In that city the
public schools are apportioned to the wards, and are so arranged
that in each ward of the city there are public schools of different
standing for the gratuitous use of the children.
The population of
the City of New York in 1857 was about 650,000, and in that year it
is stated that there were 135,000 pupils in the schools. By this
it would appear that one person in five throughout the city was
then under process of education - which statement, however, I cannot
receive with implicit credence. It is, however, also stated that
the daily attendances averaged something less than 50,000 a day,
and this latter statement probably implies some mistake in the
former one. Taking the two together for what they are worth, they
show, I think, that school teaching is not only brought within the
reach of the population generally, but is used by almost all
classes. At New York there are separate free schools for colored
children. At Philadelphia I did not see the schools, but I was
assured that the arrangements there were equal to those at New York
and Boston. Indeed I was told that they were infinitely better;
but then I was so told by a Philadelphian. In the State of
Connecticut the public schools are certainly equal to those in any
part of the union. As far as I could learn education - what we
should call advanced education - is brought within the reach of all
classes in the Northern and Western States of America - and, I would
wish to add here, to those of the Canadas also.
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