160 HISTORICAL SKETCH OF PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND

such occasion. On the arrival of His Honor the Lieutenant Governor, the guard presented arms and the band played the National Anthem. The usual salute of 15 guns was also fired from Fort Edward by Major Morris’s battery of artillery, as His Honor departed from Government House. A new school law was passed this year dealing successfully with the delicate and difficult problem of our school question; which law is now admitted by all classes and creeds among us, to be well adapted to the educational wants of a mixed community like ours.

The administration, of the Province is vested in a Board of Education, a Chief Superintendent and Inspectors. Each Dis- trict has a local Board of Trustees, elected annually by the ratepayers. The salaries of the teachers are paid from the Provincial Treasury, but may be supplemented by local assess- ment, in which case the Treasury pays a further equal amount. The Government subsidy varies, according to grade, from $180 to $450 for male teachers, and from $130 to $380 {or female teachers. The success of the school law is very clearly shown by the fact that within the first eighteen months of its operation the attendance of pupils at the public schools increased by over five thousand.

The annual training of militia commenced in july this year. The Provincial Rifle Association held its meeting at Kensington, in August, which was largely attended. At the close of the contest, Gunner Alexander Home, rst artillery, was declared the winner of the rst prize of $60, accompanied by the Association medal.

On the 22nd of November the Hon. J. C. Pope was elected member of the Dominion House of Commons, for Queen’s County, in place of the Hon. David Laird, who was appointed Lieutenant Governor of the Province of the North West Territories. Mr. Pope was subsequently made Minister of Marine and Fisheries, a change of government having taken

place under the leadership of the renowned veteran Sir John A. McDonald.

On the occasion of the assembling of parliament, 1877, the guard of honor, accompanied by the militia band, was com- manded by Major Morris, while the usual salute of 15 guns was fired from Fort Edward by the rst battery of artillery.

The annual drill was again ordered to take place at local