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Westport Times, Volume VI, Issue 966, 30 April 1872, Page 2

The school-house recently erected in Palinerston street is unmistakeably a type of Nelson architecture. The plans aud specifications evidently have emanated from a school whore the maxim is, whatever is worth doing is worth doing ill. Tho building, to begin with, is constructed in opposition to tho first principles of health. There is no provision whatever for ventilation beyond the ordinary email windows iu front. The lighting is equally defective. The building is beyond all question too low in the walls and ceiling, the former being only nine feet in height, with an additional 4|ft. to the centre of the ceiling. In many other respects the structure is unsuitable, and will bo found to be insufficient to accommodate the number of children even at present in attendance. We understand that the Local Committee have recommended that an additional outlay of £l2O should be undertaken in order that the architectural defects may be remedied, and the place rendered tolerablv comfortable and commodious for teachers and scholars during all seasons of the year. Suggestions have been made by the Committee to the Central Board, that the walls of the school building should now be raised about five feet, and that the windows should likewise be raised, in order to attain something like symmetrical proportions. The windows should also be hung on centres with proper stops and fastenings, and there should be at least two ventilators at the ends of tho buildings. Two additional windows would likewise be advantageous, and a fire-place and chimney of somo sort is surely requiredAdditional desks and seats, with a few more hat pegs, are also wanted, and many other matters of detail which would appear to have been entirely neglected by the genius who originated the design. The section also requires to be cleared, grubbed, and drained, to make it approach the semblance of a school-ground. When all these improvements are completed, and the ground fenced in, the culverts bridged the approaches gravelled, and the porch floored, the schoolroom and ground may favorably compare with some of, the second-class structures of the kind in other Provinces. The property as it at present stands, being constructed on the Nelsou West Coast mistaken economy principle, is neither useful nor ornamental: and the only way of converting the error into a thingof usefulness is to expend another £l2O on it, as petitioned for by the Local Committee.