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enabled to reimburse their instructors for the trouble and cost of their education and maintenance. The lame, the deformed, the dumb, the blind, are all taught trades, in which they frequently arrive at a greater pitch of perfection than many of those who have no natural defects to struggle with. This conversion of the proceeds of industry towards defraying the cost of education I found to be a very prevailing principle in their public schools, the surplus of which is always appropriated to the public charities.*

Again, what a prolific source of scattering knowledge throughout all ranks are the great public libraries! Besides those which are readily accessible without any trouble, or even the form of an application, there is a much greater number dont l'entrée est très facile, to

* It were much to be desired that we took the same pains to put the poor in the way of earning bread for themselves. How many burdens it would save the parish! "England," says a modern observer, "is certainly famous for charities to the helpless; but sadly neglects the means of preparing people to help themselves."

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which you gain admittance by merely addressing a line to the librarian. Of the first class are the five grand Libraries of Paris, as follow:

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Besides manuscripts, these libraries are provided also with cabinets, maps, globes, &c. In the King's Library there is a pair of the largest astronomical globes I ever saw. They occupy part of two stories of the building, a floor being removed to make room for their enormous circumferences.

The following are among those libraries which I have mentioned as accessible by merely addressing a line to the librarian :

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All open without respect to persons, favour, or affection.

At the Bibliothèque du Roi, to which I chiefly resorted, any book might be had immediately by merely giving in its name to the librarian, or his sub., who are in constant attendance from ten till two o'clock; and you have a table to sit down at, furnished with implements for writing, where you may be as completely at your ease, and enjoy your abstraction as free from all noise and interruption, as if enclosed within your own study. I spent every day that I could find leisure, in this noble library; but could not divest myself of feeling some uncomfortable sense of obligation at receiving so many attentions, and being put in the way of so much solid enjoyment, while I recollected how little Englishmen have it in their power to return the compliment at home. In London there is no well-stored library open for consultation; the great portion being repositories of trashy novels, or merely ephemeral publications, and these are only accessible at a very high rate. The reason is, there

is such a rage for reading in clubs in London, that all the best books are collected there; so that it is not worth a bookseller's while to keep a library open for the few extra customers he might find for more recherché study.

By these various means of intellectual improvement, so bountifully supplied, the whole force of the public mind is drawn out; and the humblest aspirant after knowledge may have ample opportunities of turning his talents to account. Nor do these details apply exclusively to Paris: all the chief towns are provided, more or less, with the same description of intellectual resources. With respect to the peasantry, the number of schools spread over the country is so great, that it is rare to find any one so ignorant as to be unable to read and write. Besides, there are great numbers of lecturers, who instruct the farmers in the sciences connected with agriculture and rural economy. These lecturers are themselves farmers, and frequently form associations to carry on the laudable design of diffusing information in their vicinity; and in the towns

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