Great Britain -- Description and travel; Railroad travel -- Great Britain; Railroads -- Great Britain
These liberal appointments have secured a succession of competent masters,
and cannot fail to produce a permanent and favourable change in the character
of young Birmingham. The diffusion of sound classical learning was much
needed to mitigate the coxcombical pretensions of the half-educated, and the
vulgar coarseness of the uneducated. The inhabitants of manufacturing towns
are apt to grow petty Plutocracies, in which after wealth, ignorance and
assumption are the principal qualifications. Brass turns up its nose at
iron, and both look down upon tin, although half an hour in the world's fire
make all so black as to be undistinguishable.
Besides this, which we may term the High School, there are four schools
supported out of King Edward VI.'s foundation, where reading, writing, and
arithmetic, are taught.
The funds on which these magnificent ecclesiastical establishments are
supported, arise from lands in the neighbourhood which originally produced
only 21 pounds a year, and were part of the estates of the Guild of the "Holy
Cross." After being occupied first as fields and then as gardens, the rise
of manufactures and extension of the town of Birmingham, converted a great
portion into building land. The present revenue amounts to about 11,000
pounds per annum, and are likely to be still further increased.
Twenty years ago, school lands which are now leased for terms of years, and
covered with buildings, were occupied as suburban gardens at trifling rents.
Eventually the Birmingham Free School will enjoy an income equal to the wants
of a university as well as a school. Meagre accounts of the income and
expenditure of this noble foundation are published annually, under the
regulations of an Act of Parliament passed in 1828; but no report of the
number of scholars, or the sort of education communicated, is attached to
this balance sheet. It would be very useful; and we hope that the self-
elected corporation, who have the management, will see the propriety of
supplying it.
Birmingham also possesses a chartered college, "Queen's College," similar to
that at Durham; first established as a medical school by the exertions of the
present dean, Mr. Sands Cox, since liberally endowed by the Rev. Dr.
Warneford to the extent of many thousand pounds, and placed in a position to
afford the courses in law, physic, and divinity, required for taking a degree
at the University of London. Also a Blue Coat School, and School for the
Blind.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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