mental powers are capable of such speed, it is tering on the duties of their responsible proby no means certain that, in general, greater fession. than the present would be an advantage. Is swiftness compatible with thoroughness. To me it is evident that if men thought more rapidly, they would be less valuable thinkers. Examine those instances of ready acquiring which you so much admire. It is often the case that men with such powers of recollection, remember but what is trivial. They do not employ the simple substances of knowledge in the laboratory of thought. Their minds are like the tongues of ant-eaters, which, being thrust into an ant-hill, are withdrawn covered with insects. Those animals which gather larger and more valuable prey, seek it with labor and devour it piece by piece. While, therefore, great speed may be attainable, I shall nevertheless consider it "but a vain and doubtful good," as Shakspeare says of beauty. "1. Meet your school at the outset with a quiet and natural demeanor. Affect neither sternness nor affability. Feel and say in a few simple words, that you hope to do them good, and will try to do the best you can for them. 2. If whispering or disorder occurs, pause at once, and do not proceed till order is restored. The mere pause is generally sufficient for this. 3. Remember that good discipline is the principal thing; without this there can be no successful teaching. 4. Govern yourself. Do not fret or fly into passions never stamp or scold; do not threaten or talk too much. Let a kindly interest in your pupils temper all your actions. 5. Have the school-room kept tidy and comfortable; wash off scribblings and ink-spots, and hang up charts and maps, to give the room an attractive appearance. 6. Let the lessons be short, but thoroughly mastered. Go over the same ground again and again in review. No lofty superstructure can rise except on solid foundations. 7. Foster in your pupils a spirit of justice and generosity, kindness and forbearance, reverence for truth and duty. 8. Make daily preparation for your work; the oldest and ablest teachers do this. You will thus be able to give clear explanations, and to infuse life and spirit in your instructions. 9. Remember that your every act is closely watched, and that example teaches more pow A. But speed and thoroughness may be combined. This should be the great aim of the student. Better labor years for one grain of golden truth, than allow streams of knowledge to flow through the mind; but he who well understands the nature of his mental powers, may by close and judicious application, acquire the ability to think and learn with ease and exactness. To this end let us labor; to this end, let us inspire others by telling them of the unknown powers which lie dormant within them. So short is the time allotted us on earth, to reap the waving erfully than precept. That teacher who is a harvests of knowledge, and drink from ever-gentleman in dress and demeanor, whose lanflowing fountains of thought, that to combine guage is simple, pure and truthful, whose dethe greatest thoroughness with the greatest portment is gentle, graceful and kind, will speed, is the duty of each individual. awaken a respect in both pupils and parents, that will make his task casy. 10. Put yourself into communication with neighboring teachers. If there is no Teacher's Association, organize one as soon as possible. 11. Take an educational journal; you cannot afford to do without its suggestions." IIESIL. Hints to New Teachers. For the Schoolmaster. there right common expressions. Where a Provincialisms and Peculiar Dialect of the Yankee would make use of the word very a Western man would say right. West. THE Yankees have often been laughed at The term "mighty" is in every man's vofor their barbarisms and odd phrases, and per-cabulary there. Mighty beautiful, mighty common use. haps some few corruptions of the English lanstrong, and mighty weak even, are phrases in guage and ungrammatical expressions do preMost people at the West say, vail in New England more extensively than "I reckon ;" and many say "plunder" for in the West or South, but I think that an obbaggage; "tote" for carry; "the balance," serving traveler in the West cannot fail to no- for the rest; "like I do, for as I do; that tice the prevalence of provincialisms and offar," or "that long," for as far as that; ten amusing expressions in the colloquial lan-how de," or rather "hoddie," for how do guage of the people. Some of these provincialisms are grammatical and in good taste; others are indeed barbarisms, and equal to any Irish bulls. The noun " heap" is one of the most common words there. Almost every thing comes in a heap to the good people at the West, both business and pleasure, joy and sorrow, hatred and love. The school-boy has a heap of lessons, the scholar a heap of learning, the housewife a heap of care, the merchant a heap of customers, the great talker a heap of words, the mother a heap of children, the sick man a heap of pain, the hypochondriac a heap of trouble, and the young lover a heap of love. The people there sometimes speak of a heap of rain, a heap of fog, a heap of light, and a heap of thunder and lightning. And so great a favorite is this word that it is quite common to hear people, in some parts of the West, speak of laughing a heap, or loving a heap, or sleeping a heap, or having their head or tooth ache a heap. The word "right," used as an adverb, is in every one's mouth at the Wesi, particularlly in Ohio. This is universally the qualifying word, and it is not only employed as a colloquial term by the uneducated, but by the best educated, and even by public speakers before popular assemblies, and by preachers in the pulpit. Right good, right bad, right smart, right handsome, and even right wrong are you do. When a Western man wishes to make an inquiry of any man he meets along the road in traveling, he addresses him by the appellation "Stranger, rather than by the more confiding term, " Friend"; and when asked a question which calls for an affirmative answer, instead of a simple yes, he replies, "I did so," or "I am so," or "I will so," as the sense of the question may require, and always with a strong emphasis on the word 80. When calling to any man at a distance, a Western man always begins with the interjection O! as for example, "O John!" or "O George!" with a very peculiar inflection of the voice on the interjection. It is common to hear that a steamboat has a power of passengers, a city has a power of inhabitants, a rich man has a power of wealth, a farmer a power of cattle. The corresponding adjective, powerful, is also often used ungrammatically in such connections as these, "powerful much," "powerful great," "powerful handsome," "powerful weak." At the Western country taverns the travel"chicken fixins er will often hear the phrase, and common doins." This phrase designates two stereotype and ever present dishes on the tables of the country taverns in the West. "Chicken fixins" are what a New England housekeeper would call fricasee chickens, and "common doins" are nothing more nor less than that everlasting dish, ham and eggs. The word "diggins," first applied to the hamlets in the vicinity of the coal excavations of Missouri and Ohio, is now often used to designate any settlement or even company of people. On board the boats I frequently heard the inquiry, "How are all the people out in your diggins?" And once at a table on board a steamboat, I was asked by a man sitting at a little distance from me, "Sir, will you pass those chicken fixins down to these diggins?" pressions are in common use among the great body of educated people at the West, as it was for editors of English journals to assert, as they did, a few years since, that the letters of Jack Downing are a fair specimen of the colloquial dialect of Americans. The English language is undoubtedly spoken by the higher classes at the West with as great correctness as at the East or South, and it is certainly used with far more grammatical accuracy even by the uneducated men of our Western settlements than by the cock nies of London, or the gentry of Yorkshire. VIATOR. "Debate on the Bill Establishing Free Schools, When a Western man wishes to say that he did not reveal a secret or make known any particular fact, he will say, "I didn't let on." When he wishes to urge any one to engage in At the January Session of the Rhode Island any enterprise, whether it be to take stock in a bank or speculate in lands, to give to a benevolent object or to repent of his sins, it is often with the enquiry, "Will you go in for this operation?" When he invites a man to dine with him who has happened to call at the hour of dinner, his invitation is, "Draw up, and take a bite." When the people along the Western rivers speak of any person as having fallen overboard into the river, they say he was "spilt into the drink." The inhabitants of most of the several Western States have nicknames for their neighbors. The inhabitants of Ohio are Buckeyes; of Indiana, Hoosiers, (a contraction of who is here?); of Illinois, Suckers; of Michigan, Wolverines; of Iowa, Hawk-eyes; and of Missouri, Pukes. Legislature, A. D. 1828." The entire debate is before us in a venerable and somewhat time-worn pamphlet of twentyfour pages, reported for the "Rhode Island American" by Benj. F. Hallett, Esq. It is certainly an able debate, abounding with rich and practical thoughts, some opinions and allusions characteristic of the times and the State, and many spicy remarks. We intend to make short extracts for a future number of THE SCHOOLMASTER, which we doubt not will be interesting and highly acceptable to our readers. I ought, in justice, to say that the use of these expressions which I have mentioned in this connection, is confined chiefly to the lower and the uneducated portion of the population. But few of these phrases are used by the more intelligent and refined class, and it would be as unjust to represent that these ex-warmly combatted by his able opponents, and We commend to the careful perusal of our readers the entire remarks given below, which are from the opening of Mr. Tillinghast's argument in favor of the bill. They were it was not until after a long and earnest de- population to enchain the mind for the purpose of perpetuating a control over the body bate that the bill was carried and became a law. We should never cease to remember with gratitude those men of the "good old time" who so warmly contended for, and finally succeeded, and transmitted to us so rich a legacy as our system of Public Schools. "MR. SPEAKER :- I rejoice to have lived to see the day when the question, whether we shall make provision, by free schools, for the education of our youth, is presented distinctly for discussion in the legislature of this state, with a view to a present decision. A happy union of circumstances -a deep and steady flow of just opinions - sentiments cherished and fostered with patience and with hope, concurring at length with the results of prosperous industry, have brought us to this position, and placed the important decision fairly and directly in our power. I am persuaded that upon this question, in which so many wishes, so many important interests, and the welfare of so many human beings, living and Hereafter to live, are involved, we have now the power to give an affirmative decision, consistently with the most scrupulous prudence, according to our consciences, and with the cordial concurrence of a great majority of the people of this state. And I sincerely hope that no misapprehension or adverse event may now arise to deprive us of that power, or refer us to a distant perhaps hopeless - period for exercising it. to mould successive generations of men into willing and liveried instruments of ambition and power. The lawgiver consults the plain dictate of self-interest in locking up the fountains of learning and truth. Even the subjects, the defrauded victims of so degrading a policy, whose spirits, in their deplorable servitude, have lost the power of estimating or resenting the fraud, and are habituated to the moral darkness in which they are condemned to grope, will often shun and refuse the light that would rouse them from a athy to anguish, when it revealed to them their actual, but hopeless degradation. But we inhabit no such subdued, sad, blighted region. We represent no such shackled, and dispirited, and degenerate people. Our lot is cast in a land of free states in a sovereignty, small, it is true, in its extent of territory, but with intellectual and physical means exceeding the proportion of its extent. A state which has taken a lead in the liberality of civil institutions originated bright and salutary examples, as well as followed those of others and claiming. by no slender title, the distinguished appellation of freest of the free. We are surrounded by enlightened republics, each pressing forward in the generous race of improvement, but with no more causes for emulation and ardor in that race than exist with us. Our very location, and the natural advantages which are crowded together in our Sir, I would not willingly believe that a limited territory, and which I need not point single member of this house is, in his heart, out to those who know, and feel, and grateopposed to the appropriation of a portion of fully acknowledge them - emphatically indithe public revenue to so laudable and lastingcate that, with due encouragement, every art ly beneficent a purpose. Were we in the doand every mystery which can make the maminions of some absolute prince, or domiterials of nature subservient to the best uses neering aristocracy, we might expect opposiof society, may here be brought to the highest tion to the principle of general instruction. degree of excellence. And as to the mind Of such governments it is the policy to pre-which actuates our general population, (in serve unquestioned sway over a numerical which I include that interesting portion on which our hopes, and affections, and faith for enjoyment; and is bound by the same genfuture consolations and renovated strength, eral duties. The means of acquiring those repose the rising generation) I believe it to enjoyments ought not to be withheld. be as capable of cultivation, as capable of rewarding cultivation, as rich in invention, as effective in operation, as sagacious and vigorous in applying instruction to its legitimate purposes, and improving it by the resources of native genius, as the collective mind of any people who have existed. In such a state of things it strikes me that It is the duty of the lawgiver, promptly and with no further delay than necessity requires, to make provision for general instruction. With us the lawgiver is the people. It is the interest of the people that the civil rights and institutions which they enjoy should outlive the dangers to which the fluctuations and changes in society must subject them, and be perpetuated in their posterity. It is, therefore, the interest, as well as the duty of the lawgivers to provide for general instruction. It is the interest of every individual and every class of the people. Not merely in their civil or collective capacity, but in every capacity, in every relation, in every pursuit, which can justly excite the attachments or the activity of a rational and immortal being; amid the obligations of public, or the more endearing ties of domestic life; in the rational pursuits of business or repose. To the owners and operators of every valuable species of property, its fruits must be an increased improvement and security to that property. To those who have none, it gives consolation and usefulness, and the hope and means of acquisition. In a republican government the prize is not set on high for a favored few, nor must the avenues be locked to all but the possessors of a golden key. The child of poverty and obscurity as well as the child of wealth and honor, may aspire to the same It has been strongly said that our constitutions do not recognize such being as an unlettered man. Sir, every citizen has not only the right but in some instances is even bound by conscientious duty to take some part in public affairs. One of the most simple and ordinary of political acts which a freeman is called to perform, is that of giving his suffrage. He should be qualified to per form it with intelligence; with a mind in- The rudiments of education are the equipments of the citizen; and he can no more perform the duties of self government - he can no more pass through the forms that a republican government requires of him without them, than the soldier can perform military duty without the arms and equipments which the law prescribes - and which, let me add, the law provides for him who has not the means of furnishing himself. Nor have the citizens of this state, sir, been insensible in time past to the importance of promoting ed ucation. It would be unjust to leave or to countenance an impression that they had been so insensible. It would be unjust to omit to correct such an impression if such at this time anywhere exists. Left, as this state was at the close of the war of independence, loaded with an enormous debt contracted in tefense of the common country, which it had not the rank, the same credit, the same sources of good fortune to procure to be funded and as |