"On leaving the shoemaking room we entered another large apartment-the dining-room-where two little boys were busily engaged in scrubbing the floor, a labour on which they were bestowing as much pains as if they took a genuine pride in the occupation. Just outside the doorway, in a species of passage leading from the playground, I observed several brightly glistening boilers. Ah,' exclaimed the master, that is a capital contrivance; we cook by steam, and can boil a sack of potatoes in twenty minutes, and other things in proportion.' Then, taking me into the playground, he showed me a small steam engine, tended by a boy of about 13. 'No,' exclaimed the master, in answer to my query as the safety of entrusting such work to so young a head, 'not the slightest danger; of course we have an engineer, and it is to the interest of the boys that we should use their natural capabilities.' At this moment a lad crossed the playground with one arm in a sling. 'How's your arm?' exclaimed the master in a kindly tone. 'Better, eh? '— then turning to me, 'He sprained his wrist playing at leapfrog. Yes, they have not only their amusements in the playground, but we take them for a walk in the open streets from time to time. Healthy? Ah, to be sure, this Institution is situated in so salubrious a spot, no wonder we have such a slight amount of illness. No! we had not a single death during the past year; the death-rate and general conduct being alike satisfactory.'

"We next entered a school-room, where some thirty or thirty-five boys were seated upon a sloping gallery, answering questions put to them by the schoolmaster. The next room we entered bore the appearance of a baker's shop, for there were, I should think, upwards of a hundred half-quartern loaves. "The boys used to bake our own bread,' said the master, but we find the baker can supply us more economically. No, we don't grow our own vegetables! I wish we could, it would be a healthy occupation for the lads! Look at this!' he continued holding up a card with evident feelings of pride. This proved to be a very artistically and tastefully arranged diploma, certifying that one Wm. Morse, a scholar in the Clifton Wood Industrial School had obtained the highest award (that of £4) in the Alice Cole's prizes for efficiency in scholarship. Three other certificates

were shown me for which three separate amounts of £2 had been awarded during the past year. Education and industry," exclaimed my companion, 'these are our antidotes to crime. Out of fifty-one boys admitted during the past year only two could read or write.'

"I was next led into a somewhat gloomy apartment, as hot as an oven. This,' said the master, belongs to the laundry department in which ten boys are engaged, and from which the sum of £33 6d. was realised during last year; thus from the different shops I have shown you, from the labour of the boys added together, the sum of £442 168. 6d., was realised during the year 1879, so that after deducting the price of the labour, each boy cost the Institution an annual sum of £13 58. 1d. We have 187 boys, sixteen of whom are out upon probation, or license; of course we bestow rewards upon the meritorious, £72 is in the hands of the Committee at the present time granted as special rewards to different boys.'

"Our next visit was to the dormitories where, I confess, I was more than gratified at the cleanliness and orderly arrangement of the different beds. Each boy had a bed to himself. Uniformity, cleanliness, comfort, and good ventilation, these were the conspicuous characteristics of each room! 'Of course,' explained the master in answer to a question, the boys' friends can see them once in two months for an hour. As to punishments, there is a method of managing boys without chastisement, and all punishments inflicted must be entered in a journal, stating the nature of the various offences, and none can be inflicted without the master's sanction, and each sanction must be submitted to the Committee for approval; thus there is every check against undue severity.'

"To what a different purpose is this room applied to what it was formerly,' continued my guide, looking round at 30 or 40 beds, 'this was at one time the bedroom of one of England's greatest men-one of the greatest honours to Bristol. This was the bedroom and that the study of Edmund Burke! strange transition for his study to become the dormitory of the waifs and strays of our very gutters.'

It is a

"Parting from my instructive guide, I came away from the

schools feeling in the highest degree satisfied with my visit. The practical working of the various departments, the healthy, contented, and cleanly look of the boys, the order and method which were everywhere apparent, the painstaking care manifested by the different masters, and the educational advantages the Institution afforded, were all so many indications of the successful carryings out of a carefully elaborated scheme, and one to which I heartily wished continued success."

OFFICIAL AND SOCIAL INTERCOURSE IN INDIA.

WHAT the Hindoos generally ask of the English is nothing more than a kindly sympathy and a somewhat more desirable intercourse than at present with such of the natives as would be glad to associate themselves with their English brethren, and not a complete social combination, which is the work of time, and which is next to impossible under the present Hindoo state of society. It is a fallacy to imagine that Hindoo ladies are usually enough advanced in education and manners for having free intercourse with Europeans. To bring a Hindoo lady to this state of education and happy millennium will take half a century, looking at the slow strides they make in the advancement of education; but if Englishmen are really anxious to see natives change their timehonoured customs and to learn what liberty can do for women, surely it can be done no better than by allowing them to make the acquaintance of their wives and daughters. It is indeed surprising how little use English have made of women's influence in endeavouring to alter and improve some of the habits and customs of their Hindoo brethren. To exclude the Hindoos from the society of English ladies is actually to shut the door against them of the best school for learning virtue, courtesy, and those other noble qualities of which there is no better teacher than a true Englishwoman. Doubtless the Hindoo religion comes in the way,

as whoever, among the orthodox, eats with Europeans becomes an out-caste. With the Parsees the case is different. A Parsee gentleman can dine at the same board as a European without breaking any caste or creed, and to this class we wish the hand of hospitality were more extended by our European friends. Englishmen in India are considered rulers of society, and as the rulers of society they must learn to be equal to their versatile office. By coming in close contact with Europeans natives will learn good manners, which always tend to facilitate life, and will get rid of impediments and deep-rooted old caste prejudices.

It

Some of the prejudices which Englishmen generally have against the natives and their slovenly habits and manners have little or no foundation at all. An Englishman thinks a Hindoo wanting and deficient in personal cleanliness, but that is a mistake except in the case of the lower castes and the humbler classes, and it is a strange notion to identify them as representative Hindoos; we have no better right to take them as the cream of high Hindoo society than fishmongers of Billingsgate or street hawkers as specimens of the highborn English race. It is one of the greatest mistakes Englishmen make in India-that of confounding and mixing all the numerous races and classes that inhabit this vast country. To a greater or lesser extent the universal Hindoo "dhotee" and "angarkha" are at the bottom of this mischief. helps to mix a high-caste Hindoo with a pariah of his community in the eyes of an English official generally. Prejudices like these, though trivial in themselves, usually help to prevent friendly and social intercourse between the two races. Some improvement ought to be made in this article of Hindoo dress, and the sooner the better. From an English point of view, there are other reasons also why Europeans don't associate so freely with the Hindoos or natives as they ought to do. Generally an Englishman does not understand and does not trust the native; and I believe if the Hindoos were to try to understand their English rulers more intimately than they do now a better state of things can be expected, and the mutual sympathies would be broadened by intercourse which we so lamentably lack now.

It is much to be regretted that young Englishmen of little experience and knowledge on their coming to power and position

in India think too much of themselves and very little of the natives. This self-sufficient idea of their national superiority often leads to a haughty and insolent demeanour extremely offensive to all classes of the natives, and is highly damaging to the interests of the state they represent. The good sense, however, of a majority of well-educated young men who of late are imported to govern the natives, with good wholesome advice from the highest men in power, teaches the stern realities of an Indian life at a glance. They perceive on accession to power and post that in several branches of the service they are quite helpless without the assistance of intelligent and well-informed natives, while at the same time they are given an opportunity to observe that all the great officers who have most distinguished themselves in their administration have been known for having freely consulted and conversed with all classes of the natives, whose opinions on the state and wants of the country have been instrumental in contributing to their eminence and advancement. The names of Elphinstone, Malcolm, and others are respected and revered by the natives of India up to the present day for urging upon their brother officials, civil and military, to treat the natives of India very kindly and gently, and to bring them in nearer contact with themselves. If the advice given by these worthies be followed to the very letter it will materially help to a satisfactory conclusion of a question which has concern with the teeming millions of India as the loyal subjects of the mighty Kaisar-i-hind, and it may be the means of a better understanding between the rulers and the ruled in future and the real difficulties will be smoothed. I have often said and say once more that a majority of Englishmen in India are gentlemen in every sense of the word, and are true friends to their native fellow-subjects. It ought to be the duty of our Government to give to the younger English servants the best opinion of the natives, in order that they may be better qualified to govern them hereafter, and thus make our administration strong and efficient. It ought to be made compulsory with every fresh Englishman who comes out to India to become acquainted with the habits, manners and wants of the natives, and try to lose their deep-rooted prejudice against them, and, above all, to become attached to them and feel a warm desire