SCHOOLS IN NEW YOfiK. 389 



He cultivates the land among his trees a strong, 

 deep, sandy loam, in a gravelly subsoil, as if it were 

 open with every kind of crop except rye. In regard to 

 this grain, I have already quoted his interesting remark, 

 that u it is so very injurious that he believes three suc 

 cessive crops of it would destroy any orchard of less than 

 twenty years old.&quot; Is there really, then, some special 

 action exercised upon the soil by this species of grain ? 



The rapid growth of the city of New York has brought 

 with it the two consequences which in our day appear 

 to attend, though not always in equal degrees, the 

 accumulation of great wealth, and of large masses of 

 people in a limited space. Poverty, misery, destitution 

 and ignorance, have grown with the growth of the city; 

 but alongside of them also charity, sympathy with the 

 poor, concern for the ignorant, the establishment of 

 schools, hospitals, and houses of refuge. Before the 

 common schools were taken so completely under the 

 patronage of the State, a public school corporation in 

 New York had established a constantly increasing num 

 ber of schools in all parts of the city; and of the 190 

 common schools all free which now exist in it, about 120 

 are still under the charge of this venerable corporation. 



The average attendance upon the free schools of New 

 York in 1848 was 32,000, while 120,000 children in all 

 had attended school for some period of the year. There 

 is also a free academy, at which higher instruction, pre 

 paratory to the universities or colleges, is provided for 

 all free from charge. Of colleges there are two in the 

 city the Columbia College, a Protestant Episcopal 

 Institution, founded in 1754, which has 130 students, and 

 a library of 17,000 volumes ; and the University of 

 New York, founded in 1831, which has 150 students, 

 4000 volumes of books in its library, and is, I believe, 

 under Presbyterian direction. Two rival medical schools 

 also exist, one of them connected with the University of 



