The beginner is shown a heap of cards, on each of which is written a word. She is required to assort or class the confused heap. She finds it impossible. She is desired to pick out every word that is the name of any thing. This she will do with ease and pleasure. The heap is greatly reduced. She is desired to pick out such as imply doing something. She will do this, and so with all the other classes of words. She may then perform the same exercise in a book. She begins to study her grammar, but advances not a step without putting in practice what she learns. It need not be said that before children can parse, they can often speak and write correctly. The constant use of a slate and pencil naturally leads to written communications with each other. Children six years old write very good letters to their playmates; but, as these loose compositions afford no good opportunity for correction, I generally tell the young class a short story, and require them to write it on paper in the best manner they can. These I correct, and return to them with suitable advice. This method relieves them from the intolerable labor of writing, when they have nothing to write about. The compositions of the upper classes are of a different order.

The process of teaching geography is explained quite fully in the text book used by the scholars. This is to children a pleasing study, and those who are but five or six years old may be usefully engaged in it. A child that can imitate a letter, can imitate the outline of a country-roughly and badly, to be sure, at first-but sufficiently well to fix in her mind the prominent features of it. Her lesson requires her to find the prominent objects of the map she is drawing. She finds them, marks them on her little map, feels acquainted with them, and proud of the acquaintance. She begins to measure distances, to compare sizes, and in fact to draw. The improvement has been astonishing in this branch; and, to some of the children, it is as easy to draw an outline of any country from memory, as to make any letter of the alphabet. Their geography is entirely practical; and the first part, all that has yet been printed, is confined to the locality of places, and this is nearly all of modern geographies that the memory retains. Beginners draw small maps from common school atlases. After they have drawn each several times, they draw maps of various countries on a large scale. There are but four children in the school who do not study geography.

As soon as a child has learned to shape and join letters correctly on the slate, she is required to write on paper. The monitors are under the care of the master; and, after they have written a copy, are dispersed to their various classes. Writers on paper are classed according to their proficiency. The master, besides taking the oversight of all, has one or two classes under his particular care. Monitors are placed over the rest; and, in most cases, two to each

class, one to make and mend pens, and the other to set copies.. The monitors are, during the time of writing, behind their scholars, looking over and instructing them. As it has been objected that monitors sometimes set imperfect copies, it may be well to consider the objection, for a moment. Setting aside the fact that engraved slips are seldom suitable for beginners, being either of an improper size, or lacking simplicity; and passing by the fact that many masters, to say nothing of mistresses, who pretend to teach writing, cannot equal our monitors, I will venture to deny the correctness or truth of the objection; and for the following reasons: First, experience shows that children seldom regard a loose slip after the first line; and nothing disgusts them more than to write a second copy from the same slip, as they must do, if only a limited number of engraved slips is provided. Children prefer, in the second place, to write after written copies; and, if the master sets all of them, he cannot inspect the classes while writing. Besides, a monitor with only four or five copies to write, will be more likely to write them well, trying, as they always do, to excel, than the master will, hurried and busy as he must be, and compelled, as he often is, to write with any pen he can find. The question then is, are not monitors, who are, to say the least, better writers than their pupils, and can be constantly watching over them, a full equivalent for a master's copy, without any inspection? Finally, I believe a child will be more likely and more anxious, to exert herself, when there is some hope of equalling her copy, than when she knows this to be impossible. This is not hypothetical, but a principle of our nature, exerted on every other occasion. We have said nothing of the immense utility of this exercise to the monitors, but if what has been adduced is not sufficient to remove the objection, we challenge a comparison of our writers with those taught by any other mode.

These remarks will apply to reading also. A very young monitor, with a sense of her dignity, will be able to point out to her little class as many errors in hearing them read fifty verses, as a master would in hearing only one; for this is nearly the proportion of practice between the two modes. Besides, the monitors read much for the purpose of instructing their classes. The fact is, the whole depends upon the master. If he correctly instructs the monitors, they will correctly transmit his instructions to their classes. An examination of even the lowest class in our school, will satisfy any one disposed to cavil; and upon this examination we may safely rest the defence of the monitorial system.

Connected with writing on paper, is the making and mending of pens. This is done entirely by the children or their monitors. Every class that comes under the master's care, is instructed in penmaking; but they seldom wait for this. Being allowed to help themselves, as

soon as they please, the making of pens, which enslaves masters of common schools, and is a mystery to most adult females, is a very simple operation in our school. It is never necessary for me

to mend one pen. A child who mends her own pen, does not write so well for it, at first; but she soon recovers, and acquires an independence of others, which those only can appreciate who cannot make a good pen.

The teaching of Latin was early attempted; but the want of suitable books was a serious obstacle. One introductory book had been published in France. This the instructer translated and used in manuscript. Its object was to remove the disgust which usually attends the study of the Latin grammar. The words of an easy reading book, were classed under their appropriate heads of grammar. Thus, all words ending and declined like penna, were placed under penna, which was declined at length, as a model for the rest. So with all the nouns of the other declensions, verbs, &c. &c. The class were required to decline penna, and every day learn a number of the words of that class, declining each, and giving its English meaning. They also wrote every word on the slate, and on paper. In two or three months, the class became familiarly acquainted with the essentials of the grammar, and a vocabulary of about three thousand Latin roots. The next step was to read the book whose vocabulary had been thus previously studied. This was mere amusement for the pupils. But here our French guide failed; and I had not time to prosecute the plan. I could only pursue the ordinary mode, employing monitors; for a second class had already commenced. The first class has read to me the Historia Sacra, Epitome of Grecian History, Cesar, and part of Virgil. The second class instead of Cesar have just commenced Jacob's Latin Reader, a more suitable book; and both classes have turned into Latin from thirty to eighty pages of the Latin Tutor. Almost every translation has been written as well as read, and corrected by the master and monitors. This obliged every scholar to go over the whole lesson, and was a good exercise in English composition also.

I need not here discuss the utility of teaching Latin to females. I was requested to do so by the parents, and believing that it would be a key to the language of every science they might study, a great step towards the acquisition of French, and its other daughters of the south of Europe, and an invaluable aid in the right understanding of English, I opposed no objections, except where the children were too young to begin the study, while the best mode of teaching it is still so imperfectly understood. The useful, and not the merely critical part of Latin, is all I shall endeavor to teach, being persuaded that the time of females may be better employed, than in

acquiring a knowledge of niceties, to which even those who have spent their lives in the pursuit, barely attain.

In French, the want of suitable books, is sensibly felt. This has prevented the introduction of many improvements. Yielding to circumstances, the scholars were first made acquainted with the leading principles of French pronunciation, by reading in a class after the master. In the mean time they learned enough of the grammar to acquire an idea of the structure of the language, particularly the changes of the variable parts of speech; always comparing them with those of their own language. They then began to translate as well as read. This was done in various ways. Sometimes by my pronouncing a word or sentence, and their pronouncing after me, and giving the English; sometimes by reading in a class, each contributing her stock of information, and only appealing to me in difficult cases; and sometimes by writing translations. They then began to turn English into French, as directed in Wanostrocht's grammar. This was the course pursued with the first French class: they became monitors of the second class, and pursued the same plan; and these have commenced with a third. A fourth will commence in a few weeks. Bearing in mind that those who have studied French, have likewise studied all the other branches taught in the school, in some cases not excepting Latin, some idea of their industry may be formed from the fact that the first class have gone through the grammar several times, have written a translation of all Chambaud's Fables and half of La Fontaine's, have written a large part of the exercises in the grammar, have read Numa Pompilius twice, once as monitors and once to the master, a part of Gonzalve de Cordoue, and eight or ten numbers, each about 140 pages octavo, of the Annales des Voyages of the celebrated French Geographer Malte Brun; and all this exclusively of what has been read out of school. The progress will be much more rapid and thorough, as the greater number of classes, affords more monitorial exercise.

No suitable book on astronomy being found, and it being impossible for one person to do every thing, the instructer only painted on cloth such diagrams as were necessary to illustrate the leading principles of the science, explaining them to the scholars in familar lectures, and illustrating them in every possible way by orreries and other apparatus. As a review, each scholar was required to copy the diagrams upon paper, and explain them separately to the teacher. A few lessons were given on pleasant evenings, in the open air; but the want of a convenient place for this purpose was severely felt.

From the first establishment of the school, an appropriation has been made for the purchase of apparatus to illustrate the various sciences taught, particularly that of natural philosophy. A com

plete course of lectures has been given to the highest class; and, in all cases, the pupils have performed experiments with their own hands. Indeed, one has acted as monitor while the rest have partly reviewed the instructer's lessons. From seven hundred to one thousand dollars' worth of the best apparatus has already been purchased, with the surplus income of the school. Until the establishment of our school, no private seminaries presumed to illustrate their little text-books of natural philosophy with proper apparatus. It is a pleasing circumstance that several have already felt the necessity of following our example; but the inferiority of individual means to those of a corporation, and the flourishing state of our income, will still secure to us precedence in this respect. (Note 3.)

A class in mineralogy has just commenced its operations, with ample materials; for, in addition to our already valuable collection, our cabinet has been unexpectedly enriched by a very valuable donation of foreign minerals, from William M'Clure, Esq., late of Paris, a gentleman distinguished for his indefatigable geological researches, and his zeal in the cause of human improvement. The minerals are spread before the class, examined, compared, and analysed. Besides this, each child is furnished with a specimen of the mineral under consideration, to form the basis of a little cabinet of her own.

I shall omit many exercises subsidiary to those already described, such as reading, spelling, saying the multiplication and other tables all together, an exercise which has a powerful influence upon their habits of order and attention, and is a rapid and pleasing method of reviewing many exercises; for, many pupils who are afraid to speak alone, are emboldened by numbers; and it is no more difficult for the master's ear to detect an error in the multitude of voices, than for a musician to discover a discord in a choir. These exercises also have a powerful effect in banishing that monotony and ennui which so often reign in schools conducted on the common plan.

After this tedious enumeration of my labors, you will be surprised to hear that not the least important branch remains to be mentioned, I mean general instruction. It has been my incessant care on every occasion, and on every subject within the scope of my own knowledge, to inculcate useful information. To enable myself to lose no opportunity of doing this, my intercourse with my pupils has been as familiar as that of a parent. No magisterial dignity has prevented the approach of the most timid child; and a perfect knowledge of all their little peculiarities has been the pleasing consequence. I am aware that such a state of things is supposed to be incompatible with the rigid discipline expected in large schools; but the experience of two years has satisfied me that it is as yet unnecessary to