kit
i:!
by any means a fair criterion of judging. Their
attendance is constant from October to May, the
intermediate months being the time of vacation,
when ttie students go to their sev'eral homes. The
funds appropriated for the school are said to be
sufficient to pay the teachers, and to afford board,
books, and clothing to the scholars gratis.
According to the official statement procured by
Dr. Hooker, the Bishop of Iceland draws about
1800 dollars, or 360/. a-year from the school
funds; the lecturer on theology 600 dollars, or
120/. a-y e a r; and the inspector or stetvard, whom
I have called the housekeeper, about 220 dollars,
or 44/. a year, and receives for each of the forty
scholars 60 dollars a-year, or 480/. in the whole
for their subsistence, and the two assistants 300
dollars, or 60/. a-year each.
The admission to this school is professedly confined
to such as have made a certain progress, to
snch as have been confirmed, and to such as produce
good certificates from the clergyman of the
parishes to Avhich they respectively belong ; and at
the period when they have finished their education,
they are strictly examined in presence of the
bishop, and those who are found qualified receive
a dimissus from the heads of the college, which
entitles them, on vacancies occurring in the church,
to receive holy orders. The clergy, however, are
not exclusively taken from this school: the sons
of clergymen and of the peasantry are frequently
educated at home, and if they can pass the requisite
examination before the bishop, they too are equally
eligible for the church.
Whether the system of education at Bessestad
school be good or bad, it would be presumptuous
in me to give an opinion; I understand, however,
that it is less generally esteemed in Iceland than
private education at home, where the morals of
youth are less likely to be corrupted than at a spot
where forty of them are thrown together with very
little restraint imposed on them, and where one
or two indifferent characters may infect the rest.
This objection, natural enough in Iceland, where,
from a ll'I could learn, the peasantry and the clergy
are an innocent, simple-minded, and virtuous
people, Avould equally apply to most public schools,
and the question as to preference still remains to
he decided. One thing, however, is certain : not
only the clergy of Iceland, but numbers of the peasantry
are well versed in the classics, particularly
in Latin, which they write with fluency*.
* I t may be mentioned, however, to the credit of Bessestad
College, that some of the best and most learned works in Iceland
have issued from thence, and that f iv e volumes in Danish and
Latin have just been completed and published by " T he Royal
Society o f Northern Antiquaries at Copenhagen,” under the title of
" Scripta Histórica Islandorum de Rebus gestis veterum Borealiiim, ’
the work of S. Egilssen, Lecturer o f the Collegiate School at
Bessestad. I t contains historical sagas relating to events that
occurred out of Iceland, and more particularly to the exploits of