No. XXII. BE MASSACHUSETS ACT AS TO EDUCATION. E IT ENACTED,* That every town within this province, having the number of fifty householders or upwards, shall be constantly provided of a schoolmaster, to teach children and youth to read and write. And where any town or towns have the number of one hundred families, or housholders, there shall also be a grammar school+ set up in every such town, and some discreet person of good conversation, well instructed in the tongues, procured to keep such school; every such schoolmaster to be suitably encouraged and paid by the inhabi tants. * Reports, Appendix to Vol. III., this Act for the support of FREE SCHOOLS was passed in 1692. + Many of these free schools were kept by young men, who had just taken their bachelor's degree, at Harvard College, and were looking forward to holy orders; filling up this interval with occupation, which, at the same time that it offered a supply towards the expense of their education, afforded not merely a preparation for the general object to which they were to be devoted, but a personal and practical knowledge of those persons, for whom, and for whose religious instruction, they were to be ordained. AND the select men and inhabitants of such towns respectively, shall take effectual care, and make due provision, for the settlement and maintenance of such schoolmaster and masters. AND if any town, qualified as before expressed, shall neglect the due observance of this act, for the procuring and settling of any such schoolmaster as aforesaid, by the space of one year; every such defective town shall incur the penalty of ten pounds for every conviction of such neglect, upon complaint made unto their Majesty's justices in quarter sessions for the same county, in which such defective town lieth; which penalty shall be towards the support of such school or schools within the same county, where there may be most need, at the discretion of the justices in quarter sessions; to be levied by warrant from the said court of sessions, in proportion, upon the inhabitants of such defective town, as other public charges, and to be paid unto the county treasurer. No. XXIII. REWARDS OF THE CHILDREN AT CAMPSALL SCHOOL. The following rewards have been given to the Children attending at Campsall School, as an inducement to good conduct, and as the means of furnishing them with decent clothing and some useful books, during their continuance at the school, and upon their going into service. 1. EVERY* girl who comes to school, at or as near as may be, the time appointed ;-who has her hair, face, neck, and hands quite clean, and her clothes in good order and properly mended:--who takes pains to improve in reading, and whatever else she has an opportunity of learning;-who performs her task in sewing, knitting, straw platt, &c. and does it as well as can reasonably be expected;-and who does not in any respect behave ill-will each day receive a white ticket, having marked on it No. 1, 2, 3, &c. * Reports to Appendix, Vol. V. 2. On Sundays, and other days when the girls attend the school twice a day, they may if they behave well, obtain two of these tickets; one in the morning, and the other in the after noon. 3. If a girl is certainly known by the ladies to steal, cheat, or use bad words, either in school, or out of school, or to misbehave at church, she will not only receive no ticket on the day on which she is so detected, but will also forfeit twelve of the tickets which she had before received. 4. When a girl has one hundred of these tickets (in regular order from one to an hundred) she must return them to her teacher; and she will receive, instead of them, a prize ticket, having on it these words, "Reward of Diligence "and good Behaviour," No. 1, 2, or 3, &c. Each of these tickets will entitle the owner (on continued good behaviour) to the following sums of money which are to be given to her in necessary clothing, useful books, and a small proportion of money, when, with the approbation of the ladies, she either goes to service, or becomes an apprentice. T 5. There will be no higher prize than No. 15. Should any girl obtain any more than fifteen red tickets, each of the succeeding number will be of the same value as No. 15. 6. No prize ticket will be given for any number of white tickets, that is not a complete hundred. If a girl loses any of the hundred she has received, she must return to her teacher such numbers as she has remaining; but she will not receive, instead of them, a prize ticket, or be intitled to any reward. 7. If a girl leaves school with the approbation of the ladies, before she has completed her hundred, she must return the tickets she possesses; and if she has not lost any that she received, she will have, instead of them, a present in proportion to the number of her tickets, and to the value of the prize tickets, to which, had she been able to complete her hundred, she would have been entitled. 8. Should it ever happen that a girl behaves so ill as to be dismissed the school, or that she |