erweg's
Normal College, and of another teacher, we saw a poor woman cutting up,
in the road, logs of wood for winter use. My companions pointed her out
to me, and said, 'Perhaps you will scarcely believe it, but in the
neighborhood of Berlin, poor women, like that one, read translations of
Sir Walter Scott's Novels, and many of the interesting works of your
language, besides those of the principal writers of Germany.' This
account was afterward confirmed by the testimony of several other
persons. Often and often have I seen the poor cab-drivers of Berlin,
while waiting for a fare, amusing themselves by reading German books,
which they had brought with them in the morning, expressly for the
purpose of supplying amusement and occupation for their leisure hours.
In many parts of these countries, the peasants and the workmen of the
towns attend regular weekly lectures or weekly classes, where they
practice singing or chanting, or learn mechanical drawing, history, or
science. The intelligence of the poorer classes of these countries is
shown by their manners. The whole appearance of a German peasant who has
been brought up under this system, _i. e._, of any of the poor who have
not attained the age of thirty-five years, is very different to that of
our own peasantry. The German, Swiss, or Dutch peasant, who has grown up
to manhood under the new system, and since the old feudal system was
overthrown, is not nearly so often, as with us, distinguished by an
uncouth dialect. On the contrary, they speak as their teachers speak,
clearly, without hesitation, and grammatically. They answer questions
politely, readily, and with the ease which shows they have been
accustomed to mingle with men of greater wealth and of better education
than themselves. They do not appear embarrased, still less do they
appear gawkish or stupid, when addressed. If, in asking a peasant a
question, a stranger, according to the polite custom of the country,
raises his hat, the first words of reply are the quietly uttered ones,
'I pray you, sir, be covered.' A Prussian peasant is always polite and
respectful to a stranger, but quite as much at his ease as when speaking
to one of his own fellows."

Surely the contrast presented between the efforts of the schoolmaster
abroad and his inactivity at home--refuting, as it does, our hourly
boastings of "intellectual progress"--should arouse us, energetically
and practically, to the work of educational extension.