One of the results of the School Board was the founding of the Council of Education, which provided, in the shape of scholarships, the means by which boys could advance from the elementary school to the higher grade schools and the universities. Mr. Sam Rathbone, Mr. Gilmour, and Mr. Bushell were very active in promoting this association. SOCIETY IN LIVERPOOL. Society was much more exclusive forty or fifty years ago than it is to-day. The old Liverpool families were looked up to with much respect. The American war considerably disturbed Liverpool society, and brought to the front many new people. Liverpool became more cosmopolitan and democratic, but there was no serious departure from the old-world courtesy of manner and decorum in dress until the 'eighties, when it gradually became fashionable to be less exacting in dress, and the customs of society grew less conventional. In the 'sixties people of wealth and position surrounded themselves with certain attributes of power and wealth, which gave to the populace some indication of their rank and their social status, and in manners they were reserved and dignified. Their homes were in the country or in the fashionable suburbs of the city, and their importance was measured by the extent of their broad acres. A house in London, in which they dwelt for three or four months of the year, was the luxury only of the older families, or of those of great wealth; the fashion of having a flat in London, with a week-end cottage in the country, was not known--this has followed the more democratic tendencies of our times. The bringing of people together in our railway trains, in steamers, in hotel lounges, and foreign travel, have had a distinctly levelling influence. In the 'sixties some old county families still made their annual pilgrimage to visit their friends in the family coach, and the circle of their acquaintances was limited and exclusive. The family carriage with the rumble at the back was a dignified and well-turned-out equipage. The dress carriage, with powdered footmen, was commonly seen in Hyde Park, and was _de rigeur_ at Court drawing rooms, then held in the afternoon; the array of carriages at these functions made a splendid show. Motors may have the charm of convenience and speed, but can never replace the smart appearance of the well-turned-out carriage-and-pair. The 'sixties were the days of crinoline and poke bonnets, and although the wearing of crinoline was much ridiculed, ladies' dress in those days was much more becoming and graceful than many of our more recent fashions, and girls have never looked more fascinating than when they wore their pretty little bonnets; but perhaps I may be called old-fashioned; as we grow older our view points change. We had many old maids in those days--we have none now--and the old ladies with their hair worn in dainty curls surmounted by a lace cap were picturesque, and looked their part.