mtervals of study, and charm away weariness and discontent. Let courteous manners prevail between scholars and teachers. Let the law of love be supreme, and the good of each be regarded as the good of all. Let every thing be done to make knowledge attractive, without impairing its solidity. You have declared your principles upon this subject in the very structure of this edifice; virtually acknowledged the relation of the beautiful to the true, and applied to education that law of attraction that pervades all the plans of Divine Providence. Carry out these principles without fear and without extravagance. Let not your care be given merely to make your dwelling-houses attractive. Let there be no more school-rooms so rude and uncleanly as hardly to be fit to shelter well-bred cattle. Let children learn neatness, taste, and refinement, along with their alphabet and multiplication table. To good will, under every one of its attractive agencies, this house should be devoted.

Thus devoted, it will be a nursery of good works. Utility will go hand in hand with good order and good will. In this community, practical industry is the ruling power; utility is the prevailing standard. See to it that this standard is rightly adjusted, and that we do not confine our idea of usefulness to worldly or material interests. As we hear the sound of the spindle and the anvil, and see the spray of the waterfall, and the smoke of the furnace, let us rejoice at the large measure of enterprise and prosperity that have been granted us. But when we turn away from these things to look upon this house of learning, let us not think as sofhe base souls do, that we have left utility behind, and are dealing only with what is visionary and unsubstantial. Next to the church of God, let us feel that the school-house is the most useful building in the community, and that from it should emanate the knowledge, principles, and habits that are to give life its direction and efficiency. Reckon in your estimate of the best wealth of your city, your schools, and, without them, regard all other wealth as disgraceful covetousness or mental poverty.

Let the idea of utility preside over the direction of this school, and all its studies tend not to fill the memory with loads of words, but to strengthen the mind, and invigorate and regulate the will and all the active powers.

Standing as it does in so sacred a seat of manufacturing industry, this house has a peculiar significance. Overlooking this prosperous town, it serves to express a generous creed-to say as if it were:-"We, the people of North Providence, think much of the importance of industry and wealth, but we think that some other things are of still greater importance, and however remiss in duty we may have been in time past, we mean to practice upon a more generous system, and this fair temple of learning, standing so far above the factory and workshop, is a substantial testimonial of our determination."

It is an interesting fact, that the first movement in this State in behalf of popular education was made, not by professional men, nor by merchants, nor any of the classes that might be thought, from their leisure or literature, to advocate the claims cf sound learning, but by an association of mechanics and manufacturers in Providence. I read to-day, with great pleasure, the memorial which this association presented to the Legislature, in the year 1798. I honor those men for that document. But one of the original signers now survives. Who can meet that old man without respect? Who will not honor John Howland even more for taking the lead in that memorial, than for having served under Washington at Trenton, and braved death in the battles of the revolution? Peace to his sturdy heart, and many good days yet to that stout Saxon frame!

I must cease speaking with these few words as to the good order, good will and good works, to which this house of learning is devoted. May a good providence watch over it. Imagination cannot but conjecture the

various scenes of its future history-picture to herself the groups of children who shall come to enjoy its privileges, and who in due time shall leave its walls for the pursuits of maturer life. Prophesy is not our gift, except the prophesy that calculates events by purposes and principles. Let this edifice be used faithfully for true purposes and for just principles, and its future history will be a blessed volume in the annal of your town' It will tell of generations of noble men and women, who have been educated within these walls. And when this house shall have gone to dust, it will have performed a noble mission, by being the nursery of mental life that cannot die.

"Cold in the dust, the perished heart may lie,
But that which warmed it once, can never die."

REGULATIONS OF CHAUNCY-HALL SCHOOL, BOSTON.

The following Regulations of one of the best conducted Private Schools for Boys in New England, will furnish useful hints to teachers in framing regulations for their own schools, especially in reference to the good behavior of the pupils, and to the care of the school-room, furniture, &c.

REQUISITION.

Boys are required to be punctual at school.

To scrape their feet on the scraper, and to wipe them on every mat they pass over on their way to the hall.

To hang their hats, caps, coats, &c., on the hooks appropriated to them respectively, by loops prepared for the purpose.

To bow gracefully and respectfully on entering and leaving the hall, and any recitation room when a teacher is present.

To take their places on entering the hall.

To make no unnecessary noise within the walls of the building, at any time of night or day.

To keep their persons, clothes, and shoes clean.

To carry and bring their books for study, in a satchel.

To quit the neighborhood of the school in a quiet and orderly manner, immediately after dismissal.

To bring notes for absence, dated, and signed by persons authorized to do so, and stating the duration of the absence; also, notes for tardiness, and for occasions when pupils are wanted at home before the regular hour of dismissal.

To study lessons at home, except when inconvenient to the family-in such cases to bring a certificate of the fact in writing.

To present a pen by the feather end; a knife, by its handle; a book, the right side upward to be read by the person receiving it.

To bow on presenting or receiving any thing.

To stand while speaking to a teacher.

To keep all books clean, and the contents of desks neatly arranged.

To deposite in desks all books (except writing books,) slates, pencils, rulers, &c., before dismissal.

To give notice through the school Post Office, of all books, slates, &c., missing.

To pick up hats, caps, coats, pens, slips, books, &c., found on the floor, and put them in their appropriate places.

To replace lost keys, books, &c., belonging to the school, and make good all damage done by them."

To write all requests on their slates, and wait until called.

To close desks and fasten them before quitting school for the session.

To raise the hand as a request to speak across the hall or any recitation

room.

To show two fingers when a pen is wanted.

To put all refuse paper, stumps of pens, &c., in the dust box.

To be accountable for the condition of the floor nearest their own seats.

To fill all vacant time with ciphering, as a general occupation; and to give notice to the teacher, before dismissal, in case of omitting the exercise wholly on any day.

To be particularly vigilant, when no teacher is in the hall.

To promote as far as possible, the happiness, comfort, and improvement of

others.

To follow every class-mate while reading, and correct all errors discoverer in pronunciation, emphasis, or inflection.

To point the fore finger of the left hand, at each letter or figure of the slip of copy, while writing, and the feather of the pen towards the right shoulder. To keep the writing book square in front.

To rest the body on the left arm, while spelling, and keep the eye directed towards their own slates.

To sit erectly against the back of the chairs, during the singing lessons, and to direct their attention to the instructor.

Transferrers to show reports finished as early in the week as 3 o'clock on Tuesday, P. M.

PROHIBITIONS.

Boys are forbidden to buy or sell, borrow or lend, give, take, or exchange, any thing, except fruit or other eatables, without the teacher's permission. To read any book in school except such as contain the reading lesson of his class.

To have in his possession at school any book without the teacher's knowledge. To throw pens, paper, or any thing whatever on the floor, or out at a window or door.

To go out to play with his class when he has had a deviation.

To spit on the floor.

To climb on any fence, railing, ladder, &c., about the school-house.

To scrawl on, blot, or mark slips.

To mark, cut, scratch, chalk, or otherwise disfigure, injure, or defile, any portion of the building or any thing connected with it.

To take out an inkstand, meddle with the contents of another's desk, or unnecessarily open or shut his own.

To write without using a card and wiper.

To quit school without having finished his copy.

To use a knife, except on the conditions prescribed.
To remove class lists from their depositories.

To meddle with ink unnecessarily.

To study home lessons in school hours.

To leave the hall at any time without leave.

To pass noisily, or upon the run, from one room to another, or through the entries.

To visit the office, furnace room, or any closet or teacher's room, except in class, without a written permit.

To play at paw paw any where, or any game within the building.

To play in the play-ground before school.

To leave whittlings or other rubbish in the play-ground, on the side-walk, or

around the building.

To go out of the play-ground in school hours.

To carry out his pen on his ear.

To use any profane or indelicate language.

To nick-name any person.

To press his knees, in sitting, against a form.

To leave his seat for any purpose, but to receive class instruction.

To go home, when deficient, without having answered to his name.

To indulge in eating or drinking in school.

To go out in class, after having been out singly; or going out singly, to linger below to play.

To waste school hours by unnecessary talking, laughing, playing, idling, standing up, turning round, teazing, or otherwise calling off the attention of another boy.

To throw stones, snow-balls, or other missiles about the neighborhood of the school.

To bring bats, hockey sticks, bows and arrows, or other dangerous play-things to school.

To visit a privy in company with any one.

To strike, kick, push, or otherwise annoy his associates or others.

In fine, to do any thing that the law of love forbids-that law which requires us To do to others as we would think it right that they should do to us.

These regulations are not stated according to their relative importance, but as they have been adopted or called to mind. They are intended to meet general circumstances, but may be waived in cases of necessity, by special permission, obtained in the prescribed mode.

In a Lecture on Courtesy, delivered before the American Institute of Instruction at Boston, in August, 1840, Mr. Thayer, the Principal of the Chauncy Hall School, introduced the above regulations as the topics of

his discourse. We extract portions of this admirable lecture, which may be found entire in the annual volume of the American Institute, published in 1842, and in the Massachusetts Common School Journal, Vol. II, for 1840.

Scraping the feet at the door, and wiping them on the mats. This should be insisted on as one of the most obvious items in the code of cleanliness. It is not only indispensable to the decent appearance of a school room, but, if neglected, a large quantity of soil is carried in on the feet, which, in the course of the day, is ground to powder, and a liberal portion inhaled at the nostrils, and otherwise deposited in the system, to its serious detriment. Besides, if the habit of neg lecting this at school is indulged, it is practiced elsewhere; and the child, entering whatever place he may, shop, store, kitchen, or drawing room, carries along with him his usual complement of mud and dirt; and the unscraped and unwiped feet are welcome nowhere, among persons a single grade above the quadruped race.

I may be told, it is a matter little attended to by many adult persons of both sexes. To which I would reply, in the language of Polonius,

"Tis true-'t is pity;

And pity 't is 't is true.'

But this, instead of being an argument in favor of the non-observance of the wholesome rule in our schools, only points more emphatically to the duty of teachers in relation to it; for when, unless during the school-days, are such habits to be corrected, and better ones established?

I am fully aware of the difficulty of carrying rules like this into execution, even among children of double the age of those that form the schools of some who hear me; and do not forget how much this difficulty is increased by the tender age, and consequently greater thoughtlessness, of most of the pupils of the schools usually taught by females; but still, much may be done by proclaiming the rule, and placing at the school entrance one of the elder scholars, to remind the others of it, and see that it is observed, until the cleanly habit be established. In the school above alluded to, the rule has grown into so general observance, that the discovery of mud on the stairs or entry leads immediately to the inquiry, whether any stranger has been in. For, though few carry the habit with them, all are so trained by daily drilling, that it soon becomes as difficult to neglect it, as it was at first to regard it.

Hanging up on the hooks, caps, outer garments, &c., by loops. It is not every school that is provided with hooks or pegs for children's caps, garments, &c. All, however, should be so provided with as much certainty as seats are furnished to sit upon. It not only encourages the parents to send the children in comfortable trim, but induces the children to take better care of their things, especially if a particular hook or peg be assigned to each individual pupil. It is one step in the system of order, so essential to the well-being of those destined to live among fellow-men. If dependent on the attention of mothers at home, I am aware that many children would often be destitute of the loops spoken of; but the children themselves could supply these, under the teacher's supervision; for I understand the use of the needle is taught, in many schools, to the younger pupils of both sexes, and has been found a very satisfactory mode of filling up time, which, among the junior classes, would otherwise be

devoted to idleness.

The next in order is, on keeping clean the person, clothes, and shoes. This, I am aware, must cost the teacher a great deal of labor to enforce; for if sent from home in a clean condition, the chances are more than two to one, that, on reaching school, a new ablution will be necessary. And in how many families this business of ablution is rarely attended to at all, with any fidelity; and as to clean clothes and shoes, if insisted on, the answer might be in some such pleasant and laconic language as this: He ought to be thankful that he can wedding or a coronation!" Still, the rule is a good one, and should be enford,*

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