveals the fact, that, while they might be unpredictable in their reactions to the details

of a question, they were invariably cautious and deliberate in making a great decision. So it was in education. Projects for improvement evolved by slow degrees, and the more rapid progress of other countries often failed to present a challenge, being quietly dismissed as unsuitable to New Brunswick conditions. Nevertheless, in these crowded years, these fermenting forties and fifties, a conservative people, prone to be more concerned with practical details than with profound philosophies, did move forward considerably in educational theory and practice. The separate steps in this adjustment to changing times and conditions must now claim our attention.

Notes

^1. P. A. of Canada, C0188, Vol. VIII, Harvey to Russell, Sept. 8, 1840, Disp. 66.

^2. Ibid., Vol. IX, Colebrooke to Stanley, Feb. 16, 1842, Disp. 20.

^3. Ibid., Vol. X, Colebrooke to Grey, July 30, 1847, Separate with Dispatch 73.

^4. Wishart, pp. 9-12.

^5. The New Brunswick Courier, Saint John, Feb. 2, 1850, Vol. 8, No. 36, p. 2.

^6. Johnston, p. 3.

^7. Lower (2), P. 103.

^8. Ibid., p. 104.

^9.The New Brunswick Courier, Saint John, Jan. 26, 1850, Vol. VII, No. 35, p. 1.

^10. P.A. of Canada, C0188, Vol. XI, Head to Grey, March 31, 1849, Disp. 32.

^11. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, p. 132.

^12. Ibid., p. 138.

^13. The New Brunswick Courier, Saint John, March 23, 1850, Vol. 8, No. 43, p. 2.

^14. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, p. 130.

^15. Ibid., p. 138.

^16. Lower (2), p. 106.

^17. Ibid., Footnote on p. 104.

^18. Martin (2), p. 361.

^19. Martell, p. 56.

^20. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, p. 31.

^21. P. A. of Canada, Can. Misc., Delancey-Robinson Papers, Vol. 1, Smith to Harvey. Dec. 26, 1837.

^22. P A. of Canada, C0188, Vol. 9, Colebrooke to Russell, July 15, 1841, Disp. 37.

^23. Ibid., Vol. 10, Colebrooke to Grey, April 27, 1847, Disp. 33.

^24. Baker, p. 58.

^25. Webster, Foreword to The Distressed Maritimes, p. 4.

^26. Parrington (2), p. 156.

^27. Bailey A. G. (1), p. 8.

^28. Hannay (2), p. 173.

^29. Martin (2), p. 358.

^30. Smith, Wm., p. 244.

^31. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, p. 48.

^32. Ibid., p. 78.

^33. P. A. of Canada, C0188, Vol. XI, Head to Grey, May 20, 1848, Disp. 27.

^34. The New Brunswick Courier, Saint John, Nov. 10, 1849, Vol. 8, No. 24, p. 2.

^35. See pp. 77, 78.

^36. The New Brunswick Courier, Saint John, March 9, 1850, Vol. 8, No. 41, p. 1.

CHAPTER 6.
EDUCATIONAL DEVELOPMENTS 1833-1847

We saw that in 1833 machinery in New Brunswick for the administration of education was of the simplest kind. There was no central educational authority, nothing corresponding to a board of education or a superintendent of education. There were no qualified inspectors; in fact there was scarcely any effective inspection at all, since the parish trustees, on whom the responsibility rested, either neglected their duty or performed it in a perfunctory manner. Licenses to teach were issued by the Lieutenant-Governor on simple conditions, without examination, to untrained applicants, who all too often were individuals who had failed at other occupations because of certain habits or limitations.

In 1854 this picture of negations was no longer true. A Board of Education, a Normal School, a Superintendent of Education, and a system of inspection had all been established by legal enactments and were functioning, after a fashion at least. Even assessment as a means of supporting schools had regained on the statute books that place as a permissive measure prematurely won in 1816, and lost in 1818. These achievements were crowded into the last seven years of the period, but one cannot call the interval from 1833 to 1847 completely barren, for the School Act of 1837 paved the way for the establishment ten years later of a central authority, and the special inspection of 1844 of all schools in the province, by exposing the truth about school buildings, teachers, texts, and school attendance, emphasized the urgent need of improvement, and may be regarded as a preliminary to the reform measures which followed.

The Act of 1837 differed from the Act of 1833 in only a few of its provisions. One pertained to female teachers. There was now to be no distinction between a grant issued to a female teacher and one issued to a male, but not more than three schools in a parish, if taught by females, could be included in the schedule of trustees' certificates submitted semi-annually to the Lieutenant-Governor by the Justices of the County. 1 This meant that female teachers in excess of three to a parish were deprived of their government grant, unless they petitioned the legislature for a special dispensation in their favor. A perusal of the Journals of the Assembly for the next ten years informs us that many teachers petitioned the House for these reasons, or because the Trustees had been careless and failed to certify the school, or because the school happened to be in excess of the total number which in any given parish or county could legally receive the provincial allowance. To reduce the number of petitions arising from the reason last mentioned, an amendment in 1840 increased the maximum allowance to each parish and county, therefore increasing the number of provincially supported schools.2

The most important change provided for by the Act of 1837 was the appointment of County Boards of Education. These boards, unlike the County Boards recently inaugurated in New Brunswick, which are for financial purposes only, were not finance boards but examining boards. Each board was to consist of three or more persons appointed by the Lieutenant-Governor in Council for the purpose of receiving applications from persons desiring to obtain parish school licenses, and for the examination at an early and convenient time of the moral character, literary attainments, and loyal principles of such applicants. Those candidates who were reported to the Lieutenant-Governor by the County Boards as being suitable persons to enter upon the important and responsible duty of teaching would then receive licenses valid for the County for which they were issued.3

This step towards centralization was designed to prevent undesirables from entering the teaching profession and to introduce a degree of uniformity into the licensing of teachers. The difficulty, however, of finding qualified men willing to act as unpaid members of such examining bodies operated against the continuance of County Boards, especially when in 1847 a Normal School was established and the examination of teachers for license could then be carried through on a provincial basis.

According to the Act of 1837 County Boards were to investigate not only the character and learning of prospective teachers but their loyalty as well. In 1837, when rebellion was seething in the Canadas, New Brunswick was especially conscious of that loyalty, which, according to a correspondent of Sir John Harvey's, prevented any disloyal subject from daring to raise his voice.4 There seems, however, to have been difficulty in procuring for this loyal people school texts imbued with the proper sentiment. In a letter to Sir John Harvey reporting on some elementary school books, Edwin Jacob, vice-principal of King's, observed that there was little, if anything, in any of the publications calculated to answer His Excellency's avowed purpose of conveying to the youthful mind English impressions of men and things, and went on to say that he thought that even the British and Foreign School Society, could its agency be employed, would be found “very much in the hands of those who look with no particular reverence on the institutions of the Church and State of England”.5It is not clear whether this collection of books was the same as that commissioned by Sir John Harvey from England, and reported on to the Assembly in 1839 by Jacob and George Roberts, Headmaster of the Collegiate School, but at any rate the same fault was found on this occasion. Commenting on the History of England contained in Fenning's Spelling Book the critics stated that it could be pronounced “a bold and well-written epitome, indulging however too freely in observations which we consider ill calculated to cherish a due respect for the Throne.” Of a book entitled Pictures and Descriptions of Remarkable Events in the History of England, published under the superintendence of the “Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge”, Jacob and Roberts declared that in their judgment it contained portions “calculated to cherish a democratic and disaffected spirit”. Jacob added his regret that in the whole collection he saw no work calculated to instruct the rising generation in the true principles of the British Constitution.6 A little later in the year approved books were sent to the several County Boards of Education for distribution, under the direction of the members for the respective counties, but there is nothing in the Journal to indicate whether the books censured by Jacob and Roberts were included or not. At this same session the Lt.-Governor, Sir John Harvey, suggested that besides the books sent gratuitously to the Boards of Education a number should be imported at the public expense, placed in the charge of individuals in the principal towns and ports, and retailed by them at their wholesale prime cost, that thus parents might obtain books upon terms far more reasonable than could be procured anywhere out of England.7 There is no evidence that this suggestion was carried out at the time, and the text book situation in the province continued shocking. In 1841 Lt.-Governor Colebrooke wrote; “In many schools there are no books and in some the selection of books is objectionable; the American school books which are used containing matter calculated to prejudice the children against the institutions of their country”.8 A year later, Colebrooke's son-in-law and secretary, Alfred Reade, in submitting observations to the Assembly on the reports of trustees of parish schools, referred to the great variety and inferior character of the books used in the parish schools.9 In the Trustees' Reports on which Reade was commenting there is an admission by the Trustees of Charlotte County that most of the books used there were American, these being procured so much more easily than others.10 Finally, when all the schools of the province were inspected in 1844 by a committee especially appointed for the purpose, that section of the Inspectors' report dealing with books declared that a list of texts in use in the province would present a catalogue of nearly every elementary work, of more than local celebrity, published within the previous seventy years. The Inspectors found that in some schools the Spelling Book and the New Testament were the only reading books. There was great need, they said, of a text on which the intellect of the children could be exercised, as explanations were not usually attempted on the Bible.11 Steps to remedy all these deficiencies had to wait, however, for the establishment of a Board of Education in 1847, a development which was part of an impulse that energized education generally at that time.

Considerable credit for initiating this impulse must be given His Majesty's representatives in the province. Sir John Harvey, shortly before he left New Brunswick, declared that the establishment of a training institution for teachers was the great desideratum and that he had omitted no occasion of bringing this question under the consideration of the legislature.12 His successor, Sir William Colebrooke, seems to have seen, from the very beginning of his governorship, what the chief problem was. In one of his early dispatches he observed: “Under the law which provides for the payment of an inadequate stipend to a teacher and a local contribution of board and lodging and washing, respectable persons have not been found to take the appointments . . . . I apprehend that the system of instruction pursued in the parochial schools is very inefficient”.13 We find that a few months later he wrote to Lord Stanley that he was proposing the formation of a model school at Fredericton, and he inquired if competent persons might not be secured in England to come out in the ensuing spring. He pointed out that the system of instruction must be adapted to a country where the schools included children of all Christian denominations, and he expressed the opinion that if a man and his wife could be found who would be willing to accept £ 200 a year, they would be able to establish a good model school, and with the aid of a local assistant could train ten or twelve females as teachers at a time, to supply the country schools.14 Evidently Colebrooke was shrewd enough to realize that the needs of this small and educationally backward colony could not be adequately met by a sectarian training school, for in this same dispatch he said competent instructors for a model school could be readily obtained through the assistance of the religious societies in England, but he feared that this method might tend to excite jealousy in persons of other denominations. He believed that if the Committee of the Privy Council should procure fit persons for the training school, such teachers would meet with general support. Half a year later Colebrooke, although bitterly disappointed that the Assembly had not provided funds to carry out his plans for training teachers, reiterated his belief in a non-sectarian institution, saying: “A liberal offer was made by the Colonial Church Society to establish a training school here at their own expense but the offer I declined, being of the opinion that such a school if expressly established by a religious society would fail in acquiring that general support from all denominations which would render it extensively useful”. To this he added: “The Madras Schools have on this account been less successful than they might otherwise have been”.15 This determination of Sir William Colebrooke's that New Brunswick's first normal school should be free of denominational control forms an interesting contrast to the Anglican spirit of monopoly which presided as a matter of course at the founding of the College of New Brunswick, and is significant of the changes which time had brought.

The failure of the Assembly to vote money for teacher training caused Sir William not only disappointment but also some embarrassment. The Home Authorities, in response to his request, had engaged a Mr. and Mrs. Dixon to come out for the purpose of taking charge of the proposed model school, and the couple had waited in London for several months for exact instructions from New Brunswick. When the Assembly disappointed Colebrooke by failing to vote the sums necessary to the carrying out of his scheme, the province had to reimburse Mr. and Mrs. Dixon for the loss of their time and expectations.16

In noting the Assembly's hesitation to launch in 1842 a scheme in the interests of educational improvement, involving an annual expenditure of £ 200, we remember that at this time the province was in debt, but we also remember, that five years before, it had had a large credit which the Assembly had frittered away in the meantime. We note, too, that in this colony unable to find funds for a training school the chief official positions were monopolized by a few families, and carried with them salaries disproportionately high. Colebrooke was quite aware of the popular resentment against the Family Compact, and of the reasons for it. In one dispatch he spoke of the “tendency of the prevailing system to render the public service of the province the patrimony of a few colonial families” and went on to say that “when this influence is known to have been so effectually exerted not only in securing the succession of the principal offices in the same families but in preventing a reduction of the undue emoluments attaching to them, it is not surprising that in a season of distress the jealousy of the public should have been more than ordinarily awakened”.17 But Colebrooke also saw that the Assembly was not blameless either. He expressed himself so often and so clearly on the necessity of having executive responsibility for the initiation of money grants that in this connection his successor, Sir Edmund Head, could say in the year 1848: “I believe that the soundness of Sir William Colebrooke's views is beginning to be felt”.18 Colebrooke was Lieutenant-Governor of New Brunswick at a time when the political and financial problems of the province were extremely troublesome. Whatever his administrative errors, credit is due him for his keen interest in the social welfare of a “rugged” people whom he wished to see subdued “to the useful and the good”. One feels that, like Ulysses, he was impatient of “soft degrees”, and one can imagine that he often experienced a sense of frustration. Possibly that was so in 1842. But, although disappointed, he continued to revolve plans aiming at improved educational conditions. We find that in one of the dispatches in which he expressed regret at having had to relinquish the prospect of a model school he suggested that perhaps Mr. and Mrs. Dixon could come out under the auspices of the British Board of Education, with a guarantee for their stipend until funds could be provided in New Brunswick. He pointed out that large funds were raised in England, and parliamentary grants obtained, for the education of the negro population in the West Indies. Considering, said he, the wealth of those colonies “in contrast with the limited resources of these provinces, where so many of the most ignorant and indigent classes of British Emigrants are annually settled”, it was not unreasonable “to hope some assistance may be given in the present depressed state of the local finances in the province for the proper training of a multitude of children on whose character may hereafter depend the preservation of the relations of this Province as a dependency of the Crown”.19 Colebrooke may have seriously thought that this suggestion would be acted on, for a month later he wrote to George Dibblee, Clerk of the Peace for York County, asking him to bring under the consideration of the magistrates the importance of preserving the buildings and grounds of the old jail, at that time vacant, for the establishment of a Central Training School.20 However, a dispatch to Stanley written in August, a few weeks after the letter to Dibblee, indicated that he had given up hope of establishing such an institution in the near future, and explained that the disappointment of the expectations he had formed previous to the last session had arisen from the unlooked for reception by the Assembly of the financial changes which he had proposed.21 It was at this session that Colebrooke, at the request of the Colonial Secretary, had brought before the House the question of the disordered provincial finances,22 and that the absurd amendment, referred to earlier, had been passed by the opponents of reform in support of the old method of making appropriations. It would appear, from Colebrooke's reference, that those who objected to political and financial reforms hindered the establishment of a Normal School because it was proposed by the same man who had suggested the unpopular financial reforms. This means, if Colebrooke diagnosed correctly the reasons for the failure of his Normal School project, that we have found evidence indeed to support our earlier statement that in New Brunswick a question was often judged not by its relation to the public interest but by its connection with individuals.

Continuing with Colebrooke's dispatch of August 12, 1842, we find that to his regrets at the loss of the services of Mr. and Mrs. Dixon he added another regret, namely, that the condition of the common schools should not have been investigated, for “to the enquiries which were prosecuted in Canada may be attributed the facilities with which a reform in the system has been there effected”. He then made the following interesting observation: “As the inhabitants” (of New Brunswick) “possess but limited means of judging by comparison, they are little conscious of the great defects in the schools and of the serious consequences of these on the prospect of the rising generation, which I consider to be a question of national interest”. The example of an efficient model school would, he thought, enable the members of the Legislature and other influential persons to estimate the defects of the present system, and would induce them to apply an early and effectual remedy.23 A letter written a little later reflected Colebrooke's disappointment that such had not yet been done and hinted at some of the difficulties in the way of progress. “So many individual and local influences,” wrote Colebrooke, “impede the adoption of any comprehensive plan that we must, I grieve to think, be satisfied to use our best efforts merely to improve our old paths instead of striking out new ones.” 24

Although the session of 1842 was unproductive of legislation relating to schools, the Assembly did appoint a committee on education, of which Wilmot was chairman. His report to the House declared that the extension of education among all classes was a subject of national and provincial importance; expressed fear that in many rural districts there was an extraordinary degree of apathy among parents and guardians; referred to the necessity of a normal school; and hoped that the subject of assessment would be seriously considered during the recess.25 In addition to this report, the members of the Assembly also had before them, for the first time, reports of the trustees of parish schools. In one report from Charlotte County there occurred this statement: “The poorer classes frequently, from a feeling of false pride, and the notion that they become in a manner Parish paupers by sending their children on the Provincial allowance, leave them to grow up in ignorance; the few of such class who attend have been sought out by the Trustees”.26 Is this not of some significance in relation to our earlier designation of parish schools as institutions for the poor? If the people felt that attendance at the parish schools stigmatized them as paupers, may not that have been because the well-to-do had long considered parish schools as synonymous with pauper schools?27

Another interesting point to be noted in the Trustees' Reports of 1842 occurs in connection with reports from the parishes of Northumberland County. Blissfield Parish reported using “some of the latest improvements which have been made in the method of teaching in the Scottish Juvenile Schools”. Newcastle reported that the system taught was that of the common school system in Scotland, and that the books used chiefly were those published by the Society of Schoolmasters or Murray.28 Evidently teachers from among the Scottish folk of the Miramichi relied on whatever training, experience, and tests they had brought with them from Scotland, but the Trustees' reports do not indicate what particular methods peculiar to Scottish schools were in use on the Miramichi.29

In general, the trustees who reported in 1842 complained of poorly qualified teachers, expressed the opinion that the schools of the country could not be advantageously conducted until a more respectable class of teachers should be procured, and declared that this could not be done without some Central Training School.30 Besides these reports, there was available to the Assembly of 1842 a series of letters to the County Boards of Education, written in 1841 by the Provincial Secretary, W. F. Odell, but inspired by the Lt.-Governor's enthusiasm and desire for information. One of these letters asked the Boards to recommend a better mode of local remuneration to teachers than the existing one of board and washing, and sought the reactions of the county bodies to the possibility of having a house and plot of land attached to each school to assist in the maintenance of the master, and to furnish an opportunity for the instruction of the boys in improved methods of husbandry.31 It is interesting to discover that nearly a hundred years before the school curriculum of New Brunswick was modified to meet the needs of children in rural areas there was talk of teaching agriculture in the schools. The emphasis then, however, seems to have been on the benefits to agriculture, whereas the modern emphasis is social and civic as well as economic. In another letter, Odell said that he had been directed by the Lieutenant-Governor to intimate that the practice of employing females in charge of schools where the children of both sexes were instructed was extending rapidly in England, and that His Excellency wished to be informed if respectable women between the ages of twenty-five and forty could be found to undertake the charge of the parish schools, and would come to Fredericton for the necessary training when the Normal School should be established. A third letter referred to the success of a Normal Training system in England and the West Indies.32

The Journal of 1842 informs us that in addition to these reports and letters another document dealing with education was available for the information of such legislators as had ears to hear. This was a commentary by Alfred Reade, Colebrooke's Secretary, on the Reports of the Trustees. Again the necessity of an institution for training teachers was stressed, and the obstacles in the province, in the way of any plan having in view competency and respectability on the part of teachers, were discussed. The first of these obstacles was the insufficiency and uncertainty in the mode of remuneration. The surest way, said Reade, to lower the value of education in the eyes of the people was to pay teachers a sum inadequate to the wants and necessities of any respectable person. To do this gave the masses the idea that education was of secondary importance since its professors were worse paid than people in any other trade or occupation, and produced a feeling that no one would occupy himself in teaching if he could make his living in any other way. Thus the teacher was regarded as a needy adventurer and his character lowered in the eyes of scholars and parents. Other obstacles were the mode of payment, the variety of text books, the irregular operation of schools, and the ugliness and discomfort of the school buildings. Reade also sympathized with the trustees for the expense, inconvenience, and loss of time which school visitation entailed, and said that the trustees should be allowed travelling expenses. He also expressed uneasiness over the fact that the trustees' reports revealed an absence of all religious in- struction in many schools. Finally, the question raised in the previous autumn in one of Odell's letters, namely, the formation of agricultural schools, received some comment. The Trustees and County Boards of Education generally, Reade thought, did not favor the idea, being under the impression that parents would consider that their children were much better employed on their own farms. In a new country, observed Reade, the value of instruction in improved methods of husbandry was not appreciated.33

Thus we see that although the bulk of the population may have been, as Colebrooke thought, in no position to understand the gravity of the educational situation, the Legislature of 1842 did have before it considerable information which might have prompted immediate action. How thoughtfully all these reports and letters dealing with various aspects of education were read, or listened to, by members of the Assembly we do not know. At any rate, no action was taken during the sessions of 1842 and 1843, which were both agitated by constitutional and financial disputes. But in 1844 the House voted £ 500 to the Lieutenant-Governor, to institute an efficient inspection of the parish schools and all other schools receiving pecuniary aid from the public treasury.34 His Excellency and other advocates of reform were hopeful that the facts such an enquiry might reveal would lead to constructive measures of reform. Colebrooke wrote to Stanley that the inspection was being made with a view to amending the school law which expired in 1845, adding: “At which time I hope that the defects of the schools will be so generally ascertained and acknowledged that local interests will not prevail against the adoption of an improved system, and the establishment of a model and training school which would be an essential preliminary.” 35 Possibly, however, there were individuals who yielded to the Governor's wishes for an enquiry merely because such an investigation would require time, and would, therefore, push further off into the future the necessity of decision on the larger question of a normal school.

The report of the Inspectors, James Brown, S. Z. Earle, and John Gregory, was presented to the Assembly during the session of 1845, and is of considerable length. Later it was published in pamphlet form.

First, the Inspectors noted that the Parish Schools received £ 12,000 annually in the form of Treasury grants. This sum, in comparison with the amount granted for the encouragement of the common schools in the United States and in the Sister Colonies of New Brunswick, was exceedingly generous, but if reports and official documents might be believed, the youth of New Brunswick were far behind theirs in the elementary and useful knowledge upon which the well-being of a free people materially depended.36

Regarding the state of school buildings, the report described some appalling conditions. In one school, in operation for six months, there were no pens, ink, paper, slates, pencils, or desks, Benches were the only furniture, and they were four to six inches too high. In another school, inspected on the eighteenth of November, there were fifteen broken panes of glass, and the children were shivering. Another was apparently the kitchen of a private dwelling. Not more than eight schools, including the Grammar Schools, were provided with even a good-sized map of the world.37

That part of the Inspectors' report dealing with teachers and quality of teaching furnished evidence convincing enough, surely, to impress the most doubting of Thomases with the need of a normal school. A number of the teachers, according to the report, could not dictate words for spelling without hesitation. Many knew neither the names nor the uses of punctuation marks. Some did not profess to teach any Arithmetic, and many who did were very deficient. For instance, several were unable to make up the average attendance of their scholars. The number of those who claimed to give instruction in English Grammar, Geography, Bookkeeping, and Mathematics was great in proportion to the number actually capable of teaching these subjects. Many teachers were reported as not being in the custom of attending to the meaning of what they read, and a number read imperfectly. Of one teacher, who had been seventeen years in a district, the report said: “The teacher's education is defective and his teaching without method”. One teacher did not know the difference between a vowel and a consonant. A number of teachers, (females presumably), were reported as better qualified to teach needlework than any literary branch of school education, being incompetent to teach Spelling, Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic. It was observed in a number of schools that the teachers engaged personally in sewing and knitting. In many schools the pupils read words only, having no idea of the sense or of the punctuation. In many schools Reading and Spelling were the main subjects taught. One teacher claimed that he had lost pupils by insisting on their learning Arithmetic and Writing. In Writing, the disposition was to have the pupils follow set lines. As a consequence they failed to learn punctuation, the commencement of paragraphs, and the use of capital letters.38

While one may doubt the suitability of the Book of Revelations as a reading lesson, nevertheless, the way in which the lesson was handled by one teacher is astonishing indeed. This teacher had selected as a reading lesson the seventh chapter of Revelations, beginning: “And after these things I saw four angels standing on the four corners of the earth, holding the four winds of the earth”. When prompted by the Inspectors, the teacher was unable to tell the children to whom the “I” referred, what it was John saw, and what the angels were said to be doing. The Inspectors were told by a trustee of a school where the teacher had taught before that the pupils there were more deficient after eighteen months than before they entered the school.39 From all these circumstances the Inspectors were forced to conclude that many teachers were incompetent because of lack of scholarship; others had little or no knowledge of human character, and were destitute of the faculty or energy to enable them to enforce obedience, and at the same time retain the goodwill of their pupils; still worse, many lacked the faculty, zeal, or will to communicate instruction in a manner suited to the capacities and conditions of their pupils.40

When discussing the schoolbook question on an earlier page we noted that this board of inspection found a variety of books, but of inadequate number and quality. Frequently the New Testament was used for reading lessons, but mechanically, as in the illustration just given. However, in some cases, where expounding was attempted, the Inspector who commented on the circumstance thought it were better to have none. It was speaking at random, and was no doctrine of which he had ever heard. Religious instruction, he thought, was therefore better left to Sunday Schools and ministers. In many schools the Catechism was recited. Not infrequently the Catechisms of two or three opposing sects were taught in the same school—a source of annoyance to intelligent teachers.41

The reasons listed by the Inspectors for the poor general state of the parish schools were those which the details of their report had revealed, viz., apathy of the people, incompetence of the teachers, the limited amount of that part of the teachers' income derived directly from the people and the unsatisfactory mode of payment, defective apparatus and books, inadequate buildings, and imperfect supervision and control. Among the remedies which the Inspectors suggested was the diffusion of information on the object and power of education, through the increase of professional intelligence of teachers, and the benevolent co-operation of the clergy and the press. They also advocated a training-school in Fredericton that teachers might be instructed in the conduct and management of schools; and a model school, where they might obtain practical experience. If intelligence were to be introduced and maintained in the profession, there must be increased emoluments. The Inspectors hoped that the principle of assessment would soon be adopted, and they recommended the introduction of suitable uniform books. They thought that the powers of the trustees should be expanded, and that provision should be made for an inspection to aid them in their duties. Finally, they suggested that a provincial Board of Education should be constituted of the Governor in Council, with powers to establish a Training School, to recommend books, appoint Inspectors, and prescribe forms of school registers and returns.42

Turning from the Parish Schools to the special schools of the province which were investigated by the Inspectors, we find that these schools received good reports. The Fredericton Infant School, in its third year of operation at the time of the report, was described as experimental so far as the province was concerned, and tribute was paid to Lady Colebrooke and other ladies, whose benevolent exertions were responsible for the origin and principal support of the school. The Inspectors thought that in an educational scheme such a school might be regarded as preparatory, only, to the reception of knowledge, by regu- lating the habits and dispositions of young children.43 We may presume that Lady Colebrooke knew something of the Infant Schools in England, but whether or not she and the ladies who assisted her were acquainted with Pestalozzian ideas, as was Robert Owen, the founder of this type of school,44 we have no way of knowing.

The Inspectors were able to commend the discipline and general efficiency of the Madras Schools, but one of the Inspectors doubted if the pupils derived all the benefits which the system was intended to confer, owing to the practice of the monitors of propounding the appointed questions, reading the answers from the formulae, and afterwards calling on their classes to recite from memory the answers as read.45 Here was one man who realized the mechanical nature of the instruction given in the Madras Schools.

Sackville Academy, which owed its foundation in 1842 to the philanthropy and Methodist zeal of Charles F. Allison, was given a good report by James Brown, the Inspector who visited that young institution. He mentioned particularly the oral instruction and use of maps which he found in practice, and also the fact that the pupils were accustomed to putting their own geometry figures and arithmetic exercises on the board, and demonstrating them. He concluded that the Wesleyan Academy was, perhaps, the very best educational institution in the province.46

For some reason the Baptist Seminary at Fredericton was overlooked by the examiners, although, like the Wesleyan Academy and the Church of England Madras Schools, it received a provincial grant. However, the compiler of the Abstract stated that it was examined in the course of the year by Messrs. the Honorable Saunders and Wilmot and the Reverend Mr. Brooke, and had received a favorable report. The granting of provincial aid to this school seems to have set a kind of precedent for legislative aid to denominational schools other than Anglican. Evidently the Baptists had had to fight custom and Church of England monopoly in order to get the financial support they finally did receive, for an item in the Chatham Gleaner of April 2, 1839, told of the meeting of the New Brunswick Baptist Educational Society at Fredericton, and their protest against the continued rejection of an appeal for a grant to their seminary. The grant, the item went on to say, was passed each year in the House of Assembly, but was rejected by the Legislative Council on the grounds that their principle was against giving money in aid of religious or literary institutions for the dissemination of their own peculiar tenets. The article proceeded to deny that the Baptist Seminary taught Baptist tenets, and pointed out that the province annually bestowed £ 2200 on King's College, although it was Episcopalian, and £ 400 a year on the Madras Schools, although they taught the Anglican Catechism.47 Finally, in 1842, the Council gave way, and the Baptist Seminary was granted the sum of £ 250.48

Thereafter, for many years, this institution received an annual grant, and from that time forward we find a particularly large variety of schools, many of them denominational, receiving provincial aid. While this was distinctly fairer than the earlier custom of subsidizing Anglican institutions and ignoring others, it furnishes another illustration of the haphazard way in which the Assembly appropriated the public money for local and sectional uses, and shows that the idea that state aid should mean a measure, at least, of state supervision and control developed but slowly in New Brunswick. However, one must admit that in this connection New Brunswick had company, for we are told that in America the colonial practice of granting public subsidies to educational institutions more or less under the control of religious groups was not abandoned until the middle of the nineteenth century.49

While the Inspection instituted in 1844 was supposed to cover all schools receiving provincial aid, for some reason the Inspectors limited their report on the Grammar Schools to a few brief paragraphs. But in 1846 a committee of the House, consisting of Brown, Earle, Rankine, Wilmot, and Wark, was appointed, and their more lengthy report on these schools was presented to the Assembly during the session. If anything, the Grammar Schools were criticized more severely than had been the Parish Schools. The Inspectors said that undoubtedly the intention of the Legislature, in endowing the Grammar Schools, had been to establish a superior school for each county, wherein might be taught those higher branches of learning not available in the ordinary schools. The Inspectors were therefore surprised, they said, to find that the endowment of £ 100 per annum had been drawn for the support of several Grammar Schools which were not conducted according to the intention of the Legislature, and were actually inferior to many of the Parish Schools. Figures were submitted in the report showing that in seven Grammar Schools of the province only a few pupils were being instructed in the branches of education specified in the Grammar School Act of 1829. Only the Grammar Schools of Saint John and Northumberland Counties were reported as being in an efficient state. To remedy the existing evils the Inspectors recommended immediate legislation. Under the law, as it was, the only requirement for obtaining the provincial grant was that the trustees certify there was a school house, a competent master, and £ 50 subscribed by the inhabitants. A number of amendments were now suggested relating to average attendance, number of pupils enrolled in the higher branches, and masters' and trustees' reports, suggestions all designed to elevate the standard of the Grammar Schools, with a threat of forfeiture of part of the grant if efficiency were not maintained.50 At last the idea was evolving in connection with even those favored institutions, the Grammar Schools, that financial support should entail supervision and responsibility for efficiency.

One cannot read the school reports of 1845 and 1846 without a feeling of curiosity about general intellectual conditions throughout New Brunswick one hundred years ago. Was the depressed state of education in particular but one facet of a society insensitive to things cultural, or had the school system, ossified by custom and tradition, and weighted with the indifference of certain sections of the population, merely failed to catch up with a nascent, yet vigorous, intellectual life? From such investigation of the subject as has been possible in this study, an affirmative to both questions cannot be entirely rejected. Indifference to education can hardly be interpreted as anything else but an indication of a society culturally poor because of economic stringencies, geographical isolation, or materialistic ideals. We observed earlier that much of New Brunswick society was still in the pioneer stage during this period, or was barely emerging from it. Generally speaking, the material aspects of civilization are the first to commend themselves to a society just beginning to reach out beyond bare existence toward richer living, while the cultural graces and adornments, totally neglected during the pioneer stage, are slow to gain appreciation, especially appreciation in the form of any considerable expenditure of that material wealth which may have come to be regarded as the symbol of progress. There will always be individual exceptions to this, of course, and even national exceptions, Scotland being a case in point, but it does seem that in New Brunswick, whatever the reasons, the great bulk of the population, rural and urban, was characterized by intellectual lethargy.

On the other hand, there were certain elements in the provincial society with which such books, music, and lectures as were available found acceptance. One thinks of the capital, centre of the official and Family Compact classes, but we are told that official life at Fredericton, as at Halifax, was gay, rather than intellectual,51 due to the entertainments of the royal Governors and the presence of military officers who imparted “a degree of taste, etiquette and gentlemanly deportment.” 52 In 1830, however, there was a subscription library, offering a variety of entertaining and standard works,53 and always the presence of King's College contributed an intellectual tone. Yet, in truth, that institution, graduating a scanty number of students annually at what seemed to the province a great cost, seems to have stood rather aloof in an academic world of its own, blindly preparing, it may be, to help nourish that later curious flowering which has made the names of Roberts and Carman known throughout Canada. Of the professors at King's in the forties and fifties, James Robb appears to have made the greatest contribution to the life of the province. He was for many years connected with the Fredericton Athanaeum,54 a literary and scientific society. In 1849, encouraged by Lieutenant-Governor Sir Edmund Head, he gave a course of lectures in Fredericton on agricultural chemistry.55 In 1850 he took the leading responsibility for a Provincial Society for the encouragement of agriculture, and in this connection visited many parts of the province and gave many lectures.56 At considerable expenditure of time he compiled in 1849 an Almanac, in which he inserted much information about the province, such as tables of tidal changes, rates of duty, revenue returns, and lists of the executive and legislative departments of the government. In the preface to this work he declared: “In a colony like this, where as yet food for the mind is but scantily supplied, care ought to be taken that the poor settler, who often has no other library than his Bible and his almanac, should find in the latter something more nourishing than the chaff of Astrology, Alchemy and Divination”.57 In 1851 he prepared a scientific work in the form of lessons in elementary chemistry and botany. We do not find, however, that this was adopted as a text, as was Professor Johnston's Catechism of Agricultural Chemistry.58 In noting that Sir Edmund Head, when thanking Robb for this “paper of utility”, ventured to wonder if it were not beyond the comprehension of children in the common schools,59 we feel like suggesting that it was probably beyond the understanding of many of the teachers as well. On the other hand, although it may have been used but little in the schools at the time, it must have added to the sum-total of influences which, more and more, were directing attention to the new world opened up by science.

We have already noted that Gesner and Johnston contributed to the scientific knowledge of New Brunswick. Doubtless other transients in the province did too. To what degree the shipping merchants and lumber kings contributed to provincial learning and culture is not readily apparent. Since they were able to send their children abroad, or to educate them at home by means of private tutors, it is not surprising that they do not seem to have agitated themselves over the poor state of the common schools. We are tempted to think that, as “quality”, living in semi-manorial state after the fashion of Joseph Cunard on the Miramichi,60 the majority afforded to the rank and file pleasing glimpses of an enviable world of comfort and elegance, rather than one of learning and literary culture. It may, however, be no coincidence that during the heyday of the lumber industry on the Miramichi the Northumberland County Grammar School was well reported, there were several advertisements of ambitious-sounding private schools, and the Miramichi Gleaner could report a number of intellectual and social activities. There was a Young Men's Debating Society in Chatham in 1837, scheduled to discuss at one of its meetings three features of the British Constitution—the liberty of the press, representation of the people in parliament, and trial by jury. We note a Dancing Academy in Newcastle in 1837, a course of phrenological lectures in Chatham in 1841, a singing class in 1844—terms ten shillings a quarter—and a Mechanics' Institute in 1846, which included the Honorable Joseph Cunard as a member of its body corporate.61

With the introduction of the subject of Mechanics' Institutes we must turn our attention again to Britain, since those institutions came to New Brunswick from the Mother Country, where the slow development of the idea of state-supported education for all provided ample scope for a motley of educational agencies.

The earliest movement towards special institutions for the industrial classes was philanthropic,62 but other influences obtained besides that philanthropy which had promoted as many religious and educational societies during the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Since the exploitation of humanity which had accompanied the Industrial Revolution provided even wider opportunities, than earlier, for measures designed to ameliorate the lot of unfortunates, the philanthropic aspect of Mechanics' Institutes cannot be completely discounted, but there were other aspects. The Industrial Revolution had focused attention on men, not only as human beings, but also as workers, whose efficiency might be increased through knowledge, particularly scientific knowledge. Besides this, the trend towards political democracy was emphasizing more and more the potential power of the masses, and the expediency of educating them for active citizenship. Thus the doctrine of education for all, formerly only the dream of philosophers and idealists, began to appear in the light of a practical safeguard, both social and national.

The history of the Mechanics' Institute can be traced from Birmingham and Glasgow. In the former city a Sunday Society was formed in 1789, for the purpose of keeping the members of the Sunday School together by means of lectures in mechanics and physical education. The Glasgow Mechanics' Institute was established in 1823, having grown out of lectures given by Birkbeck to meet the needs of the artisan classes. Shortly after, London and Manchester had similar institutions, and by 1850 there were 610 literary and mechanics' associations throughout Britain. The movement met with great enthusiasm, but we are told that it is doubtful if the Institutes always attracted the people for whom they were intended. Obviously, the artisan and lower classes lacked the educational foundation to profit by the institutions; in many cases the lectures must have been over their heads, and the fees for membership and classes beyond their means.63

In New Brunswick, the majority of such Institutes were, of necessity, in small towns and villages. We may suppose, therefore, that the benefits were mainly social, moral, and in the interests of general education, rather than of assistance to industry. Several of the Institutes seem to have been associated with Temperance Societies, which were becoming popular at this time as part of the temperance movement which was sweeping the New England States. Records indicate that the earliest Mechanics' Institute in New Brunswick was the “Hillsborough Temperance Hall and Mechanics' Institute”, for the purpose of disseminating temperance principles, and instructing mechanics in the different branches of science. In 1839 the Mechanics Institute of Saint John was incorporated, and in a few years there were groups at Chatham, Hampton, Dorchester, Woodstock, Newcastle, and other points.64

From the reports of the Saint John Institute—the largest in the province—and from the titles and nature of the lectures delivered there, we can gain some idea of the aims and benefits of the movement in New Brunswick. An early report by the Board of Directors attributed to the authorities of enlightened and civilized countries, particularly Great Britain, a keen desire to promote the cultivation of the arts and sciences, and deduced that in British Colonies the spirit of the Mother Country would naturally extend itself. In any country, said the report, where Collegiate and Academy instruction could not become general, any system whereby useful information was given to all classes must be of the highest importance to the welfare and prosperity of the country, especially when the instruction given was calculated to act immediately upon the daily occupations of the several trades. The report acknowledged the avidity with which the humbler classes sought knowledge when it was offered at their very doors, and declared, significantly, that it was not necessary today to bring forward evidence of the importance of education to all orders of men. Facts were then submitted relating to the establishment and meeting-places of the society, which in 1841 numbered 560 on its membership roll. In view of the expense of the new hall the Legislature was solicited for a grant of £ 800. The report concluded with a tribute to the moral benefits of the Institute in providing a place of recreation for tradesmen, who used to spend their evenings in idle games or criminal indulgence, but were now attracted by the beauties of science and were daily becoming acquainted with those branches of knowledge upon which their prosperity and happiness mainly depended.65 In response to the plea for financial aid the Legislature granted £ 500.66

From the catalogue of the St. John Institute library, containing the constitution and rules, we learn that an entrance fee of 10s. and a yearly subscription of 15s. were required for membership. Members were entitled to vote at general meetings, were eligible for office in the Institute, had the use of the library and reading-room, might visit the Museum of Curiosities, and attend the annual course of lectures which were given gratuitously on literary and scientific subjects by qualified gentlemen. In the interests of harmony questions involving religious and political controversy were inadmissable at any meeting.67 Press reports of various dates inform us that such literary subjects as “The Common School System of New England”, “The Old World and the New”, “The Press”, and “State Support in Religion” were lecture topics, and in science the mysteries of heat, light, gas illumination, and electricity formed subjects of addresses. We note that on several occasions lecturers used their opportunities to recommend taxation for schools,68 or to correct misconceptions concerning such a method of school support.69

It may be that lectures were sometimes delivered for the self-display of the speakers or for the edification of the learned sponsors of the programme, but, on the whole, Mechanics' Institutes, as an early form of adult education, contributed to the social and intellectual life of the communities where they functioned. From the standpoint of the development of educational theory, the establishment of such associations was significant as illustrative of the growth of the idea of education for all classes. The Saint John body continued until 1890,70 but long before that date the majority of Mechanics' Institutes in the province seem to have lapsed, or deteriorated into literary or temperance societies, or mere social clubs.

If we may take the community described in Mrs. Beavan's interesting little book, “Pioneer Life in New Brunswick”, as a typical section of New Brunswick one hundred years ago, we must conclude that there was little, aside from the services of the church, to stimulate the thinking of country people at that time. Actually this particular area on the lower Saint John must have been above the average, for it started a library. Speaking of this, Mrs. Beavan wrote: “The dwellers of America are more enlightened now than in those old times when dancing and feasting were the sole amusements, so a library was instituted and formed by the same means as the church had been—a load of potatoes, or a barrel of buckwheat being given by each party to purchase books with . . . . Aught that bore the name of Chambers had a place in our collection, and the busy fingers of the little Edinburgh 'devils' have brightened the solitude of many a home on the banks of the Washademoak.” 71 Incidentally, Mrs. Beavan's remarks on education were corroborative of the Report of 1845. She referred to the evils of “boarding around”. The teacher had no fixed home, no place for his books, no chance to study, “for the log-house filled with children and wheels is no fit abode for a student”. The master, moreover, might well hesitate to correct a child in school if he was to meet sour looks and a poor supper at the end of the day. Sometimes female teachers, Mrs. Beavan said, paid for their board in some quiet home out of their cash salary, and gave up that which they could otherwise claim from the people.72 In commenting on attitudes to education, Mrs. Beavan observed that even when parents were anxious for 'larning' for their children, they had not yet enough of it to appreciate the value of an education. “The schoolmaster”, she added, “is not yet regarded as the mightiest moral agent of the earth and in this country, where operative power is certain wealth, he who can neither wield an axe or scythe may be looked on with a slight shade of contempt.” 73

From these scattered glimpses of New Brunswick life at the middle of the last century, we arrive at the tentative conclusion that, culturally, society was largely uncultivated, but by no means everywhere content to be so. Here and there were little pockets, veins, and layers of spiritual soil either ripe for the planting of culture or already nourishing a modest growth. This means that in addition to the Lieutenant-Governors and enlightened reformers and legislators like Wilmot and Brown, besides interested parents like John Gregory, besides the clergy and the press, there were many people, less vocal and less in the public eye than these, who were anxious to see the status of teachers raised, the common schools improved, and the educational experiments and achievements of other countries given such trial as the province could afford to make. Supporters in the Assembly, as well as opponents of the school legislation of 1846, 1847, and 1852, had a backing therefore, in the province at large.

The first of the legislative measures which resulted from the school inspections of 1845 and 1846 was in reference to the Grammar Schools. A number of interesting speculations occur to us when we consider why an act was passed relating to these schools before legislation was framed to establish a Normal School, and to improve the Parish Schools. First of all, there is the old suspicion that these schools had the support of powerful interests. The Church of England, by reason of an act amending the charter of King's College,74 was beginning to lose its control of that institution, but there is evidence that its grip was still strong on at least some of the Grammar Schools, even after the Act of 1846. We find that among the criticisms of the Grammar School at Saint John which were set forth in an Editorial in the Courier in 1852, the complaint was made that the constitution of the Board of Directors was unpopular, because it was too sectarian.75 A few months before this, the Courier had published a letter from “An Admirer of its Principles”, asking if the College and Grammar Schools were to remain as “class seminaries” for the benefit of a few, yet supported out of funds provided by the many. The writer went on to say that the Grammar Schools did not meet the wants of the Community, and, right or wrong, were regarded as “class schools, mere appendages to the College at Fredericton, or designed to be such”. That they were under Episcopalian influence was all too apparent, said the critic. The letter concluded with the statement that if it was expected that parents of all denominations should support the Grammar Schools, then everything within and around them that savoured of sectarianism must be removed.76 In view of these charges, it may be that Anglican and Family Compact influences turned the first attention of the Legislature to the Grammar Schools. There is a flaw in this argument, however, for when institutions operate in the interests of any group, that group naturally wishes them to remain as they are. It is possible, therefore, that the Grammar School Act of 1846 was sponsored by those persons who opposed Anglican and Family Compact influences, but if this were so, why was it that in 1852, six years after the Act, those influences were still strong enough to give rise to the complaints we have just noted? Perhaps the simplest explanation of the priority given to Grammar School legislation at this time lies in the fact that the recent inspection had revealed the woeful extent to which many of these schools were masquerading as secondary schools. When, therefore, at this same session James Brown introduced a measure for the establishment of a Normal School,77 some of the members who helped to defeat it may have felt that the reform of the Grammar Schools should come first. Others may have found in legislation relating to the Grammar Schools an excuse for postponing the controversial question of a training school. Moreover, the session of 1846 was much occupied with railway legislation, the question of a retiring pension to Judge Botsford, and a discussion of the Lieutenant-Governor's action in expending money from the surplus civil list without the consent of the Legislature.78 Then, too, this was the last session of the existing House, so that members may have had an eye to the safety of their seats. Consequently, it was easier, and perhaps more expedient, to amend the Grammar Schools than to launch a plan which seemed costly and revolutionary to many people. Finally, resentment engendered against Lieutenant- Governor Colebrooke, because of his action in 1845 in appointing his English son-in-law, Alfred Reade, to the office of Provincial Secretary, may have again helped to postpone Colebrooke's cherished project, even although the Assembly was itself partly to blame for Colebrooke's mistake.79 One wonders if Gesner may not have had this whole episode in mind when he wrote in 1847: “It is a common remark in this Province and Nova Scotia that it is vain to cultivate the higher branches of learning, so long as the Home Government bestows the principal offices and best pecuniary situations in the Colonies to persons from the Mother Country, who are sent out to fill them. That this feeling has operated against education there can be no doubt.” 80 This statement may not be very significant, for the feeling referred to may have been used as a mere excuse for educational backwardness resulting from other causes. If so, the excuse became invalid when Lord Stanley, after the Reade episode, conceded that public offices should be filled from among the natives or settled inhabitants of the Province.81

The Act of 1846, in amendment of the laws in force relating to Grammar Schools, enacted that in every Grammar School there should be an average number of fifteen scholars over ten years of age in daily attendance, and that there should be taught, in addition to Orthography, Reading, Writing, Arithmetic, English Grammar, Geography, and English Composition, such advanced subjects as Ancient and Modern History, Natural History, Natural Philosophy, Mathematics, the use of globes, and the Latin and Greek languages. The teachers were to keep a register of the daily attendance and to make a return to the Trustees twice a year. The Trustees were to inspect the school at least every six months, and to incorporate in the teacher's report information about the teacher, the books and apparatus, the branches of education taught, the size and fitness of the building, the suitability of the furniture, the nature and extent of the religious instruction, the mode of discipline, the manner of teaching, and the general condition of the school. This report and the teacher's register were to be forwarded semi-annually to the Provincial Secretary for the information of the Government. If any school appeared deficient of the prescribed requirements, the Lieutenant-Governor, on the advice of his Council, might reduce the annual allowance to such Grammar School to a minimum of £ 50. This threat was significant as showing an assumption of supervision by an authority higher than the local Board of Directors, who, through incompetence or lack of interest, had allowed many of the Grammar Schools to fall far short of the responsibilities imposed on them by the Act of 1829.82 Not until 1861, however, was this supervision strengthened further by placing the Grammar Schools under the Board of Education, while the Parish Schools were supervised by the Board of Education after 1847, and inspected by official inspectors after 1852. Thus until 1861 the Grammar Schools remained largely under local management and supervision.

In the election of 1846 three vigorous proponents of political reform were elected, Wilmot, Fisher, and Ritchie, but on the whole the temper of the Legislature of 1847, in its opposition to drastic changes, differed little from that of the previous House.83 Wilmot remarked in the course of the session that “little countries make little mechanics and little statesmen”.84 The actual occasion of the remark was a discussion on intercolonial trade restrictions, but, taken out of its context, the observation is not devoid of general significance. However, although the Legislature was not yet ready to deal seriously with the assessment principle in relation to education, it could hardly evade any longer the subject of provision for teacher training, especially in the light of the report of 1845 and of the Lieutenant-Governor's warning that the country would suffer irretrievable loss, if timely provision were not made for the training of teachers and the regulation and inspection of Parish Schools.85 Moreover, it was obvious that the influx in 1846 and 1847 of large numbers of destitute and largely illiterate Irish immigrants had increased the task of education and rendered imperative the establishment of more, and better, schools.

The Parish School Act of 1847 was drafted by James Brown and chiefly supported in the House by Wilmot and Brown.86 Its chief provisions dealt with a Training and Model School to be established by a newly con- stituted Board of Education. We have noted that for some years previous to this act the doctrines of central supervision and pedagogic training had been advocated in New Brunswick, among those who were pressing for reforms, and we have observed the part played by Lieutenant-Governor Colebrooke in the circulation and popularization of the idea of a Normal School, but in our absorption with provincial affairs we have neglected to note the development of these principles in those wider fields from which influences gradually filtered, directly or indirectly, into New Brunswick.

While here and there, mostly in Prussia, there were a few Teachers' Seminaries before the time of Pestalozzi, it was not until he had made his contribution that there was anything worth training teachers for, since children learned from books, often books in the form of a Catechism, and the teacher merely heard the memorized answers.87 In various schools, and later at Yverdon, Pestalozzi drew about him other teachers interested in improving instruction, and his Institute became the first modern normal school.88

We have seen that Prussian pedagogues had shown great enthusiasm for Pestalozzi's methods, and that the Prussian state, as part of a process of national regeneration, had created vernacular schools, had reorganized and redirected secondary education, had founded the University of Berlin, and had established a number of Teachers' Seminaries or Normal Schools. Other countries were slower in assuming state control, although in Revolutionary France the State definitely took over the control of education from the Church, and philosophers and enthusiasts formulated many plans to provide for the educational needs of the common people. In 1802, that organizing genius, Napoleon, appointed a Director of Public Instruction to draw up an organizing law. This law made secondary and special education the function of the state, but left primary education to the communes to be provided as they saw fit, such primary schools as were established to be, however, under the supervision of the central authority. In 1810 a Superior Normal School began to offer a two-year course to graduates of the Lycées or secondary schools. During the Restoration period from 1815 to 1830, this system of public instruction continued almost unchanged, except that a number of elementary normal schools were created. In the reign of Louis Philippe, thinkers such as Thiers and Guizot turned their attention to the extension downward of the system of public instruction, and in 1831 Victor Cousin was sent to Prussia to study and report on the whole system of elementary education, teacher training, and administration, which had done so much for Prussia. On the basis of Cousin's report, the Law of 1833 made the maintenance of primary schools obligatory on every commune; provided for higher primary schools in towns and cities, additional normal schools, and a corps of Inspectors; and required of primary teachers normal training and state certification. This, in brief, was the state of educational organization in France in 184889 when New Brunswick opened its first Normal School. New Brunswick, however, was destined to move forward between that date and 1870, while France was to experience 'reaction' in education, as well as in government, during that interval.

Before we turn our attention to developments elsewhere, we should note two features of both the French and Prussian systems. First, although in both Prussia and France the state assumed a large degree of control and supervision of the common schools, it gave them little financial aid. In France the communes were responsible for these schools,90 and in Germany, not until the twentieth century did the State contribute substantially to the expenses of public education.91 This was in contrast with New Brunswick, where the state gave comparatively generous aid long before it exercised supervision and control. Secondly, the democratic ideas of Revolutionary thinkers in France, and of liberal minded educational leaders in Prussia, failed to prevail against the influence of caste. In Germany, the Volksschules were designed to create an intelligent, patriotic, but obedient rank and file, while the other schools were for the official and directing class of society.92 As for France, we are told that the system of primary education established by the Law of 1833 was intended to serve the needs of an inferior social and political class.93 In both France and Germany there were but few transfer points from the schools for the masses to the schools for the leaders.

England was influenced neither by the extreme nationalism which moved the German people nor by the romantic liberalism of French Revolutionary philosophers. It did have to yield, however, to the influences of the Industrial Revolution and the political changes which followed. After the Reform Bill of 1832, the state began to recognize the expediency of educating its masters, the people, but the question was: “By what means?” Nonconformists and the advocates of a national system rejected the idea of Church control. On the other hand, state control and maintenance implied a secular system, and this all creeds rejected. Private munificence had helped in the spread of education, but, at best, it could be only a limited and precarious means of providing education on a national scale. Compromise was inevitable. The State gave aid, but distributed it through existing religious and philanthropic societies. In 1832 the Government appropriated £ 20,000 for grants to the National School Society and the British and Foreign School Society. In 1839, following the report of a Select Committee on Education, a Committee of the Privy Council on Education was created to superintend the application of grants. The President of this Council, Dr. Kay-Shuttleworth, wished to establish teacher-training Colleges where the religious instruction should be non-sectarian, but the National Society opposed this so bitterly that the Committee gave up the plan and distributed appropriations between the two great Societies, for the establishment of training colleges.94 These Societies had a number of training in- stitutions already, as part of the system of monitorial instruction in which they specialized. When, however, the Committee of Council insisted on the right of inspecting the schools to which grants were given, and began to lay down the conditions on which aid should be granted, the thin edge of the wedge of state control was inserted.

As the mechanical character of the monitorial system came to be recognized, Dr. Kay-Shuttleworth advocated as a substitute the pupil-teacher system of Holland. In 1846 a Minute of the Committee of Council made provision for a supply of pupil-teachers who were to be apprenticed to schoolmasters, and to be given special instruction over a long period by them. Each pupil-teacher was to receive a stipend, increasing with length of service, and each master a stated sum for each pupil instructed.95

In 1847 Lord Macaulay, defending in Parliament a Minute of the Committee of Council proposing the nationalization of education, declared that it was the duty of the state to provide for the education of the common people as an exercise of self-protection, and warned of dangers if progressive tendencies were not heeded. So strongly entrenched, however, was the voluntary system, and so little did the English people know or heed progress elsewhere that further action of significance had to wait until after the passage of the Reform Bill of 1867.96

When Colebrooke, as Governor of an English colony, applied to the Mother Country for assistance in the promotion of a Normal School, he was applying to a country which, as we have seen, had as yet no state system of education and no state normal schools. However, Dr. Kay-Shuttleworth, as we have noted, favored non-sectarian training schools. In 1844 when the Colonial Secretary referred to Kay-Shuttleworth some of Colebrooke's correspondence on the question of a training school, Kay-Shuttleworth wrote a letter, which, although containing no very profound opinions, was in definite encouragement of Colebrooke's idea.97 Moreover, the Imperial Authorities were doubtless quite aware of the fact that in New Brunswick the question of a state normal school was not complicated as in England by the rivalries of strongly entrenched religious and educational societies. As far as can be seen, the Colonial Office and the Committee of the Privy Council seem to have been ready to co-operate in obtaining a headmaster for whatever kind of normal school the provincial authorities might see fit to establish, but not to the extent of paying part of the master's stipend. Colebrooke again, as in 1842, suggested that since so many immigrants from the United Kingdom would profit by the schools of New Brunswick, Her Majesty's Government might, until 1850, augment the grant of the New Brunswick Assembly in order that the services of a person of superior qualifications should be secured,98 but this request, as before, went unheeded.

From observations by Colebrooke and by the Inspectors in the report of 1845, we may conclude that there were persons in New Brunswick who had some knowledge of educational developments in the United States. The problem of educational organization in America was not so much the harmonizing of Church schools and old educational foundations with a new state system as it was that of awakening interest in education and arousing willingness to pay for it.99 Without a Prussian monarch to impose a compulsory system for reasons of state, the idea of universal free education had to be evolved gradually, in a democratic manner, under the leadership of men and women with vision and patience.100 As in England, a number of semi-private philanthropic agencies, such as the Sunday Schools, the Lancastrian movement, and Infant School Societies, by founding schools helped to build up an interest in education. Gradually various political, social, and economic forces produced conditions which made state, rather than church, control and support of education desirable and expedient. The growth of manufacturing and of cities made the task of education too great for the home, the church, and philanthropic societies. Eventually, too, the spirit of the Declaration of Independence became partially realized in Jacksonian democracy, and resulted in full manhood suffrage in all the states. By 1825 democracy in the United States had arrived at a stage not reached in Britain until 1867. Public men, labor unions, Governors, began to urge the establishment of tax-supported schools. By 1850, non-sectarian, tax-supported, state directed common schools had become an actuality in almost every Northern State.101

While we cannot concern ourselves here with the details of the struggle for this achievement, it is impossible to overlook the work of Horace Mann and Henry Barnard. The former, as Secretary of the first State Board of Education in Massachusetts (1837), annually organized a campaign to explain to people the importance of general education. It may be said that “he not only started a great common school revival in Massachusetts which led to the regeneration of the schools there, but one which was felt and which influenced development in every Northern State . . . . No one did more than he to establish in the minds of the American people the conception that education should be universal, non-sectarian, and free, and that its aim should be social efficiency, civic virtue, and character, rather than mere learning or the advancement of sectarian ends”.102 Equally important for Connecticut and Rhode Island was the work of Henry Barnard.103 Both Mann and Barnard were closely associated with the spread of the normal school idea. The first state Normal School in the United States opened in Massachusetts in 1839. In a short time two others opened in the same state. Horace Mann's support of the Normal School idea had much to do with the success of these institutions. By 1860, there were eleven state and six private Normal Schools in eight of the American states. Closely related were the Teachers' Institutes organized by Henry Barnard in Connecticut in 1839 to offer summer courses for teachers in service.104 For these Institutes Barnard devised a travelling model school to give demonstrations in the art of teaching.105

It has been said that the educational reforms achieved in the United States by 1850 were in method and expansion rather than in spirit.106 Of necessity, both Mann and Barnard were practical organizers and evangelists, rather than theorists, but they were familiar with the newest and best theories of their day. Barnard had spent two years, (1835 - 1837), in Europe, studying schools, especially the work of Pestalozzi's disciples.107 He published the first American account of Froebel's kindergarten and translated the writings of Comenius, Rousseau, and Pestalozzi for the use of teachers.108 Mann studied the educational value of physiology and hygiene, supported the introduction of music, opposed the use of harsh school discipline, and visited Europe “in the search for germinal ideas”.109 Cousin's report on Prussian education was translated and widely read in the United States, and its principles adapted to American needs, when Horace Mann became Secretary of the Massachusetts Board of Education.110

Before concluding this brief sketch of some of the educational advances made in the United States previous to 1850, we should note that advocates of agricultural and technical instruction had appeared, and several experiments along those lines had been made with private funds. There was also the growth of interest in the special training of defectives and delinquents. In short, “every essential feature of modern public education was either worked out or fairly anticipated in the United States by the middle of the nineteenth century”.111 In these developments, America borrowed from other countries but did not slavishly copy. While American reformers learned much from a study of Prussian pedagogy, and profited greatly by the example of efficient German administration, they rejected the rigidity and regimentation of the Prussian system as totally out of harmony with the democratic ideal of America.112 Moreover, in contrast with the English and German two-class systems, secondary education was regarded as a continuation of elementary education, and not as the peculiar perquisite of the higher classes113in other words, the basic lines of development were laid for an educational ladder, complete from the primary grades to the university.

What Horace Mann did for New England, Egerton Ryerson did for Upper Canada, or Canada West, as it was called after 1841. As in New Brunswick, early education in Upper Canada was controlled by the Anglican Church and served the interests of an exclusive Family Compact group. Dissenters, to escape the Anglican monopoly of culture, were driven to establish sectarian colleges of their own, and to agitate for a state-supported, non-sectarian system of common school education.114 Among those most interested in the question of the Clergy Reserves were the Methodists under the leadership of their eloquent preacher and editor, Egerton Ryerson. The views of this denomination on political questions were so displeasing to the Family Compact that more than once Bishop Strachan accused them of having preachers who were ignorant men, and of American origin and sympathies.115 When the Methodist Conference in 1831 sent a memorial to the King refuting certain statements made by Bishop Strachan, the Governor, Sir John Colborne, read them a lecture, accused their preachers of secular interference, and told them pointedly: “The system of Education which has produced the best and ablest men in the United Kingdom will not be abandoned here to suit the limited views of the leaders of Societies who perhaps have neither experience nor judgment to appreciate the value or advantages of a liberal education”.116 When, however, the Rebellion of 1837, Durham's Report, and the Union Act of 1841 had cleared the way for the development of a non-sectarian state system of education, Ryerson was made the first Superintendent in 1844. Having visited other countries, and having studied the best features of the existing systems in New York, Massachusetts, Ireland, and Germany, Ryerson proceeded to reconstruct the provincial system, but without sacrificing provincial individuality. 117 At the time when Ryerson took office there were a number of model schools in the province, but these made no provision for training in the art of teaching—they were merely better schools. In 1847 he succeeded in having the Toronto Normal School founded.118 When, therefore, New Brunswick educational reformers looked to Canada West in 1847, they saw there the basis of a splendid system of elementary education, with a non-political permanent official as its executive head, the assessment principle for the support of schools in operation on a voluntary basis, and a system of teacher training definitely established. Everywhere Ryerson, like Horace Mann, was inspiring enthusiasm for education and arousing a willingness to pay for it.

On an evening in 1845 when the hall of the Mechanics' Institute of Saint John was the scene of a lecture on Education by the Reverend Mr. Wishart, those present heard the speaker commend the results in Nova Scotia of two things—the establishment of a central educational body and the use of a tax on property for the support of schools.119

The province of Nova Scotia resembled New Brunswick more than did any of the countries whose educational conditions we have briefly examined. In size the two provinces were nearly equal, and in geographical features and economic history there were many points of likeness. In Nova Scotia too, as in New Brunswick, the Anglican Church had attempted to control education, and the ruling classes favored the English system of private schools for the well-to-do and assisted schools for the poor. But Nova Scotia's population included two elements which, while not lacking in New Brunswick, in that province exercised much less influence. These were pre-Revolutionary New England stock and Scottish immigrants in sufficiently large numbers to stamp the life of the whole province. Perhaps for these reasons the champions of a public school system, who favored the education of rich and poor side by side “in true democratic fashion” and looked for inspiration to the examples of Scotland and Massachusetts, 120 obtained for the assessment principle an early place on the statute books, as we have already observed, and contrived to keep it there. However, since it was only permissive, its use was infrequent, and in 1832 there was a retreat when an enactment prohibited taxation for schools without the approval of the General Sessions of the Peace, and a two-thirds majority of the inhabitants of the local area.121 In 1838 a Committee of the Assembly studied the educational systems of Scotland, Massachusetts, and Prussia, but, although recognizing the virtues of all of these, concluded that the people of Nova Scotia were not yet ready for compulsory assessment, free schools, and adequate teacher-training.122 In the hostility of the people of Nova Scotia to compulsory contributions for schools, and in the hesitancy of the Legislature, we find a marked resemblance to New Brunswick attitudes. Similarly, too, the teachers of Nova Scotia were poorly paid and often incompetent. Actually, progress in the two provinces proceeded at much the same rate. Nova Scotia achieved a Chief Superintendent in 1850, while New Brunswick established the same office in 1852. In the matter of a Normal School, New Brunswick was first, Nova Scotia not establishing such an institution until 1854. One possible explanation of this delay lies in the existence in Nova Scotia of a number of schools which served as partial substitutes for a provincial Normal School, or vied with each other for provincial aid in training teachers. Among these was an Academy at Boulardarie, opened in 1839 on the principles of the Glasgow Normal School by Alexander and Mrs. Munro, emissaries from that school. Not long afterwards, the management of the Royal Acadian School at Halifax petitioned the Assembly for aid to convert their school into a normal school, and the trustees of an Academy at New Glasgow likewise appealed to the Assembly for special aid. In 1845 the Central Board of Education recommended the conversion into a Normal School of the Royal Acadian School, since that institution was free of sectarian influence, and possessed a substantial building; but in 1847 a Committee of the Assembly reported adversely on the possibilities of making this school fit and suitable for the purpose. This Committee favored having a number of seminaries for training teachers, but the first Superintendent of Education, J. W. Dawson, after studying the schools of New York, New England, and Upper Canada, believed that an efficient Normal School, as in New York and Upper Canada, was preferable to several of inferior capabilities. Eventually, he had the satisfaction of seeing a provincial Normal School opened at Truro in 1855.123

Just as much in Nova Scotia's educational system was eclectic,124 so it was in New Brunswick. This province borrowed ideas and doctrines, texts and teachers; gathered inspiration and encouragement; and followed examples, from many sources. But everything was trimmed to fit the provincial purse and to conform to modest ideas of progress. In the last analysis, one has the impression that New Brunswick chose to institute central supervision and to establish a Normal School, not because the province was shaken by new ideas and was dedicated to progress, but because the practical problem of poor schools and poor teachers had to be solved somehow, and the experiences of other countries indicated that the advances mentioned might prove to be a solution of the problem in New Brunswick. It took many more years to convince the “slow moving mass” of the people that the problem required a still more practical step in the form of general assessment for schools.

The Board of Education which was instituted by the Act of 1847125 was such in name only, for it consisted of the Lieutenant-Governor and Executive Council, “the usual arrangement in Tory Provinces”. There was a Secretary authorised at a salary of £ 100 a year, but no Chief Superintendent of Education or any equivalent, so that the Board lacked an agent wholly responsible for the advancement of education and capable of carrying out its policies. But at least the Act had created the form of a provincial educational body to which additions and improvements could be made.

The Board was empowered to establish a Training School at Fredericton, the master of which was to be paid no more than £ 200 a year. A Model School was to be attached to the Training School so that teachers in training might demonstrate their ability to teach. If the Board thought it expedient, subsidiary training schools might be set up at other points in the Province, where teachers trained at the Central Training School might teach other teachers and approved candidates. Students in training, after they had demonstrated their ability to teach, were to receive an allowance of ten shillings a week for the ten weeks of their training.

The framers of the Act evidently planned that teachers already licensed must be given the first opportunity of profiting by the Training School, for the Board could require as many licensed teachers to attend as it thought necessary. One can see reasons for this, especially in the light of the Inspection of 1845, but one can also see some of the disadvantages. In the first place, there was the difficulty of inducing veteran teachers to think fresh thoughts and to change their settled ways. Secondly, there was the resentment which many of these would feel at having to lose a term's teaching, journey to Fredericton, and be taught by a stranger, whose length of teaching service was less than their own and had been gained in a foreign country. The master of the Training School was to train those who attended in the Art of Teaching, which was to include a thorough knowledge of communicating the rudiments and elementary branches of common school education, in a manner best suited to the capacities, ages, and conditions of the children of the Province. That the short space of ten weeks was deemed sufficient time which to do this indicates that the legislators of 1847 either had an eye to economy, or understood the art of pedagogy very imperfectly. In all probability both of these speculations are true, but there was in addition a practical reason for the length of the training course. Since the school year at that time consisted of four terms of ten or twelve weeks, a teacher could attend the Training School at the loss of only one term from his school.

In order to compel attendance at the Training School it was enacted that licenses should be issued only to teachers who had attended the institution, but the Board of Education could say when this clause should go into effect. As a matter of fact, an amendment in 1849 yielded ground on this point by providing that the Board of Education might grant licenses of the lowest grade to female teachers, in certain cases, without requiring them to attend the Training School, and further, might license untrained teachers in areas remote from the Training School. This concession. was the first of a number of regrettable compromises in respect to teachers' licenses which various conditions have necessitated in New Brunswick from time to time.

According to the Act of 1847 licensed teachers were to be classified in three divisions, based, one concludes, on knowledge rather than teaching ability. Teachers of the lowest class were to teach Spelling, Reading, Writing, and Simple Arithmetic; second class teachers, in addition to those subjects, were to teach English Grammar, Geography, and Book-keeping; and for teachers of the highest class further additions were Natural Philosophy,126 Algebra, Geometry, Trigonometry, Mensuration, Land Surveying, and Navigation. We are struck by the absence of History from the curriculum, and by the inclusion of Surveying and Navigation as an indication of the importance of lumbering and shipping in the provincial economy. In reality, the lofty requirements demanded by first class teachers seem to have been on paper only at first. We find in a Minute of the Board of Education, under the date of May 30, 1848, an admission that the Board was acting on the assumption that the entire qualifications required by the Act could not, at the time, be demanded without refusing first class certificates to all candidates. Under these circumstances, the Board had adopted the principle of granting first class certificates only in cases in which the certificate as to competency in teaching was satisfactory, and the teacher possessed knowledge in some one of the extra branches required from the first class of teachers.127 This discrepancy between theory and practice may have been one of the reasons why the first Principal of the Normal School so strongly advocated lower standards in theory, and a closer approximation in practice to the selected standards. Legislative grants to teachers of the three ranks were set at £ 30, £ 22, and £ 18 a year respectively, in contrast with the £ 20 a year which was granted to all teachers previous to the passage of this Act. However, the sum to be paid to the teacher by the inhabitants of a district was to be the same as before, £ 20 a year; was to be raised by subscription, and could be paid in board and lodging if desired—a provision which would counteract considerably the tendency of the Training School to elevate the profession.

The Act of 1847 continued the arrangement of the Parish Trustees, who, as earlier, were charged with a good deal of responsibility and authority. The Justices of the Peace were to be continued as the link between the schools of the Parish and the Provincial Secretary. There were the usual provisions regarding poor scholars and maximum grants to parishes and counties. Aside from those sections of the Act which related to the Board of Education and the Training School, the most interesting section is that which authorized the Board of Education to spend £ 1000 for the purpose of providing books and apparatus for the use of the Parish Schools. Investigating this subject of school texts, we find that the Inspectors of the Grammar Schools had stated in their report to the Assembly in 1846 that they had before them a series of School Books, prepared and published under the superintendence of the National Board of Education for Ireland. The Inspectors described these books as being of superior character and well suited to the needs of New Brunswick, and recommended that enquiry be made during recess as to the cheapest mode of obtaining a supply for the Province, whether by importation from Ireland or Canada, or by republication in New Brunswick.128 We next learn that in 1847 Colebrooke sent Grey a resolution of the Executive Council expressive of a desire to obtain a selection of approved Parish School Books through the medium of the Committee on Education of the Privy Council. Later in the year Grey wrote that the books were on their way, and enclosed a letter from the Education Office, Dublin, relating to a selection of books, tablets, and maps, to which had been added twelve sets of books, sheets, and tuning forks for teaching Hullah's system of vocal Music.129 When we enquire into this availability of Irish texts, we discover that a degree of progress, impossible at the time in England, had occurred in Ireland in the direction of a national system. In 1831, following a period of reports and commissions, an organized system under one head was announced, with a common curriculum as far as possible without proselytism. The central authority was to be a Board of Commissioners, appointed by the Crown, who were to maintain a register of qualified teachers, establish Model and Training Schools, provide for the regular inspection of schools under its control, and distribute the annual parliamentary grants. The religious problem presented difficulties, but eventually both the Protestant and Catholic Churches accepted the National System. Later, Catholic fear of Protestant proselytism led to the introduction of separate religious instruction during school hours in districts exclusively Catholic, and the National Schools became to a large extent denominational.130 This development, however, had not yet occurred at the time in which we are here interested. What we wish to note particularly is the effort of the National Board to solve the text-book problem, which, in 1830, was much the same as in New Brunswick. For a reading lesson one child might use the Bible, another the adventures of a highwayman, a third a 'loose' romance. The Board approved such books in use as it deemed worthy, and edited and printed others. These latter were distributed gratis or at half price, and with the assistance of the Inspectors were gradually introduced into the National Schools. They were uniform in character and well graded, and contained nothing inimical to Christianity, morality, and patriotism. “Their excellence found them ready sale in Great Britain and the colonies.” 131 These, then, were the books which were Ireland's gift to New Brunswick, figuratively speaking, at the very time when the province was providing a home for thousands of Irish refugees.

Notes

^1. Fitch, p. 35.

^2. Ibid., p. 36.

^3. Ibid., p. 35.

^4. P. A. of Canada, Can, Misc., Delancey-Robinson Papers, Vol. 1, Letters to Sir John Harvey, 1837.

^5. Ibid., Vol. 2, Letters to Sir John Harvey, 1838.

^6. New Brunswick: Journal of the House of Assembly, 1839, pp. 359, 360.

^7. Ibid., p. 359.

^8. P. A. of Canada, C0188, Vol. 9, Colebrooke to Stanley, Oct. 29, 1841, Disp. 73.

^9. New Brunswick: Journal of the House of Assembly, 1842, Appendix 59.

^10. Ibid., Appendix 58.

^11. Abstract of the Returns of the Inspection of Grammar and Parochial Schools in New Brunswick, 1844-1845, p. 15.

^12. P. A. of Canada, C0188, Vol. 8, Harvey to Russell, Jan. 6, 1841, Disp. 1.

^13. Ibid., Vol. 9, Colebrooke to Russell, June 21, 1841, Disp. 28.

^14. Ibid., Vol. 9, Colebrooke to Stanley, Oct. 29, 1841, Disp. 73.

^15. Ibid., Vol 9, Colebrooke to Stanley, June 14, 1842, Disp. 60.

^16. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1845, pp. 338-341.

^17. P. A. of Canada, C0188, Vol. 9, Colebrooke to Stanley, March 25, 1843, Disp. 19.

^18. Ibid., Vol. 11, Head to Grey, May 20, 1848, Disp. 27.

^19. Ibid., Vol. 9, Colebrooke to Stanley, June 14, 1842, Disp. 60.

^20. Office of Executive Council of New Brunswick, Colebrooke's Letter Book, May 1, 1841-Jan. 13, 1843, (No volume no.), July 16, 1842, p. 310.

^21. P. A. of Canada, C0188, Vol. 9, Colebrooke to Stanley, Aug. 12, 1842, Disp. 78.

^22. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, pp. 77, 78.

^23. P. A. of Canada, C0188, Vol. 9, Colebrooke to Stanley, Aug.12, 1842, Disp. 78.

^24. Office of Executive Council of New Brunswick, Colebrooke's Letter Book, May 18, 1841-April 4, 1848, (no volume no.), Colebrooke to G. R. Young, Feb. 25, 1843, pp. 57, 58.

^25. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1842, p. 288.

^26. Ibid., Appendix 57.

^27. It is possible that the Trustees were referring in this report to the “free” scholars, whose parents were too poor to subscribe to the teacher's salary.

^28. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1842, Appendix 40.

^29. Since at that time instruction in classes was not yet general in New Brunswick, and the teachers tended to rely on texts in their teaching, it may be that class instruction and spirited oral teaching were meant.

^30. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1842, Appendix 54-68.

^31. Ibid., Appendix 84.

^32. Ibid., Appendix 85.

^33. Ibid., Appendix 68-82.

^34. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1844, pp. 301, 302.

^35. P. A. of Canada, C0188, Vol. 9, Colebrooke to Stanley, April 24, 1844, Disp. 28.

^36. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1845, p.136.

^37. Abstract of the Returns of Inspection of Grammar and Parochial Schools in New Brunswick, pp. 10, 13, 19.

^38. Ibid., pp. 2-4.

^39. Ibid., p. 4.

^40. Ibid., p. 18.

^41. Ibid., pp. 13, 15.

^42. Ibid., pp. 18-20.

^43. Ibid., pp. 17, 18.

^44. Cubberley, p. 343.

^45. Abstract of the Returns of Inspection of Grammar and Parochial Schools in New Brunswick, p. 16.

^46. Ibid., pp. 16, 17.

^47. Typescript in the possession of Louise Manny of Newcastle, N. B.

^48. New Brunswick: Journal of the House of Assembly, 1842, pp. 176, 256.

^49. Curti, p. 16.

^50. New Brunswick: Journal of the House of Assembly, 1846, pp. 229-232.

^51. Falconer, p. 792.

^52. Gesner, p. 161.

^53. Falconer, p. 793.

^54. Bailey, L. W., p. 3.

^55. Office of the Executive Council of New Brunswick, Head's Letter Book, 1848-1854, (no Vol. No.) Head to Robb, March 19, 1849, p. 189.

^56. Bailey, L. W., p. 5.

^57. Ibid., pp. 13, 14.

^58. New Brunswick: Journal of the House of Assembly, 1851, Appendix 67.

^59. Office of the Executive Council of New Brunswick, Head's Letter Book, Nov. 1850 Sept., 1854, (no Vol. No.) p. 105.

^60. Wright, p. 45.

^61. Typescript in the possession of Louise Manny of Newcastle, N. B.

^62. Hughes & Klemm, p. 56.

^63. Cyclopedia of Education (Paul Munroe ed.) Vol. 4, pp. 165, 166.

^64. Maxwell (1), pp. 52, 53.

^65. New Brunswick: Journal of the House of Assembly, 1841, Appendix 187-189.

^66. Ibid., p. 230.

^67. Mechanics' Institute, Catalogue of the Library with Constitution, Rules and Regulations, p. 6.

^68. The New Brunswick Courier, St. John, Vol. 7, No. 35, Jan. 27, 1849, p. 1.

^69. Ibid ., Vol . 8, No. 38, Feb. 16, 1850, p. 1

^70. A Mechanics' Institute Co. seems to have existed after that date. possibly to wind up affairs. For instance, we find that in 1896 W. A. Lockhart, auctioneer, advertised a sale by the Mechanics' Institute Co. on Feb. 8, 1896, of the leasehold property on Carleton St., with all its scenery and furniture. (Saint John Public Library, Scrap Book No. 10, p. 42.)

^71. Beavan, p. 129.

^72. Ibid., pp. 51-53.

^73. Ibid., p. 52.

^74. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, p. 99.

^75. The New Brunswick Courier, Vol. 10, No. 37, Feb. 28, 1852, p. 1.

^76. Ibid., Vol. IX, No. 42, March 15, 1851, p. 2.

^77. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, p. 104.

^78. Ibid., pp. 102-106.

^79. Only the year before, the Assembly of New Brunswick had supported Sir Charles Metcalfe, Governor General of Canada, on the question of the royal prerogative in making appointments. See Hannay (1), Vol. 2, pp. 88-93, 101.

^80. Gesner, p. 322.

^81. Hannay (1), Vol 2, p. 93.

^82. Fitch, pp. 48-50.

^83. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, p. 107.

^84. Fenety, p. 232.

^85. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1847, p. 8.

^86. P. A . of Canada, Canada Misc., Delancey-Robinson Papers, Vol. 14, "Report on Education in New Brunswick", April 12, 1848.

^87. Cubberley, p. 415.

^88. Ibid., pp. 297-299.

^89. Cubberley, pp. 324-332.

^90. Ibid., p. 331.

^91. Reisner, p. 200.

^92. Cubberley, p. 321.

^93. Reisner, p. 51.

^94. Hughes & Klemm, pp. 29-31.

^95. Reisner, pp. 252, 253.

^96. Cubberley, pp. 346, 347.

^97. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1845, p. 33.

^98. P. A. of Canada, C0188, Vol.10, Colebrooke to Grey, June 11,1847, Disp.52.

^99. Cubberley, p. 353.

^100. Beard, Vol. 1, p. 498.

^101. Cubberley, pp. 357-368.

^102. Ibid., pp. 379, 380.

^103. Ibid., pp. 380, 381.

^104. Ibid., p. 417.

^105. Ibid., p. 381.

^106. Morison and Commager, Vol. 1, p. 414.

^107. Cubberley, p. 380.

^108. Beard, Vol. 1, pp. 816, 817.

^109. Ibid., p. 816.

^110. Morison and Commager, Vol. 1, p. 409.

^111. Beard, Vol. 1, p. 815.

^112. Morison and Commager, Vol. 1, p. 409.

^113. Reisner, p. 413.

^114. Creighton, p. 220.

^115. Sissons (1), pp. 23, 82.

^116. Ibid., pp. 143-146.

^117. Hopkins, pp. 345, 346.

^118. Burwash, p. 173.

^119. Wishart, p. 6.

^120. Harvey (2), p. 15.

^121. MacKay, p. 523.

^122. Harvey (2), p. 15.

^123. Ibid., pp. 15-17, 27.

^124. Ibid., p. 15.

^125. 10. V. Cap. 56.

^126. Natural Philosophy seems to have been the term for elementary Physics and Chemistry.

^127. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of the Board of Education, 1847-1852, p. 30.

^128. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1846, p. 232.

^129. Ibid., 1848, p. 57.

^130. Hughes and Klemm, pp. 87-92.

^131. Ibid., p. 98.

CHAPTER 7.
PLANS, PERSONALITIES, AND POLICIES 1847-1854

To implement the Act of 1847 the Board of Education had to make provision for a building and a master, as well as for books. The old stone gaol was fitted up as a home for the master, and a school house was erected within the same enclosure.1 Once again Governor Colebrooke corresponded with the Colonial Secretary on the subject of a qualified master. After some correspondence expressing doubt that a competent teacher could be induced to come for £ 200, Grey recommended Marshall d'Avray, who, as Director of a Normal School in Mauritius, was in receipt of double the sum voted by the New Brunswick Legislature, together with house rent and fees from private teaching. But since the climate was prejudicial to the health of his family, d'Avray was willing to come to New Brunswick if he could do so “without loss either of station or of emolument”. To defray expenses of passage and of providing clothing suitable for a northern climate, d'Avray, the Colonial Secretary said, asked for £ 300, one-third of which he would be willing to repay by monthly instalments should the Colonial Legislature exact it. Grey concluded the letter by saying that it would be difficult to find a person so well qualified as d'Avray who would accept the position at such a moderate scale of remuneration. Colebrooke's reply admitted the smallness of the salary, and expressed the hope that when the Normal School had been established and was appreciated, the salary might be augmented. Fifty pounds was already sanctioned for travelling expenses, and Colebrooke asked His Lordship to sanction an advance to d'Avray from the surplus Civil List Fund, if the advance should not be reimbursed by the Assembly.2 One fancies that Colebrooke may have chafed at the necessity of haggling over terms. Yet although economy was the cry during those years, large sums were often unwisely spent for less worthy purposes than the secure establishment of a Normal School. For instance, in 1850 the same Assembly that had passed the Act of 1847 setting £ 200 as the maximum salary of the master of the Training School granted Lieutenant-Colonel Brown of the First Royal Regiment practically the same sum (£ 198), for duties paid by him on liquor consumed by the regiment during the year.3 For the same session the postage charges of some of the members amounted to £ 17; and £ 8 15s. was paid for propping up a bush which had blown down in the Government House gardens.4

At this point in the history of New Brunswick's first Normal School our attention focuses on the man whose responsibility it was to initiate the operations of the school. His background and education, his ideas and experiences, the limitations and difficulties which conditioned his work, all assume significance because of his position.

Joseph Marshall de Brett, second Baron d'Avray, was the eldest son of Dr. Joseph Head Marshall, an extraordinary Englishman who assisted Edward Jenner in the discovery of vaccination. His experiences included vaccinating a large part of the British Mediterranean fleet, introducing vaccination for the first time into Italy and other Mediterranean countries, popularizing it at the Neapolitan court and becoming Physician Extraordinary to the King of Naples. Subsequently he abandoned medicine for politics, warned the French government of the impending return of Napoleon from Elba, and became deeply concerned in the secret diplomacy involved in the overthrow of the Napoleonic empire, receiving the title of Baron d'Avray,5 a title which was afterwards confirmed by Louis XVIII. His eldest son, who commonly used the name Marshall d'Avray, spent his early childhood in France and his young manhood in England. Because of services rendered by Dr. Marshall to Britain in the matter of negotiations with the King of Naples and Louis XVIII, the British authorities may possibly have recognized an obligation to find situations for his children when he himself was dead and family fortunes had declined.6 This may explain why Grey, in recommending d'Avray to Lieutenant-Governor Colebrooke designated him as Director of a Normal School in Mauritius, when actually d'Avray had held no such position. Of this fact Grey was aware, as two months earlier he had received a letter from d'Avray reviewing the circumstances under which the latter had gone to Mauritius and had returned. From this letter7 we learn that His Majesty's Government had intended to establish a Normal School in the Island of Mauritius, and d'Avray had gone there as Director, having made preparation by attending the Normal Training School at Battersea, probably one maintained by the National Society, since d'Avray was an Anglican. On his arrival in Mauritius he found that the Colonial Government did not think it possible to establish a Normal School on the plan proposed in England, and he was therefore forced to engage in a number of activities, such as inspecting the Government Free Schools, drawing up reports, teaching in the Preparatory School of the Royal College, and substituting for professors in the College. Eventually he took charge of the Elementary Classes of the College, which seems to have been more of a secondary school than a university. Here his efforts met with great success,8 but living was high in Mauritius and he was never entirely free from financial worries. When he returned to England because of the illness of his wife, he was in debt to the Mauritius Government for advances in salary, and anxious to obtain almost any position. In September, 1847, he asked for the post of Inspector of Schools in British Guiana, a posi- tion affording a salary of £ 500 and £ 200 travelling expenses, but Grey refused to accede to the request, saying that if the climate of Mauritius did not suit d'Avray, neither would that of British Guiana.9 A month later the position in New Brunswick was available. Although even in England the post could hardly have seemed a sinecure, d'Avray accepted, and early in 1848, with his wife and daughter, arrived in New Brunswick, where his communication with the members of the Legislature, then in session, made a favourable impression.10

The nature of Marshall d'Avray's ideas on education is significant, for if his ideas were carried out, they were an influence in the development of education in New Brunswick, and if they were ignored or rejected, they become a foil for those ideas which were preferred to his. d'Avray had to struggle with varied and nagging practical problems in the midst of strange people and unfamiliar surroundings, and within the framework of arrangements made before his arrival. A number of his reports, lectures, and plans abound in practical details, from which it is difficult to distil his philosophy, but fortunately two printed lectures are available in which he dealt with education generally. From these we may conclude that he held views which, in intelligence and vision, were far in advance of his time, and may even be regarded as ultra-progressive in certain quarters today. The second of these lectures was delivered two years after the first. One cannot read both without feeling that in the interval d'Avray had applied himself seriously to thinking about the educational needs of the provincial society in which he found himself, had come to a clearer realization of how those needs might be met, and had dared to cut away from what Parrington calls “the drab realisms of a cautious past”.11 One would not like to say that he had adopted any new theories not held prior to his arrival in the province, but one does feel that he had got a fresh perspective and had learned to see new meaning in European theories and ideas, as applicable to the colonial society and the educational problem with which he had to cope.

The first of these lectures was given on February 10, 1848. Since the occasion was the opening of the Normal School, d'Avray naturally stressed the importance of proper teaching, explained the function of the Model School in the acquisition of the art, and endeavored to inspire in teachers a sense of the dignity and responsibility of their profession. He reminded them of the part which repetition and practice play in the retention of what is learned, and warned teachers that their business was to teach so as to exercise the original faculties of their pupils' minds, (a timely warning in view of what the Inspectors of 1844 had observed). But d'Avray's address contained matter of greater significance than this. In his audience that day there may have been those who wondered if this gentleman of title and urbane manners had brought with him the English notions of class distinctions, and if he regarded the Parish Schools of New Brunswick with condescension, as schools for colonials of a static lower order. Although one gentleman did ascribe these attitudes to d'Avray, as we shall see later, the tone of d'Avray's remarks on this occasion calls for a more liberal interpretation. His audience that day almost certainly included Wilmot and Fisher, men who had been born outside the charmed circle of provincial wealth and aristocracy,12 but who had become leaders of eminence. Whether d'Avray knew this or not, and whatever the beliefs on which he had been nurtured, he seemed aware that he had come to a land where humble birth presented no insuperable social barrier to talent, ability, and ambition. He did, however, advocate restricting the curriculum of the Parish Schools to Reading, Writing, Orthography, Arithmetic, Grammar, and Geography, since the majority of the pupils in those schools were not likely to devote a long time to schooling, and therefore should be taught really useful knowledge during the short time they remained under tuition.13 His intimate conviction was, he said, that such a limited scale of instruction was the best adapted to the present urgent wants of the community.14 Possibly he made a mistake when he said that “mere theorists” in education might think he had adopted too narrow a scale, for this jibe may have initiated the personal antagonism of John Gregory. Perhaps, too, it was tactless to justify a limited curriculum for the Parish Schools of New Brunswick by asking how few laboring men in England could answer a simple question in Arithmetic, Grammar or Geography, could read their Bibles or scrawl their names, for this comparison may have seemed to imply that the inhabitants of New Brunswick were on a level with the not yet emancipated laboring classes of England. But d'Avray was careful to explain that he did not mean that, for he asked: “And shall we be thought to have effected too little, if we succeed in raising the Inhabitants of this Province as far above them” (the labourers of England) “in intellectual acquirements, as they are superior to them in social position?” 15 Moreover, in speaking of the indifference of parents to education he said that this indifference was to be wondered at when we remember “that in this country, the blessings of Education offer, even to the humblest individual, every prospect of emancipating himself from the narrow and restricted circle of action in which he is born, provided his natural talents be such as to enable him to profit by the opportunities which are afforded for their cultivation.” 16 Furthermore, although d'Avray insisted on the function of the Parish School to impart that sort of instruction which would be of daily service to children through life “in their present sphere”, he added that such instruction was the stepping stone to the acquisition of further instruction whenever their inclinations prompted them to seek it, or their circumstances enabled them to do so.17 These quotations seem to predicate the existence of a belief in education as the birthright of all, satisfaction at the absence of social barriers in New Brunswick, and an appreciation of the eco- nomic factor as the real drawback to educational progress. But d'Avray went further than this. He seems to have been the first person in New Brunswick to outline publicly a plan by which ambitious but poor children could obtain an advanced education. Living in an age which lacked good roads, motor vehicles, Gestetner machines, and quick mail service, he could not visualize the taking of secondary education to rural areas by means of regional high schools and correspondence courses, but he offered a modest scheme whereby bright country children might be sent to the high school. He admitted that to do this would involve expense, but declared that the comparatively trifling addition would increase one hundred fold the efficacy of the sums already applied to educational purposes. In his own words, the plan was that “of fostering superior talent, wherever it may be found among the juvenile population, by opening for it a path from the lowest to the highest of our Educational Establishments, by means of exhibitions (scholarships) from schools of one grade to those of a higher”. He proposed that each Grammar School be endowed with two exhibitions for two years, to be competed for by candidates from the Parish Schools of the County, such competitions to take place at each yearly visit of a General School Inspector. Further, he suggested that four other exhibitions for three years be attached to the High Schools of the Province, namely, one each to the Collegiate School at Fredericton, the Grammar School at Saint John, the Wesleyan Academy at Sackville, and the Baptist Seminary at Fredericton, to be competed for by candidates from the various county Grammar Schools. To crown the scheme he proposed an additional exhibition of three years duration at King's College. Thus “a clear way would be thrown open to the humblest individual, possessed of the requisite talents, to attain the highest literary eminence in the Province”.18 After noting the stimulating effects of this scheme on teachers, parents and pupils, d'Avray concluded the exposition of his plan with a burst of oratory, declaring that the blessings of Education, “which formerly fell to the share of a few would be placed within reach of all who chose to seek them. The Gates of the Temple of Knowledge which once opened with difficulty to the studious but favored Scholar, would be thrown back wide open upon their hinges that all might enter, and the waters of the Fountain of Wisdom, of which in other days a few pale students alone were seen to sip, would now be quaffed in deep draughts by any and all who thirsted for them”.19

d'Avray's scheme may be open to the modern criticism which has been directed against Thomas Jefferson's not dissimilar plan for Virginia in the eighteenth century, namely, that although it aimed to open the cultural riches of civilization to all, only a very few could profit,20 but if d'Avray's plan proved to be unacceptable, it was probably not because it was too narrow, but rather because it was too liberal. In this connection it should be borne in mind that before his training at the Battersea normal school, d'Avray had been educated by his father who is said to have tutored the children of the liberal monarch, King Louis Philippe, and who according to the testimony of the Countess de Boigne and others, as interpreted by Joseph Conrad in his novel, The Suspect, was by no means unsympathetic to the democratic principles of the French Revolution. However, d'Avray could hardly have realized how novel, expensive, and therefore impracticable, his proposed plan would appear. It is likely that no one took it seriously, for there seems to have been no comment, and certainly it was not tried. One wonders what New Brunswick talent might have been salvaged if the scheme had been recognized as workable.

Two years later he delivered another lecture in the Temperance Hall at Fredericton, on January 22, 1850, which was afterwards printed at the request of the teachers of the district. In it he declared that the term education was often misapplied, since it did not signify that preparation for the actual business of life which ought to be the aim of all Education. As the result of his own experience and personal observation, he asserted that what was termed a first rate education in England was singularly ill-calculated to fit a young man for his future career. In asserting this he would not be biased, he said, by his early feelings and impressions, or by the certainty that he would be opposed by hundreds, who would argue in favor of the system of Classical Education “whose strongest claim to their sympathy and admiration arises from its venerable antiquity, and from the fact that despite its age . . . it is fashionable also”.21 Although acknowledging the value of the study of the dead languages in exercising the mental faculties and cultivating the perceptions, d'Avray anticipated modern educational theory by denying that such study was the only means of producing so desirable a result, and appealed to former classical scholars to confess that the Latin and Greek, which they had acquired at the cost of many years of painful work, was rarely of any service to them. He declared that the Universities themselves were tacitly admitting that for centuries they had been wrong, and were enlarging their course of studies to include those sciences which ought never to have been neglected. He then asked this long and searching question—if in the Old Country a new conception of education was emerging, if in that wealthy land men were concluding that Education should be so conducted as to qualify the rising generation for the skilful discharge of the duties of life, if the learned heads of the British Universities were becoming convinced “that they can no longer lag behind in the onward march of improvement, that they also must keep pace with the spirit of the times, and provide some better and more nourishing food than the romantic lore upon which they had fed so long; that they must endeavor now to make them practically useful men and not merely learned pedants-, if England, the land of dearly cherished prejudices is doing this, how clearly it is our duty in this favored Province, where all may find the means of a comfortable existence who choose to labour for it, but where all or nearly all must labour to obtain those means; how imperatively are we called upon to adopt such a system of Education, founded upon such a solid base and sure foundation, as shall infallibly secure to our children that amount of really careful knowledge which shall prepare them for the business of after life, qualify them for intercourse with their fellowmen, and for the efficient and conscientious discharge of every duty”.22 In brief, d'Avray called for an educational system that would pay practical, social, and civic dividends, and challenged the people of the Province to demand it, declaring that the Government could not alone produce the desired benefit. “The Education of the people in its highest and best sense can be accomplished only by themselves.” Let us hope, he said, that the day is coming, if not already come, “when Education will be universally regarded as the birthright of man, and when to withhold intellectual and moral culture from minds created and placed within our reach, shall be esteemed an injustice to Society and a sin against God”.23

He then described the educational institutions of England and showed that the private and proprietary schools for the middle classes, while superior to those for the upper classes, were still defective, affording their pupils but scanty training for the business of earning a livelihood.24 He next described the schools for the poor—Pauper Schools, Infant Schools, Monitorial Schools, Sunday Schools, and Schools of Industry,25 drawing particular attention to the type mentioned last, because in those schools manual work, such as Shoemaking, Tailoring and Farming was combined with ordinary school subjects. In this connection, he referred to schools on the Continent, particularly the School and Model Farm near Berne founded by DeFellenberg, a Swiss associate and follower of Pestalozzi. While New Brunswick, by the bounty of Providence, did not need institutions for the education of paupers, d'Avray thought that from the example of such schools the Province might learn something of value. He proposed, therefore, the formation of at least one Agricultural School or College to which should be attached a Model Farm, where all the improvements of modern science could be applied to the tillage of the soil and to the cultivation of the best breeds of stock. There should be workshops also, where the students might acquire skill in the use of carpenter's tools and in the construction and repair of farm implements. He would have the Arithmetic course include lessons on keeping farm accounts, surveying fields, and measuring timber, hay, and manure. Lectures in Botany, Agricultural Chemistry, Mechanics, Anatomy, and the care of animals should supplement the ordinary school subjects of Reading, Writing, Geography, History, and Composition. “Such is the plan upon which it is my firm belief,” said d'Avray, “that Education can best be conducted in this Young Province . . . . Then would the Province of New Brunswick, finding in its own bosom enough and more than enough to supply its wants, cease to be dependent as it is now upon other States for the chief articles of consumption, and rapidly rise to that enviable position which must naturally result from the well directed energy of its inhabitants.” As for the cost, he thought that after the original outlay, under proper management the annual expenses of such an establishment would be very small, and might even be covered by the produce.26

In conjunction with this Agricultural School, d'Avray said he would operate the Training School, which Parish School teachers would be required to attend for at least six months, and where they would take part in the exercises of the School and in all the occupations of the Farm and Work Shop. Since Algebra and Navigation were not in very general demand in the backwoods, let those who wished to acquire such subjects do so at the Grammar Schools. Of these he said he knew little, as no facilities had been afforded him of observing the mode in which they were conducted, but if they resembled the Collegiate School, with which he was acquainted, then they were well calculated to meet the exigencies of the scholar. He fervently hoped that the Collegiate School might long flourish at the head of the Grammar Schools of New Brunswick, and resist the attacks of ignorance and malignity27—a reference, doubtless, to d'Avray's avowed enemy, John Gregory, who had previously become involved in a violent and dramatic quarrel with George Roberts, the master of the Collegiate School, and the grandfather of Sir Charles G. D. Roberts.

d'Avray then addressed the teachers of the Province, who were, he said, in many respects to blame for much of the evil complained of in connection with the Parish Schools. He urged them to put away petty feeling and jealousy, to form Teachers' Associations, and above all to study diligently that they might become efficient instructors and elevate the standing of their profession. Finally, he hoped that his lecture might excite some interest in those who were in a position to give effect to his recommendations, and that such persons might be induced to acknowledge that education, to operate beneficially, must take a more practical direction than it had hitherto done.28

What were the effects of this speech? We know that many who heard it were enthusiastic, for it was in response to their solicitations that the lecture was printed. But when a new school act was passed in 1852 it embodied none of d'Avray's principles except two incidentals, inspection and optional assessment for schools, both features which had been urged in the Province before d'Avray came. Nearly ninety years had to pass before steps were taken to give to the education of rural children in New Brunswick that practical direction which he recommended, and a Provincial Agricultural School has never been realized. It is true that during the decade following this lecture a renewed and determined effort was made to convert King's College into an Agricultural School. It is also true that d'Avray opposed this proposal. It is evident that, in spite of his emphasis on vocational training, he never belittled the importance of classical education, although he stated in 1871 that many traditional and inherited opinions, such as the idea that Greek and Latin versification were the only ends of any system of education, were gradually being exploded as fallacious, and unsuited to the requirements of the age.29 We must also bear in mind that at no time did he advocate the closing of the Grammar Schools or King's College, and the abolition of classical instruction. He merely called attention to the unreasonableness of the sole emphasis on such learning.

So far, we have examined only that evidence which seems to support the theory that d'Avray held liberal views in education. The fact that one of his contemporaries accused him of social bias requires an equally careful examination. The cause of the bad feeling between d'Avray and John Gregory is not certain. The personal reaction of each to the other may have been one of those natural antagonisms that occasionally spring up inexplicably between two strong personalities. On the other hand, Gregory, as Secretary of the Board of Education, and possessor of positive views, which he was accustomed to express freely, may have resented d'Avray's calm assumption that he, d'Avray, was the educational authority of New Brunswick. Moreover, Gregory, on his own word, was of the people and for the people, and seems to have found reason to suspect d'Avray of patrician sympathies. Whatever the cause, the battle seems to have commenced almost immediately after d'Avray's arrival in New Brunswick. d'Avray's reference to educational theorists, in his opening lecture, was evidently meant to include Gregory, for later d'Avray spoke of the disinclination of the Board of Education to accept and sanction any alterations or improvements “not emanating from themselves”. “None of them, he said, are practical men—many of them are entirely guided by the opinion and views of their Secretary who is nothing more than a Theorist like themselves, and they are, I believe, disposed to receive any new suggestions with considerable jealousy.” 30 In reply, Gregory criticized the tone of d'Avray's first report, and said that the designation which d'Avray had made of the Act of 1847 as an absurdity and an impossibility was a discourtesy to the Legislature and Council. The Act might not be perfect, but it would be neither an absurdity nor an impossibility in the hands of those who were “competent and disposed to carry out its provisions without being prematurely desirous of altering its principles and of opposing their own isolated views against the good sense of the Legislature, and the decisions of the Lieutenant Governor in Council”. If, said Gregory, d'Avray had a correct conception of the difference between a Crown Colony and one having a representative form of Government, he would be able to see more clearly how the law was to be carried out.31 Later, when a second Training School was opened in Saint John under the direction of E. H. Duval, Gregory, in his official report as Secretary to the Board of Education, spoke civilly enough of the arrangement,32 but five years later inferred that d'Avray had certified Duval for the position on the strength of interviews lasting no more than two or three hours.33 At that time Gregory had lost his position as Secretary to the Board, since that position had merged with that of the Chief Superintendent in 1852, had accused d'Avray, who was then the Superintendent of Education, of actions which had placed Gregory in a false light, and had referred to d'Avray with considerable asperity in the presence of the Provincial Secretary.34 In a number of philippics in the form of letters to the press Gregory attacked afresh d'Avray's views on education, thereby elevating the question from a clash of personalities to a conflict between opposing educational philosophies, a conflict in which Gregory chose to regard himself as the champion of democratic education and d'Avray as its opponent.

Immediately after d'Avray's initial advocacy of a restricted curriculum for Parish Schools, Gregory had claimed that to insist on a limited curriculum was to say, in fact, that the greater number of Provincial youths should receive no further school instruction than Reading, Writing, Arithmetic, Grammar, and Geography, and declared that “this would be a social mistake and a serious political blunder”.35 In 1854 Gregory spoke still more strongly. He declared that d'Avray's educational policy and not parental apathy and indifference was the real stumbling block to educational progress. When in 1848 d'Avray had reduced the course at the Normal School to less than what His Majesty's ministers had proposed for the emancipated negroes of the West Indies, all were struck dumb with amazement at d'Avray's bold pretensions. The limited course of instruction proposed by him might do for remote and poor districts, but it left no alternative to boys in towns and wealthy farming districts but that of wasting their time in vain repetitions, or removing to the Grammar Schools at an expense their friends could ill afford. Indeed, said Gregory, reflection on d'Avray's career in this province “and particularly on his evident anxiety to restrain popular education convinces me that his own early education has been very defective, and that while acquiring a knowledge of French, to which he is so much indebted, he has imbibed the political opinions of the French noblesse in the anti-Revolutionary times”.36 In his next letter to the press Gregory admitted that there was parental apathy in the Province, but said that it was due to the indifferent character of the schools and the little work that they accomplished. This in turn was due to d'Avray's promotion of a “subordinating system for the scholars who pursue only the English branches”. Gregory claimed that d'Avray, in urging the propriety of lessening the course of study for the English scholar (as opposed to the classical scholar) was motivated, not by practical considerations, but by class feeling. Gentlemen study the classics; the mere English scholar never can be a gentleman; he is down and ought to be kept so. Such, said Gregory, was the master spirit which controlled education in the Province, and until a better spirit was infused it was libelous to charge the inefficiency of the schools to the apathy of the people at large.37 Nearly three years later Gregory was still writing in the same strain. He spoke of the vast social and political interests which were involved in the depths of the educational question, and appealed to Her Majesty's Government for protection against the obloquy to which he had been subjected, concluding: “I have yet to be convinced that it is a principle of the British Government that he who dares to interfere, even legitimately and officially with the educational question, in any way tending to the amelioration of the system as regards the comparatively poor, is deemed worthy of being degraded and wronged.” 38

Impetuous and officious as Gregory seems to have been, in these observations there are indications of a sincere interest in education. It seems a pity that he and d'Avray could not have worked together for the cause of education! Yet it is possible that their viewpoints were so diametrically opposite that teamwork was out of the question. This quarrel between John Gregory and Baron d'Avray may have reflected the elements of a social conflict. Gregory, who knew d'Avray personally and had opportunities of hearing him express his views in ordinary conversation, seems to have been convinced of d'Avray's Tory principles. We are bound to consider, of course, the possibility that Gregory's personal bias detracts from the reliability of his testimony. We note, too, that Gregory, in criticizing d'Avray's limited aims for Parish Schools, chose to ignore d'Avray's suggestion of scholarships leading from Parish Schools to King's College. On the other hand, d'Avray seems to have continued to insist on a restricted programme of instruction for Parish Schools after it may have been evident that there was no likelihood of the establishment of such scholarships. As far as can be discovered he offered no alternative except to remark that there were Grammar Schools in every County,39 although under existing economic conditions only a few children from rural areas could attend the Grammar Schools.

Contrary to what was alleged by Gregory, d'Avray's early pronouncements on education were marked, as we have seen, by an appearance of liberality. We must now examine his later statements as Superintendent of Education for further evidence of his views and attitudes. In 1854 he stated unequivocally in his School Report that while he believed in education for all, he did not believe that education for the poor laborer's son need be identical with that at the disposal of his wealthier neighbor. He then pointed to the schools of successive grades in France and Prussia, noting that the Primary Schools in those countries served those classes which were limited in time and means. It might be argued, he said, that a restricted course for the Parish Schools of New Brunswick would deprive many children of the opportunity of distinguishing themselves in after life, but geniuses were not so common as was supposed and where they did exist would find their way.40 He then paid tribute to Massachusetts, and said that the Common School System of that state was devised with a view to the useful and practical, and did not comprise branches of study which the Parish Schools of New Brunswick were required to impart. Let us, he urged, try to acquire some of the admirable public spirit of Massachusetts, but let us not think it a glorious thing to find among us a Parish School in which the pupils are taught Reading, Writing, Arithmetic, English Grammar, Geography, and plain Needlework for fifteen shillings per quarter, and Natural Philosophy, Chemistry, Botany, Astronomy, Algebra, Book-keeping, the rudiments of Latin, and ornamental needlework for five shillings per quarter extra.41 In a later report he made references to the changes which had swept away many of the distinctions that once lay like a barrier between certain classes of society. The results were not all good. In education the lack of instruction of former days was succeeded by the universal system. Education was running wild, and the popular education so often lauded as a blessing was but a shell of education. He declared that if one insisted that children of the lowest rank were as entitled to be well educated as children of the highest rank, one might as well assert that the poor had a right to the property of the rich, unless one were prepared to admit that a smattering of knowledge was equivalent to knowledge itself, and that as much could be learned in three or four years by the one class as in the ten or twelve years which the other class could afford to devote to school and college. Cheap schools had replaced expensive ones, but the superficial had usurped the place of the sound and thorough, and accomplishments had superseded the useful and respectable, and had unfitted thousands for their proper sphere of duty. The result was that those who were born for trade were aspiring to the professions, and young women who should be fulfilling their destiny behind the counter or in the servant's hall were playing false notes, speaking bad French, and reading trashy novels. He feared, he said, lest the progressive system destroy all our ancient institutions, and replace sound learning by a flimsy affectation of knowledge. He was glad to know that throughout the Province the real friends of education acknowledged that he was right in advocating the instruction in Parish Schools of only Reading, Writing, Spelling, Geography, and the History of the Province. To learn things which could never be of service in one's walk of life was mere waste of time. The Common School was a place for giving the means of education; to give there a complete education was utterly impracticable.42

d'Avray's solitary opponent did not hesitate to interpret portions of these Reports as evidence of class prejudice. Moreover, the original quarrel had not been with d'Avray, but with Dr. George Roberts, and Gregory's original hostility to d'Avray may not have arisen over a difference of educational policy, but from the fact that d'Avray was a friend of Roberts. d'Avray had sided with Roberts in the quarrel which the latter had had with Gregory, and Gregory had hinted that the expulsion of his son from the Collegiate School and the backing which the College Council had accorded at the time to Roberts, Headmaster of the School, furnished proof of the strength in New Brunswick of those class distinctions with which the educational system had begun. While the details of the feud between Roberts and the stormy Gregory do not concern us, certain aspects of the case cannot be ignored, because of their social implications. From a perusal of the Minutes of the College Council we learn that the Council, after hearing Roberts and Gregory, passed a resolution to the effect that it appeared George Gregory had been expelled from no improper conduct on his part, and expressed the opinion that since the Collegiate School was a school established by legislative enactment and supported mainly at the expense of the province, Roberts was not justified in expelling any pupil for any cause but improper conduct and non-payment of the usual fees, and that therefore Roberts ought to readmit George Gregory to the School. In the face of this resolution Justice Carter then moved an amendment to the effect that the Board, while unable to allow the uncontrolled right of the Master of the School to dismiss pupils for the misconduct of the parent, were of the opinion that the circumstances of the case afforded sufficient justification to Roberts for the course he had adopted with respect to Gregory's son, and that they were such as to prevent the Board from directing the readmission of the boy. From this contradiction of the previous resolution only two members of the Council, Alexander Rankine and J. A. Street, dissented.43 Gregory then published a pamphlet which included copies of the documents and letters which had figured in the affair, and described all the circumstances as they appeared to him. From this pamphlet we learn that Roberts, in one of his letters to Gregory during the quarrel, asked the latter if it did not occur to him that the examiners at the scholarship examinations were gentlemen, a question which may have had an invidious implication. We find also that Gregory, in one of his communications, declared that his enemies could not wound him by allusions to his descent, and spoke with defensive pride of his family connections.44 Thus, indirectly, Gregory implied that among the causes of the discrimination from which he believed his family had suffered were the circumstances of his birth as a mechanic's son, and the existence in the province of a spirit of class pride and snobbery.

It is possible, of course, that other factors were involved, such as a personal thorniness and aggressiveness in Gregory which antagonized constituted authorities, but the possibility that social considerations had a bearing on the case cannot be entirely ruled out, nor the implications of d'Avray's champion- ship of Roberts. The inch-by-inch struggle for Responsible Government in progress at this time meant that exclusive privileges and traditional controls were passing, but passing slowly. To these illustrations which we have noted from time to time of public feeling on the question, we may add the address by John Boyd in the Hall of the Mechanics' Institute in Saint John in 1853. The speaker cautiously admitted that New Brunswick had class distinctions borrowed from the Mother Country, “one of her lesser evils amidst her greatest good”. One saw it, he said, during elections, when votes were cast for Mr. So and So “for he's a rale gentleman”. “Such is the homage paid to class even here.” The speaker then asked if class would have a foothold had education done her perfect work. “The time is coming when natural abilities, an enlightened education, and a desire to be useful to our fellow-man—whether possessed by the mechanic, merchant, or professional man—will be, as they aught, the only lines recognized as marking the grades that must always exist in social life, of superior, inferior, and equals.” 45

That day, however, had not yet fully come, and it is difficult to decide whether d'Avray, identified as he was with the social aristocracy of New Brunswick, fully anticipated the equalitarian doctrines that have since his time received a wider currency.

It could be, of course, that d'Avray had arrived in the province with a stock of English liberalism which flowered on first contact with the independent breath of North America, but became arrested in the face of practical difficulties, and modified as he became identified with the official, socially prominent, and academic circles of a conservative capital and a still more conservative King's College. On the other hand, d'Avray may have kept his ideals to the end, but, attempting to be a realist in the midst of a culturally poor society, made compromises which to him seemed the acme of commonsense but were interpreted by his enemies as deliberate reaction.

Two points clearly emerge, however. The practical trends in education which d'Avray advocated were ignored, unless they contributed to the verbal ammunition of those who wished to convert King's College into an Agricultural School. Decades were to pass before the strictly classical in secondary and higher education ceased to be the one and only ideal. Secondly, d'Avray's view of limited course of instruction for Parish Schools, whether wise or unwise, was only partially followed. By the Act of 1852 female teachers were called on to teach a limited curriculum, as likewise were male teachers of the second and third class, but male teachers of the first class were still required to teach Bookkeeping, Geometry, Mensuration, Land Surveying, Navigation, and Algebra. Trigonometry and Natural Philosophy, however, were dropped from the requirements. This meant, in effect, that rural areas had the opportunity of obtaining teachers of whom they could demand work in advance of the elementary. In a country economically poor and largely rural, but generally admitting no social barriers to ambition, this means that the door to advanced edu- cation was at least partially open to country youths of ability and determination. Until comparatively recent times, this remained, for many, the only door. While advanced work was doubtless often carried on at the expense of the elementary classes, hundreds of ambitious young New Brunswickers managed to struggle through this narrow opening into business, the skilled trades, the teaching profession, and occasionally even the University. In this tendency to require the one-room school to do high school work, the educational policy of New Brunswick (and of her neighbor, Nova Scotia) has resembled that of Scotland.46

On the trail of d'Avray's views we have wandered far afield from the opening of the Normal School. We shall now consider some of the limitations and vexations which accompanied the operation of the School during its early years, and hindered it from achieving the fullest success. To begin with, the interval of training was only ten weeks, an inadequate period in view of the undeniable fact that many of the teachers needed scholastic instruction as well as pedagogic training. It did not take d'Avray long to discover that what the Inspectors had said on this point in 1845 was still true of many teachers. In his first annual report he commented on these deficiencies, saying that many teachers were poor readers and made constant mistakes in ordinary conversation. The majority knew little or nothing of Geography, and committing their thoughts to writing was work of the greatest difficulty. Some, he said, should never have been admitted.47 But more glaring than these deficiencies was the inability of the teachers to communicate the knowledge of which they were possessed, a handicap to which d'Avray repeatedly referred in letters and reports. “It is as teachers—as imparters of that knowledge, that they are in general so deficient, and it is in the acquirements of that art that they should be principally exercised during the time of their attendance.” 48 Because of these circumstances d'Avray criticized the brevity of the training period, and repeatedly emphasized the opinions which he had expressed in his opening lecture on the desirability of instructing and training Parish School teachers in a knowledge of elementary subjects only. This might be done in ten weeks, he said, but to try to do more was absurd, and would be useless, if effected, as the wants of the community which could, or should be, supplied by the Parish Schools were Reading, Writing, Arithmetic, Grammar, and Geography.49 This came far short of what the Act of 1847 required of first and second class teachers, but of that piece of legislation d'Avray said: “The Act appeared to me an Absurdity and daily experience convinces me that it is an impossibility also.” Referring to his opening lecture, d'Avray asserted: “I promised enough to satisfy all who had more sense than to expect too much, and none were dissatisfied but the Educational Theorists whose visionary expectations it would be impossible to realize.” 50

Besides these difficulties, d'Avray had to face lack of enthusiasm on the part of the teachers. To many of these, Normal School training represented inconvenience without commensurate compensation, for the increase in provincial grants promised by the Act of 1847 to trained teachers was but slight, and the subscriptions required from the community were to remain unchanged. Attendance at the Training School therefore demanded of the teacher some immediate expense, and held out no prospect of eventually improved financial standing. d'Avray seems to have been aware of this grievance, for one of his arguments in favour of County Training Schools was the reduction which such schools would mean in the travelling expenses of teachers.

In addition to objections to the inconvenience and expense of attending the Normal School, there seems to have been some criticism of the training as well, and possibly a disinclination to profit by it. Attorney-General Ambrose Street, during the debate on the School Bill of 1852, said he believed that the practice of sending up licensed teachers to the Training School was worse than useless, for such teachers would go back “execrating the Training School, and would relapse into their old habits”. It was difficult to “unlearn” people their bad habits and to instruct them in the new. He knew, he said, of a man of sixty who had gone to the Training School to be trained as a teacher, and who thought himself a cleverer fellow than his teacher, only he felt himself bound to attend under the law. The Attorney-General said he meant by this no imputation on d'Avray, but mentioned these facts to show the failure of the system of training licensed teachers.51 Inevitably the Training School became the subject of political controversy, as the practical problems which confronted it were seized upon by Gregory who assailed d'Avray as the author of all its difficulties. On the other hand Bishop Medley entertained a high opinion of d'Avray's ability and skill as a teacher, and John M. Brooke, Minister of St. Paul's Church, Fredericton wrote that, “As Principal of the Training School his labours have been highly appreciated, and thankfully acknowledged by a large body of teachers from all parts of the Province . . . . In his private capacity, by his agreeable manners, his amiable disposition, his upright and gentle manly conduct, he has secured the respect and esteem of all classes in the community”. Chief Justice Sir James Carter and Edwin Jacob, Principal of King's College, bore witness to his qualifications in matters of education and his character as a gentleman. If these testimonials mean anything they mean that the difficulties of the Training School were not of d'Avray's making.52 Attorney-General Street placed the blame on the indifference of the people and their unwillingness to adopt taxation for schools.53 Perhaps we should take into consideration d'Avray's statement that as supervisor of both the Training School and the Model School he had to neglect one in order to attend the other.54 A warning issued by D. S. Morrison before the Normal School opened may have some bearing on this point. Morrison, afterwards a provincial inspector for many years, stated in January 1848 that in his opinion, to render a normal seminary efficient, a plurality of teachers was absolutely necessary, for one man could not possess all the qualifications required to instruct the various classes of teachers in every branch, and if he did have the qualifications, he could not have the time. Morrison also said that owing to the deficiency of New Brunswick teachers in knowledge as well as in the art of teaching, a years attendance at least was necessary. His conclusion was, therefore, that in order to give the Normal School a fair trial, an increase in the number of teachers and an extension of the time of attendance were indispensable, and that the cost of such a plan would promote the cause of education more than the same amount expended in any other way.55

The absence of a permanent Model School presented one of the greatest obstacles in the way of the smooth operation of the first Normal School. At the opening of the latter, the parish schools of Fredericton were used in succession as Model School classes, an arrangement which d'Avray did not find satisfactory.56 Moreover, the hourly change of masters which he thought necessary in order to give to each teacher as much teaching practice as possible operated against the interests of the Model School. Evidently parents did not like the arrangement either, for the pupils of the Model Classes fell off in attendance. At one time there was no attendance for five weeks, so that a set of teachers obtained no practice for half their training. Finally, the Madras School in Fredericton under a Mr. Graham was taken on as the Model School.57

Since in 1841 “Philos” wrote a series of letters to the Editor of The Chatham Gleaner pleading for the better education of women,58 and in 1850 E. H. Duval, Master of the Training School at Saint John, admitted that previous to his visitation of schools in Boston, New York, and Toronto he had had a prejudice against the employment of women teachers,59 we may suppose that female teachers, although employed to a certain extent in the schools of the province, were not held in very high regard. Lieutenant-Governor Colebrooke's plans, we remember, included the training of women for teaching, but when the Normal School was established the premises could accommodate such a limited number of teachers that the Board of Education, at an early date, decided that the attendance of females at the Training School should be dispensed with.60 “It is evident,” d'Avray said in 1848, “that they cannot attend the school with the men,” but on the strength of Sir William's approval of a separate school for females he had given a certificate to a Miss Moore, daughter of one of the teachers in the city, and His Excellency had granted her a license. She had, d'Avray reported, twenty pupils,61 and he proposed that her school be advertised in the Government Gazette as open for the reception of female teachers who would be there trained under his superintendence.62 This, however, must have been one of the things in which d'Avray was frustrated by the Board, for the school does not seem to have obtained official standing as a training school, and in his first annual report d'Avray stated that of the one hundred and two teachers who had attended the Normal School only one female had attended, and for but a short time.63 As we shall see later, the training of female teachers did not begin until after the Normal School was founded in Saint John.

The Act of 1847 had made reference to the establishment of subsidiary schools, and d'Avray, as has been shown, supported the idea. However, County Training Schools were never established, probably because they could not all have been made useful without enormous expense. New Brunswick, in thus endorsing the advantage of one efficient Normal School over many small training schools, was in line with Nova Scotia, New York State, and Upper Canada. Unfortunately, for many years the one New Brunswick Normal School was conducted under such conditions of cramped quarters, poor heating, and bad ventilation that it could not achieve real efficiency.

Marshall d'Avray soon came to advocate support for schools in terms of the impetus which the adoption of the assessment principle would furnish.64 He also advocated inspection, pointing out that without it there was no guarantee that trained teachers would practise what they had learned at the Normal School.65 While we find no direct reference of his to the need of a Superintendent of Education, we note his suggestion of a series of lectures throughout the province to arouse interest,66 a type of evangelism which only some such official as a Superintendent could perform. In contrast with the procedure followed in Nova Scotia and Upper Canada, d'Avray was afforded no opportunity of visiting the schools of other countries, either before he entered on his work, or in the course of his duties. In spite of all the talk of a Normal School for years before it was established, the Legislature did not seem to appreciate fully either the magnitude of the undertaking, or the minutiae of preparation and detail necessary to insure the utmost efficiency.

It would appear that d'Avray found his position as Master of the Training School vexatious and unsatisfactory, for hardly had he arrived than he began corresponding with Grey on the subject of another appointment. He even expressed willingness to return to the Mauritius, but was advised that the position had been filled and no other was vacant.67 The causes of his dissatis- faction are not far to seek. The political controversy over the Training School, and the failure of the government to fulfil his expectations must have made this period of his life in New Brunswick one of considerable difficulty. Chief Justice Carter was of the opinion that he had been placed in a false position as a result of the factional conflict. His connection with the Normal School ended, however, more abruptly than he could ever have expected. In November, 1850, a fire occurred in Fredericton which destroyed the Training School, d'Avray's quarters, and many of his possessions. For a time his only means of subsistence was the eighty pounds he earned as a substitute in King's College and the Collegiate School for Professor Houseal who was absent on leave. Eventually, the Government of New Brunswick gave him some compensation for his loss by fire,68 and Professor Houseal having resigned, d'Avray became Professor of Modern Languages at King's with full pay. Since the Province had brought him to this country, the Government must have felt some responsibility for his position— certainly d'Avray implied that they should.69 At any rate, when the first Superintendent of Education had resigned, d'Avray was given the appointment, at the same time retaining his professorship. He ceased to be Superintendent of Education in 1858 but remained at King's College, and then at the University of New Brunswick, which King's was soon to become, until his death.

With the destruction of the Training School in Fredericton, the Saint John School became the only institution in the province for training teachers. In tardy recognition of the limited accommodations at Fredericton, the Board of Education had responded to the solicitation of Edmund Hillyer Duval of Saint John and had established a second Training School in that city in the fall of 1848. Duval, formerly a school inspector in England and principal of a school at Bristol, had come to Saint John in 1845 to take charge of a school there under the auspices of the British and Foreign School Society.70 When the Board of Education appointed him master of the subsidiary Training School, his classes in the British School became the Model School. He could grant licenses of only the second and third classes, but candidates whom he approved for first class might transfer to Fredericton for four weeks training and final examination.71 From 1850 until 1867 this School in Saint John was the only official training school in the province,72 and for nine of those years was under Duval's direction.

It will be remembered that the British and Foreign School Society used the Lancastrian monitorial system. Why, one asks, was such a school established in Saint John in 1845 when the heyday of the monitorial system had passed? Duval's address at the opening of the school, August 25, 1845, ex- plained that since the early days of the system a change had occurred in the “British” Schools, the education now given being of a more advanced character than at first. Hence, while the monitorial system was still used to some extent, much more direct and individual instruction was given by the master than formerly. Duval said that the system to be adopted in his school would exercise the judgment rather than burden the memory, and that the object was to get children to think.73 Clearly, changing times had brought modifications in the old rigid memoriter methods of the monitorial system.

Duval's aims for the “British” School and d'Avray's for the Parish Schools reveal an identity of purpose, which may explain why d'Avray, after only a brief interview with Duval, readily certified the latter in 1848 as a fit master for a Training School. On the occasion of the opening of the “British” School, Duval announced that the principle of the Society was to impart to children an eminently useful education, adapted to the circumstances in which they were likely to be placed. It did not offer instruction in the dead languages, but would give that education best suited to the mechanical and commercial portions of society. The course in his school, therefore, would embrace Reading, Writing, Spelling, Arithmetic, Geography, Grammar, English History, Natural History, Drawing, and Singing.74 Since the “British” School became the Model Class for Duval's Training School, it is apparent that after 1850 Duval either had to enlarge his curriculum to meet the requirements of first class teachers, or had to give first class candidates training in theory, without practice in teaching advanced subjects.

The most significant change in theory and practice during the early years of Duval's Training School began in 1849 with the enrolment of Martha Hamm Lewis. This girl, in her early twenties, “led the womanhood of this province in a great advance”. According to the story,75 as narrated long afterwards by her daughters, Miss Lewis had been educated by private tutors and in boarding school. Convinced that she knew as much as the young men of her acquaintance who were attending the Training School, she applied repeatedly for admission, but was as often refused on the grounds of custom and expediency. Finally she wrote the Lieutenant-Governor, who ruled that she was not ineligible, and the momentous hour came when an Order-in-Council directed that she be admitted to the Normal School. She was warned, however, that she could in no wise hold the Council responsible for any ill results. Duval, so runs the tale, was much perturbed and imposed certain regulations. She had to enter the classroom ten minutes before the other students and was required to wear a veil. She was asked to sit alone at the back of the room. retire five minutes before the lecture ended, and leave the premises without speaking to the male students. With these precautions, no untoward incident occurred and “those who had sponsored her brave step were vindicated”.76 In the autumn of 1850 the Board of Education, in answer to a letter from Duval relative to the admission of female teachers to the Training School, ruled that he might admit as many as could be received without inconvenience in the present establishment, “but it will be requisite to enforce perfect propriety”.77 This was the beginning of a trend which quickly resulted in a plurality of females in attendance at the Training School, and in charge of the schools of the province. In 1850 Duval admitted that one of the things which had impressed him during his visits the previous summer to American and Canadian cities78 was the number of females enrolled in the training schools of Boston, New York, Portland, and Toronto, and the number of successful female teachers in the common schools. He had become convinced that his prejudice against the employment of females was unfounded and he recommended that they be received for training.79 In 1852, of the ninety-two students at the Saint John Training School forty-nine were females, and never afterwards did female students lose this ascendancy.

Two conflicting views at this time of the function of a Normal School may be discerned. The level of learning in New Brunswick was generally low, yet the ambition of the John Gregorys in the province demanded that Parish School teachers have some knowledge of advanced subjects. Because of the tendency of the New Brunswick temperament toward concession, the inevitable compromise emerged. To d'Avray a training school was to train teachers to teach. He was dismayed to find so many teachers deficient in learning, and found in this circumstance further argument for the limited course which he advocated for Parish Schools. He also favored the elimination of unfit candidates by means of entrance requirements. But as might be expected in a naive society, many people, teachers included, looked on the Training School as a sort of secondary school. In 1856 d'Avray, then Superintendent of Education, said he had met many young men who had made heroic sacrifices to become better scholars, with a view to obtaining a higher class of license, but had seldom encountered instances of a more desirable ambition to become better teachers—as if, he added, becoming better scholars without becoming better teachers could add to their value as teachers.80 In 1850 Duval had reported that the training period in the Normal School of Massachusetts was a year, but that most of the time was devoted to studies, each pupil spending only two weeks in the Model School. This, he said, differed materially from the plan contemplated by the New Brunswick Act. He himself thought that the time spent in the Model School in Massachusetts was insufficient, but the authorities there seemed satisfied that theirs was the better plan.81 Gregory opposed d'Avray and Duval on this point. In his report as Secretary in 1850, he complained that the master of the Training School was not required by the Act of 1847 to promote directly the elementary knowledge of the teachers, a point complained of by the teachers. He himself concurred in the views of the managers of training schools in Massachusetts, and thought that an alteration was indispensably necessary to meet the expectations of New Brunswick teachers and to improve their efficiency.82 The matter was not discussed during the debate on the Bill of 1852, and in reference to the training of teachers the Act of that year only mentioned instruction in the art of teaching and in the best methods of conducting Parish Schools.83 It did, however, provide that the classification of teachers for license should be based largely on subjects, and that licenses were to be issued, not only on the report of the Training Master, but also on the ability of the candidates to pass examinations set and marked by unpaid examiners appointed from outside the Normal School.84 Duval, as we have seen, favored as much practice teaching as possible, but the quarters in which his Training School was conducted became so cramped as attendance grew that conditions operated against a large degree of professional training. It would seem, therefore, that while there was no deliberate shift of emphasis, there was a tacit recognition of the function of the Normal School to provide secondary education as well as training in teaching, and a tendency to emphasize the former at the expense of the latter. In 1855 d'Avray complained that the principle on which the training of teachers was conducted was that a little of a good thing was better than none at all. He said that the Act of 1852 imposed on candidates for first and second class such a long series of requirements that, in order to pass, the teachers were compelled to neglect training and instruction in the art of teaching, and devote themselves to the study of various branches, which, to them as common school teachers, were comparatively useless.85 Actually, in the Normal School which was conducted from 1867 to 1870 at Chatham for the teachers of the northern counties, professional instruction was given after the regular school hours.86 All this is not to say that Principals Duval, Mills, Crocket, and subsequent Normal School Principals were under any misapprehension regarding the true function of a Normal School, but they had to do the best they could under existing circumstances. Popular inertia, a tendency in the public mind to confuse knowledge and teaching ability, the unwillingness of the legislature to provide funds for expansion, the inadequacy of teachers' salaries, frequent shortage of teachers, have all combined; even to this day, to limit the professional training received in New Brunswick's Normal School. But, on the other hand, it is undeniable that a teacher, if he is to have a proper perspective, must know more than the curriculum he is required to teach. It would seem that in d'Avray's opinion existing conditions necessitated a choice between teachers able to teach essentials well, and teachers possessed of considerable superficial knowledge but of little pedagogic skill. That he believed the former was preferable to the latter is no conclusive proof of a belief on his part in any restrictions or limitations on knowledge.

Duval had returned from his tour of schools outside the province impressed with the value of Teachers' Institutes, educational periodicals, school instruction in music, and in particular the benefits of assessment.87 All who were interested in the improvement of education in the province urged the timeliness of a new school act embodying the principle of assessment. At the same time, those who opposed the introduction of the principle began to bombard the Assembly with petitions. In 1850, for example, there were nine petitions signed by five hundred and seventy-six persons against an Act having for its object assessment for schools. During the election campaign of 1850, the leading cry had been for reform and retrenchment in expenditure. Among the new members elected were several supporters of responsible government, such as S. L. Tilley, W. H. Needham, J. H. Gray, and G. L. Hatheway. Wilmot and Fisher were both defeated, probably because of their seeming desertion of the Liberal party in 1846, when they had joined a Conservative government, hoping to effect a balance in the administration. The supporters of reform had the majority in the Assembly, but the principle of executive responsibility to the Assembly was not yet in full operation, and a number of professed reformers switched to the support of the government. In consequence, the Tory Executive remained in power. The unpopular question of assessment was therefore not pushed to a decision by a cautious Executive and a House characterized by a large element of uncertainty and vacillation. Moreover, the session of 1851 presented the legislators with a number of controversial topics, including the question of the Intercolonial Railway, the fate of King's College, and the initiation of money votes.88 The School Bill was therefore held over until the next session.89

According to a newspaper account of remarks on education made by Attorney-General Street during the session of 1851, that official pointed to the admirable way in which the principle of direct taxation worked in Maine and Massachusetts, and said that when we could find a good example we should not hesitate to adopt it because it happened to prevail in a republican country.90 An editorial in the same paper a week later criticized the bill because it said nothing about better pay for teachers, and because the assessment principle contained in the bill was permissive, and required a two-thirds majority of the inhabitants of the district. So long as people remained uneducated, they never would vote to be taxed. The editorial pointed to the good results of a system of assessment in the neighboring states, even admitting: “It is to this system that the superior enterprise and intelligence of our neighbors are to be attributed”. Finally, the writer called on the Government and Legislature “to dare the transient unpopularity which may attend this measure, and generations yet unborn will bless the session of 1851 ”.91 Continuing its campaign in support of assessment, the Courier published a number of letters on the subject. One such complained that the government, although recognizing the principle of assessment as right, by shifting the responsibility of refusing or granting assessment from their own shoulders upon the shoulders of the counties, was virtually rendering useless the boon which they professed to be desirous of conferring. The writer hoped that no member of the House would show himself such a creature of his constituency as to allow the existing system to continue solely from deference to the grumblings of an apathetic ignorance.92 Another letter described the School Bill of 1851 as a “lame and meagre production”.93

In spite of the existence in the province of such opinions as these, the government of 1852 refused to take the risk of compelling assessment for schools, and the Bill of 1852, which was introduced by Attorney-General Street as a government measure, embodied the assessment principle only in a voluntary form. From the Synoptic Reports of the debate of 1852, we find that inspection and the financial support of schools formed the chief topics of the discussion on the bill.

Three of the leading Liberals elected in 1850 were absent from the House in 1852, Tilley, Simonds, and Ritchie from Saint John having resigned in 1851 following the defection to the government ranks of two of their colleagues, Gray and R. D. Wilmot.94 Besides Street, who was a Tory, the most vocal supporters of the assessment principle were Hatheway, a Liberal, Needham, a Liberal who had refused to resign along with his colleagues from Saint John, and Gray, who had transferred his allegiance and had become a member of the Tory Executive. Among the opponents of the principle were Hanington and John M. Johnson, both Liberals, and Barbarie, who had entered the House in 1850 in opposition to the government, but had later supported it. It would seem, therefore, that political affiliations did not materially affect the attitudes of members to the bill.

Analyzing the principal speeches made during the debate, we note first a general admission of the failure of Normal School training alone to effect any marked improvement in the schools of the province. Popular indifference and the inadequacy of teachers' salaries received a large share of blame. Hatheway declared that “People gave better wages to men laboring in the woods, than the Province gave to school teachers,” and as a consequence respectable men could not be induced to enter the profession.95 Needham said that if people's pockets were touched, they would wake up and determine that the schools should be conducted in a proper and effective manner.96 Botsford thought that as long as the Province gave teachers only £ 20 a year, better teachers could not be expected,97 and John M. Johnson said that “No man would take the office of a Parish School Teacher that could do anything else, because by any other pursuit he could earn a better living”.98

A second point to be noted is the frequency with which references were made to other countries, particularly Massachusetts.99 The Attorney-General compared the amounts contributed to education by the government of New Brunswick with the sums similarly contributed in Maine and Massachusetts, and said that while New Brunswick spent nearly twice the percentage per head, her education was in nothing like the advanced state of theirs. He referred to Egerton Ryerson's report on education in 1851 so that the honorable members might see that Canada had had to contend with difficulties also. He said that since the last session he had studied the Canada School Act, and had observed that in Canada and in Maine as much information as possible was gleaned from other countries before measures were passed. “Therefore, in preparing this measure he had not drawn from his own powers, but had consulted the information afforded by the experience of other countries.” 100 Needham wished that the Attorney-General had turned his attention to the principle of direct taxation as stated by Horace Mann. If the Attorney-General had done so, he would have become convinced that only one part of every hundred parts of the property of any man belonged to himself; “the rest was entrusted to him for the promotion of the general welfare”. He, Needham, wished that he could boast of being the author of such statements and doctrines; but at least he believed in them. He then detailed at great length the particulars of certain schools in the United States which he had lately visited.101 But while Needham and Street felt the inspiration of Upper Canada and the American States, other members implied that it was folly to hitch one's wagon to a star, taking the stand that the limitations of the province must condition policies and practices in New Brunswick. Barbarie, who was opposed to assessment, told Needham that if he had travelled a little more in New Brunswick, he would know a little more about how to make laws to benefit his own country. Barbarie could tell him that the poor settlers in the woods and rural districts of New Brunswick could not bear a direct tax.102 Cutler deprecated the habit of exalting the institutions of the neighboring states and depreciating our own. “The poverty of the country, the scattered state of the population, and many other causes make the teachers what they are; and this it will be in great measure a work of time to rectify.” In plain words, the legislators of 1852, even those who favored assessment in theory, seem to have exhibited the usual caution, the characteristic unwillingness to take progressive steps which might prove unpopular, and the old tendency to accept, as inevitable, a modest role for New Brunswick in things of the spirit. This last was in rather curious contrast to the feeling which was growing at the time that New Brunswick was about to ride high on a wave of economic prosperity, because of railway expansion.

A clue to the attitude of the Legislature probably lies in Barbarie's statement that if they inserted a clause to make a direct tax coercive, they would raise a storm about their ears that they could not withstand.104 Attorney-General Street himself set the tone when he said that he favored a direct tax, and always had, but was satisfied it could not be effected compulsorily. The bill, therefore, gave permission to assess, and held out inducements to encourage voluntary acceptance of the principle.105 A number of the members opposed even this. John M. Johnson thought it was better to bear the evils that were known than those “we wot not of”, and therefore preferred the present system to that proposed by the bill.106 Later, he declared that the premium offered for voluntary assessment would mean that rich and urban districts which could afford assessment would get the premium, while poor rural districts which really required aid could get none.107 Harlington thought the same—the system of a direct tax would be inoperative in rural areas where people could not command the use of money. It might do all right in Fredericton, the abode of public officials whose salaries were certain and regular, and in York County where everything represented money. Under the present system the schools had made progress—indeed he had heard it said by persons from Maine that the schools in New Brunswick were in a better shape, as a whole, than those of Maine.108

Only the Honorable J. H. Gray, Hatheway, and Needham showed a degree of readiness to support a more comprehensive measure. The first gentleman cited, as proof that several parts of the country were ready to adopt assessment, a conversation that he had held with several parties in Charlotte County, where at Milltown they had built one of the best schools in the province.109He declared his belief that there would never be a perfect system of education until there were free schools and a direct tax.110 Hatheway, who twenty years later was to risk the fate of his government on the question of free non-sectarian schools, admitted on this occasion that assessment would be unpopular,111 but argued in its favor. Every child, he said, had a right to an education, and, as Horace Mann had argued, “the wealthy should bear the burden of educating the children with more pleasure than the burden of supporting gaols or poor houses”.112 Needham, whose support of anything was always wholehearted, believed that the Government were bound, even at the risk of their seats, to force direct taxation on the people. “Some laws must necessarily be coercive, and this was one of them.” One thing a Legislature ought to do was to take care that the people they ruled, and the children of the people they ruled, were educated, for it was a self-evident fact that nations were strong in proportion to their intelligence. “If the Legislature waited for all the people of this Province to consent to adopt direct taxation, they would never have it at all.” He himself, during the past summer, had prepared a bill based on the principles of direct taxation and the system of schools in Massachusetts and Maine, and he believed his own bill was better than the Government one, but he had not introduced it, believing it would not be carried in opposition to a Government measure. If he were a member of the Government, yes, if he were the whole Government, he would soon have his bill in operation, and he would stake his existence on the success of the system. In a burst of generosity he said he would give the Committee on Education his bill, if they liked, would say goodbye to his own child, and would throw off any glory that might be supposed to attach to himself as the author of it. In a concluding burst of oratory he cried: “Educate the people and make them free; educate the people and make them happy: educate the people and keep them from crime and misery.” 113

This question of assessment occupied the major part of the debate, but the subject of inspection came in for considerable discussion also. The Act of 1847 had provided for the appointment of two inspectors, but according to the Attorney-General the appointments had not been made.114 On this occasion the consideration was how many inspectors should be appointed. The Attorney-General himself favored having three at £ 250 each per annum, rather than the suggestion of fourteen at £ 50 each, for there must be provision also for a Superintendent.115 J. M. Johnson and Barbarie preferred local inspectors appointed by the counties.116 R. D. Wilmot thought that the cost of inspectors would be more than paid for by the influence of inspection in preventing the establishment, in certain localities, of three schools where one would do, as was sometimes the case.117 Hatheway said that when he considered the time annually spent by the Legislature in discussing the numerous school petitions presented at every session, he believed that the expense of such discussion would pay the salaries of the inspectors.118 Porter warned against having clergymen for inspectors, as they were always jealous of each other and interfered with each other's suggestions.119 Crane showed that three inspectors would be insufficient, and that £ 250 annually was an inadequate salary for each,120 but Hanington was sure that county inspectors could be found perfectly competent and willing to visit the schools three times a year, and make reports, for £ 75 or £ 100 a year.121

Among sundry statements of interest made during the debate, was the Attorney-General's contention that the payment of an allowance to teachers in attendance at the Normal School opened the way for imposition. He had been told that people who had no intention of becoming teachers had come to the Normal School, even from the United States, merely to get the allowance and spent a few weeks in Fredericton.122 The Honorable J. H. Gray proposed adding to the curriculum instruction in the geography, history and resources of the Province, and pointed to the United States, where everyone, he said, was acquainted with the history, geography and natural resources of every State in the Union.123 Hanington, who had successfully introduced the previous year a measure to close the provincial treasury against grants to the college, criticized the expense, in connection with the college, of £ 2300 for twenty-three pupils, and said he had wished to bring in a resolution proposing the introduction of a system of High Schools, such as they had in Massachusetts, provided for out of the college funds, and free to select pupils from the parish schools124. He did not explain why he had omitted this feature from his resolution the previous year.

The Bill of 1852, in its final form as “An Act for the better establishment and maintenance of the Parish Schools”,125 incorporated three features of importance, in addition to those which we examined earlier in connection with the licensing of teachers. In the first place, the Board of Education was enlarged to include a Superintendent of Education who was to be Secretary of the Board also, at a total salary of £ 200 per annum, with £ 50 allowed for travelling expenses and contingencies of office. Secondly, there were to be county inspectors appointed by the Governor in Council. These were to inspect each school in their respective counties four times a year. They were to be paid at the rate of 7s. 6d. for each inspection, and were guaranteed a minimum salary of £ 50 a year. Obviously, the Legislature did not consider that the task of inspection was a full-time job! Thirdly, districts or parishes were permitted to assess themselves for the support of schools. Any district or parish adopting the assessment principle would receive a bonus of 25% on the government allowance, and pupils attending the school would not be required to pay a tuition fee in excess of the sum of 2s. 6d. per quarter. As d'Avray pointed out in 1854, those who framed the Act made a mistake in not including, for assess- ment purposes, the property of non-resident proprietors,126 an oversight which probably partly accounted for the general failure of districts to avail themselves of the opportunity afforded by the Act for assessment.

The Act continued the provisions for the Training School at Saint John, extended the period for training to three months, and, by making allowance for a female teacher at the Model School, indicated that females were expected to attend the Training School. However, to encourage males in the profession, the Act made a distinction between the provincial allowance for male and female teachers. Males of the three classes were to receive £ 30, £ 20, and £ 18, while the grants to females were set at £ 14, £ 18, and £ 20. Districts were required to contribute an amount equal to the provincial allowance,127 but the equivalent might still be furnished in board and washing. Teachers already licensed who failed to attend the Training School were to revert to third class. All licenses were henceforth to be signed by the Superintendent. The Act also contained clauses relating to Inspectors' and Superintendent's reports and to teachers' registers, and made provision for the continuance of an allowance to those who attended the Normal School. To put an end to the scores of petitions received annually in the Legislature, the Act declared that the Legislature would not in future entertain any petition of a school teacher, unless it was sanctioned by the Board of Education. As we shall see later, until the Executive assumed the responsibility of provincial finances there was no marked reduction in the number of petitions annually presented to the Legislature.

According to the debate, the legislators of 1852 realized that a connection existed between the inadequacy of teachers' salaries and the generally poor state of the schools. Nevertheless the Act of 1852 did practically nothing to improve the financial status of teachers. This omission did not pass unnoticed. While the Bill was still before the House, “A Patriot” complained that the Bill neglected the wants of teachers and people alike, and asserted that in many parts of the province parochial teachers resembled mendicants in their attire, and that only Bacchanalians and the decrepit would pursue the vocation because of the insignificant sums which teachers received. This particular critic thought that the solution was to have the Government pay the whole salary from mean's realized in an indirect way,128 but others blamed the Government for failing to make assessment compulsory, and bewailed popular indifference. “It is a melancholy prospect for the future of New Brunswick,” wrote the Editor of The Courier in 1854, “when we find the hearty, stalwart pioneers of our wilderness represented as objecting to a direct tax for the education of their children. We think if one duty is obligatory on our members of Assembly more than another, that duty would be, for each and all, to explain and impress upon every individual constituent the imperative necessity for an impost for the purposes of education”.129 This “melancholy prospect” was to prevail, however, for many a year, for it appeared less grievous to New Brunswick legislators than the loss of their seats.

d'Avray applied for the position of Superintendent, but the appointment was given to the Reverend James Porter. Edwin Jacob, Vice-Principal of King's, wished to be one of the inspectors but he too was disappointed. Lieutenant-Governor Head wrote to Jacob that he would like to comply with the request, but that in these matters he had to be guided pretty much by his Council—a significant statement from the standpoint of responsible government. He added: “Indeed, one great objection I have to the present bill is the patronage which it gives to the government, in the certainty that such patronage cannot be in all instances properly distributed.” 130

James Porter held the position of Superintendent for less than a year. When it was rumored that he was about to terminate his engagement, the Fredericton Head Quarters remarked that his resignation was to be regretted and also rejoiced in —regretted, because his place would be hard to fill, and rejoiced in because the resignation would probably in the end teach (if anything would) the public and the Legislature where the real difficulties existed in working out a scheme of liberal public instruction.131 What these difficulties were is not clear. At any rate, Porter resigned, and d'Avray became Superintendent in his place, at the same time retaining his professorship at King's.

From 1852 onwards the reports of the Superintendent and of the inspectors regularly furnished information about the schools. However, aside from expressing approval of assessment, they give scarcely any inkling of what the writers were thinking or reading. Among the more interesting items gleaned from these reports between 1852 and 1855, the following are as revealing as any.

In 1853 Superintendent Porter showed that only one third of the children of the province between the ages of six and sixteen years of age attended the Parish Schools. There were 107 schoolhouses made of logs, and 380 schools had neither yard nor privy. The Irish National Books were still sanctioned by the Board, together with Lennie's English Grammar and Pinnock's Catechism of the History of England and America. There was as yet no geography with maps for the teaching of New Brunswick geography.132 The inspectors generally complained of the negligence and selfishness of Trustees in marking off school districts. Cases were known where Trustees were selected in direct opposition to their predecessors for the sake of altering the location of school districts. Books were scarce and of a wide variety. Parents were apathetic, in some cases because of poverty, but not in all, for in general the ordinary business of the country had never been in a more prosperous state. Irregularities existed. One Inspector found a teacher who received only £ 6 a year from the inhabitants, and boarded himself. In some instances the contracts stipulated that the teacher should have Friday and Saturday to himself. Erroneous ideas prevailed in regard to assessment, some people believing that compulsory assessment meant there would be no support at all from the government.133

Reports for 1853 were in a similar vein, particularly with reference to school districts and popular apathy. Duval cited examples of the embarrassment to teachers which boarding around often entailed. In one case a teacher was asked if he would defer his period of boarding with one of the families for some time, because flour was so dear at the time.134 The reports presented in 1855 gave further instances of the same sort. The Superintendent noted that teachers were sometimes paid in potatoes, buckwheat, and socks, all charged at the very highest rates in orders upon the stores, where the unfortunate teachers obtained indifferent goods at exorbitant prices.135 One inspector reported a case in Gloucester County where an increase in the teacher's salary was made by raising the price of the produce, in which, by previous agreement, the teachers were paid.136 The Superintendent also pointed to the time which teachers lost in travelling about, seeking a vacant school, visiting the inhabitants and obtaining subscriptions, and calling upon the Trustees for approbation and signatures. He suggested that engagements should be made through the local Inspector, who should have authority to institute proceedings in an action for debt for the sums which were promised. This, of course, would add to the duties of the inspectors, who should be reduced in numbers and given salaries to make their positions full-time. The Superintendent himself should receive more than £ 50 for travelling expenses if he was to know the province and the teachers.137 Because of the odious conditions attached to teaching, and because of the increased commercial prosperity of the province, the teachers, especially male teachers, were leaving the profession for more highly paid employment. Superintendent d'Avray implied that New Brunswick, like the Mother Country, had made the mistake of overlooking the fact that as the teacher is, so is the school. At the laying of the cornerstone of the Toronto Normal School, he said, the late Governor General of Canada had alluded to this, saying that it was difficult to find a more flagrant error of putting effect before cause than that exhibited in the course pursued by the friends of education in England and other countries, who for years had busied themselves in building schools, and endeavoring to induce children to attend them, without ever enquiring whether competent teachers could be secured, and without taking any efficient and vigorous steps to supply an admitted want of qualified teachers. Since 1846, however, England had been pursuing a more enlightened policy, and, by implication, d'Avray inferred that New Brunswick must do the same.138

There is something pathetic about the fact that year after year Superintendents and inspectors penned reports similar in nature to the above. These officials, no matter how zealous in admonishing teachers and in informing the public, could work no sudden miraculous change in the character of the Parish schools. Year after year the Government and Legislature received their reports and, as often, failed to act on the information and suggestions therein presented, thereby robbing the work of such officials of much of its significance.

In 1854 the efficiency and usefulness of King's College were again vigorously attacked. As a result, five commissioners were appointed to consider the state of the college. Three residents of New Brunswick, the Honorable J. H. Gray, the Honorable James Brown, and the Honorable J. S. Saunders were members of the Commission, along with two distinguished educationists from outside the province, Egerton Ryerson from Canada West, and J. W. Dawson from Nova Scotia.139 While King's College and university education formed the principle theme of their report, the Commissioners envisioned such a linking of all the educational institutions of the Province in one comprehensive system that they felt unable to limit themselves to a consideration of the college alone. The report stressed the necessity of the recognition and application of the vital principle that every child had the right to such an education as would fit him for Christian citizenship, and that every man is bound to contribute in order to secure to every child the enjoyment of that right.140

Referring to the Normal and Model Schools, the Commissioners indicated that these institutions had been only partially successful, if not failures, and implied that this was because of inadequate facilities and meagre financial support. New Brunswick could have premises as spacious, and buildings as noble, as those in Canada West, at the expense of £ 1000 for procuring and fitting up the premises and apparatus, and £ 1000 a year for the support of the institution. A good Normal School and public libraries were, the Commissioners thought, absolutely indispensable. 141

Since the Parish Schools were in fact the colleges of nine-tenths of the people, “to despise those Schools, to neglect them, to make or keep the Parish School House the poorest and most comfortless place in the Parish, is clearly most impolitic and unwise”. Again the Commissioners pointed to Canada West, where the inhabitants had resolved that the buildings for elementary education should be no less convenient and complete, in their kind, than those for classical and scientific education. As a result the body of the people were more elevated and more capable of appreciating what was noble and refined.142

The Commissioners stressed the importance of the office of Chief Superintendent, which, incidentally, they thought should be combined with that of the Head of the University. Since such an administrative position required high qualifications, the remuneration should be sufficient to attract qualified persons. As Dr. Wayland, President of Brown University, had said, “it was bad econ- omy to employ inferior talent to do badly that which could only be of service when it was done well”.143

While this report produced no immediate action in connection with the College, the Normal School, or the Parish Schools, a number of the Commission's recommendations were eventually applied to the College; and in the School Act of 1858 the influence of the Commission may be discerned in the encouragement afforded to school libraries, and in the clauses which provided for clerical assistance and increased salary for the Superintendent of Education. One of the most interesting things about the appointment of the Commission lies in its significance as an indication of an increasing tendency in New Brunswick to look to other parts of America, rather than across the Atlantic. The adoption of such models as Massachusetts and Canada West practically guaranteed the eventual development in New Brunswick of a system of schools open to all, and forming an educational ladder reaching from the lowest to the highest institution in the province. Obviously, the next time the provincial authorities felt impelled to import an educationist they would turn, not to England as they had done in 1847, but to one of the sister colonies in North America.

The ratification of the Reciprocity treaty in this same year, 1854, was an instance in the economic field of the way in which the interests of New Brunswick, of necessity, were becoming more and more identified with the continent of North America. It is true that certain features of this commercial treaty between the United States and the British provinces of North America were not popular in the Maritimes, the latter inclining to the belief that their fisheries were being sacrificed to the interests of the Province of Canada.144 There is a suggestion, also, that interested parties in Canada and America helped to secure the assent of the legislators of New Brunswick by bribes in hard cash.145 At any rate, the treaty was ratified by a special session of the New Brunswick Legislature with only five members dissenting.146

It was during this particular session of the Legislature that the Honorable Charles Fisher introduced a resolution declaring that the conduct of the administration during the last four years had not been in accordance with the principles of self-government. This resolution having been carried by a large majority, Fisher formed a new administration composed of members responsible to the Assembly, and at the next session in 1855 the new Government started action to put an end to the old wasteful system of appropriations, and to vest in itself the initiation of all money grants.147 Also in 1855 the last remnant of the old Imperial Custom House system was withdrawn by the British Government.148 By means of these changes Responsible Government became a reality. “The old order of things,” says Hannay, “had passed away . . . . Hencefor- ward New Brunswick was committed to a policy, in which family compacts and despotic Lieutenant Governors could have no place.” 149

Coincident with all this, the Province was experiencing a mighty preoccupation with the question of railways—a preoccupation which featured a wide range of emotions, many rival schemes, and a number of overly ambitious ventures. In 1853, when the New Brunswick section of the European and North American railway was begun—a railway which was to connect Halifax and Saint John with the railway lines of the United States—there was great rejoicing.150 Hopes were still high, also, that the Imperial Government would assist the British provinces of North America in the building of an Intercolonial railway from Halifax to Quebec. Both projects, as it happened, were doomed to disappointing delays, but this was not yet apparent. The future seemed bright; there was commercial prosperity; New Brunswick ships still sailed the seven seas; soon shining rails would lead west and southwest; Responsible Government had been achieved; the province could boast of having much of the educational machinery which larger, more populous, and more prosperous states had achieved. All the kaleidoscopic bits and pieces of the previous twenty years seemed to be shaping into one simple splendid pattern— Prosperity. All the wavering lights and fitful flashes of those years seemed to be blending into a new radiance. One could almost believe, in 1854, that for New Brunswick a Golden Age lay just ahead.

Notes

^1. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of the Board of Education, 1847-1852. pp. 5, 6.

^2. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1848, pp. 54-56.

^3. Fenety, p. 348.

^4. Ibid., p. 358.

^5. Bailey, J. W. (1), pp. 22-103.

^6. Ibid., Footnote p. 5.

^7. University of New Brunswick Library, Letters and Papers Relating to the Family of J. Marshall d'Avray, d'Avray to Grey, Aug. 5, 1847.

^8. Attested to by a copy of Reports of the Mauritius Education Committee, 1844-1847, (CO 167/254), in the collection mentioned in footnote 6.

^9. University of New Brunswick Library, Letters and Papers Relating to the Family of J. Marshall d'Avray, d'Avray to Grey, Sept. 30, 1847.

^10. P.A. of Canada, C0188, Vol. 10, Colebrooke to Grey, Jan. 28, 1848, Disp. 10.

^11. Parrington (2), Intro. p. iii.

^12. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, p. 42.

^13. d'Avray (1), p. 4.

^14. Ibid., p. 8.

^15. Ibid., p. 5.

^16. Ibid., p. 6.

^17. Ibid., p. 4.

^18. John Gregory in 1850 said that the suggestion of Scholarships, to pave the way for the poor man's son from the Parish School to the honors of the College, originated some years before with the Attorney-General (Street), and was afterwards very properly adopted by d'Avray. (Gregory, Documents before the Council of King's College in the case of the Expulsion of George Gregory, p. 36.)

^19. d'Avray (1), p. 7.

^20. Curti, p. 43.

^21. d'Avray (2), p. 5.

^22. Ibid., pp. 6, 7.

^23. Ibid., p. 8.

^24. Ibid., pp. 10-12.

^25. Ibid., pp. 12-18.

^26. Ibid., pp. 18-20.

^27. Ibid., pp. 20-22.

^28. Ibid., pp. 23-25.

^29. d'Avray (3), p. 1.

^30. P. A. of Canada, Canada Misc., Delancey-Robinson Papers, Vol. 14, d'Avray to Colebrooke, April 17, 1848.

^31. Ibid., Vol. 14, Gregory to Colebrooke, April 28, 1848.

^32. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1849, Appendix 72.

^33. The New Brunswick Courier, Saint John, Vol, 43, No. 42, March 18, 1854, p. 2.

^34. The Weekly Chronicle, Saint John, Jan. 2, 1857. Gregory's opinion of d'Avray may be compared with that of Bliss Carman who wrote “Professor d'Avray and his wife were a most delightful couple; he a very distinguished-looking gentleman of the old school, with gray waxed moustache and a charming dry wit;. . .” Quoted by Sir John Willison, p. 15. Carman's opinion is corroborated by that of Eldon Mullen, one of d'Avray's students who was afterwards Deputy Director of Education in the Transvaal and Orange River Colonies. Of him Mullen wrote, “He was a thorough and elegant scholar, with a keen appreciation of what was best and truest in literature, and unerring taste in expression. There never breathed a kindlier man. He had an exquisite sense of humour, but his wit never wounded.” etc. Quoted in Bailey, J. W. (2) p. 55. d'Avray's urbane manners, good humour, and especially his composure may have irked the impetuous Gregory.

^35. P. A. of Canada, Canada Misc., Delancey-Robinson Papers, Vol. 14, Grey to Colebrooke (enclosure), April 28, 1848.

^36. The New Brunswick Courier, Saint John, Vol.43, No.42, March18, 1854, p. 2.

^37. Ibid., Vol 43, No. 43, March 25, 1854, p. 1.

^38. The Weekly Chronicle, Saint John, Jan. 2, 1857.

^39. d'Avray (2), p. 21.

^40. New Brunswick: Journal of the House of Assembly, 1854, Appendix 194, 195.

^41. Ibid., Appendix 215, 216.

^42. Ibid., 1856, Appendix 180-182.

^43. University of New Brunswick Library, Minute Book of the College Council of King's College at Fredericton, N. B., Jan. 10, 1829-June 28, 1859, Oct. 27, 1849, pp. 386-388.

^44. Gregory, p. 41.

^45. The New Brunswick Courier, Saint John, Vol. 43, No. 37, Jan. 14, 1854, p. 1.

^46. Canada: Dominion Bureau of Statistics 1927, “The Maritime Provinces since Confederation”, Chapter VIII, p. 133.

^47. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1849, Appendix 68, 69.

^48. P. A. of Canada, Canada Misc., Delancey-Robinson Papers, Vol. 14, d'Avray to Colebrooke, April 17, 1848.

^49. Ibid., Draft Plan of Education appended to above letter.

^50. Ibid., d'Avray to Colebrooks, April 17, 1848.

^51. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of the House of Assembly, 1952, pp. 169, 170.

^52. The New Brunswick Courier, Saint John, Vol. 43, No. 42, March 18, 1854, p. 2. These testimonials are in the University of New Brunswick Library, Letters and Papers relating to the family of J. Marshall d'Avray.

^53. Ibid., Vol. 9, No. 40, March 1, 1851, p. 2.

^54. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1849, Appendix 68.

^55. The New Brunswick Courier, Saint John, Vol. 6, No. 35, Jan. 29, 1848, p. 2.

^56. P. A. of Canada, Canada Misc., Delancey-Robinson Papers, Vol. 14, Report on Education in New Brunswick, April 17, 1848.

^57. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1849, Appendix 68, 69.

^58. Typescript in possession of Louise Manny of Newcastle, New Brunswick.

^59. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1850, Appendix 68.

^60. Ibid., 1849, Appendix 71.

^61. Almost certainly these were Juveniles, not pupil-teachers.

^62. P. A. of Canada, Canada Misc., Delancey-Robinson Papers, Vol. 14, Report on Education in New Brunswick, April 17, 1848.

^63. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1849, Appendix 67.

^64. Ibid., Appendix 70.

^65. Ibid., Appendix 69.

^66. Ibid., Appendix 70.

^67. P. A. of Canada, C0188, Vol. 29, Grey to Head, June 13, 1848, Disp. 31.

^68. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report Of Debates of House of Assembly, 1852, p. 169.

^69. Office of Executive Council of New Brunswick, Head's Letter Book, Nov. 1850- Sept. 1854, (no vol. number), Head to d'Avary, March 25, 1852, p. 197.

^70. Maxwell (2), p. 8.

^71. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1849, Appendix 72.

^72. According to an advertisement in the New Brunswick Courier of May 5, 1855, there was a Model and Training School in Saint John in that year, conducted by the Colonial Church and School Society under the principalship of a Mr. Manning from the Metropolitan Training Institution, Highbury, London.

^73. Saint John Public Library, Newspaper Clipping “Old Times in Saint John in 1845”, Scrapbook R 971. 532, p. 358.

^74. Ibid., p. 358.

^75. M.L.H., “Martha Hamm Lewis Goes to Normal School” (as narrated by her daughters), The Educational Review, Oct. 1931, p. 7.

^76. The full story, which is probably colored by the imagination of the narrators, contains a number of inaccuracies and discrepancies regarding the length of the training period—errors which escaped the notice of the editor of the Educational Review—but it is hardly likely that Martha Hamm Lewis's daughters invented the ostracism and the veil.

^77. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, 1847-1852, p. 95.

^78. It seems likely that Duval made this journey at his own expense. On June 14, 1849, the Board of Education ordered that Duval be informed that the Board had no funds for paying his expenses “to the States”, but that letters of some kind would be given him. (Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education. 1847-1852, p. 60.)

^79. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1850, Appendix 68.

^80. Ibid., 1856, Appendix 186.

^81. Ibid., 1850, Appendix 66.

^82. Ibid., 1850, Appendix 75, 76.

^83. 15 V Cap. 40.

^84. Fitch, p. 54.

^85. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1855, Appendix 220, 221.

^86. Maxwell (2), p. 9.

^87. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1850, Appendix 67-70.

^88. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, pp. 139-151.

^89. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1851, p. 346.

^90. The New Brunswick Courier, Saint John, Vol. 9, No. 40, March 1, 1851, p. 2.

^91. Ibid., p. 2.

^92. Ibid., Vol. 9, No. 42, March 15, 1851, p. 2.

^93. Ibid., Vol. 9, No. 43, March 22, 1851, p. 1.

^94. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, p. 152.

^95. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1852, p. 171.

^96. Ibid., p. 28.

^97. Ibid., p. 204.

^98. Ibid., p. 174.

^99. In 1850 Lieutenant-Governor Head had asked the Governor of Massachusetts for fifty copies of the Massachusetts Common School Report for the use of the New Brunswick Legislature. (Office of Executive Council of New Brunswick, Letter Book of Sir Edmund Read, 1848-1854, Feb. 23, 1850, p. 322.)

^100. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1852, p. 168.

^101. Ibid., p. 173.

^102. Ibid., p. 174.

^103. Ibid., p. 194.

^104. Ibid., p. 174.

^105. Ibid., pp. 168, 169.

^106. Ibid., p. 175.

^107. Ibid., p. 194.

^108. Ibid., p. 171.

^109. It is interesting to note that at this same session a petition was received from the Trustees of St. Stephen Academy stating that the inhabitants of St. Stephen had subscribed a large sum, and had built a School House for the purpose of establishing an Academy of a very superior nature. The petitioners therefore asked for aid in fitting up their school with the necessary library and apparatus (Journal of House of Assembly of New Brunswick, 1852, p. 53; also Debate of House of Assembly of New Brunswick, 1852, p. 24.) St. Andrews, it will be recalled, was the first place in New Brunswick, outside of Fredericton and Saint John, to establish a Grammar School. In view of these indications of interest in education on the part of Milltown, St. Stephen and St. Andrews, it is only logical to suppose that the proximity of these towns to the American border exerted an influence.

^110. New Brunswick Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, p. 194.

^111. Ibid., p. 171.

^112. Ibid., p. 194.

^113. Ibid., pp. 172, 173.

^114. Ibid., p. 169.

^115. Ibid., p. 169.

^116. Ibid., p. 174.

^117. Ibid., p. 194.

^118. Ibid., p. 171.

^119. Ibid., p. 174.

^120. Ibid., p. 172.

^121. Ibid., p. 171.

^122. Ibid., pp. 169, 170.

^123. Ibid., p. 194.

^124. Ibid., p. 171.

^125. 15 V Cap. 40.

^126. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1854, Appendix 198.

^127. The practical effect of this was to confirm many districts in the belief that second or third class teachers were preferable to teachers of the first class.

^128. The New Brunswick Courier, Saint John, Vol. 10, No. 35, Feb. 14, 1852, p. 2.

^129. Ibid., Vol. 43, No. 40, Feb. 4, 1854, p. 2.

^130. Office of the Executive Council of New Brunswick, Head's Letter Book, Nov. 1850-Sept. 1854 (No Volume No.), Head to Jacob, (private), April 5, 1852, p. 211.

^131. Quoted in The New Brunswick Courier, Saint John, Vol. 11, No. 11, Aug. 13, 1853, p. 2.

^132. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1853. Appendix 101-103.

^133. Ibid., Appendix 112-125.

^134. Ibid., 1854, Appendix 208.

^135. Ibid., 1855, Appendix 212.

^136. Ibid., Appendix 233.

^137. Ibid., Appendix 217, 218.

^138. Ibid., Appendix 210, 220.

^139. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, pp. 164, 165.

^140. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1855, Appendix 187.

^141. Ibid., Appendix 189, 190.

^142. Ibid., Appendix 190.

^143. Ibid., Appendix 191.

^144. Lower (2), p. 125.

^145. Ibid., p. 123.

^146. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, p. 168.

^147. Ibid., p. 170.

^148. Ibid., p. 172.

^149. Ibid., p. 171.

^150. Ibid., p.159.

CHAPTER 8
THE ACHIEVEMENT OF A FREE SCHOOL SYSTEM

(A) Conflict in Politics and Compromise in Education

The Golden Age, however, was over almost before it had arrived. Perhaps, like the happy state of youth, it existed more in anticipation, and later in retrospect, than in actual fact. Continuing the analogy, one may say that with its passing there came to the province many sobering realizations, many vexing problems, a number of great decisions, and the acceptance of new ties and relationships.

In this period of nearly two decades there were only two Acts relating to parish schools. The first of these, the Act of 1858, was passed by what was popularly called the “Smasher” government, but even the “Smashers” did not dare to insist on compulsory assessment for school purposes, in the face of the persistent opposition to such a reform. Before any government had developed the necessary courage and determination to face this issue, and the still more delicate question of non-sectarian schools, the province was caught up in the whole complicated set of circumstances which led to Confederation. It was inevitable, therefore, that further school legislation should await the outcome of the constitutional question and the many adjustments which the new order of things necessitated.

While the interval between the Act of 1858 and the Free School Act of 1871 was a momentous period, the four years from 1854 to 1858 were not without excitement. Not a little of this was provoked by the prohibitory liquor law of 1855. This premature measure was introduced by Tilley as a private bill, and passed the House by a slim majority. An effort was made in 1856 to have the law repealed but without success. It is not clear whether the disorder, which, it was alleged by the Courier, prevailed in the Assembly toward the close of the session, was the result of feeling on this question, or was an expression of disappointment over the inability of Jackson & Co. to complete their contract for building the European and North American railway. Whatever the cause, the proceedings of the House, if accurately described by the Courier, were indicative of a regrettable lack of dignity. The editor of the paper mentioned said that the order “to clear the galleries”, which generally was “a pretty broad hint that the members are disgracing themselves by ungentlemanly conduct, and do not wish to be observed by the public—is given with lamentable frequency from the Speaker's chair. . . . In a deliberative body, which is supposed to contain a large representation of the wisdom and manliness of our people, to see violent outbursts of passion, personal violence threatened, and to hear offensive epithets and personal abuse applied, is painful in the extreme”.1

In a few days the editor of the Courier was able to turn from shaking his head over the Assembly to shaking his fist at the Governor, for that official, the Honourable J. H. T. Manners-Sutton, to whom the liquor law was objectionable, had precipitated a constitutional crisis shortly after the close of the session by dissolving the House against the advice of his Council. In the election which ensued, those who opposed prohibition had to vote, perforce, for the new government, although in doing so they seemed to uphold the right of the Governor to override the wishes of his advisers. The outcome of the election was probably not so much a vindication of the Governor's action as an indication “that all sumptuary laws which are intended to regulate human affairs, must be ineffectual unless they have the support of a large majority of the people affected by them”.2

The campaign was marked by bitterness of feeling and violence of language. Among the names which were bandied about were the terms “Rummies” and “Smashers”, as designations for the Tories and Liberals respectively. What we are most interested in, however, are the social aspects of the controversy, as dealt with by the Courier in a long editorial reviewing the history of colonial government in New Brunswick. Here we find evidences of anti-Tory feeling highly reminiscent of Glenie. Speaking of the Governor, Council, and Judges of the early days, the editor wrote: “These latter were generally sent out from England, received enormous salaries, and strutted on their little platform with all the airs of a genuine aristocracy, to the wonder and admiration of the poor Provincials who had to work for their living, and who could only look from a distance at the honours and dignities which were placed beyond their reach .... In the process of time the descendants of this original aristocracy, educated in a college provided at the public expense, for their sole use and benefit, fell heirs to the snug berths of their progenitors, and so was at length formed a general Colonial aristocracy, without the pale of which all were held as common people, or plebeians, none of whom had the remotest chance or hope of office or power in their native land”. If, said the editorial, “we have been rescued from this state of slavery, it is not, we are sorry to say, to the intelligence, love of freedom, or patriotism of New Brunswickers that we owe it. Too many were always found here to lick the hand of power and bow the knee to oppression, and although some contended manfully for their rights, it was reserved for Canada to take the bull by the horns, and force from the hands of a corrupt oligarchy that right of self-government which is the inherent right of all intelligent people”. The British Government, when it granted responsible government to Canada, “in the same despatch pressed it upon the acceptance of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick”. In Canada and Nova Scotia the people sent the aristocracy about their business. “In this Province, unfortunately, our House of Assembly proved recreant to their trust, and allowed the old 'Family Compact' party to retain power, forgetting that as they had condemned Responsible Government as Responsible Humbug, they were bound to make it turn out so”. Up to the previous year the rule of the Liliputian aristocrats had prevailed to a certain extent among us. “Roused at length by the open corruption and slavish truckling to the Governor's behests of the men in power, the people at the last General Election returned representatives who by a majority of 29 to 11 declared the country had no confidence in 'Family Compacts'.” A Government was then formed from among the common people, of the sons of carpenters, shopkeepers and farmers, who when tried, were found as capable at making speeches, writing despatches, or concocting financial statements as any of their predecessors. However, those “who had been long habituated to think that in them lay the inherent right to govern”, had done everything they could to disgust the people with plebeian rule. Through the hireling press and venal writers they had vituperated and misrepresented the Government, attributing to it the breaking down of the railway scheme, the discord produced by the liquor law, and the financial embarrassments, deficient revenue, and depressed trade resulting from the Crimean War.

Warming to the attack, the editor next turned his attention to the Governor. “Our present Governor, the Hon. Mr. Manners-Sutton, the son of a Lord, and addicted to convivial habits, it is generally understood, had no sympathy or liking for his constitutional advisers, and associated only with 'gentlemen', in the Fredericton sense of the term.” Those with whom he associated had doubtless led him to believe that his administration did not truly represent the people's choice. “Acting on the advice of his associates, and desiring to have a Government whose 'previous habits' would entitle them to the entrie of Government House,” he had insisted on a dissolution of the Assembly, had provoked the resignation of his Council, and had thrown himself into the hands of the minority of the old “Family Compact”. The issue now was whether the people, or the Governor and an Oligarchy, should rule the Province.3

On the same day the Courier published two letters of a similar tone. The writer of one of these declared that “if the whole Province is to be thrown into confusion through the influence of a few families residing in the neighborhood of Fredericton, who have access at Government House—if that limited community is to rule the Province, the sooner the Government is placed in the centre of a larger population the better”.4 The author of the second letter, signing himself “Alarm”, said of the Governor and his office: “We respect the office; but the holder of the office must respect the people who pay him. Do these foreign importations think they are honouring us by condescending to govern us? If so, we must manfully teach them their mistake . . . . We shall go to the polls with the firm purpose of resisting this last despotic act of the Governor in this Province”.5

Throughout the electoral campaign the Courier featured editorials and communications of the same nature. For instance, on June the twenty-first, an editorial declared: “In the old country and the new, Tory is the name of that party which believes in stagnation, and always will. Its policy is the rule of the many by the few. Its creed is that the people are unfit to govern, that government is the fitting occupation of a select few”.6 It is interesting and amusing to turn from this description to a definition of the term Tory, as given by one of the party, who styled himself “Old Vinty”. He had been frequently asked by the Smashers if he knew the meaning of the word. His answer was that according to the definition which he had been taught at school, “A Tory is the name of a party, an advocate for the ancient constitution of the State, and the Apostolic Hierarchy of the Church of England. The meaning of Apostolic is what emanated from the Apostles. The meaning of Hierarchy is a sacred government,—therefore “Everything that is pure and Holy, Is comprised in the words-I am a Tory! ” ” 7

After the election was over the Courier continued to criticize the Tory party, complaining particularly of the absence of an energetic immigration policy on the part of Tory immigrant agents. What, asked the editor, had happened to Johnson's excellent report on the agricultural capabilities of the province. Four years before an English emigrant had had to hunt London for a copy, and was compelled to pay six shillings for it. At the time of the Great Exhibition, the Tory government had made Moses Perley the commissioner forward specimens of New Brunswick produce and skill. New Brunswick had a little table four or five feet square, covered with dusty black cotton velvet, in an out-of-the-way apartment. On this table lay inferior samples of flinty spring wheat from the neighbourhood of the Miramichi; some Indian bead work; and a copper bead of a vessel, a representation of an Indian chief. We were mortified, said the editor, to turn from this pitiful collection to the magnificent Canadian trophy.8

We find this outspoken editor a week later blaming all the ills of the country on the administration, thereby resorting to the tactics for which he had condemned the Tories a short time before. It was grievous, he declared, to find every man who had been for a few weeks tour in the United States and Canada coming back surprised at the activity and enterprise there, and exhibiting “a doleful expression of countenance at our own deplorable backward condition . . . . You cannot meet a man in the street who has spent a week or two in Canada that is not chagrined at the pitiful figure we cut on the scale of human progress. The few steamboats we have, are of the solid steady old class that prevailed twenty years ago; we have no railways, our mail coaches can scarcely accomplish a journey of a hundred miles in twenty hours, and they would assuredly fail to do that if Providence had not blessed us with a good soil for roadmaking. Our roads are annually top dressed with the mud out of the ditches which ought to go on to the fields, while stones lie in the fields which ought to be put on the roads . . . . The sullen, listless aspect of the country are enough to dishearten a native or a settler in this province, and to make him think whether it is worth while to stay in a land where public interest and public feeling seems to be dormant, and where no principles of government seem to be acknowledged, or whether it is not better to fly to those lands of promise of which our returned tourists give such glowing accounts”. As for the reason for this state of affairs, for years New Brunswick had been under the government of a class of men “who have managed it as if it were an isolated corner of the earth. Not only have they legislated for it without regard to the external world, but they have considered it piecemeal. They have never looked steadily at the good of the whole Province alone; they have allowed themselves to be subject to local influences and local feelings, which have generally so nearly balanced one another as to produce a general stand-still”.9

One must make allowances for the political animosities of the time, and agree with Hannay that a good deal of unnecessary violence was injected into this particular campaign,10 but this description of provincial affairs is significant. The westward expansion of Canada in the '40's and '50's meant that “the centre of interest and the centre of economic gravity were to move distinctly westward and there remain”.11 The new age of industry, of steam and steel, was to strike at the old economy of the Maritime provinces; the belief expressed by Howe in 1851 that these Provinces were “but the Atlantic frontage” of the North-west, “the wharves upon which its business will be transacted and beside which its rich argosies are to lie” 12 was to be proved erroneous; “Canadian surplus capital and population would seek outlet elsewhere; British immigration and British capital alike were to pass them by”.13 Eventually these provinces were to realize that prosperity for them could be achieved only through their own initiative, and that it could be only a degree of prosperity. In thus facing the realities of their geographical and economic circumstances, they attained a new maturity. Perhaps it is not surprising that in the new realism there was an element of bitterness.

At the first session of the new government, a session which lasted only ten days, the liquor law was repealed. The position of the Government was revealed as none too secure when, on division, an endorsement of the Governor's conduct in dissolving the Assembly was carried by a majority of only seven. By the time the House met again, in February of 1857, many of the Liberals, who had voted against prohibition, had returned to their party allegiance, and the address in reply to the Governor's speech was carried only by the casting vote of the Speaker. This stalemate prevented vigorous action, but the session was distinguished by two events of importance. For the first time the Provincial Secretary brought down a budget, and a dispatch from the Colonial Office surrendered the surplus civil list fund into the hands of the Provincial Legislature.14 Clearly, whatever party might be in power, Responsible Government had become a fully accomplished fact.

The position of the Government having become untenable, the Governor and Council decided on dissolution. Another heated election was held and the Liberals were returned to power. In the new Government, besides Fisher, who was the leader, there were James Brown, S. L. Tilley, and David Wark, all men who had shown interest for years in the cause of education. The times, however, were not propitious for any reforms in education involving drastic financial changes. Correspondence brought down at the session of 1858 on the subject of immigration showed little prospect of any large gain in population from the United Kingdom.15 The province was struggling forward with the Saint John-Shediac railway which was costing far more than had been anticipated. Britain, because of her operations in the Near East, which were placing a heavy strain on her treasury, was not disposed to support the building of the Intercolonial railway. In fact, in this year a concerted attempt on the part of the British North American provinces to obtain imperial aid for the project failed.16 The public debt of New Brunswick at the end of 1857 was revealed at this session to be over two million dollars,17 and the mercantile interests of the province were suffering from the financial crisis.18 It would seem, therefore, that in these circumstances the Government feared to introduce compulsory assessment for education, particularly as the question of denominational schools was becoming more controversial. For several years resolutions against the continuance of provincial aid to denominational schools had been defeated, and in this particular year a number of petitions were presented to the House for and against the principle of such schools.19 The majority of these were signed by Roman Catholics, asking for the right to establish separate schools, or urging that any legislation which might be passed involving taxation for education should be founded on the system of separate schools. There were also several petitions objecting to the reading of the Bible in the schools, and as many or more, urging that that religious exercise be made compulsory.20 The Parish School Act of 1858 therefore included no provisions for the establishment of free, tax-supported, non-sectarian schools, but merely aimed to correct some of the deficiencies which the passage of time had revealed in the previous Act.

Before proceeding with a study of the new statute, we must examine the official reports of the Superintendent of Education and of the inspectors for the interval between 1854 and 1858. We find that, as before, these officials continued to express the opinion that there could be no real improvement in the parish schools until taxation was universally adopted. In 1856 Superintendent d'Avray declared that objectors must be resisted on the ground that if men would not voluntarily respect the rights of society and care for the temporal and eternal interests of their children, it was the right and duty of society to supply the want thus sordidly and cruelly created. Society, he thought, could neither forego that right without great peril, nor neglect that duty without great disgrace. As Macaulay had done in England in 1847, he stressed the duty of the state to provide for education as an exercise of self-protection, asserting that if the sordid and the ignorant would not voluntarily acknowledge that the best school is cheaper than the gallows and the gaol at any price, then they must be compelled to act on that truth. Happily, there was little to fear from the evils of crime and pauperism in New Brunswick, but there was the danger that the liberal aid granted by the legislature towards the remuneration of teachers, and the facilities afforded to the people of evading the payment of the sums they ought to contribute would increase, rather than diminish, the popular indifference which was known to exist. Thus the intellectual progress of the rising generation would be impeded.21

In his next annual report, Superintendent d'Avray emphasized the importance of education from the vocational standpoint. Trade and commerce had become professions and required a wide range of information. In every branch of industry the head that planned was becoming daily of more importance than the hand that executed. Scientific knowledge had ceased to be a luxury and had become a necessity. The province required schools in which youth could obtain instruction in those branches of knowledge best calculated to train them for a life of active business.22 It is rather interesting to observe that d'Avray in this report used the term “national”, referring at one point to the necessity of discussing the means of providing a “National Education” to enable the youth of the province to discharge the duties of citizenship, and to develop the faculties necessary for the working of the great machine of civil society. Thoughts of nationality do not seem to have occurred with frequency or force in the minds of New Brunswickers, in contrast with pre-Confederation Nova Scotians, of whom Whitelaw has remarked: “It is hardly an exaggeration to say that they had come to the very threshold of nationality”.23

Had there been a stronger sense of nationality in New Brunswick, the inspector for York County might not have had to complain in 1856 of the continued lack of a map and history of New Brunswick suitable for school purposes. For this he blamed the Legislature. It need be no matter of surprise, he said, that the inhabitants of the province as a body, the parents, teachers, and children, all exhibited apathy in everything connected with education, when they could not help seeing indifference manifested by their representatives.24 Actually, however, an effort was being made by the Board of Education, and by the Legislature, to remedy the lack of a history. The first move seems to have come from Dr. Robb of King's College, whose proposal to write a small volume for the use of the Parish Schools, on the history, geography and industrial resources of New Brunswick, was well received by the Board of Education, which went on record as willing to recommend Robb's proposal to the Legislature, and to aid him in obtaining a grant for the purpose.25 The next significant official reference to the scheme appears under the date of April 17, 1856, when Wilmot reported for a Committee of the House, appointed for the purpose, that the Committee had examined a communication from Robb relative to the question of procuring certain documents bearing upon the early history of the province. The Committee favored the acquisition of a copy of such portions of the documents as were in the archives of Canada and Paris, and recommended that the sum of £ 150 should be placed at the disposal of His Excellency with a view to obtaining such a copy.26 Later in the session this sum was voted by the Legislature, although twelve members of the House opposed the expenditure.27 At the time of Robb's untimely death in 1861 the project was still unfinished, but he had collected material and had made notes in preparation for it.

The inspector's reports for the period under consideration showed that many school buildings were still very inferior, and many teachers still very inefficient. For instance, in 1857 most of the schoolhouses of Restigouche County were reported as being log huts, and there were no trained teachers in that county.28 The inspector for Kent County said that teachers in that county were paid sometimes in money, at times in money and “truck”, and not infrequently in “promises alone”.29 The inspector for Sunbury County reported that in general the difference between trained and untrained teachers was not preceptible, for in granting licenses the amount of knowledge of the candidate had been made the qualification rather than his teaching ability, and so there were trained teachers who did not succeed in imparting knowledge, and untrained teachers who excelled in doing so.30 The Superintendent, commenting on these reports, said that he felt more strongly than he had ten years before at the opening of the Training School that the possession of a knowledge of the higher branches did not make a teacher a better teacher. The pupils at the Training School all endeavored to obtain a first class license in twelve weeks. They devoted all their time and energies to the necessary preparation for the examination which was to decide their rank. They coached each other, and were coached by the master. Thus the Training and Model School failed in its real object. Moreover, said the Superintendent, this school at Saint John was working under difficulties. The building was a disgrace to the province; the period of training was too short; the duties of the master were too varied. The Training School at Saint John should be remodelled, and with no niggardly hand. The Province needed something like the Model and Training School in Canada, only on a smaller scale.31

In the same report the Superintendent drew attention to the monopoly on schools held by third class teachers, who were popular because they taught for a pittance. He had issued a circular to the inspectors calling for a closer attention to the regulations relating to licensed teachers. In the past, the inspectors had too readily forwarded certificates in favor of untrained candidates for third class licenses. Since the inspectors were paid according to the number of schools visited it was in their interests to have as many schools as possible, regardless of the fitness of the teacher.32

In addition to this report, it is probable that the case of George Taylor emphasized the importance of elevating the inspectorship to the status of a full-time, adequately paid, position. In August of 1853, Taylor, who was the inspector for Sunbury County, applied to the Board of Education for permission to teach a parish school when he was not engaged in the duties of his office. The Board, however, refused permission, stating that it did not deem the duties of a teacher and an inspector compatible.33 On October 29, 1855, the Board received an application from Taylor, who was still inspector, requesting to be paid as a first class teacher for six months' service in the parish of Sheffield, whereupon the Secretary of the Board was ordered to “inform Mr. Taylor that the Board adheres to the Minute of the first of August, 1853”.34 Taylor, however, petitioned the legislature, where a discussion took place on the propriety of double grants. The principle of such grants was warmly opposed but Taylor received his teacher's allowance.35

Although the Fisher Government of 1855-1856 favored the right of the Executive to initiate money grants—indeed a resolution to effect a change in that direction was reluctantly passed by the Assembly in 1856—the actual change did not take place until 1857 during the short Tory regime. In 1856, therefore, the Assembly could grant Inspector Taylor's petition. As a matter of fact, fifty-four petitions from teachers came before the Committee of the Assembly on School Petitions at this session. The Committee recommended that thirty-seven of the claimants should receive varying sums, and the other seventeen claims were disallowed or referred to the consideration of the House. Among the grants which were recommended was an allowance of £ 50 for the teaching of a superior school at Shediac.36 While the special class of schools known as “Superior Schools” was not established until 1858, it would appear that occasionally before that date a school of a better grade than the usual was called by that name, and received a grant in excess of the ordinary grant. For instance, in 1852, the trustees of the St. Stephen Academy requested special aid for their school in recognition of its “superior” nature. In the April twelfth edition of the Courier for 1856, the term “Superior School” occurred in an account of certain proceedings of the House. Under the date of April 7 the special correspondent of the paper described what he called a novel and interesting feature of the day's proceedings. He said that one of the members, in the sincerity of his wishes for the educational improvement of Magaguadavic, had moved for a sum of £ 50 to be applied towards the maintenance of a Superior School in that village, whereupon several members threatened that if the motion passed they would make similar motions for some favored section of their own counties. The threat was carried into effect, and, said the correspondent, for about twenty minutes it was nothing but 'Mr. Speaker, I move for a grant of £ 50 towards the support of a superior school in the Parish of—-—and County of——-' Scarcely any opposition was offered, as it was conceded that such a course would have been less than useless when the principle was assented to in the first instance.37 This makes a very interesting story, but on consulting the Journals we find no record of any such proceedings. Indeed, we discover that later in the session resolutions for grants for Superior Schools in St. Martin's, St. George, Nelson, Hampton, Hopewell, Andover, and Bathurst were negatived.38 It may be that the special correspondent of the Courier was not a reliable informant, or it is possible that something of the like did occur, and that the record was later expunged from the Journal, although there is no mention of any such obliteration.

In the light of the information embodied in the official reports between the years 1852 and 1858, a new educational measure, if it were to be any improvement over the old, would have to raise the status of the Superintendent and inspectors, apply the principle of self-government to the control of schools, and, by this means and other devices, arouse a sense of local responsibility for education. Naturally, a system of teacher training would have to be continued and, if possible, enlarged and improved. While the inexpediency of making the assessment principle compulsory seemed to be generally accepted, the existing permission to assess for schools could hardly be removed, if retrogression were to be avoided. From the number of petitions which had recently been presented to the Assembly bearing on the question of religious instruction in schools, some action in this connection also seemed unavoidable. In the early years of the province, denominationalism, as we have seen, had been closely related to educational endeavor. In line, however, with the general trend of the nineteenth century away from denominational control of education, the parish schools of the province were designed for children of all faiths, but the religious and moral purposes of education had never been entirely lost sight of. Denominational catechisms were frequently taught; the Bible, especially when books were scarce, was often used for reading purposes; and legislative support to denominational schools had come to be an accepted part of the provincial system. But Irish immigration, as we noted earlier, had added considerably to the Roman Catholic population of the province. Moreover, just as Nova Scotia had been New Eng- land's outpost in the eighteenth century, so in the nineteenth the northern part of New Brunswick had become an area of expansion for Quebec habitants. By the middle of the century, therefore, the denominational question in education had assumed something of the aspect of a Protestant-Catholic issue. As we shall see, to steer a course between the growing trend against clericalism and sectarianism in education, and the educational policy of the Roman Catholic Church was to become increasingly difficult.

In examining the Parish School Act of 1858,39 those sections of the Act which dealt with the problems we have just raised claim our first attention.

While under the Act the emoluments attached to the office of Chief Superintendent were not as tempting as the Commission of 1854 had indicated that they should be, nevertheless the position was made more attractive than formerly. The maximum salary was increased to £ 300; travelling expenses and contingencies of office were allowed as well; and the Chief Superintendent was to have the assistance of a clerk whose maximum salary was to be £ 150. Thus the highest official in the educational system of the province was freed from many of the less important clerical duties of his office, and was given both the time and the means to become acquainted with the educational conditions of the whole province, and to carry on the highly important work of enlightening and arousing the public. According to the Act, in addressing public meetings on the subject of education he was to use “all legitimate means to excite an interest therein”.

To insure a better system of inspection, the Governor in Council were to divide the province into four inspectorial districts, and to appoint an inspector for each district at a maximum salary of £ 250 a year, including travelling expenses. This salary, and the size of each inspectorial district, meant that henceforth an inspector was to devote his whole time to the work of inspection. While from the modern point of view the salary attached to this office under the Act of 1858 seems inadequate, actually it was four or five times as large as that received by the ordinary school teacher.

When Ryerson framed the School Act of 1846 for Canada West he believed that the fundamental element of the whole system was an elected board of school trustees. On no point was he more careful than to make his system appear in harmony with the principles of self-government. The local trustees of each school section were, therefore, to be responsible to the local ratepayers, and local superintendents were to be responsible to the municipal authorities.40 In New Brunswick, the trustees from the beginning had been appointed by the Justices of the Peace, and had the oversight of all the schools of a parish. It is scarcely to be wondered at that many trustees were satisfied with a partial or perfunctory performance of their duties, or frankly neglected them altogether. The indifference of the trustees was but a reflection of the apathy of the people in general. If the development of the practice of executive responsibility in provincial government had taken many years, in local matters the application of the principle was delayed still longer. It has been said that “men do not put off the old before the new is ready”.41 Neither do they, except under pressure, take on the new before they themselves are ready for it. The popular indifference that continually delayed the improvement of the schools of New Brunswick also manifested itself in the laggard development of municipal institutions. A permissive measure for the establishment of municipal government was apologetically introduced by Attorney General Street in 1851, but by 1858 only the towns of Carleton and Woodstock, and the Counties of York and Sunbury had availed themselves of the privilege, and in the next twenty years only three other areas made the change. Raymond has expressed the opinion that the desire of the magistrates to retain the honor and dignity of presiding over public affairs at the Quarterly Sessions was one reason for the dilatory adoption of municipal government. He thought, however, that “the chief reasons why the province was tardy seem to have been the apathy of the people and the indifference of the legislature. It was not the fault of the lieutenant-governors, since several of them recommended the establishment of municipal government”.42

We have earlier considered as possible reasons for this civic backwardness such factors as colonial tutelage, a long period of rule by the select few, economic stringencies, the influence of the lumber industry, and defective early education. It is interesting to note at this point what Inspector Davidson of York County said in 1856, as he contemplated the relationship between public apathy, municipal institutions, and educational progress. He believed that no improved system of education could be properly carried out except by means of municipal institutions, and added: “It is to their introduction that the unexampled prosperity of Canada West, both in an educational point of view and otherwise, is mainly to be attributed”. He then compared the amounts granted for educational purposes by the legislatures of New Brunswick and Canada West, and claimed that more than one-half as much money was distributed by the legislature of New Brunswick for the benefit of a population one-fifth as great as that of Canada West. However, New Brunswick, if compared with Canada West in educational improvement, seemed to be standing motionless. Something, he said, must be radically wrong, for as a Province the people of New Brunswick were not less intelligent than the Canadians. The answer must be “that our legislature has done too much . . . . Our people have never been taught to rely upon themselves even to a small extent, but they will have to learn sooner or later”.43

Whether or not any completely satisfactory explanation can be found for this state of provincial apathy, thoughtful individuals from the provincial governors down to the county inspectors testified to its existence, and to the retardive influences which it exerted. In the Act of 1858 we find several provisions designed to arouse a sense of local responsibility for local education.

One of the most significant of the new arrangements provided that three Trustees of Schools were to be elected annually in each Town or Parish, at the same time and in the same manner as other Town or Parish officers, and subject to the same penalties for neglect or refusal to act, or for the non-performance of their duties. If, however, a Town or Parish failed to elect Trustees, the Sessions were to appoint as usual. In incorporated Towns, Cities, or Counties, the Council was to appoint the Trustees a provision which may have been included for the purpose of encouraging the adoption of municipal government. We notice at once that with respect to Trustees the Act of 1858 did not proceed so far in the direction of local responsibility for schools as did school legislation in Canada West, where the Trustees were elected for the local school district or section, and were therefore responsible for the oversight of only one school. Not until 1871 was this procedure adopted in New Brunswick, and the practice of having Town or City Councils appoint Trustees has been continued to the present time, a practice which means that the people of urban districts exercise only second-hand control over their School Trustees.

While under the Act of 1858 the Trustees continued to exercise many of the same duties that previous acts had laid down, and while they continued to be responsible for all the schools of their parish, some of their former duties now devolved on local School Committees. Such Committees were to be elected by the ratepayers of the District at an annual meeting called by the Trustees on a notice of seven days. In specifying the duties of these local bodies the Act declared: “The School Committee shall have the immediate charge of the School House, with the furniture, apparatus and grounds. They shall, when necessary, call meetings of the inhabitants of the District for the purpose of providing a School House, books, maps, apparatus, school furniture and fuel, and for the support of the School and the comfort of the scholars. They shall have the immediate control of any Library provided by the District, and may appoint a Librarian, Secretary, and Treasurer. They shall receive and appropriate any money raised in the District for the purpose of providing a Library or increasing the same. The School Committee may admit as many free scholars, and also children at reduced rates, being the children of poor and indigent parents, as they may deem prudent and just”.

Clearly, the purpose of these administrative changes was to secure local interest in the welfare of the Parish Schools, and to encourage greater responsibility and a more faithful performance of duty on the part of local authorities. In the Act of 1847 a long step had been taken in the direction of a central authority for the whole province, and in the Act of 1852 the centralizing process had been more or less completed by the appointment of a Chief Superintendent of Education. But in local administration no change had been made since the year 1816, although the fact had been long apparent that the Trustees either could not, or would not, take a proper interest in all the schools of a parish. The Act of 1858 represents, therefore, a step towards the decentralization of local school government, but not a full stride. It was apparently felt by those who framed the Act that a more sudden and complete change to local Boards of Trustees would be premature at this time, and that half-way measures should be tried out first.

Besides these administrative changes there were other features of the Act of 1858 which aimed to arouse interest in education and to encourage local expenditure for better schools. One of these was the establishment of Superior Schools. If the inhabitants of any School District should raise by assessment or otherwise, for the support of a Superior School, the sum of £ 50 or upwards, and had engaged a competent Teacher, they were to receive from the Province a sum equal to the amount so raised, but not exceeding the rate of £ 5 per annum. When the inspector had certified that the school had been taught to his satisfaction, and that the teacher had received £ 50 or more from the inhabitants in cash,44 then the Provincial grant would be paid to the teacher, but not more than one such school would be assisted in a Parish. The establishment of these schools was an encouragement to first class teachers, and to the inhabitants of a district who wished to have the services of the best teachers, and were willing to pay for the advantages of a good school. Eventually Superior Schools were to become a special type of school, midway between the Parish Schools and the Grammar Schools, but in the Act of 1858 nothing was said about the curriculum or the attendance. In other words, the Superior School at this time was thought of merely as a better grade of Parish School, to which the Government would give special aid in recognition of special interest and initiative on the part of the people.

Another way in which the Act of 1858 offered encouragement and special assistance to those who were willing to help themselves was through a provision for the establishment of School Libraries. The section of the Act on this point reads: “Whenever any School District shall raise a sum of money for the purpose of establishing a Library, or increasing any one already established, they shall be entitled to receive from the Provincial Treasury a sum equal to half the amount so raised, to be expended in the purchase of Books therefor, not to exceed five pounds in any one year”. One of the duties of the Board of Education, as laid down in the Act, was “to provide for the establishment, regulation, and government of School Libraries, and the selection of Books to be used therein; but no works of a licentious, vicious, or immoral tendency, or hostile to the Christian religion, or works on controversial theology, shall be admitted”.

Finally, special grants were again offered to districts and parishes which might adopt the principle of assessment. The bonus, however, was reduced from 25% to 10% of the sum raised by taxation. Although counties and municipalities were also permitted by the Act to adopt the taxation principle, no special grant was provided for such areas. During the next decade frequent references were made to this omission as a flaw in the Act, and as a drawback to the adoption of assessment by municipal institutions. As we shall see, the general failure of districts, counties, and municipalities to adopt taxation for schools under this Act in the end necessitated legislation forcing school districts to tax themselves for the support of their schools.

With regard to the Training School, the Act of 1858 foreshadowed no significant changes. We note that allowances for the expenses of teachers who attended the School were to be continued, but no allowance was to exceed £ 6 to any one teacher. The salary of the master of the Training School was not to exceed £ 250 per annum; the maximum salary of the male teacher of the Model School was set at £ 125 per annum; and that of the female teacher was fixed at £ 75 per annum.

In the light of the controversy which arose later over the provisions of this Act for religious and moral teaching, the exact wording of that section of the Act which legislated on this question is of extreme importance. Section VIII, listing the duties of teachers under the Act, stated: “Every teacher shall take diligent care, and exert his best endeavors to impress on the minds of the children committed to his care, the principles of Christianity, morality and justice, and a sacred regard for truth and honesty, love of their country, loyalty, humanity, and a universal benevolence, sobriety, industry and frugality, chastity, moderation and temperance, order and cleanliness, and all other virtues which are the ornaments of human society, but no pupil shall be required to read or study in or from any religious book, or join in any act of devotion objected to by his parents or guardians; and the Board of Education shall, by regulation, secure to all children whose parents or guardians do not object to it, the reading of the Bible in Parish Schools—and the Bible, when read in Parish Schools by Roman Catholic children shall, if required by their parents or guardians, be the Douay version, without note or comment”. When, under the Act of 1871, sectarian schools were deprived of a government allowance, the Roman Catholics claimed that this section of the Act of 1858 had permitted them to have separate schools. Thus a clause in the Act of 1858, designed to satisfy all parties, later became one of the focal points in a bitter denominational controversy which penetrated to the Canadian House of Commons, and to the highest court in the Empire.

The regulations of the Act relating to the qualifications of teachers differed very little from similar regulations in the Act of 1852. Male teachers of the first class were to teach Spelling, Reading, Writing, Arithmetic, English Grammar, Geography, History, Book-keeping, Geometry, Mensuration, Land Surveying, Navigation, and Algebra, while female teachers of the same class were to teach Needlework and the first seven subjects named for male teachers. Second class male teachers were required to teach the same subjects as first class male teachers, with the omission of Geometry, Mensuration, Land Surveying, Navigation, and Algebra. Second class female teachers were to teach the same subjects as second class male teachers, with the omission of History and Bookkeeping, and the addition of Needlework. The requirements for third class teachers of both sexes were simple—Spelling, Reading, Writing and Arithmetic, with the addition of the inevitable Needlework in the case of females. The Act required all teachers of the first and second class to impart a knowledge of the Geography, History and Resources of the Province of New Brunswick and the adjoining North American colonies.

The provincial allowance for teachers of the various classes was as follows:

| First Class | Second Class | Third Class
Males | £37 10s. | £30 | £22 10s.
Females | £27 10s. | £22 10s. | £17 10s.

The payment of the government grant was contingent on the payment of an equal sum, or its equivalent, by the inhabitants of the district. In other words, the objectionable practice of paying the teacher in board and washing might be continued.

Of the remaining provisions of the Act, the majority of which were of a routine nature, we shall note only two. Penalties were fixed for the misappropriation of school funds by School Committees, and for the making of false returns by teachers and inspectors. Among the powers of the Board of Education was that of making regulations for the construction and ventilation of school houses, and for the furniture and apparatus to be used. The Chief Superintendent was to provide the necessary plans for the construction of school buildings, and was to encourage the improvement and embellishment of the school grounds. We find that about a month after the Act came into effect the Board of Education recorded a minute to the effect that the Superintendent should keep in his office, ready for immediate reference, the plans of school houses and grounds, and the description of furniture, recently published in Canada, Nova Scotia, and the United States, and should exert his best efforts to aid the School Committees in making selections and arrangements proportionate to the money to be expended.45

(B) Interim 1858-1871

It is probable that many people in the province lauded the Government for passing a School Act which spared property owners the “burden” of taxation for schools. Others, however, were disappointed that the Government should continue to temporize. At a public meeting held in Carleton on March 16, 1859, for the purpose of considering the adoption of the assessment principle, one of the speakers pointed to the United States, Upper Canada, Scotland, and Germany as instances of the beneficial working of this principle. “He could only condemn the Government for not making it compulsory (in New Brunswick). He thought they should have had the moral courage to grapple with the question of Education, and have firmly determined to stand or fall by direct taxation for the support of schools throughout the Province.” 46 Feeling evidently ran high at this meeting, for the editor of The Western Recorder & Weekly Herald stated that in consequence of his advocacy of the principle of direct taxation for the support of schools, a subscriber called the next day and requested the removal of his name from the subscription list of the paper.47 According to The Morning News, the Press of the Province, with one exception, was universally agreed that direct taxation was the only remedy for the imperfect school system of the Province. So many papers.48 not all on the same side of politics, could not, declared The Morning News, all be mistaken. people should be taught that they were now taxed heavily for schools in an indirect way. for one-fourth of the Provincial revenue went toward the maintenance of the common schools, and about 13,000 a year for denominational institutions. Why not, asked The Morning News, introduce a bill embracing what was required, and submit it to the people as an independent question.49 The Instructor, a little periodical “devoted to Education, Agriculture, Emigration and General Intelligence”, in March of 1861 made unflattering comparisons between New Brunswick and Upper Canada,50 and a month later declared: “Our educational progress is weighed in the balance and found wanting”.51

Critics who had queried for ten years, “Why does the Legislature hesitate to bring forward a scheme of compulsory assessment?” did not fail to raise this question again. There were ample opportunities for asking it, for no further steps were taken in the direction of free tax-supported schools until 1871. If, as a writer to The Courier said in 1862,52 the majority of the members of the Assembly were convinced of the benefits which would result from the adoption of such a system, then one is justified in concluding that the members hesitated because they knew there was no popular demand for it. This indifference of the people meant that eventually a system of free tax-supported schools had to be imposed from above, rather than achieved as the result of a popular movement. That the establishment of municipal institutions, and, to a certain extent, of responsible government, took place in much the same way is indicative of consistency, but only adds to the enigma of the New Brunswick civic temperament of a hundred years ago.

During the decade between 1860 and 1870, absorbing problems involving railways, industry, Maritime Union, and Confederation were before the province. This fact possibly explains the paucity of educational developments during that interval, and the postponement of a free school act. The report of the Chief Superintendent of Education in 1868 indicated that the cause of education had been influenced adversely by the problems and disturbances of the times. The year 1867 had been eventful in the history of the Province. The distraction of the popular mind arising from the political agitations and changes, the depressed state of business, the diminished demand for labour in the principal centres, were all calculated, he said, to draw men's minds from the subject of education. He added: “Whatever may be the effect of these influences in the future, it is morally certain that their tendency for the time was rather to retard than to advance the interests of education”.53 But for this negative influence, it is difficult to find a vital connection between the political and economic developments of the period, and the educational question. In a sense, the fact that the Province came to maturity educationally, as well as politically, establishes a relationship among all the events and developments of the era. We shall not, however, strain a point to discover a more significant interaction.

In addition to the difficulty of establishing a close relationship between education and Confederation, there is another reason why a lengthy consideration of the political aspects of the decade would be superfluous in this study. No period of Maritime and Canadian history has received so much attention from writers. Economists, royal commissions, and advocates of Maritime Rights have familiarized us with the chief features of the Golden Age, and have discussed the reasons for its decline. Historians have found in the pre-Confederation period ample material for article and essay. The history of the movement which led to Confederation has been told, from its beginnings in the rather nebulous ideas in the minds of Guy Carleton and William Smith at the time of the disruption of the Old Empire, through a number of proposals for various kinds of union—regional, legislative, federated—down to the consummation of the idea in the British North America Act.54 The relationship in New Brunswick between the railway question and the Confederation issue has been studied,55 likewise the basis and persistence of opposition to Confederation in that province.56 The economic and political reasons which made a union appear desirable to Canada, to Britain, and to the Maritime Provinces, have been investigated. The influence of the American Civil War, of the Trent affair, and of Fenian threats, has been recognized. The key position of New Brunswick in relation to the scheme, the part played by her governors for and against union, and the political manoeuvres which led to a reconsideration of the question in the province are not unexplored topics.57 Under these circumstances, deviations from the educational developments of this period are only justifiable when such wanderings lead to further light on the progress or retardation of schools and learning.

The “Smasher” Government which had sponsored the Act of 1858 dismissed Marshall d'Avray from his post as Chief Superintendent. A descend- ant of his family has said that he lost his position 'through the precipitate action of a group of politicians who then autocratically managed affairs, under what has been somewhat impolitely called The Smasher Government'.58 It is not clear whether the Government objected to d'Avray's political views, his educational policies, or his dual role as Chief Superintendent and Professor of Modern Languages at King's College. Patronage may have been a factor, for the new incumbent of the office was Henry Fisher, a brother of Charles Fisher, the leader of the Government. Indeed, this may have been the real reason, since a number of other public officials were dismissed at the same time in accordance with the “spoils system” which was then so generally practised in the neighbouring States as well as in other provinces of British America.

An untimely death made the new Superintendent's tenure of office so brief that no accurate estimate can be made of his views, or of his abilities as an administrator. His first—and last—report shows that he entered into his work with energy, and was making a study of educational developments elsewhere. In accordance with the Act of 1858 he had made a series of visits to all the counties, delivering lectures on education. He referred to physical education as a subject under the consideration of some of the leading educationists of the day, and hoped to mature a plan by which it might be introduced into New Brunswick. He had similar hopes with regard to the study of vocal music, which, he said, was proving advantageous on the Continent, in Great Britain, the United States, and some of the neighboring provinces. The pupil-teachers at the Training School were already receiving instruction in the subject. He believed that intercourse for purposes of mutual sympathy and improvement would be helpful to teachers, and he pointed to the establishment of Teachers' Institutes in the United States, Canada, and Nova Scotia. After consultation with the inspectors he had resolved to attempt similar establishments in the Province. On the subject of assessment he adopted a cautious tone, which is not surprising considering his close connection with the leader of the Government which had failed to make assessment for schools compulsory. His belief was, he said, that the Legislature had been wise in 1852 and 1858 in leaving the assessment principle to voluntary action. The subject was now being discussed in the Press, at meetings, and in homes. He was optimistic that in a few years the country would be ready for the general adoption of the system.59 One wonders how long he would have maintained this spirit of optimism had he lived.

Fisher was succeeded by John Bennet who remained in office until the inauguration of the free school system rendered advisable the appointment of a man experienced in its workings. Such an individual was found in the person of Theodore Rand of Nova Scotia.

Among the changes in personnel which took place after the passing of the Act of 1858, we note that E. H. Duval resigned as master of the Training School to become one of the provincial inspectors. He was succeeded by William Mills, who for some years previous had conducted a “Commercial and Mathematical School”, at his home on Coburg Street. On his appointment, Mills arranged the transfer of the Normal School to his own premises, using the pupils of the Commercial School as a Model School. Because of lack of space he placed the female section of the Normal School in another building, under the tutelage of Miss Duval, who had assisted her father.60 Later a move was made to premises a little more convenient, but “not so commodious as might be desired”.61

The arrangement far from satisfactory at any time, became more unsatisfactory as the attendance grew and the premises deteriorated. In 1870 a Committee of the Board of Education visited the School and reported on the unsuitability of the accommodations. Part of the Normal School was conducted in the basement of Calvin Church on Hazen Street. The lighting, heating, and ventilation were defective—for instance, one small stove heated three rooms. The Female Department was lodged on Mill's own premises over a fuel shed, and the skylight for ventilation in the centre of the roof was not water-tight.62 Clearly, better accommodations would have to be provided. Moreover, for some time Bennet had been urging the removal of the Normal School to Fredericton, where the Superintendent, the chief agent of the Board of Education, had his office and could exercise supervision without expenditures for travel. One central Training School would, he thought, render unnecessary the supplementary school conducted at Chatham for the benefit of the northern counties.63

This school at Chatham was under the management of William Crocket who was a native of Scotland and had attended Aberdeen College. After acting as Principal of the Superior School at Campbellton he had become the head of the Presbyterian Academy at Chatham. When he began to train teachers he used this Academy as his Model School. His report of 1870 shows that during the three years his Training School was in operation he trained 117 candidates.64 Professional instruction, as we noted earlier, was given after the regular school hours.

The availability of the stone barracks on Queen Street, Fredericton, at a rental of £ 10 sterling per annum, facilitated the move from Saint John to that city. Although sixteen years had passed since the Commission of 1854 had urged the importance of fine buildings and grounds for a Normal School, temporary housing accommodations for the Training School of New Brunswick were not to end in 1870. The first Normal School had been conducted in a gaol. The move at this time from a basement and a semi-loft was made to the stone barracks in Fredericton, where the new school opened in May, 1870, under the Principalship of William Crocket. Not until 1877 was a really suitable building, designed for the purpose, constructed on the site of the present Normal School.

From the official reports of the sixties we learn that candidates entering the Training School were found to be better prepared than formerly. The Superintendent thought that this was due to the “improving quality” of the common schools, and the practice of rejecting candidates who were not qualified.65 In 1863 the system was begun of requiring teachers, at the expiration of their training, to undergo examination in writing for their license. The superintendent commended this, but pointed out that licenses issued under the old system did not represent the same qualifications as licenses under the new system. Because of this inequality, he thought that a reclassification of licenses was necessary.66 This, however, does not seem to have been done.

The number of trained teachers greatly increased during this period. In 1868 there were twice as many trained teachers as in 1858, and the Superintendent expressed the doubt that any state in the American Union had its schools conducted by so large a proportion of trained teachers as New Brunswick. He believed that Massachusetts might shortly adopt a training policy like that of New Brunswick's, in preference to the Teachers' Institutes on which, in that state, dependence had so long been placed. Even Nova Scotia, to which many anxious eyes were turned for educational light,67 was, in this respect, behind New Brunswick in actual and relative number of trained teachers employed in the public schools. In New Brunswick, two out of every three teachers were trained; in Nova Scotia in 1867 not more than two hundred and seventy-two teachers were graduates of the Normal School.68 There were, however, still too many untrained teachers in New Brunswick, and the Superintendent suggested that the Board of Education, after giving notice, should require all untrained teachers to attend the Training School or submit to re-examination.69 He thought that if teachers did not possess the qualifications which the law and the age required, in mercy to the public they should be made to stand aside, and if they possessed those qualifications, there was no hardship in asking them to submit proof.70

In connection with this question of untrained teachers it would appear that these were of two classes—teachers who were granted third class licenses on the recommendation of the inspector, and students who were recommended by the principals of the better schools of the province, and were examined for license by a Board of Examiners, without being required to attend the Normal School. From the Minutes of the Board of Education under the date of April 12, 1860, we find that the Board had had enquiries from St. Stephen Academy and Sackville Academy relative to this question, and that the Board refused to make a blanket regulation, but ruled that each case would be dealt with according to its own merits.71

From the number of misdemeanors and irregularities of various kinds reported against teachers during this period, one is induced to wonder if the economic uncertainties, political unease, and international tensions of the early sixties had not communicated to society a social restlessness and a disregard of standards. A simpler explanation may lie in the fact that after the Act of 1858 personal and professional mistakes of the teaching profession were more likely to be noted and reported, because of a better system of inspection. At any rate, many irregularities were reported during this period. A surprising number of teachers lost their licenses for drunkenness, irregular attendance, and immoral or abusive language. Of the more flagrant cases we shall note a few specific examples. In 1862 two male teachers lost their licenses because they were charged with seduction and bastardy,72 and two female teachers also had their licenses cancelled because they had given birth to illegitimate children.73 In the same year, a teacher was charged with drunkenness, altering his license from the third class to the second, and forging the signatures of the trustees to some school returns.74 The next year, Inspector Duval reported that a teacher, or his wife, was selling liquor on the premises where the school was conducted, viz., in a part of the teacher's house, and that at the time of the inspector's visit there were parties drinking and quarreling about the said premises.75 At one session of the Board of Education in the spring of 1865, the license of one teacher was cancelled because he had made false returns, and that of another likewise, because full investigation had upheld charges that he had indulged in improper conduct towards some of his female pupils.76

Evidences of professional, as well as of moral lapses, occur in some of the inspectors' reports. One official remarked that he did not wonder there were wretched schools, for he sometimes had entered a school to find the master poring over a newspaper or the mistress engaged at a quilt.77 In the course of observations in 1870 on the school book question, Inspector Morrison revealed some interesting facts both about the texts and the way in which they were sometimes handled by the teachers. After noting that the only Geography used in the French Schools taught that the population of St. Andrews was 10,500 and that of Fredericton 5,300, he told of visiting a school in Northumberland County where the children were reading a lesson from one of the Irish National texts. The lesson began: “The country where you, children, live in, is called Ireland”, and the teacher gave the explanations all on the assumption that the children did live in that country. The class was dismissed without any reference to the error, and, on examination, the inspector found that the children actually believed they lived in Ireland. The inspector's comment was that it was bad enough to teach little Frenchmen that St. Andrew's was twice the size of Fredericton, but that to teach young Bluenoses that they lived in Ireland was drawing too largely on good nature.78

While hundreds of teachers were no doubt leading exemplary private and professional lives, the number and nature of all these irregularities cast a serious reflection on the character of the teaching body and indirectly, on the provincial society which, through indifference or poverty, had failed to demand a higher standard on the part of its teachers.

We may note two other cases, of a somewhat different category. The first of these was more pathetic than reprehensible. In 1862 the Board had before it, for consideration, the case of a teacher from Albert County who asked for provincial aid for five and five-eighths months of teaching service, when, according to the regulations, no teacher could draw the provincial allowance for less than six months of service. The teacher was well recommended by her employers and by the trustees, but the Board noted that she was “about twelve years of age”, and ruled “Impossible to entertain such an application”.79

The international situation was involved in the case of a teacher from Campobello, whose application for the provincial grant was refused because he had been for some time engaged in the service of the Federal Army during the American Civil War. The order of the Board read as follows: “Mr. D——having openly violated the law, and rendered himself liable to severe penalties by entering without license a foreign service, cannot possibly be employed by the provincial government.” 80

An excursion at this point into the economic, political, and social fields seems necessary in order to accentuate the background into which this rather depressing picture of pre-Confederation education in New Brunswick fits with a remarkable degree of harmony. In this connection we find various observations by Lieutenant-Governor A. H. Gordon of great significance. This administrator, being young, vigorous, and without family cares, travelled the remote rural areas of the province to a greater extent than had his predecessors.81 He was, therefore, qualified to speak of prevailing conditions. Even the possibility that his political observations may have been influenced by class and political prejudices cannot rob them of significance.

In 1862 Gordon made the following comparison between New Brunswick and Canada: “Above all I have been struck by the startling contrast which the position of New Brunswick presents to that of the neighboring province of Canada. New Brunswick viewed after an inspection however cursory of the wealth, prosperity, comfort and progress of that magnificent dependency appears poverty-stricken, stagnant and decaying. In Canada new buildings are everywhere rising which in the towns are generally of brick or stone; new settlements are extending in the wilderness on well organized plans: ships crowd every port of their noble rivers and lakes. Here, new buildings, almost always of wood, certainly creep up here or there; but a stone house or public building is a sure mark of an earlier period; new settlements are few: but two or three, on any plan or scale, of numbering so many as fifty persons having been mad, in the last ten years, whilst the bare sad desolation of cleared land once farmed but now abandoned is not an infrequent spectacle in any extensive journey, and I know of at least one settlement, where twenty years ago there were one hundred settlers, and now are none.” 82

It is significant that a recent economist should have to describe the rural New Brunswick of today in terms reminiscent of those used by Gordon eighty years ago. On the other hand, if this description of conditions of eighty years ago is accurate, it indicates that the prosperity connected in the Popular mind with the pre-Confederation era has been somewhat overrated.

Gordon next referred to the apathetic listlessness of the inhabitants, “a listlessness which contrasts strongly with the notions usually entertained of the American character, and which is partly the cause and partly the result of the present political conditions of the Province—partly the cause—as but for their own apathy and inefficiency the educated and wealthy class would not so wholly have lost every vestige of influence; partly the result, for under the existing state of things no man of comfortable private means has any temptation to busy himself with public affairs”.83

About a year earlier Gordon had described the leading public men as “imperfectly educated and destitute of all political experience”.84 In his lengthy confidential dispatch of December 31, 1862, he elaborated this point, and the character of the Assembly. “With one or two exceptions every gentleman of education and position has lost his seat and has been replaced by some ignorant lumberer or petty attorney, or by some keeper of a village grog shop or grocery store. Immense sums of money—immense at least for this part of the world— were lavished on the elections. Members are not ashamed to boast openly, and at my table, of the amount they have expended. I have myself heard a member of the Executive Council boast to one of his colleagues that his supporters had cost him a guinea apiece, and that their votes were not to be had at 3s. 6d. a head, like those of the county which his colleague represented.” 85

Describing some of the scenes in the Assembly he wrote: “The spectacle of the grave deaf old clerk seated at his table in gown and bands, a relic of more decorous days, and mournfully endeavouring to avoid the sofa cushions pitched about the House by playful and would be humorous members, was highly suggestive of the change which the last five and twenty years have worked in the character and appearance of the Assembly.” He attributed this state of affairs partly to the inefficiency of the speaker, but in a greater degree to the description of persons from whom the members were generally selected. “A question is seldom argued upon its own merits he past history of those who take part in the discussion is raked up—Bare assertions are met by flat contradictions— disparaging innuendoes by an appeal to a past public career, and the dispute having passed into a squabble probably not bearing the slightest reference to the question nominally before the House wanders on till dinner time, when progress is reported. Almost the only questions which appear to excite any very lively interest are those which may affect the immediate locality from which the members come, or which afford them a chance of sharing in the spoils of office.”86 “Public opinion there is really none—the press, with hardly an exception, is below contempt, and the men who have any regard to the welfare of the Province as a Province and apart from their own selfish interests might easily be numbered.” 87

While in Gordon's remarks of a somewhat similar nature two years later we may trace signs of his opposition at that time to Confederation, it is impossible to believe that they are completely devoid of significance. Under the date of October 11, 1864, he pointed out that in a Federal System the ablest men in political life would be found at the political centre, leaving little material for an able Executive and Legislature in the provinces, especially in New Brunswick, where there was a lack of material to begin with. “The local assemblies would then be filled exclusively with men of a stamp already too common among their members—men without education, able indeed to sign their names but barely able to write a few consecutive lines, and utterly unable to do so consistently with any known rules of grammar or orthography—men, not only without principle, but without the affectation of principle, men whose honesty . . . consists in their open avowal of selfish motives and the unconcealed manner in which they exercise any power they may possess to profit themselves or their friends, or to injure those against whom they may have a grudge.” 88

This picture of men and things, even after allowances are made for possible exaggerations and misinterpretations on Gordon's part, is revealing. One sees defective educational facilities as both cause and effect—as the result of years of rule by “gentlemen” insufficiently concerned with the needs of the common people; and as the cause, or at least one of the causes, of laggard developments in education after the reins had passed from the hands of “gentlemen”. These found much to condemn in the new order, but failed to see that their fathers and grandfathers were partly responsible.

Turning now to the more promising aspects of education in the sixties we find a number of improvements and advances. As we have seen, the Grammar Schools of the province, from the first, were under the management of separate Boards of Trustees or Directors. In 1861 they were placed under the control of the Board of Education, and became subject to the supervision of the Chief Superintendent. Of the eleven Grammar Schools which he visited in 1861 and 1862, he reported four as good, three as middling, and the remainder as below the grade of the ordinary Parish Schools.89 In an effort to raise the standard of these schools, the Board of Education issued a number of regulations. In future no person would be considered eligible to take charge of any of the Grammar Schools who was not a graduate of some degree-conferring university or college, or who had not received a certificate of qualification upon examination before the Board. The school house was to be fully equipped and large enough to allow not less than 120 cubic feet of air to each pupil. There must be an average daily attendance of not less than fifteen pupils over ten years of age, and at least five pupils in each Grammar School were to be regularly instructed in Latin. Greek and Mathematics, or any two of these branches, and not less than ten in English Composition and Modern History.90 Grammar School licenses continued to be issued by the Lieutenant-Governor in Council, and in the Minutes of the Council we find references to a number of applications during this period. These licenses seem to have been granted without an examination of the candidate, but whether or not the applicant in every case held a degree is not stated. In 1865 Superintendent Bennet referred to the disadvantage of having the Grammar Schools and the district schools under separate Boards of Trustees. He said that sometimes big boys were sent to the district schools, and small ones to the Grammar Schools, thus reversing the order of things and making the schools to some extent do each other's work.91 As we shall see, the Act of 1871 permitted the joint management of both types of schools, but not until 1884 were the separate Grammar School corporations dissolved by law.

Among the devices used during this decade to stimulate interest in education were competitive examinations among the brighter pupils of a County. According to the Superintendent's report in 1868 such examinations were first held in Restigouche County in 1866, and had extended to Albert, Northumberland, and part of Gloucester. The Government had aided the scheme by a grant of $ 40 to each County for prizes, but sufficient funds for the prizes required had been subscribed in those Counties by interested gentlemen before the Government took action. The Government grant had been accepted, however, and the local funds reserved for future competitions. Apparently great interest was aroused. A competition held at Belledune between the champions of Restigouche and Gloucester had been attended, said the Superintendent, by people from miles around.92 The next report, however, expressed disappointment, for the new Government was not prepared to make provision for the necessary prizes. Because dependence had been placed on the expected grant, steps had not been taken in time to procure funds from other sources. As a result, competi- tive examinations had been repeated only in Restigouche and Gloucester, where the necessary arrangements had been made the year before. The Superintendent hopefully left the matter to the good sense and patriotism of the Government and Legislature,93 and in May of that year the Executive Council issued a warrant to Bennet for $ 200 on this account.94 The grant was apparently repeated the next year, as in March of 1870, during a debate in the Assembly on another matter, one of the members urged that it be struck off, as the benefits were not equal to the expenditure. He thought that teachers were apt to give too great a share of their attention to two or three pupils, in order to qualify them for the examination.95

Early in the sixties Teachers' Institutes were initiated; in fact several regional Institutes were held before 1860, a number being reported in that year as having been organized by the late Henry Fisher. 96 The first Provincial Institute was held in 1863. The modest scale on which these early meetings were held is indicated by the attendance at the second annual session, held in Fredericton in 1864. There were only twenty of the leading teachers of the province present, besides the Chief Superintendent and three inspectors.97 A degree of public interest in these Institutes, County and Provincial, is revealed by grateful references on the part of the Superintendent and inspectors to the offers of steamship companies, whose boats plied the Saint John river, to convey the delegates at half price. That the collective body of teachers began early to make suggestions to the Government in the interests of education is indicated by a Minute of the Executive Council in 1867 acknowledging the receipt of a letter from a committee of the Teachers' Provincial Institute. The Council went on record as being interested always in obtaining information on the important subject of education; thanked the teachers; and invited future suggestions.98 It is fairly safe to suppose that the suggestions offered on this occasion related to the subject of assessment.

Towards the close of the decade, the Superintendent began to advocate the establishment of a pension fund for teachers, pointing to the existence of pension plans in Germany and in both provinces of Canada. He believed that a scheme of pensions would be an inducement to young men to enter the school service and to remain in it, and he thought it was mistaken economy to retain a man as teacher after his mental and physical energies were impaired.99

From the official reports we glean a few minor items of information, more or less interesting, or indicative of progress. The Superintendent reported in 1862 that 5000 copies of Johnston's Catechism of Agricultural Chemistry and Geology had been distributed for sale among the school book agents of the province. He recommended this as a step toward the improvement of agriculture. Special Agricultural Schools with Model Farms attached were as yet too expensive for the province, but it was well to use whatever modest means and humble appliances were at public disposal.100

We learn that a map of the Province was now available, and was offered gratis to every school district which established a library of the minimum value of £ 7 10s., including the Provincial bonus.101 The Board had made arrangements for the sale of Worcester's Series of English Dictionaries which teachers might obtain at a discount of 25%. Bennet approved of these as being free of the innovations which detracted from Webster's Dictionary.102 In general, there were few authorized changes in the school books in use, but a feeling was growing in favor of more modern texts. As Inspector Morrison pointed out in 1866, a quarter of a century had elapsed since the readers had been authorized, and school literature in the interval had improved, while succeeding editions of the Irish National texts had deteriorated. In some of the denominational schools obtaining provincial grants, books of a strong denominational bias had been substituted, and along the border, teachers, sensible of the inferiority of New Brunswick texts, were using the American books. This was regarded as objectionable, as many of these books satirized British usages and institutions.103

In 1871 the Superintendent reported that the Board had arranged with a Toronto firm for readers to replace the Irish readers. These, he said, were inexpensive, and were considered by teachers and clergymen to be well adapted to schools of a mixed character.104 In the same year, Inspector Morrison expressed himself strongly on the subject of French texts, severely criticizing those in use in the French schools. He said that if it were expedient to preserve the French language at all in the public schools, which many intelligent Frenchmen denied—a remarkable statement, surely—then it was only wisdom and justice to afford the French children as good facilities for obtaining information as were afforded to the English children. In point of fact, however, catechisms and a few other religious books formed nearly the whole literature of the French schools. The low state of these schools was not always the result of poverty or indifference on the part of the parents, but was chiefly caused, he thought, by the use of unsuitable books, and the mistaken kindness hitherto extended to the French in not insisting upon higher qualification in their teachers.105 This last was evidently a reference to the fact that French teachers were not required to attend the Training School. The year before, Morrison, at that time the Inspector for Kent, Northumberland, Gloucester, and Restigouche, had expressed the belief that the time had come when French teachers should be required to attend that institution, and to pass the same tests as were applied to other teachers. Their teach- ing power, he said, was of the feeblest.106 The Superintendent had referred to the same subject in his report of 1867, suggesting that the services of a French teacher competent in both languages should be secured for the Training School, and that no licenses should be granted to French applicants without attendance at the School.107 However, nothing was done in this connection during this period.

Among the matters complained of by the Superintendent and inspectors, nothing was mentioned more frequently than the number of small and unnecessary schools. We must bear in mind that even the town schools were not yet graded. Moreover, the vast majority were held in cramped quarters—an attic, a basement, a room in the teacher's home, etc. There were also many educational agencies, all independent of one another, and sometimes definitely antagonistic. Often in the same community or area there were a Grammar School, a common school, a Madras School, or some other denominational school. Even in the country, school districts were often divided, and unnecessary schools established, through rivalry of faction. These “fledglings”, as the Superintendent called them in 1866, were but poor affairs. They reduced the level of the schools of the province and saddled the country with useless expense.108 In 1871 he declared that if Fredericton should have half a dozen new schools, the addition would be actually a mischief, because schools were too numerous there already. The same, he said, was true of other towns and villages.109 From this, it emerges that the considerable increase in the number of schools during this decade was not so completely that sign of progress which it appeared to be, since many of the schools would have been unnecessary if a system of gradation had been employed, and if school districts had been properly marked off. In 1862, the Board, with a list before it of ninety schools having an average attendance of less than ten pupils, did make an effort to discourage multiplicity of schools of this type, by ordering that the daily average attendance in rural schools must be at least ten, and in the cities, towns, and villages at least seventeen, to entitle the teachers of such schools to the provincial allowance. Teachers were also required to attest to the accuracy of their returns by affidavit made before a Justice of the Peace.110 Both before and after this date a number of cases occurred in which teachers were charged with having forged the names of the Trustees to school returns. In one case the comment of the Board was: “Returns grossly false” and “cooked up” 111 Because of the large number of petitions from teachers who became ineligible for the government allowance on account of the regulation of 1862 the rule was relaxed in 1863. In districts where the number of resident children between the ages of 16 and 6, years did exceed 15, the regulation would not be enforced should the Inspector recommend its relaxation.112 One of the most difficult tasks to face the inspec- tors and the trustees on the passage of the Act of 1871 was that of laying off suitable school districts.

One matter on which the Superintendent expressed regret was the small number of girls in attendance at the parish schools, as compared with the number of boys. In his report for the year 1869, he drew attention to the fact that during the winter term the attendance of boys exceeded that of girls by 3598, and during the next term the excess was 2,006. It was his belief, he said, that the sure hope of general instruction even for boys would never be realized until general instruction was first secured for girls. The children of instructed and enlightened mothers were almost certain to be instructed and enlightened also. Universal female education was a prior and indispensable condition for the establishment and perpetuity of a system of universal education for both sexes.113 Although the Superintendent did not do so at the time, he might have referred to the teaching profession in this connection. Since the retention of male teachers in the teaching service was growing steadily more difficult, females were staffing the schools in an increasing degree, therefore a supply of more and better teachers was contingent on the spread of female education.

The slowness with which communities availed themselves of the opportunity to choose School Committees was also a matter of regret to the Superintendent and inspectors. In 1866 Bennet reported that more than half the schools were still without such Committees.114 It may be that lack of power on the part of School Committees to raise funds to make needed improvements, except for School Libraries, promoted a general feeling that such Committees could not render services commensurate with the trouble of electing them,115 but obviously local disinterest was largely responsible. The failure of the majority of school districts to adopt the assessment principle was another indication of this same indifference. Sometimes the absence of provisions for a bonus to counties adopting the principle was cited as a deterrent, an excuse which suggests the existence of a feeling of unwillingness to accept a duty without payment for the performance of that duty.

That the Superintendent and inspectors supported the idea of compulsory assessment is indicated by many of their remarks. In 1861 the Superintendent declared that one might as well ask the dumb to sing as to wait until the indifferent had cast off their apathy. The success of assessment in Canada and elsewhere should influence New Brunswick to make the experiment. There was much juvenile depravity in Saint John. While he commended the establishment of a Reformatory School, he thought that the outlay it required would not have been necessary if the money had been spent years before in opening Free Schools for the poor and friendless. Schoolmasters were the cheapest and most effective police.116

In 1867 Inspector Freeze said that one would think that the people of New Brunswick, with such activity and improvements in education on all sides of them, would awake to a lively sense of the condition of their young, and would at once demand of their rulers greater progress. Referring to the neighboring republic, to Canada, and to Nova Scotia, he asked: “How is it that New Brunswick is doomed 'to drag her slow length along', and to allow the adjacent States and Provinces to lead, yes more, to outstrip her in the race of educational improvement?” Placing the responsibility more boldly on the Legislature than was usually done in these reports, he said that the Province required a new and vigorous measure that would compel assessment for schools, open the schools freely to every child of suitable age, and compel attendance at school. If there was ever a time when the Statesmen of New Brunswick could be a blessing to their country and could leave themselves a name on the pages of history, it was at that moment, when the people were anxiously awaiting a bold and vigorous School Law that would give new life to study, and to the aspirations of the young, and would create a determination on the part of the people to raise the educational status of the Province, making it equal, if not superior, to that of the surrounding States.117 The next year a resolution moved by J. R. Hartley of Carleton County recommending direct taxation in support of schools failed.118

Others besides the educational officials of the Province labored during this period to arouse public interest and to spur the Legislature into action. Of these propagandists, none is more worthy of notice than George Parkin, during whose Principalship of the Grammar School at Bathurst, (1867-1871), competitive examinations in Gloucester County were conducted with such marked enthusiasm. In a lecture in 1868 in the Court House at Bathurst, Parkin, speaking of the neglect of education, said: 'I do not believe that our politicians are such blind fools that they cannot catch a glimpse of this fact, that they cannot perceive the weakness of a political economy that takes so little account of the mental resources of a nation, and hence one is forced to the inference that they willingly sacrifice what they know to be the true and permanent interests of their country for the accomplishment of such ends as will receive the richest reward of vulgar popular applause'. Referring to the Lieutenant-Governor of New Brunswick, L. A. Wilmot, and to Charles Tupper, Premier of Nova Scotia, he observed: 'It is indeed cheering to behold such a man as our own Lieutenant-Governor throwing all the weight of that influence which his fellow Provincialists have bestowed upon him and all the power of his flowing eloquence into the scale of educational progress, and to see Tupper of Nova Scotia staking his political reputation and political life on the question of free public instruction'. He closed his lecture with these words: 'It needs no prophet's eye to see that the day is not far distant when the people of this Province will be asked to declare if they wish the last barrier which separates the son of the poor man from the son of the rich man to be broken down; if they desire to leave to their posterity the proud right of boasting that every child born on the soil of New Brunswick is as free to drink from the well of Knowledge as he is to breathe the air which fans his native hills'.119

As Parkin had said, all signs pointed to an impending change. The Superintendent might admit a greater number of schools, an increased school attendance, a wider spread of knowledge,120 less pretension in the schools and more reality, less straining after impossibilities and conceits, and something of that emphasis on the elementals121 which d'Avray had always advocated, but he constantly pointed to the great numbers of children who were not attending any kind of school. In his report for 1870 he stated that there were 279 schoolhouses not the property of the district. Many of these were inferior and unsuitable.122 As for school attendance, Nova Scotia, with an estimated population of 392,562, had in 1869 a registered school attendance of 93,731. Estimating the population of New Brunswick at about 300,000, the registered attendance in that province should have been about 71,000, in place of which the minutest search could find no more than 49,000. To do as well as Nova Scotia, New Brunswick should have had 22,000 more children in school, and to do as well as she ought to do, should have had still more, for in Nova Scotia in 1869 there were 15,000 children of school age who were not attending school.123 Moreover, the average attendance of those who were enrolled was only 53.7% for the winter term of 1870, and 52.5% for the summer term.124 These facts indicated the necessity of a new method of school support. A change with regard to inspection was also needed. For instance, Inspector Duval had to supervise 270 schools, while in Ontario the law required no inspector to be responsible for more than 120 schools.125

There were other factors. More than a decade had elapsed without any significant school legislation. The Confederation issue was settled, and the British North America Act, by making education a provincial responsibility, had focussed attention in New Brunswick on educational developments in the other provinces of the new Dominion. 126

In this connection, the example of Ontario and of Nova Scotia was an inspiration. In Ontario, although the Education Act of 1850 had left the matter of assessment to the choice of the electors, Ryerson's propaganda and the growth of an educational consciousness had led to an adoption of the principle on a scale unknown in New Brunswick, so that an Act at this very time, 1871, making the adoption of the assessment principle compulsory, and the schools free, met with no opposition.127 In New Brunswick's neighbor, Nova Scotia, the leader of the Government, Charles Tupper, had gained the concurrence of A. G. Archibald, the leader of the Opposition, in 1864, and a Free School Act had passed without serious opposition, although as in New Brunswick there was not a little local hostility.128

In the Mother Country, also, the sixties had been marked by considerable educational activity. The Newcastle Commission of 1861, the Clarendon Commission on Secondary Schools in the same year, the Taunton Enquiry of 1864, the Endowed Schools Act of 1869, had all led on to the forward step taken in the Education Act of 1870, an Act which almost of necessity followed the increased enfranchisement of the working classes in 1867. Although under the new Act subsidies were continued to the denominational and other voluntary schools, there was to be a closer supervision of those schools. The main feature of the Act, however, was the provision for tax-supported, non-sectarian schools, or “Board Schools”, as they came to be called. While attendance was not made compulsory, unless the School Boards adopted a by-law to that effect, and while the schools were not free except to the indigent,129 the Act represented a great advance. These developments did not go unnoticed in New Brunswick. Hannay tells us that many people, looking to the Mother Country as an example to be imitated, argued that if Free Schools did not exist there, New Brunswick did not need them.130 Others, however, realized how progressive a measure the British Education Act was, relatively speaking, and hailed it as an inspiration. Inspector Duval, penning his report in 1871, referred to the surprising enactment so noiselessly made by the British Parliament during the previous year. “The world,” he said, “is moving, New Brunswick cannot stand still.” 131

(C) The Act of 1871

In the light of domestic conditions and potent external examples, the framing of legislation which would improve the educational facilities of New Brunswick was clearly one of the responsibilities facing the new administration after the election of 1870. The speech from the throne, the reading of which must have given Lieutenant-Governor Wilmot great satisfaction, foreshadowed school legislation, referring to the need of a better school system. “In comparison with this, all other questions for Legislative deliberation are of secondary importance. It is the first duty of the governing power to make provision for the education of every child. The children of the poorest in our land should have free access to Schools, where they can receive at least the rudiments of an education, that will qualify them for an intelligent performance of their duties as citizens.” 132 Thus the Government indicated its intentions to deal at last with the question of Free Schools.

As Attorney-General King pointed out in the Assembly, the Bill could not have taken anyone by surprise. Following Hartley's resolution in 1868 the Government had prepared a bill which got as far as being published. In 1870 another had been brought down, but was withdrawn. Then had come the election in full view of the question. A constituency could only blame itself if it had sent to the Assembly members not pledged on the question one way or another. Taxation for schools was working in New England, Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia, and on the Continent. In proposing the establishment of the provisions of the Bill the Government was only doing what almost every other civilized country had done for its people.133

In some contradiction to this, an editorial in The Telegraph at the time the Legislature opened referred to the fact that since the Bill of 1870 nothing had been done by the Government to bring out public sentiment. There had been no public meetings, nothing except a few speeches at the last session and one or two hustings speeches in which the subject with a score of others had been briefly alluded to. It might be said that the Superintendent had done something in public addresses to further the interests of free unsectarian schools, “but all who understand the small amount of influence which our Education Department exerts in influencing public sentiment, will not be apt to over-estimate the services of the Superintendent in this direction”. Perhaps, said The Telegraph, a delusion in the Province that a good School Bill was to result in an easy victory might account for the lack of energy of the friends of popular and unsectarian education.134 A few days later, the editor of this paper was pleasantly surprised to find the language of the speech from the throne so firm and manly on the question of the School Bill.135 It would seem from these and other observations that while everyone was more or less aware that a School Bill was in the offing, the subject had not been made an issue in the election.

Very early in the session the insecurity of the Government became apparent. Before even the speech from the throne had been considered, the leader of the Government, George E. King, announced the Government's resignation. Then followed the announcement that George L. Hatheway of York County had been called on to form a new administration which, when announced, was found to include the majority of the previous Executive. The announcement of the King-Hatheway coalition caused great excitement, as Hatheway, according to the story as told by The Telegraph, had been one of the twenty-three members of the Assembly who had met on the night of the opening of the Legislature, and had pledged themselves by a round robin to oppose the Government.136, The Ottawa correspondent of The Morning Freeman, who signed himself T. W. A. and was therefore probably Timothy W. Anglin, the editor of the paper, wrote that the news had caused New Brunswick's Dominion representatives mortification. Their Province, they felt, was humbled; they were unable to explain the recent confusion and intrigue; the influence of New Bruns- wick in the Dominion was always small; by these transactions that influence was rendered even less. “To do all this in the name of education is to steal the livery of Heaven to serve the Devil in”.137 The Telegraph, on the other hand, while cautiously admitting that the personnel of the new Government might not give entire satisfaction, declared: “It embraces, however, some of the ablest men on both sides of the House, and, we presume, was formed expressly with a view of carrying a School Bill. Under the circumstances, we can afford to forget the men in the importance of the measure which they carry forward to its final triumph”.138 From The Freeman we learn that Hatheway, in his speech to the electors during the by-election necessitated by his entrance into the Government, declared that the reconstructed Administration would stand or fall on the principle of direct taxation and free schools.139

Unfortunately, the official reports of the debates in the Assembly during this session are not available for the purposes of this study. We are forced, therefore, to rely on the press, and may choose The Daily Telegraph and The Morning Freeman as fairly representative of the two great sections of opinion. The latter, however, dealt mainly with the denominational question which was involved commenting but little on the other aspects of the Bill. The Telegraph, on the other hand, followed the entire course of the Bill with considerable attention.

In commenting on the text of the measure, The Telegraph was generally approving, but noted the composition of the Board of Education as one feature that might be improved. It was right, declared the editor, that the President of the University should be a member of the Board, if he could spare the time; right too, that the Superintendent of Education should be; but should not the members be “gentlemen of high culture, well versed in educational matters? . . . But what presumption is there that the nine members who compose the Government shall be reasonably educated men, or thoroughly conversant with educational matters? In this Province, at least, literary or scientific attainments are no passport to political distinction”. Even if the members of the Executive were qualified, could they give the necessary time and attention to the duties of the Board? Moreover, they were subject to distracting political influences, and, as a body, were subject to frequent changes in personnel.140 We may note that Inspector Duval had said something of the same sort more than ten years before. In 1869 he said that he had suggested as early as 1858 that the Board of Education should not consist of the Executive Council, but should be a group chosen to represent the different sections of the Province and the various religious bodies. It should be composed of gentlemen who had given special attention to popular education, had acquainted themselves with its great principles, and were well informed on improved methods which had been successfully adopted by intelligent teachers. The members of the Executive Council were not the right men, in his estimation, for they were chosen for political considerations, and to then, education was a secondary matter.141

About a week after its earlier reference to this subject, The Telegraph reported that the Attorney-General had discussed the matter very thoroughly in the Assembly. He pointed out that in England the Board was composed of the members of the Privy Council, and in Nova Scotia it was also political. In the United States it was non-political, and also in the Upper Provinces of the Dominion, save that the Minister of Public Instruction—a member of the ministry—was one of its members. The Attorney-General did not think it was necessary that the Board should be composed of men of profound scholastic attainments. A Superintendent competent in that respect was all that was required. What was needed was a body of men of fairly sound judgment and good business talent. If the Board were a non-political body, composed of men from different parts of the province, the members would have to receive large grants for contingent expenses for travelling. The probability was that such a Board would be like the Board of the University of New Brunswick, at which gentlemen held seats and were never known to attend a meeting. The members of the Executive, on the other hand, were often called to Fredericton in connection with government business. The duties of the Board, he said, were largely administrative, therefore politics could not play a part, unless in the case of the appointment of the inspectors. As for the changing character of the Executive Council, the presence of the President of the University on the Board would give a continuity of experience.142

These arguments, largely based on the practical considerations which our investigations have revealed were always appealing to a New Brunswick Legislature, proved convincing, and the composition of the Board of Education, under the Act of 1871, continued as before, except for the addition of the President of the University of New Brunswick. Educationally, the question may still be a moot question, but otherwise it seems to have been written off as closed.

Of the debate on other features of the Bill, we may briefly note what the Attorney-General said on the question of local control. Counties and parishes had proved to be too large to be effective units of local government. There were few municipalities in New Brunswick, therefore it was necessary to set up districts. These, he said, would be small enough to put no child to the necessity of walking more than two miles to school.143

During the debate, S. H. Napier of Bathurst created considerable amusement when he began his speech in support of the Bill by holding up a copy of The Fourth Book of Lessons for the use of schools, and, to show the character of the teaching under which the instruction of his youth had been received, read out that the Province of New Brunswick was composed of land and rivers, and most of it was covered by a forest composed of trees, that people called lumber- men, who lived in low log huts, went in pursuit of these trees, cut them down, and made timber. The timber was floated to Fredericton and shipped in vessels to Halifax where it was reshipped to England. For it the natives got in return cotton. This, he said, was the kind of stuff he had been taught, and he thought that many of the books then in use were not of a much higher or more accurate standard.144 It is interesting to note that only a few days before The Freeman had charged that for many years there had been a deliberate and persistent attempt on the part of the Chief Superintendent and his inspectors to decry the school system of the province. In all countries the results of the existing system were put in the best possible light before the world. Everywhere else, if a boy attended school for even one day, he was numbered, whereas in New Brunswick this was not done, and the great object was to prove that the attendance was less than it ought to be.145

Raymond has said that in view of the fact that public opinion in New Brunswick had been against free schools up to this time, it was remarkable how little opposition the Bill of 1871 encountered in the Assembly.146 It would seem, however, that several of the sessions were heated, for The Telegraph observed that the Speaker was a gentleman, and was elected to preside over an assembly of gentlemen and not over a bear-garden. Why, then, did he allow disgraceful scenes to occur?147 It is possible, of course, that the acrimony and violent talk hinted at by The Telegraph were caused by the political manoeuvres which had resulted in the King-Hatheway coalition, and not by the School Bill. Actually, however, the manoeuvres and the measure were closely associated, and in much of the wordy warfare in which the newspapers engaged we find the two subjects closely linked.

Whatever the feeling in the Legislature, there was clearly a spirit of opposition in the province at large. An examination of the petitions which were tabled at this session, and of those, too, which had been presented off and on for many years previous, indicates that the popular opposition to the School Bill fell into two classes. One group of people objected to taxation for schools; the other was hostile to non-sectarian schools. The more vocal opposition came from the latter group through their clerics and their journalists. There were 22 petitions in 1871 for Separate or Dissentient Schools signed by a total of 5,281 persons. One petition from the City of Saint John, headed by Bishop Sweeney, was signed by 736 persons, and another from Saint John County had 1,031 signatures. There were counter-petitions also. For instance, there was one against provisions for separate schools signed by 1, 163 persons from Saint John City and County.148 Most of the Protestant denominations declared for schools open to all children, regardless of their religious persuasion, but an influential element of the Anglican Church opposed the exclusion of religious instruction from the schools. However, the strongest hostility came from the Roman Catholic section of the population.149

It may be well to remind ourselves at this point that the question of eliminating sectarianism from education had provoked violent controversy in many countries. In general, the “liberalism” of the nineteenth century fostered anti-clericalism, and insisted that state-supported education should be non-sectarian and conducted by lay teachers. In England, as we have seen, denominational influences were so strong, particularly those of the Anglican Church, that even in the Education Act of 1870 provisions were continued for the state subsidization of denominational schools. In France, Napoleon III, besides exercising many tyrannies over the curricula and faculties of schools and universities, had favored religious schools. Religious instruction, therefore, prospered under the Second Empire.150 But at the very time that the school question was agitating New Brunswick, the Third Republic was being established amid the throes of a radical working-class uprising, and the avowed anti-clericalism of the radical republicans was a subject of deep concern to Roman Catholics. The Roman Catholic press of New Brunswick, as we shall see, seized the opportunity to make a comparison between the Paris “infidels” and the supporters of nonreligious education in New Brunswick.

Contemporary with all this, was the achievement of nationality in Italy at the expense of the papal states, and the beginning in Prussia of the conflict known as the Kulturkampf. Pope Pius IX, an opponent of the new political liberalism, had issued his Syllabus of Errors in 1864, condemning civil control of education. Soon, in acceptance of the challenge, Prussia under Bismarck was to expel the Jesuits, make civil marriage compulsory, place ecclesiastical seminaries under state control, and put an end to clerical school inspection.151

In America, as we saw earlier, many circumstances favored the development of non-sectarian education. But in Puritan Massachusetts Horace Mann had had to meet the cry that the public schools were Godless schools,152 and in New York City the Irish Roman Catholics made a determined, but unsuccessful, fight between 1825 and 1842 for a division of public school funds.153 In a number of the British North American provinces the outcome was different. Quebec had separate schools, and in 1863, after twenty years of agitation, the Roman Catholics of Upper Canada succeeded in their demands for such schools. In the newly created province of Manitoba, the circumstances which had attended the formation of the province out of the North West Territories had made separate schools seem expedient, and the Manitoba School Act of 1871 contained provisions for a dual system.

When the proposal was made at the Quebec Conference on Confedera tion that education should be a provincial matter. D'Arcy McGee moved an addition to the proposal, namely, 'saving the rights and privileges which the Protestant or Catholic minority in both Canadas may possess as to the denominational schools at the time when the Constitutional Act goes into operation', and his motion had carried.154 As a result of this, and the incorporation of a clause in the London Resolutions, the ninety-third clause of the British North America Act safeguarded the rights and privileges of any provincial minority. Later, the Roman Catholics of New Brunswick were to demand remedial action from the Dominion Government on the grounds that the Act of 1871 deprived them of rights and privileges which were theirs under the Act of 1858. However, we find no reference to this clause, even in The Freeman, at the time the Act of 1871 was before the local legislature.

While the Catholic viewpoint found considerable expression before and after the Bill of 1871, D'Arcy McGee's speech in 1863 on the separate school question of Upper Canada explained the Catholic attitude with such reasonableness of language that it is worth noting. Meeting the claim of those who were hostile to the petition of the Roman Catholics that there was no question of religious liberty in the matter, he asked whether Catholics were to be guided by the conscience of those who objected to their petition, or by their own conscience. They asserted that they had conscientious objections to the common or mixed system, and could not divorce religious from secular instruction in their schools. “You say they ought not to have such scruples . . . that they are either fancied or simulated.” But the Quakers say that they have conscientious objections to invoking the name of God in giving testimony in courts of Justice. We may think them wrong, and may feel that the oath is essential to the solemnity of the evidence, but we give way to the Quaker's scruples, and allow him to testify after his own fashion. The Israelites may buy and sell on the day we call the Sabbath, and the dissenters also on days established by law as fetes d'obligation in Lower Canada—“Yet we will not strain the law to prevent either from collecting debts contracted with them on those days, however you or I think they ought to be kept sacred”.

He then contended that no enduring national character was ever moulded without a strong infusion of a dogmatic religion of some sort, and met the assertion of some of the honorable members that the bill was a priests' bill by declaring it was a fathers' and brothers' bill. There were times and subjects in which he would deprecate the interference of priests as much as any layman living, but he was not afraid that in this country and age the ecclesiastical order would become disproportionately powerful. He noted the existence of an assumption that if separate schools were established, the children of Catholics would be uneducated or ill-educated, but he said that he trusted human nature and parental pride better than that. Were Catholics, he asked, less ambitious for their children than other parents.155

Turning now to the local situation in New Brunswick in the spring of 1871, we find that the press campaign for and against non-sectarian schools was conducted with considerable vigor. The following examples will give some indication of the bitterness which the subject aroused at times.

The Moncton Times, according to The Telegraph, made the observation that it was clear 'Hatheway and Stevenson's treachery' had saved New Brunswick from being ruled by a government that would inflict on the country the detestable separate school system.156 The Telegraph, meeting the charge that the Roman Catholics of New Brunswick only sought what had been accorded the Protestants of Quebec, pointed out that the Protestants of Quebec had separate schools because the government schools were intensely sectarian. If New Brunswick established schools in the interests of Protestants, one could see why the Roman Catholics should claim separate schools. But, said The Telegraph, New Brunswick wanted schools established in which no man's religion would be assailed.157 According to The Freeman, The Religious Intelligencer used strong language on the question, accusing Catholics of believing that 'Ignorance is the mother of devotion', and of preferring to have public funds “appropriated for the teaching of the blasphemous dogmas of the Papal Infallibility and its kindred superstitions and errors” than to have a liberal secular education. The Freeman, after quoting The Religious Intelligencer as having asked “Shall New Brunswick give the helping hand in the establishment of a Papal hierarchy?”, observed that all this was written in the name of education.158

On the question of conscience The Freeman asked who was George E. King to determine that he knew better than the 200,000,000 Catholics of the world what the Catholic conscience should be.159 The Freeman also accused The Morning News, The Telegraph, and The Religious Intelligencer of thinking it quite right that Pope L. A. Wilmot and the half dozen Methodist Cardinals who formed his Council, aided by a Presbyterian Superintendent and Professor, should determine what all the children of New Brunswick should read and learn, but their conscientious scruples would not allow anyone else to indulge in resisting or objecting to an order of things which to them seemed beautiful.160 The School Bill, declared The Freeman shortly after the introduction of the measure, showed that the Government had deliberately determined that the Catholics, over two-fifths of the people of the province, had no rights which the other three-fifths were bound to respect. “The only means by which the advocates of the measure hope to ensure its becoming law is by appealing to the prejudices and the fanaticism which unfortunately prevail still to so great an extent in many parts of the Province.” The Saint John News and The Telegraph, said The Freeman, were trying to inflame this fanaticism. “They mod the same means to carry this Province into Confederation.” 161

Having observed before the Bill was introduced that religion, if taught, must be denominational.162 The Freeman later declared that assuredly the public schools under the proposed system must be either Protestant or Godless and Infidel, and in any case such as Catholics could not conscientiously support. The Press which supported the system could hardly be called Protestant, as that meant Christian. “It is in this matter Infidel and Atheistic. The principle is that most horrible anti-christian principle enunciated by the Honorable Mr. King on the Saint John hustings, that the child belongs not to the Church, nor to the parents, but to the State.” 163 The cry of The Morning News, declared the editor of The Freeman, “is precisely the same that has been raised by the Red Republicans of Paris, now in revolt against God and society”. They too proclaimed that they would have free education, absolutely secular, wholly free from religious influences, but “infidelity and indifference are as detestable to good Protestants as to Catholics”. The Freeman then pointed to the fact that in Great Britain education was still mainly denominational, in Scotland was essentially religious, and in Germany was what The News called sectarian, likewise in France, despite the Infidel Reds, and in Belgium, despite the Infidel Liberals. So also in Quebec and Ontario. Where the denominational system existed, all agitation on the school question ceased, and instead of contention and ill will there was peace and harmony. Which, said The Freeman, did New Brunswick want?164

In the Assembly, the vote on the question of taking up the School Bill, section by section, was 24 to 14. Among those who voted “yea” were Theriault and Girouard, two French members, who were severely criticized by The Freeman for misrepresenting the counties of Victoria and Kent.165 A few days later the editor declared: “It was not so much through any desire for what they call Free Schools, or any love of Direct Taxation, that the clamour for this new system was raised and maintained, as it was through hatred of Catholicity and jealousy of the growth and progress of Catholic educational institutions”. Referring to the persecution of Catholics in Ireland, the editor made the assertion that in New Brunswick Catholics were met “by the same barbarous spirit which disembowelled priests in Ireland and tore Acadians from their homes”. A majority of the Legislature, composed, said the writer, for the greater part of men well-known as no good models for youth, had resolved that the people of the province should receive no education unless it was Godless.166

On May 5 a resolution passed the Assembly by a vote of 25 to 10 that a new section be added to the bill, to the effect that all schools conducted under its provisions should be non-sectarian.167 The following day the editor of The Freeman asserted that the great contest of the day was not between Catholicism and Protestantism but between Christianity and Rationalism and Infidelity. “For the propagation of Infidelity no better engine could be devised than the Common School system which excludes religion altogether and puts it out of view, thus inevitably creating in the minds of the young the impression that religion is of little or no importance in the real business of life. and leading to indifference and latitudinarianism, out of which Infidelity is sure to grow in most cases.” 168

When the bill was considered in the Legislative Council it had a narrow escape. An amendment was moved that all schools in existence at the time of the passing of the bill, and all schools thereafter established, whether separate or common schools, should be entitled to their share of school funds, provided they complied with the regular school requirements. The Council divided evenly on this question, so that the amendment failed to pass, and the bill was agreed to as it stood.169 When the Legislature was prorogued the next day, The Freeman asserted that Lieutenant-Governor Wilmot was so elated at the passing of the Education Bill that he could not maintain gravity and decorum. One spectator, alleged The Freeman, described him as a Jumping Johnny. His speech was a stump speech, of rant and clap-trap.170 As a matter of fact, three-quarters of Wilmot's address did deal with the subject of education. That portion of his speech which referred to non-sectarian schools was as follows: “I ask you to do all in your power, in your respective spheres, to give effect to the measure; and most sincerely do I hope that under its operations we may soon see, in every part of the Province, children of all denominations of christians gathered into the same Schools, sitting on the same forms, bravely competing for the same prizes, and forming youthful friendships to be continued in after years when the real life-work is entered upon, and when all denominations are inevitably gathered into the World's Great School, and side by side competing for its rewards. No Statesman will ever be found who could successfully resolve this great School into its Denominational elements for carrying on the business of the world: the mutual relations of commerce and industry constitute the centripetal force which necessitates the coherence, and therefore you have acted wisely and well in providing that all, who are growing up to take their part in such an inseparable union, shall be educated for it side by side in early life.” 171

Earlier in the address Wilmot voiced his personal pleasure at the passing of the bill. “It is with great satisfaction that I have given my assent to the Bill relating to Common Schools, and most sincerely do I congratulate you upon the provisions therein made for the education of our Youth.” 172 The comment from The Freeman was: “The exultation of the man who professes to be a Christian of the purest water, an expounder of Scripture, a shining light,173 in the fact that religion is to be absolutely excluded from the schools is worse than indecent”.174

If the Common Schools Act was “King's Bill”, in the sense that Attorney General King drafted it, guided it through the Assembly, (and later defended it in the courts), the work of preparing for the operation of the measure fell on the inspectors and the Chief Superintendent of Education. The latter, Theodore H. Rand, whom King probably interviewed on his “mission to Nova Scotia on educational matters” 175 shortly after the passage of the Act, was fitted by reason of his organizing ability and his experience with a Free School system in Nova Scotia, to undertake the necessary organization in New Brunswick.176 The Act was not to go into effect until January 1, 1872, so that people might become familiar with its provisions, and so that the preliminary organization might be effected.

The principal features of this lengthy Act 77 of sixty-two sections and many sub-sections were those to which reference has already been made. In brief, the Act established free, tax-supported, non-sectarian schools and made provision for the efficient operation, support, and supervision, of such schools.

The sections of the Act dealing with administration determined the composition of the Board of Education, which was to remain as before, with the addition of the President of the University of New Brunswick. The Board was empowered to divide the province into local school districts containing no more than fifty resident children between the ages of five and sixteen years of age, unless the area embraced four square miles, or were a town, village, or populous locality. The Board was to appoint fourteen inspectors at a total salary of $ 4,000. This last was in the nature of a temporary provision, the duty of the inspectors at this small salary being to familiarize their respective counties with the workings of the Act. Subsequently, the Board reduced the number of the inspectors, increased their salaries, and, by Regulation 42,178 established certain requirements in order to ensure the competency of the inspectors for the actual work of inspection. The duties of the Superintendent and of the inspectors, as laid down in the Act, were very similar to those outlined in previous acts. The inspectors, however, had the additional duties of choosing trustees, if a district failed to elect those officers. and of deciding what districts should be entitled to special aid as “poor” districts.

The sections of the Act dealing with the mode of support provided that teachers should receive their salaries from three sources, the Provincial Treasury, the County Fund, and District Assessment. The teacher's allowance from the province was to be based on license, but at the expiration of five years this aid would depend partly on license and partly on the quality of the teaching.179 The County Fund, a portion of the County rates amounting to thirty cents, for every inhabitant of the County, was to be distributed in the following manner: The Trustees of a school were to receive $ 20 a year for every qualified teacher employed in the school; the balance of the fund was to be apportioned to the Trustees according to the average number of pupils in attendance at the school, as compared with the whole average number of pupils attending the common schools of the County, and the length of time in which the school was in operation. Finally, any sum required by a district in further payment of teachers' salaries, or any sum required for other school purposes, was to be raised by poll tax, and by assessment on real and personal property. Districts reported by the Inspector as “poor” districts were to receive special aid from the Provincial Treasury and County Fund.

The duties of trustees and teachers were outlined in detail, and precise regulations framed relating to the election of trustees in each school district, their qualifications, and the holding of an annual meeting by the ratepayers. All schools under the Act were to be free and non-sectarian, trustees were to make arrangements for the purchase, rental or erection of school buildings, and to borrow money if necessary.

Superior Schools were provided for, under conditions very similar to those stipulated in the Act of 1858, and the Trustees of Grammar Schools might unite with the Trustees of any district for the management and support of the Grammar School. The City of Saint John was to constitute one school district, likewise the City of Fredericton. In each case the Board of Trustees was to consist of seven members, three of whom were to be appointed by the Governor in Council, and the remainder by the City Council. Section 59 ruled that similar provisions might be extended under certain conditions to any incorporated town in the province.

Section 29 of the Act called for the grading of schools into elementary, advanced, and High School departments, whenever the population was sufficient for the purpose, and subsequent regulations pointed out the advantages of such classification.180 Among these regulations No. 37 lengthened the period of training at the Normal School to five months,181 and No. 20 prohibited the exhibition of emblems and symbols distinctive of any national or other society, political party or religious organization, either in the school-room or on the person of any teacher or pupil.182 Regulation 21 gave teachers the privilege of opening and closing the daily exercises of the school by the reading of a portion of Scripture, out of the Common or Douay version, and by the offering of the Lord's Prayer, but no teacher could compel any pupil to be present at these exercises against the wish of his parent or guardian.183

The provision which this Act made for the localizing of authority and control was its most revolutionary feature, aside from the provisions for free, tax-supported, non-sectarian schools. The parish had proved to be an unsuit- able unit. The Trustees, as parish officers, had been too remote or too indifferent to make efficient authorities. The new Act abandoned the idea of parish officers, and made the inhabitants of a small area responsible for the wise expenditure of local funds, and for the efficient operation of local schools. In the Remarks appended to the Regulations which were issued on November 15, 1871, emphasis was placed on this feature, and on the fact that the share which a district would receive of County moneys would depend on the efficient operation of the school.184 Clearly, it was hoped that under the new arrangements local interest, and even local pride, might be aroused. The fact that in recent times the trend has been toward a larger unit and the amalgamation of districts is no proof that the establishment of small districts in 1871 was unnecessary or unwise. Changing times have brought improved standards and new demands for better facilities, and have also made possible consolidations and extensions which were out of the question seventy years ago. In those ideas and practices which may seem obsolete to one age there was once validity and utility in terms of the environment which nurtured them.

With the passage of this Act the province had moved forward into the company of those states which acknowledged, in theory at any rate, that an education was the birthright of every child. The Act, of course, could work no sudden miraculous changes, for there could be no quick solution of the old problem of popular indifference. Several years were to elapse before every community in the province organized schools. Not only was there indifference, but even active opposition, particularly from the Roman Catholic element of the population. This opposition led to a constitutional struggle in the courts, and in one locality to rioting, with loss of life and property.

While under the Act a teacher's position was more secure than formerly, the old problem of an insufficiency of trained and enterprising teachers persisted, and, if anything, grew more acute as the westward expansion of Canada drew hundreds of young men from the province. New problems were also to arise, and new dangers, for the sense of achievement which the Act of 1871 engendered could lead to complacency and self-satisfaction, blinding people to the fact that progress must be indefinite.

Notes

^1. The New Brunswick Courier, Saint John, Vol. 45, No. 52, May 3, 1856, p. 2.

^2. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, p. 174.

^3. The New Brunswick Courier, Saint John, Vol. 46, No. 4, May 31, 1856, p. 2.

^4. Ibid., p. 2.

^5. Ibid., p. 2.

^6. Ibid., Vol. 46, No. 7, June 21, 1856, p. 2.

^7. The Saint John Chronicle, July 10, 1857.

^8. The New Brunswick Courier, Saint John, Vol. 46, No. 23, Oct. 11, 1856, p. 2.

^9. Ibid., Vol. 46, No. 24, Oct. 18, 1856, p. 2.

^10. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, p. 182.

^11. Whitelaw, pp. 35, 36.

^12. Creighton, p. 275.

^13. Whitelaw, pp. 36, 37.

^14. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, pp. 183, 184.

^15. From Hannay we learn that the agent, Moses Perley, had no authority to spend much money for the purpose of promoting immigration, that the British Government was not disposed to lend assistance, that the Australian Colonies were competing for settlers, and that New Brunswick was not looked upon favorably as a field for immigration. (Hannay (1), Vol. 2, pp. 188, 189.)

^16. Martin (2), p. 362.

^17. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, p. 189.

^18. Ibid., p. 186.

^19. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1858, Index XXI.

^20. Ibid., Index XXXVIII-XL.

^21. Ibid., 1856, Appendix CLXXXVII.

^22. Ibid., 1857-1858, Appendix DCXXXIII.

^23. Whitelaw, p. 17.

^24. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1856, Appendix CCXIV.

^25. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, 1852-1865, Feb. 27, 1854, p. 70.

^26. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1856, pp. 276, 277.

^27. Ibid., pp. 334, 335.

^28. Ibid., 1857-1858, Appendix DCLIII.

^29. Ibid., Appendix DCII.

^30. Ibid., Appendix DCLVIII.

^31. Ibid., Appendix DCXLVII, DCXLVIII.

^32. Ibid., Appendix DCXXX-DCXXXII.

^33. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, 1852-1865, Aug. 5, 1853, pp. 57, 58.

^34. Ibid., Oct. 29, 1855, p. 87.

^35. The New Brunswick Courier, Saint John, Vol. 45, No. 48, April 3, 1856, p. 2.

^36. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1856, pp. 140, 141.

^37. The New Brunswick Courier, Saint John, Vol. 45, No. 49, April 12, 1856, p. 2.

^38. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1856, pp. 296, 303.

^39. 21 V Cap. IX.

^40. Burwash pp. 169, 170.

^41. Parrington (2), Intro. p. iii.

^42. Raymond (4), pp. 424, 425.

^43. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1856, Appendix CCXIII, CCXIV.

^44. Ibid., 1859, Appendix 671.

^45. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, 1852-1863, May 25, 1858, p. 120.

^46. The Western Recorder and Weekly Herald, Saint John, March 19, 1959.

^47. Ibid., March 19, 1959.

^48. The papers named were: The Church Witness, The Courier, The Newbrunswicker, The Globe, The News, The Carleton Sentinel, The St. Andrews Standard, The Westmorland Times.

^49. The Morning News, Saint John, Vol. 21, No. 124, Oct. 19, 1859, p. 2.

^50. The Instructor, Bay Verte, N.B., Vol. 4, No. 3, March 1861, pp. 33-46.

^51. Ibid., Vol. 4, No. 4, April 1861, p. 50.

^52. The New Brunswick Courier, Saint John, Vol. 51, No. 49, April 12, 1862, p. 3.

^53. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1868, Appendix 5, p. 5.

^54. See: Whitelaw, W. M., The Maritime Provinces and Canada before Confederation.

^55. See: Bailey, A. G., "Railways and the Confederation Issue in New Brunswick 1863-1865", Canadian Historical Review, Vol. 21, No. 4, Dec. 1940, pp. 367-383.

^56. See: Bailey, A. G., "The Basis and Persistence of Opposition to Confederation in New Brunswick", Canadian Historical Review, Vol. 23, No. 4, Dec. 1942, pp. 374-397.

^57. In addition to the works just cited see: (1) Trotter, R. G., “The Coming of Confederation”. Cambridge History of the British Empire, Vol. VI, Chapter XVIII. (2) Martin, Chester, “The Maritime Provinces. 1840-1867.” Cambridge History of the British Empire, Vol. VI, Chapter XIV. (3) Creighton, D. G., “Dominion of the North.” Chapter 6, Parts I and H, pp. 263-304. (4) Wilson, G. E., “New Brunswick's Entrance into Confederation”, Canadian Historical Review, Vol. IX, No. 1, March, 1928, pp. 4-24.

^58. Bailey, G. W., Our Schools 1847-1858 (M.S.), pp. 3, 4 (Quoting J. W. Bailey.)

^59. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1859, Appendix 670-675.

^60. Maxwell (2), p. 9.

^61. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1859, Appendix 674.

^62. Ibid., 1870, Appendix, Report on Public Schools, p. 16.

^63. Ibid., 1868, Appendix 5, p. 16.

^64. Maxwell (2), p. 9.

^65. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1862, Appendix 3, Report on Public Schools, p. 12.

^66. Ibid., 1866, Appendix 5, Report on Public Schools, p. 8.

^67. Nova Scotia had adopted compulsory assessment in 1864.

^68. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1869, Appendix 4, Report on Schools, pp. 7, 8.

^69. Ibid., 1865, Appendix 5, Report on Schools, p. 6.

^70. Ibid., 1866, Appendix 5, Report on Schools, p. 7.

^71. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, 1852-1865, April 12, 1860, pp. 140, 141.

^72. Ibid., p. 217.

^73. Ibid., p. 218.

^74. Ibid., p. 223.

^75. Ibid., p. 243.

^76. Ibid., p. 263.

^77. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1863, Appendix 5, Report on Schools, p. 35.

^78. Ibid., 1870, Report on Schools, p. 27.

^79. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education. 1852-1865, p. 195.

^80. Ibid., March 22, 1865, p. 264.

^81. See Gordon, A. H., Wilderness Journeys in New Brunswick, 1862-1863.

^82. P. A. of Canada, C0189, Vol. 1, Gordon to Newcastle, Dec. 31, 1862, (Confidential), p. 272.

^83. Ibid., p. 273.

^84. Ibid., Gordon to Newcastle, Nov. 11, 1861, p. 5.

^85. Ibid., Gordon to Newcastle, Dec. 31, 1862,(Confidential) pp. 262, 263.

^86. Ibid., pp. 265, 266.

^87. Ibid., 273, 274.

^88. Ibid., Vol. 2, Gordon to Cardwell, Oct. 11, 1864, (Confidential), p. 33.

^89. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1862, Appendix 3, Report on Schools, p. 21.

^90. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, 1852-1865, Feb. 6, 1864, p. 247.

^91. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1865, Appendix 5, Report on Schools, p. 16.

^92. Ibid., 1868, Appendix 5, Report on Schools, pp. 13-16.

^93. Ibid., 1869, Appendix 4, Report on Schools, p. 15.

^94. Office of Executive Council of New Brunswick, Minutes of Executive Council, Vol. 9, p. 219.

^95. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1870, p. 142.

^96. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1860, Appendix 398.

^97. Ibid., 1865, Appendix 5, Report on Schools, p. 29.

^98. Office of Executive Council of New Brunswick, Minutes of Executive Council, Vol. 9, page 102.

^99. New Brunswick: Journal of Assembly, 1869, Appendix 4, Report on Schools, pp. 11, 12.

^100. Ibid., 1862, Appendix 3, Report on Schools, pp. 14-16.

^101. Ibid. 1860, Appendix 398.

^102. Ibid., 1862, Appendix 3, Report on Schools, pp. 13, 14.

^103. Ibid., 1866, Appendix 5, Report on Schools, pp. 23, 24.

^104. Ibid., 1871, Appendix 4, Superintendent's Report, p. 16.

^105. Ibid., Inspectors' Reports, p. 12.

^106. Ibid., 1870, Appendix, Report on Schools, p. 26.

^107. Ibid., 1867, Appendix, Report on Schools, p. 14.

^108. Ibid., 1866, Appendix 5, Report on Schools, p. 5.

^109. Ibid., 1871, Appendix 4, Superintendent's Report, p. vii.

^110. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, 1852-1865, May 24, 1862, pp. 198-201.

^111. Ibid., Oct. 11, 1862, p. 214.

^112. Ibid., Jan. 10, 1863, p. 230.

^113. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1869, Appendix 4, Report on Schools, p. 13.

^114. Ibid., 1866, Appendix 5, Report on Schools, p. 10.

^115. Ibid., 1867, Appendix, Report on Schools, pp. 11, 12.

^116. Ibid., 1861, Appendix, Report on Schools, pp. 13, 14.

^117. Ibid., 1867, Appendix, Report on Schools, pp. 39, 40.

^118. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1868, pp. 29, 30.

^119. Willison, pp. 20, 21.

^120. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1866, Appendix 5, Report on Schools, pp. 5, 8, 12.

^121. Ibid., 1871, Appendix 4, Superintendent's Report, p. viii.

^122. Ibid., p. xv.

^123. Ibid., p. xii.

^124. Ibid., 1872, Appendix 4, Superintendent's Report, p. 5.

^125. Ibid., 1871, Appendix 4, Superintendent's Report, p. xv.

^126. We note that in 1871 the Superintendent called on the Legislature to give New Brunswick such an educational law as would place her at least on an equal footing with the other provinces of the Dominion. (Ibid., p. xii).

^127. Ross, p. 174.

^128. MacKay, pp. 523, 524.

^129. Reisner, pp. 255-276.

^130. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, p. 297.

^131. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1871, Appendix 4, Inspectors' Reports, p. 4.

^132. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1871, p. 13.

^133. Saint John Daily Telegraph and Morning Journal, Vol. II, No. 249, April 26, 1871, p. 1.

^134. Ibid., No. 187, Feb. 11, 1871, p. 2.

^135. Ibid., No. 192, Feb. 17. 1871, p. 2.

^136. Ibid., No. 197, Feb. 23, 1871, p. 2.

^137. The Morning Freeman, Saint John, Vol. XXI, No. 14, March 7, 1871, p. 2.

^138. Saint John Daily Telegraph and Morning Journal, Vol. II, No. 197, Feb. 23, 1871, p. 2.

^139. The Morning Freeman, Saint John, Vol. XXI, No. 16, March 11, 1871, p. 2.

^140. The Saint John Telegraph and Morning Journal, Vol. II, No. 241, April 17, 1871, p. 2.

^141. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1869, Appendix 4, Report on Schools, p. 21.

^142. Saint John Daily Telegraph and Morning Journal, Vol. II, No. 249, April 26, 1871, p. 1.

^143. Ibid., p. 1.

^144. Ibid., No. 252, April 29, 1871, p. 1. Napier's criticism was directed against statements which occur on p. 136 of the Fourth Book of Lessons for the use of schools, published in 1853 by direction of the Commissioners of National Education in Ireland. An examination of the offending item reveals the fact that Napier, or the paper which reported his speech, rather exaggerated the inaccuracy of this portion of the text.

^145. The Morning Freeman, Saint John, Vol. XXI, No. 36. April 27,1871. p. 2.

^146. Raymond (4), p. 420.

^147. The Saint John Telegraph and Morning Journal, Vol. II, No. 243, April 19, 1871, p. 2.

^148. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1871, p. 123, 195.

^149. Raymond (4), p. 420.

^150. Cubberley, p. 332.

^151. Reisner, pp. 184-186.

^152. Cubberley, p. 382.

^153. Ibid., p. 383.

^154. Whitelaw, pp. 250, 251.

^155. McGee, D'Arcy, pp. 10-14.

^156. Saint John Daily Telegraph and Morning Journal, Vol. II, No. 210, March 10, 1871, p. 1.

^157. Ibid., No. 212, March 13, 1871, p. 1.

^158. The Morning Freeman, Saint John, Vol. XXI, No. 38, May 2, 1871, p. 2.

^159. Ibid., No. 36, April 27, 1871, p. 2.

^160. Ibid., No. 34, April 22, 1871, p. 2.

^161. Ibid., No. 32, April 18, 1871, p. 2.

^162. Ibid., Vol. XI, No. 146, Jan. 10, 1871, p. 2.

^163. Ibid., Vol. XXI, No. 35, April 25, 1871, p. 2.

^164. Ibid., No. 33, April 20, 1871, p. 2.

^165. Ibid., No. 38, May 2, 1871, p. 2.

^166. Ibid., No. 39, May 4, 1871, p. 2.

^167. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, pp. 296, 297.

^168. The Morning Freeman, Saint John, Vol. XXI, No. 40, May 6, 1871, p. 2.

^169. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, p. 297.

^170. The Morning Freeman, Saint John, Vol. XXI, No. 46, May 20, 1871, p. 2.

^171. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1871, p. 257.

^172. Ibid., p. 256.

^173. For years Wilmot had been choir leader, Sunday School Superintendent, and active church worker in the Methodist Church of Fredericton. (See Lathern, Rev. J., The Hon. Judge Wilmot, pp. 99-165).

^174. The Morning Freeman, Saint John, Vol. XXI, No. 46, May 20, 1871, p. 2.

^175. Office of Executive Council of New Brunswick, Minutes of the Executive Council, Vol. 9, June 2, 1871, p. 327.

^176. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, pp. 299, 300.

^177. Cap. XXI Vict. 34.

^178. The Common Schools Act of New Brunswick: Regulations of the Board of Education, p. 43.

^179. This system of “Payment by results” was attracting attention in England at the time. It seems to have been In the mind of Superintendent Bennet, for in both 1870 and 1871 he hinted at the possibilities of the method. (Journal of House of Assembly of New Brunswick, 1870, Superintendent's Report, p. 10; also Journal for 1871, Appendix 4, Superintendent's Report, p. ix.)

^180. The Common Schools Act of New Brunswick: Regulations of the Board of Education. pp. 5-7.

^181. Ibid., p. 39.

^182. Ibid., p. 22.

^183. Ibid., p. 22.

^184. Ibid., p. 3.

CHAPTER 9
COMMON SCHOOLS AND SECTARIAN CONFLICT

Since Confederation scarcely any controversy has been so bitter and sustained as that which revolved around certain features of the Common Schools Act. During the early seventies and again in the eighteen-nineties, the Act, or the operation of the Act, became the storm centre of a controversy involving so many issues and interests that in itself it becomes a major topic.

When Superintendent Rand wrote his first report to the legislature, he said that since New Brunswick was almost the last country on the continent to enact a Free School Law, the success of the Free School system did not depend on its success or failure in New Brunswick. In fact it was not the Act but the people of the province who were on trial. Less in words than by means of figures and comparisons he implied that under the Act the people were beginning to accept the responsibility of educating the children of the country. The enrolment during the summer term of 1872 showed an increase of 5,856 over that of the corresponding term of the preceding year, a greater advance than that made during the whole of the previous ten years. Moreover, comparing the school attendance in New Brunswick in 1872 with that reached in Nova Scotia during the first year of the Free School system in that province, the educational progress of New Brunswick had surpassed that of the sister province. This, Rand thought, must be regarded as very satisfactory.1

The advance had been made, however, in only ten of the counties. In Kent, Northumberland, and Victoria the aggregate school attendance had remained stationary, and in Gloucester County there had been a drop of 1,117.2 The report of the Inspector for the latter county admitted that opposition to the Act had prevented the establishment of schools,3 a state of affairs which continued in that area for several years. The inspectors for the other recalcitrant counties told of the same difficulty. In fact, when Inspector Balloch took office in May of 1875 for the new county of Madawaska, which, until 1873 had been part of Victoria County, be found no schools in operation there under the Act4. As late as 1876 Inspector Wood of Kent County reported the embarrassment to school trustees who had incurred liabilities for school purposes in reliance on a share of the county fund, when their drafts on that fund remained unpaid, because in several parishes ordinary means had proved insufficient to secure the collection of the county rates. The unpaid claims upon the Kent County school fund amounted to $ 13,000, and many schools inconsequence had to close. People, so it seemed, had come to believe that the Government either could not or dared not enforce the requirements of the Act.5

While one realizes from these and similar official reports that the new Act was by no means universally accepted, only from the newspapers and parliamentary debates of the time can one gain an adequate idea of the sustained bitterness of the controversy evoked by the non-sectarian clauses of the measure. Local aspects of the imbroglia, such as failure to establish schools and refusal to pay taxes, hindered the development of education, created ferment in many communities, and set the newspapers by the ears. Such incidents as rioting at Caraquet in Gloucester County, the sale at auction of Bishop Sweeney's carriage and span of horses because of his refusal to pay taxes, the confiscation of Father McDevitt's cow, and the arrest of Father Michaud, who had accepted the seizure of his goods with less grace than had Father McDevitt, furnished copy for the most vocal of both parties. When, however, the Roman Catholic minority appealed to one court after another the controversy gained wide publicity, and when they annually carried their grievance to the Canadian House of Commons the question became a constitutional one, of significance for both Dominion and Provincial politics, since in it were involved such matters as provincial autonomy and dominion coercive powers, delicate questions in an infant federation.

At the parliamentary session of 1872 Auguste Renaud, member for Kent County, called for the correspondence relative to the School Act of New Brunswick, and complained of the tyranny and injustice of the law.6 Anglin of Saint John explained that under the old law, in Catholic Districts Catholic teachers were appointed and the Catholic catechism was taught, not only orally, but by means of Catholic textbooks.7 He said that on the passage of the Act of 1871 the Catholics of New Brunswick had most respectfully petitioned the Dominion Government, and after months of waiting had been informed that the Act would not be disallowed, whereupon the local legislature had made it still more “intolerable and hateful” to the Catholics by the regulations they had framed under it.8 He declared that since the Act deprived Catholics of rights which they had previously enjoyed, it was unconstitutional. Under Confederation, which professed to protect the rights of all classes, such a law ought not to be allowed to remain in force, and the Dominion Government should have treated the question not merely as a legal one but as one of policy and justice.9

With this preliminary the subject of the New Brunswick School Law began its course as a topic of debate in Dominion politics. Early in the session, Sir John A. MacDonald expressed the opinion that the nature of the law was not a matter in which the House of Commons could take action. He said that although he had always been a consistent friend of separate schools, he must re- mind the House that under Confederation the question of education had been expressly left to the different provinces. In his view, according to the British North America Act there were only two cases in which the Government of the Dominion was justified in advising the disallowance of a local act—first, if the act was unconstitutional; second, if it was injurious to the interests of the whole Dominion. His colleagues, who included men whose opinions as lawyers must be respected, and men who as Roman Catholics sincerely desired to protect their religious privileges, were unanimous, he said, in believing that the New Brunswick Act could not be impugned on the ground of unconstitutionality. On the second ground, Sir John disposed of the argument that the Act prejudicially affected the whole Dominion by pointing out that it was a law setting up a Common School system for New Brunswick alone. Whether it was good, bad, fair or unfair, was a matter for the consideration of the representatives of the people of New Brunswick. In his opinion, it was indiscreet to agitate against the law on the ground that it repudiated an Act which authorized a Separate School system. The Catholics of New Brunswick might think that the old Act was less objectionable than the new one, but no separate school system had been provided by the Act of 1858. The true course for the New Brunswick Catholics was, he advised, to follow the example of the Catholics of Ontario, and fight the matter out in the local legislature. He thought that if a large body like the Catholic people of New Brunswick desired a separate school system, they should have it, but it could only be obtained by working for it. They might not succeed during the current session of the New Brunswick legislature but they could afford to wait as the Catholics of Ontario had waited. The Government of the Dominion could not act in the matter. “The constitution which bad hitherto worked so easily and so well, could not survive the wrench that would be given if the Dominion Government assumed to dictate the policy or question the decision of the Legislatures of the different provinces on subjects reserved by the British North America Act to those Legislatures.” 10

Sir George E. Cartier, while anxious to uphold the interests of his co-religionists, concurred in the Prime Minister's remarks. He said that the old School Act of New Brunswick granted no separate schools to the Catholics and no special rights, but he believed that if they went to work properly, not fanatically, but justly, they would obtain the same right of separate schools that had been granted in Ontario.11

Thomas Costigan of Victoria County dissented, however, from this view of the government leaders, contending that in New Brunswick under the old law Catholic and French schools had existed, kept up at the expense of the country. He declared that when at Westminster the Quebec resolutions had been altered to provide that if special schools existed by law at the time of union, their rights should not be affected, it almost seemed that those words had been put in for the purpose of working against the Catholics of New Brunswick. He questioned the constitutionality of the Act of 1871 on the second grounds also. “It had already interfered with immigration and had been the cause of driving from his part of the country settlers both from the United States and from Quebec.” 12

Later in the session Costigan pressed his views, by moving a resolution calling on the House to present an address to the Governor General praying him to disallow the New Brunswick law.13 Cartier again attempted the thankless task of convincing his fellow Catholics of the potentialities for trouble bound up in Costigan's resolution. He pointed out that the address tended to place the rights of the Catholics of the Dominion in the hands of a Protestant majority. The Protestants of Lower Canada were satisfied at the time, but if this motion should pass to satisfy the Catholics of New Brunswick, then the Protestant minority of Quebec might some day demand a change in the school law of Quebec. He trusted that the mover of the resolution would see the false position in which he had placed the matter, and he declared that to ask the House to advise the Governor to disallow the act was to upset the basis of responsible government. He concluded by terming Costigan's motion “imprudent” and “fallacious”.14

In this lengthy debate, religious sympathy seems to have been the guide to the conduct of many of the members, but political and constitutional considerations came first with others, especially with members of the government. We note that Catholics as well as Protestants opposed Costigan's resolution, and that a few Protestants joined with Catholics in urging relief for the latter. The viewpoints of the following speakers present a fair cross section of the whole debate.

The Honorable Hector Langevin, who later came to be regarded as the political leader of the French-Canadian clericals, like his colleague and fellow Catholic, Cartier, opposed the resolution as a threat to the Constitution.15 So did the Honorable A. J. Smith, at one time the leader of the anti-Confederation party in New Brunswick. Smith said he had been opposed to the “unholy influences” which had brought Confederation about, but that after it was carried he had considered it his duty to give the union loyal support. He appealed especially to the members from Quebec not to do anything which would seem a violation of the constitution. From that province, with her especial institutions, he had expected support for the local government of New Brunswick.16 The Honorable J. H. Gray defended the non-sectarian principle of the New Brunswick School Act, declaring “it did seem lessening the dignity and character of religion to teach it in the same way as a rule of arithmetic or grammar”. He also said that if Parliament interfered in this matter, the advocates of Confederation would be charged by their constituents with allowing the rights of New Brunswick to be trifled with. Such interference, he warned, would remove any guarantee to new provinces that if they entered the Dominion their rights would be preserved.17 Dorion differed from his colleagues on the question, maintaining that New Brunswick had had separate schools before Confederation “in point of view”, whatever that may mean. His warning was that if the New Brunswick law were allowed to remain, it might lead to such union among the Catholics of New Brunswick, Quebec and Ontario, and such hostility of class against class, as would stop the action of the Dominion Government.18

The Honorable Edward Blake, although he agreed with Dorion that the schools of New Brunswick previous to 1871 were practically denominational schools, and asserted that the change from the elasticity of the old law to the rigidity of the new was not necessary to satisfy the scruples of Protestants, feared that the rights of the provinces would not be worth the paper on which the constitution was written if it could be said that all rights could be changed on addresses alone.19 Still another minister, Chauveau, admitted the validity of the objections to interference with provincial legislation, but said that to him the matter was a question of two evils, either of allowing the minority in New Brunswick to suffer under a grievous wrong or of applying such a remedy as was within the power of the House to afford.20 Colby, like Chauveau and Dorion, a member from Quebec, believed that education must be subordinated to religion, but did not believe in the employment of the veto power unless there were a palpable violation of the constitution. Under the existing circumstances he thought that the House should refrain from the exercise of that power.21 Alonzo Wright said that as a Protestant representative of a Catholic county in Lower Canada he felt bound to express his opinion, which was that the motion was simply to secure for the Catholics of New Brunswick the same rights which were accorded to the Protestant minority in the Province of Quebec.22

Thus the debate seesawed back and forth, enlivened by a number of suggestions and amendments. The first of these, moved by Gray, stressed the importance of provincial rights, declared that the New Brunswick legislation in question could be repealed or altered only by the local legislature, and concluded that the House of Commons did not deem it proper to interfere with whatever advice the responsible ministers of the Crown might tender to His Excellency respecting the law.23 An amendment was then moved by Chauveau that an address be presented to the Queen, praying her to cause an act to be passed amending the British North America Act, so that every religious denomination in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia should continue to possess all the rights and privileges with regard to their schools that they had enjoyed at the time of the passing of the British North America Act, and to the same extent as if such rights and privileges had been duly established by law.24 An amendment moved by Colby, who did not want the constitution tampered with, merely recorded an expression of regret on the part of the House that the School Law of New Brunswick had proved unsatisfactory to a large portion of the population of that province25—an amendment which Sir John indicated the Government would be inclined to support, but which Anglin criticized as of no substantial benefit to the Catholics.26 Blake suggested that the proper course was to ask the local Government to take action, or to obtain the opinion of the law officers of the Crown in England as to the right of the New Brunswick legislature to make the changes in the school law which had been made.27 When Colby's amendment had passed, Dorion wanted added to it an expression of regret that the Governor General had not been advised to disallow the School Act of 1871. MacDonald and Cartier having intimated that this was equivalent to a vote of non-confidence, Dorion's amendment was defeated by 117 votes to 38.28 The end of the matter was, that to Colby's motion expressing regret at the dissatisfaction which had been caused by the New Brunswick law, the Honorable Alexander MacKenzie moved an addition along the lines of Blake's suggestion. This was, in effect, that the opinion of the law officers of the Crown, and if possible of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, should be obtained as to the right of the New Brunswick legislature to change the school law as it had done, with a view to ascertaining whether or not the Dominion Parliament had the power in this case to pass remedial legislation under the fourth subsection of clause 93 of the British North America Act.29

In New Brunswick, the upholders of the school law had followed these proceedings in the House of Commons with interest and indignation. When Chauveau's amendment was introduced the Executive Council of New Brunswick went on record in a memorandum dated May 29, 1872, in which they warned the Government and Parliament of Canada of the danger involved in the passage of such a resolution, and asserted the right of the legislature of New Brunswick to legislate without interference upon all questions affecting the education of the province.30 In the course of the year the Catholics of New Brunswick carried their case to the Supreme Court of New Brunswick, urging that the Act of 1871 affected them prejudicially, contrary to sub-section one of section 93 of the British North America Act. While the case was still before the court the Executive Council in Committee, on December 23, 1872, recorded a refusal to admit the assumption of the resolution passed at the previous session of the House of Commons that the School Act of 1871 had made such changes in the law as deprived Roman Catholics of privileges enjoyed at the time of union in respect to religious education. The Council concurred in the opinion of Canada's Minister of Justice that the Acts repealed in 1871 made no reference to separate, dissentient, or denominational schools, and that examination had failed to reveal the existence of any provincial statute establishing such special schools. With respect to claims that the Act of 1858 had legalized denominational tuition, the Council stated: “An irregular and defective administration of the law might tolerate illegal practices, and allow parties to derive unwarrantable advantages in violation of the law; but privileges enjoyed in violation of the law cannot give rights under the law”. The Council also protested against the submission to the opinion of the Law Officers of the Crown of the right of the New Brunswick legislature to deal exclusively with the subject of education. They pointed out that the question whether the Act of 1871 was ultra vires within the intent and meaning of the 93rd section of the British North America Act was pending in the Supreme Court of New Brunswick. In the opinion of the Council the only legal and constitutional appeal from that judgment was by the dissentient parties to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council.31

We are told that during the federal election campaign of 1872 the subject of the New Brunswick law was much discussed in the province of Quebec.32 At the next session of the Dominion House, the Catholic members from that province were almost unanimous in supporting Costigan's second attempt to secure federal intervention. By that time the Supreme Court of New Brunswick had delivered a judgment upholding the validity of the New Brunswick law, and the Law Officers of the Crown in England, to whom the Governor General had submitted the question, had also ruled that the Act was within the jurisdiction of the New Brunswick Legislature. Since the passage of the original Act, the New Brunswick Legislature, in order to prevent the contravention of the purpose of the School Law by the inhabitants of school districts, had passed a series of acts legalizing assessments for school purposes under the Act.33 Costigan's resolution of 1873 was aimed not only at the Act of 1871 but also at the subsequent legislation to implement that Act. It urged that the question of the, va4idity of the original Act be submitted to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, and that in the meantime it was the duty of the Governor General to disallow the more recent legislation.34

Again Sir John A. MacDonald expressed sympathy with the Catholics, but again indicated that the question was not one of sympathy but of constitutional principle. He said that originally he had favored a legislative union but other ideas had prevailed. If a resolution like this were to pass, he would say that his original ideas had been carried out, “that a federal union of the Provinces was at an end; that the legislative union had commenced”. He pointed out that the effect of the well-meant resolution passed by Parliament at its last session had been regarded by the New Brunswick Legislature as an attempt to coerce them. What, he asked, would be the feeling if Parliament went further and asked the Governor General to disallow measures which were within the competence of the local legislature. Because of the recent judgments of the Supreme Court of New Brunswick, and of the Law Officers in England, one must suppose that the law was valid. He warned the House that if they adopted this resolution, they must be prepared to discuss the justice of every law passed by every provincial legislature, and that Parliament would become simply a court of appeal to try whether the provincial legislatures were right or wrong in their conclusions.35 Langevin agreed with Sir John, or at least dissented from that part of the resolution which said that it was the Governor General's duty to disallow the recent acts of the New Brunswick Legislature. He said that the duty of advising the Governor General lay with the Ministry, and by adopting this resolution the House would be putting themselves in the place of the Ministers.36

In general, the debate followed the same lines as the year before, one side being actuated by religious sympathy, the other by constitutional considerations and political loyalties. The former prevailed, and Costigan's resolution, supported as it was by the Quebec representatives, was adopted on May 14 by a vote of 98 to 63.37 A few days later the Prime Minister, in reply to an enquiry from Anglin, said that the resolution had been laid before the Governor General. His Excellency, assured by the Law Officers that the Act of 1871 was a matter for the Legislature of New Brunswick, and assured also by the Minister of Justice that the subsidiary acts were equally valid, could not, at the time, comply with the terms of the resolution, but would apply to Her Majesty's Government for instructions on the subject. Sir John intimated, however, that the Government would be willing to ask Parliament for a vote of money to defray the expenses of those who wished to have the matter litigated before the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council.38 The House cheered the announcement and a little later assented to the appropriation of $ 5,000 for the purpose.39

His Excellency, the Earl of Dufferin, in explaining to Kimberley, the Secretary of State, those circumstances which had led to the resolution and to his own action in submitting the matter to Her Majesty's Government, said he had followed the course recommended to him by his responsible advisers. He also sub-joined a copy of a remonstrance which had been addressed to him by a delegation from the Government of New Brunswick against the interference by the Dominion Parliament with the constitutional action of the Provincial Legislature. Kimberley replied that the Law Officers of the Crown advised that the subsidiary acts on education were, like the Act of 1871, within the powers of the New Brunswick Legislature, and that the Canadian House of Commons could not constitutionally interfere with their operation by passing such a resolution as that of May 14. Kimberley also informed Dufferin that it would be in accordance with the Imperial Act and with the general spirit of the Constitution of the Dominion for Dufferin to allow these Acts to remain in force.40 Of especial interest is the statement that this was a matter in which Dufferin must act on his own individual discretion, and on which he could not be guided by the advice of his responsible ministers of the Dominion. During the Parliamentary session of 1875 this statement was referred to more than once. Palmer interpreted it as an indication of how sacredly the British Government regarded provincial rights,41 while Blake, in bringing in a long resolution affirming the principles of responsible government, maintained that it was destructive of the spirit of those principles. MacKenzie, the Prime Minister, expressed the belief that the principle that the Governor General must act on the advice of his ministers was self-evident. He said he could only account for this observation in the despatch to the Governor General by supposing it to be some hasty expression of opinion made without considering the effect. On MacKenzie's suggestion that the matter had better not be pressed further Blake withdrew his motion.42

Before Costigan's persistence forced the subject again on a reluctant Parliament, an effort was made in New Brunswick by the Bishop of Saint John to come to an agreement with the Government; Regulation 20 of the Regulations of the Board of Education was amended; and the New Brunswick Legislature, with a provincial election coming up, devoted several stormy periods to a discussion of the whole question.

This attempt in New Brunswick to arrive at a settlement was not the first, for shortly after the Act had come into effect the Church authorities and the Saint John School Board had negotiated with each other on the subject. The School Board, faced by the scarcity of suitable school buildings in the city,43 were anxious, on their own statement, to secure the co-operation of the Roman Catholic authorities in Saint John. Correspondence relating to the conditions under which the Schools of the Christian Brothers and of the Sisters of Charity might be placed under the Saint John School Board extended over a period of several months, but efforts to bring about an arrangement satisfactory to both sides failed. The refusal of the Board of Education to deviate from the non-sectarian principles of the Act, and the insistence on the other hand of Bishop Sweeney and other Roman Catholic clergymen on a special interpretation of Regulation 20, proved a barrier to the unification of the school system of the City of Saint John.44

The second effort to arrange a settlement was made in 1873, when Bishop Sweeney submitted three propositions to a committee of the New Brunswick Government, consisting of the Premier and two other members. His Lordship proposed that the Christian Brothers and the Sisters of Charity be licensed to teach in the public schools of the province on successfully passing examinations conducted in a special manner; that the schools taught by such religious orders should be open to all the Roman Catholic children resident in any part of the district; and that books prescribed by the Board of Education, if deemed objectionable by the Bishop, might be replaced by the books of the Christian Brothers. To the first of these propositions, the Executive Council replied that it would not be objectionable to license as teachers the Christian Brothers and Sisters of Charity, permitting them to wear their own distinctive garb, but that to grant the request of a special examination would be dealing exceptionally in favor of a single denomination, and contrary therefore to the spirit and intent of the Act. In answer to the second proposal, the Council stated that the attendance of children at any particular school in their district was a matter that might properly be left to the discretion of the trustees. The third proposition received an unequivocal negative. In any school conducted under the Act no books not sanctioned by the Board of Education might be used.45

The concession indicated in the answer to Bishop Sweeney's first proposition with regard to the garb of the teaching orders became definite when, on December 18, 1873, the Board of Education ordered that Regulation 20, which prohibited the exhibition in the classroom of certain symbols, be amended by the addition of the following words: “but nothing herein shall be taken to refer to any peculiarity of the teacher's garb, or to the wearing of the cross or other emblems worn by the members of any denomination of Christians”. In order that everyone might know of the amendment, it was ordered that the amended regulation be inserted in the Royal Gazette.46

No further progress toward a reconciliation had been made when the Legislature met in 1874. As it was encumbent on the Government to take cognizance of the many petitions which had been presented praying for such amendments of the School Law as might secure separate schools to the Roman Catholics of the province, William Wedderburn moved a resolution on the subject. This resolution reaffirmed the doctrine that any state system of education should grant to all the people of the province similar and equal rights in respect to education, without distinction of class or creed, and objected to any curtailment of the powers granted to the Legislature by the British North America Act. While expressing regret that the House could not comply with the prayer of the petitioners, the resolution declared that no acts should be done or passed by the Parliament of the United Kingdom, or by the Parliament of Canada, to impair or alter the rights and jurisdiction vested in the Legislature by the terms of the British North America Act, unless the Legislature had first signified its consent.47 Wedderburn had no sooner given warning that the rising cry for the repeal of the Act of 1871 was but an effort to divert the current of public opinion from the real question of separate schools,48 than James Nowlan moved a resolution calling for the repeal of the Act of 1871 and the revival of the Act of 1858, with necessary provisions protecting existing contracts and assessments.49

The debate which ensued was marked by less restraint and dignity than the previous debates at Ottawa, and by a greater display of personal and sectarian feeling. Indicative perhaps of a weariness which the long drawn-out controversy was beginning to induce was the suggestion of a Protestant member that Catholic children should be allowed religious instruction during the sixth hour of the school session. He would grant this concession, he said, not as a right, “but in the interests of peace”.50 Some idea of the difficulties which had impeded the operation of the Act may be gained from an observation by the Attorney General that because of the appeals to Ottawa and to England people were almost led to believe that the whole law was unconstitutional. He said that as a result, trustees, constables, and justices had been afraid to do their duty under the Act lest it should transpire that they had acted illegally. Inequality in assessments, due to no fault of the school law, but to the want of proper system in the general assessment law, had created dissatisfaction, and the impossibility of laying off school districts to suit the convenience of all the residents had been a further difficulty.51

In connection with this latter matter one member remarked that in his opinion the parties who had laid out some of the districts knew as much about the country as they did of the latitude of Heaven or of the geography of the moon.52

The address of Premier King was the longest and most vigorous speech of the debate. King, on whom as Attorney General the responsibility had fallen of defending the Act during this period of attack and litigation, made no effort to deal delicately with the sectarian question, but expressed himself with extreme frankness, even bluntness. Those who blamed the Government for precipitating this question on New Brunswick seemed unaware, he said, of what was going on in Europe and in the United States. This question of religion in education was an issue in Prussia, Austria, Switzerland, England, and in the United States. In fact, the Catholic Church was making a stand everywhere for new privileges and powers and was being everywhere resisted. The New Brunswick School Law had been characterized as oppressive to Roman Catholics. When, asked King, was it discovered that non-sectarian schools were not the same “galling tyranny” in every state in the American Union, in Nova Scotia, and in Prince Edward Island. “New Brunswick is only following the general law of the continent; and because it does not follow the peddling, compromising policy of Ontario and Quebec, it is said that the Government is tyrannizing over the consciences of Catholics.” He claimed that the Irish immigrant settled down amongst the people of the United States and shared with them the advantages of the free non-sectarian schools of that country. It was true that in the large cities of the United States the Catholics were endeavoring to get parochial schools, but no such attempt was being made general. In the new English Education Act the provisions of the future were non-denominational; in Scotland the rights of denominations in the board schools had been swept away. “The genius of the politics of Christian nations is not in favor of separate schools.”

Dealing with those provisions of the British North America Act which related to education, King said that when the Quebec scheme was before the people it contained nothing but a general clause vesting the powers of legislating in regard to education in the several provinces, but that when the delegates met at Westminster they found, sitting side by side with them, arch-bishops and clergy of the Catholic Church. When the Confederation Act was passed the people of the province discovered that something had been put in, added surreptitiously as far as the people were concerned, something which was meant by those who placed it there to perpetuate the liberties which the Catholics had been permitted to take with the New Brunswick Parish School Act. He described the theory of the School Law of 1871 as one of equality, symbolizing the genius of the country in terms of which all men were equal before the law. He warned his hearers that the policy of the Catholic Church had undergone a great change during the preceding twenty years, under the development of the Ultramontane doctrine. That doctrine, he said, taught the faithful that the State was but a usurping power with which the Church had, for the time being, to make the best terms it could. How was it, he asked, that the Catholic conscience was so much more tender in New Brunswick than in Ontario, where, of the 70,000 Catholic children in the public schools, only 20,000 attended the separate schools, while the other 50,000 attended the non-sectarian schools. Calling on the Assembly not to yield for the sake of peace, he said that under the cloak of repeal church endowment was sought. “The little band of Repealers are but the drift wood and seaweed on the crest of the wave of separate schools, which is urging and driving them forward.” His final warnings were urgent. “Beware of compromise; accept none. There is no half-way house between religious equality and separate schools. If our privileges are given away today they are given for all time.” 53

At the close of the debate Nowlan's amendment was lost by a vote of 24 to 12, and Wedderburn's resolution passed by practically the same vote reversed.54 A few weeks later, in a new Parliament under a Liberal administration, Costigan moved for an address to the Queen praying Her Majesty to cause an act to be passed amending the British North America Act, so that every religious denomination in New Brunswick should continue to enjoy all the rights and advantages with regard to their schools which they had enjoyed at the time of the passage of that Act, to the same extent as if such rights and advantages had been duly established by law.55 A short time later, however, he asked leave to withdraw the proposed motion, saying that he believed it was inexpedient at that time to press the matter any further.56 A month later the people of New Brunswick went to the polls, after an electoral campaign in which the School Act was the main issue. Out of 41 members elected, only 5 candidates, representing Gloucester, Kent, and Madawaska Counties, were returned in favor of separate schools.57 Shortly after the election the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council rendered a decision affirming the constitutionality of the Common Schools Act.58

With that question definitely settled and with a local legislature strongly opposed to Separate Schools, the Roman Catholics of New Brunswick pinned their hopes on an amendment to the British North America Act to cover their case. If that hope should fail, and if the Government of New Brunswick should refuse to compromise, they were faced with the necessity of paying taxes for schools to which they could not send their children unless they disobeyed their clergy. A riot at Caraquet in January of 1875 did nothing to improve the feeling on either side, although by calling attention to the importance of a settlement, it may have helped to bring about the eventual compromise. There is no evidence, however, that violence was deliberately planned with that purpose in mind, for the disturbance seems to have been the simple and spontaneous reaction of an impulsive and probably illiterate people,59 susceptible to mass emotion and capable of strong family, community, and national loyalties.

The disturbance grew out of feeling over a local school meeting. From remarks made in the Assembly in 1875, when Blanchard of Caraquet introduced a bill to legalize the proceedings at a parish school meeting held in November, 1874, we learn that the meeting had been declared illegal and that subsequently a minority, presumably English and Protestant, had held a second meeting on January 4, 1875, and had sent returns to the Sessions which had been confirmed by that body. Blanchard warned that if his bill did not pass, there would be more serious trouble than had occurred already, for the people of Caraquet declared that they would not obey the trustees appointed at the second meeting. The Provincial Secretary thereupon explained that Blanchard, who had been the chairman of the first meeting, had not paid his county assessment for schools and was therefore not legally qualified to occupy the chair, and that the persons elected as officers, and those who voted for them, were disqualified for the same reason. He deprecated Blanchard's threatening language, and asked if that gentleman came before the House as an advocate of such scenes as Caraquet had already witnessed. No member, said the Provincial Secretary, should say in the House that the people were bound not to obey officers duly appointed. The Government would not permit the laws of the Legislature to be trampled upon, and people who set themselves above the law would be taught their duty, even if anarchy reared its head for a time. Were citizens, he asked, who had paid their rates to be “swamped” at parish meetings by those who had refused to do so.60

So much for the immediate cause of the trouble! The version given by the New Brunswick Reporter of the events which followed the second school meeting was as follows: “Encouraged by the defiant and disloyal tone of The Freeman, a number of the baser sort in and around Caraquet” broke in on the school meeting and assaulted the trustees. Then, “maddened with liquor”, they proceeded to break into houses, demolished windows and furniture, demanded liquor from the trustees, and “with a rope bowled around the streets searching for the Sheriff”. Knowing that the Honorable Robert Young was absent from home, they entered his dwelling, terrified his wife and children, demanded money, and threatened with vengeance all those who had paid their school taxes.61 A few days later, presumably when they heard that the Sheriff was coming, they fortified and loop-holed Andrew Albert's house, even, said The Reporter, with the accessory of boiling water. When they were called on to surrender by Deputy Cable and his men, they discharged shot guns and pistols from a loft, and when the Sheriff's party made a rush one of his men, John Gifford, was killed. In the melée Louis Meyou, one of the rioters, was wounded. “Then the French poltroons yielded.” When Meyou subsequently died every rioter seemed prepared to swear it was he who had shot Gifford. Following the arrival from Newcastle and Chatham of a battery of artillery and a company of volunteers, the rioters were arrested and order was restored.62

While the Reporter wrote thus, the Freeman, whose editor represented Gloucester County in the House of Commons, endeavored to make excuse for the rioters. Referring to the school meeting, the Freeman remarked: “At Caraquet, we are told, the majority, acting on their natural instincts, drove away from the place of meeting the little clique who sought to rob them by process of law”.63 In reference to the violence which followed, The Freeman contended that the rioters, goaded to desperation, hunted down by a posse of strange intruders, only fought for their lives.64

The original records of the enquiries into the death of Gifford and Maillieau, (this name appears under a variety of forms), and the court record of the subsequent murder trial are available.65 These papers are handwritten, incomplete, and in places nearly indecipherable. Supplemented, however, by the arguments which were presented before the Supreme Court of New Brunswick when Judge Allen reserved the case, they furnish something more than the outlines of the story.

It seems clear that the rioters, frightened and excited when they heard that the sheriff was coming with warrants against them, had hidden in the loft of Andrew Albert's house and had had guns with them, but whether they had taken these to bolster up their courage, to make a brave show in the hope of frightening the posse away, or with deliberate intent to shoot, is not certain,66 although Albert did testify that they had said if they were attacked they would defend themselves. In the second place, we note that the rioters and their friends seemed generally unwilling or unable to give very explicit information about the course of events. One man had hidden in a sail and so had seen nothing; another had been asleep in the loft until after the firing began; the attention of Andrew Albert, in whose house the shooting occurred, had been distracted by his wife. She had fainted, he explained, when one of the Sheriff's men, on entering the house, had pointed a gun at her; consequently he was too busy looking after her to notice what was going on. There was also uncertainty among the rioters as to the identity of the persons who had brought and fired the guns. There was a tendency, however, to attribute the shooting of Gifford to the deceased Maillieau. A number of witnesses testified that Maillieau had had a gun, and one of the rioters said he saw him shoot straight at the door of the loft, whereupon a man fell from the trap.

On several points the evidence was conflicting. Clotel Chesson swore that the water on the stove was cold. Stanislaus Albert, however, said that he saw pots of water boiling on the stove. Richard Sewell, one of the first of the Sheriff's men to enter the house, swore that he took a can of hot water from one of the women who met them and spilled it out, and a constable in the Sheriff's party swore that two women had “made at them” with scalding water. Which party had taken the lead in the shooting was another question which produced contradictory evidence. Andrew Albert claimed that the search party had fired first, and two of the men who had been in the loft said they thought Gifford was shot from below, thus intimating that a mistake had been made on the part of Gifford's colleagues. The Deputy Sheriff swore, however, that two shots were fired from the loft before Gifford was killed, and Henry Bannister, who had been immediately behind Gifford, said that as Gifford got his head and shoulders above the floor a shot rang out and Gifford fell back into Bannister's arms with about a dozen slugs in his head and neck. “None of our party”, said Bannister, “used any violence until Gifford was shot, so far as I could see.” 67 Maillieau, according to the coroner's jury, had been killed by a “ledden” bullet fired by some person unknown. In Gifford's case the verdict was directed against the rioters, and in the autumn of 1875 the trial began, before Chief Justice Allen, of the nine men charged with Gifford's murder. A panel of one hundred and fifty jurors had been summoned for the trial. There seems to have been a liberal use of peremptory challenges and some difficulty in obtaining men willing to acknowledge “indifferency”. The defence claimed that the Honorable Robert Young, a resident of Caraquet and President of the Executive Council, frequently consulted with the Attorney General and the Counsel for the prosecution regarding the rejection of certain jurors, and that he had been heard to say that no Roman Catholic should be on the jury.68 The petit jury which was finally selected was composed of Englishmen with one exception that is, if the names listed in the original court record are any indication.

From this record we learn that feeling evidently ran high at times during the trial. At one point the counsel for the crown was fined fifty dollars for calling one of the defence counsels a liar. He paid his fine with a cheque of the Honorable George E. King on the Bank of New Brunswick. The Attorney General himself addressed the jury for the crown. On December 7 the jury brought in a verdict of guilty against Joseph Chasson, the first of the nine men to be tried. The other defendants then retracted their plea of not guilty, and pleaded guilty of manslaughter. Judge Allen, however, reserved the case for the opinion of the Supreme Court, and postponed judgment until after the decision of that Court on a number of points of law in connection with the case. On these points of law he asked forty-eight specific questions, the greater number of which related to the correctness or incorrectness of his action in admitting or rejecting certain evidence. For example, he asked if the depositions taken by Coroner Blackball should have been admitted as evidence, since Blackball, in lieu of a sworn interpreter, had questioned the witnesses in French and translated their answers into English. This meant, so the defence claimed, that these statements had been filtered through the mind of a hostile judge.69

On a number of points the Judges of the Supreme Court upheld the action of Judge Allen; in a considerable number they found that he had been in error; their conclusion was that the conviction should be quashed or arrested.70 The result was therefore that the accused were freed. As Le Gresley says “les portes de la prison s'ouvrirent”.71 According to Hannay the whole episode of the riot and the trial cost the province approximately $ 20,000.72

During the session of the New Brunswick Legislature following the riot the subject of the disturbance received but little mention in the House. Beyond the remarks already cited in connection with Blanchard's ineffectual effort legalize the proceedings of the first school meeting, no reference was made to the riot except when the question of a police force and lockup at Caraquet was under discussion. The Gloucester members objected strenuously to such a measure and presented petitions against it signed by 1500 residents of the county. Burns declared that the people of Caraquet were peaceable and law-abiding, as was proved by their record of forty years, and that the fact a disturbance had taken place there recently, under very peculiar circumstances, did not justify the imposition of the burden proposed.73 The Government defended the measure on the grounds that Caraquet was forty miles from the shiretown, and that the business men of the village wanted to have a means of securing small debts, and a place in which to confine the disorderly. Finally the Honorable William Kelly asked the House to reflect on what might have been saved to the Province and to the people of Caraquet themselves if a lockup and police force had been available there a few months before.74

In 1875 the House of Commons once again devoted hours of debate the New Brunswick School Law, but Costigan's wish that the subject of the Caraquet disturbances should be avoided75 was respected. Costigan's resolution at this session was along the same lines as that which he had moved and withdrawn the year before. This time, however, in the amendment which he suggested to the British North America Act, separate or dissentient schools were definitely requested for the Catholics of New Brunswick, with exemption from taxation for the support of the public schools.76 This fourth resolution of the Costigan series raised many of the same questions that the previous resolutions had brought up. The history of school legislation in New Brunswick, the constitutional problem involved in interference with provincial powers, the claims of the Catholic conscience, the sense of injustice which Catholics felt at having to support schools which they could not patronize, the Protestant view of the Act as just because it treated all on the same terms—all these subjects were again topics of discussion. The debate, however, had its own peculiar features.

One of these was the appeal which was made to the Liberal party and administration. Costigan said that the Catholic population of the country had expected that when the Liberal party came in, this question would be satisfactorily solved. He hinted that the Honourable gentlemen supporting the Government were expected to pursue, upon the Treasury Benches and behind them that “liberal” policy which they had advocated upon the opposition side of the House, and he expressed the hope that many of them would support him on this occasion.77 Devlin of Montreal Centre said the same. As a humble mem- ber of the Liberal party he expected that the Government which he and his friends were supporting would show by their acts that they were Reformers not only in name, but in practice, and that wherever they found a law operating unjustly toward any class of Her Majesty's subjects, they would come to the rescue.78 It would seem, however, that the duty of the Government to uphold the Constitution appealed more strongly to the administration than did this challenge to their liberal principles. The Prime Minister said he believed in a system of free non-denominational schools, but that he could not shut his eyes to the fact that in all the Provinces there was a large body of people who believed that dogmas of religion should be taught in the Public Schools. He admitted that on a former occasion he had voted with those who favored a parliamentary request for disallowance of the New Brunswick Act, but since then the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council had given its decision. He adhered, he said, to the principle that the House had no right to interfere with the legislation of a Province when that legislation was secured by an Imperial compact to which all parties had submitted, and he therefore felt bound to move an amendment placing on record his views of the federal compact and the obligations that rested on the House in connection with it.79

The Honourable J. E. Cauchon agreed with the Prime Minister that it was dangerous to violate the compact entered into by the several provinces in the Act of Confederation. He did think, however, that there had been want of foresight in framing that Constitution, for although it secured separate schools to the minority in Quebec, the Catholics of New Brunswick were placed on a different footing. He said that the Catholics of New Brunswick, if they had known that, would not have agreed to Confederation, nor would the Catholics of Lower Canada. Nevertheless he believed that an accepted constitution should not be violated even to redress a wrong which should have been foreseen and guarded against.80 He approved of the Premier's amendment that any interference by Parliament which encroached on powers reserved to a Province by the British North America Act was an infraction of the Provincial constitution, and was fraught with danger to the autonomy of the Provinces, but he did not think that the motion went far enough. He therefore added a rider in which the House regretted that the hope expressed by Parliament in the resolution of 1872 had not been realized, and recommended an address to the Queen praying her to use her influence with the legislature of New Brunswick to procure such a modification of the Act of 1871 as would remove the grounds of Catholic discontent.81 This amendment indicated the limited extent to which the Liberal Government was prepared to go in dealing with the New Brunswick school problem.

In reading the debate of 1875 one becomes aware of an emotional quality which was not so noticeable in the previous debates at Ottawa on the same subject. Members who were opposed to a discussion of the New Brunswick School Law showed signs of impatience and resentment at the re-opening of the question. Appleby probably spoke for many when he expressed the hope that this subject was before the House for the last time.82 The “calm”, “moderate” and “logical” manner in which Costigan presented his case, according to both his opponents and his supporters,83 was not always maintained by others in the course of the debate, and was abandoned at times by Costigan himself as the tension mounted. Personalities, accusations, and threats were more frequently employed than in the earlier debates. Costigan was twitted84 with the fact that he had sent three of his children to a common school in New Brunswick.85 Superintendent Rand's name was dragged into the debate, Power of Halifax contending that Rand had made trouble in Nova Scotia between the local government and the Catholics, and had been dismissed in consequence.86 Then the New Brunswick Government, said Power, had received him with open arms and had found him, as they had believed they would, “a willing assistant for their coercive purposes”.87 Appleby characterized the Catholic Church as “an ecclesiastical establishment which drew its inspiration from a foreign power, which, to say the least, was not abreast of the civilization of the day”.88 The New Brunswick Legislature was accused by Power of being bigoted and intolerant,89 and Costigan described the Government in power in New Brunswick in 1871 as one composed for the most part of young men of little experience, who were unfortunately unable to retain power in any other way than by exciting the worst feelings of the people of New Brunswick through agitation on the school question, thus making political capital out of it.90 A member from New Brunswick replied that interference from the adjoining province of Quebec had excited opposition in New Brunswick, and had prevented the people from viewing the matter as dispassionately as they would otherwise have done. He declared that the sooner the province of Quebec left New Brunswick alone to do its legitimate business without interference, the sooner and the more satisfactorily this question would be settled.91 There were even hints, not only from New Bruns- wick92 but also from Nova Scotia,93 that if the resolution passed, there would be an agitation in those provinces for the repeal of union.

Besides these evidences of feeling there was a lack of complete harmony among the Catholics themselves, and a difference of opinion as to the course which would best serve the end desired by all the Catholics. Costigan blamed Devlin for supporting Cauchon's motion after having first supported Costigan's.94 Devlin accused Costigan of moving an adjournment, following Cauchon's amendment, without consulting with the Irish Catholics. He said that he himself had consulted with those who were deeply interested in the spiritual welfare of the Catholics in New Brunswick, having communicated with the Right Reverend Prelate of that Province, who had intimated to him that in his, the Bishop's, opinion Costigan's resolution would fail to accomplish the object they had in view, and that it was therefore better to accept the next best alternative, namely, the amendment proposed by Cauchon.95 Flynn, another Irish Roman Catholic, also disapproved of Costigan's action in moving an adjournment to harass the Government. He commended Costigan for the warm interest he had shown in the welfare of the Roman Catholics, but advised him not to arrogate to himself the credit of being the only earnest Catholic member of the House.96 Costigan then inferred that he doubted if Devlin had had the authorization he said he had from a high church dignitary,97 and Masson, who said that he shared Costigan's doubts, expressed regret that the name of the Bishop of Saint John had been dragged into the debate to influence the vote.98 After the Premier's amendment and Cauchon's rider had passed by a large majority,99 Baby attempted to move a stronger amendment but was ruled out of order.100 Then when Cauchon had moved for a select committee to draft the address to the Queen, Costigan attempted to move another amendment that the address should include words to the effect that the House reserved its right to seek by an address to Her Majesty an amendment to the British North America Act, should the first address fail to bring about such an amendment as the Catholic minority of New Brunswick desired. This motion was also ruled out of order, and the House adjourned at a quarter of three in the morning.101 Later in the session Devlin read from the Montreal Gazette a statement by the Ottawa correspondent of Le Nouveau Monde charging Devlin with deserting Costigan, and bolstering his position by lying that he had Bis- hop Sweeney's approval in voting as he did. Devlin denied that he had lied, and called on several Catholic members of the House who had been present at a conversation during which they had decided to vote for Cauchon's amendment. Power stood up and said he believed then, and still believed that they had the concurrence of His Lordship in the course which they took. Flynn corroborated this, and it developed that the Bishop had been in Ottawa and that they had met with him several times.102

These evidences of cross-purposes among the Catholics in the House of Commons add significance to Hannay's statement103 that the Quebec members were surprised when the rumor became current that the Bishop of Saint John had made a compromise with the New Brunswick Government, and that they were offended because they had not been consulted after all their trouble to aid the Catholics of New Brunswick. Actually, of course, only in the province where the difficulty had arisen could a solution be arrived at, and it is doubtful if the interest of Quebec in the whole affair facilitated the eventual settlement.

The negotiations leading to the compromise extended over several months. On August 6, 1875, the Executive Council gave official answer to certain propositions which had been submitted to that body by the five Catholic members of the Legislature, who assuredly were working for and with Bishop Sweeney in the matter. By empowering school trustees to allow the children from any part of a district to attend any of the schools within the bounds of the district, provided the regulations for grading were observed, the Council granted the first proposition, which, in effect, asked that in populous places all the Catholic children might be grouped in the same school or schools. The Council gave an affirmative answer to only part of the second proposition, that is, they were willing to recognize the certificate of the Superior of any Roman Catholic teaching order as a substitute for attendance at the Normal School, but not in lieu of an examination for license. The third proposition asked that in schools taught by the Christian Brothers and Sisters of Charity the teachers should not be compelled to use any books which might contain anything objectionable to them in a religious point of view, with particular reference to the History and Readers prescribed by the Board of Education. To this the Council replied that the greatest care had been taken to keep the school books free from matter objectionable to anyone on religious grounds, and that it would be the aim of the educational authorities to render the textbooks suitable for all. As for the prescribed History of England, the Council said they were prepared to recommend to the favorable consideration of the Board of Education the adoption and insertion of notes, compiled from Lingard, upon such portions of the text as might be deemed objectionable in a religious point of view. The fourth proposition was in reference to religious instruction after the regular secular school hours, and requested that the said hours should be shortened to the extent allowed for religious instruction. The Council in reply referred to that section of the Common Schools Act which gave trustees permission to rent for school use buildings belonging to religious orders or to the Roman Catholic Church, and intimated that no restriction would be placed upon the use of such buildings after the close of the school.104

These concessions, which, in a sense, legalized within the non-sectarian system of the province schools of a sectarian bias, fell short of the demands of the Roman Catholics, but were accepted as the best terms possible, and “a fair degree of harmony was restored”.105 There was a mild flurry, however, in September, when the Sisters of Charity in Saint John refused to write examinations for license along with the other candidates. Telegrams were exchanged between Rand, who was supervising examinations in Fredericton, and his deputy in Saint John, H. C. Creed; the Fredericton members of the Board of Education were hastily summoned; and the Premier, J. J. Fraser, wrote the former Premier enquiring if the latter had at any time promised Bishop Sweeney a separate examination for the Sisters. With King's emphatic denial before them, a full meeting of the Board of Education on October 22 went on record against any departure from, or annulment of, its former decisions and regulations for the government and control of license examinations. But since Rand had authorized Creed at the time of the incident to announce at the close of the regular examinations that an adjourned session of examinations for license would be held on October 28, the Board, rather reluctantly, ratified that exception to the general ruling.106 However, according to a statement in the Legislature by Premier Blair in 1893, a separate examination was again allowed to the Sisters in 1879, and such examinations were continued from year to year whenever application for the purpose was made.107 In 1884 the Board of Education ordered that members of religious orders holding certificates of professional qualification might have a separate examination in June of each year in Saint John or Chatham, at the same time as the other provincial examinations. All candidates, of course, were to write the same papers.108 This regulation, however, did not appear in the school manual, a circumstance which led, during the trouble at Bathurst, to talk of “secret” regulations.

After the compromise of 1875, the local opposition of the Catholics to the Act of 1871 gradually subsided. We note that in 1876 many school districts were laid off in Kent and Gloucester,109 that in 1877 Inspector Balloch of Madawaska County reported the organization of thirty-two school districts against seven the preceding year,110 and that the inspector for Northumberland County in the same year stated that sixteen districts were working harmoniously under the Act where formerly the non-sectarian character of that measure had been considered objectionable. 111

During the next fifteen years, while the question of sectarian instruction in education vexed the province of Manitoba, New Brunswick was free from controversy on this subject, but in the 1890's, at the very time when the Manitoba school question was proving even more embarrassing to the Government of the Dominion than the New Brunswick issue had been, religious feeling was again aroused in New Brunswick. It was excited on this occasion by the claims of the Protestant minority in Bathurst and Bathurst Village that the Roman Catholics had been conducting the school affairs of that area in contravention of the Act of 1871, and of subsequent regulations of the Board of Education. The circumstances which led to these allegations were as follows.

During the period between 1873 and 1890 the Roman Catholics of Bathurst Town and Village maintained at their own expense a school in each of those places, conducted by Sisters of the Congregation of Notre Dame of Montreal. At these convent schools the greater number of the Roman Catholic children of the two communities received their education. At the same time there was in each district a school conducted under the Common School Act, and supported by assessments levied upon all ratable persons in the district, including the Roman Catholics. These schools were attended by the Protestant children and by some of the boys of the Catholic faith, as the Sisters of the Congregation of Notre Dame did not teach boys. In 1890 the Roman Catholics of the two districts concluded it would be better to part with the Sisters, who declined to teach under the Common Schools Act, and to secure if possible Teaching Sisters who would. Several Sisters of Charity, duly licensed to teach, were engaged as teachers, and in September of 1890 certain of the convent school rooms were opened as schools under the law. Thus at one stroke the total number of children being educated in the public schools was increased by about one hundred and fifty, and the sums to be raised by taxation for school purposes were greatly increased to meet this increased attendance.

The situation was complicated by the Roman Catholic observance of holy days and by difficulties in the matter of grading, particularly as the trustees seemed not unwilling that the convent school rooms should be filled to overflowing with Roman Catholic children, while the public school buildings were so sparsely filled as to render efficient grading impossible. A further complication arose in 1892 when the trustees of Bathurst Village, on the score of economy, engaged a French female teacher, the holder of a license which was valid only in Acadian districts. In consequence, the Protestant children of the primary grades did not attend the school for a term, at the end of which time the trustees induced the teacher to resign, although she had been engaged for a year. Certain developments early in 1893 in connection with the Bathurst Grammar School strained relations between the Catholics and Protestants still further. In spite of the consensus of opinion of both the Catholic and Protestant ratepayers at a school meeting in January of that year, that the Principal of the Grammar School should be a Protestant, a Roman Catholic, son of one of the trustees, was appointed. This appointee had been a school inspector, but had been removed from office by the Board of Education for inattention to and gross neglect of his duties. “The causes which led to this inattention and neglect were well known in Bathurst, and were his habit of life.” Moreover, he was not the holder of a Grammar School license. The appointment produced intense excitement; telegrams were sent to the Chief Superintendent; and the Board of Education refused to grant the appointee a Grammar School license. Finally the Bathurst trustees appointed a gentleman from Saint John in his stead. In the meantime, however, the exasperated Protestant ratepayers had started a private school in rented rooms. When this school had been in operation less than a week the owner of the rooms declared that he wanted them for other than school purposes, and placed a padlock on the door of the building. The next morning, “friends of the private school with an axe broke the padlock, and the teacher and pupils entered the school room without any molestation”. But the small crowd which had gathered to watch proceedings engaged in a half hour of wordy warfare, whereupon two Protestant clergymen of the locality telegraphed to the Honorable A. G. Blair, Premier and Attorney General, and to H. H. Pitts, the particular champion in the Legislature of the Protestant cause, that Bathurst was on the verge of a riot. It happened that Bathurst school matters were then under discussion in the Legislature, Pitts having moved for an investigation by a select committee of the House of Assembly. Eventually, after a heated debate, the House accepted a government resolution to refer the whole matter to a judge of the Supreme Court or of the County Courts. Accordingly, on April 18, 1893, Judge J. J. Fraser of the Supreme Court, formerly a member of the government which had made the compromise of 1875, was appointed special commissioner to investigate not only all complaints charging infractions of the school law in Bathurst and Bathurst Village, but also any and every complaint which might be laid before him touching the management of schools in Gloucester County.

The above account of proceedings in Bathurst, based largely on the dispassionate judicial statements of Judge Fraser's report,112 gives but a poor idea of the feeling which was aroused throughout the whole province. Orangemen beheld a vision of King William leading them on a crusade, the partisan press of both sides indulged in extravagant editorials and highly colored reports, and inflammatory circulars were distributed in Kent County and York County. The language question in relation to the schools was raised on the hustings and in the Assembly,113 numerous petitions signed by about 10,000 persons were presented to the Legislature, and in York County, where the fiery and outspoken Pitts seems to have made the most of the controversy, the Premier and his entire ticket were defeated in the elections of 1892. Charges of catering to the Catho- lics in order to keep in power were levelled at the government, and the Board of Education was accused of making “secret” regulations favoring religious teaching orders, and of not acting promptly and efficiently in the Bathurst difficulty. Rumors even linked the case with the dismissal from office of Superintendent Crocket,114 and the Legislature spent hours discussing the whole question. So thoroughly was the subject debated in 1893 that sixty-nine pages of the total one hundred and sixty-four pages comprising the Synoptic Report of the Debates for 1893 are devoted to the Bathurst school question and related topics.

A perusal of those pages, and of the debates in 1892 and 1894, give one some idea of the pitch to which sectarian feelings were aroused, not only in the Legislature but also in the province generally. One is impressed too by the extent to which both government and opposition made use of the matter for political purposes. There seems to have been almost more anxiety to have the past actions of the Government and Board of Education either condemned or condoned than to arrive at a solution of the distressing problem, and much time was spent in political manoeuvres revolving around the means to be employed in investigating the Protestant complaints —whether by select committee, committee of the whole house, or special commissioner. It must be remembered that the Blair administration had been in power for ten years, and while shortly before this date it had lost support in Saint John City and County over a matter of political patronage, and had had to come to terms with the lumbermen of Northumberland County on the question of stumpage, it appeared likely to remain secure for many years to come. The opposition, not unnaturally, capitalized to the fullest extent on any matter which might harass the government, and turned eagerly to this fresh and exciting theme from the monotony of criticizing the administration for extravagance.

While all that was said and written in connection with the affair makes interesting reading, Judge Fraser's findings may be regarded as more important. The tenor of the fifteen specific complaints submitted to him in writing by the Reverend A. F. Thomson was that everything which the trustees and clerics of Bathurst had done, or were said to have done, in school matters subsequent to 1890 was in violation of the school law, and was motivated by a desire to promote the Catholic Church and to injure the Protestant ratepayers. Judge Fraser concluded that the evidence did not sustain the specific complaints nor the general allegation. In his opinion “the trustees of both town and village, in se- curing for school purposes certain school rooms in the Town Convent building and certain rooms in the Village Convent building, intended that the schools carried on in such buildings should be bona fide carried on and conducted in all respects in accordance with the Common Schools Act and the regulations of the Board of Education”. He also thought that the evidence did not sustain the Protestant contention that there had been clerical interference with the schools in the town and village, and in some of the other school districts of the County of Gloucester,115 and he doubted that Protestant pupils had been forced by any teacher to kneel or cross themselves.116 He did not hesitate, however, to point out certain misdemeanors and cases of mismanagement. For instance, he declared that the action of the trustees of Bathurst Village in engaging a teacher of inferior qualifications was objectionable, because that teacher, while she was qualified to teach according to her license, was not such a teacher as should have been placed in charge of the department to which she was assigned.117 He also said that from the evidence there could not be a question but that the habits of the unpopular appointee to the Grammar School were as well known to the trustees as to the ratepayers, “and were such as ought to have induced them to say that they could not for a moment listen to any application looking to his appointment”.118 Moreover, in his judgment, the trustees of both localities had not discharged their duties as efficiently as they might have done in regard to grading, having tended to fill up the convent buildings to a larger extent than was consistent with satisfactory grading in both the public school buildings and the rooms of the convent.119

In regard to religious teaching, Judge Fraser's report indicated that from the evidence several teachers in the town and village had given religious instruction during the noon hour. The judge interpreted this as an infringement of the law, but not a wilful infringement, “inasmuch as the teachers who so taught the catechism honestly believed that the recreation hour was no part of the teaching day”.120 Roman Catholic prayers had also been used at the opening and closing of school in certain of the schools, but this was not illegal according to a regulation then in force. In three or four schools outside the town and village the Roman Catholic catechism possibly had been taught during school hours, the instances going back as far as 1878. Pointing out that all kinds of irregularities might occur in the carrying on of the schools in any county, Judge Fraser declared: “Unless they are brought to the notice of the Inspector of Schools for the county, and through him to the notice of the Board of Education, or directly to the notice of the Board of Education itself, it would be manifestly unjust to charge the Board of Education with any dereliction of duty in regard to such irregularities”.121 The opinions expressed by Judge Fraser were sustained by Judge Barker of the Equity Court before whom the matter was afterwards argued in the case of Rogers et al versus the Trustees of School District No. 2, Bathurst.122 Pitts, however, was definitely not satisfied, and during the legislative session of 1894 he sifted the evidence, questioned Judge Fraser's findings, and urged a resolution, justifying the petitioners who had asked for the investigation and expressing the belief that all classes and creeds should stand equal before the law.123 The government, however, blocked this resolution by means of an amendment expressing the pleasure of the House at learning from the commissioner's report that the Board of Education had not been negligent in the discharge of its duty, and had not knowingly permitted any violation of the law. The division on which this amendment passed was mainly along party lines.124

Apparently complete harmony was not at once restored in Bathurst, as during the legislative session of 1895 Pitts introduced a resolution expressing regret that the school difficulties at Bathurst had not been amicably settled and calling on the Board of Education to insist that the dual system of grading be abandoned, so that the law might be carried out in its true intent and purpose.125 The Honorable H. R. Emmerson, speaking for the government, characterized Pitts as unrepresentative of the intelligence, respectability, and benevolent aims of the Orange Order, and charged him with bringing up the Bathurst school question so that he might seem to be earnest in the cause which had given him the only importance he had ever possessed.126 Under government guidance, and on the grounds that the case was then pending before Judge Barker, the House rejected Pitts' resolution,127 but due to his pertinacity the subject died hard in the Legislature.

In 1896 he commended the minority at Bathurst for not appealing to Ottawa, and attempted to bring in a resolution expressing the alarm of the New Brunswick Legislature at the promotion at Ottawa of legislation which had in view interference with the public school system of Manitoba. However, a seconder of the motion could not be found, although Pitts appealed to the Liberals of the House to support the policy of Laurier, and asked nine members in turn to second his motion.128 The next year he complained of an item of one hundred dollars in the accounts for the printing of Judge Fraser's report,129 and said that the government had found the religious question a better “card” to play than any financial question. “Whenever any of the Roman Catholic members or French members get a little recalcitrant, the policy [of the government] was to prod at 'Pitts and his gang', to throw out to the country that bigotry and religious intolerance were widespread in Saint John and York Counties, and that the opposition or Pitts was responsible.” 130

By this time, however, the agitation bad spent its force. Before leaving the question we may note that the Board of Education, when the disturbance was at its peak, modified and clarified certain of the existing regulations. Trustees might no longer permit teachers to use any prayer in opening school but the Lord's Prayer,131 and the term “school hours” was defined as “all the time between the opening and the close of the school for the day”,132 so that no teacher might mistakenly give religious instruction during the noon hour. A regulation was also passed ordering that public school buildings must be occupied to the full extent before additional buildings could be leased. According to Provincial Secretary Tweedie this regulation was expressly passed to deal with the situation at Bathurst.133 To this regulation, however, the following clause was added: “Unless the Board of Education or the Chief Superintendent, in consideration of special circumstances in any district, shall order otherwise”.134 The opposition claimed that this clause was added, in consequence of the circumstances at Bathurst, while the school manual was in the printer's hands.135

Without seriously entertaining the various charges levelled at the government and the Board of Education of making “secret” regulations, one cannot entirely dismiss the possibility that because of the Bathurst school case many people in the province either learned for the first time of the modifications effected in the Act of 1871 by the compromise of 1875, and by several subsequent regulations, or had failed until then to realize the significance of those modifications. As a result of this controversy more interest was aroused than perhaps ever before or since in the school manuals, and in the “undistilled Statutes”,136—if one may use the term applied by C. E. Sissons to the Regulations of the Ontario Board of Education.

Several times in the Legislature during the crisis at Bathurst, government and opposition ranks accused each other of attempting to complicate matters by appealing to “race” prejudices. Stockton, of the opposition, claimed that when Labillois was campaigning in the Kent County elections he had accused Stockton of proposing to him, Labillois, that the study of the French language in the public schools should be prevented.137 This Stockton denied he had ever suggested. Alward charged Labillois with telling the French electors in Kent that under the leadership of Stockton and Alward an effort was being made to drive the French language from the schools, and thus to strike a blow at the religion and nationality of the French.138 Labillois, in his turn, declared that the opposition candidates in Kent had charged the government with being unfair to the French by appointing an Englishman as sheriff of the county, and by dismissing a school inspector because he was French, and that they had told the French to vote against Labillois because he was partly Irish. He also said that in a conversation with him Stockton had shown himself averse to the teaching of French in the schools.139

Whether these charges and counter-charges were valid or not, they signify a recognition of the possibilities for dissension latent in the dual nature of the population of the province. Indeed, Premier Blair remarked in 1895 that the school difficulties at Bathurst had arisen from the fact of there being not merely two religious persuasions in that locality but also two nationalities.140 We have observed that Gloucester County, of which Bathurst is the shiretown, was predominately French, and that the strongest opposition to the Act of 1871 came from the French-speaking counties. Possibly from a thorough investigation of the French newspapers of New Brunswick and Quebec during the seventies we should find that the question of language was a more important factor in the opposition than is commonly thought. Even if religion was the main issue, there are signs that the dual elements in the language and culture of the province had become complicating factors by the time of the second great controversy. The point is that the Acadians and French Canadians of the province were growing steadily in numbers, importance, and national consciousness.

In the early years of the “Loyalist Province” the Acadians had had no part in the official life of the colony. It was not until 1842 that they were represented in the Assembly,141 and previous to 1900 only two of their number were admitted to the provincial ministry. At first they were not vocal in English on the subject of their rights and privileges, but as their numbers increased they began to press for some official recognition of their language. For example, about 1880 there were several requests to have the agricultural report printed in French, so that the many farmers among the 45,000 French of the province might benefit. A resolution passed the House in 1881 in favor of compliance with this request,142 but the government either did not act on the suggestion or carried it out for a time only, as in 1890 the Committee on Agriculture, which included four French members,143 suggested that the government be requested to have a portion of the agricultural report translated into French and distributed.144 The matter of the publication in the French-language newspapers of the province of the official reports of the debates in the House was also brought up from time to time. For example, in 1890 a French-speaking member complained that there was no provision regarding the French papers in the memorandum for publishing the debates.145

For the most part a spirit of “See how well we get along together” prevailed in the Legislature. It was perhaps not difficult for a majority group to exhibit such a spirit toward a relatively small minority sensible enough to display a pleasing combination of dignity and modesty. We read in the official report of the debates for 1885 that an “interesting feature” of the discussion on the Portland Revisor's List bill was a series of speeches in French. This was evidently unusual, for one of the speakers, who afterwards spoke in English, said he was proud that “the language spoken by so large a proportion of the people of New Brunswick had been heard in the House”. He also thanked the members for “their kindness towards himself and all who spoke the same language”.146 In 1890, three speeches in French on a bill relating to the Colonization Company of the Maritime Provinces were received “with loud applause from both sides of the house”. Mr. Speaker White then reported the findings of the committee in French, “his remarks being applauded and the house declaring its acceptance of the committee's report by the unanimous French affirmation "Oui”.147 As far as the Legislature was concerned the century seems to have drawn to a close on a note of cordiality, to which the sentiments which were aroused by the Diamond Jubilee, Canadian participation in the Boer War, and Laurier's emphasis on an all-Canadian nationalism appeared as contributory factors. This, of course, does not mean that the minority had abandoned their claims for recognition. We note, for example, that in 1897 A. D. Richard said in the Assembly that his nationality was not as largely represented in the administration of public affairs as it should be. He believed, however, that the government would be just enough to grant to every nationality and to every class in the province due justice at the proper time and place.148 On the other hand, the prevailing good-will in the Legislature does not mean that the majority at no time felt uneasiness, although political expediencies usually prevented any strong expression of such feeling. Symptomatic, perhaps, was the remark of a member in 1881 that the printing of the agricultural reports in French would be an entering wedge.149 A few years later a rumor that a French school inspector had voiced the necessity of conserving the French language in speech and in the schools brought forth a protest. The member who protested said that he heartily approved of all that had been done to give the Acadians an education in their own language, but that he objected to speeches by an officer of the government “which were calculated to bring on in this English province a contest between the two languages”.150

In view of all this, the status of the French language in the school system of New Brunswick, both before and after the Act of 1871, becomes a matter of considerable importance to our study.

Previous to the inauguration of the Free School system, the Acadian schools received scant official attention. The larger schools were strictly church or parochial institutions, such as the school at St. Basil in 1817,151 the convent at Acadiaville in the 1860's,152 the convent schools at Bathurst, and the seminary at Memramcook established in 1854. The latter, which later became St. Joseph's University, accepted both French and English students, and, like the Wesleyan Academy, received legislative aid more than once before the passage of the Common Schools Act. Some of the Acadian districts, like the English-speaking areas, were served in the early days by itinerant pedagogues. Later, some supported small district schools conducted by teachers who boarded around. Le Gresley implies that these Acadian districts did not share in the government allowance until after 1847,153 but the inclusion of the Acadian schools in the inspection of 1844-45 would indicate that some of them may have been in receipt of the provincial grant at an earlier date. The inspectors' report stated that for the populous parish of Caraquet no part of the government allowance had been drawn for some years, the teachers having been deterred from presenting themselves before the Board of Education from a consciousness of the want of proper qualifications. The number of Acadian schools was not mentioned in this report, but the attainments of the pupils and the qualifications of the teachers were referred to as not inferior to those found in the English schools.154 In a few instances the pupils were learning to read English as well as French,155 but of the Acadian teachers in Westmorland County, who were superior to those in other parts of the province, the report stated: “There is no reason for thinking that their qualifications would therefore enable them to teach the English language so as to make it available for the transaction of business by written correspondence”.156

Even after the establishment of the Board of Education and the appointment of a Chief Superintendent and Inspectors, official references to the Acadian schools were infrequent. Training at the Normal School was, of course, conducted in the English language and few, if any, of the Acadian teachers attended that institution. Perhaps because of that, in 1852 “Guide de L'Instituteur”, a text recommended by Dr. Meilleur, Superintendent of Education for Canada East, was sanctioned by the New Brunswick Board of Education in order to improve the instruction of the French population of the province.157 We noted earlier Superintendent Bennet's suggestion in 1867 that a teacher, competent in both French and English, should be added to the staff of the Normal School, and that in future untrained French teachers should be refused a license. Inspector Morrison, it will be remembered, complained shortly before the passage of the Common Schools Act that the texts used in the Acadian schools were inferior, and that it was a mistake not to require the French teachers to attend the Normal School. Other official references to these schools were few, and the reports give no indication of the extent to which the French language was used in the Acadian schools. Le Gresley tells us, however, that the French language held first place until 1871.158

C. B. Sissons, referring to the British North America Act and the status of the French language in the schools of Ontario, has pointed out that we are justified in concluding “that the Fathers of Confederation did not seek either to confer any new legal right on the French language in the schools of Ontario or to confirm any rights or privileges previously existing”.159 Neither, it seems, did it infringe upon any. These statements apply equally well to New Brunswick. In other words, there was nothing in the Constitution which obliged the provincial authorities to accord to the French language any rights and privileges in the legislature or in the schools, nor were they placed under any compulsion to restrict the use of French as the language of communication and study in the schools of Acadian districts. Those who framed the Act of 1871, opposed as they were to the separation of children on religious grounds, no doubt considered separation on the grounds of language an obstacle to a unified system, but if there was serious thought on the matter, and it is difficult to find evidences of any, the attitude probably was the same as that attributed by C. B. Sissons to Ryerson of Ontario—“that it was wiser to make haste slowly in turning the French . . . settlers to the study of English”.160 The Act of 1871 said nothing whatever about the use of the French language, and in the thinking of the educationists of the time the emphasis, either deliberate or unconscious, seems to have been on the promotion of education through the medium of the English language. However, since the provincial system already included Acadian schools, it was taken for granted that the use of the French language might be continued under the Common Schools Act in the elementary schools of Acadian districts, and subsequent to the Act various regulations and provisions were made from time to time with reference to such schools. Le Gresley states that the Acadians accepted these arrangements as a makeshift, satisfactory enough from a relative point of view.161 Thus controversy on the score of language did not arise, and during the nineteenth century, if there was dissatisfaction among the Acadians, it was not expressed so strongly as to engage the attention of the educational authorities.

Regulation 16 of the Regulations of the Board of Education, published November 15, 1871, included elementary French readers in a list of school texts either prescribed by the Board or at the time under consideration.162 In 1876 the Board authorized the Chief Superintendent to procure specimens of school text-books from the Commissioner of Schools for Quebec, with a view to selecting any that might be suitable and necessary for use in the French districts of New Brunswick. A few months later a committee was appointed to examine two texts, Grammaire Elementaire française and Introduction au traite d'Arithmétique Commerciale. On January 8, 1877, the grammar was prescribed, and, rather curiously, the arithmetic for both English and French pupils, if it was preferred to the prescribed English texts in arithmetic.163 It is interesting to note that in 1879 the Superintendent reported that the Legislature of Maine had authorized the French-English texts of New Brunswick for use in the schools of the French population of that state.164 From time to time the French texts, like the other texts, were subject to revision or alteration. In 1881 the Board received the report submitted by Pascal Poirier, an Acadian scholar and politician, and Professor Rivet of the University of New Brunswick, with a revision of the texts of the French-English readers; adopted the revisions; and ordered the Superintendent to communicate with the publishers of the readers.165 In 1888 the Board ordered that “Les Grandes Inventions Modernes” be prescribed as a text for use in the French-English schools, to alternate with the Royal Reader No. 4 or No. 5.166

This repetition of the term French-English emphasizes the fact that the so-called French schools were not separate language schools, but were bilingual schools, in which the primary pupils, whose vernacular was French, might learn both French and English, until they reached a point at which they could continue their education in the English language.

Bilingual teachers were, therefore, a necessary part of the scheme. Until 1884 almost all the French-speaking teachers were untrained. In 1878 Superintendent Rand recommended to the Board of Education the establishment of a Preparatory Department of the Normal School for the benefit of such French students as might not be prepared for admission to the regular classes, and the Board ordered that such a department be opened in November. Those students who passed, at the close of the session, an examination equivalent to that required for admission to the existing department of the Normal School were to receive a license of the third class valid for two years.167 Later the license was made valid for three years and the period of attendance was reduced from five months to three months.

On the whole, the benefits of this department do not seem to have been very great. After it was discontinued in 1884 Superintendent Crocket wrote: “During the five and a half years of its existence it had done nothing towards the training of its students, nor was it established with this view. It gave good instruction in the elementary branches to those who did attend, but not any better than they ought to receive in a well-taught District School . . . . It was left to their option to enter the Normal Department if found qualified, or to accept a temporary license for three years on the understanding that when it expired they were to return to the Normal School for training. In all cases they accepted the license, but with one or two exceptions they did not return, and many of them are now teaching as local licensees. But the numbers who did attend were so small that it would have taken very many years, even if they had all continued to teach, before their influence could have been much felt in the French schools. During its existence the total number who attended was only 113, including several whose scholarship was so limited that they were required to attend a second term, thus giving an average attendance per term of about 7”.

Continuing, the Superintendent said that some other provision was seen to be necessary, “whereby these Acadian students could be trained as well as instructed, and receive a permanent license on the same footing as the others. Only by some such provision can we hope to elevate the French schools and make them the compeers of the English”. He then described the set-up of a new French Department presided over by Alphie Belliveau, who had been Principal of the Preparatory Department. The students, he said, received instruction only in professional subjects from the Principal of the Normal School, but if they were deemed sufficiently well qualified to be presented at the close of the term for examination for license in advance of class three, they received both professional and academic instruction in the English department. At the close of the term they were examined for license on the same subjects as were prescribed for the other candidates, but an additional paper in French was set for all French candidates, for which they received credit by adding the examiner's estimate upon it to the other estimates without including the subject in the divisor.168

The conditions under which teachers trained in this French Department might be employed, if not clearly defined before 1897, were definitely set forth in that year, possibly because of an echo of the Bathurst school case. In October, 1897, the Board received letters from Inspector Mersereau and the Reverend A. F. Thomson169 calling the attention of the Board to a resolution passed at the annual meeting of the ratepayers of district No. 2, Bathurst, in reference to the employment of a French teacher for the primary grades of the school of that district. Thereupon the Board ordered the Superintendent to direct the trustees of the district to employ only such teachers as had received a provincial license after having passed through the course of training provided for the English teachers in the Normal School. The superintendent was further ordered to prepare for the consideration of the Board a regulation defining the conditions under which teachers who had received licenses after attendance at the French department of the Normal School might be employed.170 On December 1, 1897, this new regulation, as an addition to Regulation 33, ordered that third class teachers, holding a license received after attendance at the French department of the Normal School, if they had not subsequently passed through the English department, should be employed only in Acadian districts, or in districts in which the French language was the language in common use by a majority of the people, unless the written consent of the Chief Superintendent should be obtained. Moreover, no such teacher was to be employed in any district, Acadian or otherwise, if the Superintendent notified the trustees of the district that no such teacher should be employed therein.171

The French department of the Normal School drew a larger number of students than the Preparatory department had done. In 1889 the enrolment for the year was 29,172 in 1895 it was 21,173 and in 1900 it was 52, the highest it had ever been in the history of the department.174 The educational authorities, however, quite consistently lamented that the number of those who annually graduated from the French department was never sufficient to supply the Acadian districts with trained teachers. In 1894 Superintendent Inch pointed out that nearly one-half the schools in Madawaska County were still taught by untrained teachers. He said he was convinced that the fault lay largely with the people, who seemed unwilling to incur the expense of sending their sons and daughters to the Normal School while they could succeed in obtaining for them local licenses. In this way they kept their schools open at little or no expense to the district, the provincial grant and county fund supplying nearly all the salary paid in many cases. He declared that a constant effort had been made for several years to reduce the number of local licenses granted, but that the unpleasant alternative continued to present itself of either closing the schools or yielding to the importunities of those who pleaded for the local license.175

Without a careful study of the figures for school enrolment and attendance in comparison with census statistics, one cannot say authoritatively that the Acadian areas displayed a greater general apathy in educational affairs than the majority of other rural areas, but we may note that occasionally the inspectors made special reference to these districts as educationally backward. For example, in 1883 Inspector Landry reported that in one district in Caraquet over sixty children were running about the streets, and in Caraquet Centre there was no proper school for over one hundred children. The trustees, he said, were to blame, having failed to attend the last annual school meeting.176 In 1901 Inspector Mersereau reported that in Gloucester County a great deal of pioneer work remained to be done before all parts of the county would have schools.177

In 1900 Urbaine Johnson, a representative of Kent County, enquired in the Legislature if the Government had considered the advisability of appointing an inspector knowing the English language and French language for those districts where the population was wholly or predominately French. He said that it was immaterial to him whether the appointee was a Frenchman, Englishman, Irishman or Scotchman, so long as he had the essential qualification of being able to speak both languages. In reply the Honorable L. J. Tweedie said that if it was considered advisable to increase the number of inspectors at any time, the question of appointing an inspector knowing both languages would receive the serious attention of the Board of Education and of the Government.178 The next year Johnson raised the question again, and was seconded by Joseph Poirier of Gloucester County, who said that of course the children of French extraction wished to learn the English language, but that the only proper channel through which they could become masters of both languages was through their mother tongue. Poirier also asked the Government to give the French children “a series of French school books on the same footing as the English”,179 a suggestion which casts a reflection on the quality of the French texts hitherto provided. A few months later, when the number of inspectors was increased from six to eight, one of the appointees was J. F. Doucet of Gloucester County, whose duty it was to inspect all the French schools of the province.180

One cannot note Bishop Fallon's startling denunciation in 1911 of the bilingual schools of Ontario without wondering what might be revealed by a careful study of these schools in New Brunswick. It was not the use of the French language which Bishop Fallon denounced, but “the attempt to conduct the study of both English and French simultaneously with the same pupils in the same elementary schools. In a sentence which rang across the country he declared that the bilingual system 'encourages incompetence, gives a prize to hypocrisy and breeds ignorance'”.181

A survey made a short time afterwards of the bilingual schools of Ontario showed that a very small number of children educated in those schools ever attempted the entrance examinations, a still smaller number succeeded, and the number who ever attended any of the high schools of the province reached almost a vanishing point.182

A thorough investigation of the condition and results of the bilingual schools of New Brunswick has not yet been made. We find that during the period under consideration the Inspectors seldom even referred to the difficulties peculiar to these schools. A notable exception was Inspector Philip Cox, afterwards a professor at the University of New Brunswick, who emphasized the obstacles in the French schools to the teaching of the higher standards, “where, the Text Books being in English, the teachers are obliged to do much extra work, translating from one language to another, in order to render passages, ideas, and problems, otherwise obscure, plain and intelligible to the pupils. Neither can the latter, owing to their limited knowledge of English, make anything like an intelligent preparation of lessons in advance of recitation.” 183 The next year he stressed this matter again, saying: “With the exception of texts on Arithmetic and Grammar, a Primer, and Nos. 1, 2 and 3 French English Readers, there are no authorized French books for these schools. History, geography, Composition, Geometry, Physics, Botany and Chemistry must now be studied in a tongue but poorly understood, a circumstance that makes the inherent difficulties of these subjects still harder to be grappled with and understood. Moreover, whatever opinions may be held respecting the knowledge of the language to be obtained from the Readers referred to, all must agree that to stop at this stage is only closing the doors against the pupils acquiring an acquaintance with the idiomatic and classic beauty of their native tongue. For these and other reasons it would seem desirable to have the list of authorized French Text Books enlarged.” 184

In the light of these remarks one is impressed by the interesting possibilities of research on the question of illiteracy in French districts. Was the economic factor of prime importance? How much significance may be attached to the question of faulty texts and inadequately trained teachers? To what extent were the teachers hampered by the necessity of having to teach the elementary grades in both languages? What correlation was there between the drop in school attendance and the transfer to an all-English programme of studies at the close of the elementary grades? No attempt was made during the nineteenth century to find answers to these questions, and the problem of backward schools in Acadian districts, if it was recognized as a problem separate from that of general rural education, was passed on as a legacy to the twentieth century. In fact one may say that no scientific study of the problem has yet been made. It may be that this question, like the question of general rural education, will demand particular attention in the near future.

Notes

^1. New Brunswick: Journal of the House of Assembly, 1873, Annual Report on Schools, Part 1, pp. XVIII-XXI.

^2. Ibid., p. XIX.

^3. Ibid., Part III, App. B, p. 12.

^4. Ibid., 1876, Part III, App. B, p. 11.

^5. Ibid., p. 22.

^6. Canada: Dominion Parliamentary Debates 1872, p. 197.

^7. It is difficult to find any authorization in the Act of 1858 for sectarian teaching, but undoubtedly, as Anglin's statements indicate, the Act had been interpreted very liberally in many communities.

^8. A reference to the “millinery” regulations prohibiting teachers in the public schools from wearing the cross and the dress of religious societies.

^9. Canada: Dominion Parliamentary Debates 1872, p. 197.

^10. Ibid., pp. 199-201.

^11. Ibid., p. 201.

^12. Ibid., pp. 203-205.

^13. Ibid., p. 705.

^14. Ibid., pp. 706-707.

^15. Ibid., p. 708.

^16. Ibid., p. 898.

^17. Ibid., pp. 759, 760.

^18. Ibid., pp. 708, 709.

^19. Ibid., pp. 904, 905.

^20. Ibid., p. 763.

^21. Ibid., p. 899.

^22. Ibid., p. 709.

^23. Ibid., p. 760.

^24. Ibid., p. 764.

^25. Ibid., p. 899.

^26. Ibid., p. 900.

^27. Ibid., p. 906.

^28. Ibid., p. 907.

^29. Ibid., pp. 907, 908.

^30. Office of the Executive Council of New Brunswick: Minutes of the Executive Council, Vol. 9, pp. 363-366; Also Journal of House of Assembly of New Brunswick 1873. Annual Report on Schools, App. 4, pp. 40-42.

^31. Office of the Executive Council of New Brunswick: Minutes of the Executive Council, Vol. 9, pp. 1-11 of memorandum inserted at p. 396 of Minutes for Dec. 23, 1972; Also Journal of House of Assembly of New Brunswick 1873, Annual Report on Schools, App. 4, pp. 22-40.

^32. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, p. 311.

^33. See Index ii of Journal of House of Assembly of New Brunswick 1873 for a list of these bills.

^34. Canada: Dominion Parliamentary Debates 1873, (Scrap Book Hansard), p. 176.

^35. Ibid., pp. 177, 178.

^36. Ibid., p. 178.

^37. Ibid., p. 179.

^38. Ibid., p. 194.

^39. Ibid., p. 206.

^40. Copies of this correspondence between Dufferin and Kimberley were tabled in the New Brunswick Legislature on March 20, 1874. See Synoptic Report of Debates of the House of Assembly of New Brunswick 1874, pp. 79, 80.

^41. Canada: Dominion Parliamentary Debates, 1875, p. 578.

^42. Ibid., pp. 1003-1006.

^43. For the appalling state of the majority of the school buildings in Saint John at the close of the year 1871 see the Journal of the House of Assembly of New Brunswick for the year 1874, Annual Report on Schools, Part iii, App. C, pp. 62, 63.

^44. New Brunswick: Journal of the House of Assembly 1874, Annual Report on Schools, Part iii, App. C, pp. 65-69.

^45. Office of the Executive Council of New Brunswick: Minutes of the Executive Council, Vol. 9, Nov. 3, 1873, pp. 433-435.

^46. Department of Education of New Brunswick: Minutes of Board of Education, Dec. 17, 1873-Aug. 15, 1879, Dec. 18, 1873, p. 11.

^47. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of the House of Assembly 1874; pp. 102, 121, 122.

^48. Ibid., p. 122.

^49. Ibid., P. 123.

^50. Ibid., p. 125.

^51. Ibid., p. 127.

^52. Ibid., p. 125.

^53. Ibid., pp. 126-129.

^54. Ibid., p. 134.

^55. Canada: Dominion Parliamentary Debates, 1874, (Scrap Book Hansard), p. 78.

^56. Ibid., p. 107.

^57. Raymond (4), pp. 421, 422.

^58. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly 1875, p. 1.

^59. In 1871 the Parish of Caraquet, which contained 3111 inhabitants, had only three schools with seventy-three pupils enrolled and an average attendance of 836. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, p. 307.

^60. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly 1875, pp. 29, 38.

^61. The New Brunswick Reporter and Fredericton Advertiser, Vol. 31, No. 12, Jan. 20, 1875, p. 2.

^62. Ibid., Vol. 31, No. 14, Feb. 3, 1875, p. 3.

^63. The Morning Freeman, Jan. 16, 1875, Vol. XXIV, No. 149, p. 2.

^64. Ibid., Feb. 11, 1875, Vol. XXV, No. 4, p. 2.

^65. These papers may be found in Dr. Clarence Webster's Collection in the New Brunswick Provincial Museum. They are entitled: (1) Inquisition before Coroner Joseph Sewell in Parish of Caraquette, County of Gloucester, on the Death of Lewis Mallieau. (2) Evidence of Witnesses Severally Taken and Acknowledged on Behalf of Our Sovereign Lady the Queen, Touching the Death of John Gifford. (3) Caraquet Murder Case, Chief Justice John C. Allen, Oct. 27, 1875, Bathurst.

^66. This, of course, was an important point. In the trial which followed, the Crown tried to show that because of the rioting which had preceded the events of January twenty-seventh the party in hiding knew that they were liable to arrest and had therefore conspired to resist. The Defence contended that the shooting was done in self-defence, that some of the Sheriff's men had been rough in making arrests on the morning of January twenty-seventh, that the whole village had been terrified by “Young's Army”, and that the accused, who had gathered at Albert's house to play cards, had hidden in fear of their lives when they saw a band of armed strangers approaching. See Supreme Court of New Brunswick, Report of Cases Determined by, Vol. III 1875-1876, pp. 546-566.

^67. This evidence is taken from the record of the inquest on the body of Gifford. The testimony of the witnesses at the trial is not included in the court record, but from Judge Allen's references to the case when he submitted it to the Supreme Court, we learn that one of the constables testified that the first shot was by the Sheriff's party, straight up through the trap, to frighten the men above. The next shot came from the loft and struck the stove. When several of the attacking party gained the loft there were shots from the men there, who had retreated to one corner. Then Gifford was shot. (Ibid., p. 558), Gifford's pistol, when found afterwards, had one chamber empty. (Ibid. pp. 564, 565). Clearly, the shot which killed Gifford was not the first fired during the melée.

^68. Supreme Court of New Brunswick, Reports of Cases Determined by, Vol. III, 1875-1876, p. 559.

^69. Ibid., p. 572.

^70. Ibid.. p. 597.

^71. LeGresley, p. 151.

^72. Hannay (1) Vol. 2, p. 320.

^73. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1875, pp. 98.

^74. Ibid., 97.

^75. Canada: Dominion Parliamentary Debates, 1875, p. 561.

^76. Ibid., p. 562.

^77. Ibid., pp. 561, 562.

^78. Ibid., p. 565.

^79. Ibid., pp. 609-611.

^80. Ibid.. pp. 611, 612.

^81. Ibid., p. 613.

^82. Ibid., p. 562.

^83. Ibid., pp. 567, 568.

^84. Ibid., p. 563.

^85. Costigan explained that he had sent one of his sons to a Catholic institution at a distance and one daughter to a convent, but that his means did not allow him to do the like for the rest of his family. Since there was a good school established by law within reach, and presided over by a gentleman of high character, he had decided it was better to send the rest of his children there than to have them go uneducated. He believed he had done right under the circumstances, but he did not wish his conduct to be taken as an indication of approval by him of the school law. Ibid., p. 628.

^86. It is true that Rand was dismissed from office in 1870, true also that he had attempted to initiate an investigation into complaints by Protestants against the Arichat (convent) public school, but two other factors seem to have been involved in his dismissal, neither of which had any sectarian implications. In the first place, there was a fundamental antagonism between Rand and the Liberal Government of Nova Scotia, particularly on the question of the relationship between himself as Superintendent and the Council of Public Instruction. Secondly, Rand and the Council did not see eye to eye in the "George affair", an incident which took its name from the Inspector who was involved. (Laidlaw, A. F., "Theodore Harding Rand," Nova Scotia Journal of Education, Fourth Series, Vol. 15, No. 3, April-May, 1944, pp. 326-329).

^87. Canada: Dominion Parliamentary Debates, 1875, p. 569.

^88. Ibid., p. 565.

^89. Ibid., p. 559.

^90. Ibid., p. 556.

^91. Ibid., pp. 572, 573.

^92. Ibid., p. 576.

^93. Ibid., p. 574.

^94. Ibid., p. 627.

^95. Ibid., p. 629.

^96. Ibid., pp. 629-630.

^97. Ibid., p. 630.

^98. Ibid., p. 632.

^99. Ibid., p. 633.

^100. Earlier in the debate Baby had attempted to move an amendment to Cauchon's rider, but had been ruled out of order by Speaker Anglin. The New Brunswick Reporter claimed that Anglin's constituents in Northern New Brunswick felt he had been party to a conspiracy to allow Cauchon to catch his eye before Baby, although the latter gentleman had the floor first. The Reporter concluded from this, and from The Freeman's description of Costigan's speech as indiscreet, that Anglin, mindful of his position as Speaker of the House of Commons, had executed something of a volte face on the New Brunswick school question. The Reporter prophesied that as a result of the indignation which this had excited among his constituents Anglin was “politically dead in the north”. The New Brunswick Reporter and Fredericton Advertiser, Vol. 31, No. 21, p. 2.

^101. Canada: Dominion Parliamentary Debates, 1875, pp. 633, 634.

^102. Ibid., pp. 861, 862.

^103. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, p. 312.

^104. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, Dec. 17, 1873-Aug. 15, 1679. (Dated Aug. 6, 1875, and bound in between pages 99 and 101). In 1893 Premier Blair said that when his government came into power they found records of these arrangements but nothing formally entered among the regulations of the Board of Education, where, in the opinion of the government these memoranda and agreements should properly have appeared. They then transferred the minutes to the Records of the Board. See New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1893, p. 106.

^105. Inch, p. 231.

^106. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, Dec. 17, 1873-Aug. 15, 1879, Oct. 22, 1878, pp. 308-311.

^107. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1893, p. 65.

^108. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, 1, 1882-Dec. 3, 1902, June 10, 1884, p. 43.

^109. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1877, Annual Report on Schools, Part III, Appendix B, pp. 9, 18.

^110. Ibid., p. 11.

^111. Ibid., p. 15.

^112. Fraser, J. J., pp. 3-33.

^113. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1892, pp. 10-16.

^114. One of these stories was to the effect that Crocket had been dismissed because he was too friendly to the Roman Catholics of Bathurst. (See New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1892, p. 14). Another rumor said that his services had been dispensed with because he was not liberal enough towards the Catholics. (Ibid., p. 16). We should add, perhaps, that other reasons, not connected with the difficulty at Bathurst, were also mentioned. The opposition claimed that because the sons of the ex-Superintendent had refused to support Premier Blair in their newspaper their father's dismissal was decided upon. Blair, forced to make some comment on the retirement, said that the government and Crocket could not get along together, that perhaps blame rested on both sides, but that circumstances did occur under which the former Superintendent had not considered it his duty to consult with the government on matters of public business which should have been placed before the government months before. (Ibid., p. 69). Possibly these “matters of public business” had arisen out of the situation at Bathurst.

^115. Fraser, J. J., p. 58.

^116. Ibid., p. 60.

^117. Ibid., p. 29.

^118. Ibid., p. 31.

^119. Ibid., p. 59.

^120. Ibid., p. 59.

^121. Ibid., p. 60.

^122. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, p. 365.

^123. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1894, p. 132.

^124. Ibid., p. 135.

^125. Ibid., 1895, p. 139.

^126. Ibid., pp. 143,144.

^127. Ibid., p. 153.

^128. Ibid., 1896, pp. 55-58.

^129. Ibid., 1897, p. 55.

^130. Ibid., p. 52.

^131. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, Dec. 1, 1882-Dec. 3, 1902; Nov. 9, 1893, p. 282.

^132. Ibid., p. 283.

^133. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1893, p. 83.

^134. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education. Dec. 1, 1892-Dec. 3, 1902; Feb. 3. 1893, p. 268.

^135. New Brunswick; Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1893, p. 75.

^136. Sissons (2), p. 35.

^137. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1892, p. 10.

^138. Ibid., p. 13.

^139. Ibid., p. 14.

^140. Ibid., 1895, p. 153.

^141. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, p. 107.

^142. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1881, p. 34.

^143. Ibid., 1890, p. 19.

^144. Ibid., p. 164.

^145. Ibid., pp. 18, 19.

^146. Ibid., 1885, p. 115.

^147. Ibid., 1890, p. 175.

^148. Ibid., 1897, p. 26.

^149. Ibid., 1881, p. 33.

^150. Ibid., 1885, p. 53.

^151. LeGresley, p. 109.

^152. Ibid., p. 138.

^153. Ibid., p. 116.

^154. Abstract of the Returns of the Inspection of Grammar and Parochial Schools in New Brunswick, 1845, p. 16.

^155. Ibid., pp. 5, 6.

^156. Ibid., p. 40.

^157. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, 1852-1865, p. 15.

^158. LeGresley, p. 116.

^159. Sissons (2), p, 39.

^160. Ibid., p. 31.

^161. LeGresley, p. 152.

^162. The Common Schools Act of 1871; Regulations of the Board of Education, p. 17.

^163. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, Dec. 17, 1873-Aug. 15, 1879, pp. 167, 183, 189.

^164. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1879, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p.XXXIV

^165. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, Oct. 3, 1879-Oct. 1882, Dec. 10, 1881, p. 210.

^166. Ibid., Dec. 1, 1882-Dec. 3, 1902; Nov. 9, 1888, p. 175.

^167. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1879, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. XXIV.

^168. Ibid., 1885, pp. XXV, XXVI.

^169. This gentleman had taken an active part a few years before in the Bathurst case.

^170. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, Dec. 1. 1882-Dec. 3 1902, pp. 396, 397.

^171. Ibid., p. 400.

^172. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1890, Annual Report on Schools, Part III, p. A73.

^173. Ibid., 1896, p. 9.

^174. Ibid., 1901, p. 6.

^175. Ibid., 1894, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, pp. XXIX, XXX.

^176. Ibid., 1883, Annual Report on Schools, Appendix B, pp. 14, 15.

^177. Ibid., 1901, Annual Report on Schools, Appendix B, p. 12.

^178. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1900, pp. 173, 174.

^179. Ibid., 1901, p. 84.

^180. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, Dec. 1, 1882-Dec. 3, 1902; Sept. 4, 1901, p. 587.

^181. Sissons (2), p. 81.

^182. Ibid., p. 89.

^183. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1883. Annual Report on Schools, Part II, Appendix B, p. 11.

^184. Ibid., 1884, Annual Report on Schools, Part III. Appendix B, pp. 30, 31.

CHAPTER 10.
EDUCATION IN THE AGE OF SCIENCE AND DEMOCRACY

The Act which laid the foundation of a free school system represented the most significant educational advance in New Brunswick during the nineteenth century. It meant, in effect, that the province subscribed to the doctrine of “schools for all”, but when the century ended the ideal of “all at school” was still far from realization1, and the idea had scarcely more than dawned that diversities in environment, in ability, in tastes, and in vocation should be taken into consideration in providing universal education. Moreover, although the right of every child to an education was no longer questioned, the old laissez-faire idea of every man for himself persisted, in that the clever and ambitious child, if poor, was left to make his own way in the face of inequality of opportunity.

Within the framework of the Act there was, of course, much commendable progress, less perhaps in the growth of ideas than in the development of order and administrative efficiency. Investigation shows that the greater part of the items on the agenda of the Board of Education between the years 1872 and 1900 related to such matters as enquiries from inspectors and teachers on minor points of law, requests from boards of school trustees for permission to levy taxes for school purposes and to borrow money for the building of new schools, the laying off of new districts, the settlement of local disputes involving the location of school buildings and the division of districts, the removal of delinquent trustees, the selection of school texts, and the framing of regulations regarding the time, place, and scope of examinations for Normal School entrance and for school licenses. The general tendency of the deliberations and decisions arising out of these matters was in the direction of that order and system without which progress is difficult, but the number and exacting nature of routine items seem to have discouraged consideration by the Board of broad educational principles, interesting experiments, and important trends. This is not to say that the Chief Superintendent, occupied though he was with administrative details, was unaware of movements and ideas outside the province or was unimpressed by their implications for New Brunswick, but the fiscal weakness of the province, the preoccupation of the government with questions of politics, finance and transportation, and the popular tendency to jog placidly along in the old ways combined, as earlier, to postpone the adoption of many forward-looking suggestions.

Two examples will serve to illustrate this point. Even before the inauguration of the free school system, the idea of a scheme of pensions for teachers had been favorably commented upon by Superintendent Bennet.2 During the next thirty years the maintenance of an adequate supply of experienced teachers was rendered particularly difficult by the wave of emigration which drained New Brunswick of its young people, including many potential teachers. There was therefore a particularly obvious need of some inducement to young people to make teaching their life work. The Superintendent and Inspectors from time to time spoke of the advantages to the profession of some provision for aged and infirm teachers, the teachers themselves petitioned the government,3 the Board of Education got as far as appointing a committee to enquire into the feasibility of such a plan,4 and eventually in the Legislature P. J. Veniot and J. D. Chipman advocated a superannuation fund for teachers,5 but when the century ended a pension scheme for teachers was still not an accomplished fact. As Professor Walter C. Murray said in addressing the faculty and students of the University of New Brunswick in 1899, American democracy unfortunately was opposed to the granting of pensions on principle, the feeling being that a man should provide by economy, insurance, or investment, for his old age, no matter what his calling.6

Our second example is even more interesting and illuminating. Marshall d'Avray, it will be remembered, as early as 1847 suggested the inclusion of manual training in the school curriculum, but it was not until 1900 that steps were taken in this direction, and possibly only then because of an impetus from without. Sir William Macdonald, benefactor of the Technical School at McGill, offered in 1899 to pay for the equipment required for educational manual training in one centre of every province of the Dominion, to meet the expenses of qualifying teachers for the new course, and to maintain the schools for three years.7 Professor J. W. Robertson, who had done so much previously to assist the provincial authorities in the promotion of dairy farming and in the establishment of butter and cheese factories, was entrusted with the task of organizing these manual training schools. Thus a department, known at first as the Sloyd8 School, was established at Fredericton where the young men of the Normal School could undergo the new training, and eventually the provincial government offered a special grant to certified teachers giving instruction in manual training, and undertook to pay 20% of the necessary equipment for manual training in any school.9 The adoption of this training for boys naturally facilitated the introduction of household science for girls, but for obvious reasons the new programme became a feature of urban schools only—in fact nearly another half century was to elapse before any serious effort was made to provide rural children with opportunities for acquiring training in the manual and household arts.

The course of education in New Brunswick between 1871 and 1900, aside from the problems and complications which arose in connection with religion and language, must be viewed in relation to the economic and political life of the province during that period, for the trend, the temper and the tempo of developments were bound to be affected, directly or indirectly, by the limitations of provincial revenue and the extent of public works programmes, by the relation between emigration and immigration, by trade cycles and Dominion policies, and by many other circumstances. When developments are viewed in this light, one readily establishes a rough correlation between recognizable periods in the educational history of the province and distinct phases in its economic history.

The Golden Age of Maritime prosperity lingered on into the seventies. During that decade the economy of New Brunswick was not yet adversely affected to a large degree by the application of iron and steel and steam to methods of transportation, and was yet to feel the full effects of the growing industrial expansion of the central provinces. Moreover, emigration had not yet become an acute problem—indeed there was still the hope of a large increase in population through immigration. As Professor Murray said in 1899, when he pointed to the consolidation of schools as a remedy for the many poor and thinly settled school districts, the school reformers of the seventies, in deciding on four square miles as the limit of a school district, evidently expected the wastes of the province to be filled up in a short time.10 The general optimism and enthusiasm engendered by the consummation of Confederation and by the extension of railways had their counterparts in educational circles. The establishment at long last of a free school system gave rise to a sense of achievement, fostered a belief in the future, and created enthusiasm and determination for the immediate task of organization. This spirit pulsed through the reports submitted by the Superintendent and Inspectors and found remarkable expression in the reports from the boards of trustees of urban districts. Taking as examples the reports for 1874 from Saint John and Fredericton, one is impressed by the evidence of an extraordinary interest in education and by the thought and labour that the trustees had expended on everything relating to the schools of their respective cities. Clearly, the men who composed these boards had caught a vision of themselves as educationists. The report submitted by the Fredericton Board, as printed in the Journal of the Assembly for 1875, covers twenty-two pages, and deals not only with the question of buildings and equipment but also with such matters as the propriety of giving school prizes, the question of corporal punishment, and the arrangements which the Board had made for the introduction of Industrial Art Drawing. The report also gives an outline of the course of instruction for every grade, and includes extracts from the report of the Superin- tendent of the city schools. Principal Crocket of the Normal School, who frankly described the work of each teacher employed. Perhaps most significant of all is the recognition accorded by the Board to certain principles as essential to successful teaching.11 Undoubtedly the members of this Board had familiarized themselves with the pedagogical writings of Pestalozzi!

The report from the Board of Trustees of Saint John is also lengthy, and reveals the fact that the Board had held twenty-three meetings during the year and had discussed “everything connected with the management of the Public Schools in every department”. From the report of the Superintendent of City Schools, John Bennet, formerly the Superintendent of Education for the province, we learn that the Board had been concerned with such matters as evening schools, monthly home reports, regularity of attendance, the importance of music as a branch of education, the introduction of the new subject, drawing, and the improvement of the teaching in the Primary Schools through the use of object-lessons.12 It is no wonder that Superintendent Rand, in paying tribute to the intelligence and spirit of the school trustees in incorporated towns and cities, observed that his remarks had “a special fulness of application to the Trustees of the District of the City of Saint John”.13

From the first, Superintendent Rand emphasized the fact that much more depended on the teachers than on the buildings and equipment, essential though the latter were. He was therefore greatly distressed that in spite of the scarcity of trained teachers many applicants for training had to be rejected because of the limited accommodation in the old Normal School, and he constantly urged the necessity of a new building. When the Legislature in 1876 responded to a stirring speech by William Elder, editor of the Saint John Telegraph, and decided to spend $ 50,000 for a new Normal School, Rand gave Elder's speech publicity in the Educational Circularl4, and in his own address15 at the inaugural exercises of the new school intimated that the building would play an important part in elevating the quality of the instruction given in the schools of the province.

As another means of effecting this object Rand planned at an early date to use the ranking system, having outlined the scheme at length in his report for 187216. The plan was to come into effect in 1877, but so onerous was the task of organization during these years of transition that it was not until 1879 that a complete and graded course of instruction, based on uniform texts, was perfected, and all the schools could be ranked according to the quality of the work done by the teacher. We may presume that Rand had become acquainted with this idea during his visit to Great Britain in 1871,17 for the ranking plan, known there as “payment-by-results”, was popular in that country at the time. The device, one of the entering wedges of state control in England, had come into use about 1861, and afforded state grants based on the results of individual inspection and examination in reading, writing and arithmetic. Under this impetus teachers became more industrious and managers and pupils showed new life.18 Rand's application of the plan in New Brunswick was designed to discourage teachers from frequently changing their schools, to encourage regularity of school attendance, and to reward efficiency in teaching. To be eligible for classification, the school must have been conducted by the teacher for more than one term, and the teacher had to present for examination at least the average number of pupils in attendance for the term, an average not less than 60% of the total enrolment. The school or department was to be classified by the Inspector as being of the first rank if not less than 75% of the pupils presented for examination had passed, and not less than 60% of each class. For schools of the second rank the corresponding percentages were to be sixty and fifty, and for schools of the third rank fifty and forty.19 The narrowness of the English plan was avoided, all the subjects prescribed for the various standards or grades being made obligatory examination subjects.20 The rank of the school had no relation to the class of the teacher's license. In other words, the plan left ample room for the recognition of every form of teaching ability, afforded no shelter for “talented indolence”, and discouraged teachers from neglecting any one subject through over attention to a favorite study. Besides the ordinary provincial grants which teachers received according to their sex and license, teachers whose schools were classified were henceforth to receive an additional grant in terms of the ranking accorded to their schools at the time of the inspectoral visitation.21 As the duties and responsibilities of the Inspectors were greatly increased, the county inspectorates were abolished and eight full-time Inspectors were appointed, holding higher qualifications than those formerly required of the County Inspectors.22 From the early reports of the new officials it appears that there was a good deal of misunderstanding of the plan at first and that many teachers regarded it with disfavor, but the Superintendent did not doubt that if all cooperated, it would result in an immense improvement in the quality of the work done in all the schools.23

Through the medium of the Educational Circular, Rand sought to inspire teachers and trustees and to keep them informed on educational matters. These semi-annual publications contained official notices and much information and advice. The Superintendent also enthusiastically promoted County Institutes and made a provincial Educational Institute a regular feature, believing it to be a “desirable connection between the Profession and the Board of Education”.24 He was obviously pleased to report the interest which that body showed in his recommendations relative to secondary education,25 and was proud of the recommendations to the Board of Education from one of the committees of the Institute in 1880 touching the new course of instruction.26

Finally, during this period of reform and enthusiasm Rand repeatedly urged the adoption of means to improve the secondary education of the province. At the opening of the new Normal School he intimated that the impetus in this direction must come from the government, for he quoted John Stuart Mill at follows: 'The uncultivated cannot be judges of cultivation. Those who need most to be made wiser and better usually desire it least, and if they desired it, would be incapable of finding their way to it by their own light . . . . Any well-intentioned and tolerably civilized government may think, without presumption, that it does and ought to possess a degree of cultivation above the average of the community which it rules, and that it should therefore be capable of offering better education and better instruction to the people than the greater number of them would spontaneously elect.'27 However, in spite of Rand's solicitations, no reforms were effected in the secondary education of the province until the middle of the eighties, beyond a stiffening of the regulations governing the requirements for a Superior allowance,28 a change which increased the requirements for the receipt of the allowance but at the same time widened for a greater number of districts the opportunities of earning the grant, since heretofore only one school in each parish could receive such a bonus.

At the beginning of the eighties the Superintendent referred regretfully to the industrial depression which was responsible for the closing of schools in some areas and for a reduction in the local salaries paid to teachers.29 He was hopeful, however, that the situation was only temporary. It is true that at the close of the seventies business was particularly poor, but actually there could be no complete recovery, for in industry as well as in education the decade following Confederation had been a transitional period, but with this difference— the change had been for the worse, not for the better. Throughout the eighties and early nineties times continued difficult, partly because of depressed trade elsewhere, partly because of the disastrous effects on the provincial economy of the passing of wood and canvas from the sea-lanes of the world. The earlier hopes of a gain in population through immigration were abandoned, and the retention of native stock, rather than the attraction of immigrants, became the chief object of measures to develop the industries and resources of the province, especially after the census of 1891 had revealed the alarming extent of the drift in population to the United States and to other parts of Canada.30 While the provincial debt soared, largely as the result of a sectional scramble for railways, the educational services of the province suffered from various petty economies.

One of the first things which the Blair administration did was to order the discontinuance of the Educational Circular,31 an act which doubtless pleased that member of the legislature who stated in the house, without contradiction, that “it contained some sense and much nonsense”.32 The tendency of local boards of trustees to compete, not for the most competent teachers but for the cheapest, that is, those whose limited training and knowledge entitled them to the lowest class of license, became more pronounced than ever during this period, and even the government grants to teachers were reduced at the time of the abolition of the ranking system. The financial saving effected by the discontinuance of bonuses to classified schools was not, of course, the only reason for the abolition of this system. We are told that in England “payment-by-results” meant that 'the child became a money-earning unit to be driven; the teacher a sort of foreman whose business it was to keep his gang hard at work',33 that it perverted the inspectors from their true duties, made the lives and livings of teachers anxious and precarious, tended to reduce school work to a mechanical drill, forced students into examinations in defiance of the laws of health, and developed such a sentiment that 'failure caused not regret but indignation at the child'.34 In four years the system could not lead to the evils in New Brunswick that thirty years of operation caused in Great Britain, but obviously the plan was open to criticism. Certainly it added to the work of the inspectors,35 and it is doubtful if those officials could arrive at a fair estimate of the progress of a school in the few hours they could devote to its examination. If, for any reason, they failed to visit a school, then the teacher and the district lost the opportunity of earning the bonus. We note that during the operation of the plan the Board of Education received many complaints from teachers whose schools had not been visited, or had not received the ranking to which the teachers thought they were entitled.36 It would seem that few outside of Superintendent Rand had ever been thoroughly “sold” on the scheme, and when Rand had resigned to become a member of the staff at Acadia College, the way was clear for its abolition. Indeed, his successor, William Crocket, questioned the value of the system and suggested that it be discontinued.37 Unfortunately the fixed grants which were substituted for the allowances under the plan were smaller than the maximum grants which teachers had been able to earn under the ranking system. It is only fair to observe that a number of the legislators of the province expressed concern over this reduction,38 but there is significance in the Premier's remark that the government felt it had reached the extent of the financial ability of the country when it placed the grants at the new figures.39

Since the teaching profession did not receive its due from the country, the country did not always receive its due from the profession. The very irregularities with which teachers were charged reflected the pinched times—pitiful offences such as the alteration of a school draft from $ 9.83 to $ 25.83, 40 and misrepresentations regarding the class of license held.41 Invariably the official reports spoke of the need of an element of permanency in the profession. That at least a minimum of service might be obtained from trained teachers the practice was initiated in 1872 of exacting from every student-teacher at the Normal School a promise to teach in New Brunswick or forfeit the sum the trainee had received for travelling expenses to the training centre.42 Later the wording of the declaration was altered, the student-teacher being required to promise that if he did not teach, he would report to the Superintendent his reasons for failing to do so, and would consider himself under a moral obligation to pay to the Board the sum of twenty dollars for each session he had attended the Normal School.43 We do not know whether or not the many teachers who sought more remunerative work in the province during these years, or left New Brunswick for the south and west, had first fulfilled their obligations, but probably not many were as scrupulous as the girl who asked to be relieved from the obligation to repay the Board for her training because she was unable to secure a school in New Brunswick on account of her color.44

During this decade and a half, discussion in the legislature of educational topics seldom failed to elicit some form of protest against the cost, and periodically members registered their conviction that the state should not seek to provide anything but an elementary education. In the Legislative Council the session of 1880 witnessed a lively attack on the educational system as expensive and burdensome. The attitude of this body of the Tory tradition seemed to be: “Let the state provide for the teaching of the three R's, and a child, if he has ability and perseverance, will work out for himself a first class education”.45 The next year a resolution favoring economy in every department of legislation and administration was adopted by the Assembly. The premise of the section which related to education declared that the management of educational affairs should be rendered practical and economical, and the conclusion stated that whenever such management should be found to be impractical, or too expensive, or unadapted to the circumstances and needs of the country, measures of reform would receive the sanction of the House.46 In 1884, when the item for education was before the Assembly, a number of members were critical of the expense arising from the secondary schools and the University, and one legislator declared that the time had come when public education should be confined to the three R's.47 The same view was expressed in 1889.48 It is true that other considerations besides the need for economy prompted much of the criticism of the period. We note, for instance, a growing conviction that the needs of a large proportion of society were not being met, and the presence of a sentiment against the taxation of the “masses” in the interests of the “classes”. Moreover, the provincial sense of values may have been at fault, for railway deficits were accepted as the inevitable toll of progress, while a slight deviation from the most modest of school budgets was viewed with disapproval, even alarm. Nevertheless, one cannot avoid the conclusion that during these lean years the financial stringencies of the province, either through sheer necessity or through a species of rationalization, conditioned both practices in education and the thought-processes behind the practices.

As the nineteenth century drew to a close, circumstances were such as to engender throughout Canada feelings of optimism, patriotism and nationalism. New Brunswick, now definitely a part of the Dominion—albeit on the periphery of the national economy—shared to some extent in the new prosperity and in these sentiments. If the decline of the wooden shipbuilding industry and the extension of branch railways had meant stagnation for many coastal communities, courage and energy and opportunism were making Saint John a modern world port. Lumbering was still a staple industry with new possibilities opening up in pulpwood enterprises, and greater attention to the improvement and scientific development of agriculture was bringing noticeable results.49 A variety of small scale enterprises was taking root, the tourist trade was beginning to seem worthy of cultivation,50 and in the Hickman scheme modest hopes bloomed of bringing to New Brunswick high grade immigrants from Britain.51 New Brunswick's legislators, unable to express their faith in the future of their province in as comprehensive a phrase as Laurier's classic remark about Canada, nevertheless, made some pretty speeches,52 and the Premier asserted his conviction that New Brunswick was entering on a period of prosperity which would make her “the peer of any province in Canada”.53

The patriotic and nationalist sentiments stirred by the Diamond Jubilee and the Boer War led to increased provisions for school flags,54 stimulated an interest in the study of current events,55 promoted the observance of Empire Day,56 and focussed attention on the study of history, Canadian history in particular,57 which, according to the Inspectors' reports had heretofore been badly taught. The relation to education of the improved agricultural and industrial prospects of the province may be seen in the renewed emphasis on the idea of an agricultural school,58 in the serious consideration of the possibilities of a technical institution,59 and in a strong expression of opinion in the legislature that education should take a more practical turn for the benefit of the “toilers”, “the bone and sinew of the country”, the real producers of wealth.60 A Northumberland County Teachers' Institute listened to Mayor Snowball review their work from the standpoint of a business man;61 the border towns of St. Stephen and Milltown asked for and received permission from the Board of Education to include typing and shorthand in the curriculum of their high schools;62 an inspector declared that if one citizen might have his boy prepared for college, another had an equally good right to have his child trained to enter a business office;63 and references to the importance of manual training, domestic science and school gardening became more frequent and urgent in the reports of educational officials. Thus improvements in trade and industry hastened the hitherto slow response of the province to the newer trends in education.

During this whole period of thirty years, progress in education, while largely conditioned by the economic factor, was not uninfluenced by the dominant trends of the time. One of the most outstanding of these was an interest in science. In the civilized world at large science dominated the spirit of the age, appearing not only as an “instrument of culture” 64 but as the means by which man could make his environment yield him wealth and comfort. Increasingly, the application of science to industry, transportation, agriculture, health, sanitation, and education, wrought great changes. While for obvious reasons the process of change was neither early nor rapid in New Brunswick, it nonetheless occurred as inevitably as the distant creek is eventually flooded by the incoming tide.

From the educational viewpoint the cause of science was ably represented in the province during this period in the person of Loring Woart Bailey. A son of the American scientist, Jacob Whitman Bailey, he had grown to manhood in an atmosphere of science and on terms of familiarity with the great scientists of the day. At Harvard he had studied with Louis Agassiz, Asa Gray, and other eminent scientists, and graduated in the year of the publication of Darwin's, “Origin of Species”, coming to New Brunswick two years later, in 1861. From his father and his teachers he had caught the spirit of the new scientific age and it was a matter of significance that he was at that time brought into close relationship with New Brunswick's educational system. Although in himself a one-man department of science at the University of New Brunswick, he found time to become well acquainted, through private excursions and Dominion surveys, with the flora, the fauna, and the geologic formations of the province, the latter hitherto almost unexplored. As a newspaper article said at the time of his death, “he has left his mark on the scientific history of the Dominion; but his fame as a geologist was not confined to Canada”.65 We cannot dwell here on the place which be filled for nearly sixty years in the life of the University, nor can we do more than refer to the contributions which be made to natural science and geology, but we do note with interest that “his services were in constant demand at Teachers' Conventions and Summer Schools of Science, and were always cheerfully given”.66 We also observe that in the long list of his publications67—biological, geological, and general—there is included an elementary natural history which on June 24, 1887, was authorized by the Board of Education for use in the schools of New Brunswick.68

The addresses and lessons on the agenda of teachers' institutes during these years indicate an increasing recognition of the claims of science on the part of the teaching profession. As time went on it was a rare convention which did not feature at least one paper or lesson, either to add to the teachers' knowledge of some scientific subject, or to suggest better methods of teaching science. Perhaps the most interesting example, however, of enthusiasm for science among the teachers of the province was the Summer School of Science, established in 1887. This school, a voluntary organization, inter-provincial in its character, was held in annual sessions for several weeks in various centres ranging from Yarmouth in southwestern Nova Scotia to Campbellton in northern New Brunswick. Lectures, discussions, laboratory and field work, and excursions to local points of scientific or historical interest were features of the school. While such courses were given as literature, elocution, music, psychology, and pedagogy, scientific subjects received the greatest emphasis. In 1893, for instance, there were courses of lectures on astronomy, botany, chemistry, mineralogy, geology, physics, physiology, and zoology.69 In 1897 the President and Directors of the school petitioned for a grant-in-aid,70 and eventually the governments of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick each gave a small annual grant, with Prince Edward Island following suit later. Sometimes, too, the people of the locality where the school was held made a donation. For example, in 1900 the citizens of Bear River, Nova Scotia, gave one hundred dollars.71 Following the action of the Nova Scotia Council of Public Instruction in allowing an additional week of vacation to teachers who attended the school, the New Brunswick Board of Education granted the same privilege to the rural teachers of New Brunswick, whose normal holiday was only six weeks.72 The attendance of teachers from New Brunswick naturally varied with the location of the school. There were one hundred and seventy teachers from New Brunswick—an unprecedented number—at the session in Campbellton in 1899,73 but only thirty at Bear River the next year and only fourteen at Lunenburg in 1901. Eventually various circumstances, including the popularity of the newer summer courses for manual training, household science, and school gardening, affected the attendance, and the school was discontinued while the first World War was in progress. For over twenty years it had added to the knowledge and skill of hundreds of maritime teachers, and, in addition, had stood as a fine example of inter-provincial co-operation.

An interesting example of a plea for science from a prominent teacher of the province during the heyday of the Summer School of Science may be found in the tenor and content of a paper written by Philip Cox and read before the Northumberland County Teachers' Institute in 1893. Having referred to “arithmetical gymnastics, algebraical mazes and conundrums, and geometrical puzzles and problems” as the “gourmands” of the educational system, unduly emphasized, “not because of their superiority, either objectively or practically, to other means, but for our too often blind reverence of antiquity”, the writer said: “Why .07, an x or an L is regarded a more interesting and attractive thing for a child to observe, reason about and draw conclusions from, than a plant, a flower, a bird, a fish, a mineral, a chemical experiment, is hard for us to understand: it is a survival of a philosophy74 having little or no place in the learning and progress of the world today”. Having asserted that investigation was the keynote to mental development, this educator declared: “Our children must be led to examine the facts and laws of life and matter, and drink at the reservoir of eternal truth, wisdom and power, which, in the abstract, we call nature”.75

In the same year, in a paper on School Physics presented at the Saint John County Teachers' Institute, W. J. S. Myles contended that physics was the one science subject that would do more than any other to meet the demands of the industrial interests of the country and at the same time furnish mental training and culture. Teachers, he said, must awaken to the fact that hundreds of the boys of the province were looking forward to careers as electrical, mechanical and sanitary engineers, and to industrial positions, in all of which a greater or less knowledge of physics was indispensable. Referring to the new laboratory at McGill and to the more modest measures at the provincial uni- versity, the speaker pointed out that the colleges looked to the schools to furnish the preliminary steps in giving students a slight knowledge of the methods of “physical study”. “The idea that a college education should embrace only the humanities, mathematics, philosophy and a smattering of science is now happily antiquated . . . . Science subjects claim a prominent place in our curriculum today, because we live in what may be termed the age of science.” 76

Occasionally even the trustee boards of urban schools made particular mention of science in their reports.77 The Superintendents of Education, each in turn, emphasized the importance of observation and investigation, reminded teachers to make collections of specimens, lamented the limited work done by the secondary schools, commended the Summer School of Science, and gave attention to the question of science texts. The curriculum of the schools, if one might judge by the prescribed books, offered an imposing and lengthening list of science courses in the advanced grades, botany, geology, nautical astronomy, physics, physiology and hygiene, and elementary chemistry, and in the lower grades, nature study, the chemistry of common things, lessons in health and agriculture, and the study of “useful knowledge”. But one must not be misled by all this. It should be borne in mind that the teachers who attended the Summer School of Science and listened at the institutes to addresses and discussions on the importance of science were a decided minority, and that there were hundreds of districts, especially in rural areas, where neither the teachers nor the people cared a whit about the acquisition of scientific knowledge, or strove for the scientific approach to any subject. Actually, in only a few of the larger centres were there the qualified teachers, the equipment, and the demand, to render possible the extensive work in science which the prescribed texts indicated might be carried out. It would appear, moreover, that much which purported to be instruction in science was badly taught. Speaking from the standpoint of the grammar schools, Myles, in the paper we have already noted, even ventured to say that the claim that the New Brunswick school system ranked among the most progressive was not tenable, if it were viewed in the light of modern methods of science teaching. He declared that in not one high school of the province was experimental physics taught, and added: “Much of our physics teaching appeals entirely to the memory, some to memory and observation, very little, if any, to observation and reflection”.78 Inspector Mersereau, referring to the lessons on Useful Knowledge, said that these had created more misapprehension among teachers and more hostility among parents than any other subject. He found that while some teachers had made collections of plants, woods, and minerals, and had used these to excite thought and to promote enquiry, others merely required their pupils to memorize lists of plants and minerals with their uses and qualities.79 It is not unlikely that even when object teaching was employed, Messenger's observations about the use of object lessons in many of the American schools previous to 1890 were applicable to their use in New Brunswick. “Many teachers thought if they had before their pupils any sort of hodge-podge of miscellaneous objects for the pupils to perceive through the senses they were getting a valuable training, no matter what they perceived in the objects and no matter what the relations of the objects might be.” 80

We see, therefore, that over against the keen appreciation by a few of the meaning of science in a modern world there were confused ideas, and unwillingness or inability, because of lack of knowledge and training, to harmonize practices and attitudes with the new forces of science. Certainly agriculture and forest maintenance continued to suffer all too much during these years from unscientific and haphazard methods, and a scientific spirit was often lacking in the consideration of problems involving the preservation and restoration of physical and mental health. In other words, to return to our metaphor of an earlier page, the ocean tide had as yet only created ripples on the surface of the creek.

Another outstanding characteristic of the last decades of the nineteenth century was the growth of political and social democracy. In the United States the north had triumphed over the aristocratic south, and in many countries, notably Britain, the social-democratic forces set in motion by the Industrial Revolution were working a change in society and government. New Brunswick, founded in reaction against the American Revolution, had missed the early democratic impulse, and, not being highly industrialized, did not suffer from those evils which hastened the growth of democracy in England and made its achievement somewhat tumultuous. The development of responsible government had been slow and comparatively unspectacular, the popular attitude towards municipal institutions had been one of indifference, the struggle for a democratic school system was protracted, and the movement to abolish the Legislative Council, the existence of which robbed responsible government of half its fruits, lacked urgency and force. Eventually, as we have seen, responsible government and a free school system were achieved. During the last quarter of the century the establishment of municipal institutions became compulsory and the Legislative Council was abolished-although more, perhaps, for economic, than for political and social reasons. Progress in the extension of the suffrage was cautious, even slow, the basis of the franchise remaining practically the same from 1855 to 1889. In the latter year, during the Blair regime, a bill was passed which practically granted manhood suffrage.81 It stopped, however, at votes for women. Even an amendment to give the franchise to widows and spinsters of property was defeated. The right of women who owned property to vote at municipal elections and at school meetings, and to act as school trustees, was, however, conceded, but not without opposition. In 1886, when William Pugsley sponsored a measure to permit women to become school trustees, one member of the legislature, E. L. Wetmore, objected on the score that school meetings were often disorderly, sticks and fence-poles being used by contending parties. On this remark a voice from the Assembly cried: “Let the women use the broomsticks”. Wetmore declared that the bill was really the entering wedge of woman suffrage, and John McAdam of St. Stephen said that he would rather fail to win an election than depend on the votes of his wife and daughters.82 Petitions on the question from the women of Saint John went unheeded until 1896, when the Honorable H. R. Emmerson successfully promoted a bill to provide for the appointment of two women to boards of school trustees in towns and cities.83 From 1885 to the close of the century the question of the franchise for women in provincial elections came up repeatedly. In 1894 there were petitions signed by over 10,000 persons,84 and again in 1899 the question prompted a further solicitation. The plea of the petitioners was ably supported in the House by such men as A. A. Stockton and Silas Alward of Saint John, H. R. Emmerson of Dorchester, James Porter of Andover, A. A. Killam of Moncton, H. H. Pitts of Fredericton and M. C. Atkinson of Bristol. Premier A. G. Blair, on the other hand, consistently showed himself an opponent of this reform. A few statements culled from the debates on the subject will illustrate the growth of the democratic idea, may charm with their naiveté, and will illuminate the character of the legislatures which during these same years hesitated to take action in the direction of educational reforms.85

Alward expressed himself as happy to feel that he belonged to that class of persons who, in every legislature, find themselves “the advanced guard of liberty and progress”.86 D. R. Moore of Stanley declared that the bill to enfranchise women aimed to strike off “the last remaining shackle of electoral restriction imposed by the laws and precedent of the past”.87 Stockton thought that the “whole history of civilization had been to elevate women in the scale of existence and make them in every respect the equals of men”.88 Emmerson, one of the stoutest advocates of this reform, contended that in a democracy the government derived its powers from the governed. Women certainly came under the heading of the governed. “A disfranchised class is an oppressed class.” 89 The only arguments against woman suffrage, he said, had their origin in the barbaric past, “when women were either the decorated toy or the degraded drudge of men”.90 Speaking of prejudices against women's votes, he cried: “In large communities, exposed to the bright light of the thinking world, these prejudices cannot stand for a moment”.91 He predicted that “future ages would regard with amazement the long struggle on the part of women for the simple right of personal representation which ought to be the birthright of every citizen under our constitution.” 92 Porter expressed the same view. The constitution, he said, professed to be by the people and for the people, but only one-half of the people had a voice in affairs.93 Emmerson also pointed out that thousands of women earned their own livelihood, and in the teaching profession outnumbered men four to one, but were generally paid not much more than half the salaries men received for doing the same work. He felt, he said, that if women had the vote, the sentiment of the country with respect to the compensation which they should receive would be changed, and that in the light of common sense it should be.94

In the course of the discussions, inevitably the Queen was mentioned a number of times, various members pointing out that if the head of the empire was a woman, it was absurd to deny women the right to vote for Her Majesty's representatives, while other members contended that one secret of Queen Victoria's popularity lay in the fact that she did not “meddle” with politics.

For the most part the opponents of the movement tended to place women on a lofty pedestal. How horrible to expose her to the rowdyism and corruption of the polling booth! Give women the vote and next they would demand the right to sit in the Assembly. How embarrassing then if one member should call another a damned liar, as had been known to happen. How painful to hear a woman wrangling across the floors of the House after the manner of the Attorney General (Blair) and the leader of the Opposition (Hanington).95 To throw women into the storm-strife of politics was to jeopardize the homes of the country.96 “Behind all legislation is physical force”, said J. D. Hazen in 1899, “and in the end the men must rule.” If women were given this privilege, how could they, he asked, refuse to serve on juries or to perform military duty if called upon.97

Blair said that if he did not know how talented the supporters of this movement were, he would feel “that they had simply given themselves away to a species of fantastic sentimentalism not in accord with a wise and judicious public policy.” 98 He had, he said, too much respect for woman to wish to see her “dragged from the height upon which she stood and brought into the arena of politics”. When the applause which greeted this noble sentiment had died away, Dr. Stockton interjected “put her in a cage like a canary”, whereupon Blair said he would “sooner see her in a cage than in a polling booth”. The women of Kansas and Wyoming might have the vote, he admitted, but these were crude countries, just emerging from barbarism. He would rather follow Bright and Gladstone than the statesmen of Wyoming.99 The only English-governed community of the world which at the time (1889) had gone to the lengths proposed in the New Brunswick legislature was the Isle of Man. “No doubt it might be said that we had as much right to lead as to follow, but he thought such a course was not practical politics.” 100 Emmerson, in reply, said that Blair had given “the greatest exhibition of Rip Van Winkleism ever seen on the Boors of this house”, and seemed to forget that the world moved rapidly.101

The remark of G. J. Baird of Victoria County that there was much in the rude west from which the province might learn lessons102 was deemed unfortunate by the Honorable R. J. Ritchie of Saint John, who said irrelevantly that he did not think Canada should be prepared to follow the state of morals of the republic, considering the case with which a divorce could be obtained in Chicago and other parts of the United States.103 H. A. Powell of Sackville said that in every civilization the arena of politics had been for men. “When that divine law is interfered with, the result is the injury—it might be the ultimate undermining—of society . . . . The apostles commenced their work at Jerusalem, and the place for woman to commence and carry on her high and sainted mission is in the home.” 104 Pugsley, who had somewhat changed his views between 1886 and 1889, “shrank from hasty legislation”, and felt that “before a change so radical, so permanent and far reaching was adopted, the question should be submitted to the people”.105

On the whole the legislature approved of the change whereby “the established seat of learning, which, but a few years ago, haughtily forbade her (woman's) approach within her sacred cell, now opens widely her portals and bids the fair aspirant enter and drink deeply of her Pierian water” 106—in simple words, they approved of the admission of women to the University of New Brunswick.107 They also gave women's organizations credit for the insertion in the school curriculum of lessons on the effects of alcohol and tobacco. But the majority, on every occasion when the question of the suffrage came up, shrank with Pugsley from passing legislation along the lines advocated, and so the province entered upon the twentieth century with this last “shackle of electoral restriction”. Yet the fact that the subject received the attention it did in the legislature shows that the province, suspicious though it might be of drastic changes, was reacting to the growth of the equalitarian spirit.

The expanding political democracy of the period affected only slightly the field of industrial relations. To begin with, prevailing lip service to the dignity of labor, natural enough in a country where the majority of people had to work with their hands, saved the working classes to a great extent from finding in a crushing sense of social inferiority an incentive to action in their own interests. In a province of limited capital, modest industrial enterprises, and many manual workers, the gap between the capitalist and the labourer was naturally less pronounced than in the great industrial areas of Britain and the United States. Then too, only a fraction of the workers of the province were the employees of others, and when so employed, they were often seasonal employees only. Consequently the organization of labor groups for the acquisition or protection of rights could proceed but slowly. Moreover, while agriculture and capital had their representatives and their ardent supporters in the legislature, there were few members to speak for labour,108 as Atkinson pointed out in 1888.109 Although Moore warned that under universal suffrage the working classes would become a powerful factor in the politics of the country,110 the introduction of legislation to protect certain classes of labourers from being defrauded of their wages was not received with very great enthusiasm. On various excuses the adoption of such legislation was delayed, the chief argument being that measures of this kind would hamper trade, and would cause much litigation by which only the lawyers would benefit.111 Eventually, however, a bill respecting mechanics' and labourers' liens was accepted.112

A corollary of the doctrine of democratic government is the conception of the state's obligation to educate its citizens.113 By the Act of 1871 the province of New Brunswick had accepted that obligation. In 1881 Superintendent Rand stated that back of the common school course of the province was the assumption that the public school was an agency for the general education of all classes, and was designed to impart a common education useful to all and open to all.114 But there was still a long way to go before the educational system of New Brunswick could approach that modern ideal of democracy in education enunciated by Reisner as follows: “Ideally considered, democracy in education implies generous opportunity for every child, in spite of social distinctions and economic handicaps, to profit by educational opportunities that will enable him to develop his ability as far as possible to the ultimate advantage of himself and of society. It implies further, that the internal economy of the school is to be such that each child may discover his best capacities and may find the means of developing them; and, finally, it means that the objective of school practices is the increase of intelligence in the pupil about everyday situations and the growth in power to meet the problems of citizenship in a critically intelligent spirit.” 115

In the light of this definition the school system of New Brunswick fell far short of democracy. Many schools were small, ugly, and poorly equipped; many were staffed by untrained or inexperienced teachers who lacked culture, vision and a knowledge of child psychology. Thus the internal economy of many schools failed to provide the atmosphere in which children could discover and develop their abilities, and could grow in intelligence and power. Moreover, although in theory the system offered educational opportunities for all, local indifference in many areas prevented the establishment of schools. If the people have a right to self-government, they have also a duty to qualify themselves for the exercise of government.116 It would seem that many of the citizens of New Brunswick failed to accept the obligation to make the most of themselves through such educational facilities as were provided. In 1890 Superintendent Crocket stated that 25% of the children of the province between five and fifteen years of age were deriving no benefit from the school system,117 and in 1895, according to the Honorable James Mitchell, the average attendance of the pupils enrolled was only 56%.118 If the people were negligent in this matter, so was the Legislature. Superintendent Crocket pointed out in 1891 that he had repeatedly urged on the Legislature the need of a compulsory attendance law, that the Inspectors had referred time and again to the increasing feeling in favor of such a provision, that many urban boards of trustees in their annual reports119 had given expression to the opinion that nothing short of a compulsory measure would secure the full benefits of the system, and that the press of the province had over and over again argued in favor of enforced attendance. If, he asked, the power of the government to secure the education of every child was not inherent in the Act of 1871, on what principle of right or reason had the state the authority to tax all persons and property for the support of the public schools. This is only one example of the many strong statements on this subject coming from the Chief Superintendent and Inspectors, who also seldom failed to mention the existence of compulsory school laws in other countries. The Legislature, however, continued to postpone action throughout the nineteenth century, and when in 1905 a compulsory school measure was enacted, the optional nature of the law robbed it of much of its efficacy.

In addition to the children who received a deficient education, or none at all, because of the stupidity and indifference of parents and legislators, there were others whose unfortunate economic circumstances prescribed narrow limits to their schooling. The influence of the economic factor was recognized, of course, but the province lacked utopian socialists and economic realists. There was no one to speak after the fashion of Horace Greeley, a friend of the labor movement in the United States, who expressed the belief that before education could become what it should and must be, the social life whence it proceeded, whither it tended, should be reformed.121 The fact that poverty limited the education of so many children was perhaps a matter of regret to many thoughtful individuals; to others it almost appeared as a divine dispensation to enable the ambitious poor to show the stuff of which they were made. With the exception of a few scholarships leading to the provincial university, no aid was made available for the poor individual. The district of very low valuation received special aid from the government for the building of schoolhouses and for the maintenance of a minimum of education. That so many districts were classed as “poor” districts was largely due to the arrangements whereby the province was divided for school purposes into small units in order to arouse local pride and a sense of local responsibility. Rand himself as we have seen, regarded the arrangement as a temporary one.122 In 1885 Inspector Dole urged the abolition of all existing small districts, with their petty local machinery, and complained that his views on this subject in a previous report had received no attention.123 Toward the close of the century Superintendent Inch began to emphasize the evils of the multiplicity of small districts, to recommend the policy of consolidation, and to point to the benefits of consolidation in various American states and in Australia.124 Inspector Carter also expressed strong approval of such a move toward centralization.125 In 1900 the Superintendent called on the Board of Education to consolidate arbitrarily small contiguous districts, in view of the fact that in June 1899 there were 490 districts where the average school attendance was less than 12, seventy-six of which had an average attendance of less than 6. He added that he had little hope of the adoption of consolidation in New Brunswick so long as the matter was left to the votes of ratepayers at the annual school meetings.126 Events proved the accuracy of his judgment. A few consolidated schools were established early in the twentieth century under the impetus of Sir William Macdonald's scheme for the introduction of manual training. After that, for forty years, local rivalries, inertia, and a fear of change conspired to prevent the extension of consolidation as part of the New Brunswick school system. Even a suggestion to increase the county fund from thirty cents to fifty cents per head, in order further to relieve poor districts and to offset inequality of assessments, went down before a storm of protest.127

If it was true that the elementary education of the province was not completely democratic, in that not all the children of the province could take advantage of the opportunities for education, those opportunities often being exceedingly unequal, it was still more true that the secondary education of the province required a democratic extension. The increase of high school facilities was in accord with the spirit of the age. England, forced to recognize the superiority in industry and invention of the Germans, extended and modernized her system of secondary education during these years, and high schools were multiplied in the United States and in Ontario. Scarcely any subject gave the educators of New Brunswick greater concern that the state of those venerable institutions, the county grammar schools. By the Act of 1871 the grammar school boards might unite with the common school boards, and some of them did. However, for geographical and economic reasons the great majority of the children of a county could not attend grammar schools. d'Avray's suggestion of scholarships from the common schools to the high schools had been ignored. Moreover, with a few exceptions, the grammar and superior schools of the province could furnish no guarantee of adequate secondary instruction, for many of them filled the place and did the work of district schools.128 In 1880 Inspector Gaunce had found an average of only seven pupils for the preceding term in the Victoria County Grammar School, yet the school received a grant of $ 550 per year.129 In 1882 there were only 258 pupils in the province engaged in the study of what might be called high school subjects, and of these 84 were in Saint John and 96 in Fredericton.130 In 1887 Superintendent Crocket declared that outside of the two cities just named there was no grammar school providing a complete course of secondary education, and in 1891 he said that while other institutions had been remodelled to meet modern requirements, the grammar schools were just about where they had been three generations before.131 As late as 1894 Superintendent Inch complained that an ungraded school might be classed as a superior school, and that there were grammar schools in which less than 20 pupils were doing work in advance of grade eight.132 In 1896 he reported that Moncton, with an enrolment beyond grade eight of 84 and 91 per term, received only a superior grant of $ 250, while the grammar school of the county at Shediac received $ 350, yet had no pupils beyond grade eight the first term and only 8 the second term. Obviously, the secondary education of the province needed over-hauling.

We noted earlier that there were people in the province who denied the duty of the state to provide for free secondary education. Others, seeing that few children could take advantage of such education, complained that it benefited only the “classes”, and declared, not without reason, that much of the money devoted to secondary education was wasted. Many also complained that the secondary education which was provided did not meet the needs of the majority of the pupils. Of such complaints we note one in the form of a letter published in the New Brunswick Journal of Education in 1886. The writer of this letter stated: “For the larger scholars of the Province there are no inducements to continue at school. Especially those who do not intend or are not able to take a college course . . . . This is not right. It is not in the best interests of the Province. Three-quarters of the male pupils intend or are forced to become tillers of the soil. Now, Mr. Editor, for this large number of pupils what provision is made?” 133

Perhaps because of lack of unanimity of views on the question of secondary education reforms were typically belated or piecemeal in character. Possibly the monopolistic spirit of favored localities and groups proved the leading obstacle. There was considerable opposition from Saint John in 1884 to the measure which rendered compulsory the dissolution of the old grammar school corporations.134 Fredericton was opposed to the change by which the Collegiate School ceased to draw a grant from the University of New Brunswick and became the York County Grammar School. Areas in which grammar schools had been maintained for decades with small expense to the locality objected to the transfer of their grammar schools to more suitable points. As Superintendent Inch intimated in 1896, the residents of such localities regarded any change as an infringement of vested interests.135 The favorite suggestion of Superintendent Crocket that the petty grammar schools be abolished and five well-equipped, properly staffed, suitably located Provincial High Schools be established136 was not acted upon, but legislation in 1884 and 1887 tended toward the unification of the whole educational system from grade one to the university, and improved both grammar and superior schools. Higher standards were exacted with reference to equipment, enrolment of pupils, extent and quality of work done, and in 1895 special financial aid encouraged the employment in grammar schools of more than one teacher holding a grammar school license and doing grammar school work. High school entrance examinations were established, also Grammar School leaving and University Matriculation examinations, and in 1898 a new course of instruction for high schools was ratified. In 1900 Superintendent Inch could report that the number of pupils receiving instruction in the high school grades had increased 150% from 1891 to 1899.137

In the course of instruction the emphasis continued to be on the traditional studies, although the Chief Superintendents in turn often spoke of the demands of modern times, and there were complaints from a number of quarters that the secondary education of the province seemed designed to serve the select few who planned to attend the university. The expense which changes would involve seemed a weighty factor and the force of tradition was strong. Then, too, those parents who were able to give their children a college education generally showed the greatest interest in the schools, and were the most influential persons. Finally, the mass of the people were slow to speak and the legislature was slow to act. Thus it was only at the very close of the century that there was a move toward the inclusion of manual training, domestic science, and business subjects in the curricula of the high schools of the province.

A democratic society, aiming at the good of all, recognizes the importance of the welfare of the individual, and is concerned with questions of health-physical, mental, and moral. In 1897 Stockton, reviewing in the New Brunswick legislature the sixty years of Victoria's reign, referred to the great advances during that period in almost everything that tended to uplift and enoble humanity and to humanize the economic and sanitary conditions of the people. At no previous time, he said, had agencies for relieving suffering, caring for the distressed, and holding out a helping hand to the weak been so numerous and obtrusive.138

With the establishment of local Boards of Health and the wider use of vaccination, New Brunswick during these years sought to improve the health of its people and to ward off the terrible epidemics which periodically in the earlier days had caused a heavy loss of life and efficiency. In relation to education, the increased interest in public health promoted an emphasis on the ventilation and sanitary arrangements of schools, and led to the introduction into the curriculum of lessons on health and temperance. We find that schools were now regularly closed by the boards of health at any threat of an infectious or contagious disease, a wise precaution certainly, but one which worked hardship to the teachers of the province, until in 1894 the Board of Education sanctioned the payment to teachers of that portion of their government grant lost when their schools were closed by the Board of Health.139 The prevalence of illness among the Normal School students led Principal Mullin to apply in 1885 to the Board of Education for the appointment of a medical adviser to examine into the physical condition of the students on their admission to the institution, and to attend them in case of illness. The application was not complied with,140 but in 1890 the Board ordered that all applicants for admission to the Normal School were to furnish to the Principal a certificate of general good health, signed by a registered physician.141 In 1899 an unduly large number of cases of typhoid and measles among the students of the Normal School caused a furore over the sanitary conditions in the school. However, the investigation which followed showed that the sanitary system, “although somewhat behind the latest developments of the plumber's art” was efficient enough, and that the prevalence of typhoid could in no wise be charged to the state of the building or to the supervision of the staff.142 In the same year the Principal urged, unsuccessfully of course, the erection of a dormitory for the young ladies at the Normal School, where the dangers of contagion and infection could be reduced to a minimum, and proper hours of study could be prescribed.143

During these years the Provincial Asylum received a good deal of attention in the legislature. The management of the institution was frequently questioned, but invariably from the standpoint of cost of operation. When the government leaders expressed pride, as the Hon. James Mitchell did in 1892,144 over the fact that the asylum cost less per capita for maintenance than any institution of the kind, public or private, in America, few members of the legislature felt called on to question this state of affairs as a source of gratification.

The province was slow to undertake measures to combat delinquency and to aid physical defectives. In 1893, largely through the generosity and energy of Lady Tilley, a reform school for boys was established.145 No early provincial measures were taken for the education of blind children, or deaf mutes. For a number of years, the school for the deaf and dumb at Fredericton and a similar institution at Halifax urged the government of New Brunswick for assistance, as pupils from that province attended these institutions and frequently were unable to pay anything for their training. Finally the school at Halifax refused to accept New Brunswick pupils unless the government followed the example of Nova Scotia in giving a grant for each pupil in attendance from the province.146 In 1892 the legislature passed an act by which the Fredericton school for deaf mutes was to receive from the County School Fund a grant of $ 60 per year for every child from New Brunswick in attendance at the school. A somewhat similar provision was made for the education of blind children at the Halifax School for the Blind.147 Small though these grants were, they proved an added strain on the County School Fund of the province, which, however was not increased in spite of the new demands on it.

Retarded pupils and mental defectives were still unprovided for when the century closed. The idea of the Kindergarten for children of pre-school age had begun to attract attention about 1880,148 at the very time when, in the United States, Froebel's theories were beginning to divide the honors with Pestalozzian principles.149 In 1898 there were two kindergartens in Saint John, one in Fredericton, and one in Moncton.150 Campbellton seems to have had a kindergarten department in 1899.151 Superintendent Inch observed in that year that these were all established and maintained by private effort. He himself was strongly in favor of such schools, having suggested in 1892 the establishment of a kindergarten department in connection with the Normal School, but the overcrowding of the building had led to the abandonment of the scheme.152 As a matter of fact, the kindergarten has not become a part of the school system of New Brunswick, such schools of that nature being private institutions.

From the standpoint of pedagogy the growth of democracy in the last half of the nineteenth century led to considerable interest in the psychology of the child, and in the best methods of teaching. Judging from the official reports, the Superintendents of Education in New Brunswick and the Inspectors were conversant with the theories of the great educators of their own and an earlier day. At the Normal School student-teachers received at least a brief exposure to the latest pedagogical theories. When the period of training was extended in 1871, Principal Crocket said that hitherto the lives and principles of distinguished educators such as Pestalozzi and Arnold had been little more than alluded to, but that the extension of the term would henceforth allow the student-teachers an opportunity to devote more time to professional work.153 We note that to the list of texts for teachers the Board of Education in 1887 added the following: Fitch's Lectures on Teaching, Payne's Science and Art of Education, Browning's Educational Theories, and, for grammar school teachers, Sully's Outlines of Psychology. Evidence that the Inspectors were interested in the teachers' attitudes toward their profession is found in a number of reports, of which the following are examples. In 1887 Inspector Mersereau said that the teachers of the Institute for Northumberland and Gloucester Counties had unanimously adopted Payne's Science and Art of Teaching for reading during the year, and for discussion at subsequent meetings.155 In 1884 Inspector Oakes reported in disgust that many teachers were unacquainted with professional literature. He had found those who had never read, never even heard of, Calkin's Object Lessons, or Herbert Spencer on Education. Far too many, he lamented, made no effort to put into practice the principles they had learned at the Normal School, seldom attended an institute, or read a book or journal on education.156 The fact that the New Brunswick Journal of Education, and later the Educational Review, with which the Journal merged in 1887, received very limited patronage from the teaching profession of the province bears testimony to the truth of Inspector Oakes' observations.

The Superintendents frequently discussed the practices of other countries, and the teachers, through the Summer School of Science, and an occasional convention, such as that held at St. Stephen in joint session with the teachers of Maine,157 and the inter-provincial conference at Saint John in 1888,158 gained a few interesting contacts with the teachers of adjacent states and provinces. The eventual extension of the Normal School session to one year made possible a greater degree of professional training, but the limited staff of the institution, the lack of space in the Model School, and the necessity of teaching academic subjects to the student-teachers, all combined to set definite limits to the amount of actual training in professional work. Invariably, the Superintendent of Education and the Principal of the Normal School stressed the need of facilities for a more adequate professional training.159 Friction among the members of the staff of the Normal School in 1899, which reached such a point that one member of the faculty struck another, brought on an investigation. The Commissioners appointed for the purpose not only enquired into the strained relations which had existed for some time between the Principal and the teaching staff, but also probed into the methods pursued by the staff. Having found that only about one-fifth of the school time was taken up with instruction in method and professional work, and the other four-fifths was devoted to such ordinary scholastic work as ought to be obtained in any superior or grammar school, the Commissioners called for a reorganization of the Normal School with a view to securing more training in professional work than was possible under the existing management.160 As a matter of fact, a short time before this, Principal Mullin, in his annual report, had strongly emphasized the need of better facilities to provide more practice teaching, and had expressed the hope that the day was not far distant when the strength of the Normal School would be expended in securing to its teachers a sound theoretical and practical acquaintance with education, its principles and its practices, its history and its literature.161 The following year he suggested the abolition of third class licenses, the extension to a year and a half of the course for first class teachers, and the gradual reorganization of entrance requirements, so that eventually the teaching of academic subjects at the Normal School might be entirely eliminated, and full attention given to purely professional training.162 In 1901 the Board of Education raised the age of entrance to seventeen and increased the requirements for admission. The Superintendent said, however, that since few persons were willing to spend two years at the Normal School, unless the prospects of financial reward were brighter, the further extension of the Normal session was impossible, and the only practicable course was to continue the teaching of both academic and professional subjects, so as to improve both scholarship and professional knowledge and skill.163 We observed earlier that forty years passed before the practical suggestions of the first Principal of the Normal School were carried out. Another period of four decades has passed since New Brunswick's educationists, at the close of the nineteenth century, hoped for the early establishment of a two-year Normal course. Even after allowance is made for the effect of two wars, and other factors, this delay is surely unduly long.

Among the educational displays from New Brunswick at various exhibitions during this period was one shown at the Indian and Colonial Exhibition held in London in 1886. After viewing this exhibit, William Lant Carpenter, an English educationist who was interested in the condition of education in the “colonies”, reported as follows: “It is somewhat remarkable that a small colony, mainly agricultural, should possess one of the most perfect systems of instruction in primary schools with which I am acquainted . . . . There is a progressive course of instruction for all schools in which the subjects appear to have been selected, arranged and appointed, with a due regard to sound educational principles”.164 In commenting on this tribute, one might observe that in England at the time elementary education was not yet completely free, so that in this respect the New Brunswick system might indeed seem impressive by comparison. Moreover, the exhibit, although accompanied by an historical sketch of the development of education in New Brunswick, could not present an altogether accurate picture of actual conditions and practices. Undoubtedly, however, this particular British educationist was impressed by the evidence he saw. The following tribute from the New England Journal of Education in 1881 was also gratifying to Superintendent Rand. Referring to the prescribed course of instruction for the schools of New Brunswick, this educational journal said: “While two-thirds of the Country Districts in New England are plodding along with the go-as-you-please type of district school, with no efficient course of study, untrained teachers and no supervision, our neighbors in the Provinces are laying out a system of public education that, if properly worked, will bring forth a powerful and well-instructed people in half a century that need ask no favors of anybody on the western continent”.165

The educational officials themselves in New Brunswick, at the time of the passage of the Act of 1871 and for many years afterwards, repeatedly expressed the conviction that the province had erected a noble foundation, and that when the system was in complete working order it would be second to none.166 The request from South Africa at the close of the Boer War that Principal Mullin of the Normal School, and a number of other New Brunswick teachers, should be given leave of absence to journey to South Africa and there lay the foundation of a school system along the principles of the system in New Brunswick appeared as lively proof of the excellence of the New Brunswick system. Today the general belief seems to be that the educational services of the Maritime Provinces are of an inferior grade, a belief which has found expression in a number of Maritime briefs. Indeed, the lesson of history is surely that institutions, however well devised they may be at the time of their inception, require constant modification in the light of new needs, as humanity adapts itself to the eternal flux of things. Societies that attempt to remain static inevitably perish. It was a healthy sign that the defects that appeared in New Brunswick's educational system were becoming very evident to many observers at the close of the nineteenth century. Unfortunately not all the old defects and deficiencies have yet been corrected. Moreover, the task of remodelling, a task which in a sense must be continuous, has had many checks and postponements. It is scarcely possible, however, that those whose duty it is to build and rebuild in the present and immediate future will have to face obstacles, difficulties, and vexations any greater than those which confronted the pioneer builders of the past.

Notes

^1. Superintendent Rand's slogan was “schools for all, and all at school”.

^2. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1869, Annual Report on Schools, Appendix 4, pp. 11, 12.

^3. Office of the Executive Council of New Brunswick: Minutes of Executive Council, Vol. 9, March 16, 1877, p. 560.

^4. Department of Education of New Brunswick: Minutes of Board of Education, Oct. 3, 1879-Oct. 1882; Aug. 30, 1880, p. 58.

^5. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1898, p. 171.

^6. Professor Murray, a native of New Brunswick, and later President of the University of Saskatchewan, was, at the time of this address, professor of philosophy at Dalhousie University. Much of his address is still of significance in relation. to the status of the teaching profession in New Brunswick. (See Murray, W. C., “Present Special Position and Prospects of Teaching as a Profession”, Journal of House of Assembly of New Brunswick, 1900, Annual Report on Schools, Appendix G, pp. 159-173.)

^7. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly of New Brunswick, 1902, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, pp. LIII-LXIII.

^8. The term “Sloyd” was used for manual training schools in Sweden where the system originated.

^9. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1902, p. 156.

^10. Murray (1), p. 170.

^11. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1875, Annual Report on Schools, Appendix C, pp. 41-62.

^12. Ibid., pp. 79-99.

^13. Ibid., Part I, pp. XXXVII.

^14. Rand, Educational Circular Nos. I-VIII, Circular No. 3, pp. 35-39.

^15. Ibid., Circular No. 6, pp. 50-67.

^16. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1873, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, pp. XXXIII.

^17. Laidlaw, Vol. XV, No. 3, April-May, 1944, p. 330.

^18. Hughes & Klemm, Vol. 23, p. 35.

^19. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1880, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, pp. XLVI, XLVII.

^20. Ibid., p. XLV.

^21. Rand, Educational Circular No. 13, 1882, p. 417.

^22. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1880, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, pp. XLIII-XLIV.

^23. Ibid., p. XLIX.

^24. Ibid., p. XLII.

^25. Ibid., p. XLII.

^26. Ibid., 1881, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. XXIX.

^27. Rand, Educational Circulars Nos. II-VIII, Circular No. 6, pp. 65, 66.

^28. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1881, Annual Report on Schools, Part 1, p. XVII.

^29. Ibid., pp. X, XV.

^30. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1892, pp. 5, 7, 8, 33; Ibid., 1895, pp. 20, 21, 28.

^31. Ibid., 1884, p. 127.

^32. Ibid., p. 126.

^33. Reisner, p. 263.

^34. Hughes & Klemm, Vol. 23, p. 36.

^35. New Brunswick: Journal House of Assembly, 1884, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. XXXI.

^36. The Minutes of the Board of Education for these years contain references to the receipt of a number of such complaints.

^37. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1884, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. XXXI.

^38. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1884, pp. 126-130.

^39. Ibid., p. 127.

^40. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, Dec. 1, 1882-Dec. 3, 1902; Oct. 16, 1884, p. 68.

^41. A number of such cases are recorded in the Minutes of the Board of Education between 1882 and 1902.

^42. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1873, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. XXVI.

^43. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, Dec. 17, 1873-Aug. 15, 1879; April 28, 1877, p. 212.

^44. Ibid., July 11, 1878, p. 300.

^45. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, pp. 314-316.

^46. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1881, pp. 55, 92.

^47. Ibid., 1884, p. 54.

^48. Ibid., 1889, p. 34.

^49. The Dominion policy of assistance to the dairy industry had been a great impetus.

^50. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1897, p. 6. Ibid., 1896, p. 6. Ibid., 1901, p. 107.

^51. Ibid., 1901, pp. 45, 105.

^52. Ibid., 1900, pp. 7, 9, 23.

^53. Ibid., p. 18.

^54. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1901, Annual Report on Schools, Part III, Appendix 8, p. 47.

^55. Ibid., 1900, p. 42.

^56. Ibid., 1901, pp. 16, 40, also Part I, p. LX.

^57. Ibid., 1897, Part III, Appendix E, pp. 139-144. Ibid., 1899, Part III, Appendix B, p. 44. Ibid., 1901, Part III, Appendix C, p. 74. Also Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, Dec. 1, 1882-Dec. 3, 1902; March 15, 1901, pp. 562, 563, 593.

^58. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1899; Annual Report on Schools, Part I. pp. L-LVII. Also Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1900, p. 127 et. al.

^59. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1900, pp. 127, 156-162, 167. The proposed establishment of a Maritime Technical Institution, in which youth might be trained in agriculture, mining, horticulture, and other industrial pursuits, was later abandoned as impractical in view of the limited resources of the provinces, and the terrific expense of such an institution if it were to be at all comparable to the Technical School at McGill, or to the MacDonald Agricultural College at Guelph.

^60. Ibid., pp. 161, 162.

^61. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1902, Annual Report on Schools, Part III, Appendix E, p. 151.

^62. Department of Education: Minutes of Board of Education, Dec. 1, 1862-Dec. 3, 1902, July 27, 1900. p. 524.

^63. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1901, Annual Report on Schools, Part III, Appendix B, p. 34.

^64. Smith. P., Vol. 1, pp. 316, 317.

^65. Bailey, J. W., (2), p. 5.

^66. Ibid., p. 7.

^67. Ibid., pp. 133-139.

^68. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, Dec. 1, 1882-Dec. 3, 1902, p. 1.

^69. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1894, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. XLV.

^70. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, Dec. 1, 1882-Dec. 3, 1902; Dec. 1, 1897, p. 400.

^71. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1901, Annual Report on Schools, Part III, Appendix E, p. 182.

^72. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, Dec. 1, 1882-Dec. 3, 1902; Dec. 1, 1897, p. 400.

^73. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1900, Annual Report on Schools, Part III, p. 149.

^74. He was referring, of course, to deductive philosophy.

^75. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1894, Annual Report on Schools, Part III, pp. 116, 117.

^76. Ibid., pp. 119, 120.

^77. For example, in 1897 the Secretary of the Campbellton School Board, in praising the Principal of the Grammar School, E. W. Lewis, as an adept in the classics and mathematics, added that he was equally enthusiastic “in the teaching of those modern sciences which are now considered indispensable to the rising generation in enabling them to cope with the great problems of life in these days of scientific investigation”. Journal of the House of Assembly of New Brunswick, 1897. Annual Report on Schools, Part III, p. 116.

^78. New Brunswick: Journal of the House of Assembly, 1894, Annual Report of Schools, Part III, p. 120.

^79. Ibid., 1885, Annual Report on Schools, Part III, pp. 31, 32.

^80. Messenger, p. 324.

^81. Hannay (1), Vol. 2, p. 345.

^82. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1886, pp. 22, 23.

^83. Ibid., 1896, p. 59.

^84. Ibid., 1894, pp. 33, 99, 105, 123, 136, 157 et. al.

^85. Ibid., 1899, pp. 26, 43, 44.

^86. Ibid., 1889, p. 67.

^87. Ibid., pp. 67, 68.

^88. Ibid., p. 88.

^89. Ibid., 1895, pp. 96, 97.

^90. Ibid., p. 90.

^91. Ibid., p. 96.

^92. Ibid., p. 97.

^93. Ibid., 1899, p. 65.

^94. Ibid., p. 64.

^95. Ibid., 1889, p. 70.

^96. Ibid., 1899, p. 66.

^97. Ibid., pp. 66, 67.

^98. Ibid., 1889, p. 90.

^99. Ibid., p. 92.

^100. Ibid., p. 90.

^101, Ibid., p. 93.

^102. Ibid., p. 96.

^103. Ibid., p. 98.

^104. Ibid., 1894, pp. 162, 163.

^105. Ibid., 1899, p. 65.

^106. Ibid., 1889, p. 68.

^107. Women were admitted to the University of New Brunswick in 1886.

^108. It is significant that for the most part the advocates of woman suffrage also supported legislation for the protection of the working classes.

^109. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1888, p. 120.

^110. Ibid., p. 121.

^111. Ibid., 1889, p. 107.

^112. Ibid., 1894, pp. 126, 127, 140.

^113. Murray (2), p. 97.

^114. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1881, Annual Report on Schools, Part 1, p. XXXVII.

^115. Reisner, pp. 116, 117.

^116. Murray (2), p. 97.

^117. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1891, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. XIV.

^118. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1895, p. 32.

^119. During the nineties a number of petitions urging a compulsory attendance law were presented to the legislature by boards of school trustees and by the W.C.T.U.

^120. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1891, Annual Report on Schools. Part I, pp. XIV, XV.

^121. Curti, p. 91.

^122. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1877, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. XXVI.

^123. Ibid., 1885, Annual Report on Schools, Part III, p. 23.

^124. Ibid., 1899, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, pp. LVII, LVIII.

^125. Ibid., Part III, pp. 30, 31.

^126. Ibid., 1900, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. 62.

^127. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, p. 24.

^128. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1879, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. XIX.

^129. Ibid., 1881, Annual Report on Schools, Part III, p. 33.

^130. Ibid., 1884, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. XXXII.

^131. Ibid., 1891, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. XLIV.

^132. Ibid., 1894, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. XXIII.

^133. The New Brunswick Journal of Education, Vol. 1, No. 12, Nov. 11, 1886, p. 89.

^134. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1884, pp. 128, 129.

^135. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1896, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. XXV.

^136. Ibid., 1884, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. XXXIV. Ibid., 1888, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, pp. XLVIII, XLIX. Ibid., 1890, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. XLIII. Ibid., 1891, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. XLIV.

^137. Ibid., 1900, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. 29.

^138. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1897, p. 11.

^139. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, Dec. 1, 1882-Dec. 3, 1902; June 5, 1894, pp. 294, 296.

^140. Ibid., Nov. 26, 1895, p. 109.

^141. Ibid., April 24, 1890, p. 199.

^142. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report on Debates of House of Assembly, 1899, pp. 47-50.

^143. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1899, Annual Report on Schools, Part III, p. 10.

^144. New Brunswick: Synoptic Report of Debates of House of Assembly, 1892, p. 30.

^145. Ibid., 1893, pp. 8, 20.

^146. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1888, Annual Report on Schools, Part III, p. 125.

^147. Ibid., 1893, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. XXI.

^148. Ibid., 1881, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. XXVIII.

^149. Reisner, p. 461.

^150. New Brunsw1ck: Journal of House of Assembly, 1899, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. LX.

^151. Ibid., 1900, Annual Report on Schools, Part III, p. 123.

^152. Ibid., 1899, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, pp. LIX, LX.

^153. Ibid., 1873, Annual Report on Schools, Appendix A, p. 4.

^154. Ibid., 1887, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. XXXVIII.

^155. Ibid., Part III, p. 11.

^156. Ibid., 1884, Annual Report on Schools, Part III, p. 48.

^157. Ibid., 1898, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. XLVII.

^158. Ibid., 1889, Annual Report on Schools, Part III, p. 103.

^159. Actually, as a training school, the New Brunswick institution compared very favourably with the Normal School of Nova Scotia, which, until 1893, was simply a school in competition with the high schools, academies, and colleges, whose courses were also adapted to enable teachers to pass the examinations, which was at that was required at the time to obtain a teacher's license. MacKay, p. 533.

^160. Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of Board of Education, Dec. 1, 1882-Dec. 3, 1902, pp. 474, 480, 485-490.

^161. New Brunswick: Journal of House of Assembly, 1899, Annual Report on Schools, Part III, p. 8.

^162. Ibid., 1900, Annual Report on Schools, Part III, pp. 7, 8.

^163. Ibid., 1901, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, pp. XXVI, XXVII.

^164. Ibid., 1887, Annual Report on Schools, Part I, p. LX.

^165. Ibid., 1881, Annual Report on Schools, Part I. Footnote on p. XLV.

^166. Indeed, there were those who thought that the provincial system was ultra-progressive and overly ambitious. In 1881, for instance, the Saint John School Board, which had been plagued with complaints from parents that the course was over-loaded, wrote: “Our educational system Is admirably adapted to a wealthy community where .... the children are not forced to earn their livelihood at an early age, if at all .... Fifty years ahead of Massachusetts, which it is alleged that our system is, means a century ahead of New Brunswick; that is, of what we can afford or really need here. Permit us .... to rest satisfied with the day of smaller things”. Journal of House of Assembly of New Brunswick, 1881, Annual Report on Schools, Part III, pp. 53, 54.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

I. Manuscripts.

II. Books, Articles and Pamphlets.

III. Newspapers.

IV. Miscellaneous.

I. Manuscripts 

Anderson, Amos M., The History of Elementary Education in the Province of New Brunswick. Thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the School of Education of New York University, 1940.

Department of Education of New Brunswick, Minutes of the Board of Education (five un-numbered vols.), 1847-1852; 1852-1865; Dec. 17, 1873—Aug. 15, 1879; Oct. 3, 1879—Oct., 1862; Dec. 1, 1882—Dec. 3, 1902.

Fitch, J. H., A Century of Educational Progress In New Brunswick, 1800—1900, Ms. of a thesis in the University of Toronto Library.

Gilroy, Marion, The Loyalist Experiment , Ms. of a Master's thesis in the University of Toronto Library.

New Brunswick Museum, Saint John, N. B., Original Papers in the John Clarence Webster Collection entitled: (1) Inquisition before Coroner Joseph Sewell in Parish of Caraquette, County of Gloucester, on the Death of Lewis Mallieau. (2) Evidence of Witnesses Severally Taken and Acknowledged on Behalf of our Sovereign Lady the Queen, Touching the Death of John Gifford. (3) Caraquet Murder Case, Chief Justice John C. Allen, Oct. 27, 1875, Bathurst.

Office of Executive Council of New Brunswick, Colebrooke's Letter Book, May 1, 1841—Jan. 13, 1843 (no vol. no.); Colebrooke's Letter Book, May 18, 1841—April 4, 1848 (no vol. no.); Head's Letter Book, 1848-1854 (no vol. no.); Head's Letter Book, Nov., 1850—Sept., 1854 (no vol. no.); Minutes of Executive Council, Vols. I and IX.

Public Archives of Canada, Can. Misc., Misc. Documents, Vol. 8, Lawrence Collection; Can. Misc., Delancey-Robinson Papers, Vols. I and XIV; C0188, C0189, from secretary of state to governors of New Brunswick, originals and Letter Book replies; Inglis Papers, Vol. VII.

University of New Brunswick Library, Bailey, G. W., Our Schools, 1847-1858; Letters and Papers relating to the Family of J. Marshall d'Avray; Minute Book of the College Council at King's College at Fredericton, N. B., Jan. 10, 1829—June 28, 1859.

II. Books, Articles and Pamphlets 

Abstract of the Returns of the Inspection of Grammar and Parochial Schools in New Brunswick, Fredericton, 1845.

Adams, J. T., Provincial Society, 1590-1673, New York, 1927.

d'Avray, J. M., (1) Lecture delivered at opening of Model and Training Schools, Fredericton, Feb. 10, 1848, Fredericton, 1848; (2) Lecture delivered at the Temperance Hall Fredericton, Jan. 22, 1850, Fredericton, 1850; (3) Oration at U. N. B. Encaenia of 1871 (printed copy in U. N. B. Library).

Bailey, A. G., (1) "Introductory Sketch" to Prominent People in New Brunswick , published by the Biographical Society of Canada, 1937; (2) "The Basis and Persistence of Opposition to Confederation in New Brunswick", Can. Hist. Review , Vol. 23, No. 4, pp. 374-497, Dec., 1942; (3) "Railways and the Confederation Issue In New Brunswick, 1863-1865", Can. Hist. Review , Vol. 21, No. 4, pp. 367-383, Dec, 1940.

Bailey, J. W., (1) The Curious Story of Dr. Marshall , Cambridge, Mass., 1930; (2) Loring Woart Bailey , Saint John, 1925.

Bailey, L. W., Dr. James Robb: A Sketch of His Life and Labours , Saint John, 1898.

Baird, W. T., Seventy Years of New Brunswick Life , Saint John, 1890.

Baker, R. P., A History of English-Canadian Literature to the Confederation , Harvard University Press, 1920.

Beard, C. A. & M. R. The Rise of American Civilization , Vols. I & II, New York, 1927.

Beavan, Mrs. F., Pioneer Life in New Brunswick , London, 1845.

Brebner, J. B., (1) The Neutral Yankees of Nova Scotia , New York, 1937; (2) New England's Outpost , New York, 1927.

Brown, G. W., Building the Canadian Nation , Toronto, 1942.

Bury, J. B., The Idea of Progress , London, 1928.

Burwash, N., Egerton Ryerson, Vol. 13 of Makers of Canada, Toronto, 1910.

Canada: Dominion Bureau of Statistics, 1927, "The Maritime Provinces since Confederation", Chap. 8; Dominion Parliamentary Debates, 1872-1875 .

Clark, S. D., The Social Development of Canada , Toronto, 1942.

Common Schools Act of 1871 of New Brunswick; Regulations of the Board of Education, Fredericton, 1871.

Creighton, D. G., Dominion of the North , Boston, 1944.

Cubberley, E. P., A Brief History of Education , Cambridge, Mass., Copyright, 1922.

Curti, Merle, The Social Ideas of American Educators , New York, 1935.

Cyclopedia of Education , Vol. 4, (Paul Munroe ed.), New York, 1912.

Defebaugh, J. E., History of the Lumber Industry of America , Vol. I, Chicago, 1906.

Eaton, A. W., The Church in Nova Scotia , New York, 1892.

Falconer, Sir Robert, "Cultural Development, (B), English", Cam. Hist. Br. Emp. , Vol. VI, Chap. 33 (B), pp. 788-811.

Fenety, G. E., Political Notes and Observations , Fredericton, 1867.

Fisher, Peter, First History of New Brunswick , Saint John, 1825 (Reprinted under auspices of New Brunswick Historical Society, Saint John, 1921).

Fraser, J. J., Report upon Charges Relating to the Bathurst Schools , printed for the Legislature, 1894.

Gesner, Abraham, New Brunswick with notes for Emigrants , London, 1847.

Gordon, A. H., Wilderness Journeys in New Brunswick, 1862-1863 , Saint John, 1864.

Graham, G. S., Sea Power and British North America , Harvard University Press, 1941.

Greene, E. B., The Revolutionary Generation, 1760-1790 , New York, 1943.

Gregory, John, Documents before the Council of King's College in the case of the Expulsion of George Gregory from the Collegiate School , Fredericton, 1850.

Halevy, Elie, A History of the English People in 1815 , (Tr. from French by E. I. Watkin & D. A. Barker), London, 1924.

Hannay, James, (1) History of New Brunswick , Vols. I & II, Saint John, 1909; (2) The Life and Times of Sir Leonard Tilley: A Political History of New Brunswick , Saint John, 1897.

Harvey. D. C., (1) "The Heritage of the Maritimes", N. S. Journal of Education , April 1934; (2) "The Origin of the Nova Scotia Normal School", Maritime Advocate & Busy East , July, 1943, pp. 15-17, 27-29.

Hay, G. W., "History of Education in New Brunswick", Vol. 14 of Canada and Its Provinces , pp. 545-558, Toronto, 1914.

Hopkins, J. Castell, The Nineteenth Century , Vol. 9, London & Edinburgh, 1903.

Hughes & Klemm, The Nineteenth Century , Vol. 23, London & Edinburgh, 1903.

Inch, J. R., "Historical Sketch of Education in New Brunswick", Canada: an Encyclopedia of the Country , (Hopkins ed.), Vol. III, pp. 225-234, Toronto, 1898.

Innis & Lower, Select Documents In Canadian Economic History, 1783-1885 , Toronto, 1933.

Jernegan, M. W., The American Colonies, 1492-1750 , New York, 1931.

Johnston, J. F. W., Report on the Agricultural Capabilities of the Province of New Brunswick , Fredericton, 1850.

Kerr, W. B. The Maritime Provinces of British North America and the American Revolution , Sackville, (n. d.)

Kilpatrick, W. H., Source Book in Philosophy of Education , New York, 1935.

Laidlaw, A. F., "Theodore Harding Rand", Nova Scotia Journal of Education , Fourth Series, Vol. 15, No. 2, March, 1944, pp. 207-218, Vol. 15, Nos. 2 & 3, April-May, 1944, pp. 325-334.

Lathern, Rev. J., The Hon. Judge Wilmot , Toronto, 1881.

LeGresley, Omer, L'enseignement du francais en Acadie, (1604-1926) , College du Sacre-Coeur, Bathurst-Ouest, 1926.

Lower, A. R. M., (1) "Two Ways of Life: The Primary Antithesis of Canadian History", (Presidential Address), The Annual Report of the Can. Hist. Assoc. , 1942-1943; (2) The North American Assault on the Canadian Forest , Toronto, 1943.

MacFarlane, R. O., "The Loyalist Migrations; a Social and Economic Movement", Manitoba Essays , Toronto, 1937.

MacKay, A. H., History of Education in N. S. and P. E. I., Canada and Its Provinces , Vol. 14, pp. 511-542.

Martell, J. S., "Some Editorial Opinions from the Newspapers of the Maritime Provinces in the 1830's", Can. Hist. Review , Vol. XIX, No. 1, pp. 50-56, March, 1938.

Martin, Chester, (1) "British North America under Representative Government", Cam. Hist. Br. Emp. , Vol. VI, Chap. X (c); (2) "The Maritime Provinces, 1840-1867", Ibid., Chap. XIV.

Maxwell, Lillian M. B., (1) "How New Brunswick Grew", Sackville, 1943; (2) "How New Brunswick's Normal School Grew", The Maritime Advocate and Busy East , Vol. 33, No. XI, July, 1943 pp. 5-12.

Messenger, J. F., An Interpretative History of Education , New York, 1931.

McArthur, Duncan, (1) "The British North America and the American Revolution, 1774-1791", Cam. Hist. Br. Emp. , Vol. VI, Chapter VII; (2) "British North America under Representative Government, 1791-1812", Ibid., Chapter XIV.

M. L. H., "Martha Hamm Lewis Goes to Normal School", (as narrated by her daughters), The Educational Review , Oct., 1931.

Morison & Commager, The Growth of the American Republic , Vol. 1, New York, 1937.

Murray, W. C., (1) "Present Special Position and Prospects of Teaching as a Profession", Journal of House of Assembly of New Brunswick, 1900, Appendix G of Annual Report on Schools, pp. 159-173; (2) "University Development in Canada", Tr. R. S. C., 1922, Series III, Vol. XVI, Sect. II, pp. 77-105.

New Brunswick Journal of Education, Saint John , Vol. 1, No. 12, Nov. 11, 1886.

New Brunswick: Journals of the House of Assembly, 1786-1902.

New Brunswick: Synoptic Reports of Debates of the House of Assembly, 1852, 1865, 1866, 1867, 1870, 1874-1902.

Parrington, V. L. (1) The Colonial Mind, 1620-1800 , New York, 1927; (2) The Romantic Revolution in America, 1800-1860 , New York, 1927.

Rand, Theodore Harding, Educational Circulars No. II-VIII, 1875; No. 9,1879; No. 11, 1880; No. 13, 1882; No. 14, 1882; Printed for the Department of Education at Fredericton.

Randall, J. H., Jr., The Making of the Modern Mind , Boston, 1940.

Raymond, W. O., (1) "A Biographical Sketch of Elias Hardy", Tr. R. S. C., Sect. II, 1919, R. S. C. Third Series, Vol. XIII, pp. 91-101; (2) "N. B. Schools of the Olden Time", The Educational Review , Saint John, Vol. VI No. 7—Vol. 10, No. 10, Dec., 1892—March, 1897; (3) "Notes regarding Peter Fisher", Fisher's First History of New Brunswick (1921 edition); (4) "New Brunswick: Political History 1867-1912", Canada and Its Provinces , Vol. XIV, pp. 403-431; (5) "The First Governor of New Brunswick and the Acadians of the River Saint John", Trans. R. S. C., Sect. II, 1919, R. S. C., Third Series, Vol. VIII, pp. 415-452; (6) "Col. Alexander McNutt and the Pre-Loyalist Settlements of Nova Scotia", Trans. R. S. C., Sect. II, R. S. C. Series III, Vol. 5, pp. 23-114, Vol. 6, pp. 203-215.

Reisner, E. H., Nationalism and Education since 1789 , New York, 1936.

Ross, G. W., "Education in Ontario since Confederation", Canada: An Encyclopedia of the Country , (J. Castell Hopkins, ed.), Vol. III, Copyright 1897.

Sissons, C. B., (1) Egerton Ryerson, His Life and Letters , Vol. I Toronto, 1937, (2) Bilingual Schools in Canada , Toronto, 1917.

Smith, Preserved, A History of Modern Culture , Vols. I & II, New York, 1930 & 1934.

Smith, William, The Evolution of Government in Canada , (Confederation Memorial Volume), Montreal, 1928.

Stanley, G. F. G. "James Glenie, A Study in Early Colonial Radicalism", Collections of N. S. Historical Soc. , Vol. 25, pp. 145-173, Halifax, 1942.

Stephenson, Isaac,Recollections of a Long Life , (privately printed) Chicago, 1915.

Supreme Court of New Brunswick, Reports of Cases Determined by, Vol. III, 1875-1876, The Queen vs. Chasson, pp. 546-597, Saint John, 1877.

Tache, Archbishop,Denominational or Free Christian Schools in Manitoba , Winnipeg, 1877.

Trevelyan, G. M., A Shortened History of England , New York & Toronto, 1942.

Trotter, R. G. "The Coming of Confederation", Cam. Hist. Br. Emp. , Vol. VI, Chap. XVIII.

Turner, F. J., The Frontier in American History , New York, 1920.

Wallace, W. S., The United Empire Loyalists , Toronto, 1914.

Webster, J. C., The Distressed Maritimes , Toronto, 1926.

Wertenbaker, T. J., The First Americans, 1607-1690 , New York, 1927.

Whitelaw, W. M., The Maritime Provinces and Canada before Confederation , Toronto, 1934.

Willison, Sir J. W., Sir George Parkin , London, 1929.

Wilson, C. E., "New Brunswick's Entrance into Confederation", Can. Hist. Review , Vol. IX, No. 1, pp. 4-24, March, 1928.

Winslow Papers , Raymond W. O., (ed.) Saint John, 1901.

Wishart, Rev. W. T., Extracts of Lectures on Political Economy , Saint John, 1845.

Wright, Esther Clark, The Miramichi , Sackville, 1944.

III. Newspapers 

City Gazette , Saint John, 1818,1819.

Instructor , Bay Verte, N. B. (Printed at Charlottetown, P. E. I.), Feb.-May, 1861.

Morning Freeman , Saint John, 1871; Jan. 16, 1875, Vol. XXIV, No. 149; Feb. 11, 1875, Vol. XXV, No. 4.

Morning News , Saint John, 1859.

New Brunswick Courier , Saint John, 1848-1862.

New Brunswick Reporter and Fredericton Advertiser , Vol. 31, No. 12, Jan. 20, 1875; Vol. 31, No. 14, Feb. 3, 1875.

Royal Gazette , Fredericton, 1830.

Saint John Chronicle , July 10, 1857.

Saint John Daily Telegraph & Morning Journal , 1871.

Saint John Gazette , 1799.

Weekly Chronicle , Saint John, Jan. 2, 1857.

Western Recorder & Weekly Herald , Saint John, March 19, 1859.

IV. Miscellaneous 

Madras Schools, Thirtieth Report of, Saint John, 1849; Twenty-eighth Report of, Saint John, 1847.

McGee, D'Arcy, Speech on Separate School Bill of 1863, (Saint John Public Library).

Mechanics Institute, Catalogue of Library with Constitution, Rules and Regulations, Saint John, 1855.

Regulations for the Government of the Collegiate Grammar School at Fredericton, Fredericton, 1829.

Saint John Free Public Library, Scrapbook R. 971.532; Scrapbook No. 10.

Statutes of New Brunswick, 10V Cap. 56. 21V Cap. 9. Cap. XXI Vict. 34.

Typescript in the possession of Louise Manny of Newcastle, N. B. (Clippings from the Chatham Gleaner.)