Appendix, No. 11. W. Perceval, Dean of Emly. Tho Smith, Archdeacon of Glandelagh. W. Smith, Dean of Ardfert. R. Gibbons, Rector of Rahenny. W. Jackson, Rector of St. John's Dublin. Cha Whittingham, Archdeacon of Dublin. J. Wynne, Rector of St. Andeons Dublin, W. Usher, Archdeacon of Clonfert, Ja' King, Prebendary of Tipper, Dublin. Appendix, No. 12. Appendix, No. 12. RETURN of CHARTER SCHOOL APPRENTICES. From Mr. Nelson's Returns, of 196 children apprenticed (from 11 Schools) 24 eloped from their services; 38 enlisted in the army or navy; one relapsed to Popery; 32 were illtreated by their Masters, or of doubtful conduct; and the remaining 101 were reported at doing well. Returns, though apparently not so accurate as those of Mr. Nelson's, have been very lately received from the Masters of Schools, of 825 Apprentices: Of these 48 eloped; 17 enlisted in the army or navy; 129 ill-treated by their Masters, or of doubtful conduct; and the remaining 625 are reported as in general doing well. Incorporated Society's House, 19th Dec. 1809. *The person lately employed by the Incorporated Society to superintend the conduct and treatment of children apprenticed from their Schools. Correct Copies of Appendixes to the Report on the Charter Schools, FOURTH REPORT. DIOCESAN FREE SCHOOLS. To His Grace CHARLES Duke of RICHMOND and LENOX, Lord Lieutenant General and General Governor of Ireland. The Fourth REPORT of the Commissioners for enquiring into the State of all Schools on PUBLIC or CHARITABLE Foundations, in Ireland. MAY IT PLEASE YOUR GRACE, WE Diocesan E the undersigned Commissioners, appointed for enquiring into the several Funds and Revenues granted for the purposes of Education, and into the Free Schools. State and Condition of all Schools in Ireland upon Public or Charitable Foundations, in pursuance of the powers vested in us; beg leave to submit to Your Grace, our Report upon the present State of the DIOCESAN FREE SCHOOLS of Ireland. The DIOCESAN FREE SCHOOLS were established under the authority of an Act passed in the 12th Eliz. c. 1. which enacted, that there should be a Free School in every Diocese in Ireland, that the Lord Deputy or other Chief Governor or Governors for the time being should appoint the Schoolmasters in every Diocese, excepting those of Armagh, Dublin, Meath, and Kildare, of which the respective Archbishops and Bishops were to appoint the Masters; that the School-house for every Diocese should be erected in the principal Shire Town of the Diocese, at the Costs and Charges of the whole Diocese, without respect of Freedoms, by the device and oversight of the Ordinaries of each Diocese (or the Vicars General side vacante), and the Sheriff of the Shire; that the Lord Deputy or other Chief Governor, with and by the advice of the Privy Council, should, according to the quantity and quality of each Diocese, appoint such yearly Pension, Salary, or Stipend, for every Schoolmaster, as he should think convenient, whereof the Ördinaries of every Diocese should pay yearly for ever the third part, and the Parsons, Vicars, Prebendaries, and other Ecclesiastical Persons should pay the other two parts by an equal contribution, to be made by the Ordinaries; and that all Churches, Parsonages, Vicarages, and other Ecclesiastical Livings, that have come by any title whatsoever to the possession of the Queen or any of her Progenitors, should be charged with this payment and contribution, in whose hands or possession soever they are or shall come. It appears that Free Schools were actually established under this Act in most, if not all, of the Dioceses in Ireland, many of which continue to exist at this time; but at no time do they appear to have fully answered the purposes of their Institution; before the Restoration indeed we have not been able to find any account of them, but from the state of the Kingdom it is not probable they were either regularly kept or usefully conducted; soon after that event, a Commission appears to have been issued by the Lord Lieutenant and Council, directing the 47. G g Bishops Free Schools. Diocesan Bishops of the several Dioceses to carry the Act of the 12 Eliz. into effect, and for that purpose to applot the Sums to be paid out of the different Ecclesiastical Livings in each Diocese for the Stipend or Salary of the Diocesan Schoolmasters, which was accordingly done in many, and perhaps in all the Dioceses; but if Schools were at that time generally set on foot, they appear to have been of little public Utility, partly from the want of proper School-houses, and other accommodations for the Masters: In the 12th George I. an Act was passed empowering Archbishops, Bishops, &c. to set apart an acre of Ground, out of any Lands belonging to them, for the site of a Free School, to be approved of by the Chief Governor for the time being; and directing, that until such Ground be set out, the School should be kept in such convenient place as the Archbishop or Bishop of the Diocese should be able to procure, for a yearly rent or otherwise; and further empowering the Grand Jury of each County to present from time to time such Sums as they should find reasonable, for their respective proportion towards building or repairing the School-houses in their Counties, to be levied on the whole or such parts thereof as are situated in each respective Diocese. Under this Act a considerable improvement appears to have taken place in the state of the Diocesan Schools; but as Presentments for the different proportions of each County in the several Dioceses, were found extremely inconvenient, if not impracticable, the Grand Jury of each County, in which a Diocesan School is situated, were by an Act of 29th George II. empowered to present Sums to be levied on the whole County for building or repairing the School-house; still however there are several Dioceses unprovided with proper School-houses, and some without any, and the general benefit derived from the whole Institution is far from corresponding with the intention of the Legislature, or even with the number of Schools actually kept or supposed to be so: It appears from an abstract of the Returns made from the several Dioceses, and herewith submitted to your Grace, that out of the whole Number, thirty-four, composing twenty-two Archbishopricks and Bishopricks, only ten are provided with Diocesan School-houses in tolerable repair: in three others the Houses are either out of repair or otherwise insufficient, and the remainder are wholly unprovided, and the Masters of such Schools as are kept in them either rent Houses for the purposes, or are accommodated in other ways. But it appears from the same Returns, that in some of them. no Diocesan School is kept at all, and in others no effective one-and that the whole number of effective Schools in all the Dioceses together is only thirteen, and that the whole number of Scholars in all the Schools together does not exceed 380.In the greater part of the Dioceses in which no School is kept, there is no Contribution from the Clergy for the payment of a Master; but in some instances the Salary is actually paid by the Clergy to a nominal Master, who either keeps no School at all, or one on a different Foundation, in which the Diocesan is wholly absorbed. These irregularities and defects, in the present state of the Diocesan Schools, appear to have arisen from various causes, in which there is little or no ground for supposing the backwardness or inattention of the Bishops and Clergy to have had any share; the utter inadequacy of the Stipend, which is or should be collected for the Maintenance of the Master, and which in no single Diocese exceeds 40%. per annum, and in some is so low as 25. would alone account for the non existence or discontinuance of these Schools, except in situations otherwise advan tageous, and where Grammar-schools would therefore be established and flourish without the aid of so inconsiderable an Endowment.-In several instances the establishment of other Schools in their immediate vicinity with ample Endowments, and on more enlarged Foundations, has either wholly superseded them, or, as we have already intimated, has swallowed them up. Such being the actual state of these Schools, it may seem to be doubtful whether a system should be continued, which in its principle appears not altoge ther equitable, and has never been found efficient in practice; which is not called for by the present state of Society, and, considered as a Tax on the Clergy, operates very partially and unequally, twelve out of thirty-four Dioceses contributing nothing towards its object: At the period of its first Establishment, the state of this Country was such as to require some effectual provisions for the Education even of the upper and middle classes, and as that of the lower order had been imposed on the parochial Clergy by the 28th of Henry VIII. the same policy was pur ued in the 12th of Eliz. and it was perhaps the wisest which in the circumstances of the times could have been adopted; at the present day it appears to be both unnecessary and ineffectual. If however it should be deemed deemed imprudent to abandon altogether long established Foundations, which Diocesan however imperfect or inadequate are still productive of some advantage, we take Free Schools. the liberty of recommending the adoption of measures for rendering them more useful and efficient, and placing them under such regulations that every Diocese may contribute its proportion towards their establishment and support: For these purposes we beg leave to suggest, that instead of requiring a School to be kept in every Diocese, which has been already found impracticable, a certain number only should be established in every Province, to be supported out of the Contributions from each Diocese in the Province; or, if it should be found more convenient, out of a general Fund consisting of contributions from all the Dioceses in every Province: Supposing the whole number of Schools thus established to be twelve, and that the average Contribution of the 34 Dioceses was 367. the Endowment of each School would be 1027. per annum; but it is presumed that the average might be raised to 40l. without bearing hard on the Clergy, especially if Impropriators were obliged to contribute, and if the Sons of the poorer Clergy and Curates were to be admitted into the Schools as free Scholars. In fixing on the situation for the Schools, regard should be had principally to the want of proper Grammar-schools in the different Districts of each Province, and, as far as might be, to the continuance of the best of the Diocesan Schools already existing. By the Acts of the 12th George I. and 29th George II. provision is made for building and repairing Diocesan School-houses; and in the Act which would be necessary for the purpose here suggested, they might be so amended, as to apply and be accommodated to that purpose, and provision might be made for putting them in |