Calendar: 1851-1852 Page 30

2 annual report 1851 business of the Class and the serious anomaly of promoting such boys from one Class to another with their cotemporaries notwithstanding the absence of those qualifications on which in Grammar School promotion ought chiefly to depend On the other hand the refusal to admit such boys to participa- tion in those advantages of the School which they specially required and still more their sudden removal involved not only falling off in the number of Pupils but diminution of that wholesome influence which the School exercised over an important class in society After some consideration it seemed possible without in any way disturbing the system hitherto pursued as prepa- ration for the Universities and for the learned Professions to engraft upon it plan for the education of those Classes whose future destination required different sort of instruc- tion It was resolved to divide the School into two divisions viz the Division identical with the existing School under the title of the Division of Classics Mathematics and General Literature and the Division under the title of Μ the Division of Modern Instruction into which all the so-called English and Latin Pupils should be immediately drafted and which might be open to all boys similarly cir- cumstanced applying in future for admission into the School legitimate direction would thus be provided for the special requirements of parents and serious incubus would be removed from the original Classes The Council were fully aware that the success of plan so novel however well considered would in great measure depend upon the gentleman who should be selected for the office of Vice-Master They esteem themselves fortunate in having secured the services of the Rev John Fearnley for this purpose Mr Fearnley's long experience his conscientious discharge of the duties of Master of the Fourth Class during so many years his comprehensive views of sound education and his conciliatory manners pointed him out as one emi- nently fitted to undertake the duties of an office which would require the full exercise of all these qualifications The Council think it right to add that in accepting this arduous