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Union of Kilmanaheen,
Kilasbuglenane, Kilmacreehy, Kileilagh and Kilmoon
VII. The
Education and Employment of Children, &c.
Education
The education of the children is reading, writing, and arithmetic; very
few of them learn Latin, and that in the village of Ennistymon only. The
general employment of the male part, when they have ceased to go to school,
is manual labour, or mechanical trade. The employment of the female part,
is making coarse woollen stockings for sale; they rarely manufacture any
thing else, more than what answers for their own wearing apparel, such
as frize, and coarse linen, commonly called bandle-cloth.
Schools,
Lancastrian System
The chapel in every parish is allowed to be a school-house. At Ennistymon,
where there is no chapel, the Sessions-house answers the purpose. These
are all called public schools, and are on an old established plan, reading
aloud, or humming together: Mr. Lancaster has improved on this method,
but his plan has not as yet made any progress in this part of the country.
The quarterly salary is from two shillings to four shillings for tuition,
for the rudiments two shillings, for reading, writing, and arithmetic
three shillings, for those and for learning (as they called it) a course
of Voster five shillings, very few instances of their getting higher.
The schoolmaster at Enistymon teaches latin at 11s. 4½d. per quarter.
The number of scholars is generally from 20 to 70 at each school, and
varies according to the busy seasons in the year. In spring and autumn,
the boys who are able to labour, are kept at home for that purpose; when
their spring or autumn business is at an end, they return to school, and
continue to go there until their next hurry time. At those schools, the
boys and girls mix promiscuously: the number of boys generally exceed
the number of girls in the proportion of about ten to one. There are no
endowed schools in the union.
Irish MSS
Here we have no public library; but there are some few Irish manuscripts
in the hands of different persons in this union, which they hold in great
estimation: they had been the property of a man of the name of Laurence
Healy, who died at Ennistymon in December last. After his death, his widow
disposed of those manuscripts, and they are now in different hands, a
selection from which may be seen in the Appendix [see below]: they are
all some remains of the works of Andrew and Hugh M’Curtin, famous
Irish poets and historians, and natives of the parish of Kilmacreehy,
in this union. It is said that many parts of M’Curtin’s works
were transcribed in English, and printed. Whether the sketch in the Appendix,
or any part of it, was ever printed is not certain.
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