that this kind of education would come of itself fast enough. The real crux was, as it still is, to indoctrinate the rural masses with some sense of the value of ordinary knowledge for the success of their own affairs. This knowledge could only be imparted through the Vernacular Languages. Thus it is that Vernacular and Elementary education came to be synonymous terms. This knowledge could never be diffused except through the active agency of the Government. The rural people, consisting chiefly of peasant proprietors, and clever enough in what may be called mental arithmetic, were almost wholly unable to read and write. There was no law empowering authority to compel the attendance of children at school. Still it was hoped that many, though not all, of the parents could be induced to send their children to school to receive rudimentary education.
It has already been shown in previous chapters that Thomason looked to the Registration of Landed Tenures and the Record of Proprietary Rights, as strong incentives to education amidst the rural community. He thought, that unless the peasant proprietors should learn to read the entries regarding their own lands, they could never be fully sure that the record, with the changes occurring from year to year, was fully kept up. He found that this task of elementary education had not yet been attempted in his Provinces. Perhaps it had been regarded as hopeless, but he recognized it as one of the first
