hale in such an ill-ventilated room; see your children moping into school half an hour after their class has recited, and when requested to study their lessons for the coming recitation, hear the common excuse—“ Hant got any book." Mothers! pay at least one-half the attention to the welfare of your children that you do to the geese and turkeys in your poultry yard, the linen in your chests, or the silks in your presses. Fathers! be as anxious to see your children doing well as you are to see the pigs in their pen, and the cattle in your fields, in a thriving condition. Parents, guardians, all! care as much for the clothing of the minds of your children as you do for that of their bodies. Now there is not a well-to-do farmer in the land who would trust the management of his cattle to the supervision of any man. Why, then, I ask, should he trust the training of his children, year after year, to those with whose character he is wholly unacquainted? for surely they are of more value than many cattle! We repeat our request, that you "Visit Your Schools."

M. G.

THE TEACHER'S REWARD.

Is a teacher ever really remunerated for services rendered? Can dollars and cents balance brain, and heart, and life? Each dollar bears upon its surface a drop of the dearest life-blood that courses through a true teacher's heart.

With aching head and troubled brow, lighted by the golden gleamings of the setting sun, the teacher seeks his home, but seldom to rest in quietness; for care with muffled tread has followed upon his footsteps, sitting beside him at his meals, and near his couch. In his dreams the toilings of the day are all enacted "o'er and o'er." Petty vexations are magnified— the mole-hills of the sunshine have become mountains in the darkness, and morning finds him wearied, enervated, and wanting in that cheerful, hoping spirit that fringes the darkest cloud with the holy sunlight of God's love.

Would he for gold barter the buoyancy of health-the elasticity of a loving, hoping spirit-freedom from the "care that killeth?"

But the teacher's life is not always thus-a desert waste. There are sunny spots where birds carol amid green branches, where waters sparkle along shining sands, where flowers bloom, and cloudless skies bend o'er all.

The good desire implanted and taking vigorous root-the generous deed -the ready hand-the willing heart-the unsullied innocence of the childish mind-the glorious workings of intellect-the growth of noble principles-the morning offering with sunny smiles-the good-night kiss-the

heartfelt, kindly wish-the evil overcome with good-the holy aspirations for the greatest good of all; all these that make life beautiful and blessed, are not to be forgotten in summing up the teacher's balance-sheet of pleasure and pain.

Our reward is not upon the earth. It can not be meted out to us in gold, nor jewels, nor precious stones. Eternity, that time unmeasured, shall be the space allotted for us to enjoy the ample remuneration for services rendered here in the great work-house of time. We shall then become meek scholars in that school "Where Christ himself doth rule," learning heavenly wisdom from the lips of the Great Teacher through uncounted ages. Is not that more blessed than aught in time?

NETTIE ROBERTS.

FEMALE TEACHERS AND THEIR SALARIES.

MR. EDITOR:-In an article in a late Number of the Journal, entitled Aspects of Education," I notice among much excellent advice, with regard to the employing of female teachers; some remarks which, I think, must be condemned by all lovers of justice and equal rights. For instance, the writer attempts to justify the custom of paying less wages to female than male teachers; because, as he avers, the "Former can afford to work for less wages than the latter," and goes on to say, "Society imposes upon man certain pecuniary obligations from which woman is free." "If a gentleman desires the company of a lady at a ride, a lecture, a concert, or other entertainments, he must pay the expense of both." And again: “The female having no choice (of occupation), is but too glad to accept for teaching what her male competitor refused."

Now, as I am a practical woman, I wish to show that the theory (if I may so term it) of this writer, does not agree with the facts of every-day life. To illustrate: Tom Brown, who by the way, is an acquaintance and friend of mine, and I are employed as teachers in districts contignous to each other. My education, we will say, is equal to his, and my experience about the same. But I am to receive only $16 per month while he is paid $30. As my school is as large as his, and I am expected to do an equal amount of work, I naturally inquire the reason for this difference in our wages, and am informed that "Society imposes certain pecuniary obligations upon man from which woman is free," that if "he desires any company at a ride, lecture, or concert, he must pay the expenses of both," etc., etc. I am satisfied, because having a turn for figures, I understand that I am entitled to $16 per month in cash, and $14 in amusement of various kinds,

making in all $30. "Quite a desirable little sum!" I exclaim, and go to work with right good will, "Teaching the young idea, etc."

But imagine my indignation when in looking over my books in the spring (I always keep strict accounts), I find myself most shamefully wronged. Under date of January first, I read,

"Received of Tom Brown sixty-two cents, being the amount paid by him for my expenses at the New Year's Ball."

And again:

"Received, February 4th, twenty-five cents, being the admission fee to Dr. Pufferall's lecture."

These receipts amounting to just eighty-seven cents in all, I have to show for the $14 I expected to receive during the winter in polite attentions! But perhaps it will be argued that if said Brown should marry me, it will be all the same, as he will then "endow me with all his worldly goods." Ah! but if he should not, but should take a fancy to marry Jane Smith (who, by the way, has a rich father, and isn't obliged to teach for a living), who is to pay my expenses in future at rides, lectures, or concerts? Now what I have to ask is this, viz.: Grant the laws be so amended that whatever Brown receives above what he really earns in payment for gallant attentions to me, he shall be compelled to give a strict account of, and, in no case, be allowed to appropriate the sum, which I indirectly earned, to his own private use. Yours, C. L. MORGAN.

P.S.-An odd idea has sometimes entered my mind, viz.: whether it would not be as much to our advantage to pay our own amusement bills (if I may so term them), provided that by so doing we could become entitled to receive the same wages as the sterner sex. But I suppose as long as women are "but too glad” to accept what men will not, things will go on about the same as ever. So, after all, it may be the remedy does not lie in an amendment of the laws. C. L. M.

NATIONAL TEACHERS' ASSOCIATION.

CINCINNATI, August 12th, 1858.

THE first anniversary of the birth of this somewhat pretentious yourgster is drawing to a close, and perhaps I ought to say, in passing, for the information of the public, that it has spent its babyhood in growing, and now exhibits, at the end of a twelve month, occasional scintillations of intelligence. In fact, it is essaying to talk; and though some of its utterances are idle, others seem to have an aim, With judicious nursing the

bantling may yet be "raised" and "heard from." Under this impression the writer hereof ventures to record its doings and sayings for the Teacher.

Messrs. Rickoff and Smyth extended a welcome in behalf of Cincinnati and Ohio; whereupon Mr. President Richards acknowledged the courtesy, and then proceeded to pronounce his inaugural. In it the design of the Association was said to be to give a single aim to all true instructors. It should take the place of a National Bureau of Education. That the Association can take the place of Government in centring and energizing the efforts of educators is to me questionable; that it should not is clear. The great fact, which more than any other ought to be held before the people, taught to infancy, made attractive to old age, spread and blazoned every where, is, that Government should educate the children of the governed. Every child in this broad land has a right to knowledge, and the wealth of the country has no "inalienable right" to exemption from tribute for this purpose. If the Association shall direct its efforts to the establishment of a National Bureau of Education, instead of rendering its necessity less apparent by suggesting other means to take its place, good may come. Secondly, there is now a National Journal of Education in the broadest and best sense of the term, of lofty aim, brilliant, vigorous, and scholarly, published at Hartford, Conn. Should the Association enlarge the number of readers of this publication, though but a few thousands, it will have justified its organization.

Prof. Read, of the University of Wisconsin, gave a resume of education for the last ten decades. The following catalogue of eminent teachers this side of the Alleghany range I give in his own language:

"I need not go beyond my own personal recollections, and, with some of them, intimate personal and official relations, in naming such men as Dr. Wilson, of the Ohio University, who declined the Presidency of South Carolina College to plant himself at Chillicothe, then an insignificant point in a wilderness country; as Dr. Wylie, of Washington, Pennsylvania, afterward of Indiana, whose whole life was that of a teacher, and whose pupils, in every part of the country, adorn the highest positions of influence; as Dr. Lindsley, of Nashville, who gave up the offer of the Presidency of Princeton College, where he was at the time Vice-President and Professor, for the more toilsome but broader sphere of influence here in the West; as Prof. Dana, the author of that admirable series of Latin books-the Liber Primus, Latin Tutor, etc., which, East and West, were the books o the day, and who, for twenty years, imparted his own severe and elegant taste in the classics to the youth of Ohio; as Francis Glass, who, in a log school-house, in Warren County, this State, without books of reference, and in the midst of the daily toils of his school, wrote his Life of Washington in Latin; as Professor Mathews, who, at Lexington and in this city, cultivated and taught the highest French and analytical mathematics at a period when (except at West Point) they were hardly elsewhere taught in the whole country, and when he was obliged, for the want of translated

text-books, to make his own translations as he proceeded; as Dr. Bishop, a name which awakens love and reverence in the bosoms of hundreds of pupils; as Marshall, of Kentucky, a brother of the Chief Justice, and scarcely inferior to his illustrious kinsman in talent and worth—a man who spent a life of usefulness and honor as a faithful and devoted teacher; as Kempel of Cincinnati; Slocomb, of Marietta; or, if I may name teachers in the professions, who, as Professors and Lecturers, in any part of the country, would stand before Dr. Caldwell, Dr. Dudley, and Dr. Drake?— men whose reputation is known wherever medical science is cultivated. Other well-known names I might add to this list, if time would permit. Of the eminent instructors-those who were then active in forming the youthful mind of the country, and laying deep and broad the foundations of our institutions-alas! how few remain in the present time. It is with a feeling of melancholy that, in looking over all the tract of country this side of the mountain-range of which I have spoken, and tracing it from Lake Erie to the Gulf of Mexico, not a single college officer in commission when I became such, now remains. Dr. M'Guffey, of the Virginia University, and Dr. Scott, of Oxford, became connected with the Miami a little subsequent to my own connection with the Ohio University, and still continue active and honored members of our professional corps."

Omitting the dark side of the picture-for the Professor by no means acknowledged that all changes were improvements-I will only say, the Normal School, the Educational Journal, the Teachers' Institute (an American institution), and the better text-book and school-house, were mentioned as indications of real progress.

Prof. Young, of Indiana, read a paper on the Laws of Nature. This was a clear and able production, but much too long. When will men cease to "think that they shall be heard for their much speaking?" I might as well say here, that all the set addresses were too long.

'Brevity is the soul of wit."-Shakspeare.

The tone and aim of Mr. Philbrick's paper may be gathered from the following, which is substantially his own language:

"I am one of those who believe in the liberal education of the whole human being. Thus, and only thus, can we be symmetrically formed according to the design of the Author of our being. I believe we can take something from the Persians, who taught their boys to speak the truth and ride on horseback; from the Spartans, who taught their sons to be skillful in bodily exercises and contempt of danger; something from the Athenians, who inculcated a taste for the beautiful in art; something from the ancient Hebrews, who taught the grandeur and beauty of wisdom; and something from every source that is calculated to ameliorate and improve the human race. We need such education individually, socially, politically. It is needed to train those who are covered by the judicial ermine. It is needed in every department of human life.