of impecuniosity rather than as a permanent career to be proud of and to be worked for.  The salaries are beggarly—­considerably lower than the incomes of the teachers in the Primary Schools.  In 1908, the average salaries of principals in the Primary Schools were L112 for men and L90 for women, and in the County Boroughs L163 and L126 respectively, whilst in the Secondary Schools lay assistants were paid about L80 per annum. In view of this, surely the demand that is being made on behalf of highly qualified Secondary teachers is not exorbitant, namely, salaries of L100 to L300 for men and of L80 to L220 for women.  If the maximum rate were L150 for men and L100 for women the cost would be L220,000 a year.  Where is the money to come from?  Will a Nationalist Parliament be prepared to find it, and if so, from what source?  Ireland is a comparatively poor country and is not in a position to bear much more taxation.  The Intermediate Board, with its present resources, cannot afford to step into the breach, and the only solution seems to be that the British Exchequer should come to the rescue and that the Board should be granted the means of dealing with this all-important matter, the neglect of which is having a most injurious effect upon the efficiency of the Intermediate Schools.  It has been suggested that a half-way house might be found, that the Treasury should grant L60 for each assistant master and L40 for each assistant mistress, and that the remainder should be raised by the authorities of the schools under the direction of the Board.  This alternative scheme would cost the State about L88,300 a year, but, like all makeshifts, would not effect a real settlement of the difficulty, creating, as it would, a patchwork system of payment which might break down at any moment.  On the other hand, let the settlement be a generous one, and the return will be a hundredfold in added efficiency, a higher sense of duty, and an increased personal interest on the part of the teacher in the class of which he has charge.

In close connection with the question of salaries are those of pensions and security of tenure.  The pensions of the Primary teachers, inadequate though they be, would be looked upon as a provision of the most munificent kind by the poor men and women who enter service under the Intermediate system.  The Primary teachers, moreover, can fall back upon subsidiary occupations if they find that their salaries are insufficient for their maintenance.  They can run a little farm or keep a shop or do other remunerative work, but the assistants in Secondary Schools are debarred from these methods of supplementing their exiguous wage.  Those terrible words might, without any extravagance, be inscribed for them over the doors of their schools:  “All hope abandon ye who enter here.”  Something must be done.  A starvation wage, with an adequate pension to follow, might be tolerable, a decent wage, without any pension, might be borne, but starvation at both ends is a disgrace to the Treasury while it lasts and one of the things which should be taken in hand without any further delay.