into a small apartment, where I found the master with about a dozen
pupils standing in a row; I saw but one stool in the room, and to
that, after having embraced me, he conducted me with great
civility. After some discourse, he showed me the books which he
used for the instruction of the children; they were spelling books,
much of the same kind as those used in the village schools in
England. Upon my asking him whether it was his practice to place
the Scriptures in the hands of the children, he informed me that
long before they had acquired sufficient intelligence to understand
them they were removed by their parents, in order that they might
assist in the labours of the field, and that the parents in general
were by no means solicitous that their children should learn
anything, as they considered the time occupied in learning as so
much squandered away. He said, that though the schools were
nominally supported by the government, it was rarely that the
schoolmasters could obtain their salaries, on which account many
had of late resigned their employments. He told me that he had a
copy of the New Testament in his possession, which I desired to
see, but on examining it I discovered that it was only the epistles
by Pereira, with copious notes. I asked him whether he considered
that there was harm in reading the Scriptures without notes: he
replied that there was certainly no harm in it, but that simple
people, without the help of notes, could derive but little benefit
from Scripture, as the greatest part would be unintelligible to
them; whereupon I shook hands with him, and on departing said that
there was no part of Scripture so difficult to understand as those
very notes which were intended to elucidate it, and that it would
never have been written if not calculated of itself to illume the
minds of all classes of mankind.