dren are crammed with useless nonsense, which, by raising them
above their natural position, totally unfits them for their proper
sphere. This is what the government calls education; and the same time
and expense thus employed in teaching a few would educate treble the
number in plain English. It is too absurd to hear the arguments in
favor of mathematics, geography, etc., etc., for the native children,
when a large proportion of our own population in Great Britain can
neither read nor write.

The great desideratum in native education is a thorough knowledge of
the English tongue, which naturally is the first stone for any
superstructure of more extended learning. This brings them within the
reach of the missionary, not only in conversation, but it enables them
to benefit by books, which are otherwise useless. It lessens the
distance between the white man and the black, and an acquaintance with
the English language engenders a taste for English habits. The first
dawn of civilization commences with a knowledge of our language. The
native immediately adopts some English customs and ideas, and drops a
corresponding number of his own. In fact, he is a soil fit to work up
on, instead of being a barren rock as hitherto, firm in his own
ignorance and prejudices.

In the education of the rising native generation lies the hope of
ultimate conversion. You may as well try to turn pitch into snow as to
eradicate the dark stain of heathenism from the present race. Nothing
can be done with them; they must be abandoned like the barren fig-tree,
and the more attention bestowed upon the young shoots.

But, unfortunately, this is a popular error, and, like all such, one
full of prejudice. Abandon the present race! Methinks I hear the cry
from Exeter Hall. But the good people at home have no idea to what an
extent they are at present, and always have been, abandoned. Where the
children who can be educated with success are neglected at the present
day, it may be imagined that the parents have been but little cared
for; thus, in advocating their abandonment, it is simply proposing an
extra amount of attention to be bestowed upon the next generation.

There are many large districts of Ceylon where no schools of any kind
are established. In the Ouva country, which is one of the most
populous, I have had applications from the natives, begging me to
interest myself in obtaining some arrangement of the kind. Throngs of
natives app