124 THEISLAND ACADIANS 
     
    
   
   
    
     teaching. In some schools there was a shortage of desks and the 
     
     children were too crowded together, there were no maps, and some- 
     
     times there was not even enough firewood. As for the teachers, they 
     
     were not only obliged to work under disheartening circumstances, 
     
     but they also had to be content with very meagre wages. In 1875, the 
     
     average male schoolteacher received 48 cents per day, and his female 
     
     counterpart 35 cents for the same work. Thus, it is not surprising 
     
     that so many teachers left the profession which served as a springboard 
     
     for more lucrative careers®. As a result, competent qualified teachers 
     
     were scarce. 
     
    

    
     Although this regrettable situation existed throughout Island 
     
     schools, it was worse for Acadian teachers. In order to receive the 
     
     same salary as other teachers in the province, Acadian teachers had 
     
     to write their examinations in English which put them at a definite 
     
     disadvantage with regard to their Anglophone colleagues. According 
     
     to the superintendent of education for the province, this fact was 
     
     likely to discourage Acadians from going into teaching. Relative to 
     
     this, he wrote the following in 1887: 
     
    
   
   
    
     The syllabus of Teachers’ Examinations is too difficult in my opinion for a 
     
     French speaking scholar to overcome without devoting more time to its attain- 
     
     ment than the after remuneration would warrant. Probably this is one reason 
     
     why so few of our Acadian brethren adopt the teaching profession.” 
     
    
   
   
    
     The duties of Acadian teachers were made even more difficult 
     
     because they had to teach, with neither method nor appropriate texts, 
     
     several subjects in English to pupils who generally only spoke French. 
     
    

    
     After about 1880, Acadians started complaining about the deplor- 
     
     able gaps in their teachers’ knowledge of the French language. In 1884, 
     
     a contributor from the Island writing in the Moniteur Acadien warned 
     
     his readers that if the situation did not improve, “every trace of our 
     
     beautiful French language will be obliterated for future generations. 
     
     Even nowadays you can hardly get a French word out of either a 
     
     teacher or a pupil. What will it be like in fifty or a hundred years? 
     
     (TR)®” The anglicizing effect of the educational system supported by 
     
     the provincial government was becoming increasingly apparent. The 
     
     quality of French teaching depended almost entirely on initiatives 
     
     taken by the Acadians themselves outside the system.