2

E.—3

Owing chiefly to the further expansion of the boarding-out system—the number of children under that system having risen from 498 to 543 (an increase of 45) —the number of children actually residing in the schools has declined from 618 to 580, the increase in Eoman Catholic schools being 30, and the decrease in other schools 68. Table U shows the numbers of committed children maintained by the several schools, and the numbers residing in them, together with increases and decreases for the year :—

TABLE U.—Number of Committed Children maintained and in Residence.

The difference between the number of children on the books (1,602) and the number maintained (1,123) is 479, which is made up as follows : At service, 282; with friends, 165 ; absent without leave, 27 ; in hospitals, 2 ; in lunatic asylums, 2; at the Costley Institution on probation, 1. Considering that there were 1,602 names on the books, the number of deaths during the year (9) is very small. Five inmates died at the Eoman Catholic School at Nelson; 2 girls (aged 13 and 14, sisters) of consumption, after long illness ; 1 boy (aged 8) of acute pleurisy, from which he was suffering when he was admitted one month before he died; 1 boy (aged 9), who was ill when he entered the school, of heart disease ; and 1 boy (between 10 and 11) of enteritis, after six weeks' illness. A girl between 12 and 13 was sent from Burnham to the hospital at Christchurch, suffering from pneumonia, and died after five weeks' illness. The other three children were on the books of Caversham School. Two were girls—one of 13, who was living with her friends (under license), and one of about 12, idiotic and epileptic, who had been boarded out, and was afterwards sent first to the hospital and then to the asylum, where she was seized with paralysis, which terminated fatally; the third was a boy of 6, committed to Caversham from Wellington, but in siich a state of emaciation that it was necessary to send him at once to the Wellington Hospital instead of to the school, and he passed away in a few days. Of the 238 children committed (154 boys and 84 girls), 98 were described as destitute, 48 as guilty of punishable offences, 42 as living in disreputable places, 25 as vagrant, and 25 as uncontrollable. One hundred and four of these children are reported as having attended no school (65 of them being under 5 years of age), 97 had been at public schools, 29 at Eoman Catholic schools, 5 at private schools, 1 at a high school, 1 at an industrial school, and 1 at an English Board school. To the Church of England belong 106 of the children committed, to the Koman Catholic Church 94, 25 are Presbyterian, 10 Wesleyan and other Methodists, 1 Baptist, 1 Congregational, and 1 Lutheran. The statement made in Table U shows 50 cases in which the father and mother were both to blame, besides 31 in which the father's character was unsatisfactory, and 49 in which the mother was at fault, while 80 cases seem to be attributable to misfortune, and 7 others may belong to this class, and there are 21 cases in which the infor,mation does not justify any conclusion. ,

Maintained. In Residence. J Dec, 1885. Increase. Decrease. I Dec, 1885. Inoroaso. Decrease. Dec, 1880. Dec, 1880. rovernment Schools— Auckland —Kohimarama „ Kent Street Burnham Oaversham iOcal School — Thames Industrial School 'rivate Schools — S. Mary's, Ponsonby .. S. Joseph's, Wellington S. Mary's, Nelson 129 41 334 338 12 '2 5 i 12 1 124 43 327 320 11 03 1 127 155 12 "a 14 20 37 1 49 5 107 118 11 47 25 190 4 *2 51 23 218 47 23 190 4 2 51 21 218 28 28 Totals 1,110 34 27 1,123 618 36 74 580