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the more general diffusion of useful knowledge amongst the inhabitants of India of every description, especially those Provinces subject to the Presidency of Fort William.

"That it be also an object of the Society to select pupils of distinguished talents and merit from elementary and other schools, and to provide for their instruction in seminaries of a higher degree with the view of forming a body of qualified teachers and translators who may be instrumental in enlightening their countrymen and improving the general system of education. When the funds of this institution may admit of it, the maintenance and tuition of such pupils in distinct seminaries will be an object of importance."

Its Operations.

The new Society began its operations by establishing five vernacular elementary schools which were intended "rather to improve (by serving as models) than to supersede the existing seminaries of the country designed rather to educate the children of the poor than the numerous youth of this country whose parents are able and willing to pay for their instruction." It attempted to raise the indigenous school to some level of efficiency by organizing a staff of agents, who from time to time visited them, examined the progress made by their pupils, and rewarded meritorious scholars with books. By 1821 the supervision of the Society extended to 115 schools in and near Calcutta and containing 3,828 pupils. In these schools the Bengali language was the only medium of instruction, and Hindu and Muhammadan children indifferently were received into them. For at the time Muhammadans had no indigenous elementary schools peculiar to themselves, nor had they any regular system of private tuition. Every father, it is true, "did what he could for the instruction of his children, either personally or by hiring a tutor; but few fathers, however qualified for the task, could spare from their avocations the time necessary for the performance of such duties ;

and hired domestic instructors, though unquestionably held in more honour than among the Hindus, and treated with great respect by their pupils and employers, were always ill paid and often superannuated-men, in short, who betake themselves to that occupation only when they have ceased from age to be fit for any other. There were, moreover, few who were qualified to instruct their children, and fewer who were able to employ a tutor."

Its Services.

Mr. Adam in his Report on Vernacular Education (1836) thus reviews the services rendered by the Calcutta School Society to the cause of popular education :"The improvements introduced by the School Society into the schools in immediate connexion with it are various. Printed, instead of manuscript, school-books are now in common use. The branches formerly taught are now taught more thoroughly; and instruction is extended to subjects formerly neglected, namely, the orthography of the Bengali language, geography, and moral truth and obligations. The mode of instruction has been improved. Formerly the pupils were arranged in different divisions according as they were learning to write on the ground with chalk, on the palm leaf, on the plantain leaf, or on paper, respectively; and each boy was taught separately by the schoolmaster in a distinct lesson. The system of teaching with the assistance of monitors, and of arranging the boys in classes formed with reference to similarity of ability or proficiency has been adopted; and as in some instances it has enabled the teachers to increase the number of their pupils very considerably, and thereby their own emoluments, it is hoped that it will ultimately have the effect of encouraging men of superior acquirements to undertake the duties of instructors of youth. The system of superintendence has been organized by the appointment of a pandit and a sircar to each of the four divisions into which the schools

are distributed. They separately attend two different schools in the morning and two in the evening, staying at least one hour at each school, during which time they explain to the teachers any parts of the lesson they do not fully comprehend, and examine such of the boys as they think proper in their different acquirements. The destinations of the pandits and sircars are frequently changed, and each of them keeps a register containing the day of the month; the time of going to, and leaving, each school; the names of the boys examined; the page and place of the book in which they were examined; and the names of the schoolmasters in their own handwritingwhich registers are submitted to the Secretaries of the Society every week through the Head Pandit. Further examinations, both public and private, yearly, half-yearly, or quarterly, as necessity or convenience dictated, have been held in the presence of respectable European and Native gentlemen, when gratuities were given to deserving teachers, and prize-books to the best scholars, as well as books bestowed for the current year at schools."

Its Work officially recognized.

In 1823 the Government expressed its appreciation of the work being done by the Calcutta School Society by giving it a monthly grant of Rs. 500 towards its expenditure upon the schools under its influence. In 1825 the Court of Directors confirmed the grant, and in doing so, wrote as follows:-"The Calcutta School Society appears to combine with its arrangements for giving elementary instruction, an arrangement of still greater importance for educating teachers for the indigenous schools. The last object we deem worthy of great encouragement, since it is upon the character of the indigenous schools that the education of the great mass of the population must ultimately depend. By training up, therefore, a class of teachers you provide for the eventual extension of improved education to a portion of the Natives of India far exceeding that which any elementary instruction that could be

immediately bestowed, would have had any chance of reaching."*

More Schools opened by Missionary Societies.

As has been said, the Calcutta School Society was inaugurated in 1818. In giving a connected account of its activities it has been necessary to bring the narrative of events up to the year 1825. Let us resume the thread of events as in the year 1819. In that year the London Missionary Society established some vernacular schools in the neighbourhood of Tollygunge and Kidderpore-the well-known suburbs of modern Calcutta. Again, in 1821 Miss Cook (better known as Mrs. Wilson) opened, in connection with the Church Missionary Society, girls' schools, which in 1822 numbered 22 with a roll of 400 pupils.

"The Circle System."

In the year 1822 the Christian Knowledge Society initiated the system, familiar in later years as the "Circle System." It had three Circles-one at Tollygunge, another at Cossipore, and a third at Howrah. Each Circle contained five ancillary schools attached, so to speak, to one central school. There was a guru to each school, while the Circle Pandit and the Superintending Missionary visited the schools in rotation. Each school cost Rs. 15 a month, and the guru was paid according to the number of his pupils and their proficiency in the first four classes. In addition to the usual subjects, Scripture, Grammar, Geography and Natural Philosophy were taught.

Non-indigenous Schools.

It should perhaps be noted in passing that in the literature of the day Mission Schools and schools established by the Calcutta School Society are commonly designated "elementary schools non-indigenous." The reason for the differentiation probably was that, though they were elementary schools, the course of instruction in them marked

*In 1833 the income of the Society fell, and from that year it discontinued the examinations which it had hitherto held in the elementary schools under its superintendence.

an

advance upon the true indigenous schools-the characteristic feature in them being that in them were used printed books.

General Committee of Public Instruction appointed.

It will be remembered that the terms in which the Charter of the East India Company had been renewed in 1813 rendered it impossible for vernacular elementary education to receive direct encouragement. Still, in the following ten years something had been done, both by Government and by benevolent societies, to advance the interests of mass education. In assigning an annual sum of one lakh of rupees for the promotion of the study of Oriental Classical Languages, the Charter of 1813 had directed the Government of India to take early measures to acquaint themselves with the existing state of popular education and to report to the Honourable Court of Directors the results of their enquiries. The stress of wars had hitherto compelled the GovernorGeneral to neglect this mandate. But with the return of peace at the conclusion of the Fourth Maratha War in 1823 it was not forgotten, and the acting GovernorGeneral, Mr. Adam, appointed a General Committee of Public Instruction "for the purpose of ascertaining the state of public education, and of the public institutions designed for its promotion, and of considering and from time to time submitting to Government the suggestion of such measures as it may appear expedient to adopt with a view to the better instruction of the people; to the introduction of useful knowledge including the sciences and arts of Europe; and to improve their moral character." The Committee consisted of about half-a-dozen members, most of whom were Europeans connected with the Public Services. The General Committee were assisted by Local Committees disposed at various mofussil centres, and they in some instances were composed of a few respectable and educated native gentlemen and the principal officers of the local Government. These Local

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