§ MR. JORDANI beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland whether he is aware that, since the local manager, on 14th April last, refused admission to Armagh National School, County Clare, to Michael O'Brien's children "for want of room," five other children, two of them being a policeman's, have since been admitted; and whether, under such circumstances, he will now intimate, through the proper quarter, the propriety of settling this matter by admitting O'Brien's children to either Armagh or Mullagh School?
§ MR. A. J. BALFOURThe Commissioners of National Education report that they have no knowledge of the particular circumstance mentioned in the first paragraph, but they refer to the explanatory letter already received from the manager of the school in regard to the matter. He states that the accommodation in the Armagh and Mullagh Schools is quite insufficient even for the number of children usually attending them; that he has, therefore, been obliged to restrict the admission of new pupils, but that, in doing so, he takes care not to deprive anyone of the advantages of education, and that he never refuses anyone who is not within a convenient distance of another school. As already stated, O'Brien's children are within a convenient distance of Coore School, which, as a matter of fact, they had been regularly attending until an attempt was made to boycott the school, in furtherance of which O'Brien withdrew his children. The manager does not consider that, in these circumstances, he would be justified in still further inconveniencing the teachers and pupils of the two other schools mentioned by admitting O'Brien's children. The manager's action has the full approval of the Commissioners.