London

This city contains twelve thousand inhabitants, three hundred and fifty of whom are colored persons. Some of the latter are among the most intelligent and respectable citizens; but others do not improve their time and opportunities as they ought. “The tyrant who held their persons in the chains of slavery, stifled their souls also in the rude grasp of ignorance and vice.”

The common schools are open to all, without distinction of color. The Union School has an average daily attendance of 184. On the 21st of June, 1855, when the writer visited it, there were present 174 pupils of both sexes, of whom 13 were colored. In the St. George School, which has on some fortunate days, an attendance of 190, but 4 colored children were present.

The principal reason for this neglect of common school advantages by the colored people, is the prejudice of the whites. Many of the whites object to having their children sit in the same forms with the colored pupils; and some of the lower classes will not send their children to schools where the blacks are admitted. Under these circumstances, it is unpleasant to the colored children to attend the public schools—especially if any of the teachers happen to be victims of the very prejudice which they should induce others to overcome.

An interesting scene was presented in the school very recently organized by Rev. M. M. Dillon, (late Rector of Dominica,) and Mr. Ballantine, lay-assistant, under the patronage of the English “Colonial Church and School Society.” Here were one hundred and seventy-five pupils of both sexes in attendance, fifty of whom were colored. The writer entered the school-room at the hour of recess. The children were neat and cleanly—not one wore the appearance of dejection; all were playing in the inclosure or amusing themselves in the room, in the most perfect good-humor. There was no separation into cliques,—black was playing with white, and white with black.

Rev. Mr. Dillon’s mission is to minister to the spiritual wants of the refugees, and to establish schools of a high order, which shall afford religious and secular instruction especially to the children of fugitive slaves; the schools, however, to be free to all who may see fit to profit by their advantages. Both the Rev. Mr. Dillon and Mr. Ballantine are devoted friends of the negro race. They have very capable assistants in two young colored ladies from the West Indies.

At a signal, the scholars arranged themselves in lines on the floor, and then filed to the parts of the room allotted for recitations. Something of the monitorial system was observable; and two or three colored pupil-teachers attended to the reading from the Scriptures, of as many classes, composed indiscriminately of whites and blacks.

The “Colonial Church and School Society” is a union and extension of the “Newfoundland School Society,” organized more than thirty years ago, and of the “Colonial Church Society,” which has existed about twenty years. It is composed of the highest dignitaries of Great Britain both in church and State. The object of the Society is “to send Clergymen, Catechists, and Schoolmasters to the Colonies of Great Britain, and to British residents in other parts of the world.” “The religious instruction in all schools maintained wholly or in part by the Society, shall be in the Holy Scriptures, and (except in cases where the parents or guardians of the children formally object) in the formularies of the Church of England.”

The accommodations for the Society’s school in London are found to be insufficient, as the numbers in attendance are rapidly increasing. A new building is shortly to be erected, which will afford ample room for five hundred pupils. Five or six similar schools are to be organized forthwith in other parts of the province. This is a noble charity, and full of the most hopeful auguries for the colored population of Canada.

The condition of the colored people in and about London, may be gathered from the testimonies which follow, given by those who are able to draw from their own experience the contrast between slavery and liberty.