for education from time to time. There are several articles on endowed schools in the Journal of Education,' and an article on endowments in England for the purposes of Education, in the second volume of the publications of the Central Society of Education, by George Long. The evidence before the Select Committee of the House of Commons in 1835 contains much valuable information. In 1840 a sensible pamphlet on grammar-schools appeared in the form of a letter to Sir R. H. Inglis, by the Hon. Daniel Finch, for twenty years a charity commissioner.

Endowments for Education are probably nearly as old as endowments for the support of the church. Before the Reformation there were schools connected with many religious foundations, and there were also many private endowments for education. Perhaps one of the oldest schools of which anything is known is the school of Canterbury. Theodore, who was consecrated Archbishop of Canterbury in 668 (according to some authorities), founded a school or college by licence from the pope. This school certainly existed for a long time; and there is a record of a suit before the Archbishop of Canterbury in 1321, between the rector of the grammar-schools of the city (supposed to be Theodore's school or its representative) and the rector of St. Martin's, who kept a school in right of the church. The object of the suit was to limit the rector of St. Martin's in the number of his scholars. This school probably existed till the Reformation, at least this is the time when the present King's School of Canterbury was established by Henry VIII., and probably on the ruins of the old school. Many of our most noble foundations, such as Winchester College and Eton College, are of a date long prior to the Reformation. Before the Reformation schools were also connected with chantries, and it was the duty of the priest to teach the children grammar and singing. There are still various indications of this connection between schools and religious foundations, in the fact that some schools are still or were till lately kept in the church, or in a building which was part of it. There are many schools still in existence which were founded before the Reformation, but a very great number was founded immediately after that event, and one object of King Edward VI. in dissolving the chantries and other religious foundations then existing was for the purpose of establishing grammarschools, as appears from the recital of the Act for that purpose (1 Ed. VI. c. 14). But as Strype observes, in his Ecclesiastical Memorials,' "this Act was grossly abused, as the Act in the former king's reign for dissolving religious houses was. For though the public good was pretended thereby (and intended too, I hope), yet private men in truth had most of the benefit, and the king and commonwealth, the state of learning and the condition of the poor, left as they were before, or worse." It appears also that, in the confusion consequent on these violent changes, and the eagerness of all persons to get something of the spoil, schools were even suppressed which did not come within the terms of the Act. It is also certain that new schools were not always established in those places where a school had previously been connected with a religious foundation. There was a chantry at Sandwich in Kent, in the school belonging to which Roger Manwood received the rudiments of his education. The chantry was suppressed under the Act of Edward VI., and no sehool was established in its place. The want of a school there subsequently led to the foundation of the present grammar-school, for which the said Roger Manwood obtained a licence in the usual form from Queen Elizabeth. This school was in fact commenced in 1563 by a subscription by the mayor, jurats, and principal inhabitants of Sandwich. Manwood endowed it with land; and the dean and chapter of Canterbury, through Archbishop Parker's application, granted a piece of land belonging to their

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church at Sandwich for the site of the school. This appears very much like an attempt to repair part of the mischief that had followed on the suppression of the chantries and other similar establishments.

The king however did found a considerable number of schools, now commonly called King Edward's Schools, out of tithes that formerly belonged to religious houses or chantry lands; and many of these schools, owing to the improved value of their property, are now among the richest foundations of the kind in England. In these, as in many other grammarschools, a certain number of persons were incorporated as trustees and governors, and provision was made for a master and usher. At that time the endowments varied in value from twenty to thirty and forty pounds per annum. Birmingham School is an example of one of these royal foundations.

A large proportion of the grammar-schools were founded in the reigns of Edward VI. and Elizabeth, and there is no doubt that the desire to give complete ascendancy to the tenets of the Reformed Church was a motive which weighed strongly with many of the founders. Since the reign of Elizabeth we find grammar-schools occasionally established, but less frequently, while endowments for schools not grammar-schools have gradually increased so as to be much more numerous than the old schools. Foundations of the latter kind are still made by the bounty of individuals from time to time; and a recent act of parliament (2 and 3 Will. IV. c. 115) has made it lawful to give money by will for the establishing of Roman Catholic Schools. The statute of the 9 Geo. II. c. 36, commonly called the Mortmain Act, has placed certain restrictions on gifts by will for charitable purposes, which restrictions consequently extend to donations by will for the establishment or support of schools.

The History of Grammar Schools before the Reformation would be a large part of the history of education in England, for up to that time there were probably no other schools. From the time of the Reformation, and particularly till within the last half-century, the grammar-schools of England were the chief schools of early instruction for all those who received a liberal training. From these humble and unpretending places has issued a series of names illustrious in the annals of their country—a succession of men, often of obscure parentage and stinted means, who have justified the wisdom of the founders of grammar-schools in providing education for those who would otherwise have been without it, and thus securing to the state the services of the best of her children. Though circumstances are now greatly changed, there is nothing in the present condition of the country which renders it prudent to alter the foundation of these schools to any great extent; and certainly there is every reason for supporting them in all the integrity of their revenues, and for labouring to make them as efficient as their means will allow. In the conflict of parties who are disputing about education, but in fact rather contending for other things, in the competition of private schools, which from their nature must be conducted with a view to a temporary purpose, and in the attempt made to form proprietory establishments which shall combine the advantages of grammar-schools and private schools, and shall not labour under the defects of either-we see no certain elements on which to rest our hopes of a sound education being secured to the youth of the middle and upper classes of this country. The old grammar-schools, on the whole, possess a better organization than anything that has yet been attempted, and though circumstances demand changes in some of them, they require no changes which shall essentially alter their character. In the present state of affairs, these are specially the schools for the middle classes, and it is their interest to cherish and support them.

EUROPE is one of the great divisions of the globe, forming the north-western part of the old continent, of which it occupies a little more than two-seventeenths; Asia contains nearly nineseventeenths, and Africa somewhat more than six. The surface of Europe 'is calculated to contain about 3,900,000 square miles, if Mount Caucasus and the river Ural are considered as forming the boundary-line between it and Asia. The name 66 Europe" first occurs in a poem attributed to Homer. (Hymn to Apollo,' 251, 291.) Herodotus (iv. 45) says he does not know how the name came to be given to our continent, except it be from Europa, the daughter of the king of Tyre; but he seems hardly satisfied with this explanation, and we have no other to offer. If the history of the discovery of America were lost we should have a similar difficulty in conjecturing how the New World obtained its

name.

Europe is separated from America by the wide expanse of the Northern Atlantic, which washes its western and northern shores, and from Africa by the Mediterranean Sea. The boundary-line which divides Europe from Asia is only in part indicated by nature. This line runs through the Archipelago, the straits of the Dardanelles, the sea of Marmara, and the straits of Constantinople, to the Black Sea, which is traversed by it. So far all geographers agree, but they do not agree as to the remaining part of the boundary-line. In the last century this line was drawn through the straits of Yenikale and the sea of Azof, and then along the river Don as far as the point where it approaches nearest to the river Volga, and afterwards along this river to its confluence with the Kama. It then followed the Kama to its sources in the Ural Mountains, and was continued along the crest of this range to the source of the Kara, and thence along that river to the gulf of Kara.

This boundary-line is now abandoned as being too vague, and another is substituted for it. This new line traverses the Black Sea to the western extremity of Mount Caucasus, south of Anapa; it then runs along the watershed of this range east-south-east to its eastern extremity, where it reaches the Caspian Sea at Soomgait, north of the peninsula of Absheran. Thence it runs through the Caspian Sea, which it leaves at the mouth of the river Ural, whose course it follows up to its sources in the Ural Mountains. The Ural Mountains and the river Kara constitute the remainder of this boundary-line.

But

The most northern point of the European continent is Cape Nord Kyn, in 71° 6' N. lat.; North Cape, in 71° 10′, is on an island called Mageröe. The most southern points are Punta de Tarifa in Spain (36° N. lat.) and Cape Matapan (36° 17') in Greece. The most western points are Cape St. Vincent (9o W. long.), Cape Roca (9° 28′), and Cape Finisterre (9° 27'). The most eastern point is in the Ural Mountains, west of Ekatarinburg (60° 20′ E. long.). some of the islands extend farther south and west than the continent. The most southern point of the island of Candia is in 34° 55′ N. lat. The Blasquet Islands on the west of Ireland lie in 10° 35′ W. long. Cape Fugelberg in Iceland is near 25° W. long., and the most western of the Azores, Corvo and Flores, in 31° W. long. The most northern extremity of Nowaya Szemlia (Nova Zembla) is about 77° N. lat. A straight line drawn from Cape St. Vincent to the mouth of the river Kara, on the Frozen Ocean, the north-eastern extremity of Europe, does not much exceed 3000 miles; and another, drawn from Cape Matapan to Cape Nord Kyn, is 2400 miles long.

I. Progress of Discovery.-The earliest notices of the history of Europe are in the writings of the Greeks, who inhabited the south-eastern corner of our continent. From this country

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the geographical knowledge of Europe extended by degrees to the west and north. Homer, who probably lived about 1000 years before the Christian æra, was acquainted with the countries round the Ægean Sea or Archipelago. He had also a pretty accurate general notion respecting those which lie on the south coast of the Black Sea; but what he says about the countries west of Greece, on the shores of the Mediterranean Sea, is a mixture of fable and truth, in which the fabulous part prevails. It would seem that in his age these seas were not yet visited by his countrymen, and that he obtained his knowledge from the Phoenicians, who had probably for some time sailed to these countries, but who, according to the common policy of trading nations, spread abroad false accounts of these unknown regions, in order to deter other nations from following their track, and participating in the advantages of this distant commerce. It is probable also that the Phonicians long excluded the Greeks from the navigation of the Mediterranean; for when the Greeks began to form settlements beyond their native country, they first occupied the shores of the Ægean, and afterwards those of the Black Sea. As the European shores of the Black Sea are not well adapted for agriculture, except a comparatively small tract of the peninsula of Crimea, their early settlements were mostly made on the Asiatic shores, and consequently little addition was made by these colonies to the geographical knowledge of Europe. But the navigation of the Phoenicians was checked in the middle of the sixth century before Christ, apparently by their country being subjugated by the Persians. About this time also the Greeks had begun to form settlements in the southern parts of Italy and on the Island of Sicily, and to navigate the Mediterranean Sea in its full extent. Accordingly we find that in the time of Herodotus (450 before Christ), not only the countries on each side of the Mediterranean Sea and the northern shores of the Black Sea were pretty well known to the Greeks, but that, following the track of the Phoenicians, they ventured to pass the Columns of Hercules, and to sail as far as the Cassiterides, or Tin Islands, by which name the southwestern part of England must be understood. It is even reported that some of their navigators sailed through the English Channel and entered the North Sea, and perhaps even the Baltic. It must be observed, however, that Herodotus professes himself totally unacquainted with the islands called Cassiterides (iii. 115); and Strabo (104, &c.) expresses a very unfavourable opinion of the alleged northern voyages of Pytheas.

Thus a considerable part of the coasts of Europe was discovered, whilst the interior remained almost unknown. When the Romaus began their conquests, this deficiency was partly filled up. The conquest of Italy was followed by that of Spain and the southern parts of France, and not long afterwards Sicily, Greece, and Macedonia were added. Cæsar conquered Gallia and the countries west of the river Rhine, together with the districts lying between the different arms by which that river enters the sea. His two expeditions into Britain made known also in some measure the nature of our island and its inhabitants. Thus, in the course of little more than 200 years, the interior of all those countries was discovered whose shores alone had been previously known. In the mean time nothing was added to the knowledge of the coasts, the Greeks having lost their spirit of discovery by sea with their liberty, and the Romans not being much inclined to naval enterprise.

After the establishment of imperial power at Rome, the conquests of the Romans went on at a much slower rate, and

the boundaries of the empire soon became stationary. This circumstance must be chiefly attributed to the nature of the countries which were contiguous to the boundaries. The regions north of the Danube are mostly plains, and at that time were only inhabited by wandering nations, who could not be subjected to a regular government. Such at least are the countries extending between the Carpathian Mountains and the Black Sea; and therefore the conquest of Dacia by Trajan was of short continuance and speedily abandoned. The countries between the Alps and the Danube were soon added to the empire; but, as the nations who inhabited the tracts north of that river had not yet given up a wandering life, they were enabled to elude the Roman yoke. The most important addition to the empire and to geographical knowledge was the conquest of England during the first century after Christ, to which, in the following century, the south of Scotland was added.

Nothing seems to have been added afterwards. The Geography of Ptolemy contains a considerable number of names of nations, places, and rivers in those countries, which were not subjected to the Romans. Probably they were obtained from natives, and from Roman traders who had ventured to penetrate beyond the boundaries of the empire. But these brief notices are very vague, and in many cases it is very difficult to determine what places and positions are indicated.

The overthrow of the Roman empire by the northern barbarians destroyed a large part of the geographical knowledge previously obtained, except perhaps as to that portion of Germany which was subject to the Franks, which by degrees became better known than it was before. But two sets of men soon made their appearance who contributed largely to extend the geographical knowledge of Europe-missionaries and pirates. The Christian religion had been introduced into all the countries subject to the Roman power. The barbarians who subverted the empire soon became converts to the Christian faith, and some of them ventured among other barbarous nations for the purpose of converting them also. They visited the nations that inhabited the eastern parts of Germany, but here their progress was at first slow; they did not cross the river Oder, or at least they did not venture far beyond it, and the geographical knowledge of this part of Europe was consequently not much increased. The progress of those missionaries was more important who penetrated from Constantinople into the interior of Russia, where they succeeded in converting to the Greek church the different tribes into which the Russians were then divided. This was effected in the ninth century. In the tenth the western missionaries got into Poland, and its inhabitants by degrees became converts. In the beginning of the thirteenth century the Prussians and Lithuaniaus had not been converted to Christianity, and the attempts of the missionaries were for a long time abortive. Christianity was however introduced among the Prussians during the thirteenth century by force of arms, the knights of St. John having conquered the country. The Lithuanians were the last to embrace Christianity, which was effected by a stroke of policy: their sovereign acquired the crown of Poland by embracing the new faith.

To the pirates we are indebted for our acquaintance with the northern parts of Europe, especially the Scandinavian peninsula; but this was not owing to pirates who went to, but to pirates who came from, these countries. The Northmen or Normans, who inhabited Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, first laid waste and then settled in part of France, and afterwards conquered England. In their new settlements they maintained a communication with their native countries, which thus gradually became known wherever the Normans had settled.

It is worthy of remark that no part of Europe has been dis covered or explored by travellers who went for that sole purpose. We must however make an honourable exception in favour of Alfred the Great, who sent two noblemen to explore the countries around the Baltic Sea: and in the account of one

of them, Other, or Otter, we find the first accurate notions respecting these regions, especially Prussia, more than 300 years before the Prussians were converted to Christianity.

II. Surveys of Europe.—In the beginning of the last century trigonometrical surveys were first made with the view of constructing accurate maps. The first of these surveys was made in France under Cassini. Since that time other European governments have caused some parts at least of their respective territories to be surveyed, especially Prussia and Austria. England followed in the same steps towards the beginning of the present century, and to this great national undertaking we owe the publication of the Ordnance Maps. The southern parts of Sweden and Norway have likewise been surveyed. Thus we are now in possession of very exact maps of nearly one-half of Europe. The maps of the other countries of Europe rest on the partial surveys of particular districts, and on a greater or less number of astronomical observations; by means of which those parts which have not been surveyed can still be laid down within certain limits of accuracy. Though maps of this latter kind cannot altogether be relied on, the attention paid by all governments to their gradual improvement has been sufficient to correct very gross errors, and thus these maps have by successive and partial improvements attained a certain degree of correctness.

The great increase in commerce and navigation in modern times has convinced the respective governments of Europe of the necessity of a minute and accurate survey of their coasts. But all the coasts of Europe have not been surveyed, though more than half of them have been accurately laid down. The greatest part of the coast of Iceland has been surveyed by the Danish government, and this survey is still going on. The whole western coast of Norway, and east of Cape Lindesnaes, as far as the harbour of Christiansand, was surveyed by the Danes fifty or sixty years ago, but this survey is not considered accurate. The Baltic, including the Cattegat, has been surveyed by the governments to which the coasts belong, but not minutely, nor is the survey considered accurate. The coast between the mouth of the river Elbe and the Dollart was surveyed by the French, and continued to the Schelde by the Dutch. The coast between the Schelde and Gravelines was surveyed by the French.

Our government has shown great activity in surveying the British coasts. A minute and accurate survey has been made of the whole eastern coast of Great Britain south of the Murray Frith, and of the whole southern coast, except the tract between Sidmouth and Plymouth. The western coast, including the Bristol Channel, has been surveyed as far as Bardsey Island, and again between Holyhead and Liverpool. Farther north only the Solway Frith is partly surveyed. The coast of Ireland has been surveyed between Dublin Bay and Donegal Bay inclusive, along the northern shores of the island. The Orkneys, the Shetland and Scilly Islands, as well as Guernsey, Jersey, and Alderney, have been surveyed completely.

The coast of France has been surveyed by the French government from the Strait of Dover to Bayonne, except a part of the coast of the Bay of Biscay from about Belle Isle to the Isle of Ré. Most of the harbours on the coast of Spain have been minutely surveyed by the Spanish government.

Most of the islands in the Mediterranean have been surveyed; Corsica and Elba by the French, Sicily and Sardinia by the English. The survey of the Adriatic has been completed by the Austrians and English co-operating. From the Adriatic to the Archipelago the coast has been surveyed by the English, and they have also carried on a survey through the islands and coasts of the Archipelago.

III. Physical Geography.-Nearly two-thirds of the surface of Europe consist of an immense plain; the remainder is partly mountainous, and partly hilly. The plain occupies the east part of the continent; and the hilly and mountainous countries extend along its western and southern shores. On the eastern boundary the plain extends across the whole continent from south to north, from the mountain-range of the Caucasus and

the shores of the Black Sea to those of the Arctic Ocean. In width it extends in this part of the continent from the Ural Mountains to 26° E. long. To the west of this meridian it terminates on the north on the shores of the Baltic, and in the mountain-region of Scandinavia; on the south it continues along the southern shores of the Baltic, and extends even farther west to the shores of Holland opposite the British Islands. If small eminences are not taken into account, it may even be said to continue in a south-west direction through Belgium and the northern parts of France to the banks of the Seine, where it terminates between Paris and the mouth of the river. The portion of the plain, west of the meridian of 26°, is narrowed on the south by the Carpathian Mountains, and other ranges which are connected with them. Towards the eastern part it extends over ten degrees of latitude, but in its progress towards the west it becomes gradually narrower, partly owing to the mountains advancing farther north, and partly also owing to the seas which form its northern border running farther to the south. Here its mean breadth does not exceed three degrees of latitude, except where the peninsula of Jutland joins it. Along the coast of the North Sea it is still narrower.

By this narrow portion of the Great European Plain and the Baltic (which may be considered as its lowest part, being covered with water) the mountain-regions which constitute the western portion of the continent are divided into two separate systems. To the north lies the system of the Scandinavian Mountains, and to the south what we shall here call the South European Mountain System.

The Great Plain occupies about 2,500,000 square miles, the South European Mountain Region 1,100,000, and the Scandinavian Mountain System about 300,000 square miles.

Scandinavian Mountain System.-This comprehends the whole of the Scandinavian peninsula, or Sweden and Norway. A line drawn from the mouth of the River Torneo, at the most northern angle of the Gulf of Bothnia, to the Waranger Fiord, a bay of the Arctic Ocean, would separate it from the northwestern part of the Great Plain. A huge mountain-mass occupies the west part of this peninsula. It rises on the very shores of the sea to a height of some hundred feet, and attains, at a short distance from it, an elevation of 3000 or 4000 feet, and frequently more. South of 63° N. lat. it has not the form of a mountain-range, but of a mountain-plain, its surface frequently presenting a perfect level, and in some places swelling into hills. This elevated plain is from 100 to 150 miles across, and as it attains in many parts the line of perpetual congelation, which in this latitude is about 4200 feet above the sea, a great portion of it is always covered with snow; while other districts, where the snow melts during several weeks in every year, afford pasture-ground. On the plain there rise a small number of summits, among which the Skagstölstind attains 8400 and the Sneehätten 8200 feet. The western side of this plain is indented by deep inlets of the sea, which penetrate from 30 to 60 miles, and even more, inland; the eastern side is furrowed by deep and narrow valleys, of nearly the same length.

North of 63° N. lat. the masses of rocks take the form of a high ridge, the summits of which however rarely extend more than a few miles, and frequently present a sharp-edged crest. Their ascent on the side towards the Atlantic Ocean is rapid and frequently precipitous, a character which increases as we advance farther north, because the highest part of the range gradually approaches the ocean till it constitutes its very shores. The highest summit is the Sulitelma, which rises to more than 6000 feet; but many other parts exceed the snow-line, which varies between 2000 and 3000 feet, and towards the north sinks much lower.

The country to the east of this range, and at the base of it, is more than 1000 feet above the sea, and descends towards the Gulf of Bothnia in long slopes, interrupted by small level plains, and intersected here and there by ridges of hills, running in the direction of the slopes, and approaching in some parts to the shores of the gulf.

Mount Styltfiellen is on the northernmost extremity of the mountain-plain, where it begins to contract to the dimensions of a range. It stands near 63° N. lat., and attains the height of 6486 feet above the sea. From it, as from a common centre, branch off several ridges to the east, south-east, south, and south-west; and though they soon sink down to hills, they con tinue through the south-eastern part of the peninsula, the mean elevation of which is from 300 to 400 feet above the sea, and above which the hills rise a few hundred feet. The Scandinavian ridges enclose the great lakes of Mälarn, Wenern, and Wettern. To the south of the last lake these ridges unite, and form the table-land of Smäland, whose surface is on an average about 500 feet above the sea, and which constitutes the most southern extremity of the Scandinavian system. It descends with a gentle slope towards the east, but very rapidly to the south and west. The peninsula of Scania, which joins it on the south, is low and flat.

The Faroe Islands, which are between Norway, Cape Wrath in Scotland, and Iceland, and nearly equidistant from these three countries, resemble in their conformation the rocky plain of South Scandinavia, rising abruptly from the sea to more than 1000 feet, and presenting on their summits, at an elevation of more than 3000 feet above the sea, generally a level surface. This seems also to be the case with the south-eastern part of Iceland, which is called the Klofa Yökul, where a surface of more than 8000 square miles has never been explored, probably owing to the thick layer of snow which has accumulated on a mountain-plain which rises above the snow-line (3000 feet). The western and northern districts of Iceland, which in general rise only to a moderate elevation, though some isolated ridges and summits attain the snow-line, seem to be the product of that active volcanic agency which has frequently laid waste this portion of the island.

Though the Scandinavian Mountains are not visibly connected with the South European Mountain system, we may perhaps be excused in considering the island of Great Britain as forming such a link. The most northern part of Scotland lies in the same parallel with the southern part of the Scandinavian mountain-plain, and bears a considerable resemblance to it in configuration, consisting of one enormous mass of high rocks, which rise abruptly from the sea, and exhibit on their surface extensive plains, sometimes flat and sometimes diversified with eminences. These plains however are not covered with snow, as they do not rise above 2000 feet, and sometimes attain only 1000 feet, or a little more, an elevation which falls considerably short of the snow-line. This description is applicable to the whole of Scotland north of the Central Grampians (57° N. lat.), with the exception of the greater part of the counties of Caithness and Aberdeen. Even to the south of 57° N. lat. we meet with an elevated plain, about 1000 feet above the sea, which, under the name of the Moor of Rannoch, extends more than thirty miles in every direction between Ben Cruachan and the southern chain of the Grampians. But farther south the Scandinavian character of the country is lost, and the surface presents the broken character of ridges, valleys, and plains, by which the most northern portion of the South European mountain system is distinguished. This character of the country softens gradually as we proceed farther south. Between 57° and 54° N. lat. the plains are generally of small extent, and a great number of summits rise to 1000, 2000, and sometimes even to 3000 feet and upwards above the sea. South of 54° N. lat. however these lofty elevations, and the comparatively narrow valleys which accompany them, occur only along the western coast of Great Britain, in Wales, and the counties of Devon and Cornwall. East of the Severn the hills do not generally rise so high as 1000 feet, nor are their slopes abrupt; the whole surface consists of gentle swellings and slopes, with wide levels between them. Towards the North Sea it sinks down entirely, and forms (with few interruptions not worth mention in this general survey) a great plain, which occupies the counties of Lincoln, Cambridge, Huntingdon, Norfolk, Suffolk, and Essex. As these flats lie