=‘Infant Schools’ in the United States.=--Schools open to all younger children also sprang up in the United States during the first quarter of the nineteenth century. For many years they were nowhere regarded as an essential part of the public school system, and were managed separately, but about the middle of the century they were generally united. In 1818 Boston made its first appropriation for “primary schools, to provide instruction for children between four and seven years of age.” These schools were divided into four grades, beginning with the study of the alphabet and closing with reading in the New Testament. Besides reading, writing, and spelling, sewing and knitting were taught the girls. A formal course and the monitorial method were employed until about 1840, when the primary schools became largely inoculated with the informal procedure of Pestalozzi. The primary schools were for a long time under a separate committee, but in 1854 the management was fused in a general city board. [Sidenote: ‘Primary departments’ in New York.] New York started an ‘Infant School Society’ in 1827. This organization opened two ‘infant schools’ for poor children between three and six years of age. One of these schools was located in the basement of a Presbyterian Church and the other in that of a monitorial institution belonging to the Public School Society (see p. 261). The Pestalozzian methods used in these infant schools greatly commended themselves, and in 1830 the Public School Society added them as ‘primary departments’ in all their buildings, but under separate management. A committee was appointed in 1832 to examine the Society’s schools and suggest improvements. Upon the recommendation of two of this committee, who had inspected education in Boston, primary schools were established in rented rooms in sufficient numbers to be within easy reach for the young children. The subject-matter and methods were likewise made less formal. [Sidenote: ‘Infant schools’ in Philadelphia] [Sidenote: and other centers.] [Sidenote: Improvements through infant schools.]