South Canterbury Times. MONDAY, DECEMBER 4. 1882.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 3022, 4 December 1882, Page 2

South Canterbury Times. MONDAY, DECEMBER 4. 1882.

Tub election of persons to serve on the High School Board of Governors is an important concession to popular demand. The public antipathy to the nominee system is daily growing stronger; Government have accordingly given way, and placed the management of nearly every public institution in the bands of the people themselves. We have never been particularly favorable to the expenditure of public money on higher education, but, since such expenditure is sanctioned, it is right that those from whose pockets the money comes should have a voice in controlling it. It is satisfactory to find in this town, that persons have been chosen to sit on this Board who may reasonably be supposed to have the cause of education ac heart, and to have aspired to the position with the sole ambition of furthering it. As the High School is a public institution the people are interested in its success ; as it is an institution of a limited sphere of usefulness, its very existence is the source of a certain amount of jealousy and divided opinion. The aim of the Board then should be, not merely to conserve the interests of the institution, but also to enlarge the sphere of its usefulness, and, above all, to place it in the position it ought to occupy. A High School is a costly thing, and absorbs a very great deal of good teaching power, and it will never do to allow it to be regarded by the people as an exclusive affair in which the children of certain individuals are educated at the people’s expense. This, we can assure the new Board, is the opinion of a very large number of persons. It is only an opinion, and an erroneous one, no doubt, but it exists, and must be met and overcome. Under good management in the course of time, opinions will doubtless, yield to the stern logic of facts and results. A High School, as we understand it, should occupy a position mid-way between the primary school and the University. To secure that position the management mast guard on the one hand /against being misled—by the desire to swell the number of pupils—into lowering its standard of admission so as to induce children to attend who ought to belong to the primary schools ; and, on the other, against assuming the functions of the University. And we do certainly trust the Board will look seriously into the question of scholarships, and offer every inducement to the most promising and ambitious scholars of the primary schools to avail themselves of a grounding in the higher branches ; in order that if circumstances afterwards permit they may go up to Alma Mater with credit. The High School has resources wherewith to do immense good, and we trust the new members will acquit themselves well, and work for this object.

The failure of a shipment of frozen meat to realise a profit in London is not astonishing. The most sanguine friend of the new industry could scarcely expect a succession of large profits unbroken by losses. It is impossible to say what may have been the cause of the failure of a shipment recorded in our telegraphic columns of Saturday, but we may reasonably infer, as things are at present, that the success of the shipment is dependent, in a very great measure, on the morality of the average London butcher. His sole sole aim is bow best to make a profit for himself; he baa no interest in the success of our shipment. A correspondent of a contemporary, writing some time ago from London, said just after the landing of a large shipment, he visited scores and scores of butchers, and asked for frozen meat from New Zealand. But in every case, while the butcher had an unlimited supply of Southdown mutton, he had no such thing as New Zealand frozen meat, and the writer began wondering where on earth all this frozen meat cargo went. The inference was that the butchers found their interests best promoted by calling the frozen meat Southdown mutton, and charging for it accordingly. The only way to face this difficulty will be for the companies to establish depots in London, where the frozen meat and no other may be obtainable. Tbe expense would be fractional, and the return very gratifying, we feel sure.