be formed in a populous part of London. Having thus
an opportunity of carrying out my wishes, thoughts, and feelings, in
a way that I could not have anticipated, I gave up my connexion with
business, and devoted myself to the object. Great and unforseen
difficulties however had to be encountered. The first week was
dreadful. I began with too many children, and we had six whom the
mothers afterwards confessed they sent to _wean_. These not only cried
themselves, but set all the others crying also, and we regretted
having begun the experiment. At length, driven almost to despair, it
became evident that something new must be done to still the tumult. As
an expedient, I elevated a cap on a pole, which immediately attracted
their attention and occasioned silence. Thus I obtained a clue to
guide me, and my mind instantly perceived one of the most fundamental
principles in infant teaching, in fact of most teaching, and which
long experience has proved true, and that is, to appeal to the SENSES
of the children. After this, every day developed something new to me,
the children became happy beyond my expectations, and my course
onward was gradually progressive. Children and teachers became happy
together; difficulties vanished as we proceeded, and at length my wife
and I made up our minds to devote our whole lives to the perfecting of
our plans, and the carrying them out extensively. The novelty of the
thing drew numbers of visitors to a district, where the carriages of
the nobility and gentry had not been seen before; but the labour to us
was so greatly increased by this, that my wife sunk under it, and I
was left with four young children, to prosecute my plans alone in the
world.

From the day I caught the idea, that a great secret in teaching the
young was to teach through the _senses_, the various implements now in
such general use in infant schools, were step by step invented by me.
Objects of all kinds were introduced, and oral lessons given upon
them, to teach their qualities and properties, and amongst the various
visitors most frequently present at such times, was the gentleman who
has acquired fame by publishing "Lessons on Objects," which little
work has elsewhere been highly commended by me, albeit it came forth
into the world several years after the period I now speak of. To give
such lessons I found it requisite to have the children altogether, so
as better to attract their attention simultaneously. This was first