paid over direct to her. Where a child has not an account, one is opened for her." This plan appears to be highly commendable; thus combining instruction in an important branch of knowledge and encouragement in the principles of thrift and saving.

The more Savings Banks there are the more people will put money into them. It is always so. If a savings bank be established in a military district, soldiers contrive to save something out of their small pay to invest. Let penny banks be opened, and crowds of depositors immediately present themselves, even the boys of the ragged schools being able to put into them considerable sums of money. It is the same with School Banks, as we have seen from the example of the school children of Ghent.

Belgium is the southern portion

of what was, until 1830, the Kingdom of the Netherlands. Brussels is its chief city. Ghent. An ancient city in Belgium, built about the seventh century.

Holland (the name means Hol-
low land, or some say, Wooded
land). It is a kingdom of
North-Western Europe, the
chief part of the Northern
Netherlands. Its chief city
is Amsterdam.
The people

who live in Holland are
called the Dutch.
France. One of the largest and
most important countries of
Western Europe. Its chief
city is Paris.
Italy.

A large and fruitful country in the south of Europe

-sometimes called the "Garden of Europe." Rome is the capital of the kingdom. Glasgow. A large manufacturing city in Scotland, where there is also a University. Liverpool.

A large town in West Lancashire, England. Birmingham. A large manufacturing town in Warwickshire, England. It existed in the reign of King Alfred. All kinds of work in metals is done here-steel, iron, brass; and it has been celebrated for its manufactures ever since the reign of Henry VIII. It has been sometimes called the "Toyshop of Europe." Physiology. The study of the Laws of Life-the nature of the human body.

WHAT'S THE GOOD OF SAVING?

rector, the clergyman of the

district.

agitations, troubles and worries. legislation, law making.

facilitate, to make easy. precipice, a headlong steep. irretrievably, unalterably. abyss, a depth without a bottom, a deep hole.

"JERRY, take the twopence out of your left-hand pocket and put it into your right whenever you walk past that house.'

"Jerry was a bricklayer's labourer in a country village, a good sort of fellow, hardworking, with a large family, of course, namely, eight sons and three daughters, and regular wages of eighteen shillings a week. He sent all his children to school, and though neither he nor his wife could read or write, all his children could do both well. He never was a teetotaller, nor was he a drunkard, though his weakness was, at times, to take a little more than was good for him.

"It is hardly necessary to say that Jerry had little idea of saving money. For many years he lived from hand to mouth, and would have laughed at the notion of putting by a considerable sum of money, with his large family and his small earnings. One day, however, when he had given way somewhat to his unfortunate propensity, the rector met him, and said to him, half in joke and half in earnest, 'Jerry, take the twopence out of your left-hand pocket and put it into your right whenever you walk past that

house,'-meaning a beer-house which stood close to Jerry's cottage.

Jerry thought a good deal about this remark quietly to himself. The parson had not preached at him ;-people had done that times out of number without any effect-but there was something in the suggestion which amused and attracted him. Without saying a word to anybody he took the hint. He did not give up beer entirely, but a good many twopences from his left-hand pocket found their way, not into the publican's till, but into Jerry's right-hand pocket instead.

*

"Six years after, he came to the rector, and said he wanted him to put him in the way of sending one of his sons to Australia. It will cost a good deal,' said the rector; 'where is the money to come from?' 'I've got it, sir; and there it is,' replied Jerry, putting nine pounds ten on the table. I took the advice you gave me some time ago, and whenever I passed the beer house I took the twopence out of one pocket and put it into t'other, and that's how I saved this up.' The son emigrated, and is doing well, and not long after, Jerry, by the same plan, started another son with five pounds in a business in a neighbouring parish.

"The anecdote is literally true in every particular, and shows what may be the result of saving twopence regularly. Jerry was none the worse for the loss of the beer, perhaps he was somewhat the better; but, anyhow, he was the means of putting his sons into good positions, and that, too, entirely by his

own exertions, and without being dependent in any way on assistance from others, either in the shape of alms, or relief of any sort.

"What the labourer, with his eleven children and his eighteen shillings a week could do, everybody else could do. What a different state we should all then be in! All the trouble it would involve would simply amount to putting twopences from one pocket into another, instead of letting the publican have them all, as he now too frequently does."

Other instances abound. A young man, the son of a journeyman bootmaker living in the country, was removed from school at the age of nine years. This was a great drawback to him, but his father wanted him at home to help him at his work, so he was obliged to leave his books. At fifteen years old he was becoming handy, so his father allowed him three shillings a week, out of which he had to find himself in clothes. He managed to dress respectably, and to put by something as well. His wages gradually increased, and so did his savings, for when he was of age he had £30 in the Savings Bank. He married, and, although his family became numerous, he had ten children-yet his savings soon amounted to £150. With this he started in business as a bootmaker on his own account, and became a flourishing man. He dated his success from the time when he made the determination to put by something out of whatever he earned, even when it was only three shillings a week.

The truth is that nearly everybody could put by

something, if he has a mind to do so. The reason people don't do so, is usually because they don't give it a thought, and when it is put into their heads they can't believe that it is any use making a start except with a good round sum. This good round sum they never manage to get hold of, so the start is never made.

On this point they are utterly wrong. The smaller the commencement the better. For a young fellow to begin at once at a Penny Bank with a penny, is much better than for him to wait in order to be able to begin at the Savings Bank with a sovereign. In the end, ten chances to one, the Penny Bank copper will amount to more than the grander-sounding sovereign, even if—and it is a very great if-the sovereign ever gets saved up and put into the bank at all.

They say that there is no royal road to learning, and if this be true, it is even more certain that there is no road to independence, comfort, freedom from the parish, or the servitude of alms, but for all persons, and all classes, to set themselves to work, each individually, to put by something for the future. No amount of strikes, agitations, meetings, organizations, or anything else can produce this result. Legislation can do nothing beyond supplying the means, the tools, so to speak, to facilitate thrift; but the effort of saving must be made by people themselves. Each individual's effort, it is true, can only, at the most, be but a drop in the ocean, but without drops the ocean would be dry.