of $250, as County Superintendent. We have a very pleasant recollection of Mr. Bahney and his family. Returning to Red Bluff, in the evening we addressed the citizens on the subject of "Public Schools." [To be continued.] GIRLS' HIGH SCHOOL COMMENCEMENT.-The second annual commencement exercises of this popular institution, Ellis H. Holmes, Principal, were held in Lincoln Hall, May 30th. The Hall was filled to its utmost capacity by an appreciative audience. The essays of the young ladies, or, according to the programme, "Girls," were as beautiful as the authors and readers, which is saying a great deal. The reading was particularly fine, and gave evidence of careful elocutionary culture. The singing was even finer than the reading, if such a thing were possible. WHAT THEY SAY OF US.-The Cincinnati News and Educator, of April 28th, remarks: "We are under obligations to the Hon. John Swett, Superintendent of Public Instruction for the State of California, for his first Biennial Report. It is a volume of 422 pages; it contains all the facts and figures usually found in such reports, and in addition, the remarks of the Superintendent have a weight of common sense, and a raciness of expression not usually found in similar documents. We design to transfer some of the good things in the volume to our paper." A NEW SCHOOL JOURNAL.-We are glad to acknowledge the receipt of the Cincinnati News and Educator, a weekly paper devoted mainly to education, literature, and science. It is replete with useful and interesting matter, and cannot fail to be of great service in the work which has been so nobly done in the great State of Ohio-a State whose public schools yield the palm to none in the Union. We have some good Ohio teachers in this State, and we do them a favor by calling their attention to this paper. It is published by Nelson & Co., at Cincinnati, at the exceedingly cheap price of two dollars per annum in advance. COLLEGE OF CALIFORNIA.-The Commencement of this College occurred on the sixth of June, at the new College School Hall, in the presence of a large number of visitors. Four graduates received the honors of the Institution. An oration was delivered by Rev. Horatio Stebbins, of San Francisco. The honorary degree of A.M. was conferred on Geo. W. Bunnell, Master of the Latin High School, San Francisco, Henry P. Carlton, acting Principal of the State Normal School, E. D. Sawyer, Judge of the Fourth District Court, and Messrs. E. A. Tuttle and Henry W. Cleaveland. The meeting of the Associated Alumni of the Pacific Coast was held in the afternoon of the same day, and the alumni dinner is reported to have been a perfect success in the evening. The day was a good one for all concerned, from the State Board of Education down to the youngest member of the College School. NEWARK (New Jersey).-The Ninth Annual Report of the Board of Education is received, showing the number of children 18,982, of whom were regis tered as pupils 11,945. There are 43 different schools, and the estimated value of houses and sites is $161,365. Superintendent Sears gives a plain, straight forward talk to the Board of Education, detailing progress and suggesting improvements. Among the tables we notice one giving the names of teachers, salary, number of times tardy, times lost by tardiness, times absent with permission and without permission, etc. Newark seems to have waked up from the lethargy which formerly characterized its public schools. UNION INSTITUTE.-Monterey and Santa Cruz counties held a Union Institute at Watsonville, during the month of May. We acknowledge the receipt of Prof. White's address before the Institute, and congratulate the teachers in attendance upon the fact of having among them a gentleman so capable of setting forth principles of such importance in so pleasant a form. The Pajaro Valley Times is doing good service by giving ample attention to educational matters. We notice not only Mr. White's address in full, but also the Quarterly Report of County Superintendent Stone to the Board of Supervisors, together occupying a full page of its issue, dated May 19th. CITY FEMALE SEMINARY.-We had the pleasure of listening to the examination of several classes, and to the commencement exercises of this Institution, under the charge of Rev. Charles R. Clarke, on the thirty-first of May. Three young ladies received diplomas, and the exercises were closed by an address from Rev. Dr. Scudder. The Seminary is one of the best private schools on this Coast, and is gaining popularity each year under the care of its accomplished Principal, the author of Clarke's New School Geography. NEW YORK REFORM SCHOOL.-We have received, through the courtesy of E. H. Hallock, Esq., the " Forty-first Annual Report of the Managers of the Society for the Reformation of Juvenile Delinquents" to the Legislature of New York, being for the year 1865. The whole number of children received into the House of Refuge since its opening is 10,853. On the first of January, 1866, there was 939 inmates. In Mr. Hallock's report we find the following passage, which we take to be true, not only in reform schools, but in schools of every grade. "The seat of our work is the heart. Each child presents a different problem of strange perversity, of weakness, and ignorance, and each must be addressed as its peculiar wants require; each must have individual management, encouragement for good conduct, pain for bad, instruction for doubt, tenderness' for weakness, care for bad habits, and religious counsel for peculiar wants. As we are now situated, teaching is addressed to the mass rather than to individuals, and, as a result, while we are laboring, evil is intensified in the hearts of some who are not and will not be instructed, unless they are personally addressed." REGISTRY ACT.-We have been favored with a copy of the Citizen's Hand Book; containing the Registry Act, the Constitutional Provisions defining the Right of Suffrage, and the Laws Regulating Elections. It is a pamphlet of sixty-four pages, with copious index, and will prove of great assistance to officers and citizens generally. THE COMPLAINING TEACHER.-Our regular subscribers are not at all likely to be hit by the following words of Mr. Chuncle, who summarily demolisheth those occupants of school rooms who consider their lot the hardest in the world. Our regular subscribers are the most contented people in the world, we imagine ; but in order to sustain their contentment, as well as to show up those foolish persons who borrow the TEACHER, and then growl at its contents, we invite serious attention to our ancient friend, whose wrath is terrible indeed: "It's nothing but one continued, unremitted swindle! All through life a teacher is shabbily dealt with, and those with whom he has anything to do shave him at every step." Hear him! Forty years ago a poor, wee, helpless, contemptible little animal came into the world without either hair or feathers to cover him. For forty years he has bathed his lungs in balmy air, has slaked his thirst with crystal water, has reveled in the brilliant sunlight, has feasted his eyes with glories and his ears with melodies. Not only has he taken and enjoyed, without permission and without thankfulness, God's choicest, holiest blessings, but all mankind have been slaves to him. Even before the arrival of the puny brute grand preparations were made for him. For ages before he came, the wisest and best of mankind collected, accumulated, and preserved knowledge to serve him. Ever since his unprofitable advent humanity has been toiling for him. They have delved into the bowels of the earth for metals; they have felled the giants of the forest for timber; they have tilled the soil and ranged the world for material; they have built him houses, no one of which he could ever have furnished with glass in a lifetime; they have made him furniture such as he could not even imitate; they have adorned him with clothing and furnished him with thousands of conveniences which he could not even have imagined; they hold themselves in readiness to carry him with tremendous speed, in all imaginable safety and comfort, from one end of the earth to the other; to carry his written communications to his friends in distant parts, and to flash his messages to them on the edge of the lightning; they are constantly on the alert to provide him with the rarest productions from the remotest parts of the earth; and what does he do in return? He spends six hours a day in the intensely interesting and pleasurable occupation of watching the swelling, opening, and unfolding of fifty or sixty immortal buds of intellect. "Swindled at every turn!" "Shaved at every step!" You ungrateful wretch, the day of reckoning is at hand. We'll make you show what you brought and what you've earned since you came here. Against the sum we'll place our just but gigantic bill, and we'll compel—yes, sir-we'll force a settlement. And how many centuries, at one cent a day, for that's all your labor will be worth in Tophet, will it take you to earn the balance, carrying brimstone in coal scuttles, to torture better, but more unfortunate, fellows than yourself? Think of it and weep. STATE NORMAL SCHOOL REPORT-for twenty-four days from May 4th to June 7th, inclusive: Four pupils left school this month to take schools in the country. BOSTON. The Eleventh Semi-annual Report of the Superintendent of Public Schools, John D. Philbrick, Esq., is before us—a well printed document of 73 pages, full of valuable suggestions and information. The expenses for school purposes are set down at $643,774, which amount Mr. Philbrick uses in comparing sundry years together to show that Boston is not running into extravagance in her expenditures for schools. This policy "has enabled us," he says, "to provide tuition at twenty dollars per pupil, as good, perhaps, as is afforded in private schools at two hundred dollars, or ten times the rate. It has enabled us to make greater progress than any other large city has made toward the true ideal of a system of public education, which requires that the schools shall be free to all, good enough for all, and attended by the children of all." About twenty-five pages are occupied with remarks on Object Teaching, which, properly understood, he cordially endorses. At the close of the report, fitting allusion is made to the series of lectures upon different branches of Natural History, which was prepared expressly for the teachers of the public schools of Boston. At the introductory meeting the teachers were addressed by His Honor the Mayor, Governor Andrew, President Hill, of Harvard University, Geo. B. Emerson, LL.D., and other eminent friends of education. The lectures embraced branches of Natural History of the deepest interest. They were attended by about six hundred teachers, representing more than twenty-seven thousand children. Their influence for good cannot be overestimated. CALIFORNIA PRISON COMMISSION.-At the last meeting of the Trustees, the Agent, Mr. James Woodworth, presented his report for the preceding quarter. The following are some of the statistics of the work performed: "Whole number of interviews with prisoners, before and after their release, 854; number of prisoners conversed with for the first time, 412; number assisted in various ways, 106; number furnished with board for periods varying from a single meal to three weeks, 15; number supplied with money, in small sums, generally those leaving the city for the interior, where they had friends, or hoped to find employment, 14; with clothing, 4; number furnished with means to leave the city for various points, 14; number released from confinement (in the City Prison), their further detention not being demanded by justice or the interests of society, such release being secured by the efforts, in various ways, of the Agent, 32; commutation of sentence secured in three cases; visits to the office of the Commission by discharged prisoners, 100; visits by the Agent to the State Prison, 5; to the County Jail, 44; to the City Prison, 81; addresses to prisoners, 4; letters written, 34; articles for publication, 5; money collected, $288.50, and about 1,000 business calls made. Correspondence has been opened with several societies similar in character in the East, and documents received from them, bearing on the work, which it is designed to place in the hands of persons who need and who desire information in regard to the nature and practicability of such enterprises as the one undertaken by the California Prison Commission." The Commission seem to be doing good work, and deserve the support, moral and pecuniary, of the charitable citizens of this State. PRIMARY EXAMINATIONS.-The unexpected pressure on our space in consequence of the work done at the last meeting of the State Board of Education, must be the excuse for deferring the article on the Primaries promised in our last issue. It will be equally good for August consumption, and our readers must wait. STATE NORMAL SCHOOL.-Report for the four weeks, from April 9th to May 4th. Whole number enrolled during the month. Whole attendance of females. Whole attendance of males... Average number belonging during the month. Per centage of attendance. Number in Senior Class. Number in Junior Class.. Number in Sub-Junior Class. ... Whole number of counties represented... 81 73 8 77 71 92 24 35 22 19 In the Training School there are 360 pupils in all, 158 boys and 202 girls. The average number belonging is 284; the average attendance is 269; per centage of attendance, 95. SALARIES OF TEACHERS.-The inhabitants of Yankee land are notoriously fond of the almighty dollar, and are currently charged with being fond of “ small potatoes;" in evidence of all which, read the following list of salaries paid to school teachers in the vicinity of the "Hub: " "In Charlestown: Principal of the High School, $2,200; submaster, 1,600; first assistant, $750; second, 575; third, $450; fourth, $450; principals of grammar schools, $1,800; submaster of Winthrop School, $1,400; of the Prescott, $1,000; submasters of Warren, $600; head assistants of grammar, $550; assistant teachers, $150; teachers of intermediate schools, $500; teachers of primary, $450; teacher of music, including rent of pianos, $1,300. In Roxbury: Principal of the High School, 3,000 per annum ; principals of the Washington, Dearborn, and Comins Schools, $2,000; principal of the Dudley School, 1,000; first assistant of High School, $1,000; second assistant of High School, $700; teacher Ex-Seniors, $600; first and second assistants in grammar schools, each $550; all others, do., $450 first year, $500 afterwards; teachers in primary schools, $400 for first year, $425 for second, and $450 for third year. In Chelsea: Mr. Pitman, High School teacher, $2,300 per annum; assistants, $700 each; Mr. Payson, grammar school, $1,800; teacher of girl's grammar school, $1,200; and all other teachers, twentyfive per cent. increase. In this connection, we may fitly quote from the Massachusetts Report, for 1866: "Without good teaching, a school is but a name. But good teaching can be had only from men and women of high ability and ripe culture, and to suppose that such men and women can be attracted to the laborious profession of teaching without adequate compensation, is a fatal delusion. Poor schools can be had cheap, but good schools will always be costly; and if the character of our Public Schools is to be elevated and improved-if they are to be kept up to the standard of excellence required by an advancing civilization, affording competent instruction to every child, it is absolutely essential that the compensation of teachers should be raised in proportion to the genera increase of wealth in the community. Teachers will correspond in their character and qualifications to the demands of public sentiment as expresed in the rate of salaries |