No 2.-RETURN of INSPECTOR of DISTRICT NO 2, relative to the APPENDIX B. Religious Denominations of the Children attending the II. Returns National Schools in his District, which comprises portions from District of the counties of Donegal and Londonderry. Londonderry, May 1, 1852. GENTLEMEN, The Commissioners of National Education being desirous of ascertaining to what extent the National system is carried out upon the united principles in this district where the population is composed of various religious denominations, I have selected 38 schools in the counties of Donegal and Derry, which afford a fair specimen of a mixed attendance of children of different creeds. As I think it better to give the existing state of the schools, I have copied the names from the rolls, for the quarter ending in April, 1852, noting the numbers of the different creeds and the parish population, as found in the "Parliamentary Gazetteer," in a line with the different creeds in attendance, that the ratio in each parish may be easily perceived. The rule of the Board which prohibits the celebration of public worship in the school-houses has prevented the Wesleyan Methodists and many members of the Established Church in this district from connecting their schools with the National Board. I am, Gentlemen your obedient servant, The Secretaries, Office of Education, Marlborough-street, Dublin. R. NESBIT, Inspector. Inspectors relative to the Religious Denominations of Pupils. II. Returns APPENDIX B. No 3.-RETURN of INSPECTOR of DISTRICT No 3, relative to the Religious Denominations of the Children attending the National Schools in his District, which comprises portions of the counties of Antrim and Londonderry. from District Inspectors relative to the Religious Denominations of Pupils. Coleraine, April 20, 1852. GENTLEMEN,-In obedience to yours of the 5th instant, I send herewith a return of 21 schools selected from those portions of this district where there is the greatest mixture of creeds in the population, and where respectively the majority is of the Established Church, Roman Catholic, or Presbyterian denomination. I have gone back upon the past year, taking those two periods when the attendance is greatest, viz., midsummer and midwinter. It will be found that the mixture of the different creeds in attendance is a fair representation of the mixture of the population. I hold in my hand 15 additional returns, in which the attendance is more or less mixed; but as the population and, consequently, the attendance, is nearly all of one denomination, I have thought it unnecessary to forward them. I am convinced that there is not a school in this district, nor in any of the districts with which I have had hitherto official connexion, in which it will not be found that the mixture of creeds in attendance is a fair representation of the mixture of the population. I am also of opinion, founded upon experience, that a well appurtenanced and well administered National School, will, in every instance, and in every locality, put down every other school for the poor in its vicinity, of whatsoever kind, unless some unusual local effort or endowment be made to sustain them. I am, Gentlemen, your obedient servant, The Secretaries, Education Office, Dublin. A. T. OSBORNE, |