IV. ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS. 
l. A General View of the Elementary Schools in Germany. 
When the Elementary School as a whole forms the subject of 
the following remarks, it must be pointed out, to the foreigner es- 
pecially, that in Germany the school is by no means an imperial 
stitution, but that it is managed independently by each separate 
State. There is no imperial Ministry for public education. Yet 
the general character and aim of the schools, the training and duties 
of the teachers, are the same throughout Germany. With reference 
to the outward circumstances, there are considerable differences be- 
tween the several Federal States, nay between the parts of one and 
the same State. The presentation of a concise view of German 
school education is rendered difficult, especially by the absence of 
uniform school statistics for the whole German Empire, and by the 
fact that the statistics of the several States refer to different periods. 
and are drawn up on different principles. 
Before examining the several departments of the statistics, we 
shall endeavour to describe the general features that characterise 
the Prussian and the German elementary school system, and which 
distinguish the latter from that of other civilised nations. 
As was observed before, uniformity in the outward arrange- 
ments of the Elementary Schools is not to be found. The dissimi- 
larity is naturally great between the village school with its one class, 
in sparsely populated districts, and the municipal {school with its 
splendid buildings and all modern improvements, in the larger 
towns. Centralisation of the whole elementary school system exists 
neither in the German Empire as such, nor in the single States, and 
although the latter exercise control over each subdivision of the 
system, yet they allow the local authorities considerable latitude in 
the management of the schools. Of this latitude advantage has been 
taken, to a large extent, by the German towns, and among them by