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    308 THE CULTIVATION OF

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  • Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

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    _. . . . The Irish Female Population Has...

    suitable to tlie cases of those whose early training did not contemplate such duties . This class was to some extent brought

    under the influence of the movement . " " Many members of it were engaged as assistant teachers in the schoolsand not a few

    , worked side by side with their humbler fellow-sufferers . A system was introduced to encourage them , to become employers on a small

    scale , and deal directly with the market for their own benefit . A society was established in Cork for the purpose of enabling such

    persons to avail themselves of the lace trade . Mr . Maguire took notice of this circumstance , ( " Irish Industrial Movement , " p . 222 , )

    and says : Of the many schools which have been brought under my observation , I do not know any one which presents more interesting *

    features than the Adelaide School . At its first commencement it differed in no way from the ordinary industrial school , in which

    young persons are employed during the day ; but since then its whole character has changedand it may now be described as a

    , central depot for the reception of work and the transaction of business . It employs young persons of limited means , or reduced

    circumstances , who are now but too happy to apply their talents to a useful and practical purposeand in most instances with the

    , purest of human motives , —the wish to confer even modest comforts on relations who have fallen victims to the great calamity of this

    country , which has brought down to the dust so many lofty heads and proud names . The number engaged in connexion with the

    Adelaide School amounts to 120 . ... The weekly payments are now about £ 14 a week , with prospect of considerable increase . "

    This undertaking _raj 3 idly extended . No gratuitous assistance was offered , and the numbers of ladies applying for admission to

    it was very great . Every variety of capacity and qualification was presented by the candidatesbut the abilities requisite for the

    , attainment of the object proposed were rare . The educational condition of the _* class was found peculiarly deficient . Superficial

    " accomplishments" were unavailable in the case , and they were plenty enough ; but the knowledge of accounts , power of expression

    in writing , together with that cultivation of intelligence which can alone be accepted as proof of title to tlie adjective " educated "

    , were so remarkably absent , as to impede the successful introduction of artistic information amongst them . As the business of the

    Adelaide School progressed , the failures of its clients from this cause was its principal feature . The difficulty of inducing persons

    to submit to the discipline and training necessary for the undertaking was extreme . Prejudice against business life , and the

    distinctions of social grades , stood mightily in their way . Even want did not always conquer these obstacles , and the numbers

    who succeeded in securing any advantage from it were in great disproportion to those who applied during its course ; at a rough

    estimate , they were , as one to ten , and that at a time when the

    School had business for a far greater number of hands than it could

    308 The Cultivation Of

    308 THE CULTIVATION OF

• Citation
  • English Woman’s Journal (1858-1864), July 1, 1862, page 308, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/ewj/issues/ewj_01071862/page/20/